#92 Christian Craighead - SAS Operator

Christian Craighead is a former member of the United Kingdom's elite 22 Special Air Service unit. Craighead is credited with saving over 700 lives of innocent civilians when he thwarted a terrorist attack at the DusitD2 Hotel complex in Nairobi, Kenya in 2019. He was awarded the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross for his actions. 21 people lost their lives in the attack, both American and British civilians among them. This episode covers Christian Craighead's entire life story. "Obi Wan Nairobi" joined the Parachute Regiment as a teenager and was selected for the Pathfinder Platoon. He served on multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Shawn & Christian discuss the blowback from the British Government and the outstanding "gag order" by the Ministry of Defence. Shawn & Christian also dive into faith, purpose, and break down the SAS motto "Who Dares Wins." Shawn Ryan Show Sponsors: https://lairdsuperfood.com - USE CODE "SRS" https://babbel.com/srs https://shopify.com/shawn https://preparewithshawn.com https://mindbloom.com/srs - USE CODE "SRS" https://ShawnLikesGold.com or call 855-936-GOLD #goldcopartner Christian Craighead Links: Book - https://a.co/d/6T3LDDG | store.bookbaby.com/book/the-wrong-wolf IG - https://www.instagram.com/christian_craighead X - https://twitter.com/one_man_in Please leave us a review on Apple & Spotify Podcasts. Vigilance Elite/Shawn Ryan Links: Website | Patreon | TikTok | Instagram | Download Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:29Speaker 01

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• 0:33Speaker 02

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• 0:46Speaker 04

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• 0:50Speaker 02

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• 0:53Speaker 04

  I'm not the first then.

• 0:54Speaker 02

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17. Not a minute without parent.

• 1:00Shawn Ryan?

  Four years ago today, January 15th, there was a massacre at a luxury hotel in the capital of Kenya, in Nairobi. Al Shabab took responsibility for the attack later on, killed 19 innocent civilians. The fight went on for 19 hours into the 16th of January. There was a rogue SAS operator who went in to save countless civilians, and he is on the podcast today. This is one that has been a long time coming, and he's here. Ladies and gentlemen, if you get anything out of these shows, please head over to Apple and Spotify.

• 1:45Shawn Ryan?

  Leave us a review, like, comment, and subscribe to the YouTube channel if you're watching over there. And don't forget, there are tons, literally hundreds and hundreds of reels that you can download for free. Make them into what you want. Put them all over your social media. Make money, monetize it. We don't care. All we ask is that you tag The Sean Ryan Show so everybody knows where it comes from. And in the meantime, please welcome, some call this man Obi-Wan Nairobi, I call him Christian Craighead. Please welcome him to The Sean Ryan Show. God bless, love you all, see you soon.

• 2:32Shawn Ryan?

  Christian Craighead, welcome to the show.

• 2:34Speaker 06

  Thanks a lot. It's good to, good to finally be here.

• 2:37Shawn Ryan?

  It's good for you to finally be here. I've been waiting for this for years, years. Then you came to Nashville, we hung out a little bit, set a date. That got cancelled. You're finally in-house and I am stoked for this interview, man. So, thank you for coming.

• 2:52Speaker 06

  I think it's, we'll just put this in now. The funny story is when we came to, I came to Nashville for the SSI, met up with you for coffee and then Sean Ryan and Chris Craighead were just two dudes walking around the streets for about two hours. And some of my friends was like, that's like a really odd thought. And I never thought much about it at the time, but it kind of, so that, that happened.

• 3:14Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, yeah. I think we got, I think we got made a couple of times out there.

• 3:19Speaker 06

  Well, you did, I didn't. Well, I took the photographs though. That was a good thing, wasn't it?

• 3:24Shawn Ryan?

  Right on. Well, hey, let me give you a quick introduction here. So, Christian Craighead, UK Army Special Forces, 28-year military career, most of which, correct me if I'm wrong, is in the British SAS. Retired War and Officer Second Class, Special Air Service, Parachute Regiment in the British Army. Eventually SAS, awarded conspicuous gallantry cross for actions in Nairobi, Kenya. You're a member of the Order of the British Empire, the MBE. You're the author of The Wrong Wolf. The author of, what's the book that's in?

• 4:02Speaker 06

  One Man In.

• 4:03Shawn Ryan?

  One Man In, which is tied up in court right now. Known as Obi-Wan Nairobi and you are

• 4:15Shawn Ryan?

  a Armani jeans model.

• 4:18Shawn Ryan?

  So, which we'll get into later. You're wearing Armani jeans that day and, and a whole bunch of other stuff that got real popular after that incident. But, you know, we got a lot of stuff to cover, Christian. I want to cover your childhood, get into a little bit of the incident. You know, what happened that day, if we can. And then we got a whole slew of stuff after that incident, what you're doing today. But everybody starts out with a gift on the show.

• 4:48Shawn Ryan?

  Any guesses?

• 4:50Speaker 06

  Maybe, give me a buzz.

• 4:54Shawn Ryan?

  It's definitely a possibility.

• 4:57Speaker 06

  Thank you.

• 5:01Speaker 06

  The famous gummy bears.

• 5:03Shawn Ryan?

  Famous gummy bears. Those are legal. Even in the UK.

• 5:09Speaker 06

  Well, as you said, everyone starts off with a gift and I've got one for you.

• 5:13Shawn Ryan?

  Oh, man.

• 5:17Speaker 06

  I know we're gonna get on to the the subject of faith later on, but um, you know, God forbid that you ever have to put your body armor on again to defend yourself and your family or or or your ideals. But if should you ever do that, I'd like to give you this armor upgrade.

• 5:34Shawn Ryan?

  Oh, man.

• 5:38Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you. Thank you. It's a Bible.

• 5:43Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you, man.

• 5:43Speaker 06

  That's um, that's a Bible with um, I designed the image on the front, which is.

• 5:50Shawn Ryan?

  You designed this?

• 5:51Speaker 06

  Well, I had the idea and then uh, someone else actually put it together, a good friend of mine, Cole, and um, it's to send me in the in the.

• 6:00Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you, man. That is awesome.

• 6:04Shawn Ryan?

  I love this. I'll probably frame it and put it in the studio.

• 6:07Speaker 06

  Okay.

• 6:08Shawn Ryan?

  But um.

• 6:09Speaker 06

  And then it could be like break glass in case of.

• 6:12Shawn Ryan?

  Exactly. Break glass in case of war. Well, since we're on the faith subject, I actually got you a little something too. So here you go.

• 6:23Speaker 06

  Thank you so much.

• 6:24Shawn Ryan?

  You're welcome. So do you know who Dom Razzo is? So that, we had spoken about the Jim Caviezel episode last night, which is no more, but I gave Jim the exact same rosary and we had a lot of conversations before the interview and I just had a feeling that man was gonna need a lot of protection. And so Dom, Dom's a former SEAL Team Six guy.

• 6:52Shawn Ryan?

  Gave me that rosary. I gave it to Jim Caviezel. Then he sent me another one and I I carry that everywhere to protect myself and uh, I know we're gonna get into some fascinating stories about some encounters that you've had, especially before some very important missions and uh, I just wanted to give that to you.

• 7:12Speaker 06

  Thank you so much.

• 7:13Shawn Ryan?

  Means a lot to me. And Dom is a is just a. He's just an awesome human being and and I thought you should have it because you're coming out and you have a lot of cards stacked against you back in the UK right now and maybe that'll give you some protection.

• 7:31Speaker 06

  Thank you.

• 7:32Shawn Ryan?

  You're welcome. You're welcome. But and thank you for this. God bless, brother. But childhood, you ready to dig in?

• 7:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 7:41Shawn Ryan?

  Are you nervous?

• 7:42Speaker 06

  Um, a little bit, but we'll see.

• 7:45Shawn Ryan?

  What are you nervous about?

• 7:47Speaker 06

  Um, like not being, not being exciting enough, not being it's and and you know, I'm I'm trying to, I'll tell my story and and I think, I think just to start with it's, is it interesting? Maybe. Is it cliched sometimes? But you could call childhood, and this is applicable for everyone is this is when your training starts, because whatever you do, whether it be an international event, whether it be you're a sportsman, a soldier, a manager, or you you're in training the the moment you are born, that's when your training starts and you've been prepared for something.

• 8:26Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 8:27Speaker 06

  And some some things are bigger than others.

• 8:30Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 8:30Speaker 06

  But you're always in training. So you could start, you could say it's my childhood. It's one way of framing it. The other way of saying it is it's the start of my training.

• 8:41Shawn Ryan?

  I will say this. When it comes to the nervousness, everybody that comes here is nervous. Everybody thinks, oh, it's not going to be exciting. Don't worry about that, Ben. It's, it's gonna be gold, I promise. And and I know you're kind of hanged up or tied up with some of the with some of your career and I would like to offer you, when you're not tied up anymore, a slot here to to give a full scope and depth on everything.

• 9:15Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 9:15Shawn Ryan?

  So.

• 9:16Speaker 06

  And and I think a lot, some people may be aware of this. I don't really talk about my career in the Special Air Service. And and that's just my policy right right now. There's some things I could talk about, but I just choose not to. And like, like other things, policies change, people change.

• 9:37Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 9:37Speaker 06

  And viewpoints change. So in the future, I'm.

• 9:42Speaker 06

  I may talk about some stuff.

• 9:46Shawn Ryan?

  Good.

• 9:46Speaker 06

  That I don't talk about right now.

• 9:48Shawn Ryan?

  It's all good, all in due time, and there's plenty other to talk about. So let's start with childhood.

• 9:53Speaker 06

  Mm hmm.

• 9:54Shawn Ryan?

  Where'd you grow up?

• 9:55Speaker 06

  So I grew up in northeast England. So um.

• 10:01Speaker 06

  About five hours drive north of London and it was, yeah, I didn't really like my childhood.

• 10:09Shawn Ryan?

  Why not?

• 10:12Speaker 06

  The, I was, the town where I grew up is a beautiful town. I grew up in a council, a council house. Council house is like state owned property. So it's like a poorer area of town. Um.

• 10:26Speaker 06

  And I grew up, I had a single, single mother. I'd never met my father until later on in life. Um, um, so I grew up with, for the first seven years, my mother, my aunt and my grandma. My grandmother is the, the person I am today. She, she takes full responsibility of, of the man I became. It's all because of her.

• 10:52Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 10:52Speaker 06

  And she, and she, uh, she, she, she raised me and I didn't, and I had, it's strange when I was talking to someone else about. Childhood, what you think is normal, isn't, sometimes, a lot of time, isn't normal.

• 11:06Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 11:06Speaker 06

  What, what, there's probably a lot of people out there who maybe get abused and don't really know they're getting abused. There's, so it's, it's only maybe when you wake, you may wake up to it later on in life. Um, and, and then you see and you think, yeah, that wasn't cool. But.

• 11:23Shawn Ryan?

  Did you have any brothers and sisters?

• 11:25Speaker 06

  No. I, I, I, so I grew up as an only child. Um, but my natural father is probably one of the most fertile man of the nineteen seventies. So if you're from northeast England and you don't know who your dad is, we're probably related. But, but I've got lots of like half brothers and sisters.

• 11:45Shawn Ryan?

  What is it about your childhood that you didn't like?

• 11:48Speaker 06

  It, I think it was.

• 11:52Speaker 06

  You brought up abuse. Um, yeah, I think it it was this. And it wasn't, there's, what I used to say is plenty of love in my life. It was, it was, it wasn't abuse from family or anything like that. But it was just um being exposed to violence at a really young age. And and that set a sort of values in me. What kind of violence? So there's some things I don't want to share in the light of day. And so the uh, I think that the the worst one, the worst experience I had was when I was eight years old. And I'd just started at a new school and there was, it's about a mile and a half walk back.

• 12:37Speaker 06

  Near woodland and we'll talk about the woodland later, which I'm more happy to know. And I was walking home and um, a nice, warm September day and um, eight years old. And I was walking and these two guys were there, two, two older boys who had just been released from Young Offenders, from juvie. And um, the, the, the one was if off the, roughly about six years older than me. And then the other one was about the same age as him, so they would have been um, like fif- fourteen, fifteen years old. And I, I'm, I was always quite small and thin and they were like, hey, what are you doing?

• 13:17Speaker 06

  And I'm like, nothing. And then one of them just hit me around the head with this, with a branch, hit me to the ground and then they went on to sort of torture me for about two hours. Torture? Yeah, so they were just like, just beating me up. Like, like, one of them would be sitting on my chest and like, one of them like, took some dog shit and smeared on my face and like, like, lit like cigarettes on me and stuff and. Damn. And give me a kicking. And then, and then, I think the worst thing what, what the um, did is like, I had a packed lunchbox and I didn't seem to do, but they put loads of dog shit inside my packed lunchbox and then sealed it back up. So I didn't see that till later on when I was at home. And that was the thing that was, I thought was quite, that got to me.

• 13:57Speaker 06

  Um, and then uh, and I, and I ran home eventually and my stepdad, time went out and sort of had a talk and look for them and my mother did as well. I was obviously distressed and they were distressed and, and I think that was my first, even though I'd been.

• 14:14Speaker 06

  Um, beat up and set on fire and stuff like that before.

• 14:18Shawn Ryan?

  Hold on, set on fire?

• 14:19Speaker 06

  Well, not set on fire, so.

• 14:21Shawn Ryan?

  Is that a figure of speech?

• 14:22Speaker 06

  No, I not literally set on fire, but it's how I escaped. Um, is, um, I'll talk about that in a, in a, in a moment, but that to me was like pure evil. That I witnessed, I thought, and then, but here's the interesting thing, even at a young age, I was thankful. You know what I was thankful for? I was thankful that was me.

• 14:45Speaker 06

  Cause I can, I can take that. That was me. And I, and I'm certain, and I'm, that's one of the biggest reasons I'm glad for. If it wasn't, if it wasn't me that day. They had, they had the taste of blood in their mouth. It would have been someone else. And if I'd been an eight year old girl, they would have, they would have raped me. I know that. I could see that. And, uh, so that was the part for me was like, I'm glad it was me. Cause I can, I can, I can deal with that. And, um, um, yeah.

• 15:16Speaker 06

  Well.

• 15:17Shawn Ryan?

  Did you know these guys?

• 15:18Speaker 06

  I, I knew of one of them and then I, I actually met one of them later on in life. And I turned the tables a little bit and some people will say it's not good what I did, but I gave him a, a, a kick in and he begged for his life. He didn't know who I was.

• 15:32Shawn Ryan?

  How, how, how long ago or what, what's the timeframe here?

• 15:36Speaker 06

  That would have been probably about.

• 15:42Speaker 06

  Thirteen, fourteen years later.

• 15:44Shawn Ryan?

  No shit.

• 15:44Speaker 06

  I, I, I recognize that. Pure scumbag, riding a BMX with.

• 15:49Shawn Ryan?

  Twenty one years old.

• 15:50Speaker 06

  Track suit bottoms tucked into his, into his, uh, socks. Like at night, walk, running, my eyes just straight away locked on like a missile lock. I know who that is. First time I'd seen him since. I know who that is. And, uh, yeah, and I, as you drove past, as you rode past, I grabbed him by the neck. And then, and then, um, issued out some tough justice. So.

• 16:12Shawn Ryan?

  Good for you.

• 16:13Speaker 06

  And then, uh.

• 16:14Shawn Ryan?

  How did that feel? Did you feel good afterwards or did you regret it?

• 16:18Speaker 06

  I didn't regret it. No, no. I mean, it's maybe not a good message to put out to people. But, uh, sometimes you gotta, sometimes you gotta do it. Sometimes you gotta put on that armor and.

• 16:29Shawn Ryan?

  Did they know who you were?

• 16:31Speaker 06

  No.

• 16:31Shawn Ryan?

  Did you let them know who you were?

• 16:33Speaker 06

  No.

• 16:34Shawn Ryan?

  What did you say?

• 16:35Speaker 06

  Nothing.

• 16:36Shawn Ryan?

  Nothing?

• 16:36Speaker 06

  No.

• 16:36Shawn Ryan?

  What did they say?

• 16:38Speaker 06

  Like, the normal stuff what someone's begging for their life says, so.

• 16:42Shawn Ryan?

  What is the normal stuff?

• 16:43Speaker 06

  Please stop whatever done, stop and, and just so everyone's all, there was no mistaken identity, it was him. Um, but.

• 16:53Shawn Ryan?

  Right on, let's move on.

• 16:54Speaker 06

  Yeah, uh, but the fire thing, a few years before that, when I was about four or five, um, I used to try and hang around with the older kids in the, in my estate. And sometimes I'd be like a, a pain in the, pain in the neck to them. So they, again, I, I don't think it's evil, it's just, you know, sometimes, sometimes kids can be brutal. So these were much older than me, they had like, did, these were being teenagers as well when I was about four or five years old. And there's two incidents, um, uh, one was when I was, I walked into the woods and the woods was, I lived next to a set of woods and it was just a small, like, a small bin, but it was known as my woods because I knew it from an early age, I used to go there by myself and up until

• 17:39Speaker 06

  just before the army, I'd know it like the back of my hands and, and, and, uh, and yeah, I loved it. I'd still walk through it now when I go to my hometown and, you know, think of these things and, and, and, and the guys were playing with an air rifle. And I said, oh, what are you doing? And one of them turned and with a big smirk, he shot me in the leg with the, and I was about four years old in the thigh, in the thigh, and I was screaming, howling, thinking, why did you do that? The other one who was see, always seemed to be nicer than the others, took the, took the air rifle off me. And I thought, oh, good, he's gonna step in and then he shot me and he took it and then laughed and shot me in the other leg.

• 18:17Speaker 06

  I think then they realized what they'd done and then they tried to smooth it over and, and I've still got two scars on my leg. When I get, when my legs get sun-tanned, which isn't often, you can see the two white marks here and here.

• 18:30Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 18:31Speaker 06

  On my, on my, on my legs. So it's things like that, um, but then the, um, so another story and this came out when I was in, uh, on operations, a whole load of the guys were talking about. Things that make them scared and they said, I'd hate to be put in a, in like a bag. And I said, I've been tied in a bag before. And they went, what? And I said, yeah, when I was younger, they, they were playing Batman and Robin. I turned up and said, what are they doing? They're playing Batman and Robin and you're going to be one of the bad guys. So they had a potato sack and he stuffed me in this potato sack and tied a knot in the top. And then they started kicking the potato sack round and beating me. And, um, and the guys are looking at me going, what? And, and they went, well, how did you get out?

• 19:14Speaker 06

  I said, oh, when they set it on fire, I managed to escape. So that was my fire story.

• 19:19Shawn Ryan?

  Holy shit.

• 19:20Speaker 06

  Um.

• 19:22Shawn Ryan?

  So you were bullied quite a bit as a kid.

• 19:25Speaker 06

  Um, yeah, I don't, yeah. And this is the thing, isn't like, honestly, I was just about to say there, was I bullied? Cause in mine, in like, you know, when you normalize chaos, you normalize violence. And, um, so that's, they're, they're, they're the most, they're not the most graphic things that ever happened to me. But, but as I've said to someone very close to me, I said, that's, that's, those, the other things that are the worst. They're staying here and don't, I don't think they deserve to see the light of day. But, um, um.

• 19:58Shawn Ryan?

  Why are you?

• 20:01Shawn Ryan?

  You're pretty closed up. You keep a lot of stuff internalized, it sounds like. What, why do you do that?

• 20:07Speaker 06

  I think it's because I've been betrayed all my life and, and.

• 20:12Shawn Ryan?

  Who is the most important person that's betrayed you?

• 20:15Speaker 06

  Well.

• 20:18Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, we know your government is pretty much betrayed you.

• 20:21Speaker 06

  I mean, that was the, that was the answer I was going to say, but, um, I think it's just people.

• 20:26Shawn Ryan?

  If your parents, women, wives.

• 20:29Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, a bit of, bit of women, parents, it's, I mean, it's all, it's, I mean, everyone's got their own heartache, if you like. And then sometimes.

• 20:37Shawn Ryan?

  One of the things about this show, Christian, is sharing experiences because people learn from that.

• 20:43Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 20:44Shawn Ryan?

  And, and, and, and it helps them get through the trauma. And so for somebody like you to be sitting here who's experienced that kind of stuff and overcome it. When you share those experiences, that sends a wave into the world. And people learn from men like you who've overcome that because they look up to you. You know, and so when you share that and you talk about how you overcame it, you know, it, it. It's it's like a wave of good that gets tossed into the world and people ride that.

• 21:21Speaker 06

  And I think so from a betrayal point of view, I mean, everyone's, no one's totally innocent. Like I can say like, oh, a girl may have dumped me or broke my heart, but you know, I probably had some something to do with it. And I'm not perfect and then, but it's, that's the thing is, is being alone. It's that feeling of alone. So like when you're just

• 21:46Speaker 06

  um, an only child, but then there's that thing when you find yourself on your own, it's it it you, I think from an early age, it was a defense mechanism from me to then go, okay, I can do this. I'm strong. I I and I'll move on and do things. And then every now and again, I sometimes let someone in. And then when I let them in, sometimes they might not see what they like. Or I might show them too much. And it's this thing about being Christian Craighead versus my real self. And um, and and and then and then they might not like what they see and then move on. And then I think I should never, I should never, I should have just lived like a lie. I should have pretended to be someone who I'm not. And that way everyone's happy.

• 22:28Speaker 06

  And every now and again, if you show them the real me, they might go, yeah, I didn't like that. I liked, I liked the normal person. Because

• 22:39Speaker 06

  like in two thousand nineteen, when I

• 22:44Speaker 06

  launched a one man hostage rescue mission, if you like.

• 22:47Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 22:48Speaker 06

  Um, again, I don't want to go, I'm not going to go into the details of the of the thing. Life had prepared me for that moment.

• 22:56Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 22:56Speaker 06

  And it and it's a thought I have, and it's sometimes eaten me up a lot is for life to prepare me for that one, for that day.

• 23:07Speaker 06

  I had to be different. It and Merely, um, Merely, who was in, Merely Chapin, the author of Terrorist Attack Girl, who was in in the Dusa D two hotel. So her husband said to him and said to her, sorry, um.

• 23:21Speaker 06

  Like Chris wasn't the right man at the right place that day. He was the man who had to be there that day. Because everything in life had prepared me for that moment.

• 23:33Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 23:34Speaker 06

  The mindset, the skill set, everything was, it was odd. Everything lined up for that. But then this, the thought of in order to be that p- person for that day. Maybe I'm like a tool, like a specialist tool that it's really good for this job. And you might use it once and then after that it's useless. So I have and, and, and I have sometimes I think, can I fit in with normal society? And I'm not a crackpot, as you know, you've met me personally, I've met your family. It's, but I just think, am I, am I suitable for normal life?

• 24:18Shawn Ryan?

  Do you, it sounds like you put a lot of

• 24:25Shawn Ryan?

  maybe validity, I don't know if that's the correct word, but you, you really put, you, you put a lot of importance on what other people think.

• 24:35Speaker 06

  Um, sometimes, yeah, I mean.

• 24:36Shawn Ryan?

  Why do you do that?

• 24:37Speaker 06

  I don't know.

• 24:38Shawn Ryan?

  It's you.

• 24:38Speaker 06

  It's, yeah.

• 24:39Shawn Ryan?

  It's you. Who gives a shit if they don't like you?

• 24:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 24:42Shawn Ryan?

  Honestly.

• 24:43Speaker 06

  But it's the, this thing of trying to, it's trying, trying to live my life and fit in. And then sometimes I'm like, ah, yeah.

