153: When You're Called Upon, You Get The Job Done. The Seawolves in Vietnam, With Dennis Rowley.

0:00:00 - Opening 0:04:00 - Dennis Rowley and The Seawolves. 1:48:00 - Final thoughts and take-aways. 1:50:00 - Support. How to stay on THE PATH. 2:14:00 - Closing gratitude. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

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

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is Jaco Podcasts number 153 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening Echo. Good evening.

• 0:11Jocko Willink?

  Congressional Resolution honoring the veterans of helicopter attack light squadron three and their families. Whereas helicopter attack light squadron three here and after in this resolution referred to as HAL 3, began its history as detachments of Navy helicopter combat support squadron one HC1, which began helicopter gunship operations in support of Navy brownwater special operations and army units in the Mekong Delta of South Vietnam on September 19th, 1966. Whereas the detachments of HC1 adopted the name Sea Wolves.

• 0:55Jocko Willink?

  Whereas HAL 3 was officially established on April 1st, 1967 in Vong Tau, South Vietnam, and was the only active duty Navy helicopter gunship squadron in the history of naval aviation.

• 1:11Jocko Willink?

  Whereas during the squadron's existence, nearly 3,000 veterans of HAL 3 displayed extraordinary courage in support of United States military and political objectives in Vietnam.

• 1:24Jocko Willink?

  Whereas 44 veterans of HAL 3 gave their lives in support of military operations in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam.

• 1:34Jocko Willink?

  Whereas the extraordinary performance of the veterans of HAL 3 earned numerous unit citations, including six presidential unit citations, seven Navy unit commendations, one meritorious unit commendation, a Republic of Vietnam meritorious unit commendation, and the Vietnam Service Medal.

• 1:57Jocko Willink?

  Whereas the valor of the veterans of Hal 3 earned 5 Navy Crosses, 31 Silver Stars, 2 Legion of Merit Medals, 5 Navy and Marine Corps Medals, 219 Distinguished Flying Crosses, 156 Purple Hearts, 101 Bronze Stars, 142 Republic of Vietnam Gallantry Crosses, over 16,000 Air Medals, 439 Navy Commendation Medals, and 228 Navy Achievement Medals, making it possibly the most decorated Navy Squadron during the Vietnam War.

• 2:36Jocko Willink?

  Whereas the maintenance and administrative personnel of Hal 3 contributed greatly to the success of the 9 Hal 3 detachments operating throughout the Mekong Delta, providing the detachments with superb maintenance, support, and logistics.

• 2:52Jocko Willink?

  Whereas Hal 3 flew over 130,000 hours of combat and logistical support. Whereas Hal 3 inflicted several thousand casualties on enemy forces. Whereas Hal 3 performed 1,530 medical evacuations. Whereas Hal 3 delivered over 37,000 passengers and over 1 million pounds of cargo. And whereas Hal 3 was disestablished in March 1972 at Binh Thuy, South Vietnam as part of the Vietnamization Program, leaving behind it a combat and humanitarian record

• 3:35Jocko Willink?

  recognizing, recognized as bringing great credit upon the United States Navy and its role in the Vietnam War. Now therefore be it resolved that the House of Representatives, 1. Honors the service, courage, and sacrifice of the veterans of Hal 3; 2. Honors the families of Hal 3 veterans for their support; 3. Expresses its condolences to the families and comrades of those killed in action; and 4. Recognizes Hal 3 as a unique squadron in the history of naval aviation.

• 4:20Jocko Willink?

  And that resolution of recognition was made in 2010, actually 38 years after the Sea Wolves were disestablished in Vietnam. And that is a long time to wait for recognition. And this is because, well, for one thing, they weren't looking for recognition, but also to much of the world, the Sea Wolves were relatively unknown. For me, having grown up in the SEAL teams, I actually knew about the Sea Wolves.

• 5:02Jocko Willink?

  I knew about their reputation from the Vietnam era SEALs that held them in the absolute highest regard possible. And they were considered extremely courageous, sometimes beyond courageous. They were incredible pilots and highly aggressive gunners and the teams that maintained and kept the aircraft flying in really horrible conditions. They were known for getting the job done. And there's one thing that always stuck in my mind when I heard stories about the Sea Wolves in Vietnam.

• 5:42Jocko Willink?

  And that was this, simply if you called them, they would come. And it didn't matter if it was day or night, sunny skies or typhoon rains, a calm extraction or a hot landing zone filled with enemy fire. To the Sea Wolves, none of that mattered. What mattered is that the troops on the ground needed help. And if you called the Sea Wolves, they would come.

• 6:14Jocko Willink?

  And it is an honor today to have one of these men here with us to tell us about this relatively unknown, but at the same time legendary squadron of naval aviation helicopter attack squadron light how three the Sea Wolves and we have Dennis Rowley naval officer naval aviator and of course Sea Wolf sir absolutely honored to have you on the show. Thank you for coming.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  Jaco, I thank you and you Echo for the opportunity to be here. It's a it's something that I didn't want to do. You know, you hear the old saw about you don't talk about the war and I think that's true of most all of the guys that I knew and flew and fought with. We just don't talk about it except over a beer in a bar somewhere with guys we've trusted our lives to. However, my wife, Stinky, and my son and daughter, when they heard about this opportunity told me you gotta do this. You gotta help keep the reputation of the

• 7:31Speaker 01

  Sea Wolves alive. And I don't think that reputation needs a lot of buildup on my part.

• 7:38Speaker 01

  But I'm here to honor the 44 of our brothers who weren't able to come on back with us. And I'm here to help share a little bit of history about the squadron. And I'm here to thank every one of you swinging dick gunners who helped me get my little pink body back without any additional holes in it. Those guys are phenomenal. I mean, they're really something, but we'll get into that. It's a pleasure to be here. I'm looking forward to the conversation. I'm still scratching my head as to why I'm here. Because you guys have giants on this show.

• 8:18Speaker 01

  You just had a fella who was a highly decorated Marine infantry officer. He went on to get a law degree. He went on to work in the VA. He became the Secretary of the Navy. He became a congressman from the great state of Virginia. And, oh, by the way, was a little-known candidate for President of the US. And, party politics aside, this country would have been better off if Jim Webb had been our president. Totally agree. Yeah. And I can say that not from, you know, just a casual reading of his bio. I know Jim because he was a classmate of mine at the Naval Academy.

• 8:59Speaker 01

  I know Jim because he was a companymate of mine at the Naval Academy. And I know Jim to be the kind of a man that I would hope my son would become. Just a great guy. I can also say that I know Jim because for a brief time plebe summer, we roomed together. So you're looking at one of the only guys that you'll ever meet who is proud to share the fact that he slept with the Secretary of the Navy. So, yeah, we're here to spread the word and have a little fun. The one thing that was really important about recent past is a Sea Wolf reunion.

• 9:42Speaker 01

  We have reunions every couple of years, and now many reunions more frequently. But this one was pretty special. It was about two months ago. We were gathered on the flight deck of the Midway for the premiere of a documentary called Scramble the Sea Wolves. They had a big inflatable screen on the flight deck, and we were all up there laughing and scratching. One thing that I noticed about the entire experience is, man, all those guys look old now. I mean, yeah, but the...

• 10:16Speaker 01

  The movie with, the documentary was very well shot. It's actually being released on KPBS and PBS and I assume that shortly after that it'll be available on YouTube. But it, it gave us a sense of pride and I think I can speak for everyone that it gave us a little greater sense of belonging, based upon the fact that our, our story could now be told.

• 10:44Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, that's a, I've watched it and anybody can watch it. You can, if you Google Scramble the Sea Wolves, KPBS, it'll pop up and you can watch it. Just, you know, there's no email to sign up for. It's free. That's how you can, you can watch it. Let's, let's talk about the Sea Wolves. Let's talk a little bit about your past because I think you're, I mean, starting with your, your dad, being a pilot. And yeah, let's start with that and, and what that was like growing up.

• 11:12Speaker 01

  Well, my dad would really be pissed off at you for calling him a pilot because dad was an aviation ordinance chief. And he knew that the guys in the back were doing the job and the guys up front were just steering the bus. No, my dad, William John Rowley, was a hell of a guy. He was an interesting man and that's the nicest thing you can say about somebody, I think. Dad was a kind of a guy who could walk into a room and, full of strangers and an hour later walk out and everybody thought he was their new best friend. Good guy, great guy. But he comes from a long line of warriors. My grandfather, who married

• 11:52Speaker 01

  my grandmother from Hilo, yeah, he, he fought in World War I. I have a wonderful picture at home of my mom and her three brothers taken during World War II. And Uncle Walt is there in his Marine Corps uniform. Uncle Bob is there in his Navy Blues. And my, my Uncle Jim is there in his Army Air Force uniform. Yeah. And then when World War II broke out, my, my dad and his brother, my Uncle Herb, both joined the Navy. Dad went on into aviation ordinance and came out the other end of the pipe after piece as one of the last of the Tojo Chiefs. A guy who made chief in a little over three years. Yeah,

• 12:37Speaker 01

  he's an interesting fellow. And leadership lesson number one for me was the way he

• 12:45Speaker 01

  Helped me grow as I was coming up. You would think that a chief petty officer in the Navy can be very gruff and directive. And they can and they are when it's required. But Dad never told me, "Go do this." He'd say, "Have you ever considered? Have you ever thought about? Have you ever?" And he brought it into practice one day when I was just getting ready for college and trying to decide where I was going to go. He had just come back from a med cruise and he had one of his JOs, a pilot, a Naval Academy grad, invite me over to his house for dinner. And you know, I thought that was a little strange, but I was pretty excited about it.

• 13:30Speaker 01

  The guy came and picked me up in a brand-new yellow Corvette and took me over to his home and introduced me to his drop-dead gorgeous Swedish wife. Now Dad didn't have to say, "You should go to the Naval Academy for the experience in learning leadership." He brought it down to a level that I could understand.

• 13:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. You thought you'd get issued a Swedish wife?

• 13:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, actually, what I wanted, Jaco, was somebody 5'8", 5'9", long, straight blond hair, good head, bitchin' bod, witty, completely intelligent and imbued with the mating instincts of a wild mink in heat. But what the good Lord saw fit to pair me up with was stinky and she's a stumpy little brown-haired girl that's just ornery as a sack of Wildcats. So, yeah. Ain't it funny how it all works out?

• 14:18Jocko Willink?

  So, you go meet this pilot and did that flip the switch in your head?

• 14:25Speaker 01

  Well, I always knew I wanted to be a naval aviator. It's just something that I wanted. I had initially had dreams of going in and flying spads. That A-1 was just a hell of a weapons carrier in a close air support mission that was non-parallel in my way of thinking. They got a lot of guys out of the shit. But that didn't work out because the aircraft was being retired as I was going through flight school. The thought of going to the Naval Academy was always intriguing to me. I didn't know that I'd be able to make that, but I was one of the, you know, I'm sort of large and

• 15:05Speaker 01

  I was one of the only Navy dependents who were into athletics at Kebabsaki High School on Okinawa where I went through all four years of high school. And the senior naval officer on the island had roomed with Wayne Hart and the football coach at Navy. They did a quick scout and told me to take a competitive exam and I'd be considered for the academy. I had a year to waste while I was waiting to get into the academy, so I went to Berkeley. This is in the 1963-64 school year, which was very colorful. Mario Salvos was up there

• 15:48Speaker 01

  doing his dirty word movement on the steps of the administration building. It was ugly. My parents lived across the hill in Walnut Creek, California, and every time the news was over, I'd get a frantic call from my mother. "Are you okay? Are you okay?" "Yeah, Mom, I'm okay." It's, yeah. But at any rate, following that year at Berkeley, I received a presidential appointment and even though he was, he had been assassinated, John Kennedy's signature was on that. Yeah. And I went back to the Navy, fell in love with a crew, and I can honestly say that

• 16:29Speaker 01

  if it hadn't been for rowing at Navy, I probably wouldn't have made it through. I probably would have quit, which is something that you would have been pissed off about.

• 16:38Jocko Willink?

  I would have been. And why is that? Because it gave you something to focus on? It gave you an outlet?

• 16:43Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 16:46Speaker 01

  Crew is hands down the uh, the greatest team sport that you can imagine. It uh, if even one person is not pulling their weight, is not exactly in sync, the rhythm of the boat uh suffers. Uh, it'll be dragged down and everyone will know exactly the, the reason for that. You can tell by the size of the puddle, the way the boat is uh set, it's, it's phenomenal. So. It's, it's a great lesson in group leadership in that everyone has to be a leader in that shell. To put their, their, the maximum that they can into it to make the boat move. If you get a chance, read a book called uh, The Boys in the Boat.

• 17:29Jocko Willink?

  I've heard of that book.

• 17:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's got great insight into what rowing's all about. And you guys should be up on other sports.

• 17:39Jocko Willink?

  And so you, you, you row at the Naval Academy. How was your, how was your, since you kind of grew up in the Navy, your dad was a chief. You must've been at least somewhat prepared for the, you know, the shock and awe of drill instructors and upperclassmen and all that stuff?

• 17:55Speaker 01

  It uh, wasn't the uh, the drill instructors or the uh, uh, the upperclassmen. It was the chicken ship. I had a, a, a guy in my, our company that just hated me. And he'd stand me up in the uh passageway and he had a plastic baseball bat and beat me in the chest with it. Yeah, it's a non-event. You know, thunk, thunk, thunk. But if I saw that guy again, I would rip his head off. Because it was just so juvenile. I was a couple of years older than my classmates for a number of reasons. I flunked kindergarten. But at any rate, it was uh, yeah. Uh, you just don't do things like that. There's, there's, there's no, there's no leadership lessons. There's no benefit to be had.

• 18:39Speaker 01

  From some of the stuff that was going on in there. But when I got out there on the water with my teammates, you know, it all just. What a way.

• 18:47Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, there's something to be learned from having to put up with such crap. And I think there's two ways people go with it. Some, sometimes they go with like, oh, I'm gonna be able to do that one day and, and give people a bunch of shit about whatever. And some people go, okay, I'm never gonna act like that.

• 19:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:08Jocko Willink?

  And then how, and, and, um, so you were Jim Webb's roommate, Plebe Summer?

• 19:12Speaker 01

  Uh, just for, uh, a few days, but, uh, we were in the same company for, uh, all four years. Yeah, and then he's a heck of a guy.

• 19:20Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Uh, no, it was awesome. It was a real honor to have him on here. And, you know, he, he told a similar story. And he wrote about it in his, in some of his books, which was, you know, a guy just smacking him in the ass with, uh, some kind of bat.

• 19:33Speaker 01

  It was our songbook.

• 19:35Jocko Willink?

