124: Hardcore Recondo, General James "Mook" Mukoyama. "Everyday is a Great Day. I Have My Faith, My Family, and Live in the Finest Country In The World."

0:00:00 - Opening 0:06:00 - General James Mukoyama. 0:27:02 - Escalation in Vietnam. 1:02:08 - General Hackworth. 2:44:47 - Final Thoughts and take-aways. 2:52:27 - Support: JockoStore http://www.jockostore.com stuff, Super Krill Oil and Joint Warfare and Discipline Pre-Mission http://originmaine.com/origin-labs/jocko/, THE MUSTER 005 in DC http://www.extremeownership.com/washington-dc-005. Origin Brand Apparel and Jocko Gi http://www.originmaine.com, withJocko White Tea http://www.jockotea.com, Onnit Fitness stuff, http://www.onnit.com/jocko and Psychological Warfare (on iTunes) https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/psychological-warfare/id1183222322. Extreme Ownership (book) http://amzn.to/2jonHTx, Way of The Warrior Kid 2: Marc's Mission http://read.macmillan.com/mcpg/way-of-the-warrior-kid/?utm_source=authorsite&utm_medium=authorsite&utm_term=jockofollowers-jockopreorder&utm_content=na-preorder-buynow&utm_campaign=9781250156792&et=44236-a110035216-n20273057, The Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual, http://amzn.to/2szgaEj and Jocko Soap. https://irishoaksranch.com/storefront/jocko-soap 3:24:51 - 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 Jocko Podcast number 124 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening.

• 0:12Jocko Willink?

  Bullets punched through the chopper as Nev and I jumped out. Together, we ran over to the farthest wounded guy, grabbed him, ran back and tossed him into the bird. We picked up a second wounded in action the same way and then a third amazingly without becoming casualties ourselves. But by the time everyone was loaded onto the helicopter, there was no room inside for me. I stood on the skids and put on my helmet so I could tell the pilot to take off. But I found I couldn't talk. I was so dried out, my tongue had welded itself to the roof of my mouth out of pure fear.

• 0:54Jocko Willink?

  I had to open my canteen and drink some water before I could even gasp, let's get this mother out of here.

• 1:02Jocko Willink?

  We took the wounded back to base and returned to the fight. Without anything holding him up now, I couldn't out, couldn't figure out why Torpe didn't do something about getting his men consolidated outside of that paddy. He still kept saying he was pinned down. Finally, I lost my temper. I really chewed his ass over the radio demanding he get cracking and get those men out of that paddy now.

• 1:31Jocko Willink?

  Apparently, the next thing he did was put down the radio, stand straight up and begin running from man to man to get them to move back.

• 1:43Jocko Willink?

  He got mowed down right away and died a short time later.

• 1:49Jocko Willink?

  Maybe I hadn't learned a damn thing at my con. Or from Dennis Foley's near miss in that minefield. I hadn't asked Torpe to stand up. He didn't need to in order to extricate himself, but it hadn't occurred to me that he would.

• 2:09Jocko Willink?

  I had been playing the game as if Lieutenant Knapp, a natural, more seasoned leader, was in charge.

• 2:17Jocko Willink?

  It was due to the force of my word as his commander that this inexperienced young lieutenant was sent to his death. Like Jim Gardner's, Torpey's death was a big guilt thing for me and has remained so all my life.

• 2:42Jocko Willink?

  And that is an excerpt from the book About Face, which is by Colonel David Hackworth, a book that we covered on this podcast. In fact, it was the first book we covered on this podcast, and there is a reason for that. The book About Face was and is my favorite book. And when I was deployed to Ramadi in 2006, I read it and reread it every chance I got.

• 3:17Jocko Willink?

  Now, the book is about war, but I have always found it to be a book about leadership and, in my opinion, the best book I have ever read about leadership.

• 3:32Jocko Willink?

  David Hackworth was born and raised in California, lied about his age and joined the Marchant Marines and served in the South Pacific in the end of World War II.

• 3:42Jocko Willink?

  And then he joined the Army, where he rose through the ranks, serving in the Korean War and the Vietnam War, Battlefield Commission.

• 3:52Jocko Willink?

  And over his career in combat, he was awarded two Distinguished Service Crosses, eight Silver Stars, three Legions of Merit, a Distinguished Flying Cross, and eight Purple Hearts.

• 4:07Jocko Willink?

  And in the end, he became an outspoken opponent of how we were fighting the war in Vietnam, and that cost him his career in the army.

• 4:22Jocko Willink?

  He went on to write these books and was able to pass on the lessons that he learned through these books about face, which as I said, we covered on podcast number two. He also wrote a book called Steel My Soldier's Heart, which is covered on podcast 28.

• 4:41Jocko Willink?

  And unfortunately, he died on May 4th, 2005, before I ever got the chance to meet him.

• 4:54Jocko Willink?

  But a few months ago, someone reached out to me on social media, someone by the name of Jay Mukoyama, and he was a listener to the podcast, and he thought I just might be interested in talking to his father, James Mukoyama. The name looked pretty familiar. I thought I recognized it, and I quickly realized that this was the full name of one of the men that appeared in both books, About Face and Steel My Soldier's Heart.

• 5:27Jocko Willink?

  The man Colonel Hackworth simply called Mook.

• 5:32Jocko Willink?

  And I replied to Jay and said I would be absolutely honored to be introduced to his father, who was in fact, Major General James Mukoyama, a retired Army officer that had served as a company commander in Vietnam, working directly for Colonel Hackworth. And after some logistical coordination...

• 5:58Jocko Willink?

  It is my absolute honor to welcome General James Mukoyama to the podcast. Sir, this is an absolute honor.

• 6:09Speaker 01

  Well, Jocko, it is the same on this side. I've listened to some of your podcasts, especially the one on Steal My Soldiers' Hearts, and I couldn't stop listening to it. And then I realized, I looked at my watch and I said, "This is over two hours already." Just because of the way you picked out the really important things that Hack wrote. In fact, I forgot a lot of the things until you read verbatim some of the things that he said. And he lived what he wrote, I might add. He led by example.

• 6:52Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, well, I definitely have taken a ton of lessons from him over the years, and that's why it's just amazing to be sitting here with you. And let's talk about you, though. Let's talk about how you ended up in the Army and where you came from and what your background was. You know, why don't you take us back to Chicago?

• 7:10Speaker 01

  Sure. I was born and raised in the inner city of Chicago, a neighborhood called Logan Square, primarily Polish, German, Italian. We were the only minority family in that neighborhood. We went to a grammar school of 900. My brother and I were the only minorities. So I grew up, I grew up basically in a predominantly white, white environment.

• 7:37Speaker 01

  But I never felt like I was different, really, because everybody treated me fine. It was, it was a time in life in the inner city where everybody knew each other. You know, in our neighborhood, our block, we didn't lock our doors. You know, everybody knew. That's a time when, you know, most mothers stayed at home, and they were the police of the block. So if anybody would come by that was out of order, you know, they would take care of it. But we, we were, I'd say, lower-middle class economically. We never owned a home. We always lived in an apartment building. My father was an immigrant from Japan.

• 8:20Speaker 01

  Uh, my mother was, her family was from Japan, but she was actually born in Madison, Wisconsin. And so, uh, my grandparents lived with us, you know, we all, three generations in the same apartment. Uh, and I never felt poor. I, you know, because we had a strong family. Uh, our church was only three blocks away from our apartment building. Every Sunday, we put on our Sunday best clothes and we would walk as a family to church.

• 8:53Jocko Willink?

  Now, it's interesting, you, you, you said your dad had immigrated from Japan and your mom was born in Wisconsin.

• 8:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:59Jocko Willink?

  Was your mom not, didn't your mom get put in the internment camps with her family during World War II?

• 9:04Speaker 01

  No, no, no, here, here's the thing. Uh, my father came to the States in 1918. In fact, that was kind of a funny thing. He was, uh, he was gonna sign up for World War I, you know, which was still going on, but then it ended. So he couldn't, he couldn't sign up and, uh, and then when World War II hit, he was too old. You know, and plus, he was a Japanese. He, I don't know if you know this or not, Japanese could not become citizens, naturalized citizens of the United States until 1952. And so, uh, so he was a, you know, he was still a, a Japanese citizen. Uh, but he was in Chicago.

• 9:47Speaker 01

  My, my family was in Chicago, my mother and father, my brother. I wasn't born, I was born during World War II. And so, we didn't have to go to camp. Mostly, the 95% of Japanese Americans at that time, or anyone of Japanese descent, lived on the west coast, in California, Oregon, Washington State, Colorado. And so, when the war hit, Pearl Harbor hit, uh,

• 10:18Speaker 01

  President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which called for the all people of Japanese descent to be evacuated from the West Coast and put in concentration camps in the inner part of the country, basically in deserted desert areas. And these camps, they euphemistically refer to them as relocation centers. But they were really kind of my, you know, your standard concentration camp with barbed wire fences, with machine guns facing in, not out, and people not being able to come and go as they pleased.

• 10:58Speaker 01

  A hundred and thirty thousand people of Japanese descent were put in these camps, and two-thirds of them were American citizens, not aliens, okay? And no trials, no, no, the only crime that they had committed was the, the color of their skin and their fact that they were of Japanese descent.

• 11:23Jocko Willink?

  And so did your family avoid that because they were in Chicago?

• 11:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, there were only like three or four hundred of us in Chicago at the time, and we weren't considered a threat. But my other, the rest of my family, my grandparents on my mother's side, and my cousins and aunts and uncles, they were all in California, and they all got evacuated. Just imagine this, you're, it's a Friday night, and you get a knock on your door, okay? It's a local FBI agent, and he says, "On Monday morning, be at the corner of Washington and State Street with two suitcases." End of communication, okay? And you, you know, you don't have time to do hardly anything, and you, you know, you

• 12:13Speaker 01

  go there, and then you're put on a train, you don't know where you're going. And you wind up in a camp and you're there for three years. Okay, so let's say you're you're an owner of a small business. You lose the business. You no longer have a job, right? So you can't pay your mortgage and things like they lost. They lost everything. And now you're 18. Let's say you're 18 years old. Okay, and this happened to your family, right? And the local army recruiter comes to the camp and says, I want you to go die for your country. You know, frankly, Jocko, I don't know what I would have done. I might have told the guy to take a walk, you know, or use other words.

• 12:56Jocko Willink?

  And yet, so many of them joined up.

• 12:59Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 13:00Jocko Willink?

  And formed the 100th Battalion and the 442nd.

• 13:03Speaker 01

  Regimental combat team, that's right.

• 13:05Jocko Willink?

  And and those guys fought with incredible bravery and had some critical battles that turned some the tide in some critical situations as well.

• 13:14Speaker 01

  Yeah, they were the most highly decorated infantry unit in the history of the United States Army for its size and time of service. They were a regimental combat team. Let's say about 4,500 soldiers because they had an artillery battalion and other things that were attached. Okay. In about 18 months of combat, they were awarded over 9,000 Purple Hearts. You know, some guys had three or four, you know, and if not more. And you know, the Presidential Unit Citation? You're familiar with that award? There are Army divisions that never got that award. Okay, that regimental combat team was awarded eight Presidential Unit Citations.

• 13:59Jocko Willink?

  That's unbelievable.

• 14:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, they were my personal heroes. So that's and that was to kind of get back to your question. That was one of the reasons that that I wanted to join the Army.

• 14:11Jocko Willink?

  I was actually going to ask that. So you know, you're sitting here saying if you were in one of those camps, you don't know if you might have had to tell them to go take a walk. But when your time came. You, you, you, you walked into the recruiter's office, not away from it.

• 14:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, in my case, when I was in high school, as I told you, you know, faith is a very strong part of my whole life. I've been so blessed in life beyond anything I deserve. And so when I was, our church, you know, we go to church every Sunday. I was in the choir. I was in Cub Scouts. I was in Boy Scouts. I was in the youth group. You know, all of this was centered around the church. You know, when I was in Scouts, I went to the National Jamboree in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania with 52,000 of my best friends, living in tents.

• 15:06Speaker 01

  And, but, you know, that was, and what was the symbol of that jamboree? George Washington at Valley Forge kneeling in prayer. And the motto of scouting is for God and country. So that was really my motto. And then I was in Boy State. Are you familiar with Boy State?

• 15:26Jocko Willink?

  No.

• 15:26Speaker 01

  Boy State is an American Legion program.

• 15:30Jocko Willink?

  Does it still exist?

• 15:31Speaker 01

  Yes, yes. And it's, it's been around probably for 50 years now. When I went, it was the 25th year. Okay, so it's more than 50 years. And the concept of Boy State is they take junior, high school juniors, ready to go into senior year, and who are leaders, basically. And they form a quasi-state government for two weeks. And they actually divide into two political parties. They don't call them Republicans and Democrats. They call them something else. And, and they have state government, county government, and local city government. And you run for offices and you actually have to come up with a platform

• 16:15Speaker 01

  and you debate. And so it's a, it's a lesson in civics, okay? But it was sponsored by the American Legion. So we all lived in like dorms. And the dorms, we had to make our beds so you could bounce a quarter on it, you know, and they were all army blanket stuff and cots and, but it was wonderful. It was just a great experience. But, so when I was in high school, I

• 16:43Speaker 01

  But I was very active in my church, in my, I'm kind of a driven guy. And I was the president of my, my high school youth group at the church. And then I became the vice president of the Chicago Association.

• 16:57Jocko Willink?

  Where, did you play sports?

• 17:00Speaker 01

  No, well, I was, uh, no, I didn't.

• 17:02Jocko Willink?

  And what about your grades?

• 17:04Speaker 01

  I was, I was valedictorian of my, of my grammar school and high school.

• 17:09Jocko Willink?

  They have valedictorian in grammar school?

• 17:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:12Jocko Willink?

  That shows you where, how well I did in grammar school. I didn't even know that.

• 17:16Speaker 01

  And then I, I, I was in the band. I played clarinet and saxophone. So I was the first chair clarinet of the band. I was the principal woodwind in the orchestra and, and so, but anyway, I was, I was very active in my church youth group. And I, I was thinking of becoming a minister. Okay. But then I was in junior ROTC. And Chicago has the nation's largest junior ROTC program. About 30 high schools have it. And it's a great program. People misunderstand J R O T C. They think it's a feeder for the military. Okay. I mean, some of them do go into the military, but that's not the purpose.

• 17:57Speaker 01

  The purpose is to give these high school students something other than gangs to belong to. To give them experience in leadership and discipline and teamwork. And it's, it's a tremendous program. So I was in junior ROTC.

• 18:16Jocko Willink?

  Was, so it's that combined with your, your view of the, like the 442nd. Those things are kind of starting to congeal in your head and maybe move you towards a military.

• 18:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. And then in addition to that, I have just one sibling, an older brother. He's about seven years older than I am. And he joined the army as an enlisted guy. But in the first year of college, he was in a, a military fraternity called Pershing Rifles. Uh, which other people like Colin Powell and some others have been in, including myself. When I went to, to the U of I and. And you have to understand also that I'm Japanese American. In the Japanese culture, the warrior, the samurai, is at the top of the social strata. Okay, unlike China, where the scholar was at the top. In Japan, it's the warrior.

• 19:15Speaker 01

  So when I joined the military, when I became a commissioned officer, my dad was so proud. You know, his small T-shirts swallowed the large, you know. And when I became a general, it's like, you know, incredible. But I, you know, so I.

• 19:35Jocko Willink?

  Did you do ROTC in college as well?

• 19:39Speaker 01

  Oh, yes. See, I'm a driven guy, right? And, and I was, here's, here's the thing, though. As I told you, I was thinking of becoming a minister. But then I also wanted to serve in the military. So what do you think I would do?

• 19:54Jocko Willink?

  Chaplain, perhaps?

• 19:55Speaker 01

  Exactly. Little problem. I'm Protestant and my denomination theologically went so far away from what I believed in, that I couldn't buy the theology. So now I'm praying to God, right? And I'm saying, I get the message. I guess you want me to do my military thing. So that's what I did. Okay. But you fast forward 50 years, 55 years. What am I doing today? I'm doing what I wanted to do when I was in high school because I have Military Outreach USA, a faith-based nonprofit that I started. So that's a lesson in prayer. And that is, at that time, I thought God was telling me no.

• 20:39Speaker 01

  He wasn't telling me no. He was saying, wait, it's on my schedule, not on your schedule. I mean, you know, I wasn't mature enough either as, as a military guy, nor as in my faith.

• 20:52Jocko Willink?

  So what year was it that you're showing up in college?

• 20:56Speaker 01

  Uh, sixty-one.

• 20:58Jocko Willink?

  Sixty-one.

• 20:58Speaker 01

  I started.

• 20:59Jocko Willink?

  So you do four years of college. It's nineteen sixty-five.

• 21:01Speaker 01

  Right.

• 21:02Jocko Willink?

  Vietnam is really not escalated yet at that point, but did you think?

• 21:08Speaker 01

  It was pretty hot at that time and I, I basically, by that time, I, I, I was on the military thing, right? I wasn't gonna be a chaplain anymore. So I was, I was in Pershing rifles. I was on the rifle team. I was on the drill team. You know, if it smelled military, I was in, okay? And then you have to remember, I had four years of high school ROTC also before I went to Benning.

• 21:32Jocko Willink?

  So you're, you're pretty good at your drill, I take it.

• 21:34Speaker 01

  Oh, I had, I mean, I mean infantry, IOBC infantry officers basic course, piece of cake. I mean, I, I went through that. I was an honor graduate in my class and in fact, this is really funny. My class, about two hundred, you know, brand new second lieutenants, right? About a third of it was, uh, National Guard and about a third were reserves. And there were only a few of us that were regular army. See, I got a distinguished military graduate commission, regular army infantry, right? And so very few of us were regular army in my class. So our attitude was not really the best, shall we say? And so we get to Benning and they, they marched us to class.

• 22:17Speaker 01

  I mean, this was in, to us, it was insane. We're second lieutenants. You know, just tell us where the building is, we'll get there, right?

• 22:24Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 22:24Speaker 01

  No, we had to march in formation.

• 22:26Jocko Willink?

  The army.

• 22:27Speaker 01

  So needless to say, the attitude was not real good with my, with my company. So the day we graduated, okay? They used to have a award, a streamer that companies could put on their guide on. It was called the Tiger Tactics Award. You know, this is where really gung ho, you know, companies and all that, which ours was not needless to say. Well, the night before, we stole one from another company and we put it on our guide on. So on graduation day, we marched by the headquarters and out comes the commander. The guy's livid. You say, where'd you guys get that? Oh, you know, it's just disappeared. And we were graduating and what's the guy gonna do to us, right?

• 23:10Speaker 01

  So we, we all graduated and, and that was it.

• 23:13Jocko Willink?

  So, so nineteen sixty-five, didn't you go to, you went to, uh, you went to graduate school after?

• 23:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, here's the thing.

• 23:23Speaker 01

  You know, I told you, I had to, we didn't have a lot of money for me to go to college. So I knew I had to earn it myself, right? So when I was in high school, my senior year, I worked thirty-three hours a week. I worked from five till ten o'clock at night at a warehouse in Chicago. And I worked eight hours on Saturday so I could raise money, okay? I also played in two bands. I told you I played clarinet and saxophone. I played in a Polish band for weddings. And that was so cool because by the third set, everybody was so blasted, nobody cared, right? And then, but I also played in a Jewish band. So I used to play for bar mitzvahs. So I knew all the temples in Chicago.

• 24:07Speaker 01

  So I used to tell people I had them coming or going, either way. And then I had to, you know, I took out two government loans. And that's the only way I could afford to go to school. And so sixty-five rolls around, I graduate.

• 24:21Jocko Willink?

  And I find this interesting for a real obvious reason. You majored in English in college.

• 24:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, the reason I did that, Jocko, was, once again, you know, I'm a pretty focused guy. And my, my focus was on becoming the best officer I could be, the best leader I could be of infantry soldiers. And I knew I was going into combat, right? So as a freshman, I tried to determine, what am I going to major in to prepare me for that? So I looked at psychology and I looked at English, not rhetoric, but English literature, okay? I rejected psychology in my first year because we had these classes, classes with Pavlov and his dogs and all this stuff, you know? And I was going through that and I said, what does this have to do with people?

• 25:11Speaker 01

  You know, I mean, I want to learn how to, you know, work with people. Well, literature, whether you read the whole continuum of, you know, every man or Shakespeare or Hemingway, if you read that stuff...

• 25:25Speaker 01

  There are universal traits of human nature that come out at you, okay? If you can understand that, you can realize what motivates people, okay? So I, and then not only that, but if you read the best writers of all time, I just felt by sheer osmosis, I'm not the smartest guy, just by sheer osmosis, you know, I could absorb that and I could express myself better. So that's why I majored in English.

• 25:51Jocko Willink?

  And I've talked about that, I was an English major as well. And I was, I was, I was prior enlisted, so I'd been in for eight years. And actually, I'd been in for 10 years by the time I went to college. And I knew right away I was going to be an English major. And the reason I wanted to be an English major, because I'd, I'd gotten commissioned and served two years in the, in the SEALs before I went to college as an officer. And I realized you got to write everything, you got to read directives from people, and you got to understand what they're saying, and then you got to communicate with your troops. And I wanted to have a good command of the English language. The, the part that you talked about, the understanding of human nature, was something that I saw once I got in and I started reading it. I started applying and thinking about what I was reading. And now this is something that I, that I advocate for everyone to,

• 26:36Jocko Willink?

  if you want to really understand human nature, you got to read.

