553: Becoming Brothers Through Battle, Death, and Honor in Ramadi. With Miguel "Pitbull" Santana.

>Join Jocko Underground Full Episodes< https://app.redcircle.com/shows/64a89f88-a245-4098-8d8d-496325ec4f74/exclusive-content Book: Unheard Voices The Fight For Ramadi: A Soldier’s Memoir From Combat Outpost Falcon In 2006, Miguel “Pitbull” Santana and his soldiers entered Ramadi, Iraq—a city many believed was already lost. What followed was months of relentless combat, sacrifice, loss, and brotherhood. Miguel joins Jocko to tell the story from the ground: the firefights, the men who saved each other's lives, the leaders who went first, and the bonds that remain unbroken twenty years later. 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 553 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening Echo. Good evening. Our four months in Tal Afar were a necessary brutal baptism by fire. We learned to read the dust, respond to the ambush, and trust the discipline forged in the face of constant danger. But Tal Afar was the proving ground. Ramadi was the crucible. I remember the briefing was the fault line. Our orders changed. We are going to Ramadi. The moment before and after which, nothing would be quite the same. We sat with fragments of the mission, unaware of how thoroughly the months ahead would hollow us out and rebuild us, or how deeply they would forge the ties between us.

• 0:45Jocko Willink?

  The order came down. Say nothing to your families until the movement was complete. Opsec above all else. It sounds clean as a directive, but it settled over us like something heavier. The transition south carried a sense of purpose and determination. We were leaving northern Iraq after months of hard-earned experience, bringing with us confidence, discipline, and combat knowledge forged through countless patrols and operations. Ramadi had earned a reputation as the most dangerous city in Iraq. But to us, the mission represented more than danger. It was an opportunity to take part in the fight that would ultimately shape the outcome of the war in Anbar Province.

• 1:32Jocko Willink?

  And that right there is an excerpt from a book called Unheard Voices: The Fight for Ramadi, A Soldier's Memoir from Combat Outpost Falcon. And it was written by retired Major Miguel Santana. And Miguel served over 25 years in the US Army. He started off as an enlisted soldier, moved up through the ranks, eventually earning a commission, becoming an infantry officer, attending infantry school, airborne school, mechanized leaders course, and ranger school. And during his time, he also served as a platoon commander in the Battle of Ramadi in 2006 and 2007.

• 2:13Jocko Willink?

  And in that role, he and his soldiers conducted countless missions alongside SEALs from Task Unit Bruiser, provided support when we needed it most, including during our most intense and dire moments, evacuating SEAL casualties during desperate battles. Many of the stories that Leif and I wrote about in Extreme Ownership and The Dichotomy of Leadership involved Miguel directly and his men. And his platoon from Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 36th Infantry Regiment, which was led by the exemplary Captain Mike McCusker, was eventually task organized under Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 37th Infantry Regiment,

• 2:58Jocko Willink?

  the Bulldogs, under the venerable Main Gun Mike Byma for operations in Ramadi. And Miguel and his platoon fought with such tenacity that he earned

• 3:15Jocko Willink?

  the nickname Pitbull, and it fit. And it is an honor to have him with us here tonight to share some of his stories, his experiences, and lessons learned. Miguel Pitbull, it's awesome to see you. Thank you so much for joining us after 20 years.

• 3:31Speaker 01

  Yes, sir. What an honor. After 20 years, just to be sitting here, face to face.

• 3:38Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I mean, guarantee the last time you and I looked at each other was down at Cop Falcon, you know? Either you were heading out, or I was heading in, or whatever the case may be.

• 3:48Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's an interesting time to... Oh, no, guess, we did see each other down in Texas, though. For the Ready First Reunion. That was outstanding. And then you just came out, we had a little Task Unit Bruiser reunion out here in San Diego, and it was very fitting to see you there as well, and for you to see the boys again, and for the guys to say thanks to you for all that you guys did for us. And I know, you know, since day one, you know, it's funny, when General McFarlane was on, you know, he's, you know, we both couldn't hold him in any higher regard.

• 4:27Jocko Willink?

  And just to get his perspective from his altitude of positional leadership on the battlefield. And, you know, I've had some grunts on here that were in Ramadi with us. And so to have you on here with that platoon commander level infantry on the ground, living in downtown Ramadi, this is a real, I think it's gonna give people another perspective that they haven't seen yet. So, thanks so much for coming out, man.

• 4:59Speaker 01

  Thank you for the invite.

• 5:01Jocko Willink?

  Let's get into it. Let's get a little background first. So, born where? In the DR? Born in the DR?

• 5:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was born in Dominican Republic. And at the age of six, my parents migrated to the US. And it's interesting how we got here because my dad is a retired military officer from the Dominican Republic. And so my dad was a combat engineer.

• 5:23Jocko Willink?

  Oh, wow.

• 5:23Speaker 01

  And when he retired, well, actually, let me back up. Something special that there's a bond between my dad and I, and is that because as a combat engineer, my dad got an opportunity to travel outside of Dominican Republic. And so my dad went to the School of Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia. Where it's like, what, 30, 40 years later, his son, you know, goes there to go to infantry school, and ranger school, and airborne school. It's like, how cool is that? And so, yeah, and then my dad also got a chance to go to Panama. And my dad built a lot of roads in Dominican Republic and the Sistis. And then I don't remember my dad serving because he retired shortly after I was born.

• 6:08Speaker 01

  And then he petitioned for a visa for green card, and we got it. And, you know, my mom and dad, we migrated to the United States. And we lived in New York for about four years, and then my mom kept telling my dad, it's like, no, we gotta go up to Massachusetts, because that's where my mom's side of the family lived. And so I grew up in a small little town called Lawrence, Massachusetts.

• 6:30Jocko Willink?

  Okay, and then what'd your parents do when they got to America?

• 6:33Speaker 01

  And so, my mom and dad, besides my dad being a military officer, my dad and my mom were business people. In Lawrence, Massachusetts, my parents established the first Hispanic, kinda like, convenience store grocery store. So it's funny because at like, the age of seven, the age of eight, I'm doing bank reconciliation and bank deposits with my mom and dad. And, you know, so I grew up in a convenience store in Lawrence, and everybody knew who we were because at the time, we were the only Hispanic store. And so we were making history in Lawrence.

• 7:05Jocko Willink?

  Nice.

• 7:06Speaker 01

  And so that's how kinda we got to the US.

• 7:10Jocko Willink?

  And then how was, how was school, and what sports were you doing in school growing up?

• 7:14Speaker 01

  Oh, man, let me tell you something, Jocko. In my house, we're four boys. Four athletes. And we were involved in all type of sports, you know? My mom and dad, you know, besides running a store, like, they were taking us to all the different sporting activities, you know? I mean, I played baseball, I wrestled, and football. And so we were very, very active boys growing up. And my mom, we kept my mom pretty busy.

• 7:39Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah. You got a, you got a story in the foreword to your book.

• 7:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:47Jocko Willink?

  You talk about your brother who saved you from drowning. What was going on that? You were drowning, and your brother saved you. What happened?

• 7:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, so that's a tough story. I dedicated the book to my brother because,

• 8:04Speaker 01

  you know, what good is all the accolades if I could not be there for my brother? And so, yeah, at the age of 10, you know, it was in the summer, and we were, we went to a lake, and, you know, just having a coke out at a lake. And it was packed. There was a lot of people there. And my brother and I, we didn't really know how to swim, so we're playing in the water. And next thing you know, I couldn't feel the bottom, so I was drowning. And my brother, at the age of 10, showed me what courage was. He somehow swam out to me, went underwater, pushed me, went underwater, pushed me again. I don't know how many times he did that, till I finally was able to, you know, touch the ground, and then get out. And then my brother continued to fight for himself to get out.

• 8:49Speaker 01

  And so at the age of 10, my brother gave me life, a second chance in life. And so a lot of the self-discipline, kindness, you know, I get it from my brother. And...

• 9:02Speaker 01

  You know, why is this very personal? Because my brother never got the chance to read the book. I mentioned it to him.

• 9:10Speaker 01

  And he's like, you gotta write this book. And so on the 12th of January, my brother passed away at 57. I just turned 56. My brother was only a year older than me. And so he didn't get a chance to read the book. And so I dedicated it to him.

• 9:26Speaker 01

  But at the age of 10, you know, selfless service, commitment, dedication.

• 9:32Jocko Willink?

  Did you with like learning that those lessons from your brother with your dad having served in the Dominican military? Did you have your eye on the militaries from a young age?

• 9:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. I mean, we all come from a family of service. My dad served. My uncle served. He was a cop. So we come from a family that have always served. And it's interesting because the Santana family has a rich history to Dominican Republic in addition to the US. And so, you know, we can, I consider ourselves like we're like two generations. Like there's still there's still Santanas in the Dominican Republic that are still serving, whether it's doctors, police officers. But the new generation that live in the United States also serve like my younger brother served in the Air Force. And did about four or five years and then transitioned.

• 10:27Speaker 01

  So my younger brother is a federal agent. He works for Customs and Immigrations.

• 10:32Jocko Willink?

  So when you were in high school, were you thinking this is what I'm gonna do?

• 10:35Speaker 01

  Well, actually, no.

• 10:38Speaker 01

  When I was in high school, I was a little, I didn't really know if I wanted to become a cop or a soldier. And a good mentor of mine in high school said, well, why don't you do both? And you know, 17, 18 years of age, you don't really know this. And he was like, he explained it to me. He's like, look, join the Army Reserves, come back and go to the police academy and do both. And I was like, man, that's a great idea. I think I'm gonna do that. And that's what I did. I originally started in the reserves. So I went to basic A I T, became a tank system mechanic, came back, went to the police academy. Served as a as a reserve auxiliary police officer in the city of Lawrence, Massachusetts.

• 11:23Speaker 01

  But after a couple of years, I realized my passion was more to be a soldier. And so I resigned as a police officer and I committed to being a soldier and be the best of it.

• 11:34Jocko Willink?

  And so did you go full active duty at that time?

• 11:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 11:37Jocko Willink?

  And what year was that?

• 11:38Speaker 01

  And then I also applied to the ROTC program. And that's when it was about what, seven years in already, six, six, seven years?

• 11:47Jocko Willink?

  So you did that, so you were a cop and a reserve cop and a reserve soldier for seven years?

• 11:52Speaker 01

  Correct.

• 11:53Jocko Willink?

  What year did you graduate high school?

• 11:54Speaker 01

  Eighty nine.

• 11:55Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So eighty nine, ninety, all the way up to like ninety six is when you decided you were gonna commit to just soldiering. So did you go, did you go active duty at that point?

• 12:05Speaker 01

  So I applied to Green to Go, O C S and ROTC. And I got picked up by Florida International University ROTC program.

• 12:14Jocko Willink?

  And then, so did you go down to Florida to go to school? Is that the way it worked? Did you have to go four years?

• 12:19Speaker 01

  That's how they sent me, yeah. So I went to college for four years. Government paid for it. But here's what's even more interesting is that besides being an infantry officer,

• 12:32Speaker 01

  the Army paid for me to go to college and I got a bachelor's degree in business. No figure.

• 12:40Jocko Willink?

  The military is a good deal, man.

• 12:42Speaker 01

  It is, it is, it is because, you know, later on, you know, when I, so I served as an infantry officer, went to infantry school, went to Ranger School, you know, and and then the military said to me, hey, we need, we need comptrollers.

• 13:00Jocko Willink?

  And you remember being in the convenience store, running through the checkbook.

• 13:06Speaker 01

  Doing all of that. And so in between my second deployment, because you know, the first deployment, we were together, Ramadi, I went back again.

• 13:18Speaker 01

  And I went back as a company commander. And they're like, hey, we're gonna make you as an infantry guy, we're gonna make you responsible for the whole financial footprint. M N F West. And so I was responsible for all the money running around M N F West Iraq between Al Assad, Ramadi hit T Q. And people would look at me and be like, you're an infantry guy, but you're the money guy. I'm like, yeah, yeah. The Army has big plans.

• 13:46Jocko Willink?

  How you're going through, so you get commissioned, what year did you get commissioned?

• 13:52Speaker 01

  August 2004.

• 13:54Jocko Willink?

  Dang, okay. And then once you get commissioned, did you go to, is that when you went all that schooling or did you do some of the schooling? Some of the military schools, did you do during college or did you do them all once you got commissioned?

• 14:04Speaker 01

  Some of the schooling I did as an enlisted, but infantry school, Ranger School and Mechanized School, I did it as an infantry officer.

• 14:13Jocko Willink?

  How old were you?

• 14:14Speaker 01

  Thirty five.

• 14:15Jocko Willink?

  How was 35 years old going through Ranger School?

• 14:17Speaker 01

  Outstanding. It's the, it's the best year of my life. At 35 years old, I was like in the top physical condition of my life, you know? Ranger School, people ask me, how was Ranger School at 35? I mean, I lost 28 pounds. I'm just a little guy.

• 14:36Jocko Willink?

  I remember we talked earlier, you wrestled at 112, right? What did you graduate Ranger School at weight wise?

• 14:41Speaker 01

  Well, I lost 28 pounds. I was like maybe, I was like maybe 135, 138.

• 14:48Jocko Willink?

  Lost 28 pounds. That would, that right there would make Echo Charles quit. We wanna lose what 28 pounds.

• 14:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. And it's interesting because I, I got recycled once in Ranger School. And for those that make it straight through, those were lucky, but the majority of people, you know, got recycled. And now, now here's, here's one thing about Ranger School. What did Ranger School, Jocko, taught me? It's not the leadership per se. You know what Ranger School taught me personally at 35? How much I can push myself, what's my limit? And then there's still some more left. You know, being deprived of sleep and food.

• 15:29Speaker 01

  Matter of fact, I almost lost my right eye in Ranger School. In one of the training missions. Get off the helicopter, we're running into the woods. And my Ranger buddy in front of me pushed the branch over and I didn't see it. And the branch came back and slapped me on the face. And all I remember was just my feet up in the air. And so that mission from a training mission became a medevac to get me back down the mountain. This was up on Delana, Georgia. And so I remember the doctor simply said, you wanna quit? What do you want Ranger? I said, I'm staying. And so I remember they treated me, they covered my eye and mandatory eight hours sleep.

• 16:13Speaker 01

  And then in the morning, they just simply asked me, what do you wanna do Ranger? Get me back out there. And so for a couple of days, you see me running around the woods with a patch eye. And in the morning, the medic would come and, and check up on me, make sure I was okay. But I knew the importance of, you know, I set that as a goal for me to get my tab. And so I was, I was willing to leave everything on the table. Because what type of a leader, what type of an infantry officer I would be if I, if I didn't get it.

• 16:44Jocko Willink?

  And I mean, this is post September 11th. This is 2004. You must know that what you're preparing for is to go to war.

• 16:50Speaker 01

  Correct.

• 16:52Jocko Willink?

  What's your, what's your first duty? So where do you end up getting assigned when you get done with Ranger School?

• 16:57Speaker 01

  Well, at the time, I, I was, one of the assignments was potentially 75th Ranger Regiment, 82nd, or potentially Europe. I didn't really know, we didn't really know. And so as soon as I got graduated Ranger School, it was like, hey, four lieutenants, we all got orders. Hey, I'm going to Germany. And initially I was supposed to go to Baumholder, they call it the Rock.

• 17:24Speaker 01

  And so, all right, we get to Germany. But once we get to Germany, I got, I got rerouted to Freiburg, Germany with, you know, First Armored Division. I do have to share this story.

• 17:38Speaker 01

  And I hope he sees it. Colonel Graves, the battalion commander, you know, we get off the bus and we go see the battalion commander. And he immediately, you know, here we are, these, these four lieutenants standing there. And he points at one, are you tabbed? And the first lieutenant says, no. He points to the second, no, he points to the third, no, he points to me. And, you know, I said, yes, sir. He's like, congratulations. You're gonna be second platoon, Bravo Company, one three six platoon leader. You got forty five days. Get your shit ready. You go in Iraq with us. So I made, I got three lieutenants for staff.

• 18:14Jocko Willink?

  Dang.

• 18:15Speaker 01

  And so that was it. I just got forty five days to get my stuff in order in Germany.

• 18:20Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 18:22Jocko Willink?

  You were also, what, thirty five at that point?

• 18:24Speaker 01

  Thirty five.

• 18:25Jocko Willink?

  So he's looking at you. These other guys probably were, what, twenty two, something like that?

• 18:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:29Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. I was a prime list of guy too. So when I was an ensign, which is an O one, you know, it's a pretty old.

• 18:38Jocko Willink?

  Which has, which definitely has some advantages experience wise. And so what was the, so now you know, you guys, do you guys know you're going to Iraq immediately?

• 18:46Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:46Jocko Willink?

  You got forty five days to train.

• 18:49Speaker 01

  Well, actually, the, the, the unit, you know, my soldiers themselves were already.

• 18:52Jocko Willink?

  Already trained up.

• 18:53Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, and, and so.

• 18:54Jocko Willink?

  Were you backfilling somebody? Did somebody get fired?

• 18:57Speaker 01

  No, no, the position was, was vacant for a while. Um, Danny Lohan, the platoon sergeant was kind of running the platoon. And then I just came in like forty, forty five days before deploying. And then I had a, a quick, like, I, I went to grab for about a week, you know, to get certified in the Bradley with the crew. In addition to getting my household goods in order, you know, I ended up, I ended up picking an apartment in Germany that I even forgot where I lived. Because it was just like forty five days, go, you know? And so I ended up really getting to know my soldiers in route to, to, to Iraq.

• 19:32Jocko Willink?

  So you, you, um, don't have much time to train up with these guys. Uh, and you are heading on deployment. That's what's going on. Um, again, I, I read a little opening from the book. I'm gonna pick up the book here. The book is, is just outstanding. And, um, you know, we were talking before we hit record and, and you talked about, what'd you say, the smell, the, the smells and the, and the feeling?

• 19:57Speaker 01

  Sense of smell.

• 19:58Jocko Willink?

  The sense of smell, the sense of taste, like, that's what you get from a book like this, that's written by someone that was on the ground. Uh, again, the book is called Unheard Voices, The Fight For Ramadi. Um, you're the, I, as far as I know, you're the first person from the one three seven to the one three six that's written a book, you know, documented. You know, what, what went down from your perspective. So it was awesome to hear, again, the, and we'll, we'll talk about, we'll get into the relationship between, you know, my guys and your guys, uh, at some point, but it couldn't, couldn't have been any closer. Uh, but I'll go here. Here we are. And again, I'm not gonna read the whole book, obviously, order the book, um, but.

• 20:39Jocko Willink?

  I'm gonna fast forward a little bit. I looked, I looked around at everyone and wondered which of us wouldn't make it back home. I studied each face, noticing those who seemed scared or ready for war. You could tell a lot from a soldier's face. I remember standing on that ramp, looking down at the blur of fatigues, hard, faces hardened by the past few days, bodies heavy with the weight of the coming mission. It wasn't just a clinical finality. I felt it was a sense of profound, heavy duty pride. This was the moment of professional commitment. I ran the count in my head, a necessary ritual of responsibility, focusing on the numbers, because every single one of those faces was a brother I swore to bring back alive.

• 21:17Jocko Willink?

  And your first step is where? Is it in Kuwait? Where's your first stop?

• 21:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, we, uh, in the book, you'll see, we, we, we went from Freiburg, Germany, where we were stationed. Our first stop was Kuwait. And let me just point something out. That, what you just read, came out of an outstanding NCO called Michael Otten.

• 21:39Jocko Willink?

  Yep, that was his, those were his words.

• 21:40Speaker 01

  Those were his exact words. I, I, I have a good relationship with all my NCOs and all my soldiers. Son Otten lives in Florida. And before I, I, I wrote the book, I, I kind of run it by him, showed him pictures. And he was like, wow, sir, look how young we were. And then there's a picture in the book that you'll see him standing there and at the ramp that I just took. And I asked him, what was going through your mind when you took that picture? And that's exactly what he said.

• 22:07Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I mean, I didn't read that part, but he says, man, how, man, look how young.

• 22:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 22:13Jocko Willink?

  You know, um. Yeah. Uh, so Camp Buring, am I saying that right?

• 22:19Speaker 01

  Camp Buring.

• 22:20Jocko Willink?

  Camp Buring, that's where you guys end up. And when you get there, it's time to train. It's time to get all your equipment. Your Brad's have been shipped over earlier, so you're waiting for those things to show up. You talk about some of that stuff. Um, fast forward a little bit, because we were considered a mechanized unit, we also had to complete high stakes convoy, live, live fire training. This training emphasized immediate brutal contact drills, reflexive reaction to ambush, and the laborious process of vehicle recovery. Every drill is executed at maximum speed, simulating the chaos we knew was waiting, instilling a deep, almost religious adherence to procedure. The slightest lapse in a drill meant virtual death sentence in Iraq.

• 22:57Jocko Willink?

  The last most sobering training we had to take was cultural awareness, a crash course in understanding local customs that felt impossible to grasp from a PowerPoint slide. And the criticality, and the critically important rules of engagement, defining the lawful use of force. These were the mental guardrails we desperately needed, the line between duty and atrocity, all delivered while the smell of sand and cordite clung to our clothes.

• 23:25Speaker 01

  You know, there's one thing that is very important, Jocko, that I, I had the opportunity of serving in a mechanized unit with First Armored Division. But I also deployed with the one seventy third Infantry Brigade. And so I've done both, light infantry and mechanized. And the thing about mechanized is, is not just your soldiers, you also have to think about your vehicles. Where to position your vehicles, because your vehicles is an extension of you. And so, you know, about the two weeks we were in Kuwait, besides getting the soldiers ready, getting our weapons, we also had to get our vehicles.

• 23:58Speaker 01

  Um, the vehicles came in and we had to, you know, load them and then bring the vehicles to the, to the firing range and make sure that they were all exact zeroed. You know, the twenty five mic, it's a beautiful, it's a beautiful gun and it has a very distinct sound. And so, you know, and then in a light infantry unit, you, you don't have, you know, the Bradleys. I mean, yeah, you have strikers. But even that, I would say it's still mechanized and, and the fight moves much quicker, you know, when you have vehicles.