• 24:49Shawn Ryan?

  Who do you want to fit in with?

• 24:50Speaker 06

  Well, I don't know, I just like get on in life and it's like, I'm chasing, it, it's this thing, like everything costs something. And I didn't wake up and become, and became Chris Craighead. I would, it was a long, hard slog to January two thousand nineteen.

• 25:05Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 25:06Speaker 06

  And it cost me everything. It cost me family, it cost me relationships, it cost me my soul in some cases. And um, so it's just, it's coming to, it's coming and then, and that's one of the things of maybe getting ahead of ourselves, but um, about you're trying to find purpose in life and, and right now I'm got some things coming in. But I still in my mind think, I don't know, I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing. So part of me sometimes think, are my rounds complete?

• 25:35Speaker 06

  Have I, have I done what I'm supposed to be put on this earth for and now I'm just waiting to die?

• 25:39Shawn Ryan?

  Would you mind if I make a suggestion?

• 25:42Speaker 06

  No.

• 25:43Shawn Ryan?

  Do you think you're gonna find what your purpose is by trying to cater to the crowd and fit in?

• 25:48Speaker 06

  I mean, yeah, and that's what I realized is that's what I was getting at is sometimes I'll open it and do it and then go, no, what am I doing? Then withdraw back in, withdrawing and then so it's it's just trying to feel like we do, trying to work, see what works, what doesn't work. But then, but going back to childhood.

• 26:07Speaker 06

  Yeah, and but so they set the sack on fire and I escaped. And one of the, a good friend of mine said, that's why Chris is how he is. So how am I? Well, those people might be horrified or people might say, yeah, no big deal what happened there as a kid. But that did something to me, those those types of incidents did something to me. And what they did was from a very early age of about, well, starting from about four years old and chipping away all the way up until teenager is they made me not tolerate bullies.

• 26:48Speaker 06

  To stand up for people who can't stand up for themselves and do the right thing when you can. And that's why I think it's part of the training, although it's horrific and I'd hate to happen it to if I

• 27:02Speaker 06

  that happened to someone I love and I'd go and hunt them people down. But it but it but it was required, I think.

• 27:11Speaker 06

  And then and then that put me into this childhood flex of like acting like for me, I was quite thin, small. So if I saw anyone as a threat or if I saw I'd resort to violence straight away. I'd be like, yeah, someone like did something I knew I knew was potential because I was small that the so I'd just punch punch him in the face.

• 27:35Shawn Ryan?

  Was it the temper or was it calculated?

• 27:37Speaker 06

  It was um combination, I think more calculated than it was temper. And um and this is the thing, because I know that if I if. Bullies won't be bullies. So if some, I, I would read the room and if I knew that, I knew that they'd like, look at me, he's the smallest, I'm gonna do something to him. So I just be like, yeah, no, you're not. And it, and, and I, and, and, and obviously, life in the nineteen eighties was different. People had fistfights at school all the time. They were kind, it's not like, it's now would be a huge thing. I'm not condoning it. Uh, now I'm not saying to any young people watching this, go out and fight violence with violence, because it's a difference, it's, it's a different time now.

• 28:15Shawn Ryan?

  The underlying message that you're sending is, is timeless. It's don't get pushed around.

• 28:23Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 28:24Shawn Ryan?

  Stand up for yourself, stand up for others.

• 28:27Speaker 06

  Yeah. And, and that's what those, those acts of violence and abuse through my, throughout my life, and there's, there's lots. Um, that's what the, these ended up, I mean, and luckily, um, I didn't fall into the wrong, on the wrong side of the law with that violence and things calmed, I started calming down and one of the things I always say saved my life, if you like, was the army cadets. So the army cadets in UK is like a youth organisation, where at the age of thirteen, you join and you get issued a uniform and you do two parade nights a week and you do get inspected and you do lessons on fieldcraft, marksmanship, that kind of thing. So youth organisation.

• 29:08Speaker 06

  And, uh, and I, all I wanted to do was join the army or be a, be a warrior from, from as long as I can remember, I wanted to be a, a soldier. And so I, I joined, I lied about my age and joined when I was twelve. And then, um, and then just started doing that and, and, and that saved my life because at the same time, and I think there's, it's hard to disagree with this. Twelve, thirteen, thirteen years old is a time when you are at a junction in your life. Like you see, when a lot of people go, you know, good kids

• 29:41Speaker 06

  fall prey to crime and drugs and things like that, it's usually around about the tw- the, the start point is usually about thirteen years old. That's the time when you, there might be.

• 29:53Speaker 06

  Missing classes at school and going round the, smoking in the back of the school and doing whatever the, whatever happens now. It's usually about that age when you start falling off, falling off, falling, going off, off the, on the wrong track. And, and that's certainly happened in my set of friends then, I was the only one who joined the army cadets. And those friends, people who I was friends with, I believe all of them have been inside prison now. Some of them may have died of overdoses, I'm sure two of them have died of overdoses since then, and because it's, again, it's gonna sound like a, a grown up, but just the act of smoking a cigarette can lead to

• 30:33Speaker 06

  her own addiction. It's the, it's the gateway into this bad thing. I'm, I'm not saying everyone did it, but I, I, as everyone fell completely off the tracks, but that's at that point. So it's a bit of waffle there to say that at thirteen years old, I joined the army cadets and that saved my life, gave me purpose, two nights of the week. They're doing the lessons and every now and again you go away for a weekend and it, and there's somebody do like an annual camp of two weeks away. And that really set me up for, uh, set me up for joining the army, but also, but I was going to join the army anyway. But it was just, like I said, I think it saved my life, gave me purpose. And, uh, and, and especially at, um, at thirteen years old, my grandmother, uh, my grandma, she died.

• 31:18Speaker 06

  And that's when I felt truly alone. So yes, my mother may say she loved me, ex-stepdad and other people. But I was really, it was only my grandmother who really knew me. Who was really, who, who really believed in me and really saw me who, who, for who I was. She knew I wasn't go, she knew I was different. And she, and she, like, without my grandmother, I don't know what would have happened to me. But she, she put in these core values and so a combination of obviously the bad stuff, but she, she made me respectful to people to, like at school, at school, it might be like, again, people might say, well, he's a bit of a thug, he's like beating people up or whatever.

• 32:01Speaker 06

  Like I say, it's a different time, but I was always super, super respectful to school teachers. It was always really polite to the school teachers and things like that. And then, and that was just because my grandma, my grandma would say, like, there'd be a woman walking down the street, like an older woman, and she'd go, go across and ha- help, help her with her bags. Give your seat up to people on the, on the, on the bus or when we're traveling. Give your seat up to that lady. Okay.

• 32:24Shawn Ryan?

  Why do you think your grandma was able to see that you were different?

• 32:28Speaker 06

  I, I don't know. I think it was just that connection.

• 32:31Shawn Ryan?

  You were closer to her than your mother?

• 32:33Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah, I was closer to her than, to, than to anyone.

• 32:36Shawn Ryan?

  Why is that? What did your mother do for a living?

• 32:38Speaker 06

  She worked a night shift and, um, different, like, in the care industry, but, uh, yeah.

• 32:45Shawn Ryan?

  Stepdad?

• 32:47Speaker 06

  Factory worker.

• 32:48Shawn Ryan?

  Factory worker? Do you think maybe they were just busy with their occupations?

• 32:53Speaker 06

  No, they're just, again, I don't wanna throw dirt around too much. Um, because people would be go, oh, it wasn't that bad or was, whatever. The bottom line is.

• 33:03Shawn Ryan?

  Doesn't matter what people think.

• 33:04Speaker 06

  I'm thankful, I'm thankful for those two people especially. Not because of, because what they did was is the, it's like they're saying, there is no enemies or friends, just teachers. And they, when I was looking, even from as young as eight, nine years old, I was looking at those two and say, I'm never gonna be like you two.

• 33:25Shawn Ryan?

  Was your grandma always around? Did you live with her?

• 33:28Speaker 06

  Um, so because my mother worked night shift three nights a week, so every three nights of the week. Um, with my grandma, but every single day I went around to her house and saw every single day. With the exception of one day. So in, in nineteen, um, eighty-nine, I went away on like a,

• 33:48Speaker 06

  with the school had like a weekend away, um, or it was always a week away and, um, like doing climbing and outdoor, outdoor activities and things. And, um, I, I had a camouflage jacket that, and had, and my grandmother's doing the, she sort of, they, I cut the tops off two pairs of socks and, and then my grandma sewed them onto the cuffs. So it looked like, I mean, it's a thing that people used to do. But I lost my temper when she was doing that, the night, on the Sunday night and then screaming in the shower and she was screaming in the shower at me. But we, it all, it all, it all came back together at the end and I said, sorry and, and, uh, and she'd always say, oh, you test the patience of a nun. And, um, and then, uh, that, and then the next day I went and I went away that weekend.

• 34:33Speaker 06

  And usually I came back, I got back on the, um, it was the, I think it was the, the Sunday or was the Sunday and. For the first time ever, I didn't go to her house on the way home from school. Um, cause kind of on the way and I just, cause I was, I think it was cause I was carrying gear and stuff, so I went straight home. But as soon as I got home, I, I uh picked up the telephone on the wall and give her a call and say, hey grandma. Yeah, it was a good week and we're talking and um, and I said, I'm not coming round tonight. And then she was going to go babysit for my um, other, some other members of family. I said, I'll see you tomorrow. And she goes, yeah, I'll see you tomorrow. And she goes, I love you. I love you too. Like I did every day, always, always called her. Remember, this is before mobile phones.

• 35:18Speaker 06

  And then um, and then she went to um, my auntie's house. And then, then my dad got, my stepdad got a call. He looked and didn't say anything. Then he said, look, you know, your grandma's had a heart attack. She's in hospital. So, um, yeah, so I just ran out the door. And um, ran into my hometown. Don't know what I was doing. I didn't know where I was running. I was just running. It's like a, you know, like a irrational. Mm-hmm. Thing that you do is go out running. Like I just ran and it was like dark. It was February evening. And uh, she's, and obviously now, he, I can't, he can't do anything. He can't find me. So I'm just there and I, and then go to, uh, there's a church in town.

• 36:03Speaker 06

  And I didn't go to the church, but it's very old. Um, and there's like a gateway sort of thing into the church and it's got a cross on the top. And I just, I was just sat on the, on the bench opposite it and I was looking at the cross. And I was like pleading with God, please don't take her away from me. And I was like, like, cause I got, this is not supposed to happen. She's my only supporter. She's my, she's my link. And um, and more importantly, she's the only person who believes in me. And uh, so I'm looking, pleading with God. And then uh, so then I, I run home. Then I, like, something makes me run home and it goes, right, we're getting an attack cab. We're going to the hospital, which is about eight miles away.

• 36:45Speaker 06

  So we're going home and uh, get to the hospital and then uh, I never saw her again. Cause as I walked in, she died. So.

• 36:54Speaker 06

  The takeaway point from that is, I mean, it's always sod's law. The one time I didn't go to see it is it and and I always say I've said it to so many people all the way through my life is if you love someone or care for someone dearly.

• 37:09Speaker 06

  If you have an argument, whether it be your mother, brother, wife, girlfriend, friend. If you ever have an argument, don't leave on back terms. Always resolve it because you never want because it's always a possibility that's the last time you'll ever see them.

• 37:25Shawn Ryan?

  That's a great point. You know, me and my wife have a rule. We never go to bed angry. We always work it out before we go to bed. For that reason.

• 37:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, so she, yeah, my grandma, she um like she made me the man I am. And then and I still think about her every day.

• 37:46Shawn Ryan?

  That's amazing. I'm sorry to hear that um she's not with us anymore. Christian, I want to dive into your purpose.

• 37:55Shawn Ryan?

  So we keep, we keep, forgive me, but I'm going to put you on the spot. We keep going back to what other people are going to think. And so my question for you is, do you think you're going to find your purpose? By catering to what you think people that you don't even know want from you?

• 38:14Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, that's the the trap I'm falling into. So I don't. But it's.

• 38:18Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, to to to.

• 38:19Speaker 06

  And this is probably.

• 38:20Shawn Ryan?

  You're a man with a. I mean, the amount of courage that you can muster up in situations is like nothing people have ever seen. I mean, you entered a hotel where people were being slaughtered by Al Shabab against your country's orders. You did that.

• 38:44Shawn Ryan?

  Nobody does that. And now let's fast forward. That happened in 2019. Let's fast forward to four years.

• 38:52Shawn Ryan?

  We're worried about what other people think. Does that add up to you?

• 38:56Speaker 06

  It's it's probably what I think it is doing a self diagnosis is it's a side effect of being alone of.

• 39:05Speaker 06

  Like, like, is it called abandonment syndrome, you know, my, you know, my, my, you know, my grandma died, but she, in essence, she left me. And um, so it's, it's, it's like this thing, but I don't wanna be alone, like, I'm, I'm trying to. But like I say, it's testing and adjusting. No, it's not gonna, it's not gonna give me my purpose, but I kind of, some, and sometimes I don't wanna be alone, and then I realize I am alone. And we're all alone, but that, that's the problem. It's part adjustment of coming out of the military after twenty years. So, and part of this, like, just trying to, trying to work it out.

• 39:40Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, that's part of being alone, though. I mean, that's part of, I mean, you're a leader. You're a leader of men and leaders.

• 39:53Shawn Ryan?

  Are lonely.

• 39:55Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 39:57Shawn Ryan?

  They are.

• 39:58Speaker 06

  But uh.

• 39:58Shawn Ryan?

  Because you have to make the tough calls, you have to lead.

• 40:01Speaker 06

  So, yeah, and so it's all just been about, like, finding my feet, really. And, and I'm still looking, I'm still looking to try and find this purpose and, and see, see what it is, what, you know, there's things I wanna do and there's things I'm doing, but there's still nothing that is like filling my soul, like. As a young person, I wanted to be a soldier, and then when I was in the army, I wanted to get into the unit, and when I was in the unit, I wanted to do X, Y and Z. And then there's this big void now of like, well, what do I wanna do? And I'm still, and, and, and again, it's not a negative, it's, it's like a, I'm sure it's gonna come to me.

• 40:34Shawn Ryan?

  I think it's gonna come to you.

• 40:35Speaker 06

  It's probably come to me when I'm not even looking for it. That's how it always works.

• 40:39Shawn Ryan?

  Well, I think it's gonna come from the heart and then, and.

• 40:47Shawn Ryan?

  When you push everybody else's opinions and all their, all their bullshit that they think that you should be doing to the side, I think that's. That's the opportunity where it's gonna come to you.

• 40:59Shawn Ryan?

  Would you agree with that?

• 41:00Speaker 06

  Yeah, possibly, yeah. I mean, it's definitely a thing.

• 41:05Shawn Ryan?

  What's the argument?

• 41:06Speaker 06

  Well, yeah.

• 41:08Shawn Ryan?

  What's, what is it? What's the argument?

• 41:11Speaker 06

  Again, I'm just trying to do what, what the right thing is. But um, and then see what the, rather than based on the opinion of me. Again, it's trying to, I'm not trying to cater to everyone. It's, I mean, maybe I'm, that's a bit out of context, like being taken out of context a bit, but I'm not. But I'm just trying to find, find my way. But the, the problem is, is I'm not, there is, there is no, it's just the fact, I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm not, I'm, I don't, I don't know what I, I don't know what my purpose is yet. I'm still trying to pin it down and I'm, yeah.

• 41:43Shawn Ryan?

  I think you know your purpose. You've got great messaging. I mean, last night at dinner with me and my wife, you, you rattled off a few purposes. I mean, one of them is that book right there.

• 41:55Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 41:55Shawn Ryan?

  You know, the, the, the wrong wolf, standing up for what you believe in. Standing up for people that can't stand up for themselves. I mean, that's.

• 42:05Shawn Ryan?

  It seems to be the lifelong, it, it's following you.

• 42:09Speaker 06

  Hmm.

• 42:09Shawn Ryan?

  Everywhere you go.

• 42:12Speaker 06

  Oh, watch this space and see how it develops.

• 42:16Shawn Ryan?

  Right on.

• 42:18Shawn Ryan?

  Well, let's move on. What, so what, what kind of stuff were you into as a kid? What, what did you enjoy doing?

• 42:24Speaker 06

  I enjoyed like anything to do, uh, like laptop, anything about the military, guns, aircraft especially. Like I had this thing about military aircraft that could identify all sorts of still nuclear weapons. Like red up on nuclear, I was fascinated with nuclear technology and weapons and um.

• 42:42Shawn Ryan?

  Where did that inspiration come from?

• 42:44Speaker 06

  I have no idea.

• 42:45Shawn Ryan?

  Movies?

• 42:46Speaker 06

  Yeah, there was some, like the, the, the one, there's two movies, sorry. Well, there's a whole group of movies that inspired me, but one of the key ones, the wild geese. I remember watching the wild geese. Have you seen it?

• 42:57Shawn Ryan?

  I haven't.

• 42:58Speaker 06

  You need to, you watch it. And I said this, I've said it in a previous interview, if you haven't watched the wild geese.

• 43:06Speaker 06

  It's it's an it's an it hasn't aged very well, but it's got like um Richard Burton, Roger Moore, um Richard Harris, they're the they're the the main stars in it. It's it was nineteen, I think it's nineteen seventy seven, um but it's it's about mercenaries who free fall into Africa to rescue a a tribal leader. Really? And yeah, so it's um and um I saw that and went, I that that it'll fill my heart that and it's um um so that was the main that if he said what what movie of all movies inspired you to be in the military would be in the Wild Geese is that that is it. Um and for anyone out there who's into

• 43:50Speaker 06

  movies or making movies, I should say, just hear me out here, that is dying to be made into a modern modern movie, dying, because it takes a lot of boxes as well, even in even in this age, it's a it if you made that into a TV show or movie, just say, I'm just giving you that gift. Yeah. Go and go and look them up, Wild Geese, and say, let's make a modern uh a modern version of this. It's good. And then Who Dies Wins? Have you seen that movie? I haven't. What Who Dies Wins? Who Dies Wins? Like the the motto of the SAS, it's about a SAS guy who goes undercover in a in a anti-nuclear movement and the and then these terrorists who he's um undercover with

• 44:34Speaker 06

  um um take over the US Embassy in London. And then at the end of it, there's a SAS hostage rescue mission and it's Lewis Collins. It's it's just that movie has inspired so many young men to join the SAS of my of my my my age group. Interesting. Yeah, it's a it's a great movie. It's a great movie. What about Bravo Two Zero? Yeah, I was in the army when that came out. Oh, okay. I was already committed. You're already in there. Yeah. And then, uh, yeah, and but then there's all the other movies. Again, it's this strange thing of, because we're going to talk about this later on, is what is the like Commando? I I if someone said, what movie have you seen more than any other movie? It would be Commando.

• 45:18Speaker 06

  But and First Blood Part Two, again, I've talked about before, is how much of an influence First Blood Part Two was. But what?

• 45:28Speaker 06

  Commando.

• 45:31Speaker 06

  Rambo.

• 45:33Speaker 06

  Demolition Man.

• 45:35Shawn Ryan?

  All the classics.

• 45:35Speaker 06

  157. Like, all these. Uh, Die Hard.

• 45:42Speaker 06

  What's, what's the formula?

• 45:45Speaker 06

  Bad guys do some shit.

• 45:50Speaker 06

  Lone Man turns up, sorts them out. Sometimes reluctantly, sometimes against orders. It's strange, isn't it, how, and I think that's why there's a lot of popularity, that why my incident is so popular.

• 46:02Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 46:03Speaker 06

  Cause it's playing into this, like, this is what we grew up on.

• 46:08Speaker 06

  And, and, and, and so maybe it's a thank you to Sylvester Stallone, to Arnold Schwarzenegger, to all these people who helped me, helped with my training. Um, because maybe it is, I think.

• 46:20Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. Well, let's take a quick break and then when we come back, we'll get into what got you in the military, how old you were, where you at?

• 46:33Speaker 01

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• 47:42Shawn Ryan?

  All right, Christian, we're back from the break. We're getting ready to dive into some of your military career. But first, what was the inspiration to join so young? You had a, if I correct me if I'm wrong, 28-year military career. You joined when you were 16 years old. Why did you join so young? What was happening in the world?

• 48:05Speaker 06

  It was, it wasn't so much what was going on in the world. It was going on in my world. I just had to get into the army. As I mentioned earlier, I didn't really enjoy childhood. All I was doing was waiting to grow up. And the earliest I could get into the army, that's when I was going to jump at it, join the army when I was 16. So that's, yeah.

• 48:29Shawn Ryan?

  Did you have any idea what you wanted to do in the army?

• 48:31Speaker 06

  Absolutely. I knew straight away. I knew I wanted to join the parachute regiment, which if you wanted to do comparisons, it's the Ranger Battalion.

• 48:42Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 48:42Speaker 06

  And I wanted to join the parachute regiment. And that was it. There was no, I was set. Lots of people, including all of my family, didn't think I was going to be able to do it.

• 48:56Shawn Ryan?

  They didn't want you to do it?

• 48:57Speaker 06

  No, they didn't think I'd be able to do it because it's hard to become a parachute. It's hard training. And I was a skinny, skinny little guy who looked young. And people were like, there's no way he's going to get into the paras. We have a, there's a test called P Company. It's kind of like Hell Week. And there was a few months before I actually enlisted, there was a documentary on the UK TV. And everyone was saying, that's what Chris is going to do. And people were going, he'll never be able to do that. And so people, and some members of my family, my aunt was worried about it

• 49:37Speaker 06

  because she knew I was fanatical about joining the military and being a warrior. But she was like thinking, what's he going to do when he fails? Because, and that was what people thought. And it goes back to my grandmother. She knew, she knew like my potential. But everyone else takes everything at face value. So people think Navy SEALs are like six foot five. Yeah. You know, you know, the, the whole deal and like, what? It's like, it's the same thing. People thought paratroopers were all like big, tall, tall, mean, mean men and like big and gnarly. Not young looking, little skinny, skinny guys. Mm hmm.

• 50:19Speaker 06

  So, um, but I knew, and I, I went to the army career recruitment office. And then they, um, they said, come back and do the, the entrance test. Um, you don't need to be very bright to be a paratrooper on, on paper. Um, but I, I took the test and, and I completely knocked out of the park. And they were like, wow, you did really well on this, which is, is one of those things where you, when you're older, you look back and go, interesting how. I didn't do well at school. I didn't apply myself very well at school. But when you do these, um, I can't remember the name, it's similar to the US military, you do like a, the test. You, you score off the charts on it and you're like, and I did really well on this and you can do anything you want.

• 51:03Speaker 06

  You can, and they were saying, if I was you, I would do an apprenticeship in the Royal Signals. You'll get promoted really fast, you'll get a really much more money. Like people want to do this apprenticeships and I was like, nope. Parachute regiment, nope. And they were like, nah, you know, it's been 10 years since the Falklands War, everyone wants to join the, join the parachute regiment. I'm like, yeah, okay. And then they, they said, well, because it's gonna, there's so many people wanna join. The, um, it's gonna be about a year before you start your training. And I was like, fine, I'll wait. Went home, two weeks later, get a phone call, yeah, you start training in September. And there's this call in the bluff and, and, and the message here is for any, for anyone.