• 26:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. So I was, so when I was graduating?

• 26:44Jocko Willink?

  You know, when I said that in 1965, the war, because what was it? What year was Idrang? 19, that was 1965, wasn't it? The Battle of Idrang?

• 26:56Speaker 01

  I think it was.

• 26:57Jocko Willink?

  I think it was 1965. I think it was. And you know, they kind of used that as, hey, this is when the real escalation started. And, and the reason I asked you that specifically is because I've had some Vietnam vets on that were going to college in 1965, and they were like, they hadn't even, hadn't even heard of Vietnam at that point.

• 27:15Speaker 01

  So I guess it was because I was in ROTC, you know? I was kind of paying more attention, you know? And I knew I was going to Benny. I mean, that was the foregone conclusion.

• 27:26Jocko Willink?

  And you knew you were going to combat as well?

• 27:27Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 27:28Jocko Willink?

  That was your mindset?

• 27:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, because that was my goal, to be an infantry officer, you know? I mean, if I, you know, that's, that to me was where I wanted to go. And, and so in 65, I got an, I got an offer to get an assistantship. Uh, you know, to, to be, uh, really a counselor in the dorm. But it's like I died and went to heaven because they, they paid for tuition and fees. And I got like a hundred bucks a month salary, which to me was like.

• 27:58Jocko Willink?

  Richest guy in the world.

• 28:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, you know, but, but the important thing was I could get my master's degree. Okay. And by the way, I got it in a year. Cause I went to summer school. I'm, I, I just, I wanted to go on active duty, but this was a chance for me to go, you know, on an assistantship and not have to pay for it. But now the pragmatism kicks in for me, you know, cause you know, really with an English degree, as you know, you know, it's, it's great for preparing you to understand things, but you know, that and 50 cents in those days were getting me a cup of coffee. So I, and then I knew I was going to go into combat. I knew I was going to be an infantry officer and the odds of my perhaps getting wounded,

• 28:44Speaker 01

  you know, were fairly decent. So I need to have a fallback, you know? And I wasn't an accountant, so I wasn't a CPA or, you know, something like that. So I got my master's in the teaching of social studies. So I could be a teacher, you know, you don't have to run the hundred yard dash to be a teacher. And so, and I, and teaching is a noble profession and I always felt that, you know, it's something I could do if I got wounded and still contribute to society. And 70, well, you know, the 75% of your time as an officer or senior NCO is teaching. You know, so I figured I want to find out how the pros do it allegedly. What I found out is the military has the best education system, really does.

• 29:30Speaker 01

  You know, I didn't have to get my master's degree in history and philosophy of education and, and psych and all that stuff. No, didn't need it.

• 29:39Jocko Willink?

  So you, you, you wrap up, you get your master's degree and now you, you know, you're going to Vietnam. What, what happens when you graduate?

• 29:46Speaker 01

  Okay. So I, I go to Fort Benning. I go to IOBC and you know, I'm an honor graduate in my class. Oh, I didn't finish that story. This, my, my, my class that I was in, you know, really bad attitude guys, right? On the, on the day of graduation, they announced the honor graduates. Okay. I was in the third platoon. So first platoon, they announced the honor graduates in the platoon. Second platoon, they announced the honor graduates. Third platoon, which I'm in.

• 30:14Speaker 01

  I'm the only guy who's an undergraduate out of my platoon. When they announced my name, everybody booed.

• 30:22Speaker 01

  Because I ruined our record, right? So what happened is I volunteered for, I volunteered for, well, I was regular Army. So I had to, I had to go airborne. I volunteered for Ranger School. But in those days, the West Pointers, all, it was mandatory, they had to go to Ranger School. So I graduated the same time that the West Pointers did. They took up all the quotas. So I didn't, I couldn't get into Ranger School. But I had a solution. See, I'm always thinking ahead. I was gonna, I applied for Pathfinder School. So I figured I'd go through Pathfinder School. I'd finish that. The West Pointers would be gone. I could slide into the next Ranger class, right? They didn't give me Pathfinder. So now I'm stuck, right?

• 31:05Speaker 01

  So I said, okay, I'm volunteering for Vietnam. And they sent me to Korea. So I was in the DMZ in Korea, which is really a god thing. I've got to tell you this because I was with the Second ID on the DMZ. And those days, you were, you were assigned, and you stayed there for 13 months on the DMZ.

• 31:24Jocko Willink?

  And there was still active combat patrolling and we'd take casualties during that time period.

• 31:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, 13 months I was there, we had 12 KIA and about 40 wounded. Okay? So this was not a walk in the park. And it was, it was a great experience for me because in addition to, see, we were in the DMZ. We actually had a company compound. Okay? And we actually had a guard mount, you know? And we had our own NCO club and we had, and, and so we had all the, all the BS of the admin stuff that you do on, when you're in garrison. But we were doing combat patrolling every day on the DMZ. So it was really a, a great experience for me as a young officer. Because I, I was able to lead troops out on patrol.

• 32:13Speaker 01

  But also I had to do all this admin stuff. You know, the garrison.

• 32:18Jocko Willink?

  And so that was your platoon commander tour. What were the patrols like? What were you doing?

• 32:23Speaker 01

  Basically, they're ambush patrols because the DMZ was set up where it was a free fire zone. If you saw anyone, you could shoot them because nobody was supposed to be there. Okay? And we would have to say Korean Chung Hee, which is tell them to stop, you know? But how many times did you say that before you pulled the trigger, basically? But we, we did ambush patrolling primarily.

• 32:51Jocko Willink?

  And that was, you said you were lucky or you said it was God that put you there? And, and do you feel that because that's just a really good sort of warm up for combat?

• 33:02Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 33:03Jocko Willink?

  That's, I feel that way. My first deployment to Iraq was, was relatively, it was relatively easy, right? We were in Baghdad, things were going pretty well. We had the upper hand on the enemy and we didn't get into too much major combat. You know, we got a few firefights here and there, but wasn't like when I got from Marty. And I felt like that, I was real blessed to have had an experience where you get the, kind of the initial nervousness out of your system and you realize, okay, I can do this. That, that was, I, I felt pretty lucky about that.

• 33:38Speaker 01

  Well, also, you know, keep in mind, I was, I was just a young second lieutenant, shaved tail. What did I know really? And I was, once again blessed, I had a platoon sergeant who really, he was a Korean war veteran.

• 33:51Jocko Willink?

  Oh, wow.

• 33:51Speaker 01

  You know, a guy was actually an E7, okay? And, and basically when I got there, you know, I was his lieutenant. Okay? So nobody screwed around with me. But on the other hand, I listened real carefully. I mean, that's one thing I, I learned, you know? I, as a young officer, I've had my success in, in the military because I had great NCOs who made me look good. And I had commanders who mentored me and didn't cut my head off when I screwed up. And I've made my fair share of mistakes.

• 34:24Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm. Haven't we all? You get done with that tour and then what's your, what's your next assignment?

• 34:30Speaker 01

  So, you know, you get your dream sheet, right? About where you want to go, when you do, when you leave that area. And so I put in for Fort Bragg, for Fort Benning, because I wanted to go to an airborne unit. Because I was airborne, but I'd never served in an airborne unit, right? They sent me to Fort Lewis, Washington. So I go to Fort Lewis, Washington, to the, uh, the training center, infantry training center, okay? And when I get there, I'm, I'm made, uh, long story short, when I was in Korea, uh, I also was, uh, they found out I had a master's degree, so they pulled me off the line. And, uh, the battalion commander calls me into his office, right?

• 35:13Speaker 01

  So I, I go down there and he says, "Lieutenant Mukoyama, uh, how you doing?" "Sir, I'm having a great time." You know, "I'm, I'm with soldiers, you know, we're doing combat patrolling, you know, and I, I really, and this is what I've, I've been trained to do," you know? And, and he's, and so I'm happy, okay? So he says, "I see you have a master's degree." I said, "Uh, yes, sir." And he said, "You know, our battalion adjutant is leaving, and you have a degree in English?" You can see where this is all going, right? And I said, "Yes, sir." And he said, "Well, how would you like to be the battalion adjutant?"

• 35:56Speaker 01

  And I said, "Sir, I'm honored that you would even consider this, but, you know, I'm really happy, you know, leading soldiers." And he said, "Lieutenant, I'm not looking for happiness in my battalion. You will report on Monday morning." You know, "Yes, sir." Okay, so off I went, and, uh, and I became the battalion adjutant. But that, once again, was a great experience for me, 'cause I, I, I learned a lot of the admin stuff in, unfortunately, and some, I also saw some bad stuff going on, which I was not happy with. I saw, you know, I, because I was the adjutant, oh, and what I didn't tell you was, that was at battalion level, the brigade adjutant left.

• 36:41Speaker 01

  And they called me up to brigade, to be the brigade. Now, I'm a first lieutenant. That's a major's position, right? But I happened to be pretty good. I was the best battalion adjutant out of all the battalions. So I go up there, I go up there to brigade, to be the brigade adjutant. And what I found was, you know, the officer efficiency reports, the OERs? I knew all the battalion commanders, because I dealt with them all, okay? So if I, Jim Mochiama, were to rate the battalion commanders based on their leadership, right, and I would have rated them one, two, three, four, okay? But I saw the reports going through, and it was four, three, two, one.

• 37:26Speaker 01

  And, and that's because they were looking for managers, not commanders. And so that was, that was a tough pill to swallow, so.

• 37:37Jocko Willink?

  Eye-opening for you as a young. Yeah, I know when I worked, I was the admiral's aide, and I saw, I didn't see stuff like that, that turned me off, but I saw, I just, just getting a better grip on what was happening behind the scenes was very important for me, and it helped me out, you know, later on.

• 37:57Jocko Willink?

  And when you were in Fort Lewis, that's when you first met Hackworth, right?

• 38:01Speaker 01

  Absolutely correct. This, this was so cool. When, when, you know, when Hack, now I'm a captain. By this time, I'm a captain, right? And I'm at the, I'm, I'm the secretary general of the SGS. I was the secretary, the general staff, okay? What that means is I was the assistant for the chief of staff, basically. And so, I'm, yeah.

• 38:28Jocko Willink?

  Did you know who Hackworth was?

• 38:31Speaker 01

  Of course. We all, we all, I mean, Hack was a legend, you know? Everybody knew who he was, but also because I had that job, one of my functions was, I was the guy who coordinated the general's schedule and the chief of staff's schedule. And Hackworth was reporting into Fort Lewis as a new battalion commander, okay? Well, whenever a new battalion commander came in, I always did research on the person. You know, so I could tell the general, you know, here's the guy who's coming, here's his background. Well, Hackworth was. You know, Mr. Infantry, basically. And so when he came to see the general, he walks into the headquarters. You know, I'm sitting behind this desk. He walks in, so I stand up.

• 39:15Speaker 01

  You know, I say, "Welcome Colonel Hackworth to Fort Lewis. You know, the general will be with you in 10 minutes, you know, because he came early." Right? The first words out of Hackworth's mouth, I'm not kidding, first words, "What are you doing sitting behind a desk?" He said, "You should have a company." He said, "If you want one, I'll give it to you." Okay? The guy doesn't know me from Adam, right? I mean, you know, and but, you know, I was pretty sharp in the way I wore my uniform. I did have, you know, my jump wings and my E. I have an expert infantryman's badge, okay? And I had my EIB, and that's it. I didn't wear any ribbons or any of that stuff. And just the stuff that counted, as far as I was concerned.

• 39:59Speaker 01

  And so Hack saw that, you know? And, and I said, "Colonel, I really appreciate, you know, what you're saying, but I came to the same conclusion that you did a couple of months ago. And I've already talked to a battalion commander who's accepted me to take one of his companies. So I'm committed to him, sir. So I can't, you know, I'd love to take you up on your offer, but I can't because I'm committed to this other battalion commander." And Hack said, "I understand totally." Okay? Well, that turned out to be another God thing, because later on, as you know in the book, he and I got together and we saved the career of a drill sergeant.

• 40:37Jocko Willink?

  Mm-hmm. We, I just want to hear a little bit more about this, because it's something that I haven't been able to gather from anyone. You know, in my mind, you know, I thought everyone must look at Hack like, you know, this guy's Mr. Infantry, as you put it. But I also would say to myself, "Well, you know, here's, I'm thinking that because he wrote these books and because I studied him." But that was an actual thing. People knew who he was by his reputation throughout the Army.

• 41:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was not only his reputation, but his appearance. I mean, you know, his neck was probably the size of my waist. I mean, this, you know, Hackworth was just, you know, and he always had, you know, he wasn't bald like today, you know, but, you know, eighth of an inch, you know, razor-sharp, you know, sides and, and all that. And what I, what I didn't say is when he... Hackworth had this unique ability to size people up when he saw them. Like when he said that to me. And I've said this before, but Hackworth's, his philosophy was you're either a dud or a stud. And there was nothing in between. And he had this uncanny,

• 41:51Speaker 01

  I've seen it dozens of times, where he actually did size guys up. And I never saw him miss on that evaluation. He just had this instinct, you know, to size guys up. And that's, and that's why he was successful as a commander. Because one of the principles is to surround yourself with good people. And so when he came to a unit, he found some guys that weren't cutting it, they were gone. I mean, especially in combat, you know, he can't tolerate that. You know, and he would, and he had the strings that he could pull.

• 42:25Jocko Willink?

  He had the relationships all over the place, it seems.

• 42:29Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 42:30Jocko Willink?

  Now, how did, when did he leave with, to go to Vietnam and take over the battalion?

• 42:36Speaker 01

  He probably left, let's see, I left in May of 69. So it was probably end of 68 or maybe early 69.

• 42:46Jocko Willink?

  And, and he goes over and he's over there for a few months. And then he ends up needing, well, he wants to surround himself with good people again. And so he reaches out to you?

• 42:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 42:57Jocko Willink?

  How does, how does that happen?

• 42:58Speaker 01

  Well, you know, I was still at Lewis as an A I T company commander. And, and another thing I should tell you, at that time, I'm, I'm not real happy with the army. Because they never gave me any assignment or anything I ever asked for.

• 43:17Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you're like oh for four at this point.

• 43:19Speaker 01

  Well, wait, are you ready for this? I, I get, what I didn't tell you was in graduate school, I majored in Japanese history and Chinese history and political science and Japanese language. In my masters of social studies, okay? And I happen to be Japanese American. I happen to have had a tour in Korea. Right, where by the way, I didn't tell you, I got some awards from the Korean Army. And so now the Army comes out with the Foreign Area Specialty Training Program, or FAST, okay? And the concept was a great concept. You know, in Vietnam, we got caught with our pants down because we didn't have any Army experts in Vietnam.

• 44:01Speaker 01

  Nobody knew the culture, nobody knew the language, the politics. Sound familiar? And so basically, the Army said, okay, we're going to develop geographic experts for the whole world. Okay? And we're going to call it the FAST program. So I saw that, and it was in the Army Times, you know, and they said, if you have an interest, call this number, you know, and so I called. You know, and I said, hey, look, pull up my record. You know, you'll see, you know, I'm, I'm, I've got my master's degree in Far Eastern Affairs. Ethnically, I'm Japanese. I've got a tour in Korea where I got some awards from the Korean Army. Okay?

• 44:44Speaker 01

  And I'm regular Army, right? What are my chances of getting in this program?

• 44:51Jocko Willink?

  They should be 100%, right?

• 44:53Speaker 01

  Are you ready for this? The first words out of the guy's mouth, you haven't been to Vietnam. And I said, well, that's right, but if you'll go back in my record, you'll see, I volunteered for Vietnam, and the Army sent me to Korea. Okay? He said, but that doesn't count. Okay? The second thing he said was, you haven't been the career course, advanced course for officers. Well, he got me there. I hadn't, you know, I was just a young captain. I hadn't been there. So in essence, he's telling me, you know, come back in a couple of years and maybe we'll think about it. You know, he didn't give me any encouragement. He didn't say, hey, you're a natural for this program. You know, I'll keep on monitoring your career, you know, blah. He didn't do any of that stuff.

• 45:37Speaker 01

  And about that time, I get the letter from Hackworth saying, hey, Mook, I, we got a war going on. If you want a company, it's yours. And like, I hit the lotto, you know, and I, and frankly, I was, I was thinking of, you know, resigning my regular Army commission, but I hadn't been to Vietnam yet. And I was a bachelor. I had a lot of my friends who were married, who were going back for their second and third tours. You know, and I felt an obligation, and not only that, but I figured, well, maybe if I go, I'll change my mind. You know, and serving under Hackworth would be the best opportunity I could, I could have. So I jumped at it, you know, and I went, but uh, things did not change.

• 46:17Jocko Willink?

  How did you get orders? I mean, you know, I know Hackworth had some relationships with people, but just to get a guy deployed to be in his battalion, how did you pull, how did he pull that off? What did it look like?

• 46:27Speaker 01

  Well, I mean, I, I called my infantry officer assignment guy, whom I'd never spoken to in the five years I was on active duty, right? Cause I always felt that I shouldn't be managing my own career, you know? If I, if I did my job, that the army would, you know, I, I'd be treated okay, you know? Well, none of that ever happened, right? So I called this guy at the Pentagon and I say, "Hey, I'm volunteering for Vietnam again." And he basically said, "Well, okay, you know, give me your phone number in case we lose connection here." And, and then he said, and I said, "But I have a stipulation. I, I need to go to the ninth division." And he said, "Okay,

• 47:10Speaker 01

  I can make that happen. When do you want to go?" I said, "As soon as possible." And this is February, and he said, "Well, I can get you there in August." And I said, "No, that's not soon enough." He said, "How about April?" I said, "Sold." So I got orders to, you know, now everybody told me in the world at that time, here I am, infantry, regular army captain, going to Vietnam. When I hit the repo depot, uh, they could assign me anywhere, you know, and orders meant nothing, you know, because captains, infantry captains were a dime a dozen. So when I get to Vietnam,

• 47:49Speaker 01

  everything was greased. Ninth Division, I went from the ninth, I went from, from Saigon right to the ninth division at Dong Tam. You know, I'd land there, got my orders to his battalion. It's all, all greased.

• 48:03Jocko Willink?

  Weren't you doing some kind of like Vietnam indoctrination for a week long and, and Hack pulled you out two days into it or something?

• 48:12Speaker 01

  I was so upset. They had a five day in-country training program for newbies. Okay, especially, you know, well, you know, in the Delta, I'd say 85% of our casualties were from booby traps. And so we were, and there was a special terrain, you know, with rice paddies and, and canals and, you know, just the whole thing was totally different. And so they had this five-day training course to acclimate you and to understand the booby traps and the terrain and all this stuff. And I'm in it for two days and I'm pulled out of the course. And I put on a helicopter and they take me down to, you know, the battalion fire

• 48:56Speaker 01

  support base. And I'm madder than a wet hen, you know, and I, I go to Hack and I say, sir, you know, how can you do this to me? I mean, I'm trying to learn how to stay alive, you know, so I can, and he said, Mook, you don't need that stuff. I know you, you know, yes, sir. Yes, sir.

• 49:13Jocko Willink?

  And when you showed up, so for those of you that hadn't read, haven't read the books or listened to the other podcasts about this, Hackworth had showed up, but he was requested by name to go and take over the 439th in Vietnam, which was a, which was a battalion that was having a lot of problems. And he went in there and he fixed it. I mean, that's, there's no simpler way to put it. He went in there and squared that battalion away and made them from hopeless to hardcore is, is the, the terms that get used. When you showed up, the heat had already been there for a while. So things were pretty solid at that point.

• 49:47Speaker 01

  Oh, they were, they were so good. It was incredible. In fact, the first guy I met when I, when I got there was our battalion S4. His name was Mario Takahashi. He was actually a, a National Guard guy from Hawaii. He was about 6'2" or 6'3", big Japanese guy, you know, not like me.

• 50:08Jocko Willink?

  How tall was Hackworth?

• 50:10Speaker 01

  Hackworth.

• 50:11Jocko Willink?

  Cause you just, you made it sound, when you said, talking about his neck, was he like a big, cause in pictures, he always looks pretty lean and, and not very physically, uh, large.

• 50:20Speaker 01

  Well, when I, I mean, he was stout.

• 50:22Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 50:23Speaker 01

  I mean, he wasn't, he wasn't real huge, he wasn't real tall.

• 50:27Jocko Willink?

  Uh huh.

• 50:27Speaker 01

  Uh, but just the way he carried himself.

• 50:30Jocko Willink?

  That's what I always envisioned, was he was just a guy that if you walked away, go, I bet that, you know, how tall was Hackworth? Oh, he's six eight.

• 50:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:37Jocko Willink?

  You know, and then you find out he's whatever.

• 50:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:39Jocko Willink?

  Five ten or something.