  And, and they're telling him, he needs to say, you know, just admit that it hurts. And he wouldn't admit it.

• 19:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:41Jocko Willink?

  But same thing, you know, he's kind of like, he, he, what did he say? He said, you know, I don't hold anything against those guys that did that to me, but I remember their names.

• 19:52Jocko Willink?

  So I think they made the list for Jim Webb.

• 19:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:55Jocko Willink?

  Um, and then how did you end up picking? So you, you already automatically knew you wanted to be a pilot?

• 20:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely.

• 20:02Jocko Willink?

  And was that hard to get selected for that?

• 20:05Speaker 01

  Uh, no, it was a service selection is done based on class rank. And I graduated in the top 10% of the bottom third of my class. And that was sufficient to get me into, into aviation. Since I couldn't fly the SPAD, I, I really wanted to go jets. Sorry, guys, I have to admit that. But, uh, due to, due to my size, uh, and my anthropometric measurements, if I had to punch out, I would have, uh, left my knees on the glare shield of the, uh, the trainers.

• 20:34Jocko Willink?

  How tall are you?

• 20:35Speaker 01

  Uh, six, four.

• 20:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, big.

• 20:39Jocko Willink?

  This was, you know, clearly, and Jim Webb talked about this when he was on the podcast, you know, he's, he was the guy in charge of hanging up the names of the guys that had been killed. And, and yet, when I had Charlie Plum on, who graduated, I think, in 64, or he showed up in 64, no, graduated in 64. Vietnam wasn't even on the, on the radar for them. And for you guys, it, you know, 1967, 1968, it had, you know, you had to have known, okay, I'm going to fight in Vietnam.

• 21:11Speaker 01

  When you walk into Mother Bee Bancroft Hall, you go into the rotunda, which is a very large open area. And when we started losing our former classmates, the graduates, I'm sure Jim explained, but you put a poster board up there with a picture out of the lucky bag, and a brief bio, and not a description, but where they died. And initially, it was just onesies, twosies, but pretty soon, the march went all the way around the rotunda, and they had to move it up into Memorial Hall. And it really brought home the fact

• 21:51Speaker 01

  that this is, this is serious. This is, you know, you're making up your minds, whether or not you want to dedicate your lives to the defense of this country, and it might come at a considerable cost. And for 44 of our brothers, it certainly did. Forty-four Seawolves didn't make it back. And I'm sort of an emotional guy, but one of the few times that I've really cried openly and unashamedly, was at the Wall. Seeing a couple of my gunners

• 22:32Speaker 01

  up there, just really brought it home to me. Amazing people gunners are.

• 22:43Jocko Willink?

  So that's, that's what you know you're getting into upon commissioning? And so you, you get commissioned and you graduate in 68? Your class is 68?

• 22:56Speaker 01

  Right.

• 22:57Jocko Willink?

  And you, then you go to Pensacola, Florida? Is that where you go to flight school?

• 23:01Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 23:02Jocko Willink?

  And that's, what you, talk us a little bit through the, the flight school path? You show up, you learn to fly, what, a T-38? Is that what you learn on?

• 23:13Speaker 01

  No, you, you start out on a T-34.

• 23:15Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 23:16Speaker 01

  And it, it's, there's, there's been a change in the way they, uh, they instruct naval aviators now. When we were going through, you had to do the flights, uh, the fixed wing flight syllabus first, before you could get into helicopters. And then you'd go through the helicopter, uh, syllabus. And then after that, those of us that, uh, got orders to, uh, Vietnam would, uh, go up to, uh, Fort Rucker and the army would, uh, instruct us in tactics, in, uh, armaments, systems. Uh, they did, they did a good job in prepping us. And then send us overseas and the rest of it would be done in country.

• 23:56Speaker 01

  So the, the, the training that we received along the way was, uh, was excellent. But, uh, a lot of it was just like, uh, back at the academy. They told us that, uh, hey, guys, the education you receive here at the United States Naval Academy costs the taxpayer approximately $250,000, which was a lot of money back then. And our reply was, yeah, but you're sticking up our butts a nickel at a time. So, you know, you know.

• 24:24Jocko Willink?

  Had you, so now you're in the pipeline for, for helicopters. Had you heard of Sea Wolves at this time? Were, were you hearing about it? Did you, is it something that you said, oh, I want to go do that?

• 24:35Speaker 01

  We were just starting to hear about it. And you know, it, uh, wasn't, uh, fully developed in my mind. It, uh, that's, uh, uh, where I wanted to go. But it, it quickly became.

• 24:50Speaker 01

  There is a purpose for every element in the military, from the guys who swabs the decks all the way on up. But I didn't want to be a bus driver. I didn't want to be a guy who bored holes in the sky. So, this, being a Sea Wolf, immediately appealed to me as an opportunity to be able to, I don't know, to pay back? It's a funny thing, and I'll jump ahead a little here. But I have a cousin who is very close to me. She's like a sister to me.

• 25:31Speaker 01

  And I'd never really thought about questions like you just asked, but immediately after I got back from Vietnam, she was driving me on out to family home in Walnut Creek, California. And without taking her eyes off the road, she said, "How can you do it?" And I thought about that for just a minute and said, "Well, it was pretty easy. I went over there to bring as many of our guys home safely as I could." And in some ways, I failed. In some ways, I succeeded. But that's it. I was enough of a student to understand the domino effect, certainly. But that wasn't in my thinking.

• 26:14Speaker 01

  You know, you're thinking sort of 10 yards? 10 yards? But in the air, it's a little more expansive. It's the guys that you're flying with, the guys in your fire team, the guys on your depth, the guys who were the maintainers back in Ben Thui. They're the guys you think about, and that's why you do it.

• 26:34Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so did you get to select? You get done with the training, did you get to select, "Hey, I want to go to the squadron in Vietnam"?

• 26:45Speaker 01

  Uh, pretty much, yes.

• 26:47Jocko Willink?

  Was there a long list for that?

• 26:49Speaker 01

  There were. I'm sure there were more volunteers than got accepted. I don't know the mechanics of that. I asked for it, and I got it.

• 26:56Jocko Willink?

  And how did that look like showing up in Vietnam?

• 27:04Speaker 01

  I was the only officer assigned to the Sea Wolves who took that reverse freedom flight on into Saigon. And I got there and they shuffled me off to the Annapolis Hotel, which I thought was a little unusual. But, you know, I had a couple of days to kill because there wasn't any transport down to Bintui. And I knew a dear friend of mine who was at in Det 2 at Na Bay, and he'd got over there before I did. So I figured, Na Bay, that's not too far away, I'm gonna go visit him. And the next morning, I check out a 45, put it in my gym bag, I'm in civvies, they didn't

• 27:46Speaker 01

  like us roaming around town in onesies in uniform. So I jumped on a Navy bus out to Na Bay. And I was having a great time talking to the guys at the Det there and learning a little about what's going on. Comes time to leave, and it's probably about 16:30. And I say, well, I better get back. And they say, well, you just missed the last bus. But don't worry about it, you can take a petty cab. So here I am, brand new in country, I've got the zipper in my gym bag open with my hand very close to it, and this Vietnamese fellow is pedaling away, taking me back to the hotel. It took us about an hour to get back there.

• 28:30Speaker 01

  And I tipped him generously, because I'm not a light fellow, I was a lot lighter then. But, you know, here I am, my first day in country, and I'm gonna get greased. So, yeah.

• 28:42Jocko Willink?

  Hey, tell us, if you wouldn't mind, some of the, about the formation of the Sea Wolves, because it's a very cool story about the Mekong Delta, about the way things, the way the enemy moved through the Mekong Delta and through the Rung Sat Special Zone, and there was no roads, and the only way to get around was water. If you want to maybe expand on that, just so people can kind of get a feel for what started this whole thing off.

• 29:07Speaker 01

  Sure, sure. The Mekong Delta is fed by waters from the Himalayas. It comes on down and spreads out into a broad quasi-oceanic area. Basically, it's mud and crap and brown water. And hence the brown water Navy. But at any rate, the... There are very few roads that do anything but connect major cities in the Mekong back then. And consequently, just about all the traffic's moved by sand pen or junk. And that's the way people got around.

• 29:51Speaker 01

  The infiltration that the NVA and the VC practiced came largely either on foot, by bicycle, or by boat. In order to counteract that, Task Force 116 was put into place. Game Warden was the operational mission. And we were there to interdict that traffic in personnel, ammunition, and food logistics that was moving down into the delta.

• 30:28Speaker 01

  The Army took that mission on first, actually flying off a couple of LCDs that were rigged with a makeshift flight deck. But that didn't work out too well. And this is not saying anything against the Army. But in their syllabus, they weren't trained on instruments. In Navy, we were rigorously first in fixed wing and then in helicopters. So we were used to flying in the ship. And the Navy and the Army was not.

• 31:00Jocko Willink?

  And that's because the Navy has to fly at sea and land on ships.

• 31:06Speaker 01

  That's right, different missions.

• 31:07Jocko Willink?

  That's it.

• 31:08Speaker 01

  Different missions at the time. The Army outgrew that, but it was painful. They had a different mission than we did. So they had a unit that was assigned to our OPCON. And they would fly cover for the small boats. Those were primarily the PBRs and the Swift boats. We didn't see many Swift boats up at Ben Luck. We were working with the PBR sailors. PBR Patrol Boat River is a 32-foot fiberglass luxury boat that was stripped clean and was highly maneuverable, but it was, I say stripped

• 31:53Speaker 01

  clean of everything that was non-essential. They were very lightweight, had little armor at all, but they were very heavily armed. And these boats, you talk about guys with brass balls, they'd poke up into these impossibly narrow canals and up little riverlets, just looking for trouble, and it frequently came their way. So, the Army was attempting to work with them. There were all sorts of minor operational problems to overcome, who's calling out the missions, what the support area is. It just wasn't working well. So, the Navy

• 32:36Speaker 01

  decided that we needed a Navy squadron, and they turned to HC-1, the Fleet Angels, to put a few debts in place, to help provide cover for the brownwater Navy. And by brownwater Navy, I mean the small boat guys, the SEALs, any Navy vessel that was down in the Mekong. And it wasn't working well with the Army. HC-1 picked it up. It started working very well, because they understood the Navy's mission much better than the Army, and they

• 33:16Speaker 01

  were equipped with the capabilities to fly both at night and in bad weather. And I don't know if you've been in monsoon before, but...

• 33:29Speaker 01

  It's shitty flying. It is.

• 33:31Jocko Willink?

  I'll take your word for it.

• 33:32Speaker 01

  Really bad. So, uh, as, uh, as you've already mentioned, on April Fool's Day in, uh, sixty-seven, uh, they decided that the, uh, in-country squadron was, uh, required and, uh, that responsibility was shifted from HC1 to HAL3. Uh, we grew to having, uh, nine detachments, uh, that were scattered throughout the delta to, uh, give us a quick reaction time to virtually, uh, any, any area in the Mekong. And, uh, each detachment had, uh, two aircraft assigned. It had, uh, uh, two full crews for each aircraft. And that was about it.

• 34:13Speaker 01

  But let me, let me give you a little info on, uh, the Noble UH-1 Bravo. I love that aircraft. It was a piece of crap. It really was. But it, uh, got us out of, uh, out of a lot of trouble every time we flew it.

• 34:30Jocko Willink?

  Uh, just for people that are listening, that's the classic Vietnam Huey aircraft. That's, that's what you see, that's what you see in movies. That, that's it.

• 34:39Speaker 01

  Yeah. There really was sort of a, uh, McHale's Navy, uh, that, uh, cachet that was attached to the Sea Wolves. Uh, the, the Army was just getting rid of their Bravo models to go to this, uh, to the Charlies, which had, uh, several hundred, uh, greater horsepower, uh, more maneuverable, blah, blah, blah. And they had, uh, some old Bravos sitting around and rather than shipping them back to the boneyard or destroying them in place, they gave them to the Navy. So frequently, we had a lot of rebuilding to do before, uh, we, uh, turned these guys loose. But God bless the Army. They gave us, uh, they gave us our, uh, our aircraft.

• 35:23Speaker 01

  Support for the, uh, Bravo and the Navy chain was not the best. So you've...

• 35:30Speaker 01

  It's easy to say beg, borrow, or steal. Borrow or steal is what we did quite well. Quite well. Our guys were incredible. We, a chief would grab a couple of guys and go out and come back with exactly what we needed. And you don't ask a question about that. You just put it into play. So, the nine jets, two helicopters in each. Each Huey was basically configured with two seven-shot rocket pods. 2.75 folding thin aerial rockets. We had a pair of 60s that were mounted with a flex gun. The copilot controlled those.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  But the thing that really made us unique and powerful was our door gunners. When I first got there, and just for a very short period of time, our door gunners were still firing 60s from the shoulder. And that was just an incredibly powerful tool in keeping the bad guys' heads down during our break and prepping the area for the next aircraft to roll in. So we typically have a door gunner on one side and on the other side, if we were lucky, a 50. Eventually, this grew. We got some miniguns.

• 36:55Speaker 01

  Most all of our debt birds eventually had miniguns. And the guys in the back would fly them and it did wonders for keeping heads down, as did the 50 cows that we had. When we went from shoulder-held 60s to... There's a lesson there. Our guys would... It wasn't unusual to see them standing out on the skids, firing cover for us. That was a great, good thing, but it also resulted in brassing the sink elevator and the, or it just wasn't really, really acceptable. If you brass a tail rotor, you'll know about

• 37:39Speaker 01

  it, it's a rough ride going back in. But they decided that, no, we can't have that. And sort of tied the gunners' hands by putting what they called a pussy pole in the, in the door and mounted the 60 to it. Well, the guys got more than a little inventive and decided that if one 60 is good, two would be better and mounted two. One, yeah, here we go again. Hayden, thanks. Yeah. But mounted two 60s there and found out that they were brassing the, the tail rotor still. So what they did was they rotated each 90 degrees

• 38:22Speaker 01

  in opposing directions and all of a sudden, brassing was no longer much of a problem. Did essentially the same with our 50s. They mounted that so that it would fire 90 degrees longitudinally. And that was a very powerful weapon for not only keeping, keeping guys down, but also gave us a great degree of flexibility in the, in the break. And perhaps I should explain that by the break, we typically would fly in a, in a wagon wheel type, type

• 39:01Speaker 01

  approach. Two helicopters roughly flying 180 out from one another. So one is rolling in on the target as the other is coming around behind it. So when you then break off the target, the next helicopter is in there laying down its fire. And that, that 50 would, would really help us out in both identifying problem areas and taking care of the problem.