• 51:48Speaker 06

  You know, if you've got, if you've got something in your mind that you wanna do. Most of the time, people trying to talk you out of it, haven't got your best interests in mind. So just stick to your guns, be stubborn, nope, nope. And sometimes you might be persuaded because it might be the better thing to do something else, but if you've got a plan. Nope, I would understand, so, cause I've, I've seen a lot of people in the British Army. And I'm sure the same in the US military, where they've went to a recruitment office and say, hey, I wanna be a. I wanna be a ranger. And they'll say, well, what you you could do is if you join the engineers, you can still do ranger school and technically you're a ranger. And I'm like, oh, okay. And then and then they join and and they be and they're like, I didn't sign up for this. I didn't wanna be and they do minimum time and get out.

• 52:33Speaker 06

  It was the same in the British Army. They'd say, do this. And lots of people I knew wanted to join the paratroop parachute regiment. And they said, no, be an engineer, do do be a driver, be a medic, you can still be a paratrooper. And they're just being sold a sold a lie.

• 52:48Shawn Ryan?

  Interesting.

• 52:48Speaker 06

  Because because I'm sure it's the same in the US military. These recruiters have got a quota to meet. Say, hey, we we desperately need more medics, drivers, engineers, infantry. And that's what they're gonna try and meet that quota. I believe that's what happened, but but I was just stubborn, so. And then in September nineteen ninety two, I entered service into the British Army.

• 53:13Shawn Ryan?

  What how old do you have to be to? Is it sixteen or did you slide in there somehow?

• 53:18Speaker 06

  No, sixteen sixteen, but you can't uh after in the Falklands War, some paratroopers who were killed on Mount Longdon in the the battle there were seventeen years old. And I think after so at some point after that, then you can't go on combat operations until you're eighteen years old.

• 53:36Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 53:36Speaker 06

  So it's eighteen. You can join the army, but you can you can't serve on combat operations until you're eighteen.

• 53:41Shawn Ryan?

  So still today, you can join at age sixteen. Does that mean you're leaving the home and?

• 53:47Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean, on my last day in the in the in the British Army, I went to the Army Foundation College in Harrogate, which is where all the junior soldiers are now. And I gave them a presentation about what I did in Kenya um to six hundred and forty um um recruits, students, whatever you're gonna call them. And and things have changed. Now, the I I I was talking with the Command Sergeant Major, the RSM, as we call them. And they do a lot of like, that's what it is. It's Army Foundation. It's building the foundation for young people to have a not just a career in the military, but give them a right step up in life. So they focus on education, they do still it's still military training, but it's preparing

• 54:30Speaker 06

  them for life, life for service and it's it's it's good.

• 54:35Speaker 06

  When I joined in nineteen ninety two, the army had, you had your apprenticeships, if you had a trade job. You had the junior leaders. So if you join like, say, the Guards, like the, say, the Household Cavalry, like the Guards. Or Infantry Regiment, they have junior leaders. So it would be a year's training and you, people would get. Command appointments. So you'd be like a junior Lance Corporal or junior Sergeant Major if you were good and things. And it was again a similar sort of thing. Only exception was the parachute regiment. We had junior para, that's what it was called. And that was, yeah, it's.

• 55:15Speaker 06

  The amount of, I was the last ever junior para platoon. And then it, it, the shell of the junior army for, I, I might be wrong here, but it was for a year or two. The amount of time and then they restarted it. And I think everyone does the same training now. But I was the, this was the last platoon of junior para. But the amount of people who went into the SES or became Command Sergeant Majors from junior para was. It, so it was a, it was a system that worked. They were preparing people and we're gonna go like. Uh, maybe a bit philosophical here, but it was brutal. Mm hmm. But you know what? That's what I wanted. Mm hmm.

• 55:54Speaker 06

  Because I'd read about it and the harder, the better, the more, the more, the more the thrashing we got, the harder the physicality. That to me was what it was about. Cause I was joined, I, I, in my mind, I was, I'm joining the elite. I'm, I'm doing the best I can do at my age. And, and it was, and it was brutal. It was brutal. And I, I look back now and think. If, it'd be hard as a sixteen year old to say, would I want that to happen to someone? Part of me would say no. But part of me now is like, yeah, but it has to, again, it's this conditioning. Yeah. And here's the, but here's the question. Here's the thing, and it's not, it's like an open question to everyone listening to you. As I, as I said earlier, we've got the Army Foundation College.

• 56:38Speaker 06

  That is setting, it's like, I put it in a good light, it's setting young people up for service in the military and in life. Great.

• 56:49Speaker 06

  Junior paratrooper. Turned me into a warrior.

• 56:55Speaker 06

  So what do you want? Because you can't have, in my opinion, you can't have both. Mm hmm. Do you want this seventeen year old, when they graduate seventeen year old, you want them to be set up in life? You know, the the message and that we got now and oh, yeah, you're gonna do well and you can do this and you can drive a car and you can.

• 57:13Speaker 06

  Balance your books and you and you've done, or do you want them to be a fucking killing machine? Cause that's what you got from junior parrot. Yeah. It's like, I remember writing a letter to my mother saying, I I I asked her when I was researching uh one man in if she had it. She couldn't, didn't have it, but it was saying how for me, I wanna die in combat. I wanna storm a machine gun position. It's the ultimate honour to be killed fighting from a country. And so it was that sort of, that's what we were saying, saying to me. And it was like that thing of going, yeah. And and and that's what you got. And that's why the, like I said, there's such many, a lot of these people went, ended up in special forces or career soldiers. The command sergeant major, because it was this thing of like, yeah.

• 57:56Speaker 06

  You know what? As a paratrooper, where, why do you, why do you join the army? It's like, I wanna jump out of aeroplanes and kill people. That's what I wanna do. Mm hmm. Like, okay. Mm hmm. Just, and it's that rather than going, oh, yeah, well, I wanna get a trade. I wanna get some life experience. I wanna see the world. Okay. You haven't got, you haven't got the mindset to be dropped behind enemy lines. Yeah. And close in with the superior force. And kill the Queen's enemies. That's the, that's what the view was then, in my opinion. And it was, and it was. And and and the instructors went on that line, boom, boom, like, this is what we're training for. We're training for all our war. There was nothing, and you saw when I used to walk past, used to walk past, it was in the guards deck or.

• 58:39Speaker 06

  In southern England and you could see the, like, the guards between were allowed to put posters and things up on their, on their walls and pictures of their families and stuff. Nothing. Nothing was allowed in up on the walls in the junior parabola with the exception of one thing was the ten commandments of the parachute of the German Fallschirmmeeger, the German parachute riflemen.

• 59:01Shawn Ryan?

  Really?

• 59:01Speaker 06

  Yeah, that's the only thing was a lot in in every room on the walls.

• 59:04Shawn Ryan?

  Do you remember them?

• 59:06Speaker 06

  Mo- most of them. I'm gonna get tested. Um, but the things that step out is for you, you're the embodiment, and it changed to British, but you, because it said the the ten commandments of the of the paratroop, you're the embodiment of the British warrior. For you, the fight will be the ultimate goal. Seek it, always seek it out.

• 59:23Shawn Ryan?

  What was going on in the world?

• 59:25Speaker 06

  Hard as, what was it? Tough as leather, hard as crisp steel, agile as a greyhound. You are the embodiment of the British soldier. For you, fulfillment will be bound. Seek it out wherever you can. Something like that.

• 59:35Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 59:36Speaker 06

  Which is the last one, which is things pretty hard hurting. And there's other things more controversial, as they like, be shy of chatter. Men act, women chatter. Chatter will take you to the grave. So it's a.

• 59:49Shawn Ryan?

  Nice. What what year is this?

• 59:52Speaker 06

  Nineteen ninety-two.

• 59:53Shawn Ryan?

  Nineteen ninety-two. What was going on in the world then? From your perspective?

• 59:57Speaker 06

  From it was the the main effort from from the UK point of view was just the troubles in Northern Ireland.

• 1:00:03Shawn Ryan?

  What kind of troubles?

• 1:00:04Speaker 06

  By the the insurgency, so would be the, it was the only deployment for British troops to go to Northern Ireland and assist with the policing there. Patrol, patrolling like the streets of, of the, of the streets and into the rural areas of, uh, of Northern Ireland.

• 1:00:19Shawn Ryan?

  Did you go there?

• 1:00:20Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:00:20Shawn Ryan?

  What kind of stuff are you guys doing?

• 1:00:22Speaker 06

  Just doing like routine patrols.

• 1:00:23Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. Anything exciting?

• 1:00:25Speaker 06

  Uh, there's a few. They they were big on to the IED things. And it's hard to imagine this is still UK and it's, there's still unrest there now, but, um, but, um, not to me personally, um, but to people in the same company as me, someone got badly injured with a improvised explosive drive hit an armored vehicle and things. And this is on the streets of UK.

• 1:00:46Shawn Ryan?

  Wow, that's crazy.

• 1:00:47Speaker 06

  Northern Ireland and it was and people were being killed every day.

• 1:00:50Shawn Ryan?

  That's still going on.

• 1:00:51Speaker 06

  Sectarian violence. There's the ceasefire happened in nineteen ninety five.

• 1:00:56Shawn Ryan?

  What is it? What is the, can you give us some insight into the?

• 1:00:59Speaker 06

  I don't know. I want to do it in justice because.

• 1:01:01Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:02Speaker 06

  It's just like, yeah, this.

• 1:01:03Shawn Ryan?

  Is it criminal? What is it? What kind of organizations?

• 1:01:07Speaker 06

  Well, it's the, you have the religious element, Catholics and the Protestants. Again, apologies to anyone watching this because I'm going to, I'm not doing this any justice and it's complicated. But you have then they have the people who, the Republicans who want a united Ireland. That's the IRA.

• 1:01:23Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:01:23Speaker 06

  And then, but then you have loyalist terrorists who don't want a united Ireland and they fight each other and kill each other.

• 1:01:30Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:01:30Speaker 06

  And it, and it, and it went to a boiling point in the nineteen sixties.

• 1:01:34Shawn Ryan?

  Are any of these government entities, entities?

• 1:01:36Speaker 06

  Uh, there is a political winner, wing of the IRA, which is Sinn Fein. And again, apologies to everyone out there who's watching going, yeah, I'm, I'm not, I'm not a hundred percent and it is.

• 1:01:48Shawn Ryan?

  This is just, this is the way that you understand it. So.

• 1:01:52Speaker 06

  And we were, we were just supporting police operations. I mean, I was a young eighteen year old. Um, young guy on patrol. That's.

• 1:01:59Shawn Ryan?

  How did it feel?

• 1:02:01Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:02:01Shawn Ryan?

  Being out there for the first time.

• 1:02:02Speaker 06

  Yeah, it was good. Well, so we, I went to like an operating base in, in West Belfast and, um.

• 1:02:12Speaker 06

  And I was seventeen years old when I got there and they just started like a, like a six month, a six week rotation in this patrol base. So I can't go on the ground. So I just, so my task when I first got there is I'm the company runner. So I'm sitting in the ops room. Making cups of tea and stuff for the people and delivering messages because no mobile phones or anything there. And on the, and I'd only been there a few days and then my eighteenth birthday was coming up. Didn't think anything of it at the time, at the, so it's. Day before my birthday and my stick who I'm being attached to, they're going out on patrol. And the stick leader's like, hey, just, just hang in the room, watch, you're not on, you're not doing duty, you don't have to be in the ops room tonight.

• 1:02:54Speaker 06

  Just watch a movie and then get your head down, we'll not, we'll not be back till early hours of the morning. Okay. So I'm watching a movie and then I go to bed. And then at one minute past midnight, the door gets kicked in. And my stick leader's there in all, all his gear and says, who ended up in the SES himself, like a performer. Um, he's then going, get, hey, Craighead, get your gear on, we're going out. Like, cause now I'm legal, one minute passed, so I put on my full gear. And all the police and sticks all waiting for me outside and went happy birthday. And then they put in the vehicle, my armored vehicle, we go out on a patrol in the streets. And that's my, that's like a few minutes into my eighteenth birthday.

• 1:03:36Shawn Ryan?

  Nice. Well, what happened?

• 1:03:38Speaker 06

  Nothing. Again, most of the time in Northern Ireland, it was just maintaining a present and.

• 1:03:43Shawn Ryan?

  How long, how much time did you spend in the regiment?

• 1:03:47Speaker 06

  Uh, fifteen years.

• 1:03:48Shawn Ryan?

  Fifteen years? And then what?

• 1:03:51Speaker 06

  Oh, sorry, in the parachute regiment.

• 1:03:52Shawn Ryan?

  Yes.

• 1:03:52Speaker 06

  Sorry. Um, yeah, I was, so I was in the second battalion, the parachute regiment for three years.

• 1:03:58Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:03:58Speaker 06

  And then I volunteered to go into Pathfinder Platoon. And Pathfinder Platoon is again, is in, it's the brigade reconnaissance force for the airborne brigade. It's very similar. The, the, the equivalent in the US would be force recon.

• 1:04:12Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:04:13Speaker 06

  Um, so very, very hard selection to get in, fast and furious selection. Um, do the same hills as, as what you do on, like in the Brecon Beacons, running around there, navigating on your own. Um, and then once you're in there, you do high altitude lobbling, parachute descents and specialist training. They had M16s at the time when, M16A2s when the British Army was still on the SA80 weapon. So it was kind of, it's like a poor man's special forces.

• 1:04:40Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. What year is this?

• 1:04:41Speaker 06

  This is nineteen ninety-six.

• 1:04:43Shawn Ryan?

  Nineteen ninety-six.

• 1:04:44Speaker 06

  And that, and that first year in Pathfinder Platoon was probably one of the best years of my life. I had so much, so much fun. It was just a good experience. At the, I'm sure it was nineteen ninety seven, they got a sergeant major and things went bad then. Cause before it was like a band of rogues. And the sergeant major thing, it's not a, it's not a point of a sergeant ma-, not the, it's not to bad mouth the sergeant major. But beforehand, I think the command didn't have a point of contact to say, you need to tell your guys to get a haircut, you need to, you gotta wear issue equipment. So when, when the, with the emergence of a sergeant major, the, the brigade headquarters now then had a, a point of contact. So things stopped being fun.

• 1:05:28Speaker 06

  And, and, and, and almost just after a year of getting into Pathfinder's, I then had a really bad accident, road accident.

• 1:05:36Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh. This is in nineteen ninety seven.

• 1:05:38Speaker 06

  Nineteen ninety seven.

• 1:05:39Shawn Ryan?

  So this is a major.

• 1:05:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:05:41Shawn Ryan?

  This is a turning point in your life.

• 1:05:43Speaker 06

  Yes, I think again, it's one of those things what, did it have to have to happen? Probably. And it wasn't very nice, but, um, but I was badly, like badly injured.

• 1:05:55Shawn Ryan?

  What happened?

• 1:05:57Speaker 06

  Um, well, we were driving up onto, onto a mountain training exercise in, in Scotland. And on the, on a motorway, one sort of truck pulled out in front of another.

• 1:06:09Speaker 06

  The guy driving, I was in a Land Rover in the back of a Land Rover, he swerved, kind of lost control of the vehicle or vehicle because there's no witness because most people died. So that's what they think happened. Land Rover rolled down the hill. Um, I was catapulted out of the back of the Land Rover. I was in a sleeping bag and that saved my life because as the Land Rover went flat, one of the trucks rolled on top of the Land Rover and crushed it, killing the driver, another Pathfinder instantly and trapping the other Pathfinder in the passenger seat who, who, who, who was injured, but not that badly. And then I was catapulted out into, onto the, into a tree. And then they found me, when the emergency service turned up, they found me in the tree.

• 1:06:52Speaker 06

  Apparently in a sleeping bag and I was bust up. Yeah. You know, so um um I keep on forgetting one of the terms, but um so I dislocated my hip. So leg pulled out of its socket in my my hip. I broke um ribs on my uh one of the sides, this side, my right side, broke ribs there. Had a tension hemorathorax, so things will get bad there. Shh. Um broke my collarbone, my shoulder blade, um jaw, my cheek, my skull. And then I had a bleed on the brain. I had a either a subdural hematoma or extradural hematoma. On on different medical reports, they say different things. Basically, I had a bleed on the brain.

• 1:07:37Speaker 06

  Life threatening. I also broke my neck in three places and my back in seven places. So I was in a I was in a bad way. Yeah. I was pretty poorly. And um they rushed me to hospital. And then um they they notified my mother and my stepdad and they came down. And they said to my mother, he's not gonna, you know, prepared. They put me on the ward where he's like, he's in life support and I've moved him into the ward where, yeah. Be prepared that he he's gone. And then uh at some point I was resuscitated twice. And then and then I and then and then I was in a coma for three weeks. Two, two, two, two, two and a half weeks. And then I came out of it.

• 1:08:23Speaker 06

  And then uh and I came out of the coma and I'm in the and in the recovery ward. And they've taken all the luckily I was in so I was in a coma for most of the time. So I'm so I didn't really feel any I got out of it. I got I got away with it lightly. So I didn't have to and I had traction on my leg when I woke up and my neck was kind of they were fractures, but they were all stable. So I didn't have to have any of these halos or anything on.

• 1:08:48Speaker 06

  And I get, I'm in the recovery ward and I get a phone call. The nurse says, oh, there's someone phoning you at the desk. So they're taking the traction off. So I hobble down and they say, yeah, make sure you're at work. Make sure you're back at work in like two weeks' time after Christmas. There was like, it was about four weeks and I was like, okay. And it wasn't even that long ago. It's nineteen ninety seven and I didn't have any rehab at all for this. Are you serious? It's crazy, isn't it? And it's like no rehab. I didn't even get downgraded on my military docs. I'm just like, no rehab. And it was just like, make yourself better. And then eventually I did my, I did my first jump five months afterwards. And the first jump I did was a, um, from, I think it was, I looked at my logbook.

• 1:09:33Speaker 06

  It was eighteen thousand feet with full operational load out and carrying a GPMG. Just dropped him aside. That's the first jump I did after that, five months later. And I shouldn't have done it, but a young, young guy then, I'm like twenty three going, yeah, I'm good. How are you, how are you feeling? Yeah, I'm good. Yeah. I'm not good. Yeah. But I'm gonna do it. And I suffered a bit with my back for a few years after that. And then, but it's fine now, touch wood. Um, but that, that's, that, that was weird because that's a thing of, I always say to people who are injured now is like, make sure you're fit. Like, don't, no one's gonna thank you for it. No one's gonna thank you for like putting yourself on the line again early.

• 1:10:15Speaker 06

  Make sure you're recovered. But here's the other thing as well is I wasn't right. Because of maybe the bleed on the brain. I, so my memory, when I think about what I was doing in, in that nineteen ninety seven into nineteen ninety eight,

• 1:10:29Speaker 06

  until about

• 1:10:31Speaker 06

  ten months afterwards, I wasn't right, wasn't right in the head. And I thought I was right. It's like people who, do people who are, or people who are insane, do they know they're insane? No, it's a, I'd say thing, I'd get into fights, I'd be like. And then eventually I it just came I got better. But it was um but yeah, it was it it and again, I'm not throwing dirt, but I was definitely mismanaged.

• 1:10:55Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:10:56Speaker 06

  Definitely they they thought again, they thought it was I keep on saying again. They they thought it would have been better for my welfare to be down in work in a but it's a military town. So I'm always going out pretty much most nights drinking and fighting and stuff. So it was like that kind of thing. It's all a shot in the nineties. It's um it's good and bad. So but the best thing we what they should have really done is just stay at home. In hindsight, it would have been just stay at home, get fit, have some home cooking.

• 1:11:25Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:26Speaker 06

  Family look after you, keep you right. That's what they should have done.

• 1:11:28Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:11:29Speaker 06

  Because the in their like view is come down and the army would keep me right. The army doesn't keep you right. It just I was just left with the guys again. So but yeah, but I recovered from it and.

• 1:11:45Shawn Ryan?

  I know you were you were on the Iraq invasion, correct, in two thousand and three?

• 1:11:49Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:11:49Shawn Ryan?

  Let's rewind just a little bit to nine eleven, two thousand and one.

• 1:11:53Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:11:57Shawn Ryan?

  This is an interesting conversation, I think, because I've never asked a a foreign special operator what it was like on nine eleven from their perspective. And so I'd like to ask you on September eleven, two thousand and one, what where were you? And what was going through your head?

• 1:12:20Speaker 06

  Um. I was in the jungle when it happened, so I didn't hear about it initially. I was actually on selection. It was a selection that I was on. I was an SS selection that I failed. I didn't um well, I didn't fail it. I didn't pass it, but I got injured in the jungle. I got injured, I think it was on nine eleven. Um got evacuated out. I was all right, but the the training officer wouldn't let me go back into the jungle. So I was then said, come back another time.

• 1:12:46Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:12:47Speaker 06

  So I was with and then it's only when I got out from the hospital, having been checked up. Then it was still on the news. It was like and everyone's just like, what the hell? But the thing is, people like it's the common phrase was this is like it's like watching a movie. Is this really happening? And um so there was that feeling of wow. And people don't say in UK and then.

• 1:13:12Speaker 06

  I think it's quite sad to say, people in the UK, I felt when I got back, no one was really. It didn't, it didn't burn itself into society like it did in the United States. People were aware of it.

• 1:13:22Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:22Speaker 06

  But it didn't, it didn't see, you know, that searing sort of.

• 1:13:28Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:28Speaker 06

  We're under attack mentality, like focus. It was just, oh, it's another incident. That's how I view it was felt in the UK. It wasn't like this energized, there certainly wasn't people joining up. The military going, right, I've just saw nine eleven.

• 1:13:42Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:13:43Speaker 06

  Let, let's time to gear, it's time to gear up or whatever. It's that, it didn't have that effect.

• 1:13:48Shawn Ryan?

  Did it go through your head that you were probably going to go to war?

• 1:13:53Speaker 06

  Uh, kind of. I was very focused on getting into the, into the unit. So I was like, and, but, uh, but, but that. It's only in hindsight did I realize that was, that was a turning point for my life as well, because that's when.

• 1:14:11Speaker 06

  Up until nine eleven, I'd, uh, I'd done a couple of deployments with pathfinders into the Balkans and to, into Sierra Leone. But that's when, up and, up and, but they, so how do, how do I frame this? Is that. I had a life up until nine eleven. I'd always go back to my hometown a lot and then I'd. Meet my guys that I know from my hometown and go out and socialize and meet people. That's when things got real, because that's when I went, realized it was when I was nearly retiring. Yeah, it's from two thousand and one. That's when I stopped going home because things got busier. And, uh, for me, there wasn't much going, like, we were just in the unit, our first deployment was two thousand and three.

• 1:14:53Speaker 06

  So we didn't respond, uh, although pathfinders did go to, um, uh, Afghanistan in two thousand and two, two thousand and one. But I was, I was back on, I was going on selection, that got called off at the last moment. But, um, but yeah, so, but then that's when things got real. And then I joined the army, sorry, joined the, the unit in two thousand.

• 1:15:13Shawn Ryan?

  What is it, I mean, so you deployed as a ally to the United States.

• 1:15:19Speaker 06

  Mm hmm.

• 1:15:20Shawn Ryan?

  Correct. I mean, what is like, what is, what was the briefing? You know, what did? I guess, what is it like to go to war?

• 1:15:34Shawn Ryan?

  For something that happened to a country that you're not a part of.

• 1:15:39Speaker 06

  I think it all comes back to how the mainstream media and the politicians frame things, isn't it, about this. We're going because of the weapons of mass destruction, we're part of a allied task force to rid the world of evil. That kind of message isn't it. So it wasn't. I think most British soldiers didn't think they were going there in support of the of the United States.

• 1:16:04Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:16:04Speaker 06

  They're going as part of a task force, which the United States and other countries were included.