• 50:40Speaker 01

  And not only that, but I'll tell you, he, when, when I became a general later on in life and, and he came to one of my, uh, every, every year I used to have a leadership conference for my, my officers and my NCOs that I would invite speakers to come to. And Hackworth came, uh, to one of my conferences and then he visited me in Chicago when he was doing book, his, uh, about Facebook, right? And so he invited me and my wife and kids to have dinner with him one night. You know, he always said, bring your kids, you know, some guys would say, no, just, you know, bring your wife or whatever. Cause my kids were fairly young, they weren't real young, they were maybe eight or nine, you know, at that time.

• 51:26Speaker 01

  And my wife and the kids actually commented about how soft spoken Hackworth was. He wasn't a blustery guy, uh, uh, you know, among guys, yeah, but, you know, in the, in public with, you know, women and family members, he was, he was a gentleman.

• 51:47Jocko Willink?

  Mm hmm.

• 51:48Speaker 01

  Which kind of surprised my wife, cause I told him well about him, you know? And so, but that's, that's how he was.

• 51:55Jocko Willink?

  And, and so, the, the battalion when you show up, it's just, the guys are really on board with what's going on.

• 52:04Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely, because I got there probably three weeks before our, our famous, but, uh, it wasn't really a battle on 22 May, where we decimated, uh, a VC training battalion, basically. Uh, and, uh, I remember being at the talk.

• 52:26Speaker 01

  You know, when he's planning all this, Hackworth had this innate quality to just smell out the enemy, you know, even with all the intelligence we get and all this stuff, you know, he was able to figure out what they were doing. And so, he set us up for that night. But to answer, to address what you were saying, by the time I got there, Takahashi was the first guy I met, okay? He was really a strong, straight shooter, and he was the S4. And so, he got all the equipment for the battalion, and he got it whatever way he had to get it, you know? And then I meet, the next guy I meet is another, is a company commander, and the guy was like 6'3" or something, you know? So, I'm seeing a pattern here,

• 53:10Speaker 01

  right? And I'm 5'5", okay? And, but, here's a cool thing about this. One of the other company commanders, his name was Don Meyer. And by the way, Hackworth had this really cool way of, of using words and terms and titles, that, you know, like, our companies were not Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, Delta. They were Alert, Battle, Claymore, and Dagger, okay? And the Claymore company commander was a guy by the name of Don Myers. Don Myers was my roommate in college at the University of Illinois, and we both were infantry ROTC

• 53:50Speaker 01

  guys, right? And then, later, he was, he was with the 101st, and he was wounded, so they shipped him to Fitzsimmons. And then, they assigned him to Fort Lewis, which was where Hackworth and I were. So, Don and I were roommates again at Fort Lewis, Washington, okay? So, then Hackworth ships to Vietnam, and he takes Myers with him, okay? So, now, Myers, who, by the way, is 6'3", right? And his nickname was Lank, you know? And when he and I were in college as roommates, it was like Mutton Jeff, you know? And I wasn't the tall guy. And so, anyway, but, as you, as you can understand, to have, I commanded

• 54:34Speaker 01

  Battle Company, and he commanded Claymore Company. And I knew that if we were gonna run into any crap, you know, that he would, he would be there for me. And he knew I would be there for him. And that was, that was, it just, it was really good.

• 54:54Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that that whole thing with names is something that I completely ripped off from Hackworth. When I was a task unit commander, our task unit was called, well, there was Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie. And I had Bravo, and immediately when I took it over, I changed the name from Bravo to Bruiser. And that's was that changed the attitude of people. It really does.

• 55:14Speaker 01

  Well, also, as you know, all elite units have have greetings and countersigns, right? So for the hardcore, our our motto was hardcore recondo. That was what the greeting was. The countersign, which I cannot say totally, was no effing slack. Okay, but I'll tell you, there were a guy, I saw this, I witnessed this. There were guys who were wounded on stretchers. And Hackworth would walk up to them and they'd salute them and say hardcore recondo.

• 55:50Jocko Willink?

  What kind of missions did you do when you showed up there? So you take over your company commander?

• 55:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, they were, they were, they were just really recon, search, search and destroy. Not really destroy, but you know, we were, we were seeking out the VC. But as it got closer to, we knew we were leaving, right? Because President Nixon had had said that, you know? So it just got to be, you know, recon the area, make sure they weren't there. If they were there, we get into firefight, but it didn't happen very often. It was mostly booby traps and things. And basically, that was it. I mean, because they had, you know, they're smart. They knew we were leaving, so why go in, why get into contact?

• 56:40Jocko Willink?

  Right, right.

• 56:41Speaker 01

  If we're leaving.

• 56:42Jocko Willink?

  Now, you were showing me some pictures earlier, your. Pretty famous picture that got published. It's someone, your RTO had just been wounded. What was the story on that?

• 56:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, this is one of our operations and there was a booby trap and, and he was, he got a sucking chest wound from it and, and I got a little shrapnel, not a lot. And basically I called in a medevac helicopter. And the helicopter came in unbeknownst to us, there was a UPI photographer on the helicopter. And he snapped a picture of my guys carrying my wounded RTO on a stretcher towards the helicopter. And that became like the UPI picture for the day that went around the world. You know, the Vietnam photograph. I didn't even know it existed until three years later. I was out, I was off of active duty. I was reading on US News and World Report magazine.

• 57:39Speaker 01

  And the picture was like three inches by four inches in the magazine. But it was all my soldiers, you know, and I saw it and I said, hey. And then I saw I was in the picture. So I'm kind of in the picture so you can see me. So I got the photo from, from them.

• 57:55Jocko Willink?

  I get asked a lot, and it's something that I don't have any experience with, is what it was like having draftees as, you know, I was in all the, all volunteer military. And then on top of that, you know, the unit I worked with, we were all volunteered again. You know, you volunteered to come in, then you volunteer again to try and be in the SEAL teams. And people ask what it was like working with draftees. Now Hackworth's opinion was draftees were good because they didn't care about their career. And if they thought something was wrong, they'd say, hey, this is crap. We don't want to do that. Or, hey, you're not telling the truth to us. And so he thought it was good and it kept the army in check. But there still had to be some leadership differences in dealing with.

• 58:38Jocko Willink?

  And, and later in your career, obviously you started working with the all volunteer army. What did you notice about the draftees that you learned from?

• 58:46Speaker 01

  Well, the, the draftees, just like, and it doesn't make any difference. So you're draftees or, or volunteers. It depends on the leadership. And, you know, they'll respond to good leadership and.

• 59:01Speaker 01

  The draftees were like anyone else. Once you're in the position, you're gonna do the best you can, especially when you're in combat, because you want to survive. And by that time, it gets to be a bonding thing. You know, you're not there fighting for liberty and justice in the American way. You're fighting for the guy to the right of you and the guy to the left of you, basically. Because you know, every day, you're living together, you're dying together, you know, and so it's a function of leadership. And the draftees were great guys. I mean, I'd serve with them anywhere. In fact, I didn't even know who was draftees. I didn't care. I didn't ask, you know, whether they're draftees or volunteers, although the

• 59:43Speaker 01

  vast majority of our guys were draftees in the 4th or the 39th.

• 59:48Jocko Willink?

  Wow.

• 59:49Speaker 01

  And that's what was so cool about it, that Hackworth could take that battalion and turn it around. And I heard stories, because I came later on, you know, but he had a price on his head initially.

• 1:00:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, a price on his head from his own guys in his own battalion.

• 1:00:03Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. But nobody had the gonads to step up and claim the price, so to speak.

• 1:00:10Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. I mean, one of the things he talks about, and again, I've talked about this on other podcasts, but, you know, when he showed up, everyone had, whatever, they had guitars, and they had radios, and they had, you know, big hammocks for themselves. And he got there and said, okay, anything that you can't carry on your back is gonna be in the middle of our base tomorrow morning. It's getting shipped out on helicopters. So people went crazy. Are you kidding me?

• 1:00:31Speaker 01

  Well, not only that, you know what he did? I'm sure you know this, but he took away Class A meals.

• 1:00:37Jocko Willink?

  Oh, I did not know that, or I don't remember it.

• 1:00:39Speaker 01

  Because they were so, they were so, how to say this nicely, they were not disciplined. Okay? Because they had lousy leadership before that. And Hackworth basically said, you know, you guys are soldiers. And he said, I'm gonna keep you alive, you know, but you're gonna have to soldier. So he actually took Class As away initially. He made them shine their boots. Initially, I mean, you know, stuff that sounds crazy.

• 1:01:09Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:09Speaker 01

  You know, but he was getting their attention.

• 1:01:12Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:12Speaker 01

  You know, and, and cleaning weapons. I mean, they would, you know, they were not cleaning. I mean, how crazy is that? They weren't cleaning their weapons at nighttime. There was night discipline, light discipline was almost nonexistent. I mean, it was crazy and Hackworth made them, you know, soldier up and, and, uh, but then what happened was, uh, they started to use his tactics. And they found out that, hey, this works. I mean, we're not taking casualties like we did before. We're actually inflicting casualties that we weren't doing before. And then he started to give stuff back. Oh, you know what else he did? He took away beer initially. I mean,

• 1:01:56Speaker 01

  beer was like water. I mean, we're, you know, the average temperature was like 95 degrees, you know, and all that. It was like 3.2, whatever the beer was, you know, but he took that away initially too. I mean, and people thought he was nuts.

• 1:02:11Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, actually, there's a great quote about Face. It's some guy writing home to us. It's just a quote from a letter somebody wrote down, wrote, you know, my new, my new battalion commander's crazy. I don't know what's gonna happen. That's literally a letter a guy wrote home. It's interesting to me. So I've seen this and I'm sure you've seen this in your career. I've seen it in the business world. I'm sure you've seen it in the business world and in the military. Guys that go so far in that direction of being so hardcore and over the top that they break their guys and people actually don't like them and they don't wanna serve them and they don't wanna do a good job because they're, they're, they're too focused on stuff that doesn't really matter. And Hackworth just, he seemed to have this

• 1:02:56Jocko Willink?

  ability to balance it so well between being hardcore and yet at the same time, everybody knows that he's gonna take care of him and he loves him.

• 1:03:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, that was the main thing, because they knew that they were gonna they were gonna live under his command if they followed what he said. And they would be successful, too. Don't forget. Success breeds success. And so the hardcore, as they kept on progressing, became prouder and prouder of, you know, and the guys. It was just a unit that nobody wanted to reckon with. And that's how it was. But Hack led by example. I can't, I just can't emphasize that enough. You know, I have my leadership

• 1:03:47Speaker 01

  mantra, which, and I'm a simple guy, so I boil things down simply into three words. Example, caring, and balance. And you gotta lead by personal example. It's not, you know, do what I say, but do what I do. And caring is to care for your soldiers. And, you know, caring means, especially in combat, keeping them alive. That's how you care for them. And you train tough. You know, I mean, Hackworth always mentioned that, you know, the harder you train, you know, the better that they'll perform in combat. In fact,

• 1:04:27Speaker 01

  sometimes it was easier in combat than, you know, some of the training that he'd make them go through. And finally, is balance. Especially leaders, and I'm talking to leaders, right? And I always told my leaders that you've got to maintain a balance between your professional military job and your family. And I used to tell my guys, you're not doing me any good if you're going through a divorce. You know, and too many guys, it's easy when you get promoted to get kind of caught up in the perks and in the responsibility, you know, so you work harder to be more, and then what do you do? You ignore your family. And then things fall apart.

• 1:05:12Speaker 01

  And so I I warned my my soldiers. I always said, you know, maintain that balance. And I tried to do that, not only personally, but to to get my so. When we were mobilized, for example, okay, my division. Now, this was not, we didn't deploy overseas. We were a training division. Our wartime mission was, the Army Reserves, by the way, was the only service that had this. We we had reservists whose wartime mission was to take over the training of the recruits at the active duty stations, which would then release those active duty soldiers to go join forces. It made a lot of sense, you know.

• 1:05:52Speaker 01

  So so when that happened, I I went to my staff. Now, you have to understand, this is like the late 80s, right? Okay. And I went to my staff and I said, I want a 24 hour 800 number from my family support program. I want my soldiers to know, and I want their spouses to know, that while they're deployed, if there's any problems, they can count on us. And I want it to be 24 seven, man. And they said, General, you have to understand, those days, 800 numbers were pretty expensive. And and they said, you know, number one is going to be expensive. Number two, you know, 24 seven?

• 1:06:37Speaker 01

  You know, and I said, make it happen. Because I I, the last thing I wanted my soldiers who were deployed to worry about was their families. Right? And then what I did is I, yeah, I had the two star stationary, you know, as as a major general, little notes, you know, they're not eight and a half by 11, they're little note things. So I told my staff, I want to send a personally signed note to every spouse or significant other of a deployed soldier in this division. And I want a note to go to their employer, because you have to understand, these are reservists, right? Okay? So I had 1,500 soldiers.

• 1:07:22Speaker 01

  Mobilize, right? So this is 3,000 letters that I'm gonna sign, you know, personally. They wanted me to use an auto, auto pen, you know, by, by computer, you know, manufacture your signature. I said, no way. These are, these are going, you know? So I, I did that. And what happened was I was, I had a cousin whose husband was a steel, seal salesman, okay? And she calls me one day and she said, you'll never know what happened to my husband. He was making a call on this company in Indiana, okay? And on the wall was one of my letters.

• 1:07:59Jocko Willink?

  Very cool.

• 1:08:00Speaker 01

  To them. And he saw my name on it, you know? So caring for your caring and balance is important.

• 1:08:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah. Um, you know, you talked about that, that operation that was so well planned and so well executed. And you talked about Hackworth's sort of sixth sense instinct. And then, you know, I've, I've heard you talk in some other interviews about a situation that you were in. That was, that you described as really sort of impacting your, your mental state. And to me, when I heard you talk about it, it seemed to be almost like a turning point mentally, psychologically for you.

• 1:08:53Jocko Willink?

  And it had to do with you overrunning a position and, and you end up with some, some.

• 1:08:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, I didn't, I didn't realize the impact of that incident until many, many years later. But in order for me to explain that, I have to talk about something called moral injury, which is and one of these so-called invisible wounds of war. A lot of people are familiar with post-traumatic stress disorder. A lot of people are aware of traumatic brain injury. But when you ask them if they could describe the invisible wound of war called moral injury. Very few people are knowledgeable about that.

• 1:09:36Jocko Willink?

  How long has that term been used?

• 1:09:38Speaker 01

  There was a psychiatrist at the VA, Dr. Jonathan Shea, who basically coined that phrase in 2009. So it's been around for a while, and now it's starting to really pick up steam in research because of its significance in contributing to the high suicide rate among veterans. And the concept is, when I go around and I give presentations, and I tell people, "The concept is so intuitive, you'll get it in 30 seconds." Okay, so here it is. From the time you're born until you're 18 years old,

• 1:10:22Speaker 01

  you develop a personal moral code, sense of right or wrong. That could come from your family, your religion, community, friends, whatever. And then you join the military, and you learn a warrior code. The warrior code is superimposed on your personal moral code and in fact transforms it somewhat. Then you might have to participate in activities or operations that violate your personal moral code, such as killing. You don't have to be the person that pulls the trigger. You could be a witness, or you could feel that you should have prevented it. Or you could be in a unit that follows another unit,

• 1:11:05Speaker 01

  and you see that innocent civilians have been killed. Or you handle body parts. At that time, you sustain a so-called invisible wound of war called moral injury. It's not a physical wound. You can't see it. But in military operations, we're constantly moving. You're going from point A to point B to point C. You don't have time to stop and reflect on this stuff. So what do you do? You bury it. And it becomes unresolved grief, shame. And what happens is, you come back to the States. And let's say you leave the military, or you're in the National Guard or reserves, and you come back to a community,

• 1:11:50Speaker 01

  anywhere in the country, that doesn't understand what you've been through, and it boils up to the surface. And unless you have a strong coping mechanism for that, bad stuff happens. Anger, guilt, depression, suicide. And the suicide rate among veterans today is epidemic. I mean, the VA, it's anywhere from 20 to 22 veterans per day are dying by suicide. And that frankly is under-reported. It's really higher than that. Because you've got veterans who are dying by suicide. It's not reported as a suicide. They'll drive their motorcycle or car into a tree or viaduct, and it's a vehicular accident.

• 1:12:35Speaker 01

  Or unfortunately, there's something called suicide by cop, where they force the law enforcement officer to take lethal action. And so what's the implication of all that? We lose more veterans to suicide in a year than all the combat deaths since 9/11. That's how dramatic it is. And we believe that moral injury is a major contributing factor to that. And Military Outreach USA, our organization, we feel that the main approach to moral injury is not a medical doctor with prescription drugs. It's the forgiveness and grace of a moral authority,

• 1:13:17Speaker 01

  and the counseling of clergy and sensitive therapists, and the support of a community offering hope and help. And so now, getting back to that incident that you asked me about, Jocko. I was a company commander, battle company. We had just overrun Vietcong position and killed numerous enemy. And I literally had three dead bodies at my feet, okay? Well, the time a unit is most vulnerable is right after a victory. It's just human nature. To let your guard down and breathe a sigh of relief. Well, I'm the guy in charge. I know that. So I'm on my radio and I'm kicking rear end and taking names.

• 1:14:02Speaker 01

  I'm telling my platoon leaders, reorganize your units, redistribute ammunition, take care of your wounded, look for enemy avenues of approach for a counterattack, right? And in the middle of all that stuff going on, I stopped. And I looked at the three dead bodies at my feet. I realized that something had happened to me. Something had hardened my heart. Only moments earlier, these were alive human beings. They had families, they had emotions, they had loved ones. They were fighting for something as important to them as I was fighting for. And I was in their backyard.

• 1:14:45Speaker 01

  And then I remember Jesus's Sermon on the Mount, where he told us to pray for our enemies. So in the midst of all this stuff going on, I said a prayer for the three Viet Cong. And I know I was praying for myself as much as I was praying for them. Now, you know, I didn't have a big ceremony, get on my hands and knees, any of that stuff. You know, this all took about 45 seconds. But it's something that was seared in my heart and mind for the rest of my life. And now that I know about moral injury, okay, which I didn't know at that time, I realize that I was one in a million who was able to address my moral injury

• 1:15:29Speaker 01

  at the time it happened. Okay, and you know, I'd always, when I came back from Vietnam, I had seen a lot of my comrades having nightmares, having flashbacks, you know, personality changes. And I frankly asked myself, how come I'm not going through that? Okay, and at the time, my answer always was my faith and my wife. My wonderful wife of now forty-six years, who is an angel. I've been so blessed having her for a wife. So that was my answer, okay? But now, since I've been dealing with Military Outreach USA and this issue of moral injury, I realized that my answer was really lacking, okay?

• 1:16:14Speaker 01

  There were two other things. One was that incident in Vietnam that I just mentioned to you. But the other thing, which I now realize, is when I came back from Vietnam, I joined the reserves. Okay? And I was able to maintain my sense of purpose, of being in a unit with other people who shared the same values that I did, of patriotism, of dedication, of selfless service, which a lot of veterans, when they come back, they just want to cut ties totally. And they, a lot of them, drift because they don't have that sense of purpose.

• 1:16:57Speaker 01

  They don't have the camaraderie, they don't have the bonding. You know, I had that with the reservists, especially, you know, in Viet, you know, with Vietnam and all the BS that we had to take from the public. You know, I mean, you won't believe this, but, well, I know you know this, but when we came back from Vietnam, we were told not to wear our uniforms in public. I mean, that's how bad it was. That's crazy. You know, guys wore wigs so they, people wouldn't know they had short haircuts. You know, because they could pick them up as being military. And so, my being in the reserves helped me, you know, maintain that.

• 1:17:38Jocko Willink?

  One of the things that I tell guys is very similar to what you just said, you know, I tell guys, you gotta find a new mission when you get done. When you get done with the military, you gotta find a new mission. And if you can stay in the reserves, obviously that that gives you that. But if you don't do that, well, then you gotta find, what are you gonna do? What are you gonna step out there? Are you gonna become a great dad? Are you gonna build a business? Are you gonna work for a company and do a great job? You gotta find a new mission. And I find that guys that I've seen that that have real problems, it's because they they got out and they didn't know, didn't have any direction to go into. And also, just to dig a little bit deeper, so you're in that situation where you see these guys and and for the first time, you you kind of look down on

• 1:18:20Jocko Willink?

  them and see them as people, as as other human beings. Is it, you know, is it the fact that you, when you, when you said a prayer for them and for yourself, I kind of got a thought of when you hear about like Native Americans hunting. And, you know, they they think, you know, when they when they get a kill, they'll they'll thank, you know, Mother Nature and and thank for the sacrifice. Was it that type of thing where you said, Okay, you know what, we're fighting. I was doing my job. You guys were doing your job. And I hope you have peace now. Was it that type of thing?

• 1:19:01Speaker 01

  Absolutely. Because, you know, what happens is you forget that they're they're dehumanized. You know, you've got all these, all these names that you call them, you know, but I really respected the VC, our enemy, you know, that's, that's the other thing. You can't underestimate your enemy. You always have to respect them.