• 24:31Speaker 01

  Why? Cause you can move faster into the battle space. And you can use the vehicles, like I said, as an extension.

• 24:39Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah, they make, they make a huge difference. That's for sure. Do you guys, you know, we have, we, we have Humvees, well, in the SEAL teams, we used to, in that, in that time, they have other vehicles now. But, um, you know, I always compare this, I always thought of my Humvees the same way I thought of our boats. In the old days in the SEAL teams, we would get issued boats and motors, right? And these boats and motors, motors are, they're like, uh, they're like almost living creatures.

• 25:10Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 25:10Jocko Willink?

  And different motors have different personalities. And we would name the motors. And, you know, the classic one that I remember off the top of my head is we had a motor and one of my platoons that was named Frankenstein. And it was like kind of made up of different parts, but it was, it was strong and reliable. But, you know, you had to kind of know how to work with it. And we kind of had relationships with these, with these motors. And, you know, some of them just, they just run better and some of them don't run as well. And same thing with Humvees, especially in the beginning of the war, we kind of got hodgepodge Humvees from all over the place. So we'd have, we'd have to plan, we literally had vehicles that we knew that could only go fifty five miles an hour. And the other, the better ones could go maybe sixty five miles an hour. So we, and we named all those vehicles as well. So we kind of knew the personalities.

• 25:53Jocko Willink?

  Did you got, did your Bradleys have personalities like that?

• 25:56Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 25:56Jocko Willink?

  I figured as much.

• 25:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, as you were talking, um, I'm a little guy, I'm only five four. And in the book, you're gonna see a picture of, uh, Sam Molly, Battle Dwarf.

• 26:11Speaker 01

  I mean, just another outstanding NCO. And you know, now, if, if, like I said, I'm only five four. So the Bradley for me was comfortable. But if, if you're like yourself, you know, five, eleven, six feet, the Bradley's tight.

• 26:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 26:25Speaker 01

  Um, but yeah, every Bradley, every vehicle of ours had, had, had a specific name and, and its own personality, you know, starting from the driver to the gunner.

• 26:37Jocko Willink?

  And you guys, did, at what point did you guys figure out you're going to Tal Afar?

• 26:43Speaker 01

  Well, the original orders was to, to go to Tal Afar, you know.

• 26:47Jocko Willink?

  So you knew leaving Germany, you were going to Tal Afar?

• 26:49Speaker 01

  Correct, yeah. The orders was to replace third ACR up in Tal Afar. And I do remember we, we flew in into FOB Psych. And you know what, to my surprise was that, um, I always thought Iraq would be like open desert, hot, you know? And when we got to, to Tal Afar, it was like, what, mid February, it was cold, it was raining, and it was green. And I was like, this is weird. I wasn't expecting this. Kids playing in the street and I'm saying to myself, we're at war. What, what's going on here? And so, uh, yeah, that was pretty interesting.

• 27:26Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, there's a huge difference, even just between southern Iraq and even Baghdad going up to northern Iraq. I know, I know guys that would go and do a mission and it'd be hot, very hot in Baghdad, and get up there and it'd be really, really cold.

• 27:40Speaker 01

  And snowing.

• 27:40Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and I've, I've heard stories about guys going up there and there's snow on the ground.

• 27:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:45Jocko Willink?

  So, so that's where you guys, FOB Psychs, uh, or, did I say that right?

• 27:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:49Jocko Willink?

  FOB Psychs, you guys get up there and again, you've got so much great information in this book, talking about what's going on.

• 27:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, and, and let me, let me just share with, with the readers and with everybody, kinda like what you and I were talking is, um, you know, this book wasn't really written in, in, in six months or a year. You know, this book is a 20 year in the making. And so, um, I just, I'd like to share this with everybody is that, you know, for 20 years, just like all the other veterans, you just wanna forget and you bury it. Well, um, I took everything and just buried it in a taco box and just wanted to move on. But as a leader, I took a lot of pictures. I did a lot of journals. And so, as those that read this book, this book is very simple and you're gonna realize,

• 28:38Speaker 01

  every story has a picture, every story has a date, has a time. Why is that? Cause I took the pictures. And all the pictures that I have are all date stamped, the date and the time. And so I know when, all the events that we were pretty much involved, you know, from laughter, destruction, you know, I have it all.

• 29:01Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and time really does get, uh, skewed when you don't have those reference points. I know when, when General McFarland came on and we've, and I kind of, for the first time, we were putting, I put together kind of the dates behind the combat outpost going in. And what seemed in my head to be, you know, three or four weeks between each combat outpost going in, it was like days. And, you know, that was his intention, was to keep the enemy off balance and keep going. And, you know, when you start thinking about that, and we, I talked about this with him, the, the miraculous logistical efforts that you're gonna, you're gonna have 200, you know, concrete,

• 29:46Jocko Willink?

  12 foot tall concrete T-barriers shipped in to go around COP iron. And then a couple of days later, week later, they're going around Falcon. By the way, they're also doing Eagle's Nest. Like this is happening just all over each day. It's just, there's, there's so much effort being put forth. But in my mind, this was like, these things were like three, four weeks apart. And when I finally, you know, went through the dates, I was kinda shocked that, oh, that, that was only a few days away. The only thing that I, there's one thing that I particularly remember was, uh, putting in COP Hawk, which was the 38 up at the hospital, and they pushed it a little bit so my guys could have time to come out of COP Falcon

• 30:30Jocko Willink?

  and get refitted and go into Hawk. But it was like, they had to push it like a day, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to be there. So it's just interesting that, like you're saying, you have these timestamps on these photos, which, which are a frame of reference. Without that frame of reference, time becomes very tough to grab onto and, and make sense of when you look, look, for me, looking in the past.

• 30:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, and, and a lot of the pictures is really what helped me and a lot of my notes was what helped me write this book. And so, you know, when, when I write about a specific event, that's the exact time because I took a picture. You know, and, and I took a lot of pictures. Just as a leader, I figured, you know, I'm gonna take a picture and as I write my report, I have a picture to reference it. And, uh, I'm glad I did because here it is 20 years later. It's like a time, time capsule.

• 31:21Jocko Willink?

  No, it's awesome. And, and again, before we hit record, I was telling you that I don't have many pictures at all from my whole Navy career. And, you know, there's a, there's a picture of me in Ramadi, but it's taken by,

• 31:34Jocko Willink?

  I wanna say it was taken by the Ops Officer from 137. I won't say his name, but you, you know who I'm talking about. But I think he's took it and like gave it to me at some point. Cause we just didn't take pictures, you know, there was, it was kind of considered, you know, OPSEC, you know, SEAL teams don't take pictures and I, you know, kinda listened to that. So I don't have many pictures. And again, I, just to reiterate, you and I are gonna connect on Dropbox or something and I'm gonna get a copy of all these pictures cause I should've taken more. I should, I wish I would've taken more. But, um, um, it's, it's awesome that you have them. And, you know, you put a bunch of them in the book too, which is, which is great, cause it really brings it to life.

• 32:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, and, and I also, um, as I was writing the book, the self-publishing company, Strategic Book Advisors,

• 32:22Speaker 01

  they just did a phenomenal job. And they're like, hey, you need a website. I don't need a website. No, you need a website. Why do I need a website? And I'm glad that they convinced me to create an actual unheard voices website that goes with the book. Because in the book, a lot of the pictures are black and white. And so you can see it. But in some of these pictures, you can't really see the blood or you can't, you know, um, you can't, it doesn't really show you what you need to see. And so on the website, um, I started sharing some of the colored pictures. And so the website is, is an extension of the book. And also I'm going through some of the videos because I, I do also have videos, um, some good videos, some funny videos.

• 33:07Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 33:07Speaker 01

  That I'm gonna be sharing with the world because everybody needs to understand, like kinda when we first started, my book, what do I bring? The sense of smell and taste of what Ramadi was. And so in order to be able to understand and grasp the importance of Ramadi, it's besides the book is, is the website. Where you're gonna see pictures from 20 years ago. Matter of fact, I also created a folder where 20 plus years reunion, I, I, some of the pictures that, that you and I took.

• 33:36Jocko Willink?

  Oh, that's awesome.

• 33:37Speaker 01

  It's in there. And then I'm working on, you know, creating another folder for videos. Jocko, you know, for the last 20 years, I never had a digital footprint. I mean, I had Facebook, but it was more for keep up with my soldiers. But I think as a leader, it's our responsibility. You know, and everywhere I go, I always say, as a leader, if we were in combat, you know, you can trust each other. We know that. Well, as a veteran, why, why do we have to stop? Leaders continue to lead. Doesn't matter that we, you know, we're retired. It doesn't matter. Matter of fact, it doesn't even matter if you didn't even retire. If you served, you're a veteran. And if you were a leader, continue to lead. If you're a soldier, you're still a soldier.

• 34:19Speaker 01

  And so the website is, is an extension. It, it is helping. You know, I like to share this also. I mean, the amount of people that have reached out to me through the website, sending me messages and thanking me for writing this book and also for the website. You know, moms and dads are finally getting to understand what we went through. You know, and, and being a soldier to us is like, I, I'm doing my job. There's nothing to talk about. Like, yeah, I just did my job. But as a leader, it's our responsibility to continue to lead and share the stories of, of, of, of those soldiers.

• 34:58Speaker 01

  I don't know if this is the right time, but I do wanna share this. When you look at the book, the front cover of the book, Jocko, I took that picture. And you saw it and you immediately recognized it. Leave, the whole Task Bruiser yesterday, you know, was it yesterday? Yeah, yesterday. They immediately recognized the front cover. Well, that, that was the entrance to COP Falcon.

• 35:21Speaker 01

  And then where I wrote a soldier's memoir from COP Falcon, you notice it's, it's a red, it's a red stripe. Well, that red stripe is the blood that we all shed. You know, I am a Purple Heart recipient. I got shot, you know, just like Captain McCusker and I, we, we shared a, um, close quarters up in Tal Afar. And so we both bled. And so that stripe reminds me, it reminds all of us, you know, for the blood that we shed in combat. And then in the top right-hand corner, I put the American flag as a symbol for what? For our fallen soldiers that we can never forget. And so this book is, is written by me. Every picture's me. And this is,

• 36:03Speaker 01

  as a leader, this is my way of giving back to my soldiers and their families, their moms, their dads, sons and brothers. So they can truly understand what we went through in that time. And this book is not just about the army. It's about the SEAL teams. It's about the Marines. It's about all of us that at one point or another set foot at COP Falcon.

• 36:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, no, it's uh, it's awesome to capture this stuff historically as well because you know, people's memories fade and even just talking, you know, just, just this past weekend and we did the task unit Bruiser reunion and being down in Texas when we did the 111 AD reunion, you're, you're hearing stories that when you hear them,

• 36:47Jocko Willink?

  you remember them, but if you wouldn't have heard them, you, they may have continued to fade, right? So, uh, just being able to document these things so that as people, as these memories fade, they don't fade anymore because they're captured. So it's uh, it's awesome. It's awesome. And thank you for writing it. Um, getting back to this, you guys up, you guys get up to, uh, FOB Sykes, this is where you guys end up and you guys immediately you're, you get sent out to a place, uh, Cop Burma. And you say Cop Burma wasn't just another small base. It was a pivotal US Army Combat Outpost located in the rural outskirts of Tal Afar, Iraq. Its position was chosen for

• 37:29Jocko Willink?

  its sheer strategic value located midway between Mosul to the east and Sinjar to the west, yet uncomfortably close to the Syrian border. So that's where you end up is Combat Outpost Burma.

• 37:43Jocko Willink?

  Of course, you know, like it's, it's, it's a rough living out in the Combat Outpost. Um, and what was your, what was your mission when you're out there at the Combat Outpost? What were you guys doing primarily?

• 37:58Speaker 01

  Well, primarily, you know, we were responsible for a major artery where a lot of the logistics, um, passed through. And so Camp Burma, our, our backside of Camp Burma was just open desert. And so a lot of threat, a lot of the threat came from the front. And so, um, we replaced 30 CR. And, uh, like I was telling you earlier, I was just amazed. It was cold, rainy, snowy. And I'm saying to myself, this is Iraq? Cause it was, it was actually very beautiful, the northern part, you know? It was very nice.

• 38:35Jocko Willink?

  I'm gonna fast forward a little bit.

• 38:38Jocko Willink?

  April 9th, 2006. The episode began around 9:00 AM. We rolled out of our Combat Outpost Burma for what was supposed to be a routine building search. Our platoon never got past the first two houses. As Staff Sergeant Jeff Anderson led his squad into one home, Sergeant Michael Otten's team went into another adjacent barn. Michael's men immediately found the grim evidence, a suicide vest and bags of fertilizer and explosive packed with metal shrapnel. This wasn't a casual hideout. This was a workshop. Next door, Jeff Anderson barely, had barely searched a room before his gut gave him a bad vibe. The room was unnervingly, unnervingly sparse compared to the rest of the furnished house. Jeff tugged a framed poster off the wall, revealing a vent-like opening, a known spot for stashing weapons. He dragged the couch over to

• 39:23Jocko Willink?

  boost himself up, and that was the trigger. "I pulled the couch away from the wall and I heard this click, click, click," he told us, "and that's pretty much when the couch exploded in my face." Amazingly, the blast only deafened Jeff for a few seconds. Before the smoke cleared, a hand grenade dropped from the hole, skittered across the floor and exploded. The gunman was cornered inside the wall and he was fighting to the death. This wasn't a typical engagement. Captain McCusker noted that the most, that most of these guys fire and flee, but this enemy was determined to fight to the death. "After pouring over a thousand rounds and exhausting our grenades, the gunman stayed hunkered down with his submachine gun and Kalashnikov.

• 40:05Jocko Willink?

  The situation demanded something final. Captain McCusker knew someone had to go in, confirm the kill, but he saw the toll the fight had already taken on us. He wasn't going to tell one of his soldiers to crawl into that hole. In a decision that defined his leadership, Captain McCusker armed himself with a flashlight and his 9mm pistol and squeezed into the opening. As the lieutenant, I was immediately behind him, covering the entry with my M4 carbine. Specialist Jeremy Illy, am I saying that right? Correct. Illy stacked directly behind me. We moved as a team, disciplined to the last inch. Captain McCusker shone his light into the hole, and that was all the enemy needed. He immediately opened fire with his AK-47. The burst was instantaneous and deafening. The rounds went

• 40:49Jocko Willink?

  right past the captain's face and straight toward me. One moment, I was standing with my M4, ready, and the next, a round struck the optic of my M4. The impact was violent. The force combined with the shrapnel spray from the broken optic threw me back. I was instantly bleeding from my face and left hand, feeling the dizzying concussion as I fell. The optic had absorbed the round, saving my life, and the military issued, issued glasses I wore shielded my eyes from the shattering plastic and debris. Without those Army-issued ballistic glasses, I would be blind today. Specialist Jeremy Illy, the man stacked right behind me, didn't hesitate. He reacted instantly, dropping his body over mine to cover me from further

• 41:32Jocko Willink?

  fire while simultaneously returning fire into the opening. Lying there, concussed and bleeding, all I felt was the intense searing heat of his brass casings raining down on my neck and back as he stood his ground. He kept that unrelenting fire until both the captain and I were clear. Captain McCusker, bleeding from the concrete fragments that had peppered his face, managed to pull himself out. He looked up at me and asked the question we all ask, "Am I shot?" I confirmed he was bleeding. The evacuation didn't end the battle. We moved to the medical tent to treat the shrapnel, but the fight raged on. Captain McCusker, seeing the enemy's fanatical will, decided to end the standoff. He ordered and brought the Explosive Ordnance Disposal Team

• 42:15Jocko Willink?

  back and detonated four blocks of C4, systematically demolishing the entire second floor of the building. A week later, when I spoke to Specialist Jeremy Illy about that moment, he kept it simple. "Sir, I believed you were dead. I covered you and returned fire." He had stood his ground, returning fire until both the captain and I were successfully ex-filled. That moment was the definition of professionalism and brotherhood. When I was finally cleared from the medical clinic, I was given the option to take recovery leave. I chose to stay. When I returned to the outpost, the soldiers asked me why. I looked at the exhausted, dust-caked faces of the men who had just fought for five hours, who had literally laid their bodies over

• 42:57Jocko Willink?

  mine and told them the truth. Because this is home now with you guys. It was a loyalty forged in fire, a bond thicker than any family tie, and it was why I was still standing.

• 43:12Jocko Willink?

  You got your optic right there with a bullet hole in the front of it.

• 43:16Speaker 01

  This is it. This is...

• 43:22Speaker 01

  You know, everybody has something that they like to look at to either motivate them or inspire them. You know, when things are good or things are bad, I always look at this. Um, I, I never realized that the round or shrapnel, what hit it. What I do know was is that it saved my life. And so, take a look at that, Jocko. You see where the round hit?

• 43:49Speaker 01

  And I still have it. Um, it was written off as a battle loss, and it was ordered to me when I got my Purple Heart. And I still, even, still today, I, I have the actual glasses where you can see the huge indent. If I was not wearing this, I would have lost my right eye. So you, you gotta trust your equipment. And, and, and then that moment in time, trust your equipment, trust your soldiers, trust the relationships that have been forged. It's very important. Um, stuff, you know, stuff's on, Jeff Anderson, son Otten, Illy, my platoon son, you know, um,

• 44:32Speaker 01

  the actual ID of the suicide vest that son, um, Michael Otten, um, Otten found, I, um, I have a video of that, of that, of that actual vest. And we blew it up in place. I have a video of that.

• 44:48Jocko Willink?

  And Captain McCusker leading from the front?

• 44:49Speaker 01

  Yes, leading from the front.

• 44:51Jocko Willink?

  He's a stud.

• 44:52Speaker 01

  Oh, he's just...

• 44:53Jocko Willink?

  Absolute.

• 44:54Speaker 01

  Just an awesome leader.

• 44:56Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 44:58Jocko Willink?

  Outstanding. Um, you got some other good stories. Get the book. If you're listening to this right now, just get the book. I'm going to fast forward a little bit. The city of Tal Afar and Kop Burma became more than just a backdrop to our deployment. It was a forge, a place where we hammered out fierce bonds, overcame deep challenges and faced shared uncertainty.

• 45:23Jocko Willink?

  Of course, you and I both know that that didn't last too long. What were you guys up there? Three, three, four months or something like that?

• 45:29Speaker 01

  About three, four months, yeah.

• 45:30Jocko Willink?

  And, you know, I started off this whole thing by, by reading about when you guys find out you're going to Ramadi. Um, and, well, that's what happens. Uh, fast forward a little bit. Our unit arrived in May 2006 to provide critical support and to shift the tide. We inherited a desperate situation, but we brought heavy firepower and focused determination of a mechanized unit. Over the next year, through relentless patrolling, clearing operations and focused application of combat power, we'd work alongside the Marines, Navy SEALs and other coalition forces to fundamentally change the situation on the ground. When you guys were heading down

• 46:09Jocko Willink?

  there, um, are you guys, are you guys reading through intel reports? Like, what are you guys doing to prep for what's coming?

• 46:18Speaker 01

  Uh, well, there wasn't really much prep. It was more, um, we got the orders and it was simple. We're going to Ramadi. Um, however, no one, no loved ones need to know. And so it was, it was interesting because telling your soldiers we're going to Ramadi and everybody knew at the time Ramadi was the dangerous city. I mean, Ramadi was a lost city that everybody, you know, um, written off as it's gone. And so, um,

• 46:48Jocko Willink?

  And the casualty reports.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  And the casualty reports.

• 46:50Jocko Willink?

  That's the thing that I remembered. I didn't know I was going to Ramadi. So we were deploying in, in April and I didn't, I didn't know I was going to Ramadi until February. We were supposed to go to Baghdad. I did a pre-deployment site survey in Baghdad to go and work with the, the Iraqi counter terrorist force. That's what we were going to do. We were all set on that. And then a couple of weeks before deployment, I found out we were going to Ramadi. Now, I had been tracking Ramadi the whole time and I knew that was totally, is, is, is the Wild West. So the casualty reports alone made that very clear. Because Baghdad, I want to say has, I think the number like Greater Baghdad has something like 15 million people in it. I think it's actually more than that. Ramadi has 300,000,

• 47:34Jocko Willink?

  350,000 and Ramadi would have more casualties. So you knew it was going to be bad.

• 47:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, and, and the area that we got was an area that the Marines would not go in. And if they would, they would get shredded. And so there wasn't, you know, in the book I write that, you know, Tal Afar was just, you know, the staging area, getting us ready for Ramadi.

• 48:01Jocko Willink?

  Um, and you also get, so you leave your battalion at this point, right? And you guys get chopped under the 137.

• 48:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. Um, Captain McCusker Bravo 136, we, we, we get attached to, you know, Task Force Bandits. Um, and then Captain McCusker gets assigned to Cop Iron. And then within that Captain McCusker had to give one of its platoon to Bravo one, you know, 137 Captain Bayama. And so that, that's where I was assigned to Cop Falcon.

• 48:36Jocko Willink?