• 1:16:10Shawn Ryan?

  What did it, I mean, but it stuck. I've seen you guys there the entire time. You know, in the Iraq theater, in the Afghanistan theater. I mean, did it become apparent that that the US is going to drag this war on and on and on?

• 1:16:28Speaker 06

  No, I think I think people get, I think people just get more sort of the average like time span of people in the military isn't long career soldiers, but people just like go with it. A lot of it for myself, it's more hindsight. You think, wow, how did that happen?

• 1:16:45Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. What was the, what was the pulse of just the UK in general? I mean, Europe was, Europe was very critical of every move that the US made in that in both of those wars. However, most of them took part in the war.

• 1:17:02Speaker 06

  The media, as far as I'm aware, were pretty supportive of going to war and support our troops.

• 1:17:09Shawn Ryan?

  Really?

• 1:17:09Speaker 06

  And things I, apologies if I'm wrong. But I was, but I was there. So I mean, I was deploying, so I didn't really get it. So that I, I'm not really seeing the newspapers because I'm deployed. So that's what I think happened, but I may be wrong. But, but people might be calling me wrong and they're just working on hindsight going, no, no, no, we all, no one wanted to go to war. Tony Blair took us into an illegal war, blah, blah, blah. But I suggest that you maybe weren't saying that at the time. Now you're just saying it in hindsight because you know the information and that's easy to do. And we'll talk about it in later on. It's, people talk about it and say, remember, people, when you're doing it, you don't know the outcome.

• 1:17:51Speaker 06

  Same as, same as when people think about these weapons of mass destruction, whether at the time, people thought they existed.

• 1:18:01Speaker 06

  So.

• 1:18:03Speaker 06

  It's easy now to point fingers and say we shouldn't have done it.

• 1:18:06Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:07Speaker 06

  Um, but.

• 1:18:10Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, what was the pulse of your, your unit? Were you guys excited?

• 1:18:14Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Any, any, any opportunity um to go to combat or potential combat is, should be greeted with enthusiasm, but like, yeah, this is, hopefully this will be it. The, the two deployments done before, we hadn't really seen any combat.

• 1:18:32Speaker 06

  When I say combat, I'm using the term combat, shooting and exchange of gunfire isn't necessarily combat, in my opinion.

• 1:18:38Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:18:39Speaker 06

  So, so, but like, um, it's a lot of people in Iraq and Afghanistan will find out in the future that, you know, that then it was, it was like on.

• 1:18:49Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:18:49Speaker 06

  Some guys in the British Army had some real, real tough fights. But um, but at that time, it was kind of an unusual thing, two thousand, going into two thousand and three, it hadn't been this.

• 1:19:01Shawn Ryan?

  How long it had been since the regiment had been at, at war? Where were you guys drawing your experience?

• 1:19:09Speaker 06

  So I wasn't in the regiment in two thousand and three.

• 1:19:11Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:19:11Speaker 06

  This is, I'm still a pathfinder between.

• 1:19:13Shawn Ryan?

  Pathfinder. What, where, I guess what I'm asking is where were you guys drawing your experience from?

• 1:19:20Speaker 06

  I saw, yeah, um, again, every, sorry, it's a, sorry, I'm getting confused because sometimes people, most people call the reg, I call the unit, I call the, the SES the unit, but a lot of people call the SES the regiment.

• 1:19:31Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:19:31Speaker 06

  So when you, sometimes.

• 1:19:32Shawn Ryan?

  I meant Pathfinder.

• 1:19:33Speaker 06

  Yeah, um, uh, but from the, um.

• 1:19:38Shawn Ryan?

  Or anyone.

• 1:19:39Speaker 06

  From the parachute, the, the last sort of proper scrapping war was the Falklands War in nineteen eighty-two.

• 1:19:45Shawn Ryan?

  So you're drawing from nineteen eighty-two experience in two thousand and one.

• 1:19:50Speaker 06

  Well, two thousand and then, but then when they went to Afghanistan, they weren't, it wasn't, it was the different Afghanistan. So two thousand and three was when this army's deploying to um Iraq, to, to, to invade Iraq.

• 1:20:05Shawn Ryan?

  Do you understand what I'm asking? So, so in.

• 1:20:11Shawn Ryan?

  With the SEAL teams when we went in. You're drawing off experience from very like real world operations. I mean, there was some stuff that went down in Panama and Colombia, right? There was a couple of SEALs on the ground in Somalia. There wasn't a whole lot of experience, like real experience to draw from.

• 1:20:31Speaker 06

  Exactly the same thing.

• 1:20:32Shawn Ryan?

  You had a lot of experience of peacetime.

• 1:20:37Speaker 06

  And that was the same thing in the army I joined because as much as they were super professional and dedicated instructors and training, none of them had seen any combat.

• 1:20:48Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:49Speaker 06

  With the exception of in junior power, one, one, one corporal was in the Falklands and one of the, and this platoon sergeant was in the Falklands. But the others were talking about, yeah, kill, kill, kill, but none of them had done it before. So it was, it's interesting when you think about it like, and I think that's where the military is heading now. Is we've got a whole like generation of instructors who missed the boat on the war on terror.

• 1:21:15Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:21:15Speaker 06

  And, and, and are drawing on experience of like, so now they're teaching on opinion rather than on experience.

• 1:21:21Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, well, this is a whole nother, this is a whole nother direction that we can go into, but I, I mean, personally, I believe here in the U S, I don't, I can't speak for anywhere else. I believe that they are actively trying to

• 1:21:36Shawn Ryan?

  get rid of all of the wartime experience and that entire mindset. That's, that's why you're seeing the forced vaccinations. That's why you're seeing the woke agenda.

• 1:21:49Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:21:49Shawn Ryan?

  That's why you're seeing forced, what are they called? Inclusivity.

• 1:21:54Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:21:54Shawn Ryan?

  You know, all of these things. Nobody joins the military to deal with that kind of shit.

• 1:21:58Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:21:59Shawn Ryan?

  You know, they join the military to defend their country and go to war, fight and go to battle for their country.

• 1:22:06Speaker 06

  It seemed like a mark of shame if you say that nowadays. You say, what do you want to do? I want to go to war. Oh, and like all of the recruitment adverts were all based around either woke agenda or it's about peace, like peacetime type operations, like support and influence. Yes, they're important.

• 1:22:23Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:24Speaker 06

  But you, but it's always like that sort of narrative, not full on.

• 1:22:29Shawn Ryan?

  There's no pride in it.

• 1:22:30Speaker 06

  Full on, the Russians are attacking.

• 1:22:32Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:32Speaker 06

  It's World War III, let's go. Not, none of that. It's, and it's like, and I, and I suspect, I can only speak for myself and people might strongly disagree with this, but it's like a mark of shame now if you were served in, if you said, I, I was in the war on terror.

• 1:22:45Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:22:46Speaker 06

  It's like, oh, we don't talk about that.

• 1:22:47Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:22:48Speaker 06

  That's not what we're about.

• 1:22:49Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, we're, we're, we're getting really good at erasing history.

• 1:22:52Speaker 06

  It cost me and every, a lot of other people, a lot of things.

• 1:22:59Shawn Ryan?

  Recruiting numbers are down in the UK.

• 1:23:01Speaker 06

  I believe so, yeah.

• 1:23:03Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:03Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:23:03Shawn Ryan?

  They're, they're.

• 1:23:04Speaker 06

  And especially into the, um, I, I'm, I don't know firsthand, but I, someone said there was an article recently that recruitment into special forces or the tier one special forces is at an all time low as well.

• 1:23:16Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:16Speaker 06

  Apparently, I might be wrong, but apparently it's.

• 1:23:18Shawn Ryan?

  I know for a fact it is here. But it, it, it seems like it's just.

• 1:23:22Speaker 06

  It gives a message, it's a message. It's like, where are your action movies? All these, it's like training from the minute you're born. Now you have a generation of people, not all of them, this is the generation, well, why would I want to do that?

• 1:23:36Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:23:36Speaker 06

  Well, there's a high chance of death. High risk. Do I get paid more? Not really. Why would I want to do that?

• 1:23:42Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:23:42Speaker 06

  It's just strange.

• 1:23:43Shawn Ryan?

  It's actually a good question.

• 1:23:45Speaker 06

  Yeah, no, it's bragging rights. Isn't it, it's for like, bragging rights, this is the biggest motive, egos, I was brilliant, it's, that's what it's for. So why do you want to do it? Well, so I can say I'm a Navy SEAL.

• 1:23:55Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, looking, looking at it, like, listening to what you're saying, I'm hearing it, and I'm like, actually, this is just common sense.

• 1:24:01Speaker 06

  Yeah, who's the.

• 1:24:01Shawn Ryan?

  Do I get paid more? No. Why would I want to?

• 1:24:04Speaker 06

  Do I get paid more? No. Is there a chance of death? Yes. Sign me up.

• 1:24:08Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:09Speaker 06

  I'm in.

• 1:24:10Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:10Speaker 06

  There's a, there's a high chance you do this mission, you're never going to come back. It's a one way mission. Sounds great. Perfect.

• 1:24:17Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. Well, let's rewind, let's go back to 2003. So you deployed for the invasion.

• 1:24:24Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:24:24Shawn Ryan?

  The Iraq invasion in 2003 is a.

• 1:24:26Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:24:26Shawn Ryan?

  Is a pathfinder.

• 1:24:27Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:24:28Shawn Ryan?

  How many people are you deploying with?

• 1:24:32Speaker 06

  In my team, it was a six man team.

• 1:24:35Shawn Ryan?

  That's it.

• 1:24:35Speaker 06

  Yeah, six man, six man like reconnaissance team. I didn't, when we deployed into across the border, my patrol wasn't employed, so we was drove over in nightly, cut down Land Rovers across with the main force and then waited, we waited for a mission. I was quite, I was held in very high regard by the officer commanding of Pathfinders and he was saying, I'm not going to employ you yet, waiting for the right job for you, which was frustrating for me and frustrating for my team. And, but then I got a job and it was good.

• 1:25:13Shawn Ryan?

  What was it?

• 1:25:14Speaker 06

  It was good. It was a close target reconnaissance of an Iraqi armored division. So it meant getting close to the Iraqi armored division, on foot, going in, getting as close as you can, trying to work out numbers, routine, and also look at those, like a MSR, like a road behind the armored division. There's also a secondary mission was to check the quality of the road and what condition it was in and that kind of vibe and general atmospherics of the area.

• 1:25:45Shawn Ryan?

  So this is, so Pathfinders is a reconnaissance element?

• 1:25:49Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:25:50Shawn Ryan?

  Is there a sniper element as well?

• 1:25:52Speaker 06

  The sniper's in every team, there's a sniper in every team. So for this mission, it was like, you're gonna, there's 4,000 Iraqi troops in this armored division.

• 1:26:05Shawn Ryan?

  4,000, you guys are...

• 1:26:06Speaker 06

  And it's me.

• 1:26:07Shawn Ryan?

  Conducting surveillance.

• 1:26:08Speaker 06

  Six man team, no air support.

• 1:26:11Shawn Ryan?

  Whoa.

• 1:26:12Speaker 06

  And it's, I've got, I was a JTAC at the time, I was the team leader and I carried the radio in case we, if we needed air support, we'd do a nine line and it would, but it wasn't overhead, it would be chalk to us if we needed it. And I had to think about this, it was, it was, I'm...

• 1:26:33Speaker 06

  I'm gonna say this to everyone, it's a true story and doesn't mean everything I say is bullshit, but it was it was a good mission. And the O C actually said to me, you don't have to do this. Because it's a high, we knew, we kind of worked, they said that you're gonna come into contact with the enemy. It's high risk, you don't have to do it, but if you want it, you can do it. And I was like, of course I'm gonna do it. There's like, yeah. So I then came up with a plan and because of the.

• 1:26:58Shawn Ryan?

  Did you say, I'm gonna get paid more?

• 1:27:01Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:27:01Shawn Ryan?

  No.

• 1:27:02Speaker 06

  What?

• 1:27:02Shawn Ryan?

  Is there's a high chance of dying?

• 1:27:04Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:27:05Shawn Ryan?

  Yes.

• 1:27:05Speaker 06

  But it was.

• 1:27:06Shawn Ryan?

  I'm in.

• 1:27:06Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:27:08Speaker 06

  Um, but so, so my, how I'm doing this is we're going, um, use another patrol. To, um, we'll call a sponsored patrol. So we drove to like a release point. And so we got given this operations box around this armored division and you had three para. Third time the parachute, their sniper team was on, looking at the bottom bit. And then the armored reconnaissance was looking into the top bit and then my team was going to go into the actual hornet's nest. Um, the sponsored patrol, so all in all, it'd be two vehicles from my. Team and two vehicles from the sponsor patrol would go to a release point. And then I would leave my vehicles behind and then go in on foot.

• 1:27:48Speaker 06

  So the sponsor and, and because of noise, I didn't want to take six people. There. So I said, I'm gonna go with three people, me and two others. So we then work out who's gonna do it. So I go in, I've got my. The Army S U S A rifle with a forty, uh, mic, mic grenade launcher underneath. I've got the radio for the aircraft and then take Paddy, who was actually my second in command. Brilliant sniper, he's going in with a sniper rifle. Me, and the reason for that is. Um, when we get to a point where we're gonna approach in on foot. Paddy would then set up with his sniper rifle, give overwatch whilst me and a guy called Larry.

• 1:28:32Speaker 06

  Would then go in, two of us towards the armored vehicles and, and, and try and scope it out. So less people, less movement, less noise. And Larry, who's ended up into the SES as well, brilliant soldier, brilliant mindset. He had the M249, the Minimi. And so we had, and we had hand grenades and Browning High Power pistols. So we're, we're taking as much firepower as we can for three men. So we, on the first night, we have a bit of an incident, one of the vehicles rolls and the second in command of Pathfinder is an officer gets badly injured. And so that's the mission gets scrubbed that night. Next night, just reset and do it again.

• 1:29:17Speaker 06

  This time, everything goes well, we get to the release point and then we, the three of us set off on foot into the, into this armored division. The going from the release point to the, towards it is terrible. There's like, like mounds of mud, mud mounds, and it was so, uh, bad going. Um, so I should add as well, for that night, we blacked out all our faces. Not like camouflage cream, not blackface. So we're just like, and, and my, my theory was, because I'd heard it from an experienced SES guy years earlier, who, who taught me a lot, was that if you come face to face with the enemy, it gives you like a good edge, having camouflage cream on. Mm-hmm.

• 1:29:59Speaker 06

  And I, and we sort of knew we were going to come into contact with the enemy. And like, before we left, we stripped down our weapons, cleaned the magazines, everything, because it was like a given. People were very envious, like, we're going to do it, because we knew. So we set off on foot and it's, the going is so bad, like really bad. So I, I can't have to make command decision, but I'm going to run it through these, these two guys who are holding the highest regard. So I'm going to look, we're not going to make, we're going to, if we continue to go on this course, we're not, we're not going to.

• 1:30:33Speaker 06

  Get there in time and worst case we'll be trapped in the daylight in the open. I said, so what I suggest is we get onto this track. You know, the rules, we don't walk on tracks, but we get on this track. Move down the track at pace up until there's some set of power lines crossing it. I said, that we'll use that power lines as a, as a mark. And then get off the track and then move towards the armored division. You're happy with that? Cause it's moving on track and I know, but I think it's the best idea. And they're like, absolutely, it's the best call. So get on the track. I'm number one, Larry with the minimize is number two. And Paddy at the back with the sniper rifle. And then we're moving down this, moving down the track.

• 1:31:13Speaker 06

  As we're approaching, um, like there's like, so there's on the right hand side of this track. There's a berm about six feet high all the way down, as you, as you see in the Middle East a lot. And, um, moving down the track and I'm see the power lines and just as about to break off the power lines to go off us. The, my, uh, day sack with my packings aching my arms and I stopped to adjust it. And as I stop, I hear whispering to my right hand side. I'm like, so he whispering to my right hand side. I'm like, in Arabic. So slowly, slowly they turn and I'm like that. And we had no vision goggles on like to the two other guys in my eye. Like thumbs down like enemy, like there.

• 1:31:58Speaker 06

  Mm hmm. And then, and then, um, Larry's like stops posing like, like silently swings straight away to cover. And the distance is about, we're about eight yards apart. That's it. Uh, from, from, from each other, three of us. So there's like eight, eight yards to me, Larry, and then eight, about eight yards back to, um, Paddy. But the, the, the berm is about from me to your way and the whispering is on the other side of it. So I'm like.

• 1:32:25Speaker 06

  And um, and I'm like, till Larry and Paddy and they slowly woke up.

• 1:32:32Speaker 06

  And then as we, as he gets, I'm like, there's whisper, whispering over the other side of the berm. Like, cause it's this thing where the message was like, you can't engage the enemy unless you're getting engaged or like thing. And I'm like, and then all of a sudden, I don't know if it's because of the movement, the whispering, someone stands up behind the berm. Instantly I reach up, lean, lean up and um, and up, uh, take a shot, one shot and my weapon jams.

• 1:33:03Speaker 06

  Then I go into trance, trance state. I don't freeze out. I'm like, boom, he goes down, but my weapon stopped. Don't know why, I just run like straight down to my wallet pocket, pull out a high explosive grenade, run over the berm. Sorry, I'm missing a bit out. Be- before the uh, as they close up, I then silently go to the berm. And look over the top when my vision goggles on, and I can see around about eight to twelve Iraqi soldiers all in a huddle, talking to each other and stuff. So I think where the, where the um, power lines was, it was like a, they were using that as a, like we were as a marker and it was like a standing patrol or a sentry position.

• 1:33:46Speaker 06

  Then I closed down and then I say, eight to twelve Iraqi army, army soldiers uh, behind the berm. And I don't know if it's because they heard the movement or they heard my voice that, then then guy stands up, take the shot, he goes down. So you killed him? I don't know. I don't know if I hit him. Well, I probably hit him, but I don't know if I killed him. It was one shot with. Gadget. You know, with NATO ammo, but he goes down. I then run up with the high explosive grenade, throw it down into the uh, into all the Iraqis. That detonates.

• 1:34:18Speaker 06

  And there's a bit of a scream and there's still threat to life and they're all there. And I run and I pull out my brown high pistol, high power pistol and I um, and I uh, um, shoot five of them. So it's like a chaos drill. And um, on, on to my uh, left hand side, Larry's there, he's making music with his M two four nine. He's dealing with threats and then, and then um, Paddy with a sniper rifle, he's then throwing hand grenades to potential depth position. Wow. And uh, so this is my first experience of using lethal force and um, and there's a lot of takeaway points from this.

• 1:34:59Speaker 06

  So then, when, so then I'm like, okay, let's go. And um, um, I'm like, let's, let's go. Quickly, uh, quickly clear that stoppage. What I think had happened is the cocking handle on a SA moves back and forth. And when I fired that first round, it caught on my, like, loose um, black jacket. And then um, so that then, um, so the all threats have been neutralized, like I said, they all like, recognized straight away. Firstly, when we set up and then when we took the shot and went over the top and the detonators, they were still, you know what high explosive grenades are like. It's not like the movies where everyone gets blown. It's like, all of us done, but people are there, weapons, threat to life.

• 1:35:43Speaker 06

  We were in the middle of it, we're a war. So then we, I engaged five of them and then, and take them down. And then, like I said, all the other things go on. And then say, right, let's go, use to move back and I'll cover. So we then do the one, I'm like, holding it, they're running back, running, moving back. Um, I fired a forty mil grenade, just, just, just beyond the position, just to deter any sort of follow up. And then um, then I said, right, get on the road and let's fucking go. Um, so we did a couple of bounds and then it was turn and then run. And to all these doubters in the military, you say, when you do combat fitness tests and you've got your gear and you've got to run fast for two miles.

• 1:36:24Speaker 06

  It's for things like this and running. And we run to the emergency extraction point or the emergency rendezvous. Um, um, get there.

• 1:36:34Speaker 06

  Larry, uh, sorry, uh, Paddy then sets up his sniper rifle. So looking down, hopefully the, we're hoping there's going to be a follow up. And, um, but then I'm on the radio, yeah, send a contact report, asking for the sponsor patrol to come and pick us up. And then we're waiting in the dock and, um, it's funny because Larry's like cursing into himself quietly under his mouth going, why the fuck aren't they coming? Like he's like, and that's why we're all angry that they're not following us. Why aren't they, why aren't they trying to attack us? Why aren't they coming after us? Cause we're, again, it's our mindset.

• 1:37:10Speaker 06

  We want this armored division, there's this strange mentality, we want the armored division to mobilize and come, come at us. Mm hmm. And, um, so eventually the sponsor patrol gets here and we get extracted out and then, uh,

• 1:37:23Speaker 06

  back to, all the way back to headquarters, get their flight further and then obviously it's talk of the town because people are saying, wow, they've had close quarter engagement. Yeah. And, uh, and it's all good and we get ready to go in the next night. So it's like, so mission kind of failure because you got compromised, but they say we're happy to go in the next night to establish a, and this time the next night would go in and put an observation post in. We'd still do the CTR, but then do the observation post. But the, the takeaway point where it was like,

• 1:37:55Speaker 06

  um, so like preparation. That my, the reactions that I did and same as Paddy and Larry. They were critical because we kind of, because we kind of knew. We were going to get into a fight. The odds are it was like almost certain where, and everyone knew that, again, headquarters, everyone knew that. So we were keyed in to that. I often think if that had been a routine patrol. And we'd stumbled across the enemy in such a way, would we have reacted? Would our, would we, would we have been so keyed up? And it's the good point is, is what I'm saying to anyone who carries a gun, whether it be law enforcement, military or civilians.

• 1:38:39Speaker 06

  Do you think you're going to kill someone today? And they're like, a lot of the time I'm saying, no, I'm saying, why not?

• 1:38:45Speaker 06

  You're carrying a gun. Someone thinks that you you're such a threat that you you need to carry a gun, or you think you're a threat and you need to carry a gun. So you really should be thinking you're gonna have to use lethal force today. Otherwise, why are you carrying it? To me, it seems illogical. But again, it's and what I'm what's that to round it's not sound like a psychopath. It's so it's like have your head in the game.

• 1:39:07Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:39:08Speaker 06

  Earlier to what from what something I said earlier about seeing the signs. Knowing and like.

• 1:39:16Speaker 06

  Anyone who pulls a trigger with a surprise look on their face and never usually ends well. So it's that whole thing. You see it coming. You see the signs. You get prepared. You get your head in the game. And this could be taking place over milliseconds.

• 1:39:26Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:39:26Speaker 06

  But that's the the the good point of that.

• 1:39:28Shawn Ryan?

  That is a damn good point.

• 1:39:31Shawn Ryan?

  That's a. That's a hell of a first engagement. Rifle malfunctions.

• 1:39:37Speaker 06

  Mm hmm.

• 1:39:37Shawn Ryan?

  You go up. You use a fragmentation grenade. And then you kill five people with a pistol. What is it like going home after that?

• 1:39:49Shawn Ryan?

  What's it like going home after?

• 1:39:51Speaker 06

  Yeah, it was I mean, to me.

• 1:39:52Shawn Ryan?

  When did it register?

• 1:39:54Speaker 06

  Oh, straight away, but. It's for me. It was like, what happened? I used, I mean.

• 1:40:03Speaker 06

  It I went I went to sleep that night. This I maybe we're gonna circle back to this later on when we talk about faith. Because there's something happened in between. Um, but.

• 1:40:15Shawn Ryan?

  What happened in between? Let's just do it.