• 1:19:30Speaker 01

  You have, you know, I mean, you don't have to agree with them, but you, you, you have to respect their abilities, because once you lose track of that, you can really get screwed. And basically, I'll, I'll give you some examples. When we had that battle on 22 May, okay, I was in the CNC helicopter with, and I guess I should describe that battle a little bit more, so your listeners, we're, we're talking about the hardcore battalion, and when we surrounded this, this VC training battalion really is what it was, and we annihilated it, basically. They were, they were encircled, and we were just calling in airstrikes, naval gunfire,

• 1:20:13Speaker 01

  you know, we were just taking, and then Hackworth had them totally encircled, and so I'll never forget, I was in the helicopter with him, and he basically said, "Mook, uh, we, we got a, first we get a radio message from one of our companies, it might have been an alert company, and they said, "We just had a contact, you know, we killed three, we've, you know, we got four weapons, we captured a guy," or whatever, "and they're headed in this direction." Okay? So Hackworth would turn to me and say, "Mook, you know, let's say, give them 15 minutes, we're gonna hear from Battle Company." 15 minutes later, Battle Company comes up, "We just had a contact," you know, "and they're

• 1:20:54Speaker 01

  headed," so this happened all day, okay, I saw this, I was with them in the helicopter, and, but there was one VC, we were flying near a canal, and he was mortally wounded, you could see the guy was dying, basically. He took his AK-47, and he threw it into the canal. Okay? And the reason he did that is he didn't want us to get that weapon. Because part of the body count was you matched how many weapons, you, you know, if a unit reported, and they said, "Well, we killed 20, and we got one weapon," you kinda say, "Wait a second." Mm-hmm.

• 1:21:36Speaker 01

  You know, so, when I saw that, I knew that this guy, you know, we were up against a tough enemy. Mm-hmm. You know, and, and, uh, so, so you gotta respect your enemy, and...

• 1:21:51Jocko Willink?

  I want to pull some, before we move past Vietnam and Hack, I want to pull some stuff out of About Face, just to kind of hear you, hear your thoughts on it. I'm going to start off with one that you've talked about a little bit, but here we go. This is from About Face by David Hackworth, and this is a quote from someone else. It says, "Hack had the knack of being able to size people up very quickly, almost instantaneously. And I'd say 99% of the time, he was right. He could look at a person, and in his vernacular, the guy was either a stud or he wasn't. There was no in-between. If he was a stud, Hack would find a way to get him. And he would not take no from people if he wanted them.

• 1:22:35Jocko Willink?

  Because he wanted a winning team. And if a person didn't want to go with him, then immediately, the guy wasn't a stud, you see? Because anybody who knew Hack, or came into contact with him, really wanted to be with him, after he'd known him for a while." And that's a quote from Brigadier General James H. Mukoyama, which is you. You're quoted in the book. And you've talked about that a little bit. And he just, he must have had an extremely magnetic personality, for you to say that if you spent time with him, you wanted to be with him.

• 1:23:09Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely. And, and he, I used to say, he had the Midas touch. Everything the guy touched, just whether it was in the military, whether it was in business, whether it was with women, and this guy, you know, he was a stud himself. And, and you know, but he was, he was also a sensitive guy. I'll never forget when, you know, I tell people, he wasn't the most moral guy that I knew, but he was the, the most ethical officer I ever served with. What I mean by that is, he never did anything for personal gain.

• 1:23:52Speaker 01

  He always did things for the unit and for the soldiers, okay? But did he have affairs and things like that? Yeah, and he used to tell me, he said, "Mook, you know, I should have never married, because my love is the Army." You know, so he, he basically, he turned down the War College. He could have gone to the War College, he turned it down, because he said, "Hey, I'm on another battalion in Vietnam."

• 1:24:19Speaker 01

  You know, I mean, he would have been a general, there's no question about it. Had he not stood up, you know, when he was in 06 and, and, you know, he was, I think he was the youngest 06 at that time in the army, but he was a guy who, who was, he was sensitive, though, and he took care, he did take care of his family. In fact, I can say this now because it's, you know, I think statute of limitations might be gone, but, you know, in those days, you weren't, you weren't able to take a lot of cash out of Vietnam, you know, and, and I basically, one day, he knew I was going back home. Oh, and by the way, he did everything he could to convince me to stay, to extend in Vietnam, okay? He was,

• 1:25:04Speaker 01

  he had moved down to be the, the senior advisor for the Arvin Airborne Division, which was really the palace guard around Saigon, okay? And he knew all my hot buttons. You have to understand, I was a bachelor guy at this time, right? And, and, and the airborne, the Vietnamese airborne wore special fatigues. They were like tiger fatigues, and they had red berets, you know, and I'm just this young stud guy who likes dirt uniforms. And he said, Muk, he said, why don't you come down here and I'll make you the G1 advisor. That's the admin guy, right? And he said, but when you come down, if you're an advisor for the

• 1:25:48Speaker 01

  Vietnamese airborne, you get jump pay, you know, so that's extra money, right? And, and he said, and I'll give you two R and Rs. You can, because he knew I, I wanted to go to Japan and see my relatives. So in six months, he said, I'll give you two R and Rs, right? So the guy's, you know, he's trying to move the, you know, the sun and the moon to get me to extend six months. And, and I said, sir, I appreciate it, but I, I had some close calls, and I figured the next one would have Mukulayama written, that bullet would have Mukulayama written on it. And I said, no thanks, you know, I appreciate it, but I'm, I'm out of here. So, so I left.

• 1:26:29Jocko Willink?

  You know, you're talking about the way he was, you know, so, so pro-army, and yet he rebelled against the army in a way. And here, here's a, another thing from the book. He says, "What a mistake it was to listen to the generals of corporate HQ, who were briefed only in zero defect terms and so far from the cutting edge, expected nothing less. It was amongst the biggest mistakes of the war. The politicians only listened to these generals, and the generals only listened to themselves.

• 1:27:10Jocko Willink?

  Few people asked frontline soldiers, the only ones who really knew."

• 1:27:19Jocko Willink?

  Could you guys, or could you, because you were pretty close to him, could you sense that his frustration with the army? Did he talk about it with you? Did he, how did he treat? You know, that's a very hard thing for a leader to do. If your senior leadership is telling you to do stuff that doesn't make sense, or, but, you know, "Hey, we can get it done and we're gonna do it." It's a hard line to walk to say, "Look, we support the chain of command. This is what they're telling us to do. I'm gonna spin it in a positive way. Everyone's gonna think that we're doing it for the right reasons." Because if I say, "Hey, look, Mook, here's what I want you to do," and it's dumb, but we're getting told to do it anyways, that's not a good way to lead.

• 1:27:55Speaker 01

  No, he wouldn't say that.

• 1:27:56Jocko Willink?

  So he would, he would support the chain and?

• 1:27:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, he would, he would present it in the, in the way in which, you know, he would talk about the mission, and he would make sure that he would accomplish the mission, but he would do it his way. You know, you know the phrase battlefield expediency? That's what we did all the time. You know, I mean, screw it. What, you know, what are they gonna do? Send us to Vietnam? We're already there. You know, so, you know, we just did what we had to do. And, you know, I mean, the stupid rules of engagement that we had, you know, where you'd have to get approval to fire on people even though you're receiving fire, you know, and just nutty stuff.

• 1:28:43Jocko Willink?

  Right.

• 1:28:43Speaker 01

  You know, and we'd just say, "Hey, you know, we're gonna do what we have to do," and that's what we did.

• 1:28:51Jocko Willink?

  Here's when he uh, when he took over the battalion. "The following day I took over the battalion from Lieutenant Colonel Franklin A. Hart in a parade field exchange of command in the middle of the Mekong Delta. What kind of war have I gotten myself into?" I wondered. A perfectly starched General Yule was there, having flown in for the occasion in his polished choppers. There was other brass too, and photographers, the American flag, the battalion colors, which were ceremoniously passed on to me, and all of this before the scroungiest, most spiritless assembly of soldiers I'd ever seen. Incredibly, none of the generals or colonels seemed to notice the slack condition of my new charges or their positions.

• 1:29:34Jocko Willink?

  From the outset, I realized that to make this unit an effective military force, I'd have to implement about a thousand changes. So I figured we'd start with five a day. Little things, basic things like where your steel pot, and cleaning carry your rifle at all times. And ammunition will not be worn Poncho Villa style. My first order was that darkness, that come darkness, the fire support base perimeter would pull back 300 meters. The troops instantly began to grumble about this, but it was the next order that really began the mutinous feeling within my hard luck outfit. Anything you can't carry 24 hours a day is gone in the next chopper. Goodbye tents, and cots, and rucksacks, and food lockers.

• 1:30:16Jocko Willink?

  The bitching and moaning began in earnest as piles and piles of junk mounted at the LZ to be whisked away by Chinook. But I didn't care. I wasn't there to have them like me. Again, we, we, we already talked about this. And I, this comes up a lot from a leadership perspective. Do you, is it more important to be liked, or is it more important to be respected? Is it more important to, and I actually had a guy ask me this question the other day. Is it more important to win or to be liked?

• 1:30:52Jocko Willink?

  And I said, well, those two things aren't mutually exclusive at all.

• 1:30:55Speaker 01

  You're right. You're absolutely correct. They're not mutually exclusive. You know, if you demonstrate to your soldiers that you care for them professionally, that's you'll be liked. There's no question because they know that you're there for them. And, you know, you don't, as, as it said there, you know, you're not there to win a popularity contest. You know, you're not there to be politically correct. You're there to accomplish your mission, but also make sure that your guys come back.

• 1:31:31Jocko Willink?

  And I think I'm, I'm starting to tie together something very clearly in my head right now. And that is, you know, your, your number two rule of leadership, which is caring. And I think if you, if you care about your people and they see that you care about them, that trumps the fact that you want them to do things the right way. Cause the reason you want them to do the things the right way is because you care about them and it's going to keep them alive. Make, make you successful.

• 1:32:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely. You know, I, when I was a young officer, I, well, no, I, at that time, when I was a company, after Hackworth left, we had another battalion commander come in, right? And he wrote on my OER, all my career, I had max OERs, really good stuff. But on, on this one, he wrote that, and I'll take this hit any day of the week. He said, I was too concerned for my troops sometimes.

• 1:32:35Jocko Willink?

  Wow.

• 1:32:36Speaker 01

  And, and I said, okay, I'll take that.

• 1:32:40Jocko Willink?

  Wow. That's, that's an interesting perspective.

• 1:32:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:32:46Jocko Willink?

  And, you know, this is one of those dichotomies as well. Because one of the hardest things about being a leader is obviously you care about your men so much. And yet you are going to do things, you are going to put them in situations that's going to put their lives at risks, at risk. And that is, that is something that every leader has to, well, at least military leaders, they have to, they have to find a way to get a handle on that. Cause you love your guys and you want to take care of them. But you do have to do your mission.

• 1:33:16Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:33:19Jocko Willink?

  It's one of the hardest things to balance.

• 1:33:24Jocko Willink?

  Talking about the morality of war a little bit, this was a, and again, this is why, you know, the story that I opened up with, you could see that, that one clearly had to do with, with

• 1:33:36Jocko Willink?

  having moral dilemmas and having guilt because Hackworth gave a guy an order and the guy followed the order, maybe not the way Hackworth thought he was, but the moral injury that he got from that, he said lasted his whole life of giving an order and somebody does something you didn't expect to do, and they end up getting killed. It's one of his guys, one of his guys that he loved gets killed because of the way he led.

• 1:33:59Jocko Willink?

  Here's another kind of moral situation. Going back to the book.

• 1:34:05Jocko Willink?

  They're flying around, they're on a mission. We went down to about 100 feet. The suspects were still running, but this closer inspection confirmed my initial feeling. They were just eight kids, no older than 13 or 14, simply scared shitless as they ran, looking for cover, carrying neither weapons nor military equipment. "No," I told the pilot, "I don't give you permission to fire. I'll put an infantry insert on them."

• 1:34:35Jocko Willink?

  I instructed the platoon leader, whose men were aboard the four slicks, where to land. With gunships covering, the platoon hit the ground. They immediately received small arms fire and took a couple of wounded. The little kids were, as my savvy pilot had said from the outset, Vietcong.

• 1:34:56Jocko Willink?

  It was a major lesson learned for me, but one impossible to etch in stone. I had a couple of men wounded who would not have been if I'd just said to blow those kids away. But I couldn't say blow them away because they appeared unarmed. Yes, they were VC, but they could just as well have been kids ditching school who happened to get caught in the crossfire. Anything was possible. And I suddenly realized it would not be easy, this delta war. It wasn't easy to tell the good guys from the bad guys anywhere in South Vietnam, but here in the delta, it was damn near impossible.

• 1:35:39Jocko Willink?

  Again, very similar to what my guys dealt with over in Ramadi was very hard to tell who was good and who was bad and the enemy knew they could just put the, you know, drop the weapon and walk away and now they were considered innocent even though 20 seconds prior to that they were shooting.

• 1:35:57Jocko Willink?

  How did you keep your men from becoming so callous that they were just gonna start shooting kids because they suspected they were VC? How hard did you have to keep control of that?

• 1:36:12Speaker 01

  Well, I, my response to that is the American soldier innately is ethical. It's, it's in our culture not to shoot women and children.

• 1:36:27Speaker 01

  Now guys, you know, if they're, you know, that, that, that might be something else, but we, and we do not shoot civilians just, you know, who are, who are, are, uh, who are caught with, you know, we, we run across them just because they're there and we want to take revenge. We don't do that as an army.

• 1:36:55Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:36:55Speaker 01

  Generally speaking. Now, there are times when people lose it and I understand that. That's, that's the stress of war. That's happened in all wars. I don't condone it, but I can understand. And so to answer your question, we really didn't have to, our, our guys were pretty professional and I was proud, proud to serve with them. I didn't, they didn't, I didn't see any of that. Okay?

• 1:37:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And this, this just tells me once again, it's about leadership. I mean, cause here you can see Hack clearly leaning towards making sure he's doing the right thing, even though he's a guy that loves his troops and wants to take care of them. He still leans towards doing the right thing. And from what you're saying, that filtered all the way through the chain of command. And we, we took an in-depth look. I've actually done two podcasts concerning. The My Lai massacre and what happened there and it was just so clear that the leadership was completely at fault and the way that they led those troops and it was when I went through to try and pull something positive out of the My Lai massacre.

• 1:38:04Jocko Willink?

  The positive message that I got from it was that it was one it was one officer who had flown. It was Thompson, I believe his name was, but he'd flown over, he'd seen what was happening. He flew back to base, told the the senior leadership, this is what's going on in the ground. The senior leadership radioed into the field and said, stop killing people. And they they literally instantly stopped. They stopped the massacre just because a leader stepped up and said, stop. So good leadership completely changed the the situation as it was ongoing and and clearly if there would have been a better leader on the ground that was leading in the right way, it never would have even started. So you can see here from what Hack's saying, the way he led and the way he treated unknown, you know, people and

• 1:38:49Jocko Willink?

  then the way that was carried out through the whole battalion. That's another amazing testament to good leadership.

• 1:38:56Speaker 01

  Yeah. And and one thing about My Lai, which I tell people is that it was the exception that proved the rule that United States military, that that was an exception.

• 1:39:09Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah. Yep.

• 1:39:10Speaker 01

  You know, the the rule in our military is we don't, we don't do that. And that proved it. I mean, I I didn't see, you know, there were other armies there who were more ruthless, like the like the Rocks. The Rocks were not there, the Republic of Korea. They were not there to win the hearts and minds of the people. They were there to win the war. So if they would go by a village and they were fired upon, they'd destroy the village. And after a while, nobody fired on the Rocks.

• 1:39:48Jocko Willink?

  When Hackworth now gets, he got wounded an eighth time?

• 1:39:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39:55Jocko Willink?

  That was while you, while you were there?

• 1:39:56Speaker 01

  I thought you were getting to that when you read that one quote. But the way, now I wasn't there with him when he, when he got his eighth Purple Heart. But I know the story and, and basically there were guys who were in, in bad shape. And he lands the CNC in the middle of the, in fact, that might've been it and maybe you, they, they landed it in the middle of a firefight or hacked it. He ordered the pilot to take him down and he does put the wounded guys into the CNC. Well, the CNC isn't that big, you know, there's no room for Hack. So he stands on the skids and they take off and he gets hit in the leg. And that was his eighth Purple Heart.

• 1:40:40Speaker 01

  Well, after that, you know, he could tell the guys in the battalion, I want you to walk through this wall of fire and the response would be where do you want us to go? You know, he, he led by example.

• 1:40:51Jocko Willink?

  But is that what caused the army to say, okay, we're gonna? Did they pull it, did they pull him from the battalion at that point when he got his eighth Purple Heart?

• 1:41:00Speaker 01

  Pretty much that was, that was it.

• 1:41:02Jocko Willink?

  Cause what was, if you got three Purple Hearts, you went home? Was that, was that the deal?

• 1:41:06Speaker 01

  I don't know. I only had one. I had no idea, but you know, they, they basically said, you know, we can't afford to lose you. I mean, if, if they, you know, if you get killed, I mean, that's a, a big hit on just the morale and you know, and so you're out of, you're out of there in the field. Okay. So he went up to Play Khu to become the deputy, he was the G3 Corps Advisor for Two Corps. Okay. Which was the Central Highlands. And when my company was pulled out of Vietnam and I refused to go, I said, hey, I want to stay here. I called Hack and I said, sir, you know, I don't, I don't really want to go back. Can you use me?

• 1:41:48Speaker 01

  I had orders the next day to go to Play Khu.

• 1:41:52Jocko Willink?

  And then you went up to Play Khu and you start, you guys were doing advising for the, for the Arvin?

• 1:41:57Speaker 01

  Yes. We, we were the, we were the MACV. That's the Military Assistance Command Vietnam people. And I had.

• 1:42:09Speaker 01

  There was a close call that I had when, this was another moral injury thing, by the way, which I really had really buried, had not really thought a lot about it. But we, we had an inspection team that went out on these special forces camps around the border of Cambodia and Laos and Vietnam, and you had Pleiureang, Benhet, Dokto in the central highlands. And so, we would fly into these camps, and there were three people on this inspection team, so to speak. It was the deputy corps advisor, who was an O6, a full colonel, you know, big deal.

• 1:42:54Speaker 01

  There was the command sergeant major, highest ranking enlisted advisor, also a big deal. And I was the young captain, okay, carrying everybody's bags. Note taker or something. Yeah, right. So, so we land on this special forces camp, and we come under attack, and the sergeant major is killed. And he was maybe 20 meters away from me, and it was a rocket. And it was just, he was in the wrong place, you know, it could have been me if I was, you know, if it had come in the other direction. Well, the backside of that story is that he was scheduled to go on R and R the next

• 1:43:35Speaker 01

  day to Hawaii to meet his waiting wife to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary. Okay? Now, I was just, I was just a young captain, but I outranked him, okay? I could have ordered him not to go on that, that mission. Why risk it? You know, because he, he was going to meet his wife the next day. I didn't do that. Okay? And I, I've thought about that in terms of survivor guilt and, and all of that. It was, and that's something that's come up in my, you know, my studying this moral injury stuff.

• 1:44:21Jocko Willink?

  At this point, did you, so now you're working with Hackworth directly? And are you starting to sense his frustration about the war at all?

• 1:44:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, a little bit. Yeah, well, no, more than a little bit because the, the, the G3 for the Corps was a fairly corrupt guy. And Hackworth was very frustrated with that. And that's why he left, actually.

• 1:44:56Speaker 01

  Well, let's backtrack. I, I, yeah, he, he was moved down to the Vietnamese Airborne. Because he really was not happy. I think he might have been moved. I, I never really got the story on that, why he went down there.

• 1:45:13Jocko Willink?

  And now, at this point, what's your, what are you thinking about in your career and your life?

• 1:45:18Speaker 01

  Oh, I'd already decided I was resigning when I got back to the States.

• 1:45:22Jocko Willink?

  And what made you, what made you lean in that direction? Because, I mean, you did more years in JRTC than anyone has ever done before. And then you did ROTC and you had all that military stuff. And now you got your combat tour in Vietnam under. What, what, what tilted you in the other direction?

• 1:45:41Speaker 01

  I felt the Army was going in the wrong direction when it came to leadership. I thought that they were looking for managers and not commanders.

• 1:45:54Speaker 01

  I was in some positions during my career where I had access to officer efficiency reports. And I could see where the ratings of the senior officers, the lieutenant colonels, the battalion commanders, where the tendency was to give the managers high ratings,

• 1:46:18Speaker 01

  irrespective of their command abilities. And, and then my personal career was, was not managed very well. Hackworth. Hackworth wanted me to stay. He knew I was, I was thinking of resigning. In fact, that's why he offered me the company. Cause you know, he thought that experience might turn things around, you know. And so I'm, here I am at, still with Hackworth in the battalion, right? And he contacted his friends at the Pentagon. And he said, listen, you guys, we got a stud here. And he's thinking of leaving. You know, show him some personal attention. We got a chance to save him. You know, he told me this later, right? So I

• 1:47:01Speaker 01

  got this letter from the Pentagon. You know, I'm out in the middle of nowhere, you know, and I, this first letter they had ever sent me. And they said, Dear Captain Mukoyama, we have reviewed your 201 file very carefully, right? And we believe you have promise for graduate school. Okay? Only problem is, I already had my masters to do, which means that they didn't really pay a lot of attention, right? Their review. I, I showed the letter to Hack, and I said, Hack, you know, I mean, this is crazy. You know, I'm gonna put my career in the hands of these guys? You know, and that pretty well sealed it for me.