• 39:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's a great, a great background and, and you know, even when you watch, um, uh, Scramble the Sea Wolves, the, just, all the footage is just, it's unbelievable footage of the way you guys were flying and what the gunners were doing, gunners hanging out and shooting underneath the bird back in the other direction. Hanging out by a gunner's belt. Um, they might've invented the term gunner's belt. I, I was, go ahead.

• 40:03Speaker 01

  There's, there's a rite of passage that, uh, most of the, uh, FNGs got, and when I was in that FNG seat, I learned it one dark and stormy night. Uh, we're flying along in the, in the hack, the aircraft commander diverted my attention off to the left. And when I turned back, right here in the window of the Huey was one of my gunners who had mooning me. So, hey, this is gonna be fun. That and, uh, the other was, uh, if, if you were new to the DEP as a pilot, you were gonna get a collar full of brass. And it was

• 40:48Speaker 01

  really easy for them to do when they had the free guns. Uh, they got a little more inventive later on.

• 40:54Jocko Willink?

  Ah, that, that's, that's freaking dangerous.

• 40:58Speaker 01

  It's smarts.

• 41:00Jocko Willink?

  So, speaking of fun, one of the, one of the things, uh, I pulled off of the website, um, sea wolf dot org, is you guys had this thing that you called the Wolfgram, which was sort of, sort of like a sit rep for all the, all the different elements that were out there. And I think it paints a pretty good picture of the overall attitude. And I pulled out one of the clips and I'm just gonna read it. So this is your DEP, DEP4, from beautiful downtown Ben Luck. The Fog Cutters of DEP4 would like to wish everyone a merry monsoon season. Only 10 shopping days left. We'd better start with Lieutenant

• 41:40Jocko Willink?

  JG Hu White before we forget him. Everyone else has. He, he, uh, he, though he was leaving in May, but Guppers forgot to assign him a new duty station, Admin forgot to request a flight booking for him, and Operations forgot to inform him that this, that his FTL papers had been signed. But we're sure we'll finally, but we're sure things will finally turn around for what's his name? Lieutenant Deacon Johnson left on R and R to Hawaii and Lieutenant JG Rookie Rich, can't read the name, Farmer? Farmer? Yeah, Farmer, was called in to straighten out Bin Toy, Bin Toey, cutting us to three

• 42:24Jocko Willink?

  FTLs and ANACS. Commander Hammond will still have to fly every day even after the Deacon gets back. Boku Map, as Lieutenant Johnson is referred to by Mama-san, won't be much good for anything after coming back from Hawaii. Rookie Rich's talent for hiding should be of great value in Bin Toey. Lieutenant JG Chek Carlos Steele has opened a chain of combination taco stand slash minigun exchange outlets with branches in Koochi, Tan An and Benluck with others soon to be opening in Long Bin, Ving Long and Vietn.

• 43:05Jocko Willink?

  Lieutenant JG Weird Harold Black is still looking for his mysteriously vanishing M60 Bolts. Latest debt for basketball casualty was Lieutenant JG Buckets Coffee, named after his golden touch on the court, who got four stitches in his head after going for a rebound. Who will it be in April? Three additions arrived this past month. Lieutenant Tom Rabola and Lieutenant JG Denny Rowley, which is you, sir, are new in country and Lieutenant JG Bill Belts was shafted, shifted from debt eight. Oh, well, with TV booze and all the attractions of the big city, what more could you want?

• 43:46Jocko Willink?

  As one of our departed pilots used to say, going home is for sissies.

• 43:53Jocko Willink?

  So, and you guys, these are all, they're fantastic to read. I read that to my buddy Dave Burke, where I sent, I sent him a copy of it and he said, "That's the best sit rep I've ever read in my life."

• 44:05Jocko Willink?

  So you guys had, you know, it's, it's good because you know, I always talk and, and every vet that comes on here, we kind of talk about how we have fun and that shows that, and I guess getting mooned through your side window also shows that you guys were having fun. I don't know if the hot brass is fun, but you guys were having a great time and you guys were making it fun. And at the same time, man, it was very intense and very dangerous. One of the things that, you know, you, you, you kind of threw it out there. You said, "Hey, we, we put these deaths all over the place so we could have a quick response time." And what that meant was you guys were spread out in these deaths so that you could get two guys on the ground

• 44:50Jocko Willink?

  within a matter of minutes. Tell me about that op tempo and what it was like when, when they scrambled the Sea Wolves.

• 45:00Speaker 01

  Well, we had two full crews for each one of our two birds. And what that meant was you were 12 hours on, 12 hours off, 365, 24, whatever.

• 45:15Speaker 01

  In order to support the, the Brownwater Navy, when they got in the ship, they, they needed us right away. And we could literally get off the deck in about three minutes. And that put us out there quickly enough that we could probably get them out of trouble. The, the worst thing that could, could happen to them in my estimation, other than losing someone is, is losing their engine. Because then they were just out there with, they were a grape. No, no place to go. So all they could do is just absorb the, the incoming.

• 45:55Speaker 01

  And with that in mind, what we would do is go on out and try and first get their heads down, and then two, start working the target. We had a very close relationship with the PBR sailors, very close. Those guys were sticking their necks out every day, and the times they got in trouble, we were happy to go and try and extricate them, no matter what. But one of the great quotes that I saw in the history that I was reviewing is the first contact that HC-1 made.

• 46:35Speaker 01

  The two boats had gone out on patrol and had stumbled across a battalion-sized element with about eighty sampanes and junk that were trying to cross a river. And the boats came under, obviously, intense fire. When the sea wolves got there, a couple of minutes after this, the incoming fire team lead contacts the chief of the boat and says, "Where do you want us to put in our strike?" And he said something like, "Hell, I want you boys to go in there and hold field day on those guys."

• 47:17Speaker 01

  And that's sort of the attitude that, you know, it is, it's an overused term, but it's a brotherhood. It truly is. We'd do anything for those guys. They were putting it all out.

• 47:32Jocko Willink?

  Did you guys, did you guys pre-brief with them for missions? Or how did you figure that out? How did you figure it out? So, did you know where they were going? Did you know what their target was? Did they pre-brief you?

• 47:45Speaker 01

  Unfortunately, we had intelligence that was, to put it kindly, generally a piece of crap. It wasn't very good, for a number of reasons, for a number of reasons. But what we'd do is we'd talk to the guys on the boats. We'd know what the tactical situation was in the OA, and we would know where they were going and what they were doing. That is, are you going out for a bunker? Are you doing an insert with SEALs? We'd get that information from the team that was there. Actually, we didn't have a team. It was a... Uh, just a squad, yeah.

• 48:27Speaker 01

  But, uh, we'd share the, share the information so we'd know about where they were going. And what we do as soon as we got airborne is head for the, uh, the pre-brief spot and then get, uh, uh, update the info en route. So that by the time we got there, we knew that where the fire was coming from, uh, what the situation was with the boats and where we were likely to put in our first strike.

• 48:50Jocko Willink?

  So the de-confliction as far as where you were shooting in friendly fire and all that was, I mean, as long as, as long as they'd tell you, hey, north, north side of the river or something like that, is that how you would de-conflict? And did you, when you were supporting ground troops, how the hell did you know who was who down there?

• 49:06Speaker 01

  We'd, uh, have them pop smoke. And that generally worked, but the, the worst thing that could happen is, uh, when you say pop red and one shows up right where you, uh, expect it and one shows up a hundred meters on down. Yeah. So, uh, uh, the, the, the bad guys had our, had our freaks and, uh, uh, well, I don't know if they had our freaks or not, but they could certainly see a smoke and, uh, they'd pop it also.

• 49:35Jocko Willink?

  Right.

• 49:35Speaker 01

  Same one. And that, uh, could create a little confusion, but it also gave us a, uh, uh, locus points that we could, uh, talk to the guys on the boats and they could, uh, direct our fire. And one thing that's important about that, the 2.75 folding fin aerial rocket, uh, was a, a great tool. I didn't like it much because, uh, it wasn't all that uncommon to have one of the, the fins not open properly and then it'd just go squirrely and, uh, go anywhere. If you had the aircraft, uh, trimmed up, uh, it, it could be an effective weapon.

• 50:18Speaker 01

  But I didn't like to use it too far out because that gave it more of an opportunity to, uh, to develop a mind of its own. I use it more as a, as a close in weapon.

• 50:32Jocko Willink?

  So these, the, you'd be sitting in your, in your hooch or whatever, and you'd be sta- you know, just standing by, it was your 12-hour shift, and then all of a sudden, the radio call would come in, they'd, they'd tell you guys, "Go." What was the procedure like from there?

• 50:47Speaker 01

  Uh, assholes and elbows out to the aircraft, the, uh, one of the other crews, first, first guy there, would, uh, be, uh, suddenly, uh, the, the aircraft was pre-cocked, but they'd go ahead and, uh, set the, uh, uh, the, uh, rockets up for us, and, uh, jump in, uh, hit the button and go. You, uh, every, I think that it's safe to say that practically every operational mission that we flew, we took off over max gross weight. Uh, you'd, uh, pull it up enough to get it out of the revetment, and get it out there, and what

• 51:30Speaker 01

  we'd do when we were really seriously overweight, is just sort of inch it ahead and get a little forward, uh, momentum, uh, on the helicopter, and then drop the collective, which puts all the weight down on the skids, and spread the skids, and then pop it up a little, and the aircraft would be, uh, would slingshot up to, oh, about three feet, and then, you know, you, hopefully you'll get across the B-40 fence at the end of the, uh, end of the runway. It, it, it was colorful. Yeah, but, uh, had to do it in order to carry enough ordnance to, uh, to get guys out of trouble.

• 52:07Jocko Willink?

  And then, uh, I mean, um, when we were in Iraq, we always felt like the helicopters, which when Ramadi, the helicopters, they wouldn't really fly over the city of Ramadi because it was, it was too dangerous for them. Um, the couple of times that they came in, it was like, uh, it was like a just massive machine gun fire at them, and, and they didn't really enjoy that too much. But you guys were just, uh, so, so my point is that helicopters, and actually vehicles as well, they're, they're like bullet magnets, right? Everywhere, you see a helicopter come in, the enemy just sees that and focuses on it. You guys must have, you, you had to be taking fire all the time.

• 52:47Speaker 01

  Yep. All the time, you get used to it. The, uh...

• 52:52Speaker 01

  One of my gunners reminded me of a, uh, the first time that, uh, we saw a 51 cal coming at us. It was, uh, it was night and these things, you know, they, it's as big as a basketball. It's as big as a freaking basketball coming up at you. We started to see the tracers come up at it and he says, "Damn, you did the right thing." I said, "Yeah?" And he lowered the collective immediately, uh, got down, uh, on the deck and then, uh, came around and we could, could adjust, but those things are frightening.

• 53:27Jocko Willink?

  Oh yeah, that's

• 53:28Speaker 01

  But it's, it goes with the turf. You're, you're, you're 20 years old. That was 23 at the time and

• 53:37Speaker 01

  it's, you think the mission, you think the, the pride that you take in, in the guys and the, uh, the pride they take in you and it, it's frightening, you know, there was, I was terrified at times. I think we all were, but, uh, you, you get by that. You get by that. You think about the guys down there who are really in the shit and it's easy to, uh, apply what you know tactically and, uh, get the job done.

• 54:05Jocko Willink?

  That's, that's another thing that, that's why I was kinda asking you about meeting with the guys on the ground because you guys are doing this and, and I'm sure in some situations you had never met the people that were down there and you're still risking your lives to go in there and give them the support that they need.

• 54:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's what we did.

• 54:26Jocko Willink?

  There's a, there's a counterintuitive thing too, to helicopters that you just mentioned, which is when you're getting shot at from the ground, if you get lower, it takes away some of their field of fire, right?

• 54:37Speaker 01

  Right.

• 54:37Jocko Willink?

  So, so you would think, "Oh, there's someone shooting at me. I'm gonna get up and go away." When the reality is, if you get lower, you know, that, that person, there's gonna be trees or whatever, terrain features in between, that's gotta take a little bit of time to, uh, to get your instincts going in that direction.

• 54:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. It certainly does, but it's amazing how quick those instincts are developed.

• 55:02Speaker 01

  When you got somebody shooting at you.

• 55:04Jocko Willink?

  And then the maintenance crews, the birds are, I saw pictures of birds, they were just like, it looked like they'd been used for target practice. Coming back, you go watch that movie, Scramble the Seawolves, it looks like target practice was used, that's what they were using the birds for target practice, that's what some of them look like. And the maintenance crews were just, they said they were making patches from beer cans.

• 55:28Speaker 01

  That's true, that's true, and the guys were proud of that, and the patch that was a beer can would not be painted over generally.

• 55:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, and there was one thing that I want to say, and this is gonna sound like I'm a one-trick pony and my love for the gunners. But those guys not only fired the weapons, they serviced the weapons, they serviced the helicopters, they performed all the dailies, they were all qualified plane captains. They kept that thing up and running for us, so that we could walk out with our silk scarves and strap the thing on and take them out to where they needed to be in order to get the job done. No, we're not Air Force, we don't believe in silk scarves.

• 56:18Speaker 01

  Sorry, Air Force brethren.

• 56:21Jocko Willink?

  And then, so you're doing this, this is a crazy optempo, operational tempo of 12 on, 12 off, 365 days. That's insane.

• 56:32Speaker 01

  You get used to it, you know, it's funny.

• 56:36Jocko Willink?

  I mean, you got, you got eight hours of sleep, okay, and then you got four hours to eat, and then the other 12 hours you're on standby to go fly into gun battles.

• 56:44Speaker 01

  I got.

• 56:45Jocko Willink?

  For 365 days.

• 56:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, I got nervous though when I wasn't flying, you know, a decent aviator wants to fly, and it's hard sometimes just sitting around waiting for your turn.

• 56:57Speaker 01

  We played, lifted a lot of weight, uh, played a lot of volleyball, played volleyball with and against the, uh, the SEALs and sometimes the, uh, the boat drivers. Uh, they just, it was, uh, 50 meters from the, uh, from the aircraft and that kept us, uh, kept us right there so we could respond quickly.

• 57:17Jocko Willink?

  And then, um, how often were you guys doing casualty evacuation?

• 57:22Speaker 01

  Only when needed. Yeah. It, it wasn't a primary mission of ours. If somebody got shot up and, uh, needed to lift out of town, uh, we'd provide that. And occasionally we'd, uh, get a call that, uh, uh, someone, uh, was, uh, wounded and, uh, uh, we'd go out and, uh, pick them up. But, uh, generally that was a job that was done by some certifiable idiots that I love, the, uh, the dust-off pilots. You got, uh, 20, 19, 20-year-old kids that are out there giving the keys to, to, uh, a, uh, a Maserati. Of course, this was only a Huey, but still, you get the idea. They were crazy. They'd fly into, into anything.