• 1:40:17Speaker 06

  Let's wait. So. So I go to the ops room. I like. What happened is I had a close quarter engagement with the enemy. Things went wrong. I performed. It was kill or be killed. And I did my job. And it was all this thing, as we all know in the military. Oh, do you think you could really kill a man? Do you think you could do that? How would you think you'd do in combat? It came to me, close quarters, closer than what the same probably the same distance that I am to you was the engagement range. And. It was high stress, high speed incident. And not only did I perform well. Paddy, my T I C and Lorraine. All thought that like like. Boom, boom, boom. And it was a good feeling, great feeling.

• 1:41:02Speaker 06

  I was tested in the ultimate way, close quarter combat, and we won, and we, and we live. And we, and we, and we fight another day. That's what it, to me, is a, a good feeling. Mm hmm. So I get to the brigade headquarters, the brigadier wants to up, update everything of that, and I'm talking to them, people are shaking their hands, saying, good job, things like that. I then see the padre, who's a friend of mine.

• 1:41:30Speaker 06

  At this point, I don't feel any guilt, so I have no guilt about it at all. I don't feel, and I still to this day don't feel bad about it. It's like, again, it's a combat experience. And I see the, I see the padre, and I look, and all of a sudden I feel this well of emotion inside me. Do you know when you, do you know when you do something bad at school, when you're a child, and you see your parents, and you think, oh, and your bottom lip starts shaking or whatever. It was like that. And he kind of must have saw that. And he, and he knew I was a, a man of faith.

• 1:42:01Speaker 06

  And he, and he said to me, he said, Chris, do you want to come take communion? Right now. And I went, yeah. So we went to a makeshift, made a makeshift sort of altar, if you like. And then he did like, he did like, to call it communion.

• 1:42:19Speaker 06

  And, and I'm

• 1:42:23Speaker 06

  there on my knees, and it felt like, had my eyes closed, praying, and it felt like someone had moved this halogen sort of light above me and turned it on. And I could feel this light and warmth going through me as I took communion. It was like, I could feel it. It's like, I could feel it. And, and not only could I feel it, it's like literal like there was a light above me, even though my eyes were closed, it was like bright, as if someone had put a searchlight above me, and I could feel the heat off the light running through my body. Wow. And I open my eyes, and the padre looks at me and says,

• 1:43:07Speaker 06

  did you feel that? And I'm like, yep. I goes, I thought it might just be me. Went, no. He goes, sometimes you, I goes, sometimes there's moments when you are close to God, and we were close to God right now.

• 1:43:24Shawn Ryan?

  What did that feel like after he said that?

• 1:43:26Speaker 06

  Yeah, it was, it was, it, it, it's a bit of a pun, because I think it enlightened me. It felt like I was, it felt like I had laser focus. It felt like I was, I felt clean, if that makes sense. I felt like I could breathe. Do you know, do you know, do you know a bit like if you've been on a spa day or something? It was like walking out of a spa day. And then I, and then I went to, this is where it maybe gets a bit lowbrow. And then went, did a report, went to where we were, my team were sleeping, got in my sleeping bag, zipped it up.

• 1:44:06Speaker 06

  And went, and as I was falling asleep, falling to sleep, it was like I was a little boy who just had the best Christmas present ever. Because, as I said earlier, I'd been tested in combat. And they, like, friends and I had all been tested. We all, and we all, we all won, we won. We were put into the, in, in the, into the hornet's nest, face to face with the enemy. And we got out of there and we, we did, we did a good job. So it was like, yeah.

• 1:44:40Shawn Ryan?

  Was that the first time in your life that you had really felt that close to God?

• 1:44:48Speaker 06

  Yes, it's one of, yeah.

• 1:44:50Shawn Ryan?

  Like he was right there?

• 1:44:51Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:44:53Shawn Ryan?

  So two first experiences within 24 hours, probably within less than 24 hours, correct?

• 1:44:58Speaker 06

  Well, within, within four hours.

• 1:45:00Shawn Ryan?

  Within four hours of each other, you had taken another man's life for the first time and felt the presence of God extremely close to you.

• 1:45:10Speaker 06

  Extremely close. I think I felt him, the presence of God before that.

• 1:45:13Shawn Ryan?

  Do you think that's a coincidence?

• 1:45:15Speaker 06

  No, no.

• 1:45:17Shawn Ryan?

  Why do you think that happened at that point in time?

• 1:45:20Speaker 06

  I think it was, it was part, it's all part of a, it's the, like, every time I move away from faith, I get pulled back in. So.

• 1:45:33Shawn Ryan?

  Let's take a break.

• 1:45:33Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:45:37Speaker 01

  Mr. President, my company told me of the explosion on our rig.

• 1:45:41Speaker 02

  On October 2nd.

• 1:45:42Speaker 01

  Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all heap the blame on me.

• 1:45:47Speaker 02

  Tom Cruise is.

• 1:45:48Speaker 03

  Digger got us into this mess, and Digger's gonna dig us up.

• 1:45:52Speaker 02

  From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 1:45:54Speaker 04

  What would happen if I stopped doing it? You stall, you freeze in there, that's what.

• 1:45:58Speaker 02

  With great power comes great deniability.

• 1:46:01Speaker 04

  I'm not the first daddy.

• 1:46:03Speaker 02

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17. Not a minute without parent.

• 1:46:12Speaker 01

  Mr. President, my company told me of the explosion on our rig.

• 1:46:15Speaker 02

  On October 2nd.

• 1:46:16Speaker 01

  Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all heap the blame on me.

• 1:46:21Speaker 02

  Tom Cruise is.

• 1:46:22Speaker 03

  Digger got us into this mess, and Digger's gonna dig us up.

• 1:46:26Speaker 02

  From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 1:46:28Speaker 04

  What would happen if I stopped doing it? You stall, you freeze in there, that's what.

• 1:46:33Speaker 02

  With great power comes great deniability.

• 1:46:36Speaker 04

  I'm not the first daddy.

• 1:46:37Speaker 02

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17. Not a minute without parent.

• 1:46:46Shawn Ryan?

  All right, Christian, we're back from the break. We had just kind of covered your first operational combat experience with the Iraq invasion. And so before we move on in your career, is there anything else that you would like to discuss when it comes to the Pathfinder stuff?

• 1:47:04Speaker 06

  I think I'll just leave it at that.

• 1:47:06Shawn Ryan?

  You want to leave it at that?

• 1:47:07Speaker 06

  Yeah, I'll leave it at that. They're stories.

• 1:47:09Shawn Ryan?

  Perfect. Well, let's move into the SAS. It took you three times to get in there.

• 1:47:19Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:47:20Shawn Ryan?

  When did you find out about the special air service?

• 1:47:27Speaker 06

  I knew, I found it quite young as a, as a, when I was quite young.

• 1:47:31Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:47:32Speaker 06

  As there still are today, they're within newspapers a lot. The Iranian Embassy siege happened in nineteen eighty. I, I can't remember that. I, I was, I was in four years old, but I, I got, people say they remember it. I, I don't remember it. But, but I'd always heard them being mentioned and, and it's still to this day is what people say. It's the, it's the magic dust of the coun- country. Oh, they should just send the S A S in to go and get them or to kill them or to do this or to. So that's what the, the working man is like, is like saying, oh, just send the S A S in. They'll sort them out. So, um, and then the movie, as mentioned before, Who Dies Wins? I saw that when I was, I think I would have been eleven or twelve years old,

• 1:48:16Speaker 06

  which is still, you could argue too young to see that movie, but I saw it. And in my mind, I always, that's why I was, I need, I need to be in the S A S.

• 1:48:25Shawn Ryan?

  Hmm.

• 1:48:25Speaker 06

  When I joined the army and when I was in training and when I was in, I never mentioned about joining the S A S. I never, I never openly said it to people. Well, I want to do one thing at a time. I wanted to get in the parachute regiment first. Let's get in the parachute regiment first and then. So, but in my heart, even when I went into the army recruiting office and I wanted to.

• 1:48:47Shawn Ryan?

  You know.

• 1:48:48Speaker 06

  I wanted to be in the S A S.

• 1:48:50Shawn Ryan?

  You know. What is the, can you, can you explain a little bit of the difference between S A S and S B S?

• 1:48:57Speaker 06

  There, there's kind of no real difference. Um, they do the same, well, there's no real difference. One is the, so the, there are these lots of different, people will say, oh, what's he saying that for? The selection process is identical, so we do a joint selection.

• 1:49:14Shawn Ryan?

  Okay, so you're mixed in.

• 1:49:15Speaker 06

  Yeah, so you do a joint selection and, and that's, and, and they're, and they're the, but the, on paper, they are the maritime, um, tier one special forces element.

• 1:49:25Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 1:49:26Speaker 06

  So.

• 1:49:26Shawn Ryan?

  So there's not one up here and one, they're equivalent.

• 1:49:30Speaker 06

  They're supposed to be the same.

• 1:49:33Shawn Ryan?

  Roger that. Roger that.

• 1:49:37Shawn Ryan?

  When it comes to the selection, are you recruited for SBS SAS?

• 1:49:42Speaker 06

  You volunteer.

• 1:49:43Shawn Ryan?

  You volunteer. Do you volunteer for... Are they... Do they both fall under an umbrella?

• 1:49:49Speaker 06

  You can if you're in the army, apply to join the SBS. And if you're in the Navy or the Royal Marines, you can apply to join the SAS. Or RAF as well.

• 1:49:59Shawn Ryan?

  So this is basically Delta SEAL Team Six equivalents, if correct? SBS would be more the Team Six, Delta would be more the SAS?

• 1:50:08Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:50:09Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. Makes sense.

• 1:50:11Speaker 06

  And you volunteer, so you put a request in through your unit, that goes to the recruitment cell, and then you have to do some courses, pre-courses to go on selection, and then you go on selection, and it's a six-month process. And then continuation training after you're badged into your unit. But the continuation training is then separated. So the guys who pass SAS selection do their continuation training in Hereford and the SBS in Poole, and that's where they'll do their dive training and things.

• 1:50:47Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. Do you guys do dive training?

• 1:50:49Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:50:50Shawn Ryan?

  No? All air stuff?

• 1:50:53Speaker 06

  It's just a mix.

• 1:50:54Shawn Ryan?

  Oh, okay. Gotcha. What is the... What are they looking... What do you think they're looking for when it comes to recruiting SAS guys?

• 1:51:08Speaker 06

  I think being blunderberr is to want people who are physically capable, whatever that means, so robust and fit, really fit and really robust. But more importantly, a selection continues, you need to be able to assimilate information. And time is always precious. In theory, selection should be much longer, but we're sort of cramming a lot of stuff in and trying to test and evaluate. So we want people who can pick up, assimilate information quickly, get told something, put into practice, and then do the next skill set.

• 1:51:51Speaker 06

  And being able to work with other people is another key requirement. So that's kind of what they're looking for.

• 1:51:58Shawn Ryan?

  Is there a certain type of... Disposition, attitude, demeanor that they're looking for.

• 1:52:07Speaker 06

  Not what they're looking for. I think people just fall into that category.

• 1:52:12Shawn Ryan?

  What is it like, do they have interviews before you go to the selection?

• 1:52:17Speaker 06

  I'm not, they didn't when I was.

• 1:52:19Shawn Ryan?

  You just throw your name in the hat, get approved and you're in?

• 1:52:21Speaker 06

  Yeah. Well, yeah. And you do the course here.

• 1:52:24Shawn Ryan?

  Interesting. What is the, what would you say the culture is like? What is it like when you show up for selection? Are they welcoming? Do they treat you like shit?

• 1:52:33Speaker 06

  No, it's very quiet. It's just people, again, we're on the borders of what I'm going to talk about and not talk about. But when you turn up selection, it's similar to joining the army again. Everyone's measuring everyone up. The, from the instructor point of view, they're not saying anything. They're not imposing anything. They're not, they don't need to.

• 1:52:52Shawn Ryan?

  Strictly evaluation.

• 1:52:53Speaker 06

  It's just they're not, they're not like screaming, shouting, doing whatever. They're just, they're, they're part of the, they don't, like you said, the selection process. They, they, people know what they're getting into, but it's more of the, you know, when 200 people or so, just short of 200 people turn up on day one and you're looking around going statistically about, you know, six to, six to 12 people are going to graduate out of this.

• 1:53:16Shawn Ryan?

  So you get about a 5% chance of making it.

• 1:53:19Speaker 06

  Sometimes it's bigger courses, sometimes it's smaller, but like pass. But you're looking around and you're thinking, who, who's going to pass? Am I going to be one of these? Is there someone else? And you're weighing it up and just getting the measure of people, I suppose.

• 1:53:33Speaker 06

  And then it starts.

• 1:53:34Shawn Ryan?

  That's roughly a 5% success rate.

• 1:53:39Speaker 06

  I believe so. That's what it should be.

• 1:53:41Shawn Ryan?

  How many people came out with you?

• 1:53:42Speaker 06

  Well, we had a, had a quite a big course. It must've been easy. So it's like, I think 18.

• 1:53:47Shawn Ryan?

  18 came out?

• 1:53:48Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:53:49Shawn Ryan?

  Nice. At what point do you figure out if you're going SAS or SBS?

• 1:53:54Speaker 06

  Beforehand.

• 1:53:56Shawn Ryan?

  Before, so you know what you're trying out for beforehand? They don't?

• 1:54:00Speaker 06

  They don't, they don't put you into a box and say, you had actually been better in the SBS and you, it's, that's, that's what you put in for, for service in the SAS. Then that may have changed now. I'm not sure. I'm out of the loop somewhat.

• 1:54:13Shawn Ryan?

  So what, what happens if they have a class where everybody wants to go SAS?

• 1:54:16Speaker 06

  That's it. And sometimes there's been courses where just one person has passed.

• 1:54:21Shawn Ryan?

  No shit.

• 1:54:21Speaker 06

  Two, two people, I think as well. And, you know, so it's like, yeah.

• 1:54:24Shawn Ryan?

  Interesting. Well, how do they fill billets?

• 1:54:28Speaker 06

  That could be a potential problems. I've, I'm, I'm kind of, I'm, I'm out of the loop now, so the, the big problem is is we have a lot of people. I think people are leaving now because of the war and terrorists finished. So, so this tends to be people leaving and sometimes the more people are leaving than coming in.

• 1:54:47Shawn Ryan?

  Man, you know, it's really, it's really interesting just to see. It's, we're gonna go off on a tangent here, so get ready. But it's really interesting to me to watch special operations, the tip of the spear globally just diminish and vanish into, I feel like it's gonna vanish into nothing. You know, the, the Canadian guys, have you ever worked with them, the CANSOF?

• 1:55:17Speaker 06

  I've got some friends.

• 1:55:18Shawn Ryan?

  Guys, I mean, recruitment numbers way down, way, completely demoralize the unit. I interviewed this guy Dallas Alexander.

• 1:55:28Speaker 06

  I know that, he's a friend of mine.

• 1:55:29Shawn Ryan?

  No kidding? You guys know each other?

• 1:55:31Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:55:32Shawn Ryan?

  Well, damn, I wanted to connect you, but so much for that.

• 1:55:34Speaker 06

  Yeah, we, um, yeah, we met recently at the, we're supporting Frontline Healing Foundation and he was playing his stuff and that's the first time we met.

• 1:55:44Shawn Ryan?

  Oh, cool.

• 1:55:44Speaker 06

  But we talked to each other before and like, so it was like, but he's a real great guy.

• 1:55:49Shawn Ryan?

  I love that guy, man. Salt of the earth, like, just.

• 1:55:52Speaker 06

  That's what I keep saying to him now, goes, remember me when you're super famous. Remember me, remember me when you, when you, cause he is good and this is not a shameless, what do you call it, like a plug for him? He is, I said, you are, you're waiting to. Yeah, this, this, yeah.

• 1:56:10Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:11Speaker 06

  He's, he's, he's, some of his tracks are like, good.

• 1:56:14Shawn Ryan?

  But their numbers are down. British Special Forces numbers are down, American Special Forces numbers are down. Nobody's signing up for this. I feel like the special operator is becoming obsolete. Do you, do you feel like that? I feel like warfare is evolving and the...

• 1:56:38Shawn Ryan?

  Special operator is is is being phased out.

• 1:56:41Speaker 06

  I I would say, I think it's more of the ebb and flow of society and the military. You know, and some things are popular, some things aren't popular, and it's just this. Um, and and and I I don't, I can't really speak on behalf of UK Special Forces, because like I say, I'm out of the loop, so I don't know how their recruiting is and how their retention is. But I've heard it's not good, but I might be not, I'd be wrong, but it's this ebb and flow of like, right now, they're not, they're not, like, ten years ago, that they were the, they were the, the, the, the pick of the litter.

• 1:57:19Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 1:57:20Speaker 06

  Now, maybe, like, things are focusing elsewhere, or who knows, and and like I say, it's just an ebb and flow. And and it's usually if something happens to then, oh, we need to make this a priority again.

• 1:57:32Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, it's it's a real shame to just watch all the experience disappear, you know, because

• 1:57:41Shawn Ryan?

  when the next one, you know, when the next war comes up, that that experience, all of that experience will be gone. Because they've demoralized the unit, the units, plural.

• 1:57:52Speaker 06

  I I I think part of the problem with with this, it's not, this is not focused to Special Forces, is when you have

• 1:58:02Speaker 06

  leadership who

• 1:58:06Speaker 06

  look to the the the political side of things and try and please their political masters and like, instead of like the focus of supporting the army, they're just looking for the next gig probably. And to be popular with the with their political masters and you know, they're to know, so that's why everything's, all this corporate knowledge is just lost. Yeah, all this skill sets, they don't care because it's like a black mark. I was in the, I was served in Iraq and Afghanistan. And people might say, oh, we don't talk about that. We don't want to know what you did.

• 1:58:34Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:35Speaker 06

  We don't want to know that. And and rather than saying, right, what did you, what did you actually learn? What did, what was some of the points? So we know now we've got a whole generation, potentially of instructors who haven't been in a you haven't done like FOB life, you know, like from an art, this is speaking from a Green Army point of view. All these guys who served in FOBs and leaders and things, and now they've gone. And now there might be another generation who they didn't pass that on to.

• 1:59:01Shawn Ryan?

  They need that information.

• 1:59:03Speaker 06

  No one decided to capture it.

• 1:59:05Shawn Ryan?

  It's it's.

• 1:59:07Shawn Ryan?

  Not only do they not decide to capture it, they have ostracized the experience from some of the units. Dallas is a perfect example. I mean, the man was on a, what, four man sniper team that has the longest sniper kill

• 1:59:23Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:59:23Shawn Ryan?

  in the history of the world. And they ostracized him from the unit. They flushed that experience down the fucking toilet.

• 1:59:33Speaker 06

  There is an element, isn't there? We've covered this and it's

• 1:59:36Shawn Ryan?

  You do.

• 1:59:37Speaker 06

  first time I've seen it is the veterans. It didn't matter what stage, don't like success. They don't like good things.

• 1:59:44Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 1:59:45Speaker 06

  Someone takes the longest sniper shot.

• 1:59:47Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, with what you were involved in in Nairobi and all the experience that we're that we don't even know about. I mean, they have.

• 2:00:00Shawn Ryan?

  We'd look at the experience you have to pass on to the future generations of SAS. And they fucking flush that down the toilet. It is, it's, it's

• 2:00:10Shawn Ryan?

  it's disgusting. You know, you, you, you could have imparted a lot more wisdom than you have on that unit. And I'm sure you would have been.

• 2:00:21Speaker 06

  So I have to like say, I am on good terms with, with my, with, with two two SAS.

• 2:00:27Shawn Ryan?

  You are.

• 2:00:28Speaker 06

  At this moment in time, I'm on good, good terms. I, and I, there's a whole lot of reasons why I retired. I didn't retire bitter. I, I did, I did have some grievances with some leadership members. And I felt that either they were jealous of what I did, or they were getting pressure from outside of the regiment.

• 2:00:52Speaker 06

  But it was more of timing thing. I did 28 years and, and things like, so I left, I left the SAS extremely proud that I'd served in that unit. And I was on camp just about three weeks ago, talking with the Commandant's Army Major. And

• 2:01:08Speaker 06

  so, so, and like, so hey, I'm friendly forces and you know, and like I said to him, I'm not, I'm not bitter towards the regiment. I'm bitter towards the British government. I'm British towards the Ministry of Defence. And I'm British towards some personalities of leadership

• 2:01:24Speaker 06

  who were in command in 2019, 2020. That's, that's my, that's my issue. And it's all personal stuff. It's not, but, but as a, as a, as a

• 2:01:36Speaker 06

  Yeah, I'm I'm I'm super proud of the SAS and I would always support them if I could.

• 2:01:40Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 2:01:40Speaker 06

  Um, but but that to your point is it's not just me, there's lots of men with lots of experience and once you're out, they don't care.

• 2:01:47Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 2:01:48Speaker 06

  They're not saying, they're not calling people back or saying, what do you think about this? They're not saying, I mean, I get messages from operators saying, hey, I'm looking at this weapon scope. What do you think on it? What we're looking about doing this sort of drill for hostage rescue. What do you think? And I'm like, all right, okay, well.

• 2:02:04Shawn Ryan?

  Well, you know, they do.

• 2:02:05Speaker 06

  And that's what comes back to you on this on the of of support. Um, maybe we'll touch on it later, but that's one thing I'm extremely grateful for is that I've had nothing but support from

• 2:02:18Speaker 06

  members of members and peers of the SAS, not just guys I served with, but the older generation have all supported me. And now the future generation, they're coming up to me when they're seeing me in her if and say, you don't know who I am, but I'm actually, I'm in whatever squadron. You inspired me to join the join the join the SAS. Thanks. And the guys all send their regards and stuff. And it's not just about what I did that day. They're actually talking about social media. Um, the potential book, which probably isn't going to come out, but the book that's been written. Um, that they say this is a story that needs to be told. And we'll we'll touch on that in a bit anyway, but it's good to get, you know, it's good to get support from your peers.

• 2:03:02Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:03:03Speaker 06

  And.

• 2:03:04Shawn Ryan?

  Let's talk about the culture within that unit. Let's talk about the the just the culture. What daily life is like is an SAS operator. So what do I mean by the culture? I mean, how are you received when you make it through selection and you get to you?

• 2:03:19Speaker 06

  I think, um, again, I kind of don't want to really talk much about this. It's everyone's just driven and they're working towards whatever the mission at hand is. That's it.

• 2:03:29Shawn Ryan?

  That's it.

• 2:03:30Speaker 06

  Yeah, that's all I'm gonna say on that. Every squadron is different. Every team is different. The best way to round it all off is everyone in that, nearly everyone, the driven professionals working towards whatever mission is their focus.

• 2:03:44Speaker 06

  That's, that's, that's what it is across the board.

• 2:03:47Shawn Ryan?

  Okay. Well, we will scoot past SAS into fifteen January twenty nineteen Nairobi, Kenya. Five terrorists from Al Shabab Somalia. It was a nineteen hour gunfight standoff evacuated approximately seven hundred civilians. There were twenty one casualties, twenty eight wounded, nineteen Kenyans, one American, one British.

• 2:04:15Shawn Ryan?

  Was at the Dusset D two luxury hotel in fourteen Riverside Plaza. In Nairobi's affluent Westgate neighborhood.

• 2:04:28Shawn Ryan?

  Let's talk about that day.

• 2:04:31Speaker 06

  So.

• 2:04:32Shawn Ryan?

  How did that day start?