• 1:47:41Jocko Willink?

  And so, did you, did you submit your resignation while you were still in Vietnam? Or did you come home?

• 1:47:47Speaker 01

  As soon as I came home, I did. I wanted to finish the tour in Vietnam, which I did. And then, I, I told the army, I'm, I'm gonna be out of here, you know. And so they assigned me to Fort Sheridan, Illinois, right? Cause I lived in Chicago. And I finished, I had three months there, and then I was done.

• 1:48:06Jocko Willink?

  And then, did you, at what point did you decide you were gonna stay in the reserves?

• 1:48:11Speaker 01

  Oh, immediately. That was never a question. I was committed to doing 20 years. Turned out to be 32, but I, you know, I was committed to doing 20 because, especially at that time in 70, 71, the reserve components didn't have a lot of combat experience, guys. And I felt that it was important that I try to help, you know, the reserves be ready.

• 1:48:39Speaker 01

  Basically, and I had something to contribute. So that's why I joined the reserves.

• 1:48:45Jocko Willink?

  And then you start on your civilian career as well.

• 1:48:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, and what happened there was I I worked for a Japanese importing and exporting company. It's called a trading company and it was the name of the company was Mitsui and Company. It's world renowned. We used to have a saying that the sun never set on Mitsui because they had offices in like a hundred and sixty five countries, okay? And it was a very prestigious company. If anybody, they had quote unquote Mitsui men, you know, if you were a Mitsui guy, that was a big deal. It was like their Harvard graduates would all go there, you know, and things like that.

• 1:49:26Speaker 01

  And I was at the Chicago office and the problem was I actually experienced reverse discrimination. By that, what I mean is that I had studied Japanese history, political science, and Japanese language a little bit at the University of Illinois, okay? And I had a pretty good work ethic, okay? And but they couldn't, it couldn't compute in their mind, I'm talking about the Japanese, okay? All the manager positions were Japanese, like the branch manager, he was a vice president, you know, and all that.

• 1:50:06Speaker 01

  I had no opportunity to ever get to even to be a department manager in that company because they looked at me and they couldn't compute that I didn't speak Japanese fluently. Okay? So in their mind, I'm the village idiot, you know? Even though I had my master's degree, I'd commanded a company in combat, I had signed for ten million dollars worth of equipment, I had more responsibility in life than these guys will ever know, you know? But they didn't get it. They didn't understand that. So I did that for about five years. I mean, I was treated well. I have no complaints, but, you know, and I didn't expect any guarantees, but I had hoped

• 1:50:51Speaker 01

  I would have. An opportunity to compete. And when I saw that wasn't gonna happen. I had a roommate from the U of I who was a member of the Chicago Board Options Exchange. And options trading was just starting at that time. And he was a great visionary, a little weak on details. And so, he had an operation on the floor of the exchange and he realized he needed to get a handle on that. And I'm pretty good with details. So he called me and he said, Jim, I know you're not happy where you're at. Would you want to come work with me?

• 1:51:35Speaker 01

  And I said, hey, wait a second. I don't have one day of finance, formal education. I didn't know the difference between a stock and a bond, much less a stock option. And he said, don't worry about it. I know your abilities. You're good with math. This is not rocket scientist stuff. And I said, okay, I'll do it. And that started out a 35-year career in the financial services industry. I became a member of the New York Stock Exchange, the Chicago Board Options Exchange. I was very blessed. I became part-owner of the company. So, that enabled me to devote all the time I did into reserves that I did. Because that was part of the deal I made with my friend.

• 1:52:18Speaker 01

  I said, listen, if you want me to join you, I'm bringing the reserves with me. And you have to understand, if I'm called, I'm going. And if I'm in the reserves, I'm gonna give it 100%. But he had gone through ROTC with me. So he was an Army officer, so he understood. So, I was able to have a successful career at the same time.

• 1:52:44Jocko Willink?

  And you moved up really quickly through the ranks in the reserves.

• 1:52:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, I had, I had, like, like I said before, Jocko, I had great NCOs who made me look good. I had commanders who mentored me. I was, I was a brigadier general at the age of 42, and I was a major general three years later. I was the youngest general in the army at the time. So, yeah, I, I was, I was challenged. I had great assignments. And so, I was very blessed. And my wife supported me through all of this. Without her, I would not have been able to get to first base.

• 1:53:24Jocko Willink?

  I noticed you, you mentioned a couple of times, General William Levine.

• 1:53:29Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:53:30Jocko Willink?

  And, and the impact that he had on you. He was a guy that landed a D-Day at Utah Beach and was one of the people that liberated Dachau in, in World War II.

• 1:53:40Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:53:40Jocko Willink?

  Was there any significant lesson learned that he passed on to you?

• 1:53:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely. He, he, I think he's personally responsible for that balance part of my leadership concept that I've developed over my career. He really emphasized family. And, and keep in mind, when I joined the reserves, I didn't have a clue about the citizen soldier. You know, those of us on active duty, what do we know about the guard and reserves and their pressure? You know, what they deal with? You know, people in the guard and reserves have to balance three balls at the same time, right? You, you've got your, your family, you've got your civilian career that puts bread and butter on the table, and then you've got the reserves or the guard, you know, which, you know, and

• 1:54:28Speaker 01

  so you're balancing all that stuff. And General Levine, I'll always remember, emphasized the family. He always made sure that we were aware of the stresses on the family. You know, when we were gone, I'll never forget in my career, without fail, that's when the furnace would break down. That's when we'd have a blizzard. So my 95-pound wife would have to go out there and shovel the snow because I wasn't there. You know, our son, Jay, who's, who, who you know, he, he basically was a rascal when he was a young guy. And my wife had to take him to the emergency room in the hospital like three times. I

• 1:55:13Speaker 01

  don't even know where it's at.

• 1:55:14Jocko Willink?

  Three times a week.

• 1:55:16Speaker 01

  And I don't even know where it's at, you know, because I wasn't home. So, you know, the stresses on the, so he really drove that home. And I understood better the stresses on the citizen soldier, which are tremendous. You know, at least when you're on active duty, you're focused, you know, and you're in a community where everybody is going through the same thing. So they all understand, you know, the stresses on the marriage, they, you know, they share things, they can help each other out. But in the reserves and guard, you know, the rest of the, you go to a meeting one week in a month, you know, and unless you're in leadership, you know, that's about it.

• 1:55:57Speaker 01

  And, you know, you don't have the, you don't have the bonding and the community strength that you do when you're on active duty.

• 1:56:06Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, when we got to Ramadi, it was the 228 National Guard unit out of Pennsylvania and reserve units that were on the ground and they'd been there for, I think they'd been there for 14 months. But boy, they were outstanding soldiers, all of them. It was a real honor to, to work with them a little bit and then get the turnover and great guys. They, you ran, you ended up running training for like 21 out of your 25 years in the reserves. That's, that's, that's a lot of training to run.

• 1:56:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was, and, and once again, I'd say, you've heard me say this before, it's a God thing. Basically, the Army was the only service that really had a, a great process where we had reserve units whose wartime mission was to take over the training centers, you know, like the Great Lakes Naval Training Center, you know. But the Navy didn't have that, the Air Force didn't have that, the Marines didn't have that. We had reserve units that their wartime mission was to go to Fort Benning. For example, that was my division's mission, was to go to Fort Benning and take over the

• 1:57:20Speaker 01

  training of the infantry officers and recruits, not officers, the recruits at Fort Benning. So that the active duty soldiers that were already there who were up to speed on everything, you know, could go join fighting units, basically. So that was, that was the mission, alright? So I joined, when I came off of active duty, I joined the 85th Training Division in Chicago. And that was an infantry training division at the time. And I was with them for 18 years. And I commanded at the company level, battalion level, brigade level, and I was the assistant division commander.

• 1:58:01Speaker 01

  And every year, we would go on annual training to a active duty training fort. And we take over the training of the recruits. So I did it at Dix, I did it at Fort Bliss, I did it at Fort Ord. And then finally with the 70th, I did it at Fort Venney. And so then what happened was I, I was the commander of the 70th Division out of Lebonia, Michigan, and Desert Storm came, okay? And I knew we were going to be mobilized. You know, the handwriting was on the wall, okay?

• 1:58:44Speaker 01

  So I put together a list. I had 16 subordinate units in my, I had three brigades and Training Command and other things. And so I made a list of 1 through 16, and I prioritized them, okay? And I, and it was a mixture of readiness and leadership. You know, that's how I prioritized them. And I also had to be sensitive to, I had units in Indiana and Michigan. So I couldn't take all the Michigan units and leave out Indiana guys. That wouldn't have been fair, because everybody wanted to be mobilized.

• 1:59:25Speaker 01

  Okay, you have to understand, this was, this is when, this would be the first time, okay? And we've been practicing for like 25 years.

• 1:59:36Jocko Willink?

  You're ready for game day.

• 1:59:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, so the question is, if the balloon went up, would people show up? You know, and so, so I had this list, and I went to Trade Dock, which was our uh, higher headquarters at Fort Monroe, Virginia. And I said, listen, here's my list, here's my division, okay? I said, use this list, and if you're gonna mobilize my division, or any part of my division, do it in this order, and don't screw with this. This is the best way, this is the best way my division will serve, you know, the army.

• 2:00:15Jocko Willink?

  Did they comply?

• 2:00:16Speaker 01

  Oh yeah, they were delighted.

• 2:00:18Jocko Willink?

  That's awesome.

• 2:00:19Speaker 01

  I was the only division commander that had done that. So they went out to the other 11 division commanders, and they, hey, say, we need some lists, you know, and that, and they did exactly what I told them to do, cuz they mobilized half of my division. So they just went right down the list, you know, down to eight or nine, and, and that was it, you know.

• 2:00:39Jocko Willink?

  Now, you ended up having kind of a run-in at the end of your career.

• 2:00:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, I had several, actually. I, uh, you know, and it was because of Hackworth, you know, About Face, and, and, uh, and the first one was, uh, I went on the Oprah Winfrey Show. And, uh, basically, uh, um, my mom was still alive at that time, she used to watch Oprah during the day, and Oprah was out of Chicago, right?

• 2:01:09Jocko Willink?

  Oh, that's right.

• 2:01:09Speaker 01

  And, and then she, and she used to, and I didn't know this, cuz I never watched it, but she used to announce ahead of time, uh, subjects that she was going to cover, and if anybody knew anyone who were experts in that area, let her know, you know, so she could get them. So she decided, this is in the late 80s, okay? Now, put yourself back at that time, when the economy was not doing so hot, and the Japanese economy- was doing real good, you know, because of their computers, their automobiles, their televisions. And so people were blaming the Japanese about our poor economic situation.

• 2:01:49Speaker 01

  And it was called Japan bashing. So in fact, there was a Chinese guy, his name was Victor Chen, who was killed in Detroit by some automobile workers with baseball bats because they thought he was Japanese. He was actually Chinese. Okay. So Oprah decided to have a show about Japan bashing. So she said, if anybody knows anyone in the Japanese American community that might be a good, you know, person on this, please let me know. Well, my mom saw that. And she said, you need to get on the show, you know. So I tried calling, I couldn't get, you know how this is, you know, I couldn't get through whatever. Well, I have a very,

• 2:02:33Speaker 01

  I had at that time, a very influential journalist in Chicago. His name was Irv Kupsonit, who had a very famous, it's called Kup's Column. He used to interview presidents, kings and queens, political people, you know, at, in Chicago at a restaurant. And so, so I called Kup. And I said, hey, Kup, you know, I'm trying to get through on this thing with Oprah. And, and he said, I'll see what I can do. Okay. Two hours later, I get a call from the executive producer of the show. And, and he says, I understand that you're a general in the army. I said, yeah, I'm, I'm in the army reserves. And, and that you're the highest

• 2:03:18Speaker 01

  ranking Asian American in our armed forces today? And I said, yeah, that's right. And he said, well, and, and I, I was trying to figure out where the guy was going, right? Well, he was trying to see if I could chew gum and walk at the same time. So once he figured I could do that, he said, you know, we'd like to have you on the show. Okay. So I said, fine. When is it? Tomorrow. Okay. So I said, okay, I'm in. So I called my, at that time, I was Working for a New York Stock Exchange firm. And I called the headquarters in New York. I said, hey, I need a day off. So they gave it to me. And then I called the Chief of Army Reserves Office. Because keep in mind, I'm a two-star general, right?

• 2:04:00Speaker 01

  And I said, hey, I'm going on the Oprah Show, you know? And what's the subject? Well, the subject is Japan bashing. But I'm being invited because, you know, I'm high-ranking Japanese-American in our Army. And I'm going to wear my uniform, you know? So I get a call back, okay? From the Chief of Public Affairs of the Army. Now, he's a one-star. Okay, and I'm a two-star, okay? So he calls and he said, I understand you're going to be on the Oprah Show. Yeah, that's right. What's the subject? Japan bashing. Oh, it's not about the Army? No, it's not about the military at all. But I'm being invited because I'm the highest-ranking

• 2:04:43Speaker 01

  Japanese-American in the Army. In the military, the whole military, and being an O8 at the time. And he said, well, then we don't want you to wear your uniform. Okay? And I said, listen, I take my responsibility very seriously as a role model for minorities. This is a great opportunity to let people know that we have equal opportunity in our armed forces. I don't see this as a possibility to fail. I see this as an opportunity to succeed. And I just said, I, you know, I don't really have a lot of time for this because it was going to be the next day, right?

• 2:05:28Speaker 01

  So I said, is this an order? You know, from, you know, the Secretary or from the Chief? I don't care, you know, whoever's above me. Is this an order? And he said, "Well, I can't tell you it's an order." And I said, "Well, okay, in that case, thank you very much for calling me." You know, I appreciate what you said. I've taken it all in under consideration. Bottom line, I'm wearing my uniform, and that was the end of it, okay? So he writes a memorandum for record that to the Chief of Staff of the Army that went into my file that said, you know, I spoke to General Mukoyama. I told him it was, you know, above his pay grade levels and he might get involved with,

• 2:06:12Speaker 01

  you know, things that went out of hand and all that. And he basically told me that he was gonna wear his uniform. So, so I go on the show, okay? And I'm ready. I do my homework, okay? And we come back from commercial break and Oprah starts out by saying, "And today we have with us Major General Jim Mukoyama, the highest ranking Asian-American, Japanese-American in our military today, camera, and I'm gonna sit there in a civilian suit?" I mean, what kind of a message would that have been? I was in my Class A's. Of course. Okay, so, and the first words out of my mouth were, "Oprah, I want everyone to understand that whatever I say today

• 2:06:57Speaker 01

  is the opinion of Jim Mukoyama. I am not representing the Department of the Army. I'm not representing the Department of Defense. However, I am a soldier in the United States Army. I'm proud of it. We have equal opportunity in our armed forces." End of message. And the rest of the thing went very well. They actually had a guy on there who I would affectionately refer to as a redneck. And he was blaming the Japanese for all the problems of, and some of it was correct, where they weren't fair in, in some of the economic dealings with us. You know, their markets were not as open to our products as they should have been.

• 2:07:42Speaker 01

  But on the other hand, the guy was saying some nutty stuff, like he said, "Well, they're costing us jobs, okay?" So I said, okay, who's the fourth largest automobile manufacturer in the country? The answer Honda America, okay? They have a plant in Marysville, Ohio that employed 3,500 Americans, okay? They can't close that plant and take it back to Japan. It's in the United States. And I said, I'm also tired of hearing people complain about American quality because the Honda Civics produced at that plant had fewer defects than Honda Civics that were coming from Japan.

• 2:08:25Jocko Willink?

  Wow.

• 2:08:26Speaker 01

  J.D. Powers. I had, I had all this stuff.

• 2:08:28Jocko Willink?

  You're ready. Don't mess with the general.

• 2:08:32Speaker 01

  So then I told him, I said, and guess what? The steel for that plant comes from Indiana, which is also jobs for Americans, okay? Then the other thing the guy said was the, the Asians are taking over our universities. I said, what's that all about? And he said, well, they're getting all the scholarships, okay? And I said, listen, the Asian Americans are not smarter than any other ethnicity or race. The reason they do so well in school is the parents get involved and they make sure that their kids study and they emphasize the value of education.

• 2:09:17Speaker 01

  That got a huge approval from the audience, you know? So what happened was there was a, believe it or not, a federal judge in Chicago who saw that program, okay? So he writes a letter to the Secretary of Defense saying, you know, I saw the Oprah Show and there was this Major General Jim Okuyama who really did a great job for you guys and you guys should be proud of him, right? So the Secretary of Defense at that time was Dick Cheney, okay? So he endorses the letter down to the Secretary of the Army. The Secretary of the Army endorses the letter down to the Chief of Staff of the Army.

• 2:09:59Speaker 01

  So when that hits my file, same time the other thing hit my file, basically one canceled the other.

• 2:10:07Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Did you send a photocopy of that back to the, back to the P A O?

• 2:10:11Speaker 01

  But that's, you know, so right then and there, the Army knew what they were dealing with because I, you know, I was. You know, it was an opportunity to show that we have equal opportunity, armed forces. I tell people that one of the proudest things of my service was that when I would lose track of people's race, you know, I stopped looking at people as Asian American or African American or Hispanic Americans. I looked at them as private, corporal, lieutenant, whatever their job was in the military. That's how I caught myself forgetting sometimes of people, you know, because I tell people, everybody was olive drap.

• 2:10:54Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, OD.

• 2:10:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. So that was my first.

• 2:11:00Jocko Willink?

  Now, you started to say that the book, the book, did the book start to play any kind of role in your career? Did people start talking to you about Hackworth's book?

• 2:11:09Speaker 01

  No, not really. That, that, what I mean by that is, you know, the whole stance that he took about Vietnam to risk his career and just actually just saying, hey, I'm out of here. Because, you know, I've, I've done this now for 30 something years. And frankly, it was weighing on him. I mean, talk about the moral injury of knowing that you're leading soldiers in combat when they could have been, the policy could have been done better.

• 2:11:39Jocko Willink?

  Right.

• 2:11:39Speaker 01

  Which would have resulted in fewer casualties.

• 2:11:43Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's, that's, I don't know if there's a heavier weight to bear than that. That's a heavy one. And then what was the next thing you took a stance on?

• 2:11:51Speaker 01

  Well, the next thing that happened, which caused the end of my career, basically, is.

• 2:11:57Jocko Willink?

  I like that you say that with a smile on your face.

• 2:12:00Speaker 01

  Well, I'm, I, I don't regret a day.

• 2:12:03Jocko Willink?

  There you go.

• 2:12:04Speaker 01

  If I had to do it again today, I'd do it in a heartbeat. And here's what happened was, I was an Army Reserve guy. So for full transparency to your listeners, okay, I was on active duty for five years. I was on an Army reservist for 27 years. Okay, now the Army has three components. They have the active component, they have the Army Reserve, and they have the Army National Guard. Okay? The Army Reserve and Army National Guard are the so-called Reserve Components. Okay? Now, the active Army, of course, are the 24/7. That's their full-time job.

• 2:12:47Speaker 01

  The Army Reserves are a federal force. And the Army Reserves fall into the normal Army chain of command, Department of the Army. We answer to the orders of the President. Okay? Army National Guard does not fall into that chain of command, nor do they report to the President. They report to the governors of each state. It's really a state organization, although 95% of their budget comes from the federal government. Okay? And as an Army reservist for 25 years, 27 years,

• 2:13:32Speaker 01

  I saw whenever it came to reducing the Army force structure, the Army Reserves would always get the short end. And the Guard would always be protected. Okay? The actives would always take care of themselves. That was never an issue. Okay? But the so-called "one Army" concept, where everybody's supposed to be together in this, the Reserves always got the short end of the stick. And the reason for that is the Reserves were a national force. Okay? We were professional in, you know, in the military, as you know, you're not supposed to be political.

• 2:14:16Speaker 01

  You're supposed to be apolitical. Right? Not involved in lobbying and stuff like that. The National Guard is very political. It's jobs for the state.

• 2:14:29Speaker 01

  Okay, so whenever there's, the National Guard has so much political clout. If you look at any presidential election, just watch the week before the election in November, that's when the Guard normally has their national convention in DC, okay? And I can tell you, every major presidential candidate shows up, okay? And, and keep in mind, they have the political support of a governor, two senators, and the congressman, right? The Army Reserve doesn't have that political clout.

• 2:15:11Speaker 01

  So frankly, we've always gotten, gotten screwed. And so I, I watched that for 25 years. I said enough is enough. And so I, I founded a 501(c)(3) organization called the Army Reserve Association, which was comprised of officers, enlisted, and civilians. The mission was to educate the public and Congress about the Army Reserves. Because people, when they think of, they hear of the reserves, they think of the National Guard. They don't think of the Army Reserves, which has armories and they have soldiers in every state in our union. But people don't think about that, okay?