  Let's get, let's get into Cop Iron a little bit. So again, people that have been listening to this podcast, they, they know all this stuff because I've had, you know, General McFarland, we briefed the whole thing. Um, but we're putting these combat outposts inside the city. And you go through some of the stuff in the book as well. You kind of explain the strategy and the strategy that, that it's actually the strategy that Colonel McMaster had done with the third ACR up in Tal Afar. That's why Tal Afar was pacified because these, or relatively pacified, was because they put combat outpost throughout the city. General McFarland showed up there, kind of got the brief, okay, this is what you did? Cool. We're going to Ramadi. We'll do the same thing down there. So that's kind

• 49:16Jocko Willink?

  of the, uh, the, the genesis of the plan. But going into these areas that you just mentioned, you know, these were areas where there hadn't been coalition forces in a long time. And when coalition forces did venture into these areas, it didn't go well. So Cop Iron was in South Ramadi and this was the first one that we were putting in. Um, and you say this, "When we first moved into the sector that would become Cop Iron, from mid-June 2006, the heat hit us like a wall. It was instantaneous and suffocating. The air felt like it came straight off an engine block. The city was already alive with the sound of generators, distant muffled gunfire and the constant unnerving hum of a place that lived on the edge. We knew precisely what we were walking into, one of the worst sectors

• 50:00Jocko Willink?

  in the worst city in Iraq at the time. The operation began before dawn on June 18th. We moved silently into the neighborhood, the shadows still deep enough to offer cover. The streets were narrow, winding and completely scarred from years of relentless fighting. Trash tires, trash fires burned in the alleys and the sickly, heavy smell of diesel and decay hung perpetually in the air. We dismounted at the first major intersection and immediately split into squads, running parallel clearances of the buildings on opposite sides of the street. Every door creaked as if it hadn't been opened in years, signaling our presence. Every shadow, every broken window seemed like it could hide a trigger man. In reality,

• 50:42Jocko Willink?

  the scene was one of overwhelming abandonment. Most of the buildings were empty, furniture overturned, walls blown open by past blasts, doors broken off the hinges. Some, however, were not empty. They'd been used as fighting positions." So this was the first big, uh, operation that the 137 was conducting. And I remember Colonel Tedesco, I mean, he's, he's epic in his own right, but he gave an epic speech to, while we were doing the warning order, or actually the op order. And he gave an epic speech about, you know, the, the biggest battle. This is the biggest operation since the Battle of the Ardennes for us. I mean, he was fired up. I was fired up. We were all

• 51:27Jocko Willink?

  fired up. And, uh, we went and staged there by the bridge. What was that? Was that ECP3?

• 51:33Speaker 01

  ECP3, yeah.

• 51:34Jocko Willink?

  So we, we all went and staged by the bridge at ECP3. I don't know if you remember this, but we were, so my guys went over, Leif's guys went over, or their, the plan was for them to go over and clear a couple of buildings where the combat outpost was going to be. And then when the, when the IED clearance team came through, my guys would watch to make sure that there was no more IEDs put in place. And the, and if they got, if my guys got in trouble, we'd call the tanks over, call the brads over and get help. Well, the bridge was so fouled, there was these big concrete barriers all over it. It was going to take like three or four hours to, before my guys could get support. And

• 52:17Jocko Willink?

  this is one of those moments where, you know, well, what kind of risk are we going to take? And so Colonel McFarland, we were in the back of, uh, what do they call a one, it's a 113, but it's turned into a command vehicle. It's a 117. It's a 117. And so it's like a little command vehicle. It's a 113 that's been, so we're in the back of this thing. It's like World War II. I'm like having fantasies of World War II because I'm back there with the brigade commander and the battalion commander and we're looking at the BAPs, you know, and there's, it's still Ramadi. There's like tracers in the air and stuff like this. And they, they, you know, they look at me like, hey, we're not going to be able to support your guys when they're over there. You know, we don't recommend you go. What do you want to do? And I was like, well, let me go talk to, let me go talk

• 53:00Jocko Willink?

  to the guys. And I went to Leif, hey, here's what's going on. Dave Burke was the, the, uh, Angloco guy said, hey, guys, here's what's going on. What do you want to do? And of course Leif's like, hey, talk to, he talked to his guys. Hey, here's what's going on. And these guys came back to me, hey, here's, here's what we got. We're here over there quiet. We have air cover. We have an AC 130 overhead. We can call in more air support if we need it. And worst case scenario, we'll do an immediate action drill and we'll bound back to the river and we'll just swim across because we're frogmen. We'll go. And I was like, all right. So I went and told them. Then Colonel McFarland said, Roger that. And, and Colonel Tedesco said, Roger that. And so then they went across and then the, the, they cleared the bridge. Eventually you guys went across and started setting this stuff

• 53:45Jocko Willink?

  up. Uh, but it was surprising that there wasn't a, a lot of resistance on that first combat outpost. And there was a, there was a Ranger operation that had taken place. I don't know if you remember this. It was a Ranger operation where they had been shot off target down there. And so, and I don't know if you remember this as well, there was a, a little clump of buildings south of Cop Iron that was called Muj Village. And so, you know, we're all thinking, you got Muj Village, you got this target that the Rangers had been shot off of. This is going to be a, this is going to be a fight. And interestingly, as you put, you know, it was like abandoned looking buildings. Um,

• 54:29Speaker 01

  And I have pictures of that building. I mean, that whole building was just completely destroyed. There was nothing there.

• 54:36Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah. Uh, you know, also, it's also important to mention, we had Iraqis with us as well. So there's a bunch of Iraqi soldiers. We had a T-72. So we had Iraqi tanks on that one.

• 54:48Speaker 01

  And they came out of, I believe, Karigadore.

• 54:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I think they did. I think they did. Um, So fast forward a little bit, once we had the area secured, the 40th Engineer Battalion and Logistics Teams arrived, that's when Iron began to take shape. Cop Iron wasn't handed to us, we literally had to carve it out of blast damaged concrete and dust. We worked under the fierce sun assembling HESCO barriers by the section, filling them with whatever we could scoop up, dirt, rubble, broken bricks. The engineers' dozer pushed massive earthen berms around the perimeter while the operators worked under sporadic sniper fire. Every time a round snapped overhead, the operators would flinch, duck behind the armor for a necessary second, and then immediately push the dozers forward, driven by the urgency

• 55:31Jocko Willink?

  of getting the protection up. And again, you know, I just said, oh, it was surprisingly quiet, but obviously it wasn't completely quiet. And actually, a couple of days later, that's when Corporal Chris Leon from Anglico, one of Dave Burke's guys, was killed by one shot. And he was actually the first Anglico Marine that was killed in Iraq. So, you know, by no means was this a peaceful situation, but it wasn't as much of a fight getting the footprint there as I initially thought it was gonna be.

• 56:05Speaker 01

  And where actual Cop Iron was established, I mean, they were a little exposed. And so their biggest threat was sniper fire compared to Falcon. Falcon, we were surrounded by buildings. And so our biggest threat was indirect and IEDs. But Iron had massive sniper fire threat. But at the beginning, you know, we would do patrols during the day, but the threat was so high, Captain McCusker changed and they started, you know, we started doing missions more at night.

• 56:42Jocko Willink?

  And during that mission, you were working for Captain McCusker. And then, as you were saying, once Cop Iron was established, that's when it started looking like you were gonna get chopped over.

• 56:55Speaker 01

  Well, let's, let's, let's backtrack a little bit. After Iron was established, you know, first platoon, second platoon, third platoon, we were all at Iron. And it's in the book, when, hey Miguel, you're gonna go to Falcon and you're gonna be with Captain Byema. And we went to do a leaders recon with the route clearing team. It should have been a quick 45 minutes. Turned into like, turned into like maybe four, five, six hours, I don't remember how long. But, but what I do remember, and it's in the book, I got hit with two massive IEDs all within five minutes. Like literally, we left Cop Iron,

• 57:34Speaker 01

  crossed the train tracks, not even 100 meters. The MRAP in front of me got hit with a massive IED. What I remember, because it was right in front of me, and you know, as you know, in the Bradley's, the commander's a little bit exposed on the hatch. And so I took that direct concussion. Now, here's, here's another thing that is very important for people to understand is that at that moment in time, we're trying to assess. We returned fire, gained fire superiority, right, of the objective, but I knew, I knew that we had to secure

• 58:15Speaker 01

  it. I knew that we had to dismount and get the engineers out of the MRAP. And so the first hand, first hand Duran was with us. And the XO's tank, he was also with us, Captain Fox. And the driver was Private Jeremy Brockton. And so the decision was made, Captain Fox is gonna pass me on my right and take and secure the lead, that, you know, would become the lead vehicle and secure the front. And then I was gonna dismount to aid the injured soldiers inside the MRAP. Well, as the tank is passing me on my right, and I'm looking towards my right, I cease passing. Right at the medium was a pressure

• 58:59Speaker 01

  plate IED. Literally hit the tank, lifted half the tank, broke track. If that decision was not made, and I would have dismounted, we all would have been wiped out by that pressure plate IED. And so the tank got hit. And so this simple mission of just a leaders recon just became a major operation because now, you know, I found myself with two vehicles destroyed. And so now I had to secure the objective. Because as you know, Jocko, for the Iraqis to destroy a vehicle, that was a big deal for them. And so we knew, I knew,

• 59:42Speaker 01

  I wasn't gonna allow them to have that, these two vehicles. And so we stayed there for hours until finally, out of Cop Iron, the M88 recovery vehicle. And I remember his name because I also took a picture of him. Staff Sergeant Panetta, our company mechanic with the M88 came out to recover the MRAP. And then we only had one MRAP available. And so the other tank that escorted the MRAP, I mean escorted the M88, did self recovery on the other tank. And then all the injured soldiers out of the MRAP, you know, we put them in the back of my Brad. And we fought for hours because they wanted the vehicles

• 1:00:26Speaker 01

  and I wasn't gonna allow them to, to take it.

• 1:00:30Jocko Willink?

  A little bit more to this story. I don't know if you know this. So from our perspective, talking to Colonel Tedesco, and I remember he, you know, he says, hey, we're gonna do an armored reconnaissance. And you're, okay, Roger that, sir. And I said, hey, you know, I can get my guys in there too. Like they can come and they can come take a look around, they can see what they see, they'll take pictures, the whole nine yards. And he said, well, you don't really need to, because we got, we're gonna have our guys. And I said, well, if you don't mind, we'll do it, you know, just so we get a feeling, we'll get to look at some overwatch positions that we can go to, that around the surrounding area, maybe not necessarily the cop itself. And he goes, okay, you guys wanna go down there, cool. So I go back to Leif and his guys, and I think it was, I think it was

• 1:01:15Jocko Willink?

  Leif's platoon chief, Tony Fraddy. And I said, hey, you know, the, the army's gonna do an armored reconnaissance down there. And he goes, what do you mean armored reconnaissance? And I go, it means they're gonna take their vehicles, they're gonna drive and look around. I mean, it's so, it's so the opposite of when a SEAL thinks of reconnaissance, you know, we think of like crawling through and no one's gonna see us. And so he was kind of just look on his face like, what does armored reconnaissance even mean? I go, it means they're gonna take their vehicles, they're gonna drive and they're gonna look around, that's an armored reconnaissance. And he goes, okay. But, so while that happened with you guys, my guy, Charlie Platoon, Leif's platoon went in and went in on the Marine Corps circ boats, which we had a great relationship, the Marines were outstanding. They went in

• 1:01:58Jocko Willink?

  on those boats, foot patrolled in, went into Cop Falcon, took pictures of everything, took pictures of all the, you know, the building itself, the entryways, the, the long access roads coming out of there so they could plan for sniper, sniper positions, and came back. And, I mean, we were back and done and cleaned and handing pictures over to Colonel Tedesco, you guys were still out there. And so it was good that we did it because we were able to, we, you know, we had been in Cop Falcon, we knew what was gonna happen, we knew, had imagery of this situation. But, yeah, that, that was devastating to hear. But thankfully, you guys didn't lose anybody on that.

• 1:02:34Speaker 01

  And the other thing too was like, it wasn't just necessarily elitist recon, it was also route clearing. Because, exactly. And so every night, you had a route clearing team, patrolling, clearing these routes daily. And so the decision was made, hey, part of the route clearing, Miguel, you and the leadership, you guys are gonna go, follow the route clearance, you'll be the security element.

• 1:03:03Jocko Willink?

  Was the MRAP in front of you, was that a dagger?

• 1:03:06Speaker 01

  It was in front of me.

• 1:03:07Jocko Willink?

  Was it one of the, like, one of the mine clearance vehicles?

• 1:03:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:09Jocko Willink?

  With the robot arms and everything?

• 1:03:11Speaker 01

  With the robot arms, yeah, and the rollers, and the rollers. But it was, you can tell it was command detonated because it hit the vehicle right. And you can see it in the book. And I think, I think I uploaded the picture on the website. Literally, I split the vehicle in two. And so it was, it was meant to be looked like a route clearing. And then we were gonna go see and pass in front of Falcons. And, and from my perspective, you know, what I was looking for is like maneuvering the vehicles, tight alleyways. Because up in Tilafur, it happened to me, it happened to us a couple of times. In the map, you think you can drive a vehicle through, through this street, but you didn't realize

• 1:03:53Speaker 01

  it was a tight alley. And you can't drive the Bradley through. And so route, I mean, leaders recon with our vehicles was very, very important. Because I never wanted to find myself in that position where, where, you know, we drive the vehicle in, and then we can't do really a pivot turn, or we can't get out. And so that route clearance was very important. But once again, it was, it should have been a 45 minute mission and we were there for hours.

• 1:04:19Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And that wasn't the last time that that happened either. This stuff happened. Before we jump in this next, I gotta, I was talking to Mike Byema and Leif sent Mike an email that, that you were coming on the podcast. And so here's Mike, Main Gun Mike.

• 1:04:39Jocko Willink?

  Wanted to say this, June 2006, Ramadi, Iraq, our brigade was preparing to launch the offensive that would clear the city of Al Qaeda. Just days before we crossed the line of departure, the task organization for the operation became official. That's when an infantry platoon from Bravo Company, First Battalion, 36 Infantry Regiment, was attached to my company. The platoon leader's name was Miguel Santana. His company commander was Mike McCusker. I already knew Mike's reputation. Every brigade has officers whose names travel ahead of them. Mike was one of those men. Just months earlier, in Tal Afar, he would be wounded crawling toward a fortified machine gun bunker to destroy it. He was the kind of leader anyone respected. So when I learned he was sending me one of his platoons, I wondered what I was getting.

• 1:05:23Jocko Willink?

  Company commanders usually keep their best platoon leaders. They also keep the ones who need the most supervision. If they have to give one away, they send the one in the middle. The dependable one, the replaceable one. Then Miguel walked into my command post. He wasn't physically imposing, maybe about five foot six, maybe five eight if you counted his boots. His uniform was dirty. Nothing about him screamed, "Future legend." That first impression lasted about five minutes, then he started talking. You could tell immediately he loved being an infantryman, not because he said it, because it came through in everything he talked about. His soldiers, the mission, training, closing with the enemy.

• 1:06:06Jocko Willink?

  There wasn't any bravado, just quiet confidence and complete commitment. Over the next nine months, I watched him lead. Mission after mission, firefight after firefight. The remarkable, the remarkable thing wasn't that he was fearless. A lot of soldiers can be fearless for, for a few minutes. Miguel was consistent. He was calm when everyone else was amped up. He was preparing while others were resting. He checked on his soldiers before he checked on himself every single day. Eventually, nobody called him Lieutenant Santana anymore. Not the soldiers, not the Marines, not the SEALs. To everyone in Team Bulldog, he became Pit Bull. It wasn't a nickname someone made up, it was one he earned.

• 1:06:49Jocko Willink?

  Officially, he was my platoon leader and I was his company commander. We respected the chain of command, but war has a way of stripping away titles and leaving only character. By the end of Ramadi, Miguel Santana wasn't just one of my platoon leaders, he was my brother. And more than 20 years later, that's still exactly who he is. End quote. So there's Main Gun Mike Byma. And I actually, when I emailed him, I said, "Open invite when you want to come and talk about Bulldog and Main Gun Mike and you don't..." You know, that's another nickname that got earned. Main Gun Mike. He fired a lot of main gun rounds out of his tank.

• 1:07:32Jocko Willink?

  So that's how you ended up working for, for Mike Byma. You guys wrap up at, uh, Cop Iron and now he needs to plus up his force to go into Cop Falcon. And we'll get into Cop Falcon here. The successful establishment of Cop Iron proved that the neighborhood outpost strategy could work. But the next step, pushing further north into a denser, more hostile area was significant gamble. Falcon was a clear declaration of war on insurgent turf, a sanctuary that had long been off limits except for short raids. This time, we weren't raiding, we were staying. Cop Falcon became the first outpost established in south central sector of Ramadi, an area that had long remained under insurgent control.

• 1:08:14Jocko Willink?

  The first step was to clear the battle space around Falcon of entrenched enemy forces, but clearing alone was never enough. In previous operations, insurgents often returned as soon as coalition forces withdrew, quickly reestablishing control over the population. To prevent that cycle from repeating, forces at Falcon were tasked with permanently holding the area through a constant presence in the neighborhood. The combat outpost became the anchor that denied insurgents the opportunity to refill the vacuum after operations ended. So that was the, that was the mission. And, uh, yeah, actually you're right, you do have a picture of that vehicle just torn in half. Um, get the book, you want to see these pictures.

• 1:08:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, less than 100 meters after crossing the main tracks on Route Central, Key Artery, the attack began. The lead vehicle, mind resistant ambush protected vehicle, hit by a massive IED. And this is what you were just talking about. Uh, you got images of all this stuff. And then finally, on June 26th, we pushed the full force of the mission. We moved from Camp Ramadi to the objective at zero 200. The city was strangely silent, as if holding its breath for the coming fight. I rode one of your Brad's. I don't know whose it was. I, I want to say it was McCusker, I don't really remember, but my guys came in on the boats and then I, I went in with you guys.

• 1:09:36Speaker 01

  Were you on the first Brad?

• 1:09:37Jocko Willink?

  I don't remember.

• 1:09:38Speaker 01

  Cause I, I was in the first Brad.

• 1:09:40Jocko Willink?

  I had a dog in the back too. There was a working dog in the back with it.

• 1:09:43Speaker 01

  Probably.

• 1:09:44Jocko Willink?

  And it was hotter than hell.

• 1:09:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:46Jocko Willink?

  And noisy. And I never liked being in Brad's. I never liked being in any vehicle. I didn't want to be in Humvee, I didn't want to be in a Bradley, I didn't want to be in an, I wanted to be on the ground, you know? Sitting in there, especially for us, man, sitting in the back, just, we're not used to it. We want to see what's going on. Uh, let's see, fast forward a little. Our objective once reached was a permanent statement. The SEALs were already at the objective, providing crucial outer security through their established overwatch and sniper positions. Knowing the SEAL team was in position meant I had a constant critical need to maintain flawless situational awareness to prevent any chance of friendly fire. My platoon immediately moved through the neighborhood, clearing structures block by block. The first building was seized, was a former community center school, now nothing but

• 1:10:31Jocko Willink?

  a shell with blown out windows. We took over more houses, many gutted or abandoned with damaged roofs and broken doors, exhibiting signs of previous intense destruction. The construction phase was a testament to courage. The engineers threw, brought in pallet after pallet of concrete barriers, over 300 of them, using forklifts under direct fire. HESCOs followed immediately. We built the perimeter in three essentials, essential layers. First, the concrete barriers to stop the devastation of a vehicle borne improvised explosive device. Second, the HESCO walls for blast protection. And third, sandbag rooftop positions for dedicated overwatch. You got some great pictures of Cop Falcon here. You know what's, when you think, go ahead.

• 1:11:13Speaker 01

  And the firing positions, um, the way we, we designed it, um, we actually brought an engineer and we got two 50 cows, built an actual, um, frame support for the 50 cow and massive amount of sandbags.

• 1:11:33Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:11:34Speaker 01

  All the way up to the roof. And so the 50 cow was just to, to reach out there. And then on top of that, we had, you know, two 49 and, and, um, and the saw and the grenade launchers. I mean, it was just a massive fortress.

• 1:11:47Jocko Willink?

  Yep. And, you know, I was just thinking about, as I was reading through all that stuff, it's important to remember that, you know, when you, when you, when you talk about reinforcing this stuff, you might think to yourself, "Yeah, you know, I guess you would need to reinforce it, that seems like a good idea." No, it was absolutely mandatory. There was a, uh, an ECP, I think it was two nine or five or two ninety, two nine or three, up in, um, Tameem, that got hit and was devastatingly impacted with the, uh, MIT team, the ongoing, the oncoming MIT team and the offgoing MIT team leaders were killed. A bunch of Iraqi soldiers were killed.

• 1:12:30Jocko Willink?

  The, the, what we talked about earlier, ECP three had been overrun, all but overrun. Do you remember getting down there?

• 1:12:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:39Jocko Willink?

  It was, you, it was just nothing left. This had been a little outpost and the enemy had hit it with mortars, followed by RPGs, machine guns, and then a vehicle borne ID. And this combat, the, the, uh, ECP, down there at ECP three, there was like nothing left. You see twisted HESCO barriers and...

• 1:13:00Speaker 01

  I have a, I have a picture of us at ECP. One of our soldiers, Sergeant, uh, Kruhdo, took a sniper shot in the face and survived. So I have pictures of ECP, ECP three. I also have pictures of the devastation, the aftermath.

• 1:13:21Jocko Willink?

  Yep. Yeah. So when we're sitting here and when we're doing the planning of how you reinforce these positions, it, it couldn't be any more serious because it is a real absolute threat. And by the way, those two that I talked about are just two that I talked about. There's, there's five or six, maybe even seven times where the enemy did, you know, combined arms attacks and completely devastated, they did an OPVA. They did it all over the city. And so this was very serious, you know, for you to, for you to approach, you're talking about how you designed to get 50 cows up there and the amount of sandbags, the amount of concrete barriers, because you were going to get attacked. That's what was going to happen.

• 1:14:03Speaker 01

  And also Falcon too, Jocko, if you remember Falcon was like right in the middle, there's a bunch of, bunch of roads that led into Falcon. So it wasn't just baseline and central, we also had the, we also had the backside. And so now, if you, for those that don't know, the cover of the book, that tank, that was the main entrance.

• 1:14:23Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:14:24Speaker 01

  And so you had to deal with, with the tank, you had to deal with the 50 cows up in the roof, the two 49s, the grenade launchers. And so after we initially, um, took over Falcon, I mean, immediately we started taking in indirect. And after even we thought that, okay, we built it, it's fortified, um, so on Luhan, all my NCOs, we would walk the perimeter just to make sure that every angle was covered. And, and we would go out and we would hide and, and say, "Hey, sir, look, that's, that's a weak spot. We got to fortify that."