• 58:02Speaker 01

  My hat really goes off to them because, uh, uh, they'd fly into areas where they shouldn't.

• 58:09Jocko Willink?

  That's a, uh, another thing I talked about, um, with, uh, Colonel Bill Reader, who was on this podcast and same thing. I mean, he just said that the, the pilots back then, and maybe it's because the aircraft were, uh, very inexpensive compared to the, you know, to what they fly nowadays. They didn't, they don't want to risk the aircraft now, but he said these guys, they would just fly into, like, it was, hey, your, your, your aircraft is just gonna get hit. That's the way it's gonna be. Deal with it.

• 58:40Speaker 01

  And if you ever get the, get the opportunity to read, uh, the, uh, some of the citations for the Congressional Medal for, uh, the, these Hilo pilots, it's, it's incredible what they did.

• 58:52Jocko Willink?

  Now, I was, and always on this show give the, uh, same praise that you give to the machine gunners. Because the machine gunners in, in a ground combat, it's the machine gunners that are going to allow you to be able to maneuver and get away from a situation. Um, or maneuver towards, you know, they're gonna allow you to move. And same thing with, with your gunners and what they were doing. So you had a gunner on each side.

• 59:17Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 59:18Jocko Willink?

  That would protect the flanks.

• 59:19Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 59:20Jocko Willink?

  One of them on either a sixty or a dual sixty and the other one on a fifty cal.

• 59:27Speaker 01

  Or

• 59:28Jocko Willink?

  Generally.

• 59:28Speaker 01

  Or eventually a minigun.

• 59:30Jocko Willink?

  Oh, and then you guys got the miniguns.

• 59:32Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 59:33Jocko Willink?

  I in I looked at there was a real real fast flash on the screen in Scramble the Sea Wolves. There's a minigun and it's actually it's upside down. You can't. I had to pause it to read it. It said, um, the Lord giveth and the minigun taketh away.

• 59:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. It was a formidable weapon for a close closer support.

• 59:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, for people that don't know what a minigun is, it fires, it fires what? Five thousand rounds a minute? I mean, it's absolutely ridiculous what it shoots.

• 1:00:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't know what the rate is, but it's it gets your attention.

• 1:00:09Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and it just it's powered. It's it's powered. It's electrically powered. So it actually feeds the ammunition faster than than a than a normal mechanical weapon could fire. But it just it's crazy how much and how much, how many rounds puts I think it's five thousand, something like that. It's a ridiculous amount. And then you guys got those. So those were on your birds while you were on deployment?

• 1:00:32Speaker 01

  That's right. Yeah, as far as the the minigun goes, you know, it doesn't go bang, bang, bang. It goes. Uh, the rate of fire is phenomenal and the the gunners loved it, but you know, there's a little John Wayne in all of us. And I think, uh, every one of them would like to go back to the to the free guns. One thing that I do want to point out is that, uh,

• 1:00:56Speaker 01

  we were not very well equipped. So when we were up and around, uh, you know, on patrol or or actually out there engaged and had to fly in to, uh, take a gas up and, uh, and, uh, rearm.

• 1:01:12Speaker 01

  We'd go into an army base because the army had all the fuel and they had nails. The 2.75 makes a boom, but if you can load it with fluchettes, you can really keep the enemy down. So we'd go on up there, depending on the tactical situation. If we had a cause, it's their anti-personnel, something developing on the ground, we'd load up there. And that's where I saw my first Cobra. The Snake was an impressive aircraft. It was so much, it had so much more firepower than any one of our Hueys. But where do you put the gunners?

• 1:01:57Speaker 01

  You know, it's four and a half seating. They don't have any suppression for rolling off target, other than your wingman. And it, you know, it was intriguing, but it just didn't make sense to me.

• 1:02:09Jocko Willink?

  Did I remember this correctly, that at one point, whoever the commander was at the time, got offered, "Hey, do you guys want some Cobras?" And the answer was, "Nope, we need to stick with the Hueys."

• 1:02:20Speaker 01

  I'd heard that story. I don't know whether it's true or not, but yeah, yeah. Yeah, we liked that. But, you know, one of the guys you mentioned in the Wolfgram, and I will mention his name, Chuck Steely. Chuck was quite a guy. And he would go out on, to requisition parts for us. At the time, the army had a contractor, Dyn electron, that was doing the work on their aircraft. And, you know, they're bored out of their skull when they don't have anything to work on. So they got a Loach and started rebuilding it from spare parts from here and there, and got it to be fully functional. And, you

• 1:03:04Speaker 01

  know, to have an observation helicopter like that, to go out and snoop and poop with us, that would be incredible. Chuck engineered a deal where for a refrigerator full of beer, they'd give us this aircraft, you know, it was written off the rolls, they're closing it. But, you know, they'd said, "Hey, if you have a problem, let us know. We'll come down and take care of it."

• 1:03:29Speaker 01

  I like to think that Chuck was unplugging our refrigerator when the dead O and C came in. And not just no, but hell no. But you know, that sort of thing was not unusual over there. Yeah, God bless Chuck. He did, did everybody a lot of great service.

• 1:03:47Jocko Willink?

  The, uh, the, speaking of beer, apparently the, the wolf on the Sea Wolf insignia is somehow based on the Lowenbrow beer can.

• 1:03:57Speaker 01

  That's what they say.

• 1:03:58Jocko Willink?

  Allegedly.

• 1:03:58Speaker 01

  That's what they say. I can neither confirm nor deny. You know, strangely enough, I, I didn't drink much beer at all when I was over there because, uh, uh, they, they seemed to treat it with something that, uh, just put the taste off. We, we all thought it was formaldehyde. That was the, the, the going rumor, but.

• 1:04:17Jocko Willink?

  They told us that in Guam, when I was in Guam, my first deployment, they told us the same thing.

• 1:04:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:21Jocko Willink?

  That there was formaldehyde. That rumor's been, that rumor survived from 1969 to, uh, 1992 when I was on my first deployment. There was formaldehyde in the beer.

• 1:04:31Speaker 01

  But how did the beer taste?

• 1:04:32Jocko Willink?

  Awful. And I kept trying to see if I could make it taste better, but I didn't succeed.

• 1:04:40Jocko Willink?

  There's, so some of the stuff that you're talking about, um, you know, from a leadership perspective, you got, you got guys that are risking their lives every time that call comes. How, how did you, did you see guys that, that got to a point where they couldn't take it anymore? Did you, did you have situations where you had to send guys back to the rear? Um, what did you do when you saw a guy kind of start to, start to get too nervous to, to go?

• 1:05:10Speaker 01

  Uh, this may sound self-serving, but I don't care. I didn't see anyone in our deaths and I did not see directly anyone who behaved in a cowardly manner, an over cautious manner. Uh, we didn't have anyone that, uh, was sent back to the, to the rear. There was a camaraderie that you just can't explain to somebody who hasn't enjoyed it. It's a, it's an honor to serve with people like that. And we all took pride in our reputations among our squadron mates. So it wasn't hard at all.

• 1:05:52Jocko Willink?

  And, and that was so clear, when you watch Scramble the Sea Wolves, it's so clear.

• 1:06:00Jocko Willink?

  And there's this incredible, like you can see the camaraderie and you can hear it when you read through the, the, the Wolfgram. So you can see that guys are having a good time and there's this, I mean, what, what I would consider, and you can tell me if I'm wrong, but like a peer pressure of, hey, we're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna do this. You know, I've, I've often said that when you get to a good SEAL platoon, it's not a team, it's not a platoon, it's like a gang that you have. It's a gang. And we just don't allow for that bad attitude to creep out.

• 1:06:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. I, I feel the same way about the, the Sea Wolves. And this might be a good time to share with you the fact that I, at one time, after returning from Vietnam, was so fed up with the mission that we were flying. It was an aging aircraft that didn't have systems that were required to do the job. The job itself was not that important. And you know, you come from living on adrenaline for a year and then come back and you're expected to, I don't know, figuratively put your boots up on the table.

• 1:07:21Speaker 01

  One day I got so pissed off, in the middle of the morning, I jumped in my Corvette. Remember that? Hey, I learned, I learned. Jumped in my Corvette and tore on up to Coronado. And two of the SEALs that we operated with friends were there. And I walked into the office, they had their LSDs pulled up face to face. And I said, guys, I've had it, I want to join up. And they looked at each other and they locked up their secret. And each of them grabbed me by an elbow and took me up to the little club in Coronado. And we started pounding beers. It tasted great. No formaldehyde there.

• 1:08:03Speaker 01

  And by the middle of the afternoon, they convinced me that uh uh being a uh a peacetime SEAL uh wasn't uh everything that uh that I would expect. And that the uh the Navy had put an awful lot of investment into making me what I was. And I could make a far better contribution by uh continuing to fly. And I uh I turned my back on my opportunity to find out whether I had what it takes to become a SEAL.

• 1:08:34Jocko Willink?

  I'm surprised that those guys um.

• 1:08:38Jocko Willink?

  Well, I'm surprised they didn't talk you into it. Those must have been. They must have. I'm surprised once they got enough beer in them, they didn't they didn't have you down at down at Bud's. With a log standing over your head.

• 1:08:50Jocko Willink?

  Is there any particular missions in when you were in Vietnam that that stand out as you know, one of the ones on scramble of seawalls that they talked about? This was absolutely ridiculous. They're talking about the the the helicopter was the helicopters were there supporting a unit on the ground. There was no one to relieve them. Um they needed more fuel. They were running out of fuel. The fuel light's on. There's still no one to no one to relieve the helicopters and provide support. They say, you know what? Screw it. We're just gonna stay until we run out of gas. And that's and that's what they did. They stayed until they ran out of gas. The other group came in. They used ammo cans to refuel to to to carry once the once the the fire on the ground had subsided.

• 1:09:35Jocko Willink?

  They used ammo cans to refuel the the helicopters that were out of fuel so they could get back to base. That's freaking crazy.

• 1:09:46Speaker 01

  Well, you know, we never really took time to think about whether it was crazy or not. You got a job to do. And, you know, that's probably a natural way to, to explain it. That was the job. You went out and did that because that's what was expected. That's what the guys on the, in the boats, expected of you. That's what the, uh, the SEAL team that we had, uh, the SEALs that we had operated out of Benoit expected. And when they call you, you go.

• 1:10:16Jocko Willink?

  You know, that's another thing I think is really, um, impressive about the Sea Wolves is, well, first of all, they took volunteers to go do the job and, and like you said, a, a bunch of people volunteered. But the other thing is, and, and I heard some of the vets talking about this, some of the Sea Wolf vets talking about the fact that they'd say, oh, I was in the Navy and I was, you know, in the shit. In Vietnam, people said, ah, you were in the Navy, you weren't in the shit. But the reality is people, you wouldn't, I can't imagine that there was any of the gunners that when they joined the Navy, they thought to themselves, what I'm gonna be is a door gunner in direct combat with the enemy. These are guys that were, joined the Navy for whatever reason.

• 1:10:58Jocko Willink?

  And they end up in that job where, you know, they're doing this day in, day out and risking their life, day in, day out. Not, not really what they signed up for, and yet they held the line over and over and over again.

• 1:11:12Speaker 01

  All of them volunteers. Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's, it humbles me to have been able to, uh, to operate with guys like that. And, you know, I, the pilots, yeah, the pilots, uh, brass balls. It was expected. It was the job. The gunners had those balls and then some. Because they kept us up, uh, kept the aircraft up, kept the systems up. I had a leadership lesson, uh, when I first got there. Uh, growing up, my dad, uh, you know, he, we'd hunt and fish and I, uh, had fired our, we had two, uh, 14s for each bird.

• 1:11:57Speaker 01

  They hung on the back of the pilot seat. And I'd taken one on out, we had a little makeshift range and, uh, fired it. And brought it back on in after I was done and took it in to the crew area to clean it.

• 1:12:12Speaker 01

  You would have thought that I had just stepped on a baby rabbit. I mean, it was polite, it was respectful, but give me that thing. And the guys had that feeling about the armament, you know, this is my job. I do this. So, you know, it took a little getting used to. It was easier to let him clean my 45.

• 1:12:41Jocko Willink?

  Then, I just kinda wanna, you know, when you're there,

• 1:12:47Jocko Willink?

  you start to get to know these guys really well. And I don't, you didn't have anyone killed from your debt while you were there, is that correct?

• 1:12:55Speaker 01

  That's correct.

• 1:12:57Jocko Willink?

  But obviously, other guys in other debts were killed while you were there. Did you guys have any kind of, and this is something I've talked about before, is Americans, and I think it's just because we have so many different cultures here, we don't have a good protocol to deal with, to deal with death. And, you know, other, other cultures around the world, if someone dies, you know, you do this for a day, you do this for a day, you say this prayer, you go through this ceremony and then you move on. And Americans, we have so many different cultures here that are all mixed together, and death isn't something that happens all the time, so we really don't know. A lot of times, hey, what am I supposed to do? And I think that's what, that's what causes people problems is, they don't know, they don't know how to handle it, they don't know how to put closure on it,

• 1:13:42Jocko Willink?

  and so it just kinda sticks around. When you guys would learn that, that someone in your debt had been killed, was there any protocol that you guys set up? Was there anything that you guys did to, to try and take that on board and then move past it?

• 1:13:57Speaker 01

  I probably miss out on a leadership opportunity. And when guys got killed in other deaths in combat, or even just ferrying an aircraft in for maintenance,

• 1:14:11Speaker 01

  I didn't sit down with the guys and talk about it. I internalized it and...

• 1:14:20Speaker 01

  Being Irish would reflect on all the good times we had. Didn't think about what went wrong. Didn't want to know initially, you know, eventually you do because it's important for your trade. But I just think about the good times that we shared together. I lost a couple of academy classmates. I lost some great friends that I made while I was in country. One young fellow, and I don't want to mention any names, but he and I were both bicyclists. And the one thing that he wanted to do when he got back home was build himself the primo

• 1:15:01Speaker 01

  bike and start competing. And he never got that opportunity. And when you personalize something like that, when you think about the opportunities that are lost in a heartbeat, it makes you very thankful to be alive. It makes you very thankful to have known that person. And it makes you feel like you should redouble your efforts to get the sons of bitches that took that life away from them. It can help focus your aggression, and that's a good thing.

• 1:15:40Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no doubt about it. And that was, I guess, my way again. I was uneducated. No one ever taught me. But one thing I did is, okay, we're gonna go to work. That's the thing that I knew how to do. That's what I still know how to do, is like, go to work. And, you know, there's, I guess, you could say there's some, you know, eventually you gotta, you gotta deal with it. You gotta feel it more in the future. But, man, when I was overseas, it's like, yeah, okay, we're gonna work. And that's where the focus becomes because, and also from my perspective, it's like, you know your guys, that's what they would want you to do. That's what they would want you to do. So.