• 2:15:52Speaker 01

  So when Desert Storm ended, right? When Desert Storm hit, the Army mobilized both National Guard and Reserve units, okay? The National Guard had, now, full transparency, as I said, I'm an Army Reserve guy, okay? So I'm pretty jaded on this, if you want to say that. But, you know, the National Guard has great patriots. I'm not casting aspersions on, on them at all, you know? But a facts are facts. And here's what happened. When, when Desert Storm hit, the National Guard had three so-called premier

• 2:16:37Speaker 01

  Infantry brigades that were supposed to round out active duty divisions. Okay, one of them was the 48th out of Georgia. Okay, and there was a National Guard Brigade that upon mobilization, they would be assigned to that division and they would go to war with the division. Okay, and what happened was when it came, and by the way, they had all the best equipment. They had better equipment than some active army battalions and brigades. They had Abrams tanks. You have to understand, this is the early 90s. They had Abrams tanks and they had Bradley vehicles, when a lot of active units didn't

• 2:17:22Speaker 01

  have that. Okay, but they were publicized as being the premier Army National Guard combat units that were ready to go to war. Okay, when the balloon went up, the Army said, "We can't send these guys. They're just going to be cannon fodder." So they sent them to the NTC, the National Training Center in California, for 90 days. Okay, only problem was, the war ended so quick, they never got to the, they never got there. All right, the reserves, on the other hand, our soldiers performed magnificently. We had helicopter units, we had medical units, we had civil affairs, we had psy-ops, we,

• 2:18:06Speaker 01

  you know, our, our people did extremely, my training division, perfect example. You know, we were mobilized, I had my guys in the front gates of Fort Benning within 72 hours. And my drill instructors were on the trail, my, my, uh, uh, my, my instructors were on the platform, teaching.

• 2:18:28Speaker 01

  You know, running the ranges and all that.

• 2:18:30Jocko Willink?

  And so then when it came time to downsize, is that where you took a stand?

• 2:18:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, absolutely. What happened was that, you know, when the, we, so we win Desert Storm, and then the Soviet Union falls apart and the wall comes down, right? So everybody's looking for this peace dividend to transfer money from the Defense Department to social services, okay? And so the Army has a process that's called the Total Army Analysis. It's a very good logical process so you can determine the force structure that we need for the Army, okay? And the way it works is you look at what are the, what are we facing throughout the world?

• 2:19:20Speaker 01

  You know, what are the problem areas, you know? And then you say to yourself, okay, based on that, how many divisions do, infantry divisions do we need? How many armored units? How many helicopter battalion, you know, blah, blah, blah? And then you face reality and you say, how much money can we really get out of Congress for this? So based on all that stuff, you come up with a force structure, okay? The Army didn't do that. What they did is they had the Vice Chief of Staff of the Army, the Chief of Army Reserves, the Chief of the National Guard Bureau, the President of the National Guard Association,

• 2:20:04Speaker 01

  which is not a government group, and the President of the Reserve Officers Association, go to a hotel and they cut a deal. And it was called the off-site agreement because it wasn't done at the Pentagon, okay? Well, I told you I had formed this Army Reserve Association, all right? I had people in that meeting. Within five minutes, I knew what happened. And the Army Reserves really...

• 2:20:36Speaker 01

  They eliminated eighty percent of Army Reserve Aviation. And we had four special forces groups at that time in the reserve components. There were two National Guard groups, the Nineteenth and Twentieth, and two Army Reserve Special Forces groups, the Eleventh and the Twelfth. The Twelfth was one of the units that was under my command. I was the deputy commanding general of an Army Reserve unit. So, I'll give you an example. We had a Black Hawk battalion, once again, in my Army Reserve, under my command, that fought in the Gulf. They were so good that Schwarzkopf selected them for his taxi unit, okay?

• 2:21:21Speaker 01

  And they had received the, it's called the Army Aviation Association Award, AAA Award, for the best Black Hawk battalion. So that's how good these guys were, okay? This agreement eliminated that unit out of the Army Reserves and put it into the Illinois National Guard, okay? Now, I'm a big boy. I can, I can accept, I don't appreciate it as a taxpayer, but I can accept waste of money or whatever. Where I draw the line in the sand is when you jeopardize soldiers' lives and the readiness of our forces, okay?

• 2:22:05Speaker 01

  This unit overnight, oh, what I didn't tell you was the Illinois National Guard did not have one qualified Black Hawk pilot or mechanic. They could not even fly those birds from Scott Air Force Base where we had them to the Illinois National Guard field. They had to go to the Wisconsin and Minnesota Guard to borrow pilots so they could move those birds. Now, the implication is that unit overnight went from C1, you know, the highest readiness rating, down to C5, which is non-deployable.

• 2:22:46Speaker 01

  Basically, you know, and it it took about three years plus to get that unit up to C three, which is just marginal deployment level. Okay, so that's one example. Another example are those special forces groups. Okay, the army looked at the four reserve component special forces groups and they said, you know, we only need two. Okay, so we'll eliminate the National Guard, you know, groups because, you know, why does the National Guard govern? Why does the governor need a Farsi speaking demolitions expert? Okay, and the last time I looked, we didn't have an insurgency in Illinois.

• 2:23:27Speaker 01

  So, so the National Guard says, no, we don't accept that. So the army with their tail between their legs go back to the drawing board and they looked at readiness, which is what they probably should have done to begin with. And they found out that the 12th group in the USA in the Army Reserves was the best out of the four. And then it was either, I think it was the 20th out of the Guard was the second best. So they said, okay, we got the solution. We'll take one out of each component. Right? Guard wouldn't accept that. So what did they do? They eliminated both Army Reserve, you know, groups. And I was livid because the 12th was under me at one time.

• 2:24:12Speaker 01

  I wasn't the commander of it, but it was in my chain. We had taken that unit from C four to C two, which for a reserve unit to be able to get reservists to pass those special forces qualifications, that's not easy. Okay, and they eliminated that unit. Now, I'm a big boy. Okay, when it came like to the helicopter units and I said, okay, take my pilots and so and mechanics, take the reserve patch off their shoulder, make them National Guardsmen. I'm good with it.

• 2:24:55Speaker 01

  Okay, they wouldn't do it because it was jobs for the Guard. So my guys had to find new jobs. Some of them had to actually change MOSs because, you know, there were no.

• 2:25:10Speaker 01

  No aviation jobs for them, right? And just think of you and I as taxpayers, how much that costs us. You know, so now, I'm getting all kinds of calls from the field. You know, we didn't have computers at that time in the internet, so I'd get telephone calls and faxes saying, "General, somebody's gotta stand up and fight this." You know, in that meeting I told you about that they had, I found out from my moles that in essence, they were gonna have a press conference the next day where everybody was gonna hold hands and sing kumbaya and say that the Army has come up with this great

• 2:25:52Speaker 01

  agreement where everybody agrees and nobody disagrees. Well, that wasn't true. A lot of people disagreed with it. So, I called the Vice Chief of Staff's office at the Pentagon, right? Not as Major General Jim Mochiyama, but as Jim Mochiyama, President, Army Reserve Association. Okay? So I call, asking for a return call about this, this press conference that's gonna happen, or announcement, you know? And I didn't get a call back. So, the next morning, an hour before their press conference, we sent out a press release.

• 2:26:35Speaker 01

  And we basically said, "This is not good, this is, you know, shouldn't go through, need to have a GAO study, Government Accounting Office study." And that pretty well got me into the crosshairs. And so then, what we did is, and now, keep in mind, I had never done this in my life. I'd never lobbied, I'd never been to Congress, I'd never walked the halls, you know, any of that stuff. We had a, we actually, and I think I might have sent you some of this stuff, but we had a, a meeting of the Army Reserve Association, called for it in Washington DC. And I had men and women come from all over the country.

• 2:27:18Speaker 01

  And we went and we lobbied our senators and congressmen. And we told them, "This is wrong, this needs, there needs to be a GAO study, it needs to be studied before it's implemented." Okay? Now- Frankly, I knew we were tilting at windmills, but I had to do it because, you know, all I was getting all these requests from sergeants and civilians and lieutenants and majors throughout the country saying, somebody's got to fight this. And they were right. So I had to do it. So then I get an invitation from a congressional subcommittee. Okay, it was not a subpoena.

• 2:28:00Speaker 01

  So I didn't have to go. I could have said, I've got a headache, or I've got a conflict or whatever. But I didn't, you know, I said, yeah, I'll be there. And I went and I testified. And a year later, I was history, shall we say. But it's, like I said, Jocko, I wouldn't hesitate in a moment to do it again. It's when I was in Vietnam, I knew that our generals were not standing up for us all the time like they should. And I said, ever get to a point in life where it's the difference between my career and my soldiers, the soldiers win.

• 2:28:41Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, absolutely. And that's one of those balanced things too, is, you know, as a leader, you know, you want to toe the line. And I have people ask me this pretty regularly. Well, you know, you always say you want to support the chain of command, but what if the chain of command is wrong? That's real simple answer. If the chain of command is wrong, and it's something that matters, like the safety of your troops, the training of your troops, then you stand up to it. You know, if it's something that doesn't matter, for they go, oh, we want you to fill out this paperwork differently than you did it yesterday. You know what I do? I do it. I don't care. You know, you want me to put my uniform on this way instead of that way? That's fine. Whatever. I'll do it. You want to start putting soldiers at jeopardy? That won't, that won't stand.

• 2:29:21Speaker 01

  So here's what happened. Okay. While all this stuff is going on, The Washington Post puts this front page, okay, and it talks about how the, the, this big controversy, you know, and my association is right at the forefront of all this. So I'm quoted in all of it. Now, keep in mind, I'm still an active Army Reserve Major General, a tradoc, right? And, and in fact, Before I testified, I got a call from the Chief of Staff at Tradoc, who was a good friend of mine. We were both major generals. And, and he didn't tell me I shouldn't go. He kind of said that, "Well, you know, it's really not a good idea, you know, for you to go."

• 2:30:05Speaker 01

  And he was a good friend of mine, and I said, "John, you know, I, I understand. This is, you have to do this. This is your, you know, this is your job. But I gotta go. I, I can't, I cannot stand by and let this pass." So, he under, well, and, and so that was also in the Washington Post. You know, like, I was threatened. I wasn't threatened, you know. Oh, okay. And so, so basically, I, then the Army Times wrote an editorial, which basically criticized the Army Reserves, especially my association, you know. And saying, "The Army Reserves are not team players. They're crybabies."

• 2:30:50Speaker 01

  You know, and, but what got me is when they said they're putting out bad information. Okay, that was in their editorial, okay? So I wrote an op-ed, okay? Which, to their credit, they published, okay? And in the op-ed, I said, "Number one, where is..." And, and the title of their, their editorial was "The Enemy Is Us." Okay? And I said, "I agree with you. The enemy is us. But the problem is, number one, where is... You didn't list in detail the false information that was being put out by the Reserves. So you need to do that."

• 2:31:35Speaker 01

  I said that in the op-ed. They never did, by the way, because we had never put out anything false. But the second thing I said, and I said, "If we go to war in the next 18 months, and this thing goes through, we're gonna have people coming back in body bags that would not have." I mean, now, that's a pretty serious statement. It is, indeed. Okay? And you would think, if I was Chicken Little saying the sky was falling, that they would have been inundated with letters from the field, saying, you know, "The general's gone too far." Right? They didn't get one letter.

• 2:32:16Speaker 01

  And so, but, so because of the stand I took, needless to say, the Army wasn't real happy with me. And a year later, when it came time to, to get a new assignment, surprise, surprise, I was not considered, there were no assignments that I was considered eligible for. And so I, I said, this has been fun. So the Chief of Army Reserve actually wanted me to stay. And he said, this too shall pass. So why don't you stay? You can go into Control Group, which is kind of this administrative pool of people who don't have assignments. And maybe in a year or two, you can come back. You know, we'll get you an assignment. And I said, no.

• 2:33:01Speaker 01

  I said, you know, the Army's made it very clear. You know, they, they don't want my services. They don't think I have any value and I'm gonna move on. I gotta move on in life. And so that's what I did.

• 2:33:13Jocko Willink?

  Now, even though you moved on, you retired, you didn't stop serving by any stretch. And, and you know, I look at the military outreach that you started is really your new way of serving. Was that, is that an accurate statement?

• 2:33:27Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely. What, what happened was, you know, my wife is so wonderful. She's, she says she's not as, as Christian as I am, but she lives her life better than I do. And so I'm having my personal pity party, feeling sorry for myself because my 32-year career is down the toilet. Right? And she said, Jim, you know, God is sending you a message. Number one, that, you know, this chapter in your life is over. Okay? Number two, you survived Vietnam. You also became, attained the rank of two-star general, which was the highest a reservist could get at that time. Okay?

• 2:34:10Speaker 01

  And then she says, number three, and you got me as a wife. So how can I argue with that, right? But she was absolutely right. What happened was God brought other things into my life at that time. Promise Keepers, which is a men's Christian group. I got involved with a church in Chicago, Willow Creek Community Church, which is a very famous evangelical church. I led a men's small group. I lead a men's monthly breakfast. I got involved with the Department of Veterans Affairs, which I'd never been involved in before at a national level. I was the chairman of an advisory committee on minority veterans.

• 2:34:53Speaker 01

  And I was on that for five years. So I learned about the VA system. All of this was in preparation for me to eventually start Military Outreach USA about seven years ago, which is a nonprofit, faith-based organization. But a very simple concept, Jocko. We're trying to develop a national network of partners, mostly houses of worship, of all faiths, by the way, and organizations like the VFW, American Legion, Rotary Clubs, Lions Clubs, high schools.

• 2:35:35Speaker 01

  This is all at the local community level that will reach out to our military community, which we define, by the way, as active duty, reserves, National Guard, veterans of all eras and their family members. We stress the family members equally because they serve and sacrifice as well. Okay? And to reach out to them, to be a welcoming environment, to appreciate their service, recognize that, and to offer hope and help if they need it. Now, the churches and synagogues want to help, they don't know how to do it. Because they don't understand the military culture.

• 2:36:18Speaker 01

  They don't know the issues that our military community is facing. And they don't know where the resources are. That's where Military Outreach USA comes in. We provide all of that information. We have webinars. We have publications. We have DVDs. We have presentations. And everything that we do is free of charge. No cost. The only thing we ask is when people join us as partners, either as a house of worship or as an organization, that they commit to take our materials and use them to help our military community. And it doesn't cost them anything.

• 2:37:03Jocko Willink?

  And if people want to help out Military Outreach USA, I know the website is militaryoutreachusa.org.

• 2:37:13Speaker 01

  That's correct.

• 2:37:14Jocko Willink?

  And then from there, what are you looking for?

• 2:37:16Speaker 01

  Well, we have numerous programs. See, because we understand houses of worship come in all shapes and sizes. Okay? So we have different programs that they can choose from. Some are as simple as a church can list the names of service members who are currently serving. You know, either relatives or members of the church. And people can pray for them. Prayer is so important when you're overseas, especially in a combat situation. I know it helped me a lot when I was in combat. I needed all I could get, I'll tell you. But also, they could do things like send packages.

• 2:38:00Speaker 01

  Send letters. Today, who writes letters? Nobody. You know, it's all email and all that stuff. How about getting a letter? Right at mail call? How neat is that? You know, but then we can also do things for veterans. In fact, we have, two years ago, we started a program. And by the way, we have a memorandum of agreement that was signed by the Department of Veterans Affairs in 2016 by the secretary himself, which recognized Military Outreach USA as a national partner with them on a program that we initiated called Veterans Exiting Homelessness.

• 2:38:44Speaker 01

  Okay, now here's the thing. The VA has done a very good job in reducing the veteran homeless population. It's still too high, but three years ago, it was like 150,000. You know, it's like 50,000 now, which is still too high, but look at the, look at the reduction. Okay, well, that's created a new problem. And the problem is when they take a homeless veteran, male or female, some with kids, off the street and they work with a caseworker or a social worker. Okay, and the social worker feels that they're stabilized and now they can get them to what's

• 2:39:23Speaker 01

  called permanent housing, which is really an apartment that's got, that's subsidized by a HUD-VAS voucher. Okay, they give them the keys to the apartment, right? But homeless people, that's all they give them. So just think of the first time you moved into an apartment, you need stuff. Lysol, toilet paper buckets, sponges, mops, you know, dishes. How about a bed? Homeless people, they get a one-bedroom apartment, but guess what? They don't have a bed, right? So we came up with this program called Move-In Essentials. And we listed things like we have a bathroom kit, we have a kitchen kit.

• 2:40:08Speaker 01

  We even have a Beds for Vets program. Nice. Okay, and what we've done is we've gone out to our Our churches, our partners, you know, our organizations. And we've asked them, can you conduct a donation drive of this stuff? Okay? I'm not asking them to collect money. Give me the stuff. Okay? And then it's delivered to the VA Medical Center, social worker. And they distribute it to the veterans. So we know they're going to veterans. Okay? Because you know, there are a lot of people out there who claim to be veterans, who are not. And so we know they're going to veterans. And it goes out almost as quick as it comes in. Okay?

• 2:40:52Speaker 01

  This has helped us a great deal as an organization. Because before, we're at a point in time where we really can move up to the next level as an organization. But we frankly need volunteers and money. Okay? Because we don't have a staff. We've done all this on a shoestring, basically. And so with this program, we now have results that we can show people. Okay? So if people come to me and say, Jim, you know, what difference are you guys making? Two years ago, all I could say was, well, we're developing this network of partners. And we're asking them to help, you know, in their communities. Which did make a difference, by the way.

• 2:41:37Speaker 01

  I mean, we prevented some suicides. We've helped people that needed stuff, you know? But we didn't have, I don't have the staff to record all of this stuff, you know? But when we came up with this program, we have a tracking thing where we know how many veterans are being helped. We know what's been collected. And we know, so now, if somebody says, what difference do you make? Okay? Since January of 2016, we have helped over 31,000 veterans. We've collected over 750,000 items. In fact, I think it's over a million now.

• 2:42:22Speaker 01

  And valued at almost $2 million. And we have, we just provided, this month, our 1,000th bed.

• 2:42:33Speaker 01

  Okay. And so now I've got stuff that I can tell people. Well, we've come up with a new program this year. And it's called Adopt a Caregiver. Okay. See, what we're trying to do is find gaps where there's a need and nobody else is filling it. So first, we did that veterans exiting homelessness thing. Well, now, there are 5.5 million military caregivers in our country. Okay. Serving over 1.1 million former military. Okay.

• 2:43:15Speaker 01

  And they get some help from the VA, but not a lot, as much as they need. Okay. So we are now going to our churches and our organizations. And we're saying, we have this program. Adopt a caregiver. Okay. And if you want to be a caregiver, you let us know. And we'll contact the local social worker and volunteer support at the VA facility near you. And we'll hook you up with a caregiver that needs help. Now, this could be anything. It could be babysitting. It could be mowing a lawn. It could be shoveling snow. It could be showing up with a meal.

• 2:44:00Speaker 01

  It could be just showing up and being there for three hours and let the caregiver get a break. Okay, this is not rocket scientist stuff. It's an easy program. But it's something that if we can get this moving like we did the veterans exiting homelessness, it's going to be a tremendous help for our veterans. And, but most importantly, for the caregivers. You see, in another lifetime, my wife and I were hospice patient volunteers. We did that for six years. So I know how it is to deal with terminal illness. Okay. But I also witnessed that it's the caregivers

• 2:44:43Speaker 01

  who are, sometimes, need the help more than the patient. You know, and so in this case, we've got military caregivers that need help. And we can do it through this program.

• 2:44:57Jocko Willink?

  Well, it sounds like, like I said, you're continuing to serve even though you're no longer in uniform. And I think that's probably a pretty good place to wrap up for today. And, you know, again, it's been just an absolute honor to sit down and talk with you. As we get feedback from this episode, I will come to Chicago and go to your museum and, and we'll do this again.

• 2:45:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, let me, let me say one thing that I was not able to get in. And anybody who knows me would tell me, Jim, why didn't you say that? I have a standard mantra. Okay. And that is every day is a great day. I have my faith, my family, and live in the finest country in the world. I say it every day, every chance I get. And people ask me, well, why, you know, how can you be so positive? And, you know, why do you say that? I say, well, number one, as a very young 24 year old company commander in Vietnam in combat, there were times I didn't know if I was going to be alive the next moment, much less see the next sunrise. When you're in those circumstances, what is important in life

• 2:46:09Speaker 01

  becomes real focused. And that is faith, family, and living in the finest country in the world. Now, so then people will come back at me and say, well, how can you say that when we have so much division in our country? Okay. And I say, listen, I'm a little bit longer in tooth than you are. And when I was a kid, the, I've seen the improvements in our society when it comes to race relations. Now, I'm a minority, so I get it. And I told them, the, the odds of me becoming, when I was a kid, the odds of me becoming a major general in the United States Army were slim and next to none. Okay. When, you know, when we've had an African American president who was reelected.

• 2:46:54Speaker 01

  And then I tell people, when President Kennedy was elected, that was a big deal. And a lot of people don't know why. And I say, because he was Catholic. But today, that's not a big deal, right? And that though, in those days, that was a big deal. So I tell people, every day is a great day. I have my faith, my family, we live in the finest country in the world. Well, that saying was challenged about five and a half years ago. When I had some health challenges, which I think, I didn't mention it earlier today. No, you haven't. I was still working in the financial services industry.