• 1:15:07Speaker 01

  And so we make sure that from every angle, for Cop Falcon was completely sealed and you were not going to be able to get in.

• 1:15:15Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah, and you're right, that, that reminds me, I mean, even the, the indirect fire, the morning that we were putting it in there, um, Colonel McFarland came down and there was, uh, there was, uh, I always thought it was a mortar. He said on the podcast, he said it was a, it was a rocket, it was a 120 millimeter rocket that hit, killed, killed a soldier.

• 1:15:37Speaker 01

  If I recall correctly, I believe he took shrapnel under his side plate.

• 1:15:42Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 1:15:43Speaker 01

  Came under.

• 1:15:44Jocko Willink?

  Yes. He didn't have a side plate. They didn't, we didn't have side plates. And again, this is, you know, leadership from Colonel McFarland.

• 1:15:56Jocko Willink?

  You know, I was, I was on the other side of that wall where that hit. And, you know, he got evacuated and all that. It was terrible, but like the next day a truck arrived with the sappy side plates in it and gave him out to all the soldiers to get him, get him in there. And that was always interesting to me, you know, being from the special operations side. Guys always prioritize being light, you know, and less body armor. And, you know, all of us came home from Ramadi with a different attitude.

• 1:16:28Speaker 01

  And also besides the side plate, you remember we, we got issued the, I don't know if you guys wore them, but we had to wear the, the groin.

• 1:16:37Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, there was the groin ones, the guy, I, I would see the army dudes with the groin thing, with the shoulder things, with the neck, the neck collar.

• 1:16:45Speaker 01

  I was like, absolutely. I, I wear the, the groin, but I didn't like the shoulder, the neck, cause it's just,

• 1:16:50Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:51Speaker 01

  I'm a little guy.

• 1:16:52Jocko Willink?

  But if you're a turret gunner, in a Humvee?

• 1:16:54Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:16:54Jocko Willink?

  All day.

• 1:16:55Speaker 01

  All day, correct, correct.

• 1:16:57Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:17:00Jocko Willink?

  Fast forward a little bit here. Tasking a bruiser from SEAL Team Three established a presence within Cop Falcon. Further strengthening the combat outpost capabilities and operational reach. Their integration into Falcon reflected, reflected the growing importance of the position as coalition forces expanded their permanent presence inside the city. By late July, Falcon had effectively become a fortress. Reinforced with barriers, fighting positions, heavy weapons, and constant operational tempo that denied insurgents freedom of movement. And you got the, a good picture in here. So we, we, you guys gave us a little house inside of Cop Falcon. The guys wrote SEAL House on it. BTF, Big Tough Frogman.

• 1:17:43Speaker 01

  And it was funny because yesterday, you know, when I got, um, Lay and the whole team and Nick and everybody. And I showed him the book and I showed him the picture. It was like, oh my God.

• 1:17:54Speaker 01

  It was like, it immediately brought him back.

• 1:17:56Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:17:56Speaker 01

  And, and Nick was, I already sent the pictures to him of that. So he has them. He's like, man, this is amazing. I don't have no pictures. Look, all my guys got to see this picture.

• 1:18:05Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah. No, it was, it was awesome. And it was because any operation to be conducted within that entire area, you could just roll out a Cop Falcon. You're already there. You're already in the bad, you're, you want to be, you want to go get a bad guy in the bad neighborhood? You can be, you're in the bad neighborhood with, with your friends from Cop Falcon, walk out, grab them, come back.

• 1:18:29Speaker 01

  No, and, and Lay and the whole team.

• 1:18:33Speaker 01

  You, you, you guys will get intel and then you would come see us. Hey Miguel, look, we're looking for this. We're looking for this guy. He's a high value target. And the intel we got, he's at, he's at this house. And I'll be like, no, Lay. I saw this guy this morning or I saw him yesterday. He's over here.

• 1:18:49Jocko Willink?

  You got a picture of him.

• 1:18:50Speaker 01

  You know, I got, I got, well, here's the other thing about the pictures. Um, besides normal patrols, we did a lot of sensing patrols, meaning that I went out and my job was to, with this biometric, take pictures and, um, right, um, what do you call that?

• 1:19:08Jocko Willink?

  Retina?

• 1:19:10Speaker 01

  Retina. So, so every house we went, there was a, um, a, um, age man, you know, there was an adult, a man in the house. We took a picture. Um, and so all that information was being gathered. And so I had, I had the ability to literally, like, I went into every single house within my own battle space and I got to see everybody. And so every time Lay and the team would come, they're like, hey Miguel, looking for this guy. I would either remember or I might have a picture. And so the intel that you guys got was good, but and then I finished it off, making the final tweaks and we did some raids, some massive raids together

• 1:19:53Speaker 01

  that gave us huge dividends because we, you know, we were able to capture the high value target you guys were looking for.

• 1:20:00Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. There was also a lot of times where it got, well, it got to eventually to a point where we would just call you up and say, hey, there's a guy named, you know, whatever, whatever. He's in, we think he's in building 16, whatever, Juliet 16. And you guys will go, cool. Well, we'll call you in 20 minutes. And you guys would patrol out there just as a kind of a standard patrol sometimes, sometimes as a raiding force, but go out, come 20 minutes later, hey, we got him. What do you want us to do with him? Yep. Send him up to our detention facility. We'll interrogate him, find out which friends are. Yeah. So that relationship was awesome. And, you know, we, we didn't care who got to do the raid. You know what I mean? It was just, please get these bad guys. Like, let's get these bad guys.

• 1:20:43Jocko Willink?

  And sometimes it made sense for us to go down there and help out. And sometimes if it was a time sensitive target, you guys could be there in three minutes, seven minutes.

• 1:20:51Speaker 01

  And one thing about the Bradley too, is when I used to get these calls, Miguel, go get this guy for us.

• 1:20:58Speaker 01

  We would bring out either two or three Brads. Right? And about maybe eight of us, 10 of us will cram in the Brad. And so you would, you would tell me, go get this person. I, I might bring out 15, 18 of my guys. And you should see their faces when the, when the ramp dropped. And all of a sudden, not one or two dudes, not one or two soldiers will come out. You would get like 10, 12, 15, 18 of us. Storming, you know, the compound. I mean, when you talk about command presence, shock and awe, I mean, that was impressive.

• 1:21:37Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. No, it was great, um, great, great relationship. And I mean, it was just couldn't, couldn't be any tighter.

• 1:21:47Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. You just, the partnership between conventional army and special operations forces became a critical element in disrupting insurgent operations and maintaining relentless pressure on enemy forces during the campaign to reclaim the city. No doubt about it. You go on to say this Cop Falcon changed how we, how we fought. We weren't raiding from afar anymore. We were in their neighborhood. Our operational template was built on constant presence. Presence patrols, targeted raids, meet and talk patrols with shakes and local families, IED sweeps, OPs on the rooftops most nights. We moved on foot within minutes of stepping outside the wire. Our foot patrols ran from sunrise to sunset and often past midnight. We walked the same streets so often that we knew every crack in the pavement.

• 1:22:28Jocko Willink?

  Insurgents hit us hard at first. Complex ambushes, machine gun fire from alley corners, mortars that bracketed our timing. But after weeks of constant grinding pressure, something changed. Civilians started pointing things out, kids waved, shop owners left their shutters open longer. By late July, we were no longer just guests in the neighborhood. We had become a permanent, accepted and feared part of life there.

• 1:22:56Jocko Willink?

  Huge difference. And just to explain to people that, that don't know, uh, the, the, the strategy in the war up until this point had been doing these targeted raids, go out, grab a bad guy and bring them back to base. And then the next night, go out, grab another bad guy and bring them back to base. But those raids only take an hour. And the insurgents are there the other 23 hours. And so the locals, they, they have to bow down and give passive support to the insurgents. But once we were, once coalition forces are there, it's kind of like they do in America when you have a bad neighborhood and they put a police station right in that neighborhood. They'll put like a, like a police trailer

• 1:23:35Jocko Willink?

  and they'll start doing patrols and get more presence. Eventually the criminals, they just, they, they can't do anything anymore. They don't have the freedom of maneuver. And so that was the goal here. And eventually the civilians that were giving passive support to the insurgents because they didn't want to get murdered. Eventually they go, hey, there's a bad guy in that building over there. You guys need to go get him. That's how it ended up.

• 1:23:57Speaker 01

  And we did.

• 1:23:58Jocko Willink?

  Yes, you did indeed. And you did indeed. Uh, you guys are also, you know, there's no rest, right? You're training, you, you're down there with Iraqi army. It's another thing people got to remember. There's Iraqi army. And again, this is another thing that was very, people don't understand, you know, we're there fighting alongside Iraqi soldiers. You know, you are fighting alongside Iraqi soldiers. You have Iraqi soldiers. You guys are living with Iraqi soldiers. We, Tasking a Bruiser, we're operating with, always with Iraqi soldiers. Um, and that's one of the things that was, you know, with the civilian populace, the, the locals could definitely tell the difference between a bad guy and a good guy.

• 1:24:40Jocko Willink?

  But the, the Iraqi soldiers are also going to be better at that than we are, obviously. You know, it's like asking somebody from, you know, somebody from Eastern Europe to tell the difference between a guy from, you know, Louisiana and Boston. You and I can tell the difference between Louisiana and Boston in a heartbeat. But somebody from Bulgaria, they don't, they hear a person speak English. It's just English, right? But the locals and the Iraqi soldiers, and eventually the Iraqi police, they can tell the difference. And so that's powerful.

• 1:25:10Speaker 01

  No, in Falcon, you know, once we, we established it, secured it. You know, you guys had a permanent home with us and we had the Iraqi, um, army with us. We were tasked to establish the first official police station. So we also had Iraqi police with us, living with us, patrolling with us, eating with us. And I'm, I just remember a couple of times training them. The uniform and the, and the, um, showing up with.

• 1:25:47Speaker 01

  An AK, no mag, or maybe a mag in one round, I mean.

• 1:25:52Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:25:52Speaker 01

  But I mean, they, they, they, they did a phenomenal job.

• 1:25:55Jocko Willink?

  And that.

• 1:25:56Speaker 01

  Once, once we took them under our wings and they realized truly that, hey, the Pitbull and Task Bruiser, you know, you, we're not going to leave you guys behind. We're here to support. They, tha- that relationship got stronger. And then we were able to get, you know, the right uniform, the equipment, and they saw firsthand, we're not leaving you, we're here.

• 1:26:18Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:26:19Speaker 01

  Then that relationship, you know, became stronger.

• 1:26:21Jocko Willink?

  Task Unit Bruiser ended up with a whole contingent of guys, a small, I shouldn't say, a small contingent of guys that just trained Iraqi police and just trained Iraqi soldiers up, up on Camp Ramadi. The important thing about the Iraqi police strategically was that the Iraqi police were from Ramadi. They were tribesmen. And that's a whole no- so, yeah, an Iraqi soldier can tell better than an American, right? But Iraqi policeman from Ramadi can tell even better than Iraqi soldier. And also, it's important to remember that most of the Iraqi army were Shia and the Iraqi police were from there and they were Sunni. And so there's a, a lot more trust that was, uh, immediately in, in, in play because these are, this is like, you know, the kid from your high school that you went to high school

• 1:27:06Jocko Willink?

  with, that you were friends with, he's now an Iraqi policeman. So when he comes in and asks you something, you go, oh yeah, you know, there's some bad guys over there, or we need help with this, or we need some more, we need some more fuel for our generators, or whatever the case may be, and the Iraqi policeman can make that happen. And, and so that was another key component of this whole strategy. But, once again, the reason I'm bringing all that up is because you guys had to live with them, you guys had to train with them, you guys had to patrol with them. It's a difficult mission. And, you know, even though the, the enemy attacks, you know, sometimes we back off a little bit, this was by no means, by no means, um, pacified in any way, shape or form. This was still, you know, contact is imminent when you go outside the wire.

• 1:27:53Jocko Willink?

  So you guys are doing all that, um, continuing operations. How often are you guys patrolling? What'd you say, you're patrolling two, three times a day?

• 1:27:59Speaker 01

  About two or three times a day. And then whenever you guys called and needed us to go raid and go pick up some, you know, high value target, but on average it was two, three times a day. Now in the summer months, you know, August and September, the pure heat, we would patrol, patrol early in the morning and then late afternoon. But, but on average, it was like two or three times a day, we would, we would be out. And it's funny because

• 1:28:26Speaker 01

  the days that we didn't do two or three patrols, like maybe we did one, the soldiers, myself would be like, what's going on?

• 1:28:33Jocko Willink?

  Bored.

• 1:28:34Speaker 01

  It's bored, sir. Come on, let's go, let's, let's go out, let's do something. I mean, tha- that was part of the, the, the, what kept you grounded is, is going out. Because if we didn't get no indirect or smart on fire, your, your brain, you already start thinking like, what are they planning? What's, what's going on outside? And so you were eager to, to want to go out and talk to people and, and, and see what's going on.

• 1:29:04Jocko Willink?

  I'm gonna fast forward a little bit.

• 1:29:08Jocko Willink?

  August 2nd, 2006. Team Bulldog, commanded by Cap- Captain Mike Byuma, was tasked to conduct a coordinated search operation in Sector J10, the Al Andalus District, to kill or capture anti-Iraqi forces operating in the area.

• 1:29:27Jocko Willink?

  Of course, you know, uh, Charlie Platoon SEAL Team 3 was supporting this operation, you guys were out there supporting this operation, um.

• 1:29:35Jocko Willink?

  "The atmosphere was thick with the dust of destruction. At approximately 058,

• 1:29:44Jocko Willink?

  Navy SEAL Ryan Jobe and his team were located in Building 125, Sector J10, in a high-risk position overlooking a crowded urban area. Jobe, a disciplined and talented machine gunner, had been instrumental in supporting our fight. As we pushed through the street below, the enemy struck. A sniper round cracked the silence, tearing into Ryan Jobe's face. The shot instantly shattered bone, destroyed his right eye, and critically wounded him. The shock was immense, but the discipline of the SEALs was absolute. Even with the life-threatening trauma, Ryan stayed conscious, refusing to succumb to the panic as his teammates instantly scrambled to save him. I was on the adjacent street with my platoon, raiding the adjacent house.

• 1:30:27Jocko Willink?

  Immediately, I remember the radio coming alive with all the communication about the SEALs' injured team member. By approximately 8:15 hours, Team Bulldog Tank Section began engaging the sniper position with 520mm main gun rounds. One of my Bradley vehicles supporting the SEAL team also returned fire with 10 25mm rounds and two tube-launched, optically-tracked, wire-guided tow missiles at Building 99 in Sector J10.

• 1:30:56Jocko Willink?

  First Sergeant Louis Duran and I immediately began coordinating with the SEAL team on Ryan's medevac while sustaining the fight on the ground. I began by repositioning our vehicles to support the SEAL team and by clearing the route. Ryan was rushed back to Cop Falcon by Team Bulldog in the M113 armored personnel carrier. Medical personnel at Falcon immediately began treatment. At approximately 8:40, we began exfiltrating from both objectives and moved back to Cop Falcon due to the high sniper threat and to regroup. However, Captain Bauma continued to engage and destroy enemy fighters, attempting to inflict additional casualties. His crew spotted a blue sedan traveling at high speed toward Sector J10. Inside the vehicle were enemy fighters armed with AK-47s.

• 1:31:41Jocko Willink?

  By 0915, Captain Bauma engaged two additional AIF rif- riflemen located in Building 65. And by 9:45, the call came quickly. Surveillance spotted enemy fighters gathering in a nearby building, preparing for another attack. Captain Bauma's tank crew engaged eight AIF squad with one main gun round at 350 meters."

• 1:32:15Jocko Willink?

  Carrying on, the SEAL platoon, all the support elements, and White Platoon, which was your platoon.

• 1:32:22Jocko Willink?

  Now back at Falcon, we didn't hesitate. Ryan had been hit, and the only answer was to strike back immediately. By 10:30, the SEAL team had mounted two of the Bradleys from White Platoon, headed straight back into the fight where Captain Byuma was aggressively engaging the insurgents on the ground. White Platoon took a defensive posture at Falcon, doubling every fighting position as Falcon was receiving direct fire. The SEALs and the supporting element from Falcon breached the assault, breached and assaulted Building 65, Sector J10. As they prepared to make entry, the house erupted in gunfire. Bullets snapped past walls and ricocheted through door frames. Inside Building 65, the fight narrowed to mere, mere feet.

• 1:33:03Jocko Willink?

  Hallways lit by muzzle flashes, stairwells choked with smoke, rooms where life or death hinged on fractions of a second. When the SEALs were pinned down under a storm of automatic fire from Building 63, Mark stepped out, not because anyone told him to, but because someone had to break the enemy's aim. He moved into the open, his weapon roaring, buying precious seconds for the others to reposition. The enemy fire intensified, hammering the walls around him, but Mark held his ground until his teammates were safe. A second time, he exposed himself, leaning out to identify the source of a new burst of gunfire. He fired back, suppressing the shooters. Then came the third final moment.

• 1:33:41Jocko Willink?

  Mark stepped into the opening. As he laid down another stream of covering fire, a devastating burst of machine gun fire split the air.

• 1:33:51Jocko Willink?

  Mark Lee fell, struck down instantly.

• 1:33:57Jocko Willink?

  Captain Byuma responded to Building 63 with the crushing asymmetric power of our armored support, pounding the structure with 11 main gun rounds, four toes, hundreds of 25mm cannon rounds from the M242 chain gun, and over 2,000 coaxial machine gun rounds and one hellfire missile, missile into bunkered insurgent positions. When the dust finally settled, the building was a gutted tomb. By approximately 11:40, the end of the fight, the area looked like a scar carved into the city. Burned-out vehicles, collapsed walls, shattered windows, and a constant acrid haze of smoke and pulverized brick hanging in the air. We found 12 enemy bodies. Intelligence suggested as many as 15 had been dragged away by their fighters.

• 1:34:41Jocko Willink?

  It had been the biggest fight since we arrived, maybe the biggest any of us had ever seen.

• 1:34:48Jocko Willink?

  At the same time all of this was happening, Staff Sergeant Peralas, commanding the Bradley and supporting the SEAL platoon on the ground, took immediate action and responded to the medevac call from Mark Lee. Staff Sergeant Peralas dismounted the vehicle, exposing himself by providing security at the back of the Bradley as Mark was being loaded into the vehicle. Under fire, the vehicle continued to engage AIF using its armor and 25mm cannon to shield the medical team. Staff Sergeant Peralas pushed through this, pushed through Sector J10 and medevac Mark back to Falcon. At Falcon, the brigade surgeon had already stabilized Ryan and was inside the M113 armored personnel carrier. Staff Sergeant Peralas and the medical team inside the 113 pushed forward to Charlie Med at Camp Ramadi.

• 1:35:33Jocko Willink?

  Everyone at Falcon watched them go, breathless, exhausted, blood on their gloves, and simmering with a cold, righteous anger. This was the turning point in spirit, the moment we went from fighting a war to fighting a vendetta.

• 1:35:48Jocko Willink?

  At Charlie Med, the medical facility was known throughout the battle space. It was staffed by a surgical shock-trauma platoon composed of some of the finest medical professionals serving in Iraq. Made up primarily of highly skilled Army and Navy doctors, nurses, medics, and corpsmen, the unit operated under relentless pressure with one singular mission, to preserve life.

• 1:36:12Jocko Willink?

  In the chaos and violence of Ramadi, Charlie Med became more than just a medical facility, it was a place where courage took a different form, where surgeons, medics, and corpsmen fought just as fiercely to save lives as combat troops fought to protect them on the battlefield.

• 1:36:34Speaker 01

  That's why August 2nd, or my birthday, August 3rd has never been the same.

• 1:36:43Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I've, you know, Leif and I wrote about the amount of support that we got from you guys and, and this is such a clear explanation of it. You know, we only see our side, but to hear your side of it, exactly what you guys were doing, exactly what you guys were seeing.

• 1:37:03Speaker 01

  My vehicle.

• 1:37:08Speaker 01

  So, Sam Paralis is my gunner, so that was my vehicle, my driver.

• 1:37:14Speaker 01

  Couple of months ago, my driver called me.

• 1:37:19Speaker 01

  I even talked to Sam Paralis, you know, that Survivor guy.

• 1:37:24Speaker 01

  It's like, you know, "Sir, I should have drove faster. I should have pounded the insurgents more." You know, as a leader, you know, it's my job to listen, to comfort.

• 1:37:38Speaker 01

  And so, you know, we talked for hours. I trusted my driver, my gunner, and that's why we tasked him.

• 1:37:50Speaker 01

  You know, many people enjoy their birthdays.

• 1:37:55Speaker 01

  It's a sense of celebration, you know? Partying, drinking, listening to music, but, you know, for me, it's not the same.

• 1:38:08Speaker 01

  You know, I wrote this book, "The Unheard Voices," is because these are the voices of my soldiers, you know?

• 1:38:19Speaker 01

  What we did for Mark Lee, for you guys, for, I mean, what we did for all of us. And so,

• 1:38:32Speaker 01

  the sense of smell and taste,

• 1:38:37Speaker 01

  that doesn't go away.

• 1:38:42Speaker 01

  I'm honored

• 1:38:46Speaker 01

  to be part of something so beautiful. You know, I'm honored to be part of the fight for Ramadi.

• 1:38:55Speaker 01

  Jocko, for 20 years, I wanted to forget. I wanted to bury it.

• 1:39:00Speaker 01

  But what type of a leader I would be, and for 18 years, my wife kept reminding me. You know, my wife is, she's not my wife, she's my soulmate. You know, beautiful, beautiful person, beautiful being, and every year, she would remind me, "Is this the year?" And as I look at my two boys,

• 1:39:25Speaker 01

  I said to myself, "I have to write this book."

• 1:39:31Speaker 01

  And then my brother dies.