• 1:16:24Speaker 01

  Let me, let me share something with you based upon what your guys would want you to do.

• 1:16:30Speaker 01

  Came home from a mission, uh, uh, one night, we were in contact and you know, you're, you're decompressing. And I walk up to my rack and there's this manila envelope for Lieutenant JG Rowley's Eyes Only. And I feel, oh no, somebody back on, back home has died. And I opened this thing up with trembling hands and pull it out and it's a standard Navy message. And I said, "Hi honey, I'm gonna be in, uh, Tansanute, uh, in three days' time. Come on up and, uh, and see me." Uh, Sean's mom, the, the love of my life, call sign Stinky, doesn't have anything to do with, uh, personal problems. It's a, a matter of attitude. Yeah.

• 1:17:14Speaker 01

  But, uh, she was a flight attendant for Braniff and she was flying freedom birds in and out. And she had one coming in, uh, Ben Lux, only about, oh, forty clicks south of, uh, Saigon. And, uh, okay, and you know, word immediately spread like wildfire throughout the debt. And my guys, God bless them, they slept in a sun, uh, sandbagged bunker, our, our enlisted, uh, crew. And it was normally pretty ripe, but it was also the only place that was really, uh, that had a little bit of privacy. Well, they had determined that I was going to bring Stinky on down, uh, for lunch. Pick her up in Tansanute and bring her on down. So they had that place spit-shy.

• 1:17:58Speaker 01

  I don't know how they, how they did it, but it was all right. It, that turned out to be a bit of a disappointment. We, uh, flew a, flew a helicopter on up to Tansanute. And you know, we're going over, uh, bad guy country, so, uh, it was armed. And I land the thing in front of, I, no, I didn't land it, I wasn't flying it. Uh, but we, we land in front of the, uh, the terminal there at, uh, Tonsonut and, uh, immediately this air force, uh, truck comes on out with its cherry top going and this, uh, this sergeant says, "You can't land here." And I pointed out to him that we already had and that we were just waiting for, uh, uh, the arrival and, uh, we solved the problem by saying, uh, "Listen, this aircraft is armed. Why don't you stay here and watch

• 1:18:42Speaker 01

  it for us and, uh, we'll just be a little while." So, we walked on over and this big old green Braniff jet comes on in and, uh, everybody gets off and, you know, the incoming guys aren't nearly as gay and festive as the outgoing guys. So, uh, they get off and, uh, there's Gail standing up at the top of the ladder just waving at me. So, turns out she can't get off the aircraft, but they didn't say anything about us getting on. So, uh, you know, my crew goes on up the, uh, the ladder and we're in there and Gail's introducing them to, uh, the other, uh, stewardesses and they're loving it. And, uh, we go to the back of the aircraft and sat there for forty-five minutes just talking with each

• 1:19:26Speaker 01

  other. Uh, but when we got back and Gail wasn't there, the, the guys were just crestfallen. They were so excited about having somebody there and, you know, they, I, I don't think the place was ever cleaned again. But that was my experience of dating my hometown honey in the zone.

• 1:19:48Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:50Jocko Willink?

  Then, uh, what was it like, um, was it standard Vietnam where just replacements would come when it was time for a guy to rotate out, a new guy would show up?

• 1:20:01Speaker 01

  Uh, pretty much. Like I, uh, uh, mentioned earlier, I was sort of kind of drift at the, uh, Annapolis Hotel and happened to run into, uh, that weird Harold who you referenced in that Wolfgram. Uh, he, uh, came just walking through, uh, with, uh, the, uh, Det Four O N C, uh, Colonel Hammond. We called him Colonel. He was a, a Navy commander. Uh, and, uh, uh, Dave introduced us and said, "Hey, this is a great guy. We should have him." And as it turns out, they had an opening and, uh, within a matter of a few days, I was in Det Four. So, it, uh, it was sort of a roll your own environment. Yeah. You know, obviously they, uh, put guys into, into slots where they needed them, but, uh, it, it was fluid.

• 1:20:47Jocko Willink?

  So then your time's coming up to head home. Was it a one year, 365 days?

• 1:20:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, pretty much, yes.

• 1:20:54Jocko Willink?

  And then, did you, you stayed right on doing your 12 on, 12 off until it was time to go?

• 1:21:00Speaker 01

  What they'd normally do is for the last week or two that you were in country, send you into Ben Tui for the out processing and we'd fly with the Sea Lords. So, you know, you didn't stop flying. It was just a different mission.

• 1:21:15Jocko Willink?

  And then you get back, then you get, okay, your time's up and it's time to go home?

• 1:21:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, pretty much. Well, you know, there'd be a bit of a party, a drunk act, but other than that, yeah, that was it.

• 1:21:28Jocko Willink?

  Then how was that transition going from Vietnam? And then what, how many hours later you're back in America or how many days?

• 1:21:38Speaker 01

  It was a straight through shot. We stopped off in Honolulu. There was one other stop, maybe Guam and then Honolulu and then home. It's a straight through and...

• 1:21:51Jocko Willink?

  And so wait, so were you married? You weren't married yet?

• 1:21:54Speaker 01

  No, no, we got engaged on R and R in Hong Kong and that's a two beer story.

• 1:22:00Jocko Willink?

  So you got R and R from Vietnam, met your bride to be in Hong Kong?

• 1:22:07Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 1:22:08Jocko Willink?

  And proposed?

• 1:22:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know, we'd already talked about it. We knew it was coming. Got down on a knee in Jimmy's kitchen and all of a sudden, but it was pretty interesting. When I arrived in Hong Kong, I'd booked a room at the Hilton. So I go on down there and, you know, I'm checking in and I'm in my uniform. So the manager happens to be walking behind the desk and says, "Ah, Mr. Lowly. Mrs. Lowly is waiting for you in your room." I figured, shit, Gail's getting here tomorrow. What's mom gonna think? Well, of course, Gail had gotten in a day early.

• 1:22:49Speaker 01

  She was in there, but you know, times were different back then.

• 1:22:54Jocko Willink?

  So your transition from Vietnam back to America, all of a sudden, and you were, you know, people, people use the term Wild West sometimes to describe various military situations where it was, oh, it was like the Wild West. I don't know if it gets much more Wild West than being Sea Wolf of Vietnam. I mean, it just doesn't seem, the way you guys were running things, the way the support that you got or didn't get, the, I mean, just the fact like you guys didn't even have flight suits, they, they wouldn't issue them or something like that, and you guys were just wearing kind of what you, what you could get a hold of. Everything was sort of Wild West.

• 1:23:32Speaker 01

  It took longer to get into a flight suit than it did to pull on a nomex shirt and shirt and pants. And frequently it wasn't nomex and as they say, you know, I've flown missions in my tanning runners, just we'd leave our gear there in the seat, and if I was playing volleyball and they scrambled us, you don't think about anything but getting in that aircraft and getting it cranking. So, yeah, it was Wild West. Thank God.

• 1:24:03Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and then, and then you get back to America and you're still in the Navy, right?

• 1:24:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:24:09Jocko Willink?

  How was that?

• 1:24:10Speaker 01

  Well, I got through training, you know, first of all, you're just decompressing. I was newly married, gaying her, getting used to living together. She's dealing with my unique personality. And it was sort of a scramble. We partied our tits off when we got back. A couple of SEALs, one of them had a, was connected to a family that owned one of the mansions there in Coronado on the waterfront. I think that was First Street, Front Street. At any rate, just a man, it was a beat up old place, but it was truly a mansion. And they had a couple mattresses on the floor and they had a table in the

• 1:24:54Speaker 01

  kitchen, but no furniture, and they had a tapper. And we'd go over there and just party like crazy. And the, where I'm going with this story is through all of that time and through all of the craziness and through all of the drinking. Uh, there was only one person who got hurt as a result of overindulging. He uh ran his car into a telephone pole, didn't uh, didn't kill him, didn't even hurt him very much, but that was the only uh instance that I know of. And uh, the only casualty we had to alcohol was that same guy who turned himself in uh to uh, for AA.

• 1:25:39Speaker 01

  And uh, was uh, cashiered out of the Navy. And then uh, for ten years, he was sober, clean and sober. And he applied to get back in and the Navy, God love it, let him back in. But more remarkable than that, this is one of our pilots now from uh, from the Sea Wolves. Uh, they gave him his wings back and he finished up his career flying.

• 1:26:03Jocko Willink?

  Wow, that's awesome.

• 1:26:04Speaker 01

  So, yeah, the, the point is, we, we had a really great time when we got back. And all that was sort of uh, a haze, but when I checked into the squadron after I completed the rag, uh, learned to fly the, the Nor- Noble H3C Slug. Yeah. The uh, our, our commanding officer took me in and uh, in my checkerboard interview says, "I know where you've been. I know what you've done. You aren't gonna get away with any of that crap here." And that uh, there was a leadership lesson there. I knew that I never wanted to be like him.

• 1:26:39Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm. Yeah. That had to be intimidating for a guy though, that's taken on these, these pilots that have been doing what you had been doing and all of a sudden they gotta try and rein these guys back into the world.

• 1:26:51Speaker 01

  Yeah. I, I hope I'm not going into too many C stories, but uh, great friend about, the only guy, names I'm using are guys who were deceased. But uh, Chuch Canis was a, a co-pilot and uh, we were sent off to uh, uh, for uh, uh, to Guam for some uh, specialized training.

• 1:27:13Speaker 01

  And he and I are there in our, in our, uh, poopy suits at the bar, the O Club Bar at the Air Force Base on Guam. And we're enjoying a couple of beers which tasted good. And all of a sudden this bell rings like crazy. And in come these guys in, in pressed flight suits with ascots. And everybody in the bar, all the Air Force guys are standing at attention. This B-52 crew coming back from a mission. And we're just sitting there with our elbows on the bar. And the crowd didn't know what to make of us. But, uh, they didn't get too

• 1:27:54Speaker 01

  close to us either. Come on, guys. We all have a mission to do. And Rolling Thunder was very important. If, uh, taken to its, uh, conclusion, uh, we might have not have lost that war. And I, I use the words loss and war carefully there. That, that's not a, not a slip of the tongue. Uh, they've, they've got a mission to do. But I mean, yeah, the war from 40,000 feet. And they're, they're worried about the Sams because they turn in at this, uh, I don't want to go there. I'm sorry. I'd like to apologize to the United States Air Force and all the noble men and women who fly for the Air Force.

• 1:28:33Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's, uh, actually, you know, those, um, when, when we got back from Ramadi, we, we, um, we got after it in a very similar way, um, for several months. I don't know how long you did, but yeah, there was a lot of, uh, um, beer and other things that were drank. And, and I don't know, you know, there's, it was sort of, uh, it was sort of, it seemed like the, the normal thing to do. I don't know. It seemed like we were gonna kind of get it out of our systems for a little while. And You know, um, get over it. Cause it is, it is, you know, it's not that big of a deal. I don't want to make it sound like it's all crazy. But you know, you're over there and it's like, okay, it's a little bit of, it's, it's a different, it's a different scenario.

• 1:29:18Jocko Willink?

  And you gotta kind of process through the fact that everything that you just were doing, whatever, a, a week ago, two weeks ago, three weeks ago, is now completely different. Your life is completely different. And there's no one shooting at you and there's no one, not, not, you're not gonna lose in your guys, which was the, the, the weight that I felt lifted off of me about a month after I got home. I was, I just woke up one morning and I just kind of felt different. And I kind of, I was like, why do I feel, I felt different in a good way. And what I felt was, oh, I, I was thinking about, why do I feel different right now? And, and as I sat there and thought about, I was like, I'm not worried about any of my guys getting killed right now, which was the first time in months that I hadn't been thinking about that all day, every day.

• 1:30:03Jocko Willink?

  And so, yeah, when you come home, um, there's, there's definitely that. And I, I think you, it's, I think you gotta pay attention as a leader to everyone in that group to make sure that guys are staying within the box and staying within what's, what's, I guess, possibly normal for those situations. Because you can definitely be, you can, there will definitely be individuals that they'll, they'll, they'll go too far and that they're, they're not making the transition. And what they need is, you know, some help, someone to come alongside, pull alongside and say, hey, man, let's, let's take it back a little bit. We're, you know, let's, let's readjust and, you know, life's gonna be normal again and all that.

• 1:30:43Speaker 01

  Yeah. Unfortunately, the, the way we were rolled in and out of the squadron, when we left and came back to the world, it was pretty much an individual effort. So, that, and I also temper with the fact that your war was entirely different than ours, I would imagine. Uh, yours was more, uh, up close and, uh, personal than, than ours.

• 1:31:08Speaker 01

  To tell you the truth, I don't recall ever reflecting on whether my guys were going to come back from this mission or not. You know, it's something that we just all did. We all did it together. And I don't mean that to sound callous. It just isn't, uh, wasn't part of my, uh, my thinking. And that goes back to, uh, what Cousin Kim asked, uh, you know, how did you do it?

• 1:31:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:32Speaker 01

  Uh, trying to bring everybody back whole.

• 1:31:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I don't, I definitely, without question, thought about that every, every day. That was the biggest thing that I thought about every day was because there was guys getting killed, um, every day. Basically, um, there was memorial services every day. There was, uh, you know, one of the, one of the things, and I've talked about this a bunch, but there was a, a vehicle graveyard outside. It wasn't, it was on the way to the gate to leave Camp Ramadi. There was a vehicle graveyard where all the vehicles that had been blown up and destroyed by IEDs. And there was, I would say fifty or seventy-five, maybe even a hundred, but a massive area. And so in order to leave the gate, you drove by that.

• 1:32:18Jocko Willink?

  It was a, it was a pretty harsh reminder. And, and you know, my guys would go on missions. I wasn't always going on missions because I was overall in charge and there was multiple units. And, um, so a lot of times I'd be just saluting the guys as they'd be leaving. And, and that's a worse feeling of like, okay, you know, you just, you just got your damn fingers crossed and you hope you've done everything you can and hope you've mitigated the risk. But that was the heaviest, the heaviest, uh, weight for me was just that daily thought. Um, every, cause then there was also, there was the fact that there was always guys in the field, almost always. There was almost always one of my, you know, little detachments of guys was out there with seven guys and twenty Iraqi soldiers and there was gunfights going on and, and that's the way it was.

• 1:33:01Jocko Willink?