• 2:47:35Speaker 01

  And I got up in the morning, I was shaving, and I felt this pain in my chest. And, I mean, it wasn't a serious pounding, and I wasn't sweating, nauseous, I didn't have a temperature. So I thought it was something I ate, you know, give it five minutes, it'll go away, right? It didn't go away. So I told my wife, this is not good. So I finished shaving and dressing though, and she drove me to the emergency room of the hospital. So I walk in and I say, hey, you know, I've got this pain in my chest, I don't know what it is. So they do an EKG, and they said, you have had a heart attack. Well, suddenly, all these doctors and nurses swoop into the ER. They undress me, they put me in a hospital gown.

• 2:48:19Speaker 01

  I'm on a gurney, and I'm on my way to the operating room, right? So I'm in the corridor, and I'm on this gurney, and I say to myself, self, can you say, today is a great day? And I said, I absolutely can. I survived Vietnam, I have a wonderful wife and children, and I, most importantly, have my faith. So.

• 2:48:47Speaker 01

  In 24 hours, I had three operations. The first operation was for the heart attack. Okay, so they do an angiogram. They found out my LAD, which is the widow maker artery, was 90% blocked. So they do an angioplasty, put a stent in. So by 10 o'clock in the morning, I'm in the recovery room. So I'm figuring, well, that's, that's the end of it, right? That wasn't the end of it. The second thing that happened was my heart cavity started to fill up with liquid. It's called effusion. So I had to go back in for an, they had to put a hole in my chest so they could, put a tube there so they could drain this liquid. And it filled up a bottle. It took about 24 hours to do that, okay?

• 2:49:31Speaker 01

  The third thing that happened then was my kidneys failed. So I had to go back in and they had to put another hole in my chest so they could hook up a dialysis machine, okay? So the standard procedure, every time I was rolled into the operating room is, what's your name? What's your birthday? How do you feel? Okay? So I'm on the operating table and I say, Jim Mukoyama, August 3rd, 44. Every day is a great day. I have my faith, my family, and live in the finest country in the world. I can't tell you the effect that had on the doctors and nurses. The first operation, the doctor said, what is your faith? And I said, well, since you asked me, doc.

• 2:50:16Speaker 01

  I said, I'm a Christian. Christ is my Savior. You're a skilled physician, skilled nurses, but I'm in God's hands. So whatever he decides, I'm okay with. So let's get on with it. So the second operation, there was a nurse and she said, where do you go to church? And I said, well, I attend Willow Creek Community Church. And she said, I do too. So no coincidence. The third operation, this was the coolest thing. There was a male nurse who was wearing a camouflage gown. And I said, you must have been in the army. And the guy said, yeah, I was a medic. And I said, well, hey, I just want you to know, I retired as a two-star general.

• 2:51:01Speaker 01

  So take good care of me, will you? And so that was kind of my, my testing of, of all that. Now, the final thing I'll tell you, which was a God thing.

• 2:51:14Speaker 01

  Months later, I was going, I had to go through dialysis, okay? So I'm going through this dialysis and, and three months later, I get a donor. And the donor was our daughter, okay? But our daughter is not our biological daughter. We adopted her thirty something years ago. And yet she was a match. So guys, when I say every day is a great day. I have my faith, my family and live in the kind of finest country in the world. I can truly say that. And every day, every day is an encouragement to me, okay? Today was an encouragement, this morning, when I was honored to participate in the National Day of Prayer

• 2:51:57Speaker 01

  with the seventy ninth Theater Sustainability Command at Los Alamos. And this podcast is an encouragement to me. So I just want you to know that. And remember, every day is a great day. Faith, family, we live in the finest country in the world.

• 2:52:18Jocko Willink?

  Well, sir, even though this is my podcast and I'm supposed to talk, after that, I don't really have anything else to say. Thank you so much for coming on. It's been a complete honor to have you. And I look forward to doing this again at some point in the future.

• 2:52:35Speaker 01

  Thank you so much.

• 2:52:37Jocko Willink?

  And the general has left the building and we have actually relocated back to our recording studio. And just amazing opportunity and definitely thanks to, thanks to Jay Mukoyama for connecting us. And I'm sending a little gift to you as well. So thanks for, thanks for putting us together with your dad. And Echo.

• 2:53:04Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 2:53:05Jocko Willink?

  Speaking of.

• 2:53:06Speaker 02

  Putting things together.

• 2:53:07Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 2:53:08Speaker 02

  Sure, yeah.

• 2:53:09Jocko Willink?

  If somebody wanted to put together something for themselves.

• 2:53:13Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 2:53:13Jocko Willink?

  And maybe something that would, you know.

• 2:53:15Speaker 02

  Support.

• 2:53:16Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:53:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:53:17Jocko Willink?

  Could you brief us on those things?

• 2:53:19Speaker 02

  Namely, your joints, you want to keep those together. Because it's a big deal if they're not together. So, good news, if you didn't already, even though you did know already, Jocko has supplements. They're called Jocko Super Krill.

• 2:53:34Speaker 02

  It's krill oil, but that's not in the name technically. Also Jocko joint warfare, also for your joints, obviously. Take both of them. There's some anti-inflammatory stuff in there too, by the way. Something that I might have mentioned before. Anyway, for your joints, very good, very important. Subscribe for the, the recurring.

• 2:53:56Jocko Willink?

  Delivery.

• 2:53:56Speaker 02

  Deal. Yeah. Cause you don't want to run out. I'm telling you, it's junk when you run out. I've run out before it's whack. Um, also discipline supplement called discipline. It is a pre-workout, pre-mission, pre-study, pre-take test, pre-cognitive enhancing supplements. Good. This is a good one.

• 2:54:14Jocko Willink?

  Pre-get after it.

• 2:54:14Speaker 02

  And it tastes good. Interestingly enough, Jocko focused a lot on that. Tastes good. Lemon lime, et cetera, et cetera. How many calories in this one? I don't know. Not, not very many. 30. All right. There you go. So you can do it while you fast too, technically. Depends on your metabolic response. Look and do it before you fast. I'm not going to make any claims. Nonetheless, it's a good one. For your brain, for your body, good supplement. Also.

• 2:54:41Jocko Willink?

  Milk.

• 2:54:42Speaker 02

  Yeah. So I was gonna say protein powder. So. Milk, protein powder. Do you, are you, are we even calling it protein powder? Or are we just calling it straight up milk?

• 2:54:52Jocko Willink?

  No, it's, it's not. It's milk.

• 2:54:54Speaker 02

  Straight up milk. Way different, huh?

• 2:54:55Jocko Willink?

  With umlauts.

• 2:54:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. So, so that is chocolate chip. No, mint chocolate.

• 2:55:02Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, mint chocolate. There's no chips.

• 2:55:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. So if you don't like mint chocolate chip, you might, there's a chance you might not like this. If you do like mint chocolate chip.

• 2:55:10Jocko Willink?

  There's a real good chance.

• 2:55:11Speaker 02

  There's like, I would say around 100% probability you're gonna like this one.

• 2:55:16Jocko Willink?

  I should clarify that I mix it primarily with milk.

• 2:55:22Speaker 02

  Me too.

• 2:55:23Jocko Willink?

  I have mixed it also plain with, well, not plain, but with cold water.

• 2:55:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:55:28Jocko Willink?

  It's with milk, it's straight up delicious.

• 2:55:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. It's like, it's a milkshake.

• 2:55:33Jocko Willink?

  Straight up, it's a milkshake. You like, oh, what, what, what do I truly in the world want to have for dessert?

• 2:55:38Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:55:38Jocko Willink?

  I want to have milk. Right. With, with water, it's.

• 2:55:45Jocko Willink?

  More like a ham sandwich.

• 2:55:47Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 2:55:48Jocko Willink?

  You know, like, okay, hey, this thing is good. I, you know, I need some fuel. You don't, you don't get all fired up when you have a ham sandwich, right?

• 2:55:54Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:55:55Jocko Willink?

  You're not, you're not, you're not, you're not reaching the next level.

• 2:55:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're happy, you're not fired up though.

• 2:56:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's kind of what, molk with water is like a ham sandwich. It's better for you, but

• 2:56:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:56:07Jocko Willink?

  Taste, taste, um, reaction is about the same for me, ham sandwich.

• 2:56:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, that's.

• 2:56:15Jocko Willink?

  With molk, with, with milk, so it's, it's legit.

• 2:56:19Speaker 02

  What is it, like a what, like a steak?

• 2:56:20Jocko Willink?

  It's, it's like a steak, yeah, comparatively.

• 2:56:22Speaker 02

  Dang, that's all fired up here. Boom, Jocko's review on molk official.

• 2:56:26Jocko Willink?

  Actually, no, it's not. It's like a mint chocolate chip milkshake. That's what it's like.

• 2:56:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:56:30Jocko Willink?

  Because a steak is a different thing for me.

• 2:56:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:56:32Jocko Willink?

  Steak is a little bit of a different experience. That's a really good experience.

• 2:56:36Speaker 02

  So technically, you kind of got to watch out for it.

• 2:56:38Jocko Willink?

  Steak.

• 2:56:38Speaker 02

  No.

• 2:56:39Jocko Willink?

  No.

• 2:56:40Speaker 02

  But if you look at it.

• 2:56:41Jocko Willink?

  Fast I did, and I, and I posted that picture, and I went and got that, I went and got a killer steak.

• 2:56:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:56:49Jocko Willink?

  And it, I, that thing was so good.

• 2:56:52Speaker 02

  Cause he did it after the fast.

• 2:56:54Jocko Willink?

  So good, yeah.

• 2:56:54Speaker 02

  So he got a hundred percent of the taste.

• 2:56:56Jocko Willink?

  Hundred percent of the taste. No, more than a hundred percent.

• 2:56:59Speaker 02

  A hundred ten percent.

• 2:56:59Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:57:02Jocko Willink?

  Somebody sent me some tomahawk steaks.

• 2:57:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:57:06Jocko Willink?

  To my house.

• 2:57:07Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:57:07Jocko Willink?

  And they came with instructions from the company that sent them on how to cook them, and I'll, I don't remember the name of the company right now. I followed those instructions, I cooked those steaks.

• 2:57:17Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 2:57:18Jocko Willink?

  Those things were epic.

• 2:57:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:57:21Jocko Willink?

  They were epic.

• 2:57:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:57:23Jocko Willink?

  So anyways.

• 2:57:24Speaker 02

  Interestingly, yeah, no steaks came to my house, or, or anything like that, or any of the houses next to mine. But hey, they do sound good, and they sound even better after, cause currently we're getting our fast on.

• 2:57:34Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 2:57:35Speaker 02

  Currently, officially too.

• 2:57:37Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:57:37Speaker 02

  Yeah. What are we at right now?

• 2:57:40Jocko Willink?

  Um, well, are you, I'm at, I'm at twenty-three hours or something right now?

• 2:57:46Speaker 02

  I think I'm at like eighteen right now. It's good.

• 2:57:49Jocko Willink?

  You ate at eleven o'clock last night?

• 2:57:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:57:51Jocko Willink?

  You got issues.

• 2:57:52Speaker 02

  Why?

• 2:57:53Jocko Willink?

  What are you doing eating at eleven o'clock at night?

• 2:57:54Speaker 02

  Because like I don't really start eating till like later in the day. I don't eat breakfast like that. You see what I'm saying though?

• 2:58:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:58:02Speaker 02

  Let's say I eat three meals a day and that's not a lot by the way.

• 2:58:04Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:58:05Speaker 02

  That's actually a little bit. You know, some guys it's six times a day, you know, that kind.

• 2:58:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:58:09Speaker 02

  I'm not like that guy, three times a day, sometimes two. So let's say I ate my first meal. No breakfast, only water, maybe some coffee sometimes. Maybe some Gatorade sometimes. Maybe like a banana sometimes, not a lot. Nonetheless, at noon ish, one, maybe two, lunch. Dinner eight, uh, like six, boom, and then again at eleven. That's normal. That's not that much.

• 2:58:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, okay. Do what you want to do over there.

• 2:58:35Speaker 02

  Nonetheless, I'm at about eighteen hours, give or take, and that steak that you were just talking about, the tamak one, sounds real good.

• 2:58:40Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:58:41Speaker 02

  But it sounds better cuz.

• 2:58:42Jocko Willink?

  Real fired up for that right now. Real fired up. By the way, you didn't even mention where you can get all this good stuff.

• 2:58:47Speaker 02

  Well, there's even more good stuff. So what I, what I like to do is like get us real excited about everything and then it's like, dang, where can you get it? Boom, origin.

• 2:58:56Jocko Willink?

  Oh, I do want to say we have in the testing phase right now.

• 2:59:02Jocko Willink?

  Chocolate peanut butter.

• 2:59:03Speaker 02

  Mook.

• 2:59:04Jocko Willink?

  Mook. Now, everyone's probably wondering, hey, what's up? What's up with just chocolate milk?

• 2:59:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:59:12Jocko Willink?

  We, for whatever reason, I don't know if it's the complimentary of flavors, but we haven't been able to nail the chocolate flavor the way we want it at this time.

• 2:59:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 2:59:23Jocko Willink?

  But the mint, I don't know, you know, the mint is awesome.

• 2:59:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:59:26Jocko Willink?

  The chocolate peanut butter, epic.

• 2:59:29Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:59:30Jocko Willink?

  We haven't nailed the chocolate yet. We got vanilla, the vanilla's, I'm not a vanilla fan.

• 2:59:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:59:35Jocko Willink?

  But the vanilla's good.

• 2:59:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:59:37Jocko Willink?

  I can't, I can't give it nine stars because I, I can't give nine stars to things that I don't personally.

• 2:59:43Speaker 02

  Right.

• 2:59:44Jocko Willink?

  Uh, really love the taste of cuz I don't love vanilla. I'll try it again once, once we roll out with the actual live vanilla milk.

• 2:59:53Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 2:59:54Jocko Willink?

  But the chocolate milk will come when we get it right. But the peanut butter milk? Stand by to get some.

• 2:59:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, makes sense. Well, isn't that the whole kind of defining factor of the vanilla flavor? It's like, it's not supposed to be amazing. It's supposed to be vanilla. Like people will use the word vanilla to describe a medium.

• 3:00:11Jocko Willink?

  Disagree, disagree. Let me tell you, I actually, let me tell you when, when. When I do absolutely love vanilla flavor. You know, when you go to a restaurant and you're like, all right. Tonight, we're gonna get some and you order dessert and you get some kind of a chocolate scenario. Let's say, let's just, let's just talk about a chocolate. That's hot chocolate brownie, right? Yeah, you roll up one of those. So there's a, the, the, my, my local, one of my local restaurants. They have a dessert. They call it the illegal. Cause it's so good, it should be illegal.

• 3:00:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:00:49Jocko Willink?

  This is Raglan.

• 3:00:50Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 3:00:50Jocko Willink?

  Raglan OB. And what it is, they take a cast iron skillet. And they put co- uh, chocolate chip cookie in there. And then, and I, I, when they make it for us, we don't, we get it, I don't know, once every two months will go illegal time. And that was an extra ice cream, cause you need it, cause it's got that chalk and it's hot. It's so good. And you know what I just realized? We're on the 24 hour fast right now.

• 3:01:21Speaker 02

  Dang, this is taking kind of long, but I kind of don't mind it. Cause man, and you're right about that vanilla thing too, by the way. Cause people do, well, people do use the word vanilla to describe real. Just, yeah, it's just vanilla, which is, you know, it's not great, but it's not junk. It's still good.

• 3:01:36Jocko Willink?

  Cast iron skillet.

• 3:01:38Speaker 02

  You're 100% right. Especially when you said, when you go to a restaurant, it's like, bro, I know where you're going with this and you're absolutely right. So, that being said, so what do you do then? You put some chocolate, like Hershey syrup in the vanilla milk. That's a violation, huh?

• 3:01:51Jocko Willink?

  Bro, that'd be a big violation.

• 3:01:52Speaker 02

  That just sounds real good right now. I'm just.

• 3:01:55Speaker 02

  Nonetheless, the.

• 3:01:58Jocko Willink?

  It should be illegal for us to do. See, I've been on, I've been fasting before and done the podcast, but this is different when I know that you're, you're in the same boat.

• 3:02:06Speaker 02

  And this is kind of like, uh, usually I'm just cruising at home. Like I've done it before for sure, but I'm just cruising at home and it's like boom. But now like, yeah, once you get to talking about it, shoot, then I, and I gotta drive by Wendy's on the way home too, so. Something.

• 3:02:20Jocko Willink?

  Check.

• 3:02:21Speaker 02

  Either way, you get all this stuff. Vanilla milk, not right now. Uh, chocolate peanut butter milk, not right now. Chocolate mint.

• 3:02:31Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 3:02:32Speaker 02

  Mint chocolate.

• 3:02:32Jocko Willink?

  Right now.

• 3:02:33Speaker 02

  Right now. originmaine.com. That's where you get it. Boom. And all the, all this, this Jocko Super Krill, that, that is like everyday stuff. You gotta take that one every day. Get on the subscription thing, but these, you know, all this other stuff, actually all of it. Like I said, all of it, originmaine.com, also at originmaine. I'll tell you what there's on there is gis for jujitsu. Very important. When you start jujitsu, or if you already started jujitsu, you need a gi. People still ask, and I'm glad they do, because I got the answer for them. What gi do I get? I start jujitsu, what gi do I get? Sometimes I ask the color, and that's a whole different question, but they say, what brand of gi? Here's the brand, Origin, brand, 100%. Made in America.

• 3:03:17Speaker 02

  Best, these are the gis that like Pete and all that, when they make them, they take into consideration all the movements of jujitsu. Like everything, even down to this. And think about it, we might not even have thought about it like outside of when you put this on. Okay, so in a regular gi, they have the string to tie on the pants. Not the belt, the string on the pants. Then you have a belt that goes over the gi top, all that stuff. Now, that string, fine, we're used to it, fine. That's a cool string, but you ever like put in the dryer, or it got caught on something, or whatever, and that string gets lost in the little tube thing? I don't even know how you, but you see what I'm saying, right?

• 3:03:55Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 3:03:55Speaker 02

  Like hoodie, that'll happen to your hoodie, and you gotta get the hanger, and you gotta do this big thing, if you even know how. Otherwise, you're kind of screwed in a way, because you gotta go all up in there. Now, take the Origin gi, these are just these details that when you get someone who's thinking of this kind of stuff, when they design the whole gi, you got some gi there. That this is one of the many reasons why you get the Origin gi. This one, the string comes out, that's okay, because it's not this endless black hole loop holder. Tunnel, you see what I'm saying? Yeah, it's like, it'll have like-

• 3:04:25Jocko Willink?

  It's like giant, thick, wide belt loops.

• 3:04:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, and a bunch of them too. So you have like, you know, it's so easy to put them in. That's even if you even want the string. If you don't want the string, you're like, hey, I'm over strings. I don't like tying my string. They give you this little belt, and you'll see, if you have Origin gi, you're like, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.

• 3:04:43Jocko Willink?

  Swivel lock.

• 3:04:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:04:45Jocko Willink?

  That's the name.

• 3:04:46Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, of the belt, it's a teeny, it's a thin belt that goes through and click. You click the belt, make it tighter, whatever, it's like a little mini belt. You don't, you don't feel it when you're rolling, nothing like that.

• 3:04:56Jocko Willink?

  Did you think you were gonna feel it when you rolled?

• 3:04:59Speaker 02

  It was a question.

• 3:05:00Jocko Willink?

  It was a question for me too. I thought, ah, you know, this seems kinda weird.

• 3:05:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:05:04Jocko Willink?

  And then you put it on, you don't, you don't notice at all. You don't notice until it comes time to take it off and it's so easy.

• 3:05:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're like boom. And here's the thing, again, it's like, we probably never really thought of this. Until you actually do it. Like, when you're, when you're done doing it, you don't really think about it, but it's just one of those things. Where it's like, dang, this is, this is good. These are good. These are good keys.

• 3:05:22Jocko Willink?

  One of the many details included. I was talking to a guy yesterday. I was getting interviewed and I said, you know, so, well, you know, he's, he's asking me about all my different businesses, right? Whatever that means.

• 3:05:35Speaker 02

  All up in your business?

• 3:05:36Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And I said, well, you know, I, I have a apparel company and we make, we make apparel up in Maine. Got a big factory up in Maine. And he says, oh, up in Maine? That's up in Maine? A factory in Maine? And you know, I was like, yeah. And he was all surprised. And I said, you know what? It's sad that you're surprised at that because 50 years ago, everybody knew that that's where they made stuff. They made it up there and it all disappeared. And now it's coming back and we're bringing it back. I told this guy, I said, we're bringing it back. We're bringing back manufacturing. We got, we're weaving material up there. You don't know what, you don't even know what I'm talking about. People's first instinct is like, oh, if you want material, you gotta go to overseas and you gotta have,

• 3:06:19Jocko Willink?

  you gotta get it, get it made in some sweatshop somewhere, right? That's literally what, that's, that's, that's accepted, right? That's acceptable. Like, oh, you just, you know, hey, you can't beat those prices and you can't, you can't overcome the, the tariffs and whatever else. No, you know what? Yes, you can. Yes, you can. And we are. We're doing it.

• 3:06:36Speaker 02

  Yeah. He gets the cotton in like North Carolina.

• 3:06:39Jocko Willink?

  You're screwing up.