• 1:39:34Speaker 01

  Can't hide anymore. If you and I led soldiers in combat,

• 1:39:41Speaker 01

  as a veteran, we have to continue to lead. And so, I'm honored that God gave me

• 1:39:50Speaker 01

  the opportunity to do this. I mean, as I look back, I say to myself, "Why did I take so many pictures?" I don't know why, but I did. I mean, August 2nd, and you know, you and I, we talked about prior,

• 1:40:07Speaker 01

  and Leif is like, "Miguel, I hated reporters. I got stuck with them." But even August 2nd, like, I was assigned to a reporter.

• 1:40:22Speaker 01

  And he documented everything, and the pictures he took.

• 1:40:28Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that was Stars and Stripes.

• 1:40:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:40:30Jocko Willink?

  And you actually have a copy of the August 3rd, 2006 Stars and Stripes, and what's...

• 1:40:39Speaker 01

  This is it right here. This is the original newspaper.

• 1:40:42Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And it was interesting because, you know, for some reason, you know, in the SEAL teams, you know, we have a whole protocol. If someone gets wounded badly or gets killed, you know, there's a protocol to go through that includes, it's called River City. Have you ever heard that term before? I think I'm getting it right. But it means you're not allowed, it means you shut down all communications because they don't want the family to find out, you know, before they can be notified correctly. Well, I started getting emails, you know, that, because it hit the news, because this article came out pretty quick. And, and, you know, again, looking back,

• 1:41:23Jocko Willink?

  it's, we have that document. We have the historical document that reports exactly what was going on and the meaning and the impact of that sacrifice.

• 1:41:34Speaker 01

  And you know, what's so amazing is, 20 years later, 20 years later, something told me, "Let me see if I can find the reporter." And I went on social media and I found him, Monte Moreno. And he's here in California. You know, back then, he was a, he was a reporter for Stars and Stripes. But right now, he's here. He's part of Ellie Times and, and I had the opportunity to have a 20-year reunion and sit with him and go over this article, and I thanked him

• 1:42:15Speaker 01

  for writing the article and taking the pictures because, as a leader, it's our job to make sure

• 1:42:23Speaker 01

  that the battles, the events are documented, because it's not about us. It's about the soldiers and their loved ones. And so, I'm honored, like I said, Jocko, I don't know why I took so many pictures, but I did. I mean, I have over a thousand pictures and videos. And so, for my name and my picture to be associated to August 2nd, it's just, it's a very humbling experience and, and 20 years later, to be able to sit with the reporter and be able to reunite with you guys, it's like, a part of me is like,

• 1:43:04Speaker 01

  very humbling. I wanted to forget. I wanted to bury it, and I did, but I just couldn't live with myself. And now that I did it, now that I wrote the book, now that I can see you shake your hand and give you a hug and leave, and the whole team, it's just a wonderful experience. And as leaders, we gotta lead. It doesn't matter if we're retired. It doesn't matter if you just served two years. You served. You're a veteran. We have to continue to lead.

• 1:43:37Speaker 01

  I also want to share something. If we circle back to Talafur, you know, when Captain McCusker and I shared that event, you know, I sustained traumatic brain injury. And so, I suffer from this condition called essential tremor. So, basically, I lost my fine motor scales on my right side of the body, so, added stress does affect my right hand.

• 1:44:06Speaker 01

  And so, for years,

• 1:44:09Speaker 01

  you know, going through the VA, trying all these different medications, but inside of me, something tells me, "This is not who you, you know, this is not who you are."

• 1:44:21Speaker 01

  And so, for me, the last 20 years has been, it's been, well, actually, the first couple of years after I retired, I was lost, going through the VA, but that little voice inside my head as a leader saying, "Lead, lead."

• 1:44:37Speaker 01

  You know what's interesting too, also, Jocko, is that leaders don't have, a true leader doesn't come. You can't box it on a height. I'm only 5'4". Leaders are short, tall, skinny, male, female, Hispanic, Americans. They're all different types of leaders. And for the last 20 years, that little voice of me telling me, "I have to write the story." You have to tell the story of soldiers because August 2nd changed me of who I am as a person. And now, 20 years later, I just want to share with the world what we all did. And once again,

• 1:45:22Speaker 01

  unheard voices is the voice of my soldiers

• 1:45:28Speaker 01

  so people can truly understand the magnitude of Ramadi and what it was for all of us.

• 1:45:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, um, you're just going to the, you know, you took a lot of pictures and you showed me a picture of the reporter sitting in the back of your Brad, working on a story. I, that is, he's got, I, if you gave that to him, I guarantee he's gonna frame that thing and put it up on his wall.

• 1:45:55Speaker 01

  I did, I did.

• 1:45:56Jocko Willink?

  Iconic picture. I also don't want to get in trouble with Mama Lee.

• 1:46:01Speaker 01

  Correct.

• 1:46:02Jocko Willink?

  Um, so I gotta say that she told me, that she told you, that you better celebrate your birthday. You better, you, you better celebrate your birthday from now on. You, you didn't celebrate for 20 years. Time for, find time for you to celebrate because Mark would want you to celebrate. Um, and, and you know, Mama Lee puts out the word, you gotta listen to her.

• 1:46:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:46:27Jocko Willink?

  So, um, you know, obviously, uh, talking to Leif and Leif, Leif sent me some thoughts. Um, Leif and, and you guys were, were joined at the hip down there. Uh, Leif wrote me this, um, our task unit bruiser seal, our task unit bruiser Charlie Platoon SEALs conducted many combat operations alongside Miguel Santana and his soldiers. Everybody called him Pit Bull. He was courageous, smart, aggressive on the battlefield and generous to provide support to our SEALs whenever we needed it. His soldiers were the same to a man. It was Miguel and his soldiers and Bradley Fighting Vehicles,

• 1:47:09Jocko Willink?

  along with Team Bulldog's tanks, who continuously braved some of the most dangerous streets in Ramadi to come to rescue us. And they did it over and over and over again. It was Miguel Santana's Bradley Fighting Vehicle that provided casualty evacuation for our wounded. Miguel took the risk to violate protocol and send a lone Bradley, single track, without escort, in order to get Mark Lee back to Camp Ramadi's Charlie Med Surgical Team as quickly as possible. It was Miguel Santana and his soldiers that fought through the streets as they were attacked from all directions on that day, August 2nd. They never backed down. They never wavered. He and his soldiers put their lives on the line for us.

• 1:47:52Jocko Willink?

  It was the honor of a lifetime to serve with such incredible, with such an incredible soldier, leader, teammate and friend, and to share the battlefield with his exceptional and heroic soldiers.

• 1:48:06Jocko Willink?

  End quote.

• 1:48:09Jocko Willink?

  Leif also reminded me, um, and I think we, we wrote about it, I think in Dichotomy of Leadership, that a few weeks after Mark got killed, there was, we got a really strong intel report of where some of the guys that were involved with that attack might be located. And we needed guys. We didn't, he didn't have enough guys to conduct a raid, you know? And so called you up and it was a squad of your guys and a squad plus of his guys that went out and conducted, um, you know, special operations, direct action raid, deep into enemy territory, conducted by a joint

• 1:48:50Jocko Willink?

  special operations conventional unit of, uh, SEALs from Task Unit Bruiser and, and, and soldiers from White Platoon. And that was just another day in Ramadi.

• 1:49:04Jocko Willink?

  Working together, one team, one fight.

• 1:49:11Jocko Willink?

  How did that, you know, I, I, I felt like we were very, we felt very invincible. Task Unit Bruiser felt very invincible. I, one of the things that I, I realized talking with Colonel Dean from the 135 and Colonel McFarland is when we were doing stuff, when my guys were out there killing bad guys, uh, kinda everybody knew about it because you'd hear the report on the radio. They would go over, it'd go from some, from, from company net, you know, Leif would tell a company commander, "Hey, we just killed two guys over here with a mortar tube." The company net would relay it to the battalion net. So now every battalion, you know, everybody hears it.

• 1:49:53Jocko Willink?

  All the companies hear it. Those guys passed the word, "Hey, SEALs just killed two guys with a mortar tube." And that happened all the time. And so everyone kinda knew, you know, what we were doing all the time. And we also, you know, we had, um, a lot of effectiveness on killing bad guys. And so, and plus the fact that we'd kinda come in and, and, you know, go in, meet and greet with you guys, go out, conduct an operation and leave and then go some, some other AO, do some work there. Plus you had guys on the other side of Ramadi, out there with Seth Stone on, at Camp Corregidor, they were doing the same stuff. So it was like we had a, you know, we built a, a reputation.

• 1:50:33Jocko Willink?

  And when Mark got killed, it was, uh, a big impact. And, you know, also, uh, Corporal Joe Thompson, that same day from 38 Marines, a guy that, a guy that, uh, my guys had worked with a bunch, killed on August 2nd as well. We, we stood side by side with those guys for the Angel Flight.

• 1:51:01Jocko Willink?

  Just that impact of the guys, you know, the, the first SEAL gets killed in Iraq and it's like, oh yeah, these guys can get killed too.

• 1:51:12Jocko Willink?

  It definitely, um, it definitely had that impact on us. It was a, it was an awakening. And I will tell you that from my perspective, not to be fatalistic, but I was realistic. And I knew, you know, those casualties happen in every day. And I, the num, that the odds are, you know, you play the, you, you roll the dice so many times, eventually it's gonna come up.

• 1:51:45Jocko Willink?

  Um, and yet, there's still work to do. And you still gotta get your gear on and go back out. And that was the attitude of the entire Ready First Brigade. You know, um, that's the, that's the attitude of the entire Ready First Brigade.

• 1:52:07Jocko Willink?

  Do you, what, what'd you guys do? You know, August 3rd, what, what do you guys do? It's back to patrolling.

• 1:52:13Speaker 01

  Back to patrolling.

• 1:52:16Jocko Willink?

  August 4th, patrol. August 7th, August 10th. It's the way it was.

• 1:52:22Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, the life I kept Falcon, it was ve- very simple.

• 1:52:29Speaker 01

  You're either patrolling or you're, you're manning one of the guard towers. Or you were doing what? Getting ready to go back out.

• 1:52:40Speaker 01

  Um, and within that routine is what kinda kept us together. Um, you know, when you said that, and, and I wrote it in the book, Life I Cap Falcon, December, when December came, it was kinda weird. And I wrote it in the book and I just remembered, because here we are, all this, all this time, we're fighting day in and day out. And then the care packages started coming in.

• 1:53:08Speaker 01

  And so you open these care packages and it's the smell of back home, the cookies. You know, the, the, the, the things that make you human. And, and in the book, and I have a picture in the company talk, all these care packages and grandma cookies, all around the walls are all the AK-47s and RPGs that I confiscated. What a, I mean, that's just, that's just weird.

• 1:53:37Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:53:38Speaker 01

  Um, here we are surrounded by the tools of weapon, of, of war, designed to kill, right next to our care package with mom and dad and granny's grandma's cookies.

• 1:53:52Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. It's rough. Uh, I, I preferred to not think about the rest of the world when I was there.

• 1:54:00Jocko Willink?

  I didn't have any pictures of my kids. I put them in a drawer, in a folder.

• 1:54:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:54:05Jocko Willink?

  I just wanted to focus on what we were doing.

• 1:54:07Speaker 01

  Yeah. You know, another thing I, I just remembered too, that I want to share is

• 1:54:13Speaker 01

  for us in the Army, when you're deployed, there's no alcohol.

• 1:54:18Speaker 01

  Right, however, because we were operating in Ramadi under, you know, alongside with the Marines. We got an opportunity to celebrate the Marines' birthday.

• 1:54:32Speaker 01

  And we got our two beers.

• 1:54:34Jocko Willink?

  Two beer day.

• 1:54:35Speaker 01

  Two beer day. And I have a picture of that. And what's so, what's, what's so, um, interesting about that, it's like, wow, two beers, really two beers. Well, you know what, halfway through my first beer, I was feeling it. Yeah.

• 1:54:51Jocko Willink?

  Completely dehydrated, no alcohol for eight months or whatever.

• 1:54:55Speaker 01

  Exactly, exactly. And so, you know, this is part of what life was at Falcon. You know, besides patrolling two, three times a day and, and, and going on these, these, um, these missions, you know, where we're going after some high value target. There was also a sense of humility inside Falcon. You know, we would get the, the care packages from back home.

• 1:55:22Speaker 01

  My platoon sergeant, Danny Luhon, myself, we, we, um, we purchased a satellite internet, uh, internet satellite.

• 1:55:31Speaker 01

  For our soldiers because we lived out of Camp Falcon. We had no internet, we had nothing. And so we would only go to Camp Ramadi, maybe every fifteen, twenty days, maybe. And sometimes I don't even go, I, I, I might, maybe a month before I would go back. And so we asked, and it was like, okay, yes, you guys can do it. So, so we bought an actual internet satellite. And, and, but it was only for the purpose of emails. And we had control of it. And so that way our soldiers can still somewhat communicate with their loved ones. And be able to help. With morale. Because remember, we, we also got extended.

• 1:56:14Jocko Willink?

  Oh, yeah.

• 1:56:15Speaker 01

  Our initial orders for twelve months. And then we got extended for what, forty-six more days.

• 1:56:22Jocko Willink?

  You, um, we'll, we'll get to that extension. You, you, uh, you ma- made a very nice tribute to, uh, Mikey Monsour in here.

• 1:56:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:56:30Jocko Willink?

  Do, do you remember when that happened? Do you remember what you heard about that when that happened, September twenty-ninth?

• 1:56:35Speaker 01

  It, it, it came through the net also. And, um, anytime that I remember. Every time you guys went out. Me as a platoon leader, I kept track. Why? Because I was out every day. Um, for the most part, either my platoon sergeant and I, we would rotate sometimes. He would go out and I would go out. Sometimes both of us will go out. But I always main- maintained situational awareness, kind of where you guys were at. And so. When that came through, it was just a punch in the gut, just like Mark Lee on August second.

• 1:57:13Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, I, and I know I mentioned that the, you know, we got to see some level of improvement, you know, as we were there. I remember when we put in cop. I think, I think it was cop sword or cop grant. I think it was cop sword. But like my guys didn't kill anybody, which was a big, which was a big step. You know, for my guys to be out in downtown Ramadi for two days and not kill anyone, like that was pretty surprising. And, but it was the first time where it's like, oh, maybe there's some stuff getting a little bit better. But, you, you know, it, there was still so much heavy fighting to do. And, uh, I mean, you, you go through some of this stuff in here.

• 1:57:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, because, um, I keep forgetting, when you guys changed out, the,

• 1:58:03Speaker 01

  the new CO team that came through, we got to meet them.

• 1:58:06Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:58:06Speaker 01

  Um, and so we introduced each other and kind of, you know, what I bring to the fight.

• 1:58:11Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:58:12Speaker 01

  And so that's where that, that relationship was also formed.

• 1:58:15Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, yeah, that we, I, myself and Leif and Seth and the, the last guys of Task and Bruiser left on October twenty-first. So then you got the guys from Team Five in. Um, and again, the, the fighting was still going hard. You say this, I remember hearing the blast before I fully understood what happened. It was a concussive wave that rolled through the adjacent city blocks like a physical hammer. A bright searing flash split the blackness, followed by a thunderous crack that seemed to rip the sky open. It was the kind of explosion you felt in your ribs before you even heard it. Then the radio net, our lifeline, came alive with the sound of pure chaos, broken only by panicked shouts and static.

• 1:58:54Jocko Willink?

  Captain Michael P. McCusker, Staff Sergeant Nicholas Cruthoff, Staff Sergeant Carlos Guzman, and Specialist Ryan Major were all hit by a massive IED. We immediately sprinted toward the impact area. The IED torn through the platoon formation with a brutal clinical efficiency. What struck me most powerfully was the silence right after the explosion. The awful stretched out seconds where radios crackled, but no one answered. Where you fared the worst, but were forced yourself to keep moving, driven on only by the primal need to reach your brothers. Reality was devastating. The four men were medevac'd out to Camp, Camp Ramadi and quickly thrown out, flown out to Longstool. Medical center, a name whispered as the destination we all prayed we'd never see firsthand.

• 1:59:37Jocko Willink?

  Yet that night, three of our own were flown there, each carrying wounds that would fundamentally shape the rest of their lives. Staff Sergeant Cruthoff, Cruthoff sustained grievous shrapnel to the face, causing vision lost on his right side. Specialist Ryan Major suffered catastrophic injuries, starting him on a long, brutal and painful road of recovery. But one detail stood apart, a testament to the warrior spirit we shared. Staff Sergeant Guzman somehow, after a month recovering in Longstool, returned to us. He returned to Iraq to finish the deployment. His resolve was not just a personal choice, it was a defiant act of loyalty, a demonstration of the pact. And his sheer determination was something every single one of us leaned on to survive the remaining months.

• 2:00:24Jocko Willink?

  That was November tenth, November twentieth. Uh, Sergeant First Class Danny Lu- how do you say his name? Lujan?

• 2:00:30Speaker 01

  Luhon.

• 2:00:31Jocko Willink?

  Luhon.

• 2:00:33Speaker 01

  My platoon sergeant.

• 2:00:34Jocko Willink?

  His vehicle gets hit.

• 2:00:35Speaker 01

  Yeah. And, and if we can just quick pause and go back to, um, so Captain McCusker and I share that experience up in Talafur. This, we were also, you know, raiding this neighborhood that we got intel. So this mission was out of cap ironed. And so Captain McCusker got hit with a massive IED. Um, and the four soldiers were from my sister platoon.

• 2:01:06Speaker 01

  And so Captain McCusker, besides what happened in Talafur, here it is in Ramadi, get hit with a massive IED. Um, Staff Sergeant Guzman came back to us after a month, still with shrapnel in his body.

• 2:01:21Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 2:01:23Speaker 01

  Staff Sergeant Carlos Guzman. I mean, towards the end of the book, I provide like, where is he? Where's Sergeant Cruthoff? Staff Sergeant Carlos Guzman did like six deployments.

• 2:01:37Speaker 01

  Four as a soldier and two as a contractor. Staff Sergeant Cruthoff. Um, earlier, remember, um, at the beginning, he was, he was the one that got shot at ECP three. From a sniper fire, sniper round.

• 2:01:55Speaker 01

  Got hit with a massive IED and was medevac'd. And so he didn't get to finish the deployment with us.

• 2:02:03Speaker 01

  And then Major, everybody knows, you know, he survived, but the injuries that he sustained. But today, he's a phenomenal, phenomenal warrior. Involving so much.

• 2:02:17Speaker 01

  You know, for the military and, and competing.

• 2:02:21Speaker 01

  I mean, just outstanding soldiers and warriors.

• 2:02:26Jocko Willink?

  What happened with, um, on, on November twentieth, another, another, uh, IED. Guys get hit, um, luckily.

• 2:02:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:02:36Jocko Willink?

  Pretty minor injuries.

• 2:02:38Speaker 01

  And, and, and, and in the book I say luckily because, you know, one of the things that we did was, I mean, the Bradley. Powerful vehicle, but it did have some, some weak spots. And so you, as the commander of the Bradley, you were exposed. And so we got, um, small glass or, um, up armor glass protector, protection around, you know, the hatch where you had to expose at least, you know, um, shoulder, you know, shoulder and, and up. But on the right side where the hatch opens, there was always a gap there.

• 2:03:23Speaker 01

  And one of my, one of my NCOs, um, Staff Sergeant Corderos came up with the bright idea of cutting a piece of, uh, of steel and bolting it in that opening. And so that is what saved my platoon sergeant, Sergeant Luhon, because when his IED hit. Um, now also the Bradley has reactive armor that, that it's on the side. And some of them went off, deflecting most of the concussion, but still. If that plate wasn't there, I would have lost my platoon sergeant. And he still took shrapnel to the neck and the shoulders. And the Bradley absorbed most of the, the brunt of it.

• 2:04:06Speaker 01

  Now, the hit was off to the side, but if it would have been directly underneath. Like I show a picture of a Bradley that got hit underneath. And I also show the, their, their favorite IEDs. We call it the speed bump IED. And, and in the book, um, I showed you what it looks like. And that picture of that IED. We were, we were going, we were coming back from, from a mission. And in my Brad, you know, I'm looking at the road and just for a split second, I saw this shiny arm and I told the driver, stop. And then I saw Sergeant, I told Sergeant Peralas, what is that? What's that shining on the road?

• 2:04:47Speaker 01

  And so he put the, the, the gun down and looked through the optics and realized, sir, I, I believe this is an IED. So we backed up. And so the picture in the book of that, of that speed bump IED was a, a, an IED that was determined to, to hit us, but we, we saw it at the last minute. And so that was one of our biggest threat as a mechanized unit was these IEDs. And so my platoon sergeant was lucky. That it wasn't a direct hit.

• 2:05:18Jocko Willink?

  December 4th, I was returning from Camp Ramadi, heading back to Cop Falcon with my soldiers. We were on a three-vehicle convoy. I was in the lead, followed by the Humvee and the trailing vehicle is another Bradley. We were moving carefully, turning right onto Route Central, near the intersection with Michigan, heading south toward the relative safety of the COP. As I passed the intersection, the Humvee following me entered the same space and immediately the IED struck. The blast, massive and concussive, shook the street and instantly left a burning wreck where seconds earlier, there had been a fully functioning vehicle carrying five brothers. Our first frantic priority was the men. We worked to get the, we worked with primal urgency to pull the men clear of the burning wreck. Each of them was injured and each were lucky

• 2:06:03Jocko Willink?

  to be alive. Once I knew the site was secure and my five soldiers were loaded into my Bradley, we quickly punched through the remaining distance to Cop Falcon so they could receive immediate medical attention. The five soldiers inside the Humvee sustained severe injuries, but they were lucky to be alive.

• 2:06:21Speaker 01

  And as you look at the pictures, I do want to point out a couple of things.

• 2:06:28Jocko Willink?

  Did you shoot these pictures right when you got to Cop Falcon of these guys?

• 2:06:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:06:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:06:32Speaker 01

  I took all those pictures.

• 2:06:33Jocko Willink?

  It's incredible. You got Specialist Justin Montgomery, he's the driver.

• 2:06:37Speaker 01

  The driver.

• 2:06:39Jocko Willink?

  Specialist Daniel Ike Anderson.