  That was the, that was the heaviest thing, um, from a leadership perspective for me. And. Yeah, so when I got home, it took about a month, you know, before I was like before and and the other thing is I didn't everything that I'm saying about that feeling I was barely conscious of it while I was there I was like it was there but I was more focused on doing the job I was more focused on it kind of cooked me like you know when they say the frog they put the frog in the boiling water you you cook it slow whatever you there was like that it was more like that like over time it just built up and what I did was just focused on working working hard but then when I got home it was like I said it was like a month after I got home I woke up one day and just felt like a

• 1:33:46Jocko Willink?

  a weight lifted and I was saying what do I what is that what is that and then as I thought about it I'm thinking what am I not why do I feel like this you know I just had a big smile on my face and was you know walking around my house and and thinking myself ah this this feels good what is this and then I realized oh you're you're you're actually not worried that one of your friends is gonna die today which is a which was a a totally so like I said it was something that crept up on me and was just there it was just part of being over there and um felt good to uh to to have that weight come off but um you know

• 1:34:24Jocko Willink?

  again I think I dealt with it pretty decently and you know did I get drunk with my friends yeah well there was uh some some significant tu bruiser activities that um were were were fun and we let off a lot of steam and I think that's fine but again you know what worries me about saying that is that there's some people that take that as like oh okay now I'm cleared hot just to go and and get drunk and get crazy and it's like no actually you're not um you gotta keep that in check and especially from the guys that are in leadership positions hey man you gotta keep a close eye and step back and detach and look at the guys and say okay I get it we're gonna let off some steam I get it we're gonna adjust back to the real world but we need to make sure that everyone is staying

• 1:35:08Jocko Willink?

  inside the box and make sure that they're gonna come back out of this thing okay because I mean we all know it nowadays man the vets veterans come home and that's a hard transition to make from from combat to You know, the civilian world and, and even the world that you're talking about going from being a sea wolf in the wild west, coming back to your commanding officer saying, look, you're not going to get away with that crap here. And, you know, we, we definitely had our share of little stories like that from T U Bruiser where, you know, guys, guys would not quite be ready. You know, as a matter of fact, J P Denell, who, who is with me at Echelon Front, my brother, when he came home, when we came home, he was in another platoon, got hurt.

• 1:35:50Jocko Willink?

  They sent him to our basic training school. So Bud's, he was going to be a Bud's instructor. And he didn't last very long over there because you can't take a guy that's 23 years old. That just been through what JP had been through and say, okay, now you're going to go, go and be in charge of training these guys that are trying to make it through Bud's. It, it wasn't a good fit. Yeah. And so I just, you know, luckily had friends and was able to just pull them over and he worked directly for me again, getting guys ready for the, the more advanced training and combat training, which he was perfect for. But that was an example of where, you know, I was, I had to look out and say, okay, this is not a good job for him right now, you know?

• 1:36:31Jocko Willink?

  JP's already an intense, an intense guy and coming home from Ramadi, you know, it was, it was, it was a tough deployment, you know, he lost friends. And as a young kid, he wasn't ready to be teaching these young, you know, he's looking at these kids like, you know, you're, are you kidding me? I'm going to, I'm going to freaking decimate you guys. And so I had to pull him over to a little bit more advanced training, my brother JP. Um, so you get, so now, so now you, you're staying in the Navy. That's it. Never doubt in my mind. And you end up, I mean, you, you end up doing the anti submarine warfare, which is the job that kind of annoys, is that the job that annoyed you? Uh, we called it, ah, so what?

• 1:37:19Speaker 01

  We were given a mission without the, uh, the means to prosecute the mission and, uh, that annoyed me. And then, and then you went on to become a test pilot? Is that right, is that correct? Steely eyed granite jawed test pilot and look at me now. So, so what is that job like? Uh, it's, it's fascinating, you know, I'm, I'm living proof that nothing harms a person more than too much formal education, but I get off on that. And, uh, it was brought home to me once when we were having a raging party at our home in Patuxent River, Maryland, when I was there at the test center. And, and most of the guys that have a copy of Playboy magazine on their night table, well, a couple of the guys had gone back to take a leak in our bedroom and found that I had some technical reports there.

• 1:38:04Speaker 01

  I, on mine, and I, I didn't hear the end of that for, for a long time, but I enjoyed it. I enjoyed the, uh, the technical aspects of it.

• 1:38:14Speaker 01

  I've often said, there are only two topics that are worthy of conversation between men, and that is flying and fornication. And, you know, I, I, I lived to fly. Having said that, since I retired, I've flown very little, but at that point in my life, it was all about flying. And, uh, it was a wonderful experience. The, the flying we did was not experimental flying, it was engineering flying. We test out weapon systems, we test out new aircraft. I was fortunate to, uh, uh, to, uh, lead one of the three prongs of the, uh, the biggest helicopter acquisition that the Navy's made when they were looking for the new Lamps helicopter.

• 1:38:58Speaker 01

  Two of my great good friends were, uh, were flying the, uh, Sikorsky and the, uh, and the Boeing, uh, products. And they were pretty well through their test, uh, program, which took, I think about a year, when, uh, Bell helicopter piped up and says, "Hey, we've got one too." Well, they didn't have a, a really logical contender, but they needed somebody to go on down and lead the test of that aircraft, and that was me. And boy, that was fun. You know, you literally are flying a test card that takes out to the edge of the envelope, and then, "Hey, are you good enough?" "Sure, I'm good enough." "Yeah, just, uh, uh, don't go too far and don't bust your ass." There's, there's a lot of, uh, investment that you're

• 1:39:41Speaker 01

  sitting in right there that you want, they want you to keep in, uh, in one piece. But, no, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Uh, lifelong friends there. And, just keep me to a story. The two guys that were flying, uh, the, uh, Boeings and Sikorski, dear friends. One of them was a Naval Academy classmate, and he and I flew in Vietnam. And, uh, the other guy, Greek, is just a wonderful guy and still a lifelong close friend. Well, uh, Duck, uh, was unfortunately, fortunately for, uh, Hughes, became their, uh, chief test pilot. Uh, he got out of the Navy and was, uh, flying for Hughes, and was killed in a, in a, in a horrible,

• 1:40:20Speaker 01

  uh, accident. And Greek and, uh, I, uh, sort of, sort of closed ranks, and, uh, decided that, uh, we were going to, uh, try and send, uh, Duck off in good stead. So, if you're familiar with San Diego now, you know, uh, about the Point Loma Lighthouse and the area up there. That's where the family was waiting. Hughes had given us a, uh, 500 to, uh, scatter the remains in. Uh, that Greek took it upon himself to do this. Now, at this time, he probably had, uh, 2,500 flight hours. He knew his way around a helicopter. He's in

• 1:41:01Speaker 01

  his Navy Blues. He gets in the aircraft. He's got the cremains in his lap, and they're flying out along, well below, uh, the, uh, the point, on, on out over the ocean.

• 1:41:15Speaker 01

  And he looks up and sees the family up there and he's so emotionally wrought that he reaches down and takes the lid off of the cremains. Well, if you've ever been in a helicopter, you know that it's not a, a, a very stable place to have cremains. And immediately, he said it was IFR inside that cockpit with duck everywhere. And fortunately, the family didn't know what was going on and everything came out fine. Greek had called me up and said, hey, uh, I had to, had to make mustard today. And I said, yeah. And he said, yeah, and when I got my blues out, I'm still brushing duck off of them.

• 1:41:57Speaker 01

  So, yeah, there's ways you, uh, you accommodate that. Uh, I always think of the great good times that, uh, that Duck and Greek and I had together. And I miss him, sure. I miss him all the time, but you, life goes on.

• 1:42:14Jocko Willink?

  Sounds like he had the final say at that one.

• 1:42:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:42:18Jocko Willink?

  You were OIC during the Iranian hostage crisis. What was that like?

• 1:42:25Speaker 01

  Uh, that, uh, was self-made. You know, yes, we were the only, uh, uh, helicopter out there that wasn't on the, uh, large gray boats to actually fly the mission that, uh, could, could provide, uh, combat search and rescue. Uh, so, uh, we took full advantage of that, uh, got the, uh, armament that we thought we, passing through Guam, uh, I didn't like the sidearm I had, so I went on down to buy one and know it's going to take two weeks. And it took me about two hours to get in touch with the, uh, local authorities and I had my, uh, my sidearm on, uh, going over the horizon, which is sort of silly, you know, I mean, really.

• 1:43:07Speaker 01

  Uh, you're, you're flying an overwater mission and you need to say, well, you never can tell. It's always good to be prepared. But, uh, at any rate, uh, we'd, uh, go out there and, uh, and just train for that. Uh, when we weren't actually out there in, in support of the, uh, the, the boats, uh, we'd go out and, and train for that.

• 1:43:28Jocko Willink?

  You, you end up doing your 20 years, um, and then you called it at 20. Is that, is that how long you did, 20?

• 1:43:34Speaker 01

  21.

• 1:43:34Jocko Willink?

  21 years. And then you went off to the civilian sector.

• 1:43:39Speaker 01

  Yes, I did.

• 1:43:39Jocko Willink?

  Started working a bunch of various jobs.

• 1:43:42Speaker 01

  That's right. I started out in high tech. Uh, our company had, uh, a professional staff of 200, uh, 60% of whom were PhDs. And I had enough technical background that, uh, I'd go out to a customer with one or more of these PhDs and they'd make their presentation and I'd say,

• 1:44:00Jocko Willink?

  Let me say what he just said.

• 1:44:01Speaker 01

  Thank you. What the doctor meant to say was, yeah, uh, just had a, had a great, uh, being surrounded by smart people. It just is a lot of fun. It can be very frustrating at times, but it's a lot of fun. Yeah.

• 1:44:17Jocko Willink?

  And we have a, a curious insult in the teams, which is someone will ask you about a guy and the guy's not a bad guy, but someone will say, oh, you know, he's, he's a really, he's a really smart guy.

• 1:44:31Jocko Willink?

  Which is, you know, he might not be the best, most common sense. He might not be the best leader, but you know, he's just, you know, he's a smart guy.

• 1:44:40Jocko Willink?

  So yes, it can get frustrating hanging around with people that are super smart. And then find, and then when did you move to Hawaii?

• 1:44:46Speaker 01

  Uh, about 14 years ago. I spent five years, uh, in, uh, range operations and then they created a new position. And for my last five working years, I was the environmental manager for the Pacific Missile Range. My, uh, daughter, when she learned of that, said, Dad, you hate those guys. And I said, yes, Heather, but now I'm in a position to say no. And I just had a lot of fun. You know, the, the, uh, the local environment community, great people, but, uh, they were not strong supporters of military training. And that, that was, uh, the, my cause to help them explain why we needed to, to train out there and that we

• 1:45:28Speaker 01

  were hurt out to kill the whales. Yeah.

• 1:45:33Jocko Willink?

  Well, yeah. Um, and then how long ago was it that you retired, retired?

• 1:45:38Speaker 01

  About four years ago. That's.

• 1:45:42Speaker 01

  Retirement has been very, very good to DJ.

• 1:45:48Jocko Willink?

  And, uh, I mean, I got, I got one more quote that I, that I, that I wanted to read. Cause I know we've been going at it for a bit here, but, uh,

• 1:45:58Jocko Willink?

  this is, this is another quote. This is a quote from, um, from a Vietnam SEAL.

• 1:46:04Jocko Willink?

  And here we go. Not only does many a SEAL owe his life to the Sea Wolves, but the units often operated together as a team. Very often located at the same base of operations, we developed friendships that are still alive today. Operating well outside standing oper- standard operating procedures, the Sea Wolves have lifted SEALs out of enemy encirclements, and I have known them to land in a hot LZ to lift out caches too large for the SEALs to pack out. They also evacuated our wounded when medevac helicopters were not available. Most important, they were always there for us. When we were down in the mud and darkness, the night illuminated with red and green tracers, the VC behind every shadow.

• 1:46:48Jocko Willink?

  Many times after we were out of danger, they stayed with us until we were safely extracted in the middle of the river and out of the range of enemy fire. And that's Chief Barry Enoch, who's a,

• 1:47:03Jocko Willink?

  legendary SEAL from SEAL Team One, Navy Cross recipient. And I think that that quote just really exemplifies the, the bond between SEALs and Sea Wolves. And like I said, it was something that I heard about as a young SEAL. And it's a bond that still exists when, when I talk to the Vietnam SEALs. And it's a bond that's, uh, that's always going to be there. And, um,

• 1:47:30Speaker 01

  I'm into that.

• 1:47:33Jocko Willink?

  Uh, do you have any, uh, you know, like I said, we've been at it for a while and I, like, and like I told you before we started, I could sit, I'll sit here, I could sit here and listen to you all day. But, uh, do you have any other, you know, any other closing thoughts that you wanna, that you wanna mention?

• 1:47:50Speaker 01

  Uh, hand salute to the 44 that didn't make it back with us.

• 1:47:58Speaker 01

  Anyone who hasn't been to the wall, anybody who's served who hasn't been to the wall, you ought to make that trip.

• 1:48:07Speaker 01

  A shout out again, and I know it sounds like a broken record, but to the guys that are responsible for getting me back in one piece are gunners, great human beings. And to the guys I flew with, hey, next time we get together, the beer's on you. Yeah, I should share with you that as a technical person, I have developed what I call Rowley's theorem. And Rowley's theorem says that all the truly great ladies hook up with all the truly big buffoons. And Stinky, if you're out there listening, I sure am glad that you did that. Love you more than pork chops, baby.

• 1:48:53Jocko Willink?

  And well, also, thanks to your son Sean for connecting us. And when he came up and asked me, he's like, oh, would you have a Sea Wolf on your podcast? I'm like, ah, let me think about that for point two seconds. Absolutely. So yeah, thanks to Sean for connecting us. And it's been an honor to sit here and listen to you. And thanks for what you and all the Sea Wolves did for our country, for our Navy, and specifically, thank you for the support that you and your brothers gave to my brothers and my forefathers on the ground in Vietnam. We'll never forget what you and your brothers did. And we'll never forget the sacrifices of

• 1:49:38Jocko Willink?

  those brave Sea Wolves that made the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom.

• 1:49:46Speaker 01

  Amen.

• 1:49:49Jocko Willink?

  And Dennis Rowley has left the building. And obviously, awesome to have him on. And incredible opportunity to talk about the Sea Wolves. And go check out this website. It's seawolf.org. Really cool website to read through. One of the coolest things on it is, I read that example of the Wolfgram. They got all the Wolfgrams, and they're all just funny. They're good. They're worth checking out. They've also got all the awards that, well, they've got the list of the awards, but they got the Navy Cross Awards in there. Just an awesome website. So go check it out, seawolf.org.

• 1:50:28Jocko Willink?

  And with that, if you want to support, you know, yourself, this podcast, etc. Echo, what do you got?

• 1:50:35Speaker 02

  Stay on the path. Okay, stay on the path. Talk about Jiu-Jitsu. Yes, Jiu-Jitsu.