• 3:06:41Speaker 02

  Has his own.

• 3:06:41Jocko Willink?

  South Carolina. I believe, I'm screwing it up too. Get the cotton in America.

• 3:06:45Speaker 02

  One of the Carolinas, yeah, in America. Actually, the thing is, I just talked to Pete and I'm pretty sure he said North. Could have been South. I don't know. I forget. And I apologize. Nonetheless, it is in America, just like how you said. And then they bring it up and here's what it is. Here's the secret. They have their looms. They have their own looms. You can't just walk into a store and start buying looms. You just can't do that. That's why it's hard to, you know, to kinda, that's why they have a unique situation there. But it's all made in America.

• 3:07:09Jocko Willink?

  And hey, everyone that is supporting us at Origin.

• 3:07:14Jocko Willink?

  Thank you, cuz right now, you know what we're doing? We're expanding. We're buying more machines. We're buying better equipment. And we're hiring more people. So, thank you for your support. It's awesome. We're, we're only able to bring manufacturing back to America because of you knowing that you wanna have the best and you want it made in America. So, thanks, everyone.

• 3:07:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:07:34Jocko Willink?

  Thank you.

• 3:07:35Speaker 02

  Sucking that.

• 3:07:36Jocko Willink?

  Much appreciated.

• 3:07:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's the one. originmaine.com. Lot of cool stuff on there. Some hoodies. Not to mention the most comfortable pants in the world, officially now. Officially, I'm wearing them right now. We go to LA today, good, fine, you know, whatever. But you're gonna wanna wear something comfortable. This is my thought process before we went. I'm gonna wear the most comfortable thing that I own, straight up. No question. Me, Origin Pants. Boom. Anyway. Also, like I said, Geezer Ashguards, compression gear and whatnot. Anyway, just go there. originmaine.com. Get what you want. Also, the immersion camps, jujitsu camp. Jujitsu immersion camp. Not concentration camp, not, not necessarily of-

• 3:08:17Jocko Willink?

  Summer camp. Not band camp.

• 3:08:19Speaker 02

  Not band camp, no. It's like an immersion camp. Immers yourself in jujitsu. You train as much or as little as you want, but you get to be in jujitsu the whole time. Boom, one week, two sessions. You can do both if you want, by the way.

• 3:08:32Speaker 02

  Jock will be there. I will be there, maybe not at full capacity. The jury's still out on that. We're gonna see about some stuff. Long story. Dave Burke, Leif?

• 3:08:42Jocko Willink?

  Looks like Leif's a go. JP working it.

• 3:08:46Speaker 02

  Anyway, a lot of, a lot of cool, fun people will be there. It's gonna be a good, good time. Um, if last year is any indicator, it's gonna be a real good time. Also, if you wanna vary up your workout, you wanna get some kettlebells. Like, some, someone just texted me today, well, you know, on DM, right?

• 3:09:07Speaker 02

  What weight kettlebells should I use? Okay, here's the thing, that's a broad question.

• 3:09:11Jocko Willink?

  That's a real broad question. Who are you?

• 3:09:13Speaker 02

  Exactly right. Yeah, it's-

• 3:09:15Jocko Willink?

  No, actually, it's an easy answer.

• 3:09:17Speaker 02

  I didn't think so.

• 3:09:19Jocko Willink?

  Or to the forty eight kilogram ones.

• 3:09:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:09:21Jocko Willink?

  Get some.

• 3:09:22Speaker 02

  And potentially kill yourself or some smash it on your toe because you can't hold it. Or it's too light for you. I don't know. It just depends. So depends on how how much you know about using kettlebells. Depends on how strong you are. Depends on how big you are and it depends on what kind of. Yeah, no, that's kind of it.

• 3:09:38Jocko Willink?

  Well, it does know it depends on what kind of fitness you are trying to achieve.

• 3:09:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, I guess.

• 3:09:43Jocko Willink?

  Because if you are trying to get big and strong, you want to get a bigger kettlebell.

• 3:09:46Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:09:46Jocko Willink?

  If you're trying to get more more metcon conditioning and whatnot, then you get maybe a smaller kettlebell.

• 3:09:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, maybe medium or something like that. The last point is, hey, it depends. Depends, but here's the thing, I will say this, and say this with complete bias because I think because on it kettlebell on it. Those are the kettlebells you get regardless of what size. You get the artsy primal bell ones. That's the that's the one you get. They're just way cooler. Also, if you want to vary up your workout, like I said, no boring workouts. Jocko doesn't have boring workouts, apparently. I thought he did. He doesn't. I know. But you want to make your workouts interesting, different movements, functional, strength and actual strength. There's other stuff on there, starting with like, oh, it's a spectrum. It goes from jump ropes all the way up to what mate?

• 3:10:36Speaker 02

  Steel bells. What's a steel bell?

• 3:10:39Jocko Willink?

  They look like a frisbee.

• 3:10:40Speaker 02

  Right.

• 3:10:41Jocko Willink?

  But they're filled with metal.

• 3:10:42Speaker 02

  But what do you do with them?

• 3:10:43Jocko Willink?

  Just work out.

• 3:10:44Speaker 02

  All kinds of stuff, right? See there, that's the point. So there's a bunch of stuff on there. Anyway, a lot of good stuff, a lot of, um. What did I just get? They were pretty cool. Oh, the socks. Boom.

• 3:10:53Jocko Willink?

  On it socks?

• 3:10:54Speaker 02

  On it socks, straight up. Yeah, there's a lot of a lot of cool stuff on there, on there, a lot of good information on there, too. So a lot of the questions that are directed at me, I don't know the answer. I sometimes don't know the answer for me as a place of me, some stuff I heard, but it's real flimsy a lot of the time. You go to on it, there's a lot of information on there, so get some, as they say. Anyway, on it dot com slash Jocko. Good way to support. If you want something, get something. Also, when you get these books that Jocko reviews sometimes.

• 3:11:20Speaker 02

  Hackworth's books about face. Good one. Steal my soldiers' hearts. Good one. Any of the books. Feel the need to get one. Hate to worry. Organize all the books by episode. JockoPodcast.com. Go to JockoPodcast.com. Click on the top. Books from episodes. Boom. I got them organized perfectly. Click through there. Get your book. Get whatever book you want. Get two books. Get a leaf blower. Just continue. Just go. Just do your Amazon thing and you're all good. Good way to support. Also, subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already on iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, Podcast, Podbean, Pod. There's Podcast apps out there. Just subscribe to the podcast. That's what I'm saying.

• 3:12:01Speaker 02

  That's kind of the thing regardless of what podcast application you're using. It's a good way to support. Leave a review. If you're in the mood, just leave a review. You know, when you kind of think about it, if you're not in the mood to leave a review, I don't even know if it's conducive to leave a review. Or is it? I don't know.

• 3:12:16Jocko Willink?

  I say go for it.

• 3:12:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, I say go for it. BTF, BTF, right? I say if you're in the mood, leave a review. Do you? Also, we have a YouTube channel. If you didn't know already, subscribe to that one. That's a good way to support as well. We have excerpts on there. Try to post every day. Try to. Sometimes two a day. Try to. Also, on there is enhanced excerpts. You know what I mean by that?

• 3:12:40Jocko Willink?

  I know what you mean by it.

• 3:12:41Speaker 02

  What do I mean by that?

• 3:12:42Jocko Willink?

  You mean you put some cinematography into the scenario?

• 3:12:46Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 3:12:46Jocko Willink?

  You film and then you edit with music and other special effects, CGI and whatnot.

• 3:12:52Speaker 02

  Sure. Well, at the very least, I'll put some music on there, you know.

• 3:12:56Jocko Willink?

  Things are exploding.

• 3:12:58Speaker 02

  Sometimes. Sometimes.

• 3:12:59Jocko Willink?

  You redid the Warpath video, so there's no longer horrible Christmas music.

• 3:13:04Speaker 02

  No, it's not horrible. See, I put Christmas music on there because it was Christmas time.

• 3:13:07Jocko Willink?

  I don't care. Don't ever do that again. You want to get Christmas spirit, watch the, watch the Christmas 1914.

• 3:13:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's a good one as well.

• 3:13:15Jocko Willink?

  That's better Christmas spirit. It's real Christmas spirit.

• 3:13:18Speaker 02

  Just say different. Yeah, you know. Nonetheless, that's why I did it. But look, you make a good point. Hey, whatever's not Christmas.

• 3:13:24Jocko Willink?

  Never put Christmas music in one of my. Uh, what are they called excerpts?

• 3:13:29Speaker 02

  Oh, now they're yours. Oh, okay. I thought they were kinda ours.

• 3:13:31Jocko Willink?

  Okay, okay.

• 3:13:32Speaker 02

  You know, I don't know, alright.

• 3:13:34Jocko Willink?

  If I'm in it.

• 3:13:36Speaker 02

  Alright.

• 3:13:37Jocko Willink?

  Please don't put Christmas music in our excerpts.

• 3:13:41Speaker 02

  Alright, you got it. I promise.

• 3:13:43Jocko Willink?

  Otherwise it'll be your excerpt.

• 3:13:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, huh. I gotta take that one. Actually, alright, I dig it. And, you know, so it's not gonna be Christmas every day. A wise man once said, "It's not Christmas every day, so why put Christmas mu- music on something that someone might, may or may not, listen to every day?" So I understand. So, yeah, I redid it. You know, revamped some stuff, some time, put some different music on there if you wanna listen to it every day.

• 3:14:03Jocko Willink?

  FYI, my wife completely stuck up for you on that one.

• 3:14:07Speaker 02

  Yeah, cuz, yeah.

• 3:14:09Jocko Willink?

  She's like, "Oh, it's nice Christmas music."

• 3:14:10Speaker 02

  It was released at Christmas time.

• 3:14:13Jocko Willink?

  Okay, I just went into like hiding.

• 3:14:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, I don't know.

• 3:14:16Jocko Willink?

  It was kind of a bummer too cuz that was a really, I know you put a lot of time and effort into that video.

• 3:14:20Speaker 02

  It took a lot of work, yeah.

• 3:14:21Jocko Willink?

  So then, when you showed it to me, you were all excited. And, and the video CGI stuff is awesome, right? But, I know that you wanted me to be just, you know, over the top. Uh, uh, with, filled with awe at the video.

• 3:14:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:14:40Jocko Willink?

  And I was with the visuals.

• 3:14:42Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 3:14:43Jocko Willink?

  But I was, that was, a lot of that was countered by Christmas songs.

• 3:14:48Speaker 02

  Christmas music.

• 3:14:48Jocko Willink?

  And so what you saw from my reaction was actually fake.

• 3:14:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, well.

• 3:14:53Jocko Willink?

  It was fairly fake.

• 3:14:53Speaker 02

  There was a fair amount of realness in there, let me tell you, cuz here, and I remember it and I won't forget it cuz you were, and cuz, you know, you go, let me get a little bit inside where you, I'll kinda like form it where it does like a certain thing and then it'll drop off, then it'll, then it'll come back, whatever. So there's this part where the certain part starts that I'm like, "Oh, he's gonna, he's gonna kinda like that part," right? So I'm kinda, so I kinda look over at you, I know, super childish, but I'm like looking at you, whatever. And you're like looking at it, and then like when that part hit, and it's Christmas music, you're like... Hmm, kinda like as if to say hmm, interesting choice instead of, you know, your other thing. They're like, oh yeah.

• 3:15:33Speaker 02

  Anyway, so. Rough. We changed the Christmas music as a result, so boom, anyway. That's gonna be the biggest hit video of all time. Yeah, sure. Anyway, yeah, so yeah, enhance excerpts, that's what's on there, along with, of course, the video version of this podcast, if you care what Jocko looks like. Also, Jocko has a store, it's called Jocko Store. URL is jockostore.com, it's the website, obviously, I know, not that creative, but still, cool stuff on there, and stuff is creative, I think so. Go on there, shirts, hats, we even got a new hat, it's like a flex fit now, boom, a lot of people have been asking for that, delivered.

• 3:16:13Speaker 02

  Gladly delivered, anyway, goodies on there, like I said, rash guards.

• 3:16:18Speaker 02

  Women's stuff. Some new mugs, you know what, I think I'm gonna put the tea on there, so if, you know, if they wanna have that option to get Jocko White Tea and international, you know. Oh yeah. I think, you know, just more options, more convenient for the people. Good call. For everybody, I think. Nonetheless, a lot of stuff on there, uh, if you want something, just get something.

• 3:16:41Speaker 02

  Also, psychological warfare, if you don't know what that is, it's an album. With tracks. Jocko Tracks. I know that sounds like, okay, it's kinda esoteric, Jocko Tracks, what does that mean here, this is what it means, it means, it's not him saying nothing like that, so. In your mom, in your, in your campaign against weakness, and we're all on the path, straight, it's, it's like common knowledge already, all of us were on the path. Like, if you're, if we're listening to this, even me talking, you listening to me, we're on the path, all of us, we're on the path. Now, this is inevitable, I think, for the most part, inevitable, where you're gonna hit moments of weakness. Sometimes you need a little help through those moments of weakness. Sometimes you need to just slip in those moments of weakness and fall and be like, "I'm not doing that again."

• 3:17:26Speaker 02

  Sometimes that's useful. You learn, in my opinion. But in those moments of weakness where you just need a little spot, this is what Jocko tracks are for. So, let's say your weakness is not getting up early. You want to hit the snooze. That's what you want to do. Too tired, I don't know, whatever. Maybe drank a little bit, I don't know. So you're on the fence, you're like, "I'm gonna hit the snooze just for what?" What's a normal snooze? 10 minutes? 9 minutes, whatever?

• 3:17:51Jocko Willink?

  I don't know.

• 3:17:52Speaker 02

  Same thing.

• 3:17:53Jocko Willink?

  You have to tell me about that.

• 3:17:57Jocko Willink?

  Cause I'm not over here hitting the snooze button.

• 3:18:00Speaker 02

  Anyway, actually, it's not for the snooze technically. It's not for hitting the snooze. It's for going back to bed. That's the weakness that this particular track. Cause hitting the snooze is like, if you just want to hit the snooze, you're not gonna have the energy to get up and, you know, boom. Maybe if you put it as your alarm. Nonetheless, this is what it is. The track, it's Jocko on a specific track telling you why you should just get up and not hit the snooze or not stay in bed. But it's like Jocko pragmatic advice. It's good. 100%. And this goes for diet stuff, skipping workout stuff. 100% effectiveness. 100%.

• 3:18:34Jocko Willink?

  That's good. Speaking of 100%, if you 100%, 100% guaranteed want to be able to deadlift 8,000 pounds minimum, you might go over that.

• 3:18:45Speaker 02

  I do.

• 3:18:46Jocko Willink?

  All you have to do is drink Jocko White Tea. It's that simple.

• 3:18:48Speaker 02

  Bro, okay. And, okay, Josiah.

• 3:18:52Jocko Willink?

  Am I gonna get sued for false advertising?

• 3:18:55Speaker 02

  No, because, and here's why. So this guy Josiah is his name. Huge guy, tore his bicep, by the way.

• 3:19:00Jocko Willink?

  Ouch.

• 3:19:01Speaker 02

  A few weeks ago, maybe a few months ago. It's been probably a few months. Nonetheless, big guy deadlifts, you know, has the setup, right? And he'll have videos there. I watch them, just to understand how weak I am. And so he tears his bicep, you know. It happens and so he, there's a video, actually I think this video was before he tore the bicep. No, no, it was after. So he has this arm in a sling, right? When you have the bicep tear. So he drinks some Jocko White Tea with a tin. He pounds it and he smashes the tin. And I'm not joking, this is the actual video. Smashes the tin, throws the tin. Deadlifts one bad arm, one hand, and it's like more than I can deadlift for real in real life.

• 3:19:44Speaker 02

  One hand, deadlift, so boom, proof.

• 3:19:47Jocko Willink?

  Proof.

• 3:19:48Speaker 02

  See what I'm saying? Proof by way of video, just saying.

• 3:19:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, there it is. You can get that on Amazon soon, very soon. Well, I shouldn't say very soon. Within a few weeks, you're gonna be able to get ready-made Jocko White Tea in a can. We're gonna put some companies out of business. Yeah, cuz you're gonna be at 7-Eleven going, oh, you know what? Oh, maybe I'll have this sugar-filled thing over here and it will make me feel like like a, like high on a sugar high for about 15 minutes and I wanna, then I wanna fall asleep and be lame. And I'll be getting diabetes. Or I can have Jocko White Tea and deadlift this car. So anyways, yeah, that's coming. That's coming. I'll let you all know when that's out. Hey Books, Way the Warrior Kid Series.

• 3:20:32Jocko Willink?

  Shows the path of hard work and discipline to kids. Book two is out now. It's called Mark's Mission. Teach your kids to be stronger, faster, smarter, more confident. Teach them to have better perspective on other people, how to handle verbal and physical bullying.

• 3:20:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, teach them to be warrior kids. And speaking of warrior kids, if you wanna support a warrior kid, go to irishoaksranch.com and get some Warrior Kid Soap made by Aiden, who's 13 years old, owns his own business. Yeah, he makes chocolate soap. It's good to use if you want to stay clean.

• 3:21:11Jocko Willink?

  Don't forget about the Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual. And you know what? This is, this is good. Read, read, just read one section a day. Legit, read one section a day. That will legitimately keep you on the path. Try it.

• 3:21:27Speaker 02

  You're right, yeah.

• 3:21:29Jocko Willink?

  If you want to listen to one track a day, instead of read it, because maybe you're doing it in the car or whatever, it's not on Audible. It's on MP3. The Discipline Equals Freedom Field Manual. iTunes, Amazon Music, Google Play, whatever, you can listen to MP3s. Of course, there's the Leadership Book, Extreme Ownership: Combat Leadership and How to Apply It to Your Business and Life. Over a million copies of that have sold. That's a lot. And it's not because we did a big advertising campaign. It's not because we took out an advertisement in the Super Bowl series, no. It's because of word of mouth. That's why people read it.

• 3:22:08Jocko Willink?

  Because it works. So get that for your business and life. And actually, if you want to now order the follow-on book to Extreme Ownership, it's called The Dichotomy of Leadership. Leif and I just finished writing it.

• 3:22:19Jocko Willink?

  This book will, it's really going to help leaders. I can't wait to get it out there into people's hands. One of the hardest things to do as leaders is find the balance between all the dichotomies of leadership, and this will help you do that. Order it now. Otherwise, the same thing's going to happen. Publishers won't have a copy for you, and you're going to be mad. And I'll be mad. That's the way it works.

• 3:22:40Jocko Willink?

  If you need direct leadership support for your team, contact Echelon Front, which is my leadership consulting company. It's me. It's Leif Babin. It's JP Denell, Dave Burke. Our website is echelonfront.com, and we solve problems through leadership. That's what we do.

• 3:22:58Jocko Willink?

  And of course, there's the muster, Leadership Seminar. By the way, 005 in Washington DC, sold out. So if you want to come to muster, you can't come to that one. You've got to wait until October 17th and 18th in San Francisco, California. That is the next muster. And also at the muster, we will not be backstage in the green room, clearing our minds in an isolation float tank. We will not be doing that. We will be with you out there the whole time, talking, answering questions, working out, eating, rolling jujitsu, everything. Come to the muster. Pragmatic leadership training for people that are leaders, people that aspire to be leaders.

• 3:23:42Jocko Willink?

  And also on top of that, for current military, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, other first responders. We have roll call one. September 21st, Dallas, Texas. It's one day. That's about leadership in dynamic environments. You can register to that one as well at extremeownership.com. And until we are together live at one of those events, whether it's the muster, or it's the roll call, or it's the immersion camp up in Maine. If you want to communicate with us, you can do that via the interwebs. Where we're cruising big time. I am Jocko Willink.

• 3:24:24Jocko Willink?

  Echo is at Echo Charles and also Military Outreach USA, which is the organization that's run by General Mukoyama. If you want to follow that, they are on Twitter at @miloutreachusa. @miloutreachusa. They also have their Facebook page, which is Military Outreach USA. And if you didn't catch the website the first time around, militaryoutreachusa.org.

• 3:24:59Jocko Willink?

  Great organization led by a great man, General James Mukoyama. And again, we thank him for his service, sacrifice, and what he has done for our great nation and what he continues to do. And I thank him for coming on the podcast to share his lessons learned and also thanks to his son Jay for connecting us. Truly appreciate it. It was an amazing experience for me to talk through lessons learned that he learned from one of my mentors and one of my heroes, Colonel David Hackworth. So, thank you both.

• 3:25:38Jocko Willink?

  And thanks to all the men and women in uniform out there doing your duty, holding the line, protecting our flag and our freedom. And to the police and law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, and all the other first responders that protect us day and night while we're here at home, thank you for your vigilance. And to everyone else that is listening, factory workers and drywall hangers and bankers and brokers and waiters and waitresses and cooks and dishwashers, to business owners and investors

• 3:26:16Jocko Willink?

  and software designers and CEOs and salespeople, to everyone out there doing your best to do your best. Think about those hardcore Recondo that fought and think about those hardcore Recondo that didn't come home. Remember them. And for them, don't let up. Don't slow down. Don't allow any slack. And keep getting after it. So until next time, this is Echo and Jocko out.