• 2:06:43Speaker 01

  Now, Specialist Ike Anderson, a couple of weeks ago, graduated from the Command Sergeant Major Academy.

• 2:06:52Jocko Willink?

  Outstanding.

• 2:06:53Speaker 01

  And he's en route to Korea to become a Command Sergeant Major.

• 2:06:58Jocko Willink?

  Outstanding.

• 2:06:59Speaker 01

  Eighteen, mid-eighteen as a private. Today, I mean, for the last 20 years, he's been carrying the torch.

• 2:07:07Jocko Willink?

  That's awesome. Sergeant Jason Blanken.

• 2:07:11Speaker 01

  And then Sergeant King.

• 2:07:12Jocko Willink?

  And Sergeant Travis King.

• 2:07:13Speaker 01

  He took the brunt of it because the IED hit the right of the vehicle. So, most of it, he took the physical aspect of, of, of the hit. He was the one that connected me with Tabi Lee, with Mamali.

• 2:07:29Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 2:07:30Speaker 01

  And then, um...

• 2:07:31Jocko Willink?

  Specialist Hopkins.

• 2:07:33Speaker 01

  He was, he was, yeah. And his injuries blew out both his eardrums. And I don't know if I put it on the book or not, but the following day, well, not even the following day, hours later,

• 2:07:51Speaker 01

  I blew up, I blew up, I blew up two houses. I found out where the, where the individuals were. And so, that night, it was a long night because I went, I went on the hunt for the guys that did this to my, to my vehicle, to my soldiers. So, it was a long night.

• 2:08:07Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 2:08:12Jocko Willink?

  A few days later, December 6th, 2006, two days after our Humvee was attacked and burned on Route Central, the war claimed two more soldiers and a Marine while they were traveling on a route the Brigade often used, the road from Government Center South to Cop Falcon, known as Route Sunset. This road was a crucial lifeline, but also relentless target for the enemy. That day, the insurgents carried out another devastating attack. A massive fuel-enhanced IED, one of the insurgents' deadliest weapons, detonated under the vehicle. The blast was devastating. It tore through the steel, setting the vehicle on fire and leaving no chance for survival. In an instant, three of the Brigade's most skilled and committed warriors were killed. It was the kind of strike that reverberated across every company, platoon, and outpost in Ramadi. The response, however, was just, was immediate and fierce.

• 2:08:59Jocko Willink?

  First Sergeant Louis Duran, Staff Sergeant James K. Wilson, and Sergeant Jeremy Illy were preparing to conduct convoy-based logistics package resupply operations back to Camp Ramadi when they witnessed the convoy coming down the road get hit. First Sergeant Duran instantly activated the Quick Reaction Force and then sent them to the, forward to the secure site. The First Sergeant and the QRF team responded quickly and aggressively to the attack, ultimately locating, fixing, and eliminating the IED cell responsible in a sharp retaliatory action. The team responded promptly, providing aid and doing everything within human ability to preserve what could be maintained. Their actions in the face of such devastation demonstrated the strong bond between units, between services, and among all of us fighting the same unforgiving fight.

• 2:09:44Jocko Willink?

  The death of Major Megan McClung, Captain Travis Patrickquin, and Specialist Vincent Pomonte resonated through every rank. It reminded us that no amount of skill, experience, or heart could eliminate the randomness and the cruelty of war. Major Megan McClung, United States Marine Corps reservist, was a Brigade Public Affairs Officer. She was a true trailblazer, mentor, and warrior. The first female Marine officer killed in Iraq, and tragically, the first female Naval Academy graduate to fall in combat. She was just outstanding.

• 2:10:17Speaker 01

  And the, the only thing, I'm sorry I cut you off.

• 2:10:19Jocko Willink?

  By all means.

• 2:10:20Speaker 01

  Um, I did miss mentioning in the book, and so Carson, one of my soldiers, was also there. And, um, I mean, what they did was incredible. I mean, first of all, they saw the vehicles coming, they got hit, and they were just eager to get out and help. And so, besides, you know, Illy in the first line, also Carson was there. And he,

• 2:10:51Speaker 01

  I mean, no questions. I mean, he, they, they just went out there.

• 2:10:54Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And just to give some context, when, when IED goes off on a vehicle, there's a chance that there's not going to be follow-on attack. There's also a decent, really good chance that there's going to be follow-on attack. So, you're just rolling in. And by the way, there's also a, a high chance that there's multiple IEDs in that area. So, now when you roll in with your vehicle or on foot, you are absolutely putting your life at risk to go help. This is not, oh, the, the IED already went off, the danger's gone. No, the danger's actually increased.

• 2:11:22Jocko Willink?

  Captain Travis Patrickquin, US Army Officer, was legendary Brigade Civil Affairs Officer, and the author of the classic presentation, "How to Win in Anbar." He effectively used a simple stick figure PowerPoint to promote the groundbreaking strategy of arming and training Sunni tribes, a strategy that would ultimately influence the successful Sunni Awakening movement in Iraq. And then Specialist Vincent Pomonte, the Humvee Gunner, detailed from his artillery unit to assist with executing civil military operations. And that, you know, was with, um, you know, General McFarland, these were his guys, you know? There was, these were, you know, the Public Affairs Officer, the Staff Officer, you know, the,

• 2:12:06Jocko Willink?

  the Civil Affairs Officer, which is what, which, what Patrickquin was doing, like, Pomonte, I think was PSD, like, these are his guys.

• 2:12:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:12:19Jocko Willink?

  Looking back, go ahead.

• 2:12:20Speaker 01

  No, and I'm sorry I cut you off again, but, but, you know.

• 2:12:23Jocko Willink?

  I might as well hear it from the horse's mouth.

• 2:12:25Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no. What I wanted to share is that, Jocko, is that you can see

• 2:12:31Speaker 01

  how busy we were at Falcon.

• 2:12:33Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. That's kind of one of the reasons I wanted to read, like, this is, what is it, November 10th, November 16th? It's just day after day. And these are, these are devastating attacks. These are destroyed vehicles. And these are not the only ones. There's constant sniper fire. And by the way, you take, this is just one, this is just one combat outpost.

• 2:12:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:12:51Jocko Willink?

  You know, there's, there's five, six other combat outposts that are all experiencing this kind of stuff all day. So, yeah, I wanted to convey that this was not, this was, this was daily operations. And the risk was always there. So, yeah, absolutely. Um, you, and I'm skipping some stuff as well. You know, like, there's more in the book, but there's even more that's not in the book.

• 2:13:13Speaker 01

  Correct.

• 2:13:14Jocko Willink?

  Uh, and that's kind of what you mentioned here. Looking back at this chain of relentless violence, from the sacrifice of Mansour, the agony of August 2nd, the continued, the continuous IED threats, to the devastating losses of December 6th, what stands out isn't the violence, but it's the bond it created. After long days and longer nights, after raids, firefights, and explosions, when we finally returned to the outpost and took off our helmets, there was always a quiet, subtle moment where we looked at each other and knew the simple truth, brothers in arms. We learned to breathe for one another, to watch each other's sectors without being asked, to memorize each man's footsteps, breathing patterns, sense of humor, and fears, but most important, to know instinctively when

• 2:13:59Jocko Willink?

  one of us was off, tired, hurting, scared, or angry. That bond saved lives. It kept us sane, and it gave us meaning during a year when death stalked us daily. I didn't realize it at the time, but brotherhood was the armor we wore beneath the Kevlar, beneath the plates, beneath the dust. That's why we survived Ramadi. That's why we remember. That's why I'm writing this book, to ensure this story isn't forgotten and is added to history books, so future generations will always remember what we fought for in Ramadi.

• 2:14:42Jocko Willink?

  Hundred percent. Hundred percent.

• 2:14:49Jocko Willink?

  You started, you mentioned this, uh, something that happened, which was rough. Uh, counting the days, you say the brotherhood we forged was our armor, but by the time the calendar turned into the final months of 2006, that armor was dented and heavy. We had survived the turning point of August, the brutal construction of the COPs, and the relentless IED strikes of November, December. We were tired, we were grieving, but we were also fueled by a single shimmering hope, January. Just as we were starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel, the news hit the wire. The First Brigade Combat Team received orders that changed everything. Our tour had been extended by an additional 46 days.

• 2:15:31Jocko Willink?

  The emotional strain was immediate and suffocating. It reached all the way back to the housing areas in Friedberg and Geeson, impacting wives, children, and parents who had already checked off 10 months from their calendars. In Ramadi, the extension was more than just a delay, it was a period of increased vulnerability. We were short timers who weren't short anymore. We had to fight the urge to check out mentally. We had to maintain the same discipline, the same IED sweeps, and the same house raids, even though our hearts were already halfway across the world. The extension was devastating because it asked for more from men who had already given everything they thought they had.

• 2:16:12Jocko Willink?

  How was it breaking the news to the boys on that one?

• 2:16:14Speaker 01

  That was tough.

• 2:16:21Speaker 01

  All the platoon leaders and all the leadership had to come to Kapurbadi. And we were giving the news that we were extended. And then, once again, it's like, you have to be careful what you say to the loved ones back home. And whether you want to or not, the news travels and it traveled quick. And so you had moms, dads, grandma, grandpas. Because remember, we were stationed out of Freiburg, Germany. And so you had loved ones that already had tickets from the States coming to Germany.

• 2:16:58Jocko Willink?

  And you had loved ones in Germany that had already seen their neighbors get the knock on the door and gone to memorial services over and over again.

• 2:17:07Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:17:08Jocko Willink?

  Devastating.

• 2:17:09Speaker 01

  Devastating.

• 2:17:10Jocko Willink?

  And I always say, you know, like, for, for the families that are home, when they're watching a soldier or sailor get buried, they, there's no way that they don't think that that, they know that that could be their, their soldier or their sailor. So it's very real. And all of a sudden, instead of coming home, where like you said, you have tickets, now we're getting, we're getting put in the, we don't know if he's coming home.

• 2:17:40Speaker 01

  Yeah. But, you know, the great thing about my soldiers, because, you know, a great, a great leader became a great leader because of strong NCOs and strong soldiers. And so my soldiers were hardcore veterans. The majority of them already had one or two deployments under their belts. And so they understood the mission. I mean, it's just outstanding soldiers. And they understood what the mission was. And like I wrote in the book, you know, the biggest thing is like, hey, guys, we're still here. We're not, you know, we're still in the fight.

• 2:18:21Speaker 01

  So whatever you do, just make sure that we continue to look after each other. Okay, it's forty, forty-six days, but we know the battle space, we know the streets. Keep your head in the game and we're gonna, we're gonna make it. We're gonna, you know, we're gonna survive this. And like, once again, all my NCOs and all my soldiers, I mean, just great all Americans. And I say it again, you know, I'm a great leader because I stood, you know, next to giants. All my NCOs and soldiers were just phenomenal. And, you know, the whole name of me, the pit bull is, is because I'm a little guy, but you mess with my soldiers, it's on.

• 2:19:06Speaker 01

  And there was times my soldiers had to, had to tell me, hey, sir, you're not gonna be the first one through the door, sir. Come on, please, don't do this to us. You can't stack and be the first one. Come on, sir, please. You know, be the third or, or just, just, just stay out this or don't, don't. But what type of a leader I would be if I, if I don't lead from the front? I mean, I never served in a Ranger regiment. But Ranger school to me and the Ranger tab meant something, lead by example. And so to circle back, you know, those forty-six days, it was hard to our families back home. But my soldiers and I, we stayed focused on the mission.

• 2:19:44Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, the way you, the way you put it in here, you say, we had, we had built the outpost. We had stood by the Iraqi police as they reclaimed their precinct. We had survived the darkest days of August and the fiery trials of December. As we entered those final grueling weeks, we did so with a grim, quiet pride. We weren't just staying because we were told to. We were staying to ensure that the progress we had brought with the lives of, we had bought with the lives of our brothers, Mark Lee, Michael Monsour, Megan McClung, Travis Patrickin, would not be undone in the final hour. We were tired, we were frustrated, and we were homesick, but we were still the ready first. We would finish the job.

• 2:20:23Speaker 01

  And as one three six, our motto is D's not words.

• 2:20:30Jocko Willink?

  And that's what you did. You guys kept pushing, you kept controlling, you kept working and, and you, you detail that in the book. Get the book so you can read through some of that. And eventually, you, you head home. And, I mean, the, the, the way you recount those things, the way you recount going home. Leaving Ramadi brought a surge of relief, but it was tempered by a heavy lingering shadow. We were leaving behind the streets where our brothers had fallen and the neighborhoods where we had grown old before our time. We were returning to Germany, changed men, bound together by a shared history that no civilian could ever truly grasp. We walked away with our heads high, knowing that we, that when the history of the Iraq war was written,

• 2:21:13Jocko Willink?

  we would, we, the stand we took in the heart of the great Sunni desert would be remembered as the moment the tide began to turn. We had survived, we had held, and finally, we were going home.

• 2:21:27Jocko Willink?

  The homecoming piece, go ahead.

• 2:21:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, and, and, and that flight back to Germany, oh God, that flight. You know, for fourteen months, you see battle hardened men, right? And in that flight, you see this warrior kind of weeping a little bit like, I'm coming home. You know, for fourteen months, you always had your sidearm, your M4, you always had, you know, a tool of war. And now on that flight home, it's like, hey, you can take off your Kevlar, you can take off your IVA and put it in your bag.

• 2:22:11Speaker 01

  And, and, you know, when you, and then when we landed in Germany, it was like a, at least for me, it was like a sense of overload because in Iraq, there was only one smell. And I, I know you can relate. You know, there's only one, one smell and that's just dirty uniform. And then we land in Germany and it's like, oh my Lord. You know, just, just all the smell of food, of just, just how beautiful Germany is. I mean, you know, the first Army Division prior to, I mean, right now, you know, they're in Fort Bliss, but back then, we were in Germany and Germany is so beautiful.

• 2:22:55Speaker 01

  The food, the beer, the women, the, the people. And so that flight back home was like a surreal and, and, and your senses were just... I do want to share the story. Remember at the beginning, I said, I have forty-five days to get ready for the deployment? Well, when we got back home to Germany, okay, we got back home to Germany. I see my loved ones, you know, I see my soldiers hugging their loved ones. And everybody's kind of going on their way and I'm standing there, centering myself. I don't remember where I live. I literally didn't remember where I lived because I got an apartment.

• 2:23:38Speaker 01

  And like two weeks later, I left after getting the apartment and I didn't really remember. And so it took me a while to kind of be driving around the neighborhood to be able to find where I live and, and I, and what helped me-

• 2:23:51Jocko Willink?

  Was it on base?

• 2:23:51Speaker 01

  No, no, it was off base. It was off base. And back then, it's not like today that you have the technology, Google map, there was, it was, it was this. But, but Staff San Krujoff, since he was married, you know, Staff San, he, he also lived off base and he lived above me. And so I'm like, Staff San Krujoff, man, how, how do, how do we get to my house? And so he kind of gave me an idea and let me tell you, Jocko, when I, when I got to my house, when I got to my apartment and I opened the door, you know what my landlady did? Because I only met her briefly when I signed for the apartment. My German landlady left me a six pack of beer in the refrigerator.

• 2:24:35Jocko Willink?

  Jack, outstanding. Salute to the Fräulein that did that. Yeah, that's awesome. The strange face of peace, there was excitement, yes, but there was something deeper disbelief. That's, that's why I highlighted this, because there is a disbelief. We had spent so much time preparing for loss, scanning for IDs, bracing for impact, that the sudden absence of threat felt strange, almost uncomfortable. Peace was a language we hadn't spoken in thirteen months. We were all a bit rusty. And then, you know, you, you go through this stuff, and again, this is beautiful writing. The families, the silent frontline at home, you talk about them, you talk about the reunion. There was laughter that turned to sobbing, hugs that lasted until muscles cramped,

• 2:25:19Jocko Willink?

  small hands clutching our uniforms as if the children were afraid we might vanish back into the dust if they let go. Moment of, it was the first real moment of relief for over a year.

• 2:25:29Speaker 01

  And let me take a quick pause there. That picture is Captain Metley. He was our XO. And so when, when his kids saw him and the wife saw him, they were like, they were not like, they were not going to let him go. And so I, I, I, I saw the picture and I had to put it in there, so, but yeah.

• 2:25:53Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's just beautiful to read. Fast forward a little bit. At one point, you talk about standing beside Colonel Sean McFarlane, possessed by, possessed its own unique weight. Being next to him at that moment was an honor I felt in my bones. He wasn't just the senior officer in a combat uniform. He was the leader whose strategic audacity and unwavering resolve had shaped the entire fight in Ramadi. His leadership hadn't been a detached theory from a distance, had distant headquarters. It mattered on the ground, in the dirt, and in the dangerous alleys where it counted most. Standing there beside him, both of us in uniform, after everything we'd endured, felt like standing at the crossroads of sacrifice and achievement.

• 2:26:37Jocko Willink?

  A specific kind of pride, not the loud boastful kind, but the steady internal kind. It's the pride that comes from knowing you are a vital part of something much bigger than yourself. It's the kind of pride that acknowledges the staggering cost of victory without glorifying violence. Understanding that true leadership is about the heavy responsibility taken on under impossible circumstances.

• 2:27:05Speaker 01

  As you read that, I do want to share this about, well, now, Lieutenant General McFarlane. Great leader. I don't remember all the details of what happened. It's still a little blurry, but I do remember I was up, we were out all night. I can't remember what, but I know that we were out all night. And the following morning, um, he wanted to talk to me. So he came from Cap Falcon, from Cap Ramadi to see us. And literally, he walked into the room where I was just passed out. And he's like, hey, Miguel, hey, Pitbull. I, you know, I kind of opened my eyes and he's standing there and I'm like, holy shit.

• 2:27:49Speaker 01

  I'm gonna get fired. I think I did something wrong. Shit, was I too aggressive? Oh, my God, what did I do wrong? He's like, hey, relax, Miguel. Just clean up and come see me. And, um, so my platoon sons, all my soldiers were like, oh, my God, I hope we don't lose the platoon leader. But, uh, he, you know, what made, you know, what made McFarlane such a great leader was just like Tedesco and all of them. He wanted to know from the tip of the spear, from his platoon leader, what happened. He didn't want the information to get lost, you know, through the staff.

• 2:28:31Speaker 01

  And so we sat there for a good hour, just talking about, you know, what I saw, what I did, what are my recommendations? And he just took it all in and, and I, I respect that. I really do. Because it wasn't once or twice, he was always there, just like Tedesco. Tedesco led from the front. You know, they didn't hide, um, at Camp Ramadi or, or, or behind the staff. They were there in the front lines with us. And anytime there was a big engagement, they were either there or they, they came, you know, shortly after to get the information directly from us.

• 2:29:14Speaker 01

  And so at no time did I worried about, did I do the right thing or not? Because I knew, I knew that I, I knew that I can trust on them. And, and they, well, they also knew that, you know, I was an older platoon leader. I was thirty-five. But I, once again, I respect that they always came to see me and ask for my input.

• 2:29:39Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, um, can't, can't say enough good things about General McFarlane and Tedesco. They're just great. Um, and there was, you know, go right down the list of outstanding battalion commanders and company commanders. There's just so many great people.

• 2:29:58Speaker 01

  I, I didn't put this in the book, but I'm gonna, I'm gonna share it. And I hope Colonel Tedesco doesn't mind. But, um, him and I have a wonderful relationship. His hour started. Colonel Tedesco, I'm sorry, I will have to, I, I'm gonna share it with the world. So the first time I met Colonel Tedesco, it was, I believe, in Carrigato. And so all the tanks and the Bradleys.

• 2:30:24Jocko Willink?

  Okay, that's where you guys, that's where your vehicles showed up.

• 2:30:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, that's where we all met. And so I, I kept it out of the book, but, you know, this is in honor of Colonel Tedesco. And so, um, we all converge in Carrigato and, you know, we're all getting out of our vehicles and we're all converging in the center. And, uh, as I'm walking there, you know, I'm only five-four, I'm a little guy. And, uh, Colonel Tedesco sees me, he walks right up to me and shakes my hand and goes, you're gonna do great things in my task force. And I was like, and I'm thinking, oh, my God, am I in trouble already? You know, I just, I just, I'm, I'm just meeting him for the first time. And I was like, yes, sir. He, and he looks at me, goes, you know why?

• 2:31:12Speaker 01

  I was like, no, sir. He goes, you're the first man that I can see eye to eye. I don't trust these, these tall men next to me, but you I can trust. Eye to eye, you're gonna do great things in my task force. And, and I was like, yes, sir, you know? And so that's how we began our relationship. And, and I'll tell you, twenty years later, I will follow Colonel Tedesco to the end. Along with, you know, Sean McFarlane and Bayama and Captain McCusker. I mean, once again, great leaders. You know, if people look at me as a great leader, it's not necessarily me. I'm a humble person. I'm a great leader because I was surrounded by the, by giants between NCOs and, and great officers.

• 2:31:56Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah, the thing that I, I realized about all these guys, and it was real obvious even being there, is all these leaders, what makes them so awesome is they just cared about the troops. And look, they were, they were doing everything they could to get the mission done and did get the mission done. But everybody, I mean, I, everybody just cared so much about making sure we do everything that we could to keep the troops as, as safe as possible. And it, you know, and it's not easy. It's not easy when they are, when they are getting wounded and they are getting killed. It is hard to, to maintain and always put them first and care about them so much when you know you're also gonna put them at risk.

• 2:32:38Jocko Willink?

  It's very, very difficult, but all of them, it was always front of mind. And you could see it, you didn't have to hear them talk about it, you could see it, you could feel it in the meetings, the way operations were planned, the way operations were directed. It was, it was, we care about the troops. We care about the soldiers, the sailors, the airmen, the Marines that are out there, they're gonna have to do this stuff. Uh, and that, that caring that they all displayed was very obvious. And I think that's what kept everyone so, uh, that made everyone trust him so much. You, you, you also, in the book, um, you, you pay tribute to a lot of the, to a lot of the leaders that you worked with. You got Tedesco in here.