• 2:04:36Speaker 06

  So that, that day, um, just before we go into it and people set up and the incident itself, people know about it. Am I going to talk about that incident? Not really. I'm going to talk around it. And I'm going to mention it, but I'm not going to talk about what I did and what happened that day, just so we're clear. Just so people are aware of this. But it's a remarkable day and a remarkable story.

• 2:05:05Speaker 06

  And it starts, the day started in an unusual way. So I, I did my own little bit of training that, that morning, just by myself. I was training out in, in the, in a rural area. And didn't finish my day's training or my morning's training was early start. And I'm driving back to the city. Driving down the road and as I pull onto what I would call the main, but it's just a dirt track leading into the city. I pull on and on this dirt track, you sometimes see a Maasai tribesman walking down it. You sometimes see workmen who are working on the Chinese rail circuit in, in Kenya. But you don't really see many people on this dirt track because

• 2:05:47Speaker 06

  to walk from where I pulled onto the road to the nearest village would probably take you a good three hours plus. And it's a dirt track. So I pull onto this, as I pull onto this track,

• 2:06:00Speaker 06

  I'm kind of taken off guard because I see this guy walking down the road and he's dressed, a short black guy, rounded black guy, um, wearing a business suit, immaculate business suit and highly polished shoes. And then something, I do something strange. I do something that I shouldn't have done.

• 2:06:23Speaker 06

  Just common sense, nothing to do with drills, procedures. I stopped, stopped my vehicle, put the window down and say, hey, hey buddy, do you want a lift? Something compelled me to pick him up to say, do you want a lift? And why, why I did that, you know, I would not have normally done that. And but something compelled me to do that. So a big smile and he runs over and gets into the car. Uh, start driving off and he's like, what's your, thank you so much for this. What's your name? I'm like, it's Chris. And he's like, tells me his name. And then he looks and says, how old are you? So I'm, time like forty three. He goes, I'm forty three. So when were you born? I said, September. So I was born in September.

• 2:07:09Speaker 06

  What day were you born? And I said, fifteenth. He's like, I don't know what day I was born, but this is a good sign because that means in September nineteen seventy five, Chris and his name were both born. And he chuckles. He's like, he says some of this, I can't really recall. Driving a bit further and then he reaches into his pocket. My internal spider sense is not triggered, triggered here. I'm, don't feel threatened, anything, don't feel. And he pulls out this big like dagger. And it's an odd dagger and what was, I found was odd was curved. But they had a double tip, so had two tips at the end, which I'd never seen. And it, and it, and I said, and I just smile and say, you're not going to try and kill me with that, are you?

• 2:07:54Speaker 06

  And he's like, no, no, I'm not going to kill you. This is a, I carry this when I'm traveling on this road in case I come across any demons or evil spirits. It comes in very handy. And he chuckles to himself and puts it away.

• 2:08:06Speaker 06

  So then moving on and I turn, as I, I tend to say, judging how you're dressed, I take it you're going into the city. And he's like, no, no, no, no, please just drop me off at the first village we come to. And I said, oh, we're approaching one now and it, it's an African village, so it's, it's an African village, right? And um, and I went, this village is like, yes, yes, but don't, don't take me into the village, drop me just off outside. So, okay.

• 2:08:31Speaker 06

  So um, as we come to a stop, he opens the door.

• 2:08:36Speaker 06

  And then as his foot hits the ground, something happens. His foot hits the ground and his face changes.

• 2:08:43Speaker 06

  When I say changes, it's still the same man, but it's a bit like if I was, you know, when someone offends you and you pull their face like. Like you, if I'm going from smiling, you'd be like all serious, like what? His face changed. And then he said, Chris. And when he said, Chris.

• 2:09:01Speaker 06

  I felt it in my heart. It like, it, it, it wasn't loud, but it was loud.

• 2:09:07Shawn Ryan?

  With stern.

• 2:09:08Speaker 06

  It was, it was like, it wasn't, it wasn't like shout Chris, but it was, he could have.

• 2:09:17Speaker 06

  Like, and it's hard to explain, it wasn't loud, but it was loud, it wasn't loud, but it was deafening. He's like, Chris. May God bless you many times this day.

• 2:09:27Speaker 06

  And then like that, his face just snapped out of it and he's like, thank you, thank you, thanks, thanks, thanks. Back in his normal voice, normal face. And he closed the door and I drove off.

• 2:09:37Speaker 06

  And I got about a hundred and fifty yards down the road, I couldn't see him again. I think he might have just gone into a, into a, a, a, a house or a hut, whatever. And I, I kind of thought that was, that was odd. Thirty hours later, after the most remarkable day of my life, I came to think about it a lot more.

• 2:09:59Shawn Ryan?

  What happened?

• 2:10:00Speaker 06

  Well, then, a few hours later, uh, five terrorists attacked the Dusset D2 Hotel Complex. Five hours there, so on. But everything, the strange thing, not the strange thing, but traditionally, I'm, I would see myself as unlucky. And if someone had said, "This is going to happen on your watch", I'd normally say, "Well, I'm probably going to be on leave, somewhere else, not available, don't hear about it." But from the moment I dropped that man off, and he said, "May God bless you many times this day", everything was perfect. I got my haircut. I went and got my haircut after that. Had a haircut. I then had lunch. I then got home, had a shower.

• 2:10:45Speaker 06

  And, again, I'm not going to go into detail of the incident, but every second counted. And if anything then was off, everything was just perfect. And then the whole, and then, not only perfect, but the whole, everything else was just like, yeah.

• 2:11:01Shawn Ryan?

  What were you doing when the incident kicked off?

• 2:11:03Speaker 06

  Uh, I just got out of the shower.

• 2:11:06Shawn Ryan?

  How did you hear about it?

• 2:11:07Speaker 06

  A friend of mine who was in the complex called me. And was like, "Chris, there's a complex attack going on. I'm not armed. I'm laying low in my office. You gotta come down here." So I'm on my way. I didn't know where I was. Um, I'd never been there before.

• 2:11:26Speaker 06

  Put it in my sat nav and went and responded.

• 2:11:29Shawn Ryan?

  Now, from what I understand, you were told to stand down and not enter?

• 2:11:34Speaker 06

  No.

• 2:11:35Shawn Ryan?

  That's not true?

• 2:11:35Speaker 06

  No. I, uh, I didn't, no, I just, the difference is I had no authority. So no one had told me to go, and no one told me not to go.

• 2:11:50Shawn Ryan?

  Did you feel compelled to go?

• 2:11:52Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:11:54Shawn Ryan?

  Did anybody go with you?

• 2:11:56Speaker 06

  Not initially.

• 2:11:58Speaker 06

  But that's, again, we're going into this gray area now of what I can say, can't say, but the bottom line is, I turned up

• 2:12:07Speaker 06

  with a view to doing something else. And people were being murdered. And I heard it.

• 2:12:16Speaker 06

  I heard a woman, I had gunfire grenades going off. I asked. And I assumed that was people dealing with the terrorists. And I was like, hey, special forces in there, police in there. And the security guard, no one's there, no one's here, no one's in there. Around that same time, I heard a woman, I heard a woman scream. And then I heard gunfire, and I cut the scream off. And I realized that woman had just been murdered. Or someone had just been shot. And I was like, right, I'm going in. And then the rest is history. And not, not, not really up for discussion at this point.

• 2:12:56Shawn Ryan?

  Can I ask you yes or no questions?

• 2:12:59Speaker 06

  You can ask me, and I'll just maybe say, if I can't comment, I won't comment. I'll say no comment.

• 2:13:05Shawn Ryan?

  Did you engage anybody when you entered the building?

• 2:13:12Shawn Ryan?

  Did you personally save anybody from that building?

• 2:13:18Speaker 06

  I think there's video evidence of someone who looks like me doing stuff like that.

• 2:13:24Shawn Ryan?

  How many people did that individual that looks like you save?

• 2:13:29Speaker 06

  Um, allegedly, people say seven hundred. Um, that's

• 2:13:34Shawn Ryan?

  Seven hundred people?

• 2:13:35Speaker 06

  That's what people have said that I'm responsible for saving that day.

• 2:13:40Speaker 06

  And I, I don't think I'm going into any, any like legal area here, but I mean, maybe from the, from the view of the MOD, they might be like, snark, sharpening their eyes right now for what I've said, not said. But, um,

• 2:13:54Speaker 06

  you know, I, I, I went in alone. But then it became a team effort with, with some remarkable individuals.

• 2:14:04Shawn Ryan?

  Kenyans?

• 2:14:06Speaker 06

  Yes, yes.

• 2:14:09Shawn Ryan?

  How uncomfortable are you right now?

• 2:14:10Speaker 06

  Pretty uncomfortable. So.

• 2:14:14Shawn Ryan?

  Is there anything you want me to ask you?

• 2:14:18Speaker 06

  No, I mean, we can just talk about, again, I think the whole incident, people can see, and the only thing that I can add to the incident is like things that I did inside there and things that happened. And I can, and, and people have got good imagination, so they can imagine what happened inside there. So I don't need to, I don't need to upset people and, and break any kind of rules. But, um, yeah, I, that incident happened and then I, and then it finished the next day and I, and I was there throughout. Um, and I, I'm just not going to say about what I, what I did exactly. People can probably work it out. Um, but it was the most remarkable day of my life and I've done, I've done close to a thousand door kicking missions. And, um, there's

• 2:15:01Speaker 06

  nothing was ever like that day, nothing. And we talk, people talk about flow state and whether it be training, I still do CQB today, and you still enter that flow state when you cross the threshold, whatever that be, whether it be skydiving, whether it be a CQB, whether it be some sort of sporting event. There's, you know, when you get dialed in and you, you like, like it's on.

• 2:15:27Speaker 06

  That day is, I unlocked some sort of superpower on that day. When I crossed that threshold or whatever that point was, it felt like I could say further. I could hear things. I could move faster. I was stronger. My mental agility. I really unlocked this like flow state, which was like, I'd have similar incidents before my military career. But on that day, if you could bottle that, I'm, I keep meaning to talk to Red Bull. I, I'm in contact with, with Red Bull about flow state and, and things. Oh, that's what my, I haven't really talked much to them about, just

• 2:16:08Speaker 06

  made the, made the introduction. But if you could bottle that, or you could tap into that at will, then that's something to, that would, as a warrior, you could do remarkable things, or sports, or an athlete, or whatever. But when that, I thought I tapped into true flow state before that. But once that day, it was like, yeah, that's what it's like to be on, on fire, to be. When they say dialed in, yeah, I was, I was working hard.

• 2:16:42Shawn Ryan?

  What ended it? What ended the incident? When did you know it was finished?

• 2:16:53Speaker 06

  I suppose when all threats neutralized.

• 2:17:00Shawn Ryan?

  How long did that take?

• 2:17:03Speaker 06

  That was, the whole incident ended the following morning.

• 2:17:11Shawn Ryan?

  It was about 18 hours?

• 2:17:14Speaker 06

  Yeah, I think from suicide detonation to building clean secure was about 18 hours.

• 2:17:22Speaker 06

  And then, and then I went home for a couple, well, I didn't go home actually. But I did some bits and pieces and then eventually I went home for a cup of tea.

• 2:17:29Shawn Ryan?

  What, what did you do after, after the dust had settled, after the last threat was neutralized?

• 2:17:36Speaker 06

  I can't really talk about, well, you know, again, that's still, that's still in the theory of, of what happened that day. Again, I don't know how.

• 2:17:43Shawn Ryan?

  What was your emotional algorithm?

• 2:17:45Speaker 06

  Buzzing.

• 2:17:47Speaker 06

  And then there's something happened afterwards and like,

• 2:17:52Speaker 06

  I'm not gonna talk about and things happen and then I go back home. So I get home in the afternoon and.

• 2:17:58Shawn Ryan?

  Let's just talk about your emotions. I'm not asking about actions on objective, on objective.

• 2:18:03Speaker 06

  Yeah, no, I'm just.

• 2:18:04Shawn Ryan?

  I'm asking about what's going on up here.

• 2:18:06Speaker 06

  I'm like.

• 2:18:07Shawn Ryan?

  How are you processing what just happened?

• 2:18:09Speaker 06

  I'm still like zero laser, like laser focused sort of on high. And a friend of mine, the padre, came out to see me a few days later. And he said, you could feel it. You could feel it around you. You could feel this buzz off you still days after the event. And you were like, yeah.

• 2:18:30Speaker 06

  You could feel this energy coming off you. And I didn't sleep well for days afterwards. I was still, bodies just processing, still running on adrenaline.

• 2:18:41Speaker 06

  Um, and then the this the thing we're feeling is like dialed in and then.

• 2:18:47Speaker 06

  Um, when I I went home, went went to the house and my house and had a shower, put a kikoi on, which is like a sh- a sarong.

• 2:18:56Shawn Ryan?

  When you say home, are you talking UK or are you talking?

• 2:18:58Speaker 06

  Talking Kenya, where I was living. And make a cup of tea, turn on the TV, I'm on the Sky News. Put on, I put at the my iTunes on shuffle, NXS starts playing a song that I had. I I'm a big fan of NXS, but never heard this song, it's called Searching. And like lyrics, I am searching, I am not alone and stuff like that. And I'm just like, that's when it hits me. That's when that's when I'm like, my eyes well up and I'm like, what just happened? What just happened? Like, it hadn't really sunk in.

• 2:19:35Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:19:36Speaker 06

  And then for a few days after, I kept on bursting into tears, like burst out crying. And it wasn't, anything wasn't triggered. It wasn't things that were triggering me. I didn't, and I asked the doctor about this. I said, doctor, I'm like, I keep on bursting into tears. Said, but the strange thing is, I'm not being triggered. I'm not like hearing something and or seeing something and it's triggering me. I feel fine. I feel absolutely fine. And then all of a sudden, without being able to control, I'm like, like, start crying. I said, what what the hell's going on? Because I feel fine. And he's like, it's in a, he, this doctor was like, it's adrenaline dump. He goes, you've just got, you've just pumped all this adrenaline. It'd been through a traumatic experience. And this is like, this is like a release thing.

• 2:20:17Speaker 06

  And that was a strange thing. It wasn't like, say, it wasn't triggered. I didn't hear a sad song or I didn't see something. It was just like driving along and all of a sudden like, like, what's this coming from? It's like.

• 2:20:26Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:20:27Speaker 06

  Like a kind of diarrhea for crying. It was just like, oh, no, I can't stop it. And then I just like start crying. And eventually it stopped. That was a interesting thing that I'd never experienced before.

• 2:20:38Shawn Ryan?

  What was the thought process going through your head when you had noticed that you were on all of the news channels and that somebody had captured you entering that?

• 2:20:45Speaker 06

  Yeah, it didn't really sink in very well. Didn't, it was just like.

• 2:20:52Speaker 06

  In some ways it still hasn't.

• 2:20:54Shawn Ryan?

  You're in a trance.

• 2:20:55Speaker 06

  Yeah, like in some ways I still still feel that way. That did, did it really happen? I don't know. Yeah, well, it did, obviously, but I do know.

• 2:21:06Shawn Ryan?

  Do you keep in touch with anybody that was in that building?

• 2:21:08Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 2:21:09Shawn Ryan?

  Who's that?

• 2:21:10Speaker 06

  Uh, Merely, she's an American, um, American lady who is in her, in the, in her room there.

• 2:21:17Speaker 06

  Um, she wrote the book Terrorist Attack Girl, so. And I keep in touch with some other people connected to the incident.

• 2:21:27Shawn Ryan?

  What's it like to hear from the woman that wrote that book?

• 2:21:31Speaker 06

  I mean, um, yeah, it's, I'm, I love, I love Merely a bit. She's like, um, and her book is amazing, Terrorist Attack Girl, again, not a shameless, um,

• 2:21:44Speaker 06

  drop or whatever you call it, plug, her book's really good. She, she suffered immensely after that incident PTSD. And she's one of the most remarkable human beings I've ever met. Super intelligent, super motivated, super like brilliant. And she dealt with her PTSD, but not only dealt with it, then said, how do I help other people with PTSD? And how does, and um, she's, the, her book's really interesting, really well, well written, too. Fascinating read.

• 2:22:17Shawn Ryan?

  Do you guys discuss the incident often together?

• 2:22:21Speaker 06

  Not often, but when I first met her, I met her in, uh, DC in, um,

• 2:22:29Speaker 06

  end of two thousand and nineteen, uh, and, um, yeah, we'd just discuss things and. And for her it was to put like, cause she heard things that were going on and, and I said, that's because at that point I would have been doing this. And she went, that explains what that noise was and all this was happening. Cause she was hiding in her room and she had no idea what was going on, but she's hearing all these noises and things going on. So I helped her. She'd already dealt, um.

• 2:22:57Speaker 06

  Really well with a PTSD, but I like help put fill in some gaps and and bits and pieces of what what what was happening that day that she hadn't been told or or she didn't know.

• 2:23:07Shawn Ryan?

  How did it feel when you saw her for the first time?

• 2:23:09Speaker 06

  Yeah, I was emotional. It was emotional, yeah.

• 2:23:12Shawn Ryan?

  Was it for her as well?

• 2:23:13Speaker 06

  Yeah, yes.

• 2:23:14Shawn Ryan?

  What was some of the first things that were said?

• 2:23:17Speaker 06

  I I don't know. I think she just said, thank you. I can't, I'm not right. But we were talked about.

• 2:23:24Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:23:26Speaker 06

  But I can't read it. I can't tell the story of how I met a husband. That is a remarkable story. I can't tell it, but it's it's strange how everything surrounding this incident is odd. But it was a strange way of how I met a husband, so.

• 2:23:43Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah, it's uh it's hard to dance around this topic. There's so much that you can't talk about.

• 2:23:48Speaker 06

  So.

• 2:23:49Shawn Ryan?

  But

• 2:23:53Shawn Ryan?

  wet point. Did you recall the man that you picked up on the road that day? When did that connection get made? He said, what did he say?

• 2:24:05Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:24:05Shawn Ryan?

  God bless you. You're gonna need it today.

• 2:24:07Speaker 06

  It was like, Chris, may God bless you many times this day.

• 2:24:11Shawn Ryan?

  When did that come back into your head? Were you in the building or was this days later?

• 2:24:14Speaker 06

  It was always the it was that that the morning after. That, yeah, it came to me. It came to me before I left the the complex.

• 2:24:23Shawn Ryan?

  How did that feel?

• 2:24:24Speaker 06

  Again, it's this, again, I compared in, I've got all this emotion going on, all this like buzz. So it was like lost and all that.

• 2:24:32Shawn Ryan?

  Mm hmm.

• 2:24:35Shawn Ryan?

  But when you did feel it?

• 2:24:36Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:24:37Shawn Ryan?

  Or when it did come back into your head?

• 2:24:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:24:41Shawn Ryan?

  What was that emotion like?

• 2:24:43Speaker 06

  Again, another one of those. Did that really happen? Did that? How did that happen? That's just.

• 2:24:51Speaker 06

  My, you know, I don't like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna spoon feed you all. And say

• 2:25:00Speaker 06

  sometimes I think, was he an angel?

• 2:25:05Speaker 06

  Maybe.

• 2:25:07Speaker 06

  Maybe not.

• 2:25:10Speaker 06

  Was he delivering a message from God? Yes. Yes, he was.

• 2:25:17Speaker 06

  And there's that's all I've got to say is it's not all I've got to say, I've got a lot to say about it, but it's like maybe sometimes gods, angels, like God or angels, um use people, you know, sometimes someone might say something to you and they're like might be a stranger, might be someone you love and you're like you know, it's like a message.

• 2:25:40Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 2:25:41Speaker 06

  And that was a message. That was a message that that was a message that moment. You know, whether that guy is a real person. Fine, but like I say, his face changed, his voice, like I say, it was quiet but deafening. That he was delivering a message from God or from an angel saying, may God bless you many times this day.

• 2:26:01Shawn Ryan?

  Man, that's incredible. That is really incredible.

• 2:26:05Speaker 06

  And some people out there are gonna say, oh, it's just a strange coincidence or meeting between two strangers.

• 2:26:10Shawn Ryan?

  Who gives a shit what people say?

• 2:26:12Speaker 06

  But it's that, but that's my, that's my theory. It could have been an angel

• 2:26:18Speaker 06

  manifested as a human.

• 2:26:19Shawn Ryan?

  What do you think it was?

• 2:26:21Speaker 06

  I, I think it's a a human delivering like a message. Like he didn't, did he know he said it? Maybe, maybe not. It's just, but the whole thing was just using it as a do like a moment of possession or

• 2:26:34Shawn Ryan?

  Do you think he was an angel or not?

• 2:26:37Speaker 06

  No, I think that's the thing. I think, I think he was a physical human being. But he was delivering a message from an angel.

• 2:26:45Shawn Ryan?

  Okay.

• 2:26:45Speaker 06

  Then, as in, he was like, what do you call it? What if you want to call it possession? Or if you want, but he was, at that moment, that wasn't him speaking.

• 2:26:56Shawn Ryan?

  Do you feel you were alone in that building?

• 2:26:58Speaker 06

  No.

• 2:26:59Shawn Ryan?

  Did you feel it when it was happening?

• 2:27:02Speaker 06

  Sorry?

• 2:27:02Shawn Ryan?

  Did you feel

• 2:27:05Shawn Ryan?

  like somebody was with you, like God was with you in that building as it was happening?

• 2:27:10Speaker 06

  Yep.

• 2:27:13Shawn Ryan?

  Man.

• 2:27:16Speaker 06

  But again, without talking about the incident in general, one of the, like, I've said this at the start of this

• 2:27:24Speaker 06

  interview is that I'm super like

• 2:27:30Speaker 06

  privileged or blessed that the incident kind of happened.

• 2:27:36Speaker 06

  In a, in a purely selfish way that people live their whole lives without, not without me, like not meaning, but they, they do good things, not good things, whatever, and then they die. And we're always trying to make sense of stuff and meaning. And that was the thing for me up to that point in life, and my life isn't over yet. But that made sense of everything that had bad that had happened to me, whether it be career moments where I thought I should have done better in my career and thought I was, it was unjust or something happened or I didn't get sent somewhere, I didn't do something, I didn't picked for a certain team or whatever.

• 2:28:15Speaker 06

  All that made sense. All of it was like, thank you. And every night I pray, I pray about, I thank, thank God for all the bad things that happened to me. For all the things that at the time I thought were unjust or unfair. Cause now I realized, now I realized that they had to happen to put me there that day.

• 2:28:38Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:28:39Speaker 06

  And, and I asked to see the, like, the signs now of, like, you know, when things are going really bad, it's like, it's very hard to do. And again, it's, it's like, and everyone, no, do you want people say things happen for a reason? It's really a patronizing thing to say, but they kind of do happen for a reason. And I, I give a presentation to um the Officer Academy, Sandhurst. I did a, a, a large brief, but first, first hand, the first time I did the presentation about Kenya, I did um, I briefed the, uh, like, they've got a platoon which all the wounded.

• 2:29:11Speaker 06

  Students go to and they do rehab and then once they're fixed to go back into training. And I give them a present, I give them the presentation at the end of it. Onto this line about, you know, everything that happened that was bad happened to me to put me there. I said, right now, you guys in this room are kind of like, don't feel good because you're looking out the window and you're injured and you see guys who you were, girls and guys who you were in training with are now graduating and you're still stuck here and they're going to be officers in the army. Said, but just remember this, right now in this audience, there may be the Chief of General Staff, the head of the Armed Forces, there could be the Commander of the SES, there could be the Director of Special Forces sat in this audience right now.