• 1:50:40Speaker 02

  Get a gi. We know, we're getting gis. Origin gis. Do we all know that yet? That's Origin. Do we know that?

• 1:50:48Jocko Willink?

  Yes, you should know that.

• 1:50:50Speaker 02

  So, go to originmaine.com. That's where you get your gi and rash guards for Jiu-Jitsu. Hundred percent, bar none. I'm almost tempted to say, don't even get any other kind of gi or rash guard.

• 1:51:01Jocko Willink?

  I would agree with that. Yeah.

• 1:51:03Speaker 02

  Boom.

• 1:51:04Jocko Willink?

  Hundred percent.

• 1:51:05Speaker 02

  Also, if you're warming up or cooling down or just cruising, they have joggers. And you got into the joggers.

• 1:51:13Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's what my son got some of the joggers, which he's totally stoked on. I tried them on.

• 1:51:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:51:18Jocko Willink?

  Just to see. It was so horrible. They are so not, not my situation.

• 1:51:24Speaker 02

  Well, here's the thing with joggers. Depending on how you wear them, for sure, but they're more of a, um...

• 1:51:32Speaker 02

  How should I put this? Kind of... Acceptably. They're kind of form-fitting from time to time.

• 1:51:39Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:39Speaker 02

  Right? So they're, you know, they're kind of, you know, so they don't flap around. So they're form-fitting. You in form-fitting joggers, yeah, I could see, oh, that could be a violation, for sure. But, if you're not Jaco, joggers, most comfortable joggers in the world, probably in the history of joggers, maybe ever. Origin main. Origin joggers.

• 1:52:01Jocko Willink?

  Also, we got some supplements on there, um, that you can take. You got joint warfare, which will keep your joints intact.

• 1:52:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. Yeah?

• 1:52:13Jocko Willink?

  Krill oil. Same thing. Kind of universal.

• 1:52:19Jocko Willink?

  Substance.

• 1:52:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's to maintain the joint. I, I, I went off the joint warfare for a little while.

• 1:52:25Jocko Willink?

  Why?

• 1:52:25Speaker 02

  Wow, long story.

• 1:52:27Jocko Willink?

  Long story being?

• 1:52:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, I, you know, lapse of discipline, you know how, you know how the kind where I'm like, oh, I don't feel the pain, you know, or nothing. So I just don't, I'm not like compelled as much.

• 1:52:37Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 1:52:37Speaker 02

  You know, when you, I mean, you make it like a routine though, right? Like, that's just the thing.

• 1:52:42Jocko Willink?

  I get up every day.

• 1:52:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:52:44Jocko Willink?

  I take it before I get, I take krill oil and, and joint warfare when I wake up in the morning and before I go to bed at night. Period. End of story every day.

• 1:52:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, like not, you, you didn't even train that day still.

• 1:52:53Jocko Willink?

  A hundred percent.

• 1:52:54Speaker 02

  Joint warfare.

• 1:52:55Jocko Willink?

  I did train that day, but.

• 1:52:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, so.

• 1:52:59Jocko Willink?

  Discipline is not a hundred percent because I don't take that every day. I take it when needed.

• 1:53:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, but it's.

• 1:53:05Jocko Willink?

  I will say, I've been using, I feel like that's a little bit of a crutch right now because I've been using it a lot before.

• 1:53:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, still, you can take it every day.

• 1:53:13Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you can.

• 1:53:14Speaker 02

  But no, the joint warfare, I, like your mindset, I think I, actually, I think I should incorporate that where it's just, that's just how, every day. So with joint warfare, I'll be like, well, you know, like it'll be in my mind, not even necessarily heavily, but it'll be in my mind. Oh, did I train hard enough to warrant like joint warfare kind of, kind of attitude? It's more or less like that. So I wasn't feeling any kind of inflammation or pain or nothing. So I was like, uh, you know, I saw, so I skipped it one day and then I sort of, you know, it just wasn't in my mind. Sure enough. And I'm still lifting, still doing it, still in the game. Freaking elbow comes back. Cause I'd get elbow from, you know, from pressing, you know?

• 1:53:58Speaker 02

  And I get little elbow things, nothing terrible. You just gotta warm up more or whatever, but man, it came back.

• 1:54:03Jocko Willink?

  And then did you go back on the joint warfare?

• 1:54:05Speaker 02

  Hundred percent. This was just, this was just the other day. So usually it takes a few days to like, kind of get back.

• 1:54:10Jocko Willink?

  How's it feel right now?

• 1:54:12Speaker 02

  Fine. But when I started, if I started to do a push up, like a close grip push up right now, I'll feel it probably. Maybe I'll, I don't know, because it's been a few days.

• 1:54:20Jocko Willink?

  So that's joint warfare, krill oil, discipline. And then you got milk, which is just the food that you need in your body. That's what it basically is.

• 1:54:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:54:29Jocko Willink?

  And it tastes good. And also for your kids, you got warrior kid milk, strawberry and chocolate. They're both really good, but let's face it, the strawberry is a whole nother deal. Brian is working on adult strawberry milk. We'll be coming out with that.

• 1:54:46Speaker 02

  Can I ask you this about the regular milk?

• 1:54:51Speaker 02

  Dark chocolate is good, right? Like after a certain number, percentage of, what is it? What is it? What means dark chocolate better, right? It's like a certain percentage of dark chocolate. Yeah, in life.

• 1:55:02Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah, because there's no sugar in it. If you just get straight dark chocolate.

• 1:55:06Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:55:06Jocko Willink?

  That's like eighty percent.

• 1:55:08Speaker 02

  Eighty percent, that's like the the threshold.

• 1:55:10Jocko Willink?

  Let me put it to you this way, eighty percent is is good. When you get to seventy two percent, you're like, you're like, oh, that's just a tasty. You know, you're just eating dessert. Eighty percent's not quite. It still gives you a chocolate satisfaction, but it's not like the same. Let me put it this way, if you eat two squares of eighty percent chocolate, you won't desire more. If you ate to eat two squares of seventy two percent chocolate, you're like, I'm gonna have a little bit more.

• 1:55:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, okay.

• 1:55:35Jocko Willink?

  It's just like that tasty.

• 1:55:36Speaker 02

  Okay, perfect. So, so the uh, the milk with adult milk, my question to you, in your opinion, your jocko disciplined opinion. If I put a chunk, because I last night I put this chunk, there was this chunk, I don't know why it was there, it was there, chunk of chocolate. It wasn't eighty percent.

• 1:55:55Jocko Willink?

  In the blender?

• 1:55:56Speaker 02

  I didn't put the whole thing, I broke off a little piece, so it was maybe like the size of a

• 1:56:02Speaker 02

  two, you know, those little baby Snickers bars? Two of those, I would say, that's how big the chunk, this block of chocolate.

• 1:56:09Jocko Willink?

  Two of the baby Snickers?

• 1:56:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's pretty big.

• 1:56:11Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:12Speaker 02

  It was a big milkshake, though, it's like three scoops.

• 1:56:14Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 1:56:14Speaker 02

  You know, like, you know, the thirty ounce, you know, the mugs that we have, full. Anyway.

• 1:56:21Speaker 02

  Put it in with the peanut butter chocolate milk. And it enhanced it.

• 1:56:25Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah, well, of course.

• 1:56:26Speaker 02

  So.

• 1:56:27Jocko Willink?

  Sugar in there.

• 1:56:27Speaker 02

  So the question is, is like, how much of a violet, like, if it's eighty percent chocolate, or dark, eighty percent dark chocolate?

• 1:56:34Jocko Willink?

  But you didn't put eighty percent dark.

• 1:56:35Speaker 02

  I know, but.

• 1:56:37Jocko Willink?

  Sugar chocolate.

• 1:56:38Speaker 02

  Doesn't matter what I did or didn't do, I'm saying theoretically. If I did 80% or more chocolate, that's good. That's still within the confines of being on the path.

• 1:56:48Jocko Willink?

  I'd say you're in the game and on the path at 80%.

• 1:56:51Speaker 02

  So if, when we come across 80% chocolate, let's add that, just collectively. Let's add that and see how we all feel about that. That's what I think.

• 1:56:59Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 1:56:59Speaker 02

  You get the little chips at the bottom of the cup, too. It's pretty cool.

• 1:57:02Jocko Willink?

  Check. Also, I just talked to a guy, strawberry, or for the Warrior Kid. Molk. If your kid is lactose intolerant, you put him on the almond milk.

• 1:57:13Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:57:14Jocko Willink?

  So get some of that.

• 1:57:15Speaker 02

  Take it. Also, if you want to represent on the path,

• 1:57:22Speaker 02

  Jaco's store, it's called Jaco's store. It's where you can get shirts, hats, hoodies, tank tops. More rash guards recommended, still within, within the confines of being in the game. Our rash guards as well. Uh, if, yeah, if you want to represent in the wild, on the path and in the wild at the same time. Jaco's store dot com, so you can get some cool stuff. All Jaco approved, all of it. Women's stuff on there, too.

• 1:57:48Jocko Willink?

  By the way, there is counterfeit Jaco stuff.

• 1:57:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, but here's the thing about the counterfeit. Here's the thing about the counterfeit ones. They're like, obvi- like, if you, all you have to do, here, I dig it. Like, you, you'll see a, a cool design that seems new. Cause that's really the, the, what do you call it? The visceral, not visceral, that's negative, right? Like, the, your immediate response is like, oh, new design on Amazon or wherever these counterfeits exist. You see the new design, so you kind of, oh, cool, and you, in your, in your haste, you click on it. But here's the thing, if you just stop for one second, you can be aggressive but not foolhardy, right?

• 1:58:26Jocko Willink?

  That's a good one, yeah.

• 1:58:28Speaker 02

  So you take this one moment to recognize the design, you'll know there's violations all through every single design on there. First off, the font is like the completely wrong font. It's completely wrong. Then I saw one, like, the good one, right? That's on like, you know, one of these, one of these, uh, websites that you can go to and you submit your PDF or JPEG. And it generates a shirt for you. It's like, it's a super cheap thing. So there's one of those, I forget what it's called, but it's one of those where it's like, obviously cheap and the design's wrong. It's backwards. Ours is backwards. The good says is backwards. That's how it's supposed to be.

• 1:59:08Jocko Willink?

  Oh.

• 1:59:08Speaker 02

  There's ones all frontwards, like just some person who didn't pay attention is trying to do it. It's real obvious. If you take that second to notice it, though. So the counterfeit ones, hmm, you know.

• 1:59:20Jocko Willink?

  There you go. So just look out for the counterfeit ones.

• 1:59:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:59:23Jocko Willink?

  They're out there.

• 1:59:24Speaker 02

  Also.

• 1:59:24Jocko Willink?

  You won't get counterfeit ones at Jaco store dot com.

• 1:59:27Speaker 02

  Correct.

• 1:59:28Jocko Willink?

  Factually.

• 1:59:29Speaker 02

  Factually. Also, Jaco White Tea. Is there counterfeit Jaco White Tea?

• 1:59:34Jocko Willink?

  There is not.

• 1:59:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, so that's, that one's gonna be a lot harder to counterfeit.

• 1:59:38Jocko Willink?

  You gotta, you'd have to put some effort into that one.

• 1:59:40Speaker 02

  Yeah, you'd have to get labels done.

• 1:59:42Jocko Willink?

  I would actually be kind of impressed if you could counterfeit that, like, like slightly, just in your mode of getting after it would be high level.

• 1:59:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:59:49Jocko Willink?

  Cause it's not easy to make tea.

• 1:59:51Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:59:51Jocko Willink?

  Not easy to make cans of tea.

• 1:59:53Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:59:55Jocko Willink?

  And it's not easy to deadlift eight thousand pounds unless you've been drinking your tea. So get some of that.

• 2:00:00Speaker 02

  Organic too, by the way, certified. Just saying. Also, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already on iTunes and Stitcher and Google Play. And wherever you listen to podcasts, cause there's a lot of podcast apps.

• 2:00:16Jocko Willink?

  There's a lot of podcasts, too.

• 2:00:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. And if you're listening to this one, dang, in, in a way, it's kind of like, man, thanks.

• 2:00:23Jocko Willink?

  Well, definitely thanks. There's also the Warrior Kid podcast.

• 2:00:27Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:00:27Jocko Willink?

  Which is getting a lot of hype right now.

• 2:00:30Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:00:31Jocko Willink?

  Why? Because we talked about it on the last two podcasts, Go Here. People kind of recognized and they didn't, uh, this is the thing. I'm not real good at the whole like, uh, like, hey, everyone, look at what I'm doing. That's not really, you know? I'm like, hey, here's a podcast. If you want to check it out, check it out. So with the, I posted it and talked about it. And so a bunch of people went and check out the Warrior Kid podcast. The feedback is awesome and I appreciate it. And also if you want to check out some Warrior Kids stuff, you can check out IrishOaksRanch.com where Aiden, who's a Warrior Kid, is making soap on his farm, just for real.

• 2:01:12Jocko Willink?

  And if you want to get some of that soap, IrishOaksRanch.com. That way you can follow the motto of Aiden's Soap, and that motto is stay clean. So, check that one out. Also, we got a YouTube channel, which is called Jocko Podcast, and that's where these videos are of this podcast. If you want to see what Dennis Rowley looks like.

• 2:01:36Speaker 02

  How tall he is?

• 2:01:37Jocko Willink?

  How tall he is? Can you tell that from a video where he's sitting down?

• 2:01:39Speaker 02

  He was kind of going out of frame, like when he like sits up. Yeah, so yes, you can tell.

• 2:01:44Jocko Willink?

  He's a big dude.

• 2:01:45Speaker 02

  Full of aloha, by the way.

• 2:01:46Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, way full of aloha. Uh, but yeah, if you want to see what Dennis Rowley looks like, and you can come on there. You can also see Echo's Enhanced Videos, as he likes to call them. He thinks it's an enhancement when he adds stuff to them.

• 2:02:00Speaker 02

  Damn, bro. You think it takes it away?

• 2:02:03Jocko Willink?

  I think so.

• 2:02:04Speaker 02

  It takes away from the message.

• 2:02:05Jocko Willink?

  The raw message is just there.

• 2:02:06Speaker 02

  Actually, I've heard that, yeah.

• 2:02:07Jocko Willink?

  Oh, really? People have actually told you that?

• 2:02:08Speaker 02

  Well.

• 2:02:09Jocko Willink?

  I don't agree with it. I'll tell you what totally changed my attitude is the, is the Mikey and the Dragons video.

• 2:02:14Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:02:15Jocko Willink?

  That video is sick. The video that you made is sick.

• 2:02:18Speaker 02

  Alright, cool.

• 2:02:19Jocko Willink?