• 2:33:23Speaker 01

  Well, I, I, the final chapter of the book, let, let me just, um, add this because, you know, the whole idea of this book was just a memoir for my soldiers and the loved ones. And Strategic Book Advisors, the, the self-published company that I went with, um, just when I thought the book was done, they're like, oh, no, you're not done. I'm like, I don't understand. They're like, you brought us back twenty years ago. We wanna know, where are you guys today? You have to add another chapter and tell us. Where are the soldiers that fought in Ramadi twenty years later? And so the final chapter is about where we're at today.

• 2:34:07Speaker 01

  And that's where I, I, I, I give tribute to the leaders and some of the soldiers, um, and kind of where we're at today.

• 2:34:17Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. Yeah, and I mean, the, the chapter before that is remembering our fallen. And so you do a great job of telling about the people that you lost and, you know, give them a quick bio about who they were so they're remembered. And then you, like, like you just said, you go through some of these, some of the leaders, you know, some of the people that you worked with, um, Colonel Tedesco, you know, among the leaders who shaped the Battle of Ramadi, few left a stronger impression on the soldiers who fought there than Lieutenant Colonel Tedesco. He carried forward a proud family legacy of military service as a third-generation warfighter. Following both his grandfather and father in serving the nation, his commitment to the Army represented something far deeper than a profession.

• 2:35:01Jocko Willink?

  It reflected a lifelong devotion to his duty, service and sacrifice and service to the country. In many ways, his career embodied the true meaning of patriotism, loyalty, and honor the United States American flag values he not only believed in but demonstrated daily through his leadership in combat and his dedication to the soldiers under his command. As battalion commander, he embodied the kind of leadership soldiers immediately recognized and trusted. Calm under pressure, tactically brilliant, physically present in the fight, and relentlessly committed to accomplishing the mission while taking care of his men. From the moment Bravo Company First Battalion Thirty-Six Infantry Regiment fell under his command, Lieutenant Colonel Tedesco treated the soldiers as his own. He did not lead from a distant command post or rely solely on reports filtered through layers of staff officers.

• 2:35:46Jocko Willink?

  He led from the front, understanding that the battlefield, that battlefield leadership required visibility, presence, and trust. We all knew we would never, we all knew he would never ask them to go somewhere he was unwilling to go himself. And the reason, one of the reasons I highlighted that is because that's exactly the way he trained, treated my SEALs as well, and me, was like, we were part of his unit. And that's exactly how I felt. Captain Bayama, as commander of Bravo Company operating at Cop Falcon, Captain Bayama established himself as an aggressive, decisive, and highly respected battlefield leader whose presence shaped the tempo and effectiveness of operations within Cop Falcon. In the brutal urban battlefield of Ramadi, hesitation could cost lives.

• 2:36:28Jocko Willink?

  Captain Bayama understood that success demanded leaders who could make rapid decisions under pressure while maintaining complete confidence in their soldiers and equipment. A tanker by trade and a warrior by nature, he brought a level of technical proficiency and combat knowledge that gave us confidence during the most dangerous operations. Whether maneuvering armored vehicles through narrow streets, coordinating combined arms firepower, or leading patrols into contested neighborhoods, he consistently demonstrated mastery of urban combat operations. Captain Bayama led from the front. He did not command from a distance or ask us to face dangers he was unwilling to face himself. His leadership style was aggressive but disciplined, always focused on maintaining initiative against an adaptive and determined insurgency. We all knew that when fighting, when the fighting intensified, he would be exactly

• 2:37:13Jocko Willink?

  where he needed to be, forward, engaged, and fully committed to the mission. And I'll add a footnote there, probably launching some main gun rounds.

• 2:37:23Jocko Willink?

  You got First Sergeant Louis Duran, the operational bedrock of the outpost. First Sergeant Louis Duran was the bedrock of our unit, the steady dependable leader whose presence brought order, discipline, and confidence during some of the most difficult moments of the deployment in the chaos of combat operations within Falcon. He served as the backbone of the company, balancing toughness with genuine care for the soldiers under his responsibility, whether inside the tactical operations center or out amongst the men. First Sergeant Duran led with quiet professionalism and an unwavering sense of duty that earned the respect of everyone around him. And you go through a lot of these different leaders and get the book so you can hear these tributes.

• 2:38:06Jocko Willink?

  One of them, Michael Auten, who we mentioned earlier, you asked him, you showed him a picture, and, or no, you asked him this question, what, what does Ramadi mean to you 20 years later? And I'll fast forward a little bit on his response, but he says, Ramadi was literally hell on earth. The fight day in and day out was forever changing. The threat of IEDs was tremendous from day one, but only got worse over the 10-month deployment. Every patrol, mounted or dismounted, was stressful, and the thought of not making it off the patrol was real. Every rooftop, every person, every piece of trash was a threat, a threat you could not identify. It was a nightmare every second. Ramadi turned little boys into stone-cold, heartless killers and made even those soldiers

• 2:38:50Jocko Willink?

  who didn't really like each other at first become brothers. It built bonds that never could be broken, bonds that will last a lifetime. Looking back at the Battle of Ramadi, I can say it was one of the proudest things I have done in my life. Though it was a nightmare and not enjoyable, I am proud to have been a part of history. In a sense, Ramadi meant life or death to me. Oftentimes, when I got in my darkest days, I referred back to the days of that battle. When I wanted to take my own life at one point, I couldn't because of the men I fought alongside in Ramadi. I couldn't take my own life because I would have failed my brothers from Ramadi. I do, I know they suffer from the same emotions, nightmares, et cetera, that I do. How could I be so weak as to leave them on this earth alone?

• 2:39:32Jocko Willink?

  I owe it to them to fight the demons we all share together. Maybe my living is the reason a brother holds on. If I break, would it encourage another brother to take his own life? I have asked myself this question often. So what Ramadi means to me is life. We must live on regardless, or else we let the place we hate more than anything win. And it does not deserve to claim another brother who fought and won a battle that nobody thought could be won.

• 2:40:04Speaker 01

  That says it all right there.

• 2:40:08Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it does.

• 2:40:09Speaker 01

  And so, once again, just like Sergeant Auten said, what type of a leader I would be if I didn't write this book? We owe it, you know, to our fallen, to make sure that the stories and the legacy carries on for future generations.

• 2:40:27Jocko Willink?

  And like I said, I've read a couple of these. You got more of them in there, super impactful. Like I said, you got the, the memory for the fallen as well. I want to close out with this section of the book. You say, "We were the ready first. We held the line when it mattered most. And though the years have passed and our hair is grayed, we remain bound by a bond that time cannot touch. I wrote this so that my sons and yours will know that there was a time in a broken city far away when ordinary men did extraordinary things for one another.

• 2:41:11Jocko Willink?

  Deeds, not words." Miguel Santana, Major, US Army, retired, Ramadi, 2006, 2007. Deeds Not Words. And you and your soldiers certainly lived that mantra without question. What was your, when you got home, what was your next assignment after Ramadi?

• 2:41:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, when I got home, like I said, I, as an officer, I was commissioned infantry. And so I went to infantry school, ranger school, and all of that. However, about three, about six months after coming back home, there was a company commander back in Iraq, back in Ramadi, this, the same battle space that we just left, that had a family, I don't want to say on here.

• 2:42:13Jocko Willink?

  Some family emergency.

• 2:42:14Speaker 01

  Family emergency, and he had to be taken out. And so, the CG, you know, I got called into a room and I was told, hey, there's a company commander downrange, we got to take him out, we got to replace him.

• 2:42:31Jocko Willink?

  He was in Ramadi?

• 2:42:32Speaker 01

  And, and he, he was, well, that's, that's the interesting part. This company commander was commanding a finance company responsible for MNF West, the whole financial footprint. And so he needed to be replaced. And so here I am, an infantry officer. I got called into a room and asked, would you be willing to go back? And I mean, it was what, six months? We just came back? And so it was asked of me, hey, would you be willing to go back and take command prior to going to the captain's career course and take command of a finance company, your own battle space, but in addition to Ramadi, you're going to be responsible for Al Assad,

• 2:43:16Speaker 01

  HIT, TQ, Fallujah, all of it, all the financial footprint. And I was like, well, I'm an infantry guy. And they're like, yeah, but you also were assessed as a future potential finance officer, comptroller. The army's changing. And so this concept of creating comptrollers, you know, S8s, G8s, we're starting. And so here I am, I, I just led an infantry platoon for 18 months and, you know, and next year, you know, I find myself going back to Iraq as a company commander. I penned and I put captain's bar in route back to, back to Iraq and took command of

• 2:43:59Speaker 01

  a finance company responsible for the whole financial footprint. And that was kind of, it was kind of weird, Jocko, because going back to your old battle space, emotionally, it was like, wait a second, I'm not the platoon leader, I'm the commander now. And my finance soldiers were like, sir, why do you want to go back to Ramadi? Why do you want to see Captain Falcon? They didn't understand the reasons why I was emotionally attached so much to Ramadi and Captain Falcon. And so, as I went back to Ramadi and visited all the battle spaces, battalion and brigade commanders were confused because, you know, my uniform showed infantry, CIB, Ranger

• 2:44:44Speaker 01

  tab, and it's like, you're the finance commander? Like, yeah, I'm the finance commander, I'm, I'm what is called a, a future S8 embedded within the brigades, but responsible for the financial footprint. And so I went back for another 12 months and led in the same battle space. And what I, what I can share with you guys is this, is that I'm glad I went right back because I got a chance to see Falcon when we left it. And about eight months later, Falcon, completely different. Soldiers were walking around without hard hats, IBAs, and it was a softer Ramadi.

• 2:45:29Speaker 01

  And that was weird for me.

• 2:45:30Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that was weird for me. The guys, eventually we got the pictures sent back for the guys that, that were replaced us. And, you know, it's like kids, girls, going to girl's school, running, running, road races down Route Michigan, just all that stuff.

• 2:45:45Speaker 01

  And it's funny because I never stopped taking pictures. So like, I have a picture of Captain Falcon when I left, next to another picture that I took, and it was like, wow, it's just so amazing. And so for me, it was, it gave me an opportunity to find closure because I was able to finally see what happened. I was actually given the opportunity to see what we fought for. But once again, August 2nd has never been the same for me, but at least I got a chance to see, because a lot of soldiers got hurt, got back sent, you know, got sent back to Germany, and they never found closure.

• 2:46:30Speaker 01

  Like, for example, Sergeant King, after he got blown up on the Humvee, he didn't come back from the deployment. And so, sitting and talking to him, it's like, man, sir, there's, there's, there's a piece that is missing. What happened afterwards? And just talking to him and helping him close those gaps and filling those missing gaps that for years he's been carrying, it's just, it's just a beautiful experience.

• 2:46:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's, one of the things that I told the guys that came to the task, you know, Bruce's reunion is there's, there's like a scene in Band of Brothers, where the German general is addressing, after they've surrendered, he's addressing his troops. And, you know, he tells them, it's been a long war, it's been a hard war. You fought proudly and bravely for your country, you're a special group, you've formed a bond that only exists in combat and it only exists amongst brothers who have shared foxholes, who have held each other in dire moments, who have seen death and who have suffered together.

• 2:47:39Jocko Willink?

  And I've explained it to them that, you know, while while that German general is giving that speech, there's an American that's translating it. And they all realize that what he's saying is true, regardless of what side you're on. And it also made me realize that for the Germans in that moment, the war was over. And for the Americans in that moment, the war was over. But us coming home from Ramadi, in Ta- it for us in our task, we came home in October. The war's not over. It's there's no end to it in sight. We just, you know, guys went got into another platoon, got into another task unit, guys, some guys went to training. It's just everybody kind of moves on, but there's no, as you put it, closure. And I think there's a lot of Americans, you know, a lot of Americans, we didn't really get that. And so, you know,

• 2:48:20Jocko Willink?

  I never said to him, like, hey, you guys did a great job. Like, you know, guy was checking out, going to a different command, you know. So I think the fact that you got to go back over there and set foot in and Leif got to see it, too, I think in 2009. And, you know, in I want to say his last deployment was in 2009 or 2010. They had one in all of Al Anbar province during his six month deployment. They had one casualty. A guy got injured in a vehicle roll. That was it. In all of Al Anbar province. I mean, that's totally insane. So yeah, that's great that you got to go back there.

• 2:48:58Speaker 01

  But you know what's also interesting, too, Jocko, is that, um, oh, five, oh, six, oh, seven, we were at the peak of the war. And so deployments was just back to back, back to back. Like, for example, yeah, I went back to Ramadi after six months for another 12 months. But and then I, from there, when I came back, it was like, hey, you, I'm thinking I'm going to the infantry captain's career course. They're like, no, no, no, you're going to go to the finance captain's career course. And so I went to the finance captain's career course to become a comptroller. And immediately, I got orders back to German, well, back to Italy with the 173rd Infantry Brigade. And so I did another 12 months with the airborne

• 2:49:43Speaker 01

  brigade.

• 2:49:44Jocko Willink?

  And where was that?

• 2:49:46Speaker 01

  At a Vicenza, Italy.

• 2:49:47Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 2:49:48Speaker 01

  And we went to Afghanistan.

• 2:49:49Jocko Willink?

  And and you were doing the comptroller stuff over in Afghanistan? What years was that?

• 2:49:54Speaker 01

  That was, um, 2012.

• 2:50:00Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 2:50:01Speaker 01

  2012, 2011, 2012. And and it was interesting, because Afghanistan, completely different from Iraq. Completely, the dynamics of it. And even though I'm the comptroller, I'm the SA, responsible for all the financial funding that's operating. Um, you know, Afghanistan was just different. You know, what we did in Ramadi was backstreet fighting. Afghanistan, totally different terrain. And so with the 173rd, I was still typical this beer. I was still involved. I still went out. Because I wanted to understand if I'm going to pull

• 2:50:44Speaker 01

  resources, funding resources and fund what the soldiers needed. I needed to be able to understand and see it firsthand. And so I went out. I'm still an infantry officer.

• 2:50:56Jocko Willink?

  Still pit bull.

• 2:50:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, still the pit bull.

• 2:51:00Jocko Willink?

  And then I I think, um, you, your last big thing was the financial planner for Operation Atlantic Resolve. That was what, 2014?

• 2:51:09Speaker 01

  2014, yeah.

• 2:51:11Jocko Willink?

  And so now, this is after the Russians invade the Crimean peninsula there, or whatever, annexed it?

• 2:51:18Speaker 01

  Yeah. And so when when I came back from Afghanistan, um, that was going on. And I was pulled from Vicenza, Italy, back to Germany at the headquarters level. So I was at the G8 now. And I was the deputy chief of the tactical branch within the resource management team. And so I was hand selected as part of this team, because back then it was completely classified. Nobody knew what we were doing. And so my responsibility was to build this funding package. To bring soldiers to Europe. And it was the biggest movement of troops and equipment since World War Two. And so I was funding missions that was in,

• 2:52:01Speaker 01

  I mean, the news is out anyway, so I guess I can talk about it. But like, I was funding missions in Poland, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Romania, in addition to Germany, and all these training exercises. So like, if you go back and you pull the original funding order, you're going to see my name on it. And so that was my big, um, I don't consider a deployment, because I was already stationed out of Europe. I spent almost 10 years operating out of Europe. And and I understood the culture, I understood the language, I understood the exchange rate, I understood the infantry aspect of it, plus the funding aspect of it. And so it just, for me, it was just, I loved it.

• 2:52:45Jocko Willink?

  What made you decide to retire?

• 2:52:48Speaker 01

  Ah, that's a tough, that's a, that's a difficult one. But, um, my third deployment in Afghanistan, um, was pretty rough. And I can see my body changing. I'm not going to share everything, but what I can say is, is that, um, the injuries that I sustained as a platoon leader, as a company commander, it started creeping up on me. And so, um, when my wife had our second child, you know, I have two beautiful boys, Michael and Matthew. I mean, they're just the love of my life, you know. I I see myself through them. But

• 2:53:29Speaker 01

  when my second boy, Matthew, was born, I was having a hard time taking care of him. I didn't understand why my hand was, my right hand was shaking. You know, I was, I was taking Tylenol, Advil's, molten like Tic Tacs, you know, like just popping them in, you know. And I'm like, I didn't really know the difference between a headache and migraines. I didn't know, I didn't understand what was happening to my body. And then one day, my wife said, no. You know, as a loving wife and soulmate, she's like, no, we need to find out. And so I went to launch store and they did the MRIs and they did all the tests and discovered that I did sustain traumatic brain injury. And so the condition that I have was officially

• 2:54:09Speaker 01

  like, for years, I didn't really know why my hand was shaking, why sometimes my voice, you know, the pitch changed. And then finally, the doctor broke it down and said, hey, you suffer from essential tremor. And I didn't believe it. But once I saw the MRIs, and then the doctor said, flat out, you know, Muhammad Ali? Oh, yeah. Greatest boxer. He's like, yeah, well, you know, he got too many concussions that that eventually became Parkinson's. Is that what you want for yourself? You know, because at the time, I was still on jump status. Even though I was a comptroller, I was still living the infantry lifestyle. And then at that moment in time, I realized that, hey,

• 2:54:52Speaker 01

  you know, I have a duty. I led soldiers in combat, but now I have the ultimate responsibility, and it's my wife and my boys. And we, my wife and I, we prayed about it. And that's when the decision was made that it's best for me to to retire. And it's interesting, um, I will mention his name, because he was a great mentor to mine. Um, at the time, he was Major Lackey. He was the, he was the, um, the brigade, the brigade S3 with the 173rd under Colonel Roland, now General Roland. Um, he became the infantry branch manager. And he called me, he's like, hey, Miguel, I got the perfect assignment for you. The

• 2:55:36Speaker 01

  75th Ranger Regiment, um, in about a year from now, needs a comptroller. I put your name in the hat, you got it. And I'm like, okay. He's like, don't worry about, I'll take care of the finance branch. But we're going to make it work. And so, you know, you have this beautiful career, you know, and, uh, I had to make the tough decision to say, hey, I appreciate it, sir. But I think it's time for me to retire and come home and take care of my family and take care of myself.

• 2:56:06Jocko Willink?

  Yes, indeed.

• 2:56:07Speaker 01

  And so that was, that was the reason why I retired.

• 2:56:12Jocko Willink?

  And so what are you doing now?

• 2:56:17Speaker 01

  I retired in uniform, but I didn't retired.

• 2:56:21Jocko Willink?

  Of course.

• 2:56:24Speaker 01

  Um, so I retired as a, as a soldier, but I, I continue service. And so as of, as of September, I was the G8. So I, I joined the civilian workforce as a, as a federal civilian. And, um, I worked out of Southern Command, the United States Army Miami Garrison, supporting Southern Command. And so I was the Garrison G8, the comptroller for the Garrison. And, um, I did that for a couple of years. But once again, Ramadi was here. And so in September, you know, with the government shutdown and all that, I, I saw the opportunity.

• 2:57:07Speaker 01

  And so I, I left that and committed to, to writing this book for my soldiers. And so what am I doing right now? Right now, you know, what's my goal?

• 2:57:19Jocko Willink?

  Hang out with your wife and kids?

• 2:57:21Speaker 01

  Besides that.

• 2:57:24Speaker 01

  Besides that, um, because my wife just said, you gotta lead. The amount of calls that I get from my soldiers and family members. And so what do I want to share with the world is? A soldier will always be a soldier. My dad, my dad is 87 years old.

• 2:57:45Speaker 01

  All right. And my dad, if I tell him, dad, I, I stand up, I want to salute.

• 2:57:52Speaker 01

  I, it's funny because I outrank my dad.

• 2:57:58Speaker 01

  And I said, dad, I want to salute. At 87 years old, you see my dad muster the strength and the courage to stand up. So we can salute each other. And so with that being said is, I'm going to continue to lead.

• 2:58:14Speaker 01

  What has helped me to this point is realizing there's nothing wrong with us.

• 2:58:21Speaker 01

  We just simply transformed ourselves.

• 2:58:26Speaker 01

  A, a leader will always be a leader, a soldier will always be a soldier. And so as a veteran, I'm going to continue to lead. You know, like this book took 20 years.

• 2:58:38Speaker 01

  Jocko, I can't stop it. I'm still, I'm writing another book.

• 2:58:42Jocko Willink?

  Awesome.

• 2:58:43Speaker 01

  I'm writing another book because my brother Jose taught me a lesson. At 57, he passed away.

• 2:58:56Speaker 01

  We're not going to live forever. And so what type of a leader I ask again, would I be? If I don't put all the lessons learned onto a book that's going to help? It has helped me tremendously, but it's also going to help my soldiers and family members. I mean, right now it's, it's kind of overwhelming too, because the amount of emails. Like I, I, I do want to share the story. Simon Wilson, I'm sorry, I, I will have to share it. But I went to see Kent Wilson. In the book, I called him the builder up in North Carolina. Every year we, we go out of our way to make sure we have a reunion, just like Sean Arton, Sean Guzman. I mean, a lot of my NCOs, I stay connected with them.

• 2:59:39Speaker 01

  And so, you know, I went to see him and it was like, we sign each other's book. And the beautiful thing about that relationship is that we still hold each other's accountable. As we're sitting by the lake, beautiful lake, beautiful house. You know, we talk about Ramadi and we see the wives and the kids playing. It's like, wow, we did that. We created that. And he's always doing some project. He's always helping his community. He's always doing something. He's right now involved in helping rebuild one, um, remodel one of the churches. In the small, you know, North Carolina town where he lives.

• 3:00:24Speaker 01

  And so it's like, as a veteran, he's still leading.

• 3:00:28Speaker 01

  As a greeting CO, he's still leading. So once again, what type of a leader am I going to be? Am I going to continue to hide? No, rain, you know, once again, I never served in a Ranger bat. But Ranger School means something to me. The TAB means something to me. I, I have to continue to lead. And so the next book is to help, is to help soldiers. How do you overcome multiple deployments? How do you overcome injuries? How do you overcome family reintegration? It took a lot for me to talk about my tremors. Because I, I, I was struggling. Why is my hand shaking? My wife had to help me shave, tie my shoes at one point.