• 2:29:56Speaker 06

  And the only reason why that's gonna happen is because you were injured now. So remember that in the future, when you're the head of the army. That sort of hit home for some of them.

• 2:30:09Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah. Where did you go after the incident? After you left Kenya? Where did you go? Did you go back to UK?

• 2:30:18Speaker 06

  Back to UK eventually.

• 2:30:20Shawn Ryan?

  How were you received?

• 2:30:21Speaker 06

  Yeah, it was amazing.

• 2:30:22Shawn Ryan?

  It was amazing.

• 2:30:23Speaker 06

  Like, and it still is today, the, my peers, everyone was like, it wa- And this is the odd thing, you know, people, if you don't know in the military normally, even if you do something good, even jokingly, they'll like, give you a bad time, they'll be, oh, I can't believe you're wearing Armani jeans or you were doing this. No, this was strange, this was like, everyone was like, eve- even people who I respect for this, guys saying, I didn't see eye to eye with you in the past, you know, I don't want to say we're friends, but I'm proud to know you.

• 2:30:56Speaker 06

  And that was to me was like, yeah, that's it, that took, that took balls to say that. The guy who said that was a good guy, was on selection with, I respect that. Say, yeah, I wasn't your friend, I didn't really like you, but I'm proud, I'm proud that I know you. And people sit still to this day, stopping cars, getting out, going, shaking my hand. And the oddest thing was the, it was the old, the old guard, guys who were in the SES in the eighties, before the eighties and nineties, and I thought they'd be critical. And not only they're positive about, you're a great ambassador for the SES, what you did is, is- Is like is the epitome of what the S E S is supposed to be about. They're saying that and I'm like and then and then of the and then they're adding in about social media.

• 2:31:41Speaker 06

  Yeah, my my daughter, my son follows you on social media and it's great what you do. We're really proud of you. Just keep doing it. Keep being a good ambassador for the regiment. So that's always good. And and the thing with the book. The book One Man In, I wrote it. They originally told me I could write a book. Then I changed. I tried to clear it. I it didn't get released. I took it to court, lost that. I'm trying to appeal that.

• 2:32:06Speaker 06

  The bottom line is it's highly unlikely that anyone's going to read One Man In anytime soon. But even if I lose the appeal, people change, policies change, positions change.

• 2:32:19Shawn Ryan?

  People don't realize what's happening, so we have to go into that. They don't realize that it's in court.

• 2:32:26Speaker 06

  Yeah, it's been to court and failed and so I wrote a book called One Man In. I I I did ask before I retired, could I write a book about the incident? And they said, yes, work with disclosure. I work with disclosure and then there was a change of mind somewhere along the line. And then they said I couldn't. I then tried to make redactions. They weren't interested whatsoever. And then so I took it for a judicial review, lost the judicial review. And now I'm appealing the judicial review. It's highly unlikely that I'm going to win any appeal.

• 2:32:55Shawn Ryan?

  Why do you think they're trying to suppress the story?

• 2:32:58Speaker 06

  I can't I I there's a there's a public here like ruling out there that can read it. It's the what I'll say about the incident is I've just said about my peers and members of the S E S and public got nothing but support for me.

• 2:33:15Speaker 06

  But the in my opinion, there's a lot of people, the establishment did not like what I did that day. They did not like what I did. And it's maybe is it personal towards Chris Craighead? Maybe, maybe not. But it's definitely personal to what Chris Craighead represents, which is one man not not.

• 2:33:42Speaker 06

  Showing no compromise, standing up to evil, taking on evil head on without permission and putting everything on the line. And that's the nature of special forces operations, I thought, was high stakes. It's a high stakes game. I didn't just risk my life. Because if that had been a failure, I would have been the scapegoat. So I risked my, my, my physical life and my life in general. I risked everything. I didn't want anything for it. People were, people were.

• 2:34:17Shawn Ryan?

  People were being murdered.

• 2:34:18Speaker 06

  People were being murdered and no one was doing anything. So I did something. And people don't like that. And here's the thing. So from, a good example is a senior member of the British military. I've said, Christian Craighead is a bad example to young soldiers because his mutiny attitude promotes lawlessness in the military. And clearly that's it. Someone said, I heard that from five different people, five independent sources. And I'm not going to pinpoint the exact person who said that because the five

• 2:35:01Speaker 06

  people who told me, they said, three people said one person and two people said another. So, but they're similar jobs. So it was just a mix up of abbreviations. But, but yeah, senior member of the British military, that's what, that's his view. It's been, I've also heard of people in the Foreign Office saying, oh, Chris Craighead, he shouldn't have done that thing in Kenya. There's lots of people in the Foreign Office who completely, who really support me, support me. Big, in a big way. But there's also members, senior members of the Foreign Office saying, he shouldn't have done that. He could have, he could have messed everything up.

• 2:35:36Shawn Ryan?

  How's that? How could you have messed everything up?

• 2:35:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, because if I'd failed, it would have been, potentially they could have said, well, it's all failed because of that man. So I would have been the scapegoat and it would have looked bad for everyone else. But that's it. And these people, like these generals and these politicians and these other people who've never said.

• 2:35:55Speaker 06

  And no one, no one's took me and said, thanks for what you did. Not, no one British high ranking official.

• 2:36:01Shawn Ryan?

  Not one British high ranking official.

• 2:36:03Speaker 06

  I got a nice letter from the government official straight after the incident and a phone call. But he got his fingers wrapped for that. He's no longer minister, or he is a minister, but he's not in parliament or whatever.

• 2:36:13Shawn Ryan?

  You saved seven hundred people that day and they're treating you like you need to be punished.

• 2:36:18Speaker 06

  And it was the, um.

• 2:36:21Speaker 06

  And I, what I want to say to people is, the last time I fucking checked.

• 2:36:27Speaker 06

  The motto of two, two two S E S is who dares wins? Not who asked for permission wins? People need to remember that.

• 2:36:38Speaker 06

  But, um, yeah, um. But then.

• 2:36:45Speaker 06

  President Trump. I got to, had them extra privilege to meet the President of the United States of America.

• 2:36:52Shawn Ryan?

  You got to be, this is after the incident?

• 2:36:54Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:36:55Shawn Ryan?

  How long after?

• 2:36:56Speaker 06

  Uh, um.

• 2:36:59Speaker 07

  Priceline Negotiator.

• 2:37:02Speaker 08

  It's me, the.

• 2:37:03Speaker 07

  Priceline Negotiator.

• 2:37:05Speaker 08

  We don't need the jingle twice.

• 2:37:06Speaker 07

  What about a third time?

• 2:37:08Speaker 08

  Stop it. This is about vacation inflation and how Priceline negotiates amazing deals on hotels, flights and rental cars.

• 2:37:15Speaker 07

  Seems like they decided.

• 2:37:16Speaker 08

  Yeah, but I didn't mention that you can save up to sixty percent off hotels in the Priceline app.

• 2:37:21Speaker 07

  Time to read the timeline.

• 2:37:22Speaker 08

  Fine. No one deals more deals than.

• 2:37:24Speaker 07

  Priceline.

• 2:37:26Speaker 08

  Please stop.

• 2:37:26Speaker 07

  Priceline.

• 2:37:27Speaker 08

  Touche.

• 2:37:28Speaker 07

  Priceline.

• 2:37:31Speaker 06

  Uh, ten months after.

• 2:37:33Shawn Ryan?

  Ten months?

• 2:37:33Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:37:34Shawn Ryan?

  Why were you here?

• 2:37:35Speaker 06

  So, um, so before we go into the meeting, the President of the United States of America. There's a reason why I said the President of the United States of America is to everyone watching this, can we just leave these, like, the personal, like?

• 2:37:54Speaker 06

  This was President Trump.

• 2:37:57Speaker 06

  It doesn't matter that it was President Trump, he was the President of the United States of America. I was a, a, a guy, a young bo- boy who was dealt a hand in life, destined to fail. Born in a council house, single parent at that time, in a poor area with no particularly good skill set. Yet, forty-three years later, I'm, I'm in the White House. This is a good story, it's, it's not a, it's not a political message, it's, it's my life story. It's a story of my life of me meeting the President, so now we're going to continue. Um, just, um, just for anyone who's going to get triggered.

• 2:38:36Speaker 06

  Um, so yeah, I was going to, um, I was in the United States to brief, to brief a military unit about what I did in Africa, in Kenya. And a friend of mine, a friend of a friend, was like speaking to the Secret Service. The Secret Service was super keen to talk to me because they wanted to know about hotels and lessons that I learned and things that they could use. So they said, could you, when you're on your way to, um, to do this presentation, could you come and just give us some of our team leaders and some of our senior members want to talk to you and ask you some questions about the incident? And I said, yeah, abso- absolutely.

• 2:39:15Speaker 06

  Uh, and then about, not long, about a week or two before I'm supposed to go there, I get a phone call from the guy who's hosting me. And he said, have you ever been to the White House? I'm like, no, he goes, well, bring a suit, because when you, once you do your, once you talk to our guys, we'd love to take you to the White House and give you a tour of the White House, show you around. I'm like, oh, it's really nice, look forward to it. That's that. So the day comes, I'm speaking to the Secret Service and then we get changed. Meanwhile, in the White House, in the West Wing, Sheila Craighead is the Director of Photography. And she's got a, she's, she's on the, she's got, she's got a finger on the pulse, she's connected to everyone and she's move, she's the mover and she's one of the movers and shakers in the West Wing.

• 2:40:00Speaker 06

  And she knows, she knows my story. I didn't know Sheila Craighead at that time, but she's been told by the Secret Service, this guy's coming and da, da, da. So the, she then speaks to, uh, the Vice President's team and said, just so it's on your radar, there's this guy who, can remember that guy who did this thing? And they're like, yeah, well, he's coming to the White House today, just so you know. And they went, okay.

• 2:40:26Speaker 06

  And then, and she, and she speaks to the national security advisers, people as well, just say, just so you know, and they go, oh, that's good. They then speak to their respective bosses and as we're on route into the White House, the Secret Service get a phone call and they say, oh, the, the Vice President. Uh, Mike Pence wants to chat with Chris Craighead. And they're like, all right, you've got to go and see the Vice President. So I'm like, okay. I haven't got my phone, so I can't ask for permission. Not that I would anyway, but, um. So then go and meet Mike Pence, see him, have a quick chat and then carry on with the tour of the White House.

• 2:41:02Speaker 06

  Um, Mike Pence, I believe, mentioned to the National Security Advisor Ambassador, Robert O'Brien. And says, hey, that guy, Chris Craighead. Or, um, is in, in, is in the White House. And the NSA is like, I wanna, I need, definitely wanna speak to him. So the Secret Service get a phone call again. You've got to bring him back into the West Wing. Ambassador O'Brien wants to speak to him. So then they send me into Ambassador O'Brien. What a great guy.

• 2:41:33Speaker 06

  Super, um, bright. But the good thing, the great thing about Ambassador Robert O'Brien is not only is he bright, but he's super pleasant as well. So he's.

• 2:41:44Speaker 06

  Again, laser, I keep on saying laser focused, laser focused. You loads, as a national security advisor should do. He was talking to me about situations going on. What do you think about this? What was your, what was your issue? We hear there, then. So I had a really good chat with him for about, I think it was about forty five minutes. Which is, um, some going for a man of who I am to speak to someone like that. In the White House and the busy people. And then he's like, we're talking and he's like, have you, uh, have you spoke to Portis yet? And I'm like, so that's the President of the United States. And I'm like, no, he goes, well, I know he wants to chat to you. All right, let's go. And I'm like, it's a whirlwind. It's, this is like a whirlwind. So he stands up, come on, let's go.

• 2:42:25Speaker 06

  Out through the Secret Service, like, oh, Chris, this way. And he's like, no, Ambassador Brian, no, no, no, we're, we're, we're just going to see Portis. And they're like, all right, this is, this is getting big. So, so then we, we moved through, um, past the receptionist.

• 2:42:44Speaker 06

  And then they said, just wait in here. So I'm in this room and they say, just wait here. And they go into another door and I can hear voices inside. So inside now, the, there would be, um, there's, basically that room is the, the president's private study. And I'm in this room just kicking my heels by myself. And as I said to you last night, I think it's, I've got this, the dubious honor of being the only person who's been in the Oval Office who didn't know he was in the Oval Office. So, so I'm in the Oval Office and don't realize I'm in the Oval Office by myself. Um, he, the door opens, I hear some talking and stuff and then, uh, and then there is, uh, and then I walk in and I'm met by President Trump.

• 2:43:29Speaker 06

  And, uh, and he, um, looks at me, walks over, puts his hand out.

• 2:43:38Speaker 06

  And the first thing he says to me is, thank you for saving American lives.

• 2:43:43Shawn Ryan?

  Is that the first person that thanked you from a high ranking government position?

• 2:43:49Speaker 06

  Uh, yes. Well, no. In person, yes. Immediately after the incident, um, there was a, a government minister from UK sent me, uh, phoned me up and sent me a letter. That was, that was it.

• 2:44:06Shawn Ryan?

  Nobody from your own country?

• 2:44:08Speaker 06

  No.

• 2:44:08Shawn Ryan?

  Personally came up to you?

• 2:44:10Speaker 06

  People from the army.

• 2:44:11Shawn Ryan?

  To thank you for what you did.

• 2:44:12Speaker 06

  People from the army, people from, um, like members of the military, members of, um, any, any of the diplomats in Kenya did, but no one outside that and no one, no one ever has since either.

• 2:44:26Shawn Ryan?

  Wow.

• 2:44:27Speaker 06

  And, um, but President Trump, um, he was, thank you for saving American lives, which, if you don't, you can, we all, and we chatted about a lot of other stuff. But if you think, you know, if you just park all your opinion or whatever, think about that. I, I went into that private study. There was no media there. There was, the British government didn't know about it. So in theory, there's absolutely no gain whatsoever for the president. No gain at all. But he took time out.

• 2:45:04Speaker 06

  To thank me for saving Americans. Something to think about. Something to acknowledge, I'd say. Um. Yeah, and then, and then, and then we, we left and then I got shown the, around the Oval Office by Ambassador, um, O'Brien and things and, and then. And then, uh, and then that was, that was out, that was that. It was a, like a. Strange, strange days, let's say the.

• 2:45:32Speaker 06

  Um. Wasn't very well received from the Brit, to the British government.

• 2:45:37Shawn Ryan?

  They found out about it?

• 2:45:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, I, I, I, I, um. So I give, uh, President Trump a, a, a coin, a challenge coin. And I got a Trump, uh, President's coin. So I was calling the guys up saying, hey, I just, I can't, you can't believe this. I met the President yesterday and give him a coin and they're like, oh, that's awesome. And then some, some, someone said, have you told the commanding officer? I went. No, they went, probably should do. And then, uh, and that's why I thought, and I told them, basically, long story short, I told them and all hell broke loose. Um, the big thing, I'm not giving them a free pass, but. From a Foreign Office point of view, it's a huge breach of protocol. My argument is. I didn't have any saying it.

• 2:46:23Speaker 06

  And I'm certainly not going to say, hey, the President wants to see you and you go, no, I've got to ask permission first. There's a bit of a pattern forming here, but, um. But yeah, I didn't, I'm not going to say, so I was, I have to go with the flow. But apparently they're still not happy about it today. And, you know, I'm sure there'll be some backlash from what I'm saying this now, I mean.

• 2:46:42Shawn Ryan?

  So, so the, who, who was upset?

• 2:46:44Speaker 06

  The, the Foreign Office and then. And I think they, I think it's the whole.

• 2:46:48Shawn Ryan?

  The Foreign Office is upset that the President of the United States thanked you.

• 2:46:52Speaker 06

  It's because I broke up, it's, it's like the break, the breach of protocol. It's like what we said, people don't like successful things. Certain officers of the time of that command in my unit didn't like it. Maybe because they got shit from the Foreign Office, who knows?

• 2:47:07Speaker 06

  Uh, they're not there anymore, but, um. Yeah, so that was, that was it. And then.

• 2:47:13Shawn Ryan?

  Um, what, what, I'd be, hold on.

• 2:47:18Shawn Ryan?

  What's that conversation like?

• 2:47:20Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:47:20Shawn Ryan?

  Hey, you just saved seven hundred people in Kenya from being murdered. And the President of the United States just said, thank you for saving American lives.

• 2:47:34Shawn Ryan?

  How do you turn that into a negative?

• 2:47:38Speaker 06

  But apparently, just so you know.

• 2:47:43Shawn Ryan?

  Is that what they think about, do they think that way about all Americans?

• 2:47:46Speaker 06

  This was the statement I make, and if anyone's watching, like, like, I'm not gonna obviously say who said it, but this was said to me over the phone when I was in America was, you've undermined the, um, the SAS, the army, uh, the government and the country.

• 2:48:09Speaker 06

  So.

• 2:48:12Shawn Ryan?

  I can't even imagine the amount of rage that festered.

• 2:48:17Speaker 06

  But I'm going to reiterate something. I have got no issue with my old unit, the SAS. I'm super proud to be there, but I have got issues with elements of the government, the MOD, and previous, and some ex-command members of the, uh, of the unit. Um, but that's, and then it, but it gets, it gets better or worse and then uh, this is, so this, this story will evolve into a few, about a month later, is I'm back in London. So I'm back in, back in London. I'm still living in Hereford and, uh, it's Christmas, Christmas time. And, um, this is kind of, I think, the final straw for where, where Chris Craighead sits in the British Army.

• 2:49:00Speaker 06

  But, um, uh, like I say, I'm not bitter or anything. It's just, it's just, this is a good story. Um, so I'm in London, get a phone call with held number. I think it's work. I'm like, hello?

• 2:49:16Speaker 06

  Yeah, this is the special assistant to the, um, US ambassador, ambassador to, um, UK. Um, he's on the line waiting to talk to you. Can you take a call? I'm like, yeah.

• 2:49:29Speaker 06

  So I answered the call and he's like, hey, hey, Chris, this is Woody Johnson. Um, I've just been speaking to Portis about you. He says you're you're a good stand up guy. Um, I'd love to, I'd love to meet you for coffee. Or you, I know you're in London, so do you want to come and um, do you want to come around for a coffee? Like now, I'll hold all my meetings, I'm like, yes, yes, Mr. Ambassador, I'm on my way. So I was like, okay. So I then went back to the shop I just walked out of and put my shopping behind and said, you don't, you couldn't do me a favor. I couldn't leave these here, I've got to do something. So I'm like, yeah, so get in a taxi. Felt like being in a movie, I'll get in a taxi, take me to the US Embassy. And it's like, and then we go to it. So we go to the uh, drive to the Embassy, people are waiting for me, straight up to the Ambassador's office.

• 2:50:15Speaker 06

  And then there's Ambassador, um, Woody Johnson, he's like, hey, great to meet you. And uh, so we then have a chat, have a cup of coffee, um, great guy, really interesting, things to say, asking me questions. It was, it's fun.

• 2:50:33Speaker 06

  I'm then about to leave and he says, hey, uh, I've got something to ask you. Okay, he goes, I'm, I'm having drinks around my house tonight, I would love you to come round. And I'm like, I'm like, yeah, Mr. Ambassador, I'm just in town doing some shopping, this, I'm wearing, um, I'm wearing jeans, um, a Turtle Max sweater and a peaco. So I, so I look like an assassin. So I look like, and uh, and uh, and I'm like, um, this is the only clothes I've got. And he goes, no, it's my part, you just come, people will just be wearing, um, suits anyway, so just come round, it's my part. I'm like, well, I goes, I, when I saw, when I, I said, to be honest, Mr. Ambassador, when I saw President Trump,

• 2:51:17Speaker 06

  I got in a lot of hot water for this, so it's kind of going to happen again if I do it. He went, sort it out, whatever you need my assistant to do, we'll make, we'll make it happen. And um, uh, so I'm like, okay. It then says, oh, there's one more thing. I'm like, I'd love for you to, um, usually I, I, as the US Representative, I say something to all my, to all the, all the people here. I'd love for you to say something on behalf of Great Britain. And I'm like, oh, so can you, can you put together with my assistant a three to five minute presentation on what you did, why you did it? And what the special relationship means to you?

• 2:51:58Speaker 06

  Alright, okay. So it's like, um, so then iPhone work. Speak to whoever and they're like, yeah, you've got to speak to the commander. Commander's like, yeah, he actually says, yeah, who does wins, go do it.

• 2:52:13Speaker 06

  Fine. So then, um,

• 2:52:18Speaker 06

  speak to them, it's all set. So I'm now feel a bit better that at least my unit know this time. Um, and then, um, so then I go and get my shopping. This is about four thirty in the afternoon, by the way, and this event is happening at six thirty. So in my mind, I'm putting together this presentation, just like. So then go, go to the Balfour staff, get my gear. Turn up at the ambassador's residence for my shopping and they let me in. And then basically then they're saying, when they, all the guests are turning up. The, uh, I'm stood next to the ambassador and he, and his beautiful wife. Dressed like, and I must have thought I'm some CIA hitman or something. He's like, he's CIA muscle or something.

• 2:53:01Speaker 06

  Um, but, and then there was lots of like powerful people, including, um, government ministers and, and such are obviously, uh, not, nothing's obvious, but I won't say any names or who was there. But it was, when I looked at the guest list, I was like, ah, okay, yeah. Feeling pretty uncomfortable now. Um, so there was the, it was the, yeah, the high society. And, uh, so then they're, they're all there mingling, there's about, I'm sure it's about a hundred and fifty, two hundred people. He's got, and they said, the ambassador is going to give his bit, you then give your bit. And then kind of if you want, like raise your glass and take a drink and stuff like, okay.

• 2:53:46Speaker 06

  So he's, he's doing his talk and I'm like going through my presentation. It's like, it's like the matrix going on inside my mind and going, oh, I'm gonna say this, this, or that. So he then hands me a mic. I didn't know it was going to be a other mic, but then I go into my presentation.

• 2:54:03Speaker 06

  And it's going well. Do you know when you when you when you're giving this talk and you only think this is I'm on fire. I'm good. Yep. And and that and it. You could see the emotion of the crowd. See people responding and stuff and it was good. So then at finish. And then at the end, I'm like messing around with the mic to try and put the mic back down, grab my drink. Everyone starts clapping and applauding me. I'm like, oh, God, I was supposed to do like a drink. I don't know where it came from, but it was like spur of the moment. I've got quite a loud voice. And when I've got it, so I grabbed my drink and I went, ladies and gentlemen, and everyone's like, stop. I went. God save the Queen and God bless America.

• 2:54:45Speaker 06

  That's awesome. That's awesome. And then Vassar Johnson then used some decidedly undiplomatic language. He went, that's brilliant.

• 2:54:55Speaker 06

  How was that received? Yeah, not good. Was there any, there was blowback? Uh, uh, I didn't hear anything firsthand. When I told the commander of my unit. He was seemed to be pleased and things, but from insiders in the headquarters, they were saying that the normal, the normal. Point was who'd his he think he is? And then a friend of mine who was working as he apparently said, well, what do you think he was gonna do? Stop telling me he wasn't gonna do it. But but it was it was I I'm quite, I'm glad it happened, but I think it was the straw that broke the camel's back. Um, with um. Um, and then, uh, like I said, there was, so that was a point in my life when I was like, a few months after that.

• 2:55:37Speaker 06

  I I felt like I wasn't gonna be in a position to give anything back. To the army and my unit. So I was like, I asked if I could write a book about it. They said, yes. There's some other factors and I I thought, right, well, now's the time to get out. Twenty eight years. I've had a good run. That's that's cool. Yeah. And that's when I got out.