  And that video, I said to myself, even, this is more powerful. Even like, you know, you never really think about, well, you think about it, but like the background music.

• 2:02:27Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:02:28Jocko Willink?

  Like when, when it says the king dies and this like cello kicks it in the background. I'm like, dang.

• 2:02:34Speaker 02

  Somber.

• 2:02:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:02:36Speaker 02

  Well, that, that is a good point, and you are kind of advanced in your thinking, because really, to put kind of, to put it kind of precisely, the goal is, it's not necessarily to be like, hey, what's the background music supposed to be? It's like, what's the feeling supposed to be? And you know how certain instruments or music or whatever will provide certain feelings, and you know, that's kind of the goal to line them up. That's it. So, man, you recognize that.

• 2:03:02Jocko Willink?

  So that video has definitely impressed upon me that videos can have a positive impact and positively enhanced, to use your term.

• 2:03:12Jocko Willink?

  What's going on with the words that are in the video?

• 2:03:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, but what about if I put like the walls crumbling and crashing down? See?

• 2:03:22Jocko Willink?

  And then you just do that over and every single thing that happens explodes?

• 2:03:26Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, does that take away from the message?

• 2:03:28Jocko Willink?

  You were like one of those people that got carried away with CGI on that video.

• 2:03:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:03:31Jocko Willink?

  Which I, you know, you gotta explore the boundaries.

• 2:03:33Speaker 02

  Yes, and sometimes you go outside. I see on a recent video that I did, I'm not gonna say which one, but I did the same thing, but not with crumbling and crashing noises and effects. I did it with lens flares. You know what a lens flare is, right?

• 2:03:45Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:03:46Speaker 02

  Optical lens flare.

• 2:03:47Jocko Willink?

  Somebody puts a light in front of the camera?

• 2:03:49Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, it's the the aberrations or I don't know, whatever the word you wanna use that that a light going directly at the camera will create these like, you know?

• 2:03:57Jocko Willink?

  Little.

• 2:03:58Speaker 02

  And you can do it on purpose, right? It's like a look. It's like an epic look when you get what's called an anamorphic lens. It kinda does this thing, it compresses it to the side kinda thing, and then when you, when you, to put in layman's terms, basically when you put the-

• 2:04:12Jocko Willink?

  What video did you do this on?

• 2:04:13Speaker 02

  I can't tell you.

• 2:04:14Jocko Willink?

  Now I'm gonna go watch all my damn videos?

• 2:04:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, go watch all the videos, you tell me, but here's why I don't wanna say it, because now people will be paying attention to it, you know? And they'll be like, oh, yeah, you're right, cuz, okay, not to go into a whole long thing, but, okay, so there's a guy named J.J. Abrams. He's a director and I think a writer too, but anyway, he does, he did like the new Star Trek movies, he did the new Star Wars. You know, he's like kind of a sci-fi guy, um, and he got a lot of, he got a lot, people had an issue with the amount of lens flares he allowed in Star Trek, the newer Star, so they're everywhere. I thought, I thought it looked dope, man. I, I really liked that look, but he got a lot of, you know, a lot of shit for it.

• 2:04:56Speaker 02

  Nonetheless, I don't wanna be in that same boat with these videos, with that particular video that I'm talking about. So if they don't notice, then good. If so, then bad. See what I'm saying?

• 2:05:07Jocko Willink?

  I'm gonna go post about it.

• 2:05:09Speaker 02

  Nonetheless.

• 2:05:11Jocko Willink?

  Psychological Warfare 2, which is an album with tracks where I tell you what you should do to push through the moment of weakness. And that's all we're gonna say about that.

• 2:05:21Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:05:23Speaker 02

  It works with a hundred percent certainty. I'll add that.

• 2:05:27Jocko Willink?

  Are you still batting a hundred percent right now?

• 2:05:29Speaker 02

  I am.

• 2:05:29Jocko Willink?

  Right now?

• 2:05:29Speaker 02

  Well, here's the-

• 2:05:30Jocko Willink?

  I'm gonna call, I'm gonna call-

• 2:05:31Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:05:32Jocko Willink?

  You on that.

• 2:05:32Speaker 02

  Oh, a hundred percent. Every single time I've ever used it, here's the thing, I haven't used it recently because it's like-

• 2:05:38Jocko Willink?

  Are you scared of it?

• 2:05:40Speaker 02

  I didn't, I didn't need it. I don't have many moments of weakness nowadays. See, I'm like forged in the fire of discipline. No transgressions.

• 2:05:51Jocko Willink?

  Are you trying to set yourself up to make a video with flair for yourself? That's what's-

• 2:05:55Speaker 02

  No, bro. No. No, no, no. I'm reporting back to you my current status on my discipline. Nonetheless, I haven't had to use it recently. So, yeah. I mean, it doesn't matter if every single time that I've used it, it, yeah, it helps. Like, what am I gonna do? Listen to you telling me and then like, "Oh, yeah, I'm still good." You know, to me, just making the effort to open my ears to you is already, you're already like-

• 2:06:17Jocko Willink?

  You already know what you're stupid doing.

• 2:06:19Speaker 02

  On the way to like power through. Yeah, exactly, right?

• 2:06:21Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 2:06:22Speaker 02

  So, you know, a hundred percent on that one in my experience. Also, you wanna vary up your workout, Onnit Fitness Gear is at Onnit.com. They got a lot of cool stuff on there, a lot of good stuff. So, if you wanna improve, enhance, vary, increase variables? Increase stuff in your workout. If it's getting boring or something like this. Go to Onnit.com, get something from there. Like kettlebells. Or rings, or battle ropes. I think if you add one or more of those things into your workout, it'll be enhanced greatly, results-wise. It's my opinion, my prediction. Also, books. What do we got?

• 2:07:04Jocko Willink?

  Well, first of all, we got Mike and the Dragons. Told you about the video. Go watch the video and then you'll wanna get the book. Why? Cause Echo did a really good job and-

• 2:07:11Speaker 02

  Thanks, bro.

• 2:07:12Jocko Willink?

  Cause the book is legit. Am I allowed to say that about my own book or does that make me arrogant?

• 2:07:18Speaker 02

  Yeah, no.

• 2:07:18Jocko Willink?

  From what I've been told.

• 2:07:20Speaker 02

  It's legit.

• 2:07:21Jocko Willink?

  Everyone appreciates it. And a bunch of people have now started posting reviews on Amazon, which is very cool. I appreciate it. I've read them and I'll read some next time live, but uh, yeah, so so Mikey and the Dragons. Here's the deal. Is it sold out at this moment in time? Yes. Will it be sold out when you hear this? Probably not. Actually, it's probably, we got more books coming in. I'm getting them printed um as quickly as they can possibly print them. And I apologize for not correctly estimating how many books everyone would buy. That is my fault and I apologize for it. But if you do want Mikey and the Dragons, order it as soon as you can so that you can get it as quickly as possible. Also, the Way the Warrior Kid books.

• 2:08:07Jocko Willink?

  Way the Warrior Kid and Mark's Mission, those books are good for kids and adults and really anyone. And, you know, just got done talking to talking to Dennis Rowley downstairs and he's like, oh, yeah, I read those books. They're awesome. So he's a he's a what I don't know how old he is, but he's a Vietnam veteran pilot and he read Warrior Kids and was was down for the cause.

• 2:08:31Speaker 02

  That's weird. You said down for the cause because I was thinking in my head down for the cause.

• 2:08:34Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well, he is clearly.

• 2:08:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:08:36Jocko Willink?

  You know, down for the cause.

• 2:08:37Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 2:08:38Jocko Willink?

  Dissonant Ghost Freedom Field Manual?

• 2:08:40Speaker 02

  Good one. Outstanding one, actually.

• 2:08:43Jocko Willink?

  Really?

• 2:08:43Speaker 02

  I think so. Again, and I said this before and say it again because this is a constant thing. It's like one of those things, like a manual, like an actual manual for life. Right. But so, okay, you said that. I get it. But yeah, you refer to it. That's what you do. It's like a reminder. And we do this all the time, by the way. But this is a good one to just remember because that's part of the the the actually, it's the majority of the challenge right there. It's to remember this stuff. Like say, hey, you shouldn't freaking drink a soda right now with your sushi.

• 2:09:17Speaker 02

  Don't do that. You know that already, but if it's just part of the habit, it's like boom, you might forget because you were thinking about some other stuff, you know, some edits or whatever that you had to do. You see what I'm saying? So you got that manual there this time and you just refer to it, kind of maybe even daily, semi-daily.

• 2:09:34Jocko Willink?

  I recommend daily.

• 2:09:35Speaker 02

  Daily, yeah. And you just remember all this stuff. It just keeps you on the path, man.

• 2:09:39Jocko Willink?

  That one is in print, by the way. There's plenty of them. So you can order that one. And it's a good Christmas gift. For people that, you know who needs it in your world. You know what I mean? And I don't think it's insulting. And by the way, if someone is offended by it, just get them to crack it open. Because they'll realize, like, hey, this isn't meant to offend. This is meant to build.

• 2:10:02Speaker 02

  Yeah. And actually, you know what? Now that you think of it, that book isn't like, Extreme Ownership might be that kind of book that if you get it for someone, they'll be like, like, what are you saying? You know, like, will elicit, what do you call it? Defensiveness. But the field manual won't. Because like, first, when you first see it, you're like, oh, this is awesome gift item. See what I'm saying? Like, looking at it. But it's like, yeah, it's like a cool, like, field manual. It doesn't scream like, you need to take responsibility for stuff. That's why I'm here. It just, you don't get that feel. But even, even if that person might feel that, maybe you got to do it with like a certain type of card or something. See what I'm saying?

• 2:10:43Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:10:44Speaker 02

  Thank you for everything you've ever taught me. And then like, give it to them. See what I'm saying?

• 2:10:52Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Well, speaking of Extreme Ownership, there's Extreme Ownership and there's The Dichotomy of Leadership, both books, they're about leadership. And they are available, of course. And those are, those are books that will pragmatically teach you how to lead. That's all there is to it.

• 2:11:12Jocko Willink?

  Echelon Front, speaking of leadership, that's our leadership consultancy. We solve problems through leadership. It's me, Leif Babin, JP Danelle, Dave Burke, Flynn Cochran, Mike Sorelli, and Mike Byma. Go to echelonfront.com. If you want us to come to your business and align your leadership, or you want us to come and do a keynote speech, go to echelonfront.com and get the details there. The muster is coming up, 2019, video soon to be released.

• 2:11:42Jocko Willink?

  It's gonna be in Chicago, Denver, and Sydney. Yes.

• 2:11:46Speaker 02

  Three must.

• 2:11:47Jocko Willink?

  Sydney, Australia. Are you familiar with that area?

• 2:11:49Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:11:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, so Chicago, Sydney, and Denver. Check out extremeownership.com. That's where we'll post the details. All of them have sold out.

• 2:12:01Jocko Willink?

  And all of them will sell out. You might not think that in Australia, we're gonna sell out, but we will.

• 2:12:07Speaker 02

  So you're saying all of them have sold out in the past?

• 2:12:09Jocko Willink?

  In the past, yes. Oh, sorry, yes. Uh, they haven't, these ones haven't sold out yet, but they will. So register early. Everyone down under.

• 2:12:18Jocko Willink?

  We know when I was in Brizzy.

• 2:12:20Speaker 02

  Sure, Brizzy.

• 2:12:21Jocko Willink?

  I was in Brizzy, and we did a little book signing. I did a little book signing, and there was people from all over Australia there. They came to Brizzy.

• 2:12:30Speaker 02

  Did you notice when you're in Brizzy? That the Australians tend to do that very thing with words. They'll shorten them and then put an E or an O at the end, you know?

• 2:12:41Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:12:41Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:12:42Jocko Willink?

  The Aussies do that with their.

• 2:12:44Speaker 02

  See, right there, Aussies. Boom.

• 2:12:46Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah, well, there you go.

• 2:12:47Speaker 02

  I kinda incorporated that when I, I've been there twice. And yeah, I noticed that and I liked it.

• 2:12:53Jocko Willink?

  The first SAS guy I worked with, you know what his name was? Well, there was two. The first one's name was Dutchy.

• 2:13:00Speaker 02

  Dutchy, what was his whole name?

• 2:13:02Jocko Willink?

  I, it was a long Dutch name.

• 2:13:05Jocko Willink?

  And the other one's name was Tommo. And then Nicky.

• 2:13:10Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:13:10Jocko Willink?

  So yeah, a hundred percent. We're batting a hundred.

• 2:13:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:13:13Jocko Willink?

  Batting a thousand.

• 2:13:14Speaker 02

  I was doing a, well, I guess what would be called a mini documentary one of the times I went there, and, um, one of the guys' name is Jason Robig. It's a black belt under Hicks and Gracie, so it's with him. And he, you, the way he'd explain when people like, hey, what are you guys doing? He'd be like, oh, we're making a little doco for, you know, for this thing or whatever. And, um.

• 2:13:35Jocko Willink?

  And people understood.

• 2:13:36Speaker 02

  Oh, they do, exactly. And I was like, doco, I like that. It's good. Yeah, man. So yeah, incorporate that into your thing.

• 2:13:42Jocko Willink?

  So, yeah, Australia, we'll be down there, Chicago, Denver. Uh, also, we have EF Overwatch now. If you're looking to bring experienced and tested leaders into your organization on the civilian side, we've got military spec ops and combat aviators that are leaders that have been trained and have been tested and they're moving into the civilian sector to come and help your company. Go to EFOverwatch.com. And if you want to keep, you know, sort of kicking it with us, we're available on the interwebs, on Twitter, on Instagram, and on Facebook.

• 2:14:26Jocko Willink?

  E.

• 2:14:28Jocko Willink?

  Boha. Echo is at Echo Charles and I am at Jocko Willink. And thanks to all our military personnel out there that are out there protecting our freedom and to all the vets that have served and have protected our great nation. And a special thanks to Hal3, the Sea Wolves, for doing what you did 24 hours a day to support and save troops on the ground. Thanks to all of you and of course to Dennis Rowley. Thanks for coming on. It's amazing to meet you. And thanks for sharing your history and the history of the Sea Wolves with us.

• 2:15:09Jocko Willink?

  Can't say that enough. Thank you. Thanks to police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, correctional officers, border patrol, first responders of all kinds. Thanks for holding the line for us 24 hours a day here at the home front. And to everyone else out there, if you're feeling a little outgunned by the world, think about, think about those words scramble the Sea Wolves. And then go out on the attack, no matter the weather or the environment or the enemy fire. You got problems, go in hot.

• 2:15:51Jocko Willink?

  And get after it.

• 2:15:54Jocko Willink?

  And until next time, this is Echo and Jaco. Out.