• 3:01:13Speaker 01

  And so by the grace of God, histamine blockers, regular allergy medicine. I don't know, but it helps me. And so I'm back. The pit bull is back.

• 3:01:27Jocko Willink?

  Pit bull is back.

• 3:01:28Speaker 01

  And so we have to lead and take care of our soldiers. It doesn't matter if we're veterans, if we're back home, we have to lead.

• 3:01:40Jocko Willink?

  Yes, indeed.

• 3:01:44Jocko Willink?

  Where can people find you? You got migelsantana.com?

• 3:01:48Speaker 01

  Correct.

• 3:01:49Jocko Willink?

  I'm surprised you were able to get that. That's pretty awesome that you're able to get that. Good job.

• 3:01:52Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 3:01:53Jocko Willink?

  You got a YouTube channel, Santana Channel Official, which currently has zero videos on it. I looked last night, so no pressure. You can't lead with no videos. You gotta get some videos on there.

• 3:02:03Speaker 01

  Well, let me just explain. So, so the whole idea of, I, I never had a digital footprint. I mean, I had free book, but just, just so that I can keep up with my soldiers. But the whole idea of the book, the, the self-publishing company that went through, they're like, hey, you need a website. And so the website is the extension of the book.

• 3:02:23Jocko Willink?

  And that's the migelsantana.com.

• 3:02:24Speaker 01

  Correct, correct. That's the domain that I bought.

• 3:02:26Jocko Willink?

  Echo, if you're looking for the links on there for his Instagram or his Twitter, click on them. They don't go anywhere. He's got no Instagram, no Twitter.

• 3:02:33Speaker 01

  Not yet, not yet, not yet. But, but the website, what, what, what, what I'm, I'm going to do different is that if you read the book and you go to the website, there's pictures of us, there's pictures of you, there's pictures of us. I, I, there's a part that it's deployment photos. And some of these pictures that are in black and white, they're on the website and they're colored. And then I have another folder for reunions. And you and I attended the 20 year reunion. But in addition to that, my soldiers have been having their own little reunions. And so I'm, I'm uploading those pictures there. And in addition to that, what am I going to do? I have a lot of videos. I'm going to start sharing videos because what good is me having all these videos?

• 3:03:18Speaker 01

  I have to share it with the world so that way people can truly get the full experience of what Ramadi was for us.

• 3:03:24Jocko Willink?

  Echo, um, can he not take those videos, put them on the YouTube channel and then link it through the website?

• 3:03:30Speaker 01

  What do you mean?

• 3:03:31Jocko Willink?

  So he's got videos, put them on the YouTube channel and then post them on the website through the YouTube channel. That'd be a good move, right?

• 3:03:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 3:03:38Jocko Willink?

  All right. So when you re-listen to this, you hear what I just said and it'll make sense. Or you'll tell your, your, probably one of your sons will be able to do this better than you, but you know?

• 3:03:47Jocko Willink?

  That's awesome. Yeah, so migelsantana.com, the YouTube channel Santana Channel Official, uh, Facebook, Miguel N. Santana. And that's where you're at right now. Echo Charles, you got any questions?

• 3:04:00Speaker 01

  I have a couple.

• 3:04:02Jocko Willink?

  Comes to be a real interview.

• 3:04:03Speaker 01

  Might sound kind of random, but I've been, I've been wondering this for a long time. So let's say you're in a firefight, right? You, you, let's say we eliminate three combatants, right? They die. What happens to those guys? Does somebody come and clean them up or like what up?

• 3:04:25Speaker 01

  Out of respect, um, anytime we engage someone, the insurgents did have, um, code of honor. They would, they will come and pick up the deceased.

• 3:04:39Jocko Willink?

  You could, you literally watch them do it.

• 3:04:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, for real.

• 3:04:42Jocko Willink?

  Like they would come and grab their guys and they would put, put them and they'd bring them out to the Ramadi General Hospital or bring them to another site. If they didn't get recovered, they'd get dogs on them.

• 3:04:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:04:52Jocko Willink?

  And then, yeah.

• 3:04:54Speaker 01

  Straight up dogs.

• 3:04:55Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 3:04:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. Oh, crazy. And then also, um, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, if, if they died, they had to bury them before either sunrise or sunset. Oh, okay. So they had, they had a protocol. Yeah, they had a protocol, but for the most part, they, they try to recover the body. Hmm, it's crazy. What kind of beer did your landlady leave you? Oh man, I, I don't remember. All I know was a. Cause Germans have good beer. Oh, yes.

• 3:05:19Jocko Willink?

  You know, you know what the most popular beer in, I might be wrong about this, might be Urban Legend, but you know what the most popular beer in Germany is?

• 3:05:26Speaker 01

  What, Bex?

• 3:05:27Jocko Willink?

  Budweiser. Is that, you think that's true?

• 3:05:30Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. I mean, for.

• 3:05:31Jocko Willink?

  I heard that at like, at Oktoberfest, which I've been to, which is in September oddly enough, right? Isn't it in September?

• 3:05:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, it's in between.

• 3:05:39Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, it's, it's, uh, they're like, oh, the most, the most drank beer. Now, look, I might, I might catch hell, I might be totally wrong, but that's the Urban Legend that I heard.

• 3:05:47Speaker 01

  But, but here's the thing, the beautiful thing about Germany is like, any restaurant you would go to, um, you can order any type of beer. I mean, coming back from a deployment, everything was good. Everything was good. And so I, I liked, sometimes I would have a, a Pierce, a light beer or the, the Dunker, the, the dark German beer. And it was just, it was all delicious. But you don't remember what kind that was? No, I don't. All I know was, because I didn't leave nothing in the refrigerator. And so, um, I opened the fridge and I was like, oh my God, it was a six pack of, uh, German beer. And, and all my gear, I threw it right, right by the living room.

• 3:06:27Speaker 01

  And it was funny because the following day, when my son says, well, I took a shower and went to bed, but the following day, when I woke up, I'm like, what, what is that smell? And it was all my gear right there by the entrance, you know? And some of my pants were so, um, you know, sweat, like you can, they would stand by themselves. You know, and that white, you remember the white, you sweat so much that, that your pants and your shirt will be white. And it's all that ammonia from your body.

• 3:06:57Speaker 01

  It's crazy. Cool, man. That's all I got.

• 3:06:59Jocko Willink?

  Any other questions for Echo Charles?

• 3:07:00Speaker 01

  No, no, no. All good, good to meet you, sir.

• 3:07:03Jocko Willink?

  Miguel, any, uh, any closing, closing thoughts?

• 3:07:05Speaker 01

  Yes, um, once again, 20 years in the making, I want to thank you, you know, for welcoming me and giving me this platform and allowing me to, to bring unheard voices to the world, because it's not about me, it's about my soldiers. And also helping moms and dads, brothers and sisters to truly get to understand what Ramadi was all about. And also to help the SEALs team fill in some of those gaps. You guys never knew I had those pictures of Captain Falcon.

• 3:07:39Speaker 02

  And I'm, you know, I, I really started sharing him. And so even though 20 years have passed, a blink of an eye still feels like you and I never missed a beat.

• 3:07:52Jocko Willink?

  Absolutely. Well, thank you so much for joining us. Thanks for writing this book. Um, it's incredible to see you again. It's it's awesome to see you down at the Ready First reunion. Awesome to see you at the Task Unit Breazer reunion. And, and now to be able to sit with you, to read your book over the past, you know, couple of weeks, read your book, go through it, look at the pictures. This has been, it's been incredible. And so thank you for that. Thank you for passing on the lessons that you learned. Thank you for remembering the fallen. Thank you for remembering and giving a voice to your soldiers who were just absolutely outstanding.

• 3:08:30Jocko Willink?

  It's a tribute to them. And thank you for your service to our great nation, but most of all from me.

• 3:08:39Jocko Willink?

  Thank you for what you and your soldiers did for me and for my SEALs. You all risked your lives to save ours and we are eternally grateful for that. And we will always consider you and your soldiers and the soldiers and Marines of the Ready First Brigade Combat Team are brothers. So thank you.

• 3:09:03Speaker 02

  Thank you.

• 3:09:06Jocko Willink?

  And with that, Miguel Pitbull Santana has left the building. Outstanding guy. Outstanding human being, outstanding leader, outstanding soldier with outstanding troops. So real honor to have him on here and just be able to discuss the incredible things that they did. And again, you know,

• 3:09:29Jocko Willink?

  such the, you know, I hit the real high level today. The book hits like one level below that. But you, you just can't capture this, what was going on every single day and what that was like. So, um, but the book does a great job on her voices, the fight for Ramadi. So check that out. Um, in the meantime, guess what? You, I was thinking, you really, on like a deployment like that, you, you're, uh, it's very sparse.

• 3:10:01Speaker 02

  Spars.

• 3:10:03Jocko Willink?

  It's tough to

• 3:10:06Jocko Willink?

  work out the way you want to work out. It's almost impossible to eat the way you want to eat. It's very difficult to train the way you want to train. That's what our service men and women do when they're on deployment, right? Now, when we're back here, stateside, you gotta take advantage of it. You gotta take advantage of it. You gotta train, you gotta lift, or as you would say, you gotta lift. Train jiu-jitsu.

• 3:10:33Speaker 02

  Yes, sir.

• 3:10:35Jocko Willink?

  Run, sprint.

• 3:10:38Jocko Willink?

  Be outside. Go do some cool stuff. And then the eating part, man, in America, you got that access to the, to the good stuff. Look, you get steak, chicken, uh, sushi.

• 3:10:51Speaker 02

  Sushi all day, hell yeah.

• 3:10:52Jocko Willink?

  All day. Uh, you can't always get everything that you want. That's why we have Jocko Fuel. We have Jocko Fuel. We have protein. The, the best protein, the tasty protein. You can mix it with water. You can mix it with milk. You can mix it with Greek yogurt. Depending on what you're looking for.

• 3:11:10Speaker 02

  The RTDs.

• 3:11:11Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 3:11:12Speaker 02

  I go hard with RTDs. You know this.

• 3:11:14Jocko Willink?

  Yes. So I just had one during the break. I had 30 grams of protein. Needed it too, by the way. Good workout this morning. Did you work out? Did you already lift today?

• 3:11:21Speaker 02

  Lifted. No, no, no, no, no.

• 3:11:23Jocko Willink?

  How, how fired up for you when you're done here? How fired up to you are you to go then back and lift?

• 3:11:30Speaker 02

  Uh, varying levels of fired up. Sometimes I'm not fired up at all. Sometimes I'm like, cool. If my son's there, like not really doing much, I'm, I can get fired up because he's, he's lifting with me, by the way. But speaking of lifting the other day, yesterday, boom, perfect. Yesterday I come in, uh, I lifted kind of late, like at 3:30 PM. Didn't eat anything all day. Uh, nothing at all. Water only, my friend.

• 3:11:54Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 3:11:55Speaker 02

  After I was done lifting, the hunger was at peak. So I was like, let me hit one of these RTDs. Milk RTD. Uh, the cereal one.

• 3:12:03Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 3:12:04Speaker 02

  Bruh, I think I hit it in literally one swallow. Not even one like hit, like one swap, bruh. It just flies down. It's like a literal, like the dessert uh, capabilities of it, like double if you just don't eat anything. It was very much of a good experience.

• 3:12:20Jocko Willink?

  We got all kinds of good stuff for you. Jocko Fuel.com. We got energy. We got hydration. We got supplementation. We got joint warfare. We got super krill. We got time war. We got the, we got awesome stuff for you. We got muscle drive. That's a nice little something to have. Nice little snack. Nice little tasty. Tastes sweet, but it's sweetened with natural sweeteners, right? Monk fruit. It's really good. We make the best stuff. Jocko Fuel.com or go to wherever you buy stuff, wherever you buy food, where you buy things. They should have Jocko Fuel. If they don't have Jocko Fuel, ask them and we'll, we'll help you out getting them, get it there. So Jocko Fuel.com.

• 3:13:00Jocko Willink?

  Also, it's really, it can be very difficult to train jiu-jitsu overseas. Was I able to pull it off?

• 3:13:08Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 3:13:09Jocko Willink?

  From bring my own mats.

• 3:13:12Jocko Willink?

  Kind of peer pressure people into just rolling with me. It's not always easy. OriginUSA.com. We have a jiu-jitsu camp where jiu-jitsu could not be any easier to do.

• 3:13:22Speaker 02

  Full action.

• 3:13:23Jocko Willink?

  Then when you're at, you fall out of bed, you're doing jiu-jitsu basically, if you want to be, right? You wake up, if you, if you, if you drank a, a 24 pack, a case of beer and you were hammered and you had no idea what was happening and you said, I'd like to, you'd be training. You'd fall onto a mat.

• 3:13:40Speaker 02

  Which, let's face it, not, not so much the beer part, but a jiu-jitsu training slash friendly competition can break out at any, at any moment and has broken out at any moment. Okay. So you remember this, Jack, it was Jack Daniel Hill and uh, Alex Tavas. This was like the most random.

• 3:13:59Jocko Willink?

  Where was this?

• 3:13:59Speaker 02

  At camp.

• 3:14:00Jocko Willink?

  Oh, okay.

• 3:14:01Speaker 02

  It was like.

• 3:14:01Jocko Willink?

  Oh, that's right. It was, it was like post, it was either, it was right around the time that the mid rats were being served.

• 3:14:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 3:14:09Jocko Willink?

  Which is like the night meal, the 11 o'clock snack meal. Yeah, they were out there having a 40 minute roll, a 40 minute death match even. Wasn't even a roll. They were trying to kill each other.

• 3:14:17Speaker 02

  Exactly. Right. But sometimes it just freaking breaks into that.

• 3:14:20Jocko Willink?

  Who won? Do you remember who won?

• 3:14:21Speaker 02

  I think Jack, cause he had, he has more experience.

• 3:14:24Jocko Willink?

  Jack, Jack had a little bit more experience at the time.

• 3:14:26Speaker 02

  And then, but Tavas was like, no, no, let's go again. And I was there. I witnessed the whole evolution. Cause there, we're at the table.

• 3:14:34Jocko Willink?

  And oh, and it started that, it was that kind.

• 3:14:36Speaker 02

  The whole thing. And it just escalated. I forget what sparked it, but just escalated. So, you know, at any given table, you might hear, well, we can go outside right now, right?

• 3:14:46Jocko Willink?

  Legitimate.

• 3:14:46Speaker 02

  You can hear that. At camp, you can go outside right now. The mats are right there. One of the many, by the way, you can, you know, as close or as far as you need them to be. And yeah, man, so jiu-jitsu whenever you like. So literally when you say fall out of your bed and you can be training, literally.

• 3:15:01Jocko Willink?

  That's what's happening. So it's a camp. It's a, it's a camp for adult humans, basically. And you're doing jiu-jitsu, but there's the lake with, there's paddle boards, there's swimming happening. There's a weight room. There's people teaching, people will teach like yoga and fitness. I don't, Jason Kalipu scout did show and workouts. Like everyone's just doing stuff. Cool stuff, fun stuff, barbecue at night, people, you know, hanging out, telling stories, doing Q and A. I do Q and A up there. Just make stuff happen.

• 3:15:33Speaker 02

  Lobster bake.

• 3:15:34Jocko Willink?

  Lobster bake, steak dinner. It's just, it's just, it's just awesome. So it is August 23rd through the 28th. This is a camp for adults. Barely, right? You just get to go to jiu-jitsu all day. And if, hey, by the way, if you don't want to train at all, let's say you got a broken, uh, uh, femur. You can just sit on the side of the mat and learn. No one's going to say anything. Oh, cool. You can watch this. Hey, this is how you do it. So you can train for zero minutes a day or seven hours a day. The choice is yours, but you're going to have a good time on and off the mats of justice. OriginUSA.com. Check out the camp. Come to camp, August 23rd through the 28th. We'll see you there. Well, by the way, when you're there, you can get awesome jiu-jitsu

• 3:16:16Jocko Willink?

  gear. You can get jeans, boots, hoodies, everything that we make 100% America. OriginUSA.com. Check it out.

• 3:16:23Speaker 02

  It's true. Also a factory tour, by the way. You're interested in how this stuff is for real made? Not just the, the legend anymore. You can see the actual process. Trust me. It's like actually, it was more interesting than I had anticipated. Cause you get to see like the, like looms and all that. Like how does a loom work? I don't know. No, you can, no, it's good. Especially the boots. That one was the one that really struck me.

• 3:16:46Jocko Willink?

  Pretty awesome.

• 3:16:47Speaker 02

  Also, don't forget about JacoStore.com. This is where you can get your Discipline Equals Freedom stuff. We got five versions of Discipline Equals Freedom shirts. Five versions, 5.0. They're all good though. Even 1.0 freaking still, still holds up big time.

• 3:17:02Jocko Willink?

  I think 2.0 is my favorite.

• 3:17:04Speaker 02

  Yeah, that, that makes sense for sure. I like the most recent one, brah, 5.0. It's good.

• 3:17:08Jocko Willink?

  Is that the arch one?

• 3:17:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 3:17:10Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. That one's pretty cool.

• 3:17:12Speaker 02

  Yeah. People seem to like that one. Nonetheless, hey, you can choose for yourself which one you like or, or all of them, whatever. Um, it's available there. Also, good. That resonates with many people, you know, and you want to represent, you can have that. Three versions, by the way. Latest one is a, it's a good one. It's kind of a handwritten, kind of OCR font handwritten. It's a good one. You gotta check it out.

• 3:17:34Jocko Willink?

  Okay, I'll check it out then, thank you.

• 3:17:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 3:17:36Jocko Willink?

  Actually, I have one of those.

• 3:17:38Speaker 02

  Yeah, you literally took it from me. So, hey, man.

• 3:17:40Jocko Willink?

  Hey, I take merchandise.

• 3:17:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, no, it's good. I'm glad you liked it. Um, also, you know, other things, stand by to get some. We're representing that. Uh, get after it, you know, the basics, fundamentals. We're, we're, you know, we're representing that too. Also, as far as representation goes, you want to subscribe to a new design every month? Slightly more, you know, I don't know, creative designs, whatever, fun, people like that. Anyway, it's called the Shirt Locker. Subscription, every month, new design. Um, check it out. Go to jocko store.com, click on Shirt Locker. You can see what it's all about. Um, otherwise, yeah, check, check out the whole site. If you like something, get something.

• 3:18:18Jocko Willink?

  Okay, good advice.

• 3:18:20Speaker 02

  I'm here to tell you.

• 3:18:21Jocko Willink?

  We got some books as well. Uh, there's a book called Unheard Voices, The Fight for Ramadi, A Soldier's Memoir from Combat Outpost Falcon. You just heard a podcast about it. So it's a great book to read and really appreciate, uh, Pitbull writing that book. So check that one out. Also, Put Your Legs On by Rob Jones, also Need to Lead by Dave Burke. Also, we have a leadership consultancy. It's called Echelon Front. Every problem that you have inside your organization is fundamentally, at its core, a leadership problem. And we solve problems through leadership. So if you need help inside your organization, or you want to come to one of our events, go to echelonfront.com. If you want to try our online training academy to learn the skills of leadership,

• 3:19:04Jocko Willink?

  go to extremeownership.com and take some of our courses. And then if you want to help service members, active and retired, you want to help their families, you want to help Gold Star families, you heard about Mark Lee today. We talked a little bit about Mama Lee and her, what she went through, losing her son, Mark. Well, she took that and turned it into something extremely positive, and that is America's Mighty Warriors. This is a charity organization, does so much to help our, our veterans and their families. If you want to donate or you want to get involved, go to AmericasMightyWarriors.org. Also, check out HeroesAndHorses.org. They started a kids program, by the way, it looks like.

• 3:19:49Jocko Willink?

  So, so check that out, HeroesAndHorses.org. And then finally, Jimmy May's organization, BeyondTheBrotherhood.org. And finally, Warriors in Need, taking aviation specialists from the military and getting them jobs in the civilian sector. That's an outstanding organization to support. If you want to connect with us, for Miguel, Pitbull on the interweb. He is migelsantana.com. And then he also has his empty, currently empty YouTube channel, soon to be very populated Santana Channel Official. And he's on Facebook, Miguel N. Santana. For us, check out jocko.com. And then on social media, I'm at jocko, like, at Echo Charles.

• 3:20:32Jocko Willink?

  Just don't spend too much time on there, because it's literally trying to kill you. And then finally, uh, thanks once again to Miguel, to Pitbull for joining us. Just outstanding to see you. Thank you for everything that you did for the country, for the Army, for the Ready First Brigade, and for tasking a bruiser. We will not forget you or your men.

• 3:20:57Jocko Willink?

  And thank you to all of our military around the world right now.

• 3:21:02Jocko Willink?

  And to our veterans as well. Thank you all for your service and sacrifice. And to the soldiers and Marines of the Ready First Brigade that we served with in Ramadi. Thank you. And we are proud to call you our brothers. Also, thanks to our police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, as well as all other first responders. Thank you for your service and sacrifice here at home to keep us safe. And everyone else out there, there's another quote that is in this book, Unheard Voices, The Fight for Ramadi.

• 3:21:38Jocko Willink?

  After Mark Lee was killed, and also after Corporal Joe Thompson was killed from 38 Marines, that was on August 2nd.

• 3:21:46Jocko Willink?

  And at that point, there had been dozens of other soldiers and Marines killed. There is a quote that Miguel put in the book. It is a quote from Colonel Sean McFarland, who said, "We must make their deaths matter. Peace and prosperity in Ramadi, that is the mission."

• 3:22:06Jocko Willink?

  Well, that mission is over, but we still have to make their deaths matter. And the way that we do that is by living to the best of our ability, to do what we can, to bring some light into the world.

• 3:22:25Jocko Willink?

  Just as our fallen heroes fought to bring light into that dark place.

• 3:22:32Jocko Willink?

  So let's keep striving and keep living for them.

• 3:22:38Jocko Willink?

  And that's all we've got for tonight. And until next time, this is Echo and Jocko, out.