• 2:55:59Speaker 06

  Man.

• 2:56:01Speaker 06

  I, um.

• 2:56:06Shawn Ryan?

  I'm sorry your country is not

• 2:56:12Shawn Ryan?

  giving you the credit that you deserve. That is, uh.

• 2:56:19Shawn Ryan?

  What a shame.

• 2:56:21Speaker 06

  I mean, there's lots of people who support me and I'm really thankful for that. So, you know, I should, that's why I try, I'm concentrating on, I'm not, I'm not even bitter. You know, I said it, I'm bitter towards, I'm not really bitter towards the government, it's just more like, I expect nothing less.

• 2:56:38Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:56:39Speaker 06

  So I'm not, I'm not even that upset. It's just like, yeah. Because I've seen it happen so many times with other things. I'm like, it doesn't surprise me. But the main thing is that so many people do support me. And that's, that's, it's not as if I did that and everyone hated me, then it's a different thing. Or the fact of the matter is that people in the army, people, there will be, I'm sure there's tons of people in the Foreign Office and the government who, who really like what I did.

• 2:57:09Speaker 06

  But there is certainly, must be a good chunk somewhere that really do not like what I did and what I stand for.

• 2:57:14Shawn Ryan?

  Wouldn't it be nice, wouldn't it be nice if more people were like you and stood up for what was right in that office?

• 2:57:23Speaker 06

  Well, this is the thing.

• 2:57:26Speaker 06

  Do you know, like?

• 2:57:29Speaker 06

  People need to, like.

• 2:57:32Speaker 06

  Cowardice is everywhere.

• 2:57:35Speaker 06

  And

• 2:57:37Speaker 06

  like bravery and whatever aspect goes a long way. It doesn't have to be something grand, like the D two incident at fourteen Riverside Drive. It can just be saying, it could be voicing your opinion when someone's bad mouthing someone else. Just stepping, standing up and saying, actually, I think you are out of line. He's a good guy, instead of just keeping quiet. It's that line of like, no decision is always this decision. So, and, and it's the same thing of like people saying, oh, well, I would have done this, or I would have done, if I'd been there, I would have done that. Or if I, would you?

• 2:58:14Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 2:58:15Speaker 06

  I don't think you would. Would, you know, when people say, oh, I would have, if I was in Uvalde, I would have done this. You weren't there. So maybe you should just hold your mouth. Yes, there's some people here, I think, are going to stand before God for what the decisions they made that day. But there's other people who are just following orders.

• 2:58:34Speaker 06

  And if someone had called me on in Kenya and said, do not, whatever you do, do not go in there. There's a probable chance I probably wouldn't have went in because I'm in the military. Maybe I would have ignored it.

• 2:58:47Speaker 06

  But I, but I, but I probably wouldn't have.

• 2:58:51Speaker 06

  But here's the thing, last year, it might be in the year before, though all the years nowadays seem to roll into one. I stopped a girl from being kidnapped. You stopped a girl from being kidnapped, where? Because no, in Hereford. At half past six in the evening.

• 2:59:08Speaker 06

  A girl's trying to get bundled into a car. And no one's stopping, no, everyone's walking past. And I'm like, so I'm walking down the road. I can hear this girl's going, help, help, help. And I look across, yeah, I'm like about a hundred yards um.

• 2:59:28Speaker 06

  From her on the other side of the road and I'm looking across, she's outside a pub, like a busy, a busy public house, so. So straight away in my thought, I'm thinking, well, she's probably drunk. And they're probably just trying to get her in the car and it's not like, it's just a reluctant, you gotta go home, no, I'm all right. So I thought, I'll give them the benefit.

• 2:59:46Speaker 06

  People are walking past or people driving, help, as I close, I say, there's um. Um, two people trying to load her into a car. They're trying to get her into a car and she's like pushing back off it and they're trying, like, God, either side, they're trying to push, she keeps, she's fine, help, help. As I get kind of level with her, she then, something changes.

• 3:00:08Speaker 06

  It was like, somebody please help me, but it was the, the, the tone, the frequency. Uh huh. That, that sort of got me and I was like, and then as I level with me, there was a woman with two kids. And she was like, why is no one helping? And I went, have you seen what's gone on there? Have you seen what's going on? And she went, no. But no one's helping, no one's doing anything. And she had two young boys. And I'm like, or two young children, and I was like, okay, call the police. I goes, do me a favor, call the police. So I walk, start walking across the road, it's quite a large, like, wide road. And I start walking towards the car. I then break into like a canter and like. Move, move towards, and the guy gets out, the driver gets out the car, aggressively gets out the car and he's like looking.

• 3:00:54Speaker 06

  Yeah, gets out and I'm like, and I'm doing this run towards him like this cantor and I put my arms out to the side like this. And I don't say anything vocally, but I can, I am saying something with our words and I'm, what I'm saying to him is. Buddy, I don't, I don't want any trouble, but I'm about to fuck you up if you want.

• 3:01:15Speaker 06

  And he re- he registers that. Cause he's like, then he shouts, oh, she owes me money, she owes me money. And gets in the car and he like shouts at the two and then the two, one of them whacks her on the head to get the car and drive speed off. And like to the woman, are you all right? Are you all right? And she went, leave me alone. And she like staggers, staggers away. At the same time, a police fan is coming down, not responding to this call. And I wave them down and there's a female police officer on the side and I said, hey, just so you know, someone's just tried to be kidnapped. And then this woman with the kids runs up behind me and says, this man's a hero, this man's a hero. I'm like, and um. And I said, yeah, and I said, and I give them like an update and she takes notes. And then that's the last I've heard of it. So. Man.

• 3:01:59Speaker 06

  But so I don't know what happened, but I, I don't know whether the police followed up and didn't follow up with me. I don't know if it's ongoing, I don't know whatever, but the moral of the story is I, I, even if you do some, something is. I didn't do anything. The only thing I did, I didn't even open my mouth. I just walked. Crossed the road and confront, confronted someone with non-verbal communication. You've made yourself available. And that was enough to potentially save someone's life, cause who knows what they're gonna do to her. They're bundling a, a, a twenty something woman into a car.

• 3:02:37Speaker 06

  Nothing good was gonna happen there. If they're willing to use physical force to get someone in the car, they're not gonna take her away and just have a chat with her and make her pay money. They're gonna do shit. We know that. And if you think otherwise, you're living in a different planet. Yeah. But all I did was, all I did was something and some, no matter how small it is, something that's, that's enough to make a big change. Yeah. And people, people still, there's this decision paralysis. There's lots of people, I think now, if you had a group of guys, a group of people, doesn't matter what they do. You tell them to go and run into a burning boat and save people, most people will do that. If you tell them to, if you order them to. We're at this state in society now where people are scared, but they're not scared of

• 3:03:22Speaker 06

  physical damage or death. They're scared of the consequences of their action. And it's causing this decision paralysis where people don't want to be the one to make the call.

• 3:03:34Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 3:03:35Speaker 06

  And whilst they're doing that, people are dying.

• 3:03:38Shawn Ryan?

  Uh huh.

• 3:03:39Speaker 06

  Cause every second counts.

• 3:03:40Shawn Ryan?

  I'm glad you brought that up. It is um sad what's happening. They are. I don't even know who they are.

• 3:03:51Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:03:51Shawn Ryan?

  But they are demoralizing society from doing the right thing.

• 3:03:59Speaker 06

  And even like the little things, if someone could collapse. And now where some people would straight away go to work, what's going on? Other people just like, I don't wanna, I don't wanna get involved in case I get taken to court. Cause if he dies, I'm like, cause I'm giving CPR and he dies, I'm like, why are you even thinking that?

• 3:04:16Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 3:04:17Speaker 06

  Should just be bummed. What can I do? When I, when I, when I, when I did what I did that day, I didn't think, right, oh, I could get, oh, what if this happens? I was just like, I'm gonna do the right thing.

• 3:04:30Speaker 06

  Boom. I'm in. Not, well, maybe I haven't got permission and maybe I'll wait outside to get permission. Maybe I'll do that. I didn't, I just went for it. I'd like to think other people would do that. Sadly, I think lots of people, the majority, wouldn't do that.

• 3:04:46Shawn Ryan?

  Well, there's no videos of anybody else entering that building.

• 3:04:50Speaker 06

  People, people did make themselves available.

• 3:04:53Shawn Ryan?

  You know what I mean?

• 3:04:54Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:04:57Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:04:57Shawn Ryan?

  There's not very many people that would do it.

• 3:05:00Speaker 06

  But.

• 3:05:01Shawn Ryan?

  Isn't that sad?

• 3:05:03Speaker 06

  And that's the message. Here I am. Send me.

• 3:05:07Speaker 06

  Let's go, let's go for it. You, you're it. Sometimes I've said this before. You know, when the whole, everything's collapsing around you and you could be, you might not be a super duper tier one special forces operator, but you're it.

• 3:05:25Speaker 06

  No one else is gonna protect your family. No one else is gonna do what needs to be done.

• 3:05:32Speaker 06

  And you've got to think, I guess I've got to do it. And then who does wins. Maybe you're going to fail and die and suffer the consequences, but maybe you're going to win and save a lot of lives. That's what people need to think and be aware of.

• 3:05:52Shawn Ryan?

  Those of you that have been around SRS for a while know that we take mental health very seriously here. So seriously that in almost every episode, you'll find a segment where we discuss how to improve your mental health. And part of improving your mental health is keeping your mind sharp. And part of keeping your mind sharp is giving it the fuel that it needs to balance energy, focus, cognition, and just regenerating your brain. That triggered me to go on a journey to find the supplement that supports brain health with the cleanest of ingredients on the planet. And I found it. I was actually going to start my own company and do this, but I found Laird Superfoods. I've partnered with them.

• 3:06:37Shawn Ryan?

  Now I'm a partial owner and I really believe in these products. Here's my favorite product. Performance Mushrooms by Laird Superfoods. Brain Fuel. You can put this in your coffee, you can put it in your tea, you can drink it raw, you can mix it with their greens, you can do all kinds of stuff. Bottom line is, this is the best possible supplement with the cleanest ingredients, all sourced in the United States that supports brain health. And here's two other products that I'm a fan of. Laird Superfoods Creamer. Guess what? Contains functional mushroom extracts. Put this in your tea or coffee.

• 3:07:18Shawn Ryan?

  And most of you know I'm not a caffeine or coffee drinker, but a lot of you are and they just happen to have Laird Superfoods Coffee, Organic Peruvian Coffee with, you guessed it, functional mushrooms that support and regenerate your brain. Go to lairdsuperfood.com, use the promo code SRS, you'll get 20% off. Guys, this is the real deal. These are the finest of ingredients. Check it out. lairdsuperfood.com, promo code SRS, 20% off.

• 3:07:55Shawn Ryan?

  Thank you for listening to the Sean Ryan Show. If you haven't already, please take a minute, head over to iTunes and leave the Sean Ryan Show a review. We read every review that comes through and we really appreciate the support. Thank you. Let's get back to the show.

• 3:08:17Shawn Ryan?

  All right, Christian, we're back from the break. We can ease the tension a little bit. We don't have to dance around anything anymore. But I want to get into some of the stuff that you're doing now. So I know you wrote one book, which may or may not ever be released, but I love the children's book that you wrote, The Wrong Wolf. The messaging in there is fantastic. It's a great story for kids. And where did the inspiration for that come from?

• 3:08:46Speaker 06

  Well, the story, The Wrong Wolf, never, never lived in my mind. Didn't, never thought about this, the story as it is. It didn't occupy any space, but I never thought about writing a children's book, full stop. Not once. The only thing similar to it, I was talking to a friend of mine from a similar unit in the US military, and we were talking about the wolves and sheepdogs, how the, and one of the points that we came up with, that sheepdogs don't kill wolves, they scare wolves away. The only thing that can kill a wolf is a wolf.

• 3:09:25Speaker 06

  And that, that's kind of what, like, you could say is, like, what I am, maybe set up to be a criminal or from a, from a bad area and, like, life was setting me up to be that, but I actually became a, became a, became a sheepdog wolf, like a wolf turned sheepdog. And I think special operations are full of those sorts of people. It's not the majority of people in, in there. So that was, that was, that was the only, like, connection in my mind. And, and so I'm listening to your podcast in the gym, Jim, when you're talking to Jim Caviezel.

• 3:10:07Shawn Ryan?

  That one's gone now.

• 3:10:08Speaker 06

  And I'm, I'm listening to that in the, in the gym. And I'm working out and...

• 3:10:18Speaker 06

  I think you say, oh, we need more sheepdogs. Jim Caviezel chips in and says, we need more converted wolves, that's what we need. And like a data transmission, that story, the story of the one wolf, just came into my mind. Bang, like the story, and it wasn't, I'd never ever thought about writing a children's book, ever. Bang, this story just comes in my mind, not just the story, but the pictures, the whole idea, the whole thing. And it's not just, oh, do that, it was like, stopped me in my tracks, kind of thing, it was like. And I just stopped working out, got in the car, got back to where I was living.

• 3:11:02Speaker 06

  And started writing down notes, like a rough idea. Picked up the phone to, Matt Klein is a good friend of mine, ex-US Army, ex-NYPD, great artist. Phoned him up, he'd already published a children's book with his wife. And this is the thing, I didn't even think about it, it was just like, oh, I need to do a children's book. So it came to me like weird, it's so weird, and I'm like, dude, I've had this idea for a children's story. Could you do some pictures? And I goes, I wanna do it, I goes, I feel like I need to do it right now. And he's like, yeah, I'm about to go and hold her back and try and get it all in, how many pictures?

• 3:11:46Speaker 06

  And I'd worked it out and I said, it's gonna be about thirty pictures, but I'll let you know tomorrow. By the next day, all the pictures in that book, I knew what they were, and they've never changed since. So like, less than twenty-four hours of having this idea, picture number one. Pack of wolves in the mountains, howling at the wolves, that's what I sent to him, picture two, et cetera, et cetera. So all of it was just, so part of me feels like I didn't even write it, it was like just given to me. Wow. And get it out there.

• 3:12:21Speaker 06

  And it's a, it's a great story. Um, and I hope when people, people, um, I thank you to everyone who's pre-ordered it or who, who did preorder it. And I, I, I just kind of hope and I, I think that people are gonna buy it out of support of me and then go, then speak to, to people who don't know who I am and say, hey, by the way, you might wanna buy your kids this book, cuz it's a great message. And uh, it's a good, it's a good story that lots of people, I think, can identify with.

• 3:12:51Shawn Ryan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 3:12:51Speaker 06

  So it's um, a metaphorical story. People who know the story of Kenya could say there's elements of the book are from Kenya, maybe.

• 3:13:04Speaker 06

  Are there elements of the book that are from my army career? Definitely. Is the elements of the book from my childhood? Yes. But it's not exclusive to me, because I think most people will look in that book and they will be, they'll be able to put themselves in pages of this book as well.

• 3:13:21Shawn Ryan?

  What, what, what, how do you summarize that story?

• 3:13:26Shawn Ryan?

  I'll tell you how I summarize it. I thought it was fantastic. It is a, it is about a wolf that doesn't belong, who tries to fit in to a new tribe and has to prove himself. He proves himself by standing up and doing the right thing.

• 3:13:47Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:13:49Shawn Ryan?

  So, there's so many lessons in such a short story in there. I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's, it goes over the feeling of not belonging. It goes over the feeling of, of fitting in with a new tribe.

• 3:14:08Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:14:08Shawn Ryan?

  Which we discussed, a lot of that at the very beginning of this episode, right? Pleasing people, trying to fit in with a new tribe. It's your, it's your story.

• 3:14:19Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:14:19Shawn Ryan?

  It's your story, standing up for the right thing.

• 3:14:23Speaker 06

  Uh, it's about, again, about loss, a lot. And I mean, the, the easy way to put it, to just really simplify it, it's about a wolf that becomes a sheepdog. But like you said, it's about someone who's different, who knows he's different. Someone who loses his, um, his only friend or mentor.

• 3:14:44Speaker 06

  Again, standing up for people doing the right thing gets excluded for one tribe to then go to another tribe where he still doesn't fit in and they don't value him. But then when bad things happen, he steps up and saves them all and only then is he accepted. And it's like, there's like, and like I said, that's, that's not exclusive to me, that's everyone, there's lots of people, whether you work in a, you're the person who might work in an office and people, you work really hard and people don't like them and yet they'll go home that weekend and bake cake for everyone. I mean, that's a really, it doesn't have to be anything grand like running into a hotel

• 3:15:26Speaker 06

  or it, it could be something as simple as that where you're, you're doing good things for ungrateful people and only, and eventually they'll maybe, um, they'll see what is, what's for, but it's, um, the other message that is a bit more subtle is, is like, I try to say, nothing ever dies, nothing really dies, not a person, not an idea, not a story, it just goes somewhere else and changes maybe.

• 3:15:57Shawn Ryan?

  What else is coming down the line for you?

• 3:16:00Speaker 06

  Well, we'll see how the, the near future goes, but, um, I'm looking to start a YouTube channel, putting out some different content out there, um, which I think a lot of people will be happy with. Certainly a lot of people always ask me if I'm going to start a YouTube channel.

• 3:16:19Shawn Ryan?

  Do you have a YouTube channel yet and you just don't put content on it? I would love to direct people to a YouTube channel.

• 3:16:25Speaker 06

  Yeah, I haven't done one yet, but I'll let you know, maybe I'll let you, maybe I'll have one set up before this.

• 3:16:30Shawn Ryan?

  If you create one, even if there's not anything in there, let me know and when we release this, I'll put it in the intro and I'm sure people will jump, jump over there and follow you no matter what.

• 3:16:42Speaker 06

  Um, so there's that and then I'm doing some good, uh, future work with Stokal, Sons of Liberty and Field Ethos.

• 3:16:52Shawn Ryan?

  Cool. What's Field Ethos?

• 3:16:54Speaker 06

  Is the, the hunting, a hunting journal, uh, that, yeah.

• 3:16:59Shawn Ryan?

  What will you be doing with them?

• 3:17:04Speaker 06

  It's been on the forecast for a long time, but we're looking to do some content with them, related content with hunting or similar activities and there'll be, I'm going to drop a, we're going to start an e-commerce shop, the name to be confirmed of the website shop, but we're going to be releasing official Chris Crake Head merchant.

• 3:17:30Shawn Ryan?

  Oh, that's awesome.

• 3:17:31Speaker 06

  And collaborations will feature on there and things like that.

• 3:17:35Shawn Ryan?

  What are some, so this is going to be hard for you, but what are some things that you need to be successful? You have a audience of over 2 million people.

• 3:17:49Speaker 06

  Yeah, I just think, what do I need to be successful?

• 3:17:53Shawn Ryan?

  What are you looking for? Throw it out in the world, you never know what's going to come back at you.

• 3:17:59Speaker 06

  I'm open to a lot of things and I think a lot of people don't approach me because they either think I've got everything tied up or that I'm already signed up. I'm kind of a free spirit, so I'm looking for people to, you know, people from whether it be whatever industry say, hey, I want to work with you, then reach out to me.

• 3:18:20Shawn Ryan?

  Good.

• 3:18:21Speaker 06

  To me through Instagram.

• 3:18:23Shawn Ryan?

  Do you hear that, everybody? He's a free agent. He's looking for people to make connections, he's looking for people to help him build a business. And there's a lot of people that watch this show that can help you do that and I hope they come your way. So, but man, I guess, Christian, I just got to say, Ben, it was a real honor to sit across from you today and get some of your story and, man, you're just a, you're just a great example to, to our youth and which is becoming a rarity all across the world.

• 3:19:06Shawn Ryan?

  And I just want to say thank you for that, man. You carry yourself very well. You carry a lot of respect. You're a great example and, man, I'm just happy you're here.

• 3:19:19Speaker 06

  Thanks, thanks very much.

• 3:19:20Shawn Ryan?

  I really am. And before we go, I need three recommendations of who you would like to see on this show.

• 3:19:34Shawn Ryan?

  Donald Trump.

• 3:19:37Speaker 06

  I think it would be uh ve- very interesting to get President Trump on here.

• 3:19:47Speaker 06

  I think he um he uh he I I think he uh I don't know what you would talk about, but goals, I think it'd be it'd be interesting for him to come on here and yeah, you come up with an unusual like um questions that maybe he doesn't get asked in other uh other other places.

• 3:20:06Shawn Ryan?

  I would love to get that in.

• 3:20:07Speaker 06

  And I think it is especially relevant if you ask him is his role as commander in chief. And I think that's that would be interesting.

• 3:20:17Speaker 06

  Um because he's ultimately is the top of the chain then. Um so um he he's he would he would be a good person to to have on something like that's different.

• 3:20:31Shawn Ryan?

  Yeah.

• 3:20:31Speaker 06

  Um.

• 3:20:33Shawn Ryan?

  I'll try to make that happen. You got anybody else? Two more.

• 3:20:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, I I mean, if you I wish you'd asked me this a bit earlier and I know that had these prep dances and.

• 3:20:44Shawn Ryan?

  That's the beauty of it, putting you on the spot.

• 3:20:47Speaker 06

  Um.

• 3:20:50Speaker 06

  Yeah, I mean. I don't know, I always like

• 3:20:55Speaker 06

  it's all horses for courses, as they say, I I I like the more off the track sort of stuff. Where some people like the veterans and the the special ops and I I like like that's why I one of the reasons for saying Donald Trump is that that I get different perspective from the com- the com- is the commander in chief or was the commander in chief. And so like so like that we could tie in special operations and decision making and signing things off for him, I think it'd be interesting. So so to think of other people, um.

• 3:21:25Shawn Ryan?

  I mean, I'd love to get Joe Biden, but

• 3:21:29Shawn Ryan?

  I don't think he's going to be able to walk up those stairs.

• 3:21:33Shawn Ryan?

  Actually, I know he won't be able to walk up those stairs, but.

• 3:21:39Speaker 06

  Are you gonna edit that out? Because they'll definitely come for you.

• 3:21:41Shawn Ryan?

  Well, I'm sure they're already coming for me.

• 3:21:47Speaker 06

  You could get, I know a good person, actually, and I'm ashamed it took me so long, Merle Chapin.

• 3:21:52Shawn Ryan?

  Who's that?

• 3:21:53Speaker 06

  Merle, the girl from the dooset.

• 3:21:55Shawn Ryan?

  The woman that was in the hotel?

• 3:21:57Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:21:58Shawn Ryan?

  That wrote the book?

• 3:21:59Speaker 06

  Mm-hmm.

• 3:21:59Shawn Ryan?

  That you saved?

• 3:22:00Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:22:02Shawn Ryan?

  Roger that. Roger that. We'll reach out.

• 3:22:07Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:22:08Shawn Ryan?

  Well, brother. I'll let you off on the third one, unless you want to keep going.

• 3:22:14Speaker 06

  I'm now I'm bugging myself. Now I'll be driving home going, ah, I should have said, why didn't I say that? What about him? What about her? What about this? I like, ah. Um. Yeah.

• 3:22:27Shawn Ryan?

  Roger that.

• 3:22:27Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 3:22:29Shawn Ryan?

  Well.

• 3:22:31Shawn Ryan?

  I want to say thank you for coming, and more importantly, thank you for saving those Americans' lives and everybody's lives, all 700 of them that day. That is a...

• 3:22:44Shawn Ryan?

  I seriously doubt I will ever sit in front of another human being that can say that they saved 700 lives in one day. So. That means the world to me, man. And, uh, God bless you. Cheers.