Jocko Podcast
Hosted by Jocko Willink
Assessment of German Military training tactics. 1942 Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content
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This is Jocko Podcast number 343 with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink. Good evening Echo. Good evening. If you know the enemy and you know yourself, you need not fear the result of 100 battles. If you know yourself, but not the enemy, for every victory gained, you will also suffer defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle. Sun Tzu, Art of War, we covered that on Podcast 23, by the way, which is over five years ago, I believe, at this time.
So it's a real common quote, though. We have to learn from ourselves. We have to learn our mistakes. We have to learn our strengths and weaknesses, but we have to learn about our enemies and our enemy's strengths and weaknesses. What do we do right? What do we do wrong? What do our enemies do right? What do our enemies do wrong? In order to know those things, we have to study our enemy. We have to look at that, look at what they're doing. At least we should. We should be looking at our enemy. And in some good times, we as a nation have been able to do that well. And we have a case here in 1942, the US Army Intelligence released a classified report about the Nazis.
Who they were, what they did right, what they did wrong, what they had revealed in their own manuals. So we got copies of some of the Nazi manuals about leading troops in combat. They have interviews or, you know, they, they had quotes, they have quotes from people that they talked to, German officers that they talked to. And they put this report together. And it was a classified report. Eventually it was declassified, obviously, but I got a copy of it to review. And you know, at first you think, oh, what, what, you kind of think, my, my first thoughts were, oh, this is going to be really interesting to see these, these.
Totally different viewpoints on leadership, right? Then these are Nazis. These are the most horrible people ever. Okay, so this is gonna be, they're gonna be totally different.
Well, you're gonna see that they're actually not that different. And you can see much of what they say at a tactical level is very similar to what any leader is going to say. And that sounds crazy, right? Cause, and that's why you gotta realize, and I think when we, when we covered, when we covered Mao.
And, and I remember pointing this out. Mao, when he's talking, when they're talking about how to win a war, they're talking about, well, the main war, the main case in point is decentralized command. Cause he's talking about, hey, listen, the, the troops out on the battlefield gotta make adjustments. They gotta make things happen because they know what's best for their unit at the time. And yet, this same guy that says that about how to win a war, says, oh, but for the government, we're gonna centralize everything. We're gonna centralize farming. And we're gonna tell you what to plant and when to plant it and how much to plant. And you're all gonna die because it's not gonna work. Which is exactly what happened. So it's a similar thing here where
you can see clearly that there's a huge disconnect between the, the leadership on the battlefield. And then what's going on with the, with Hitler, the Nazis. And the way that they were thinking, the way Hitler was thinking.
But some of the stuff is pretty disturbing too.
When you, when you think about how this whole nation was captivated. And you know, this is something that the plasticity of the human mind is something I've been talking, I've been talking a lot about it on, on the academy. And just how people are so gullible. And it's, they're, they can, if you're not careful, you can get manipulated very easily. And there's no greater example of that than. Than the Nazi party in Nazi Germany. Just manipulation of the brain, people, people crowd mob mentality, which we talked about on the underground mob mentality going on. And if that, well, he's doing it, she's doing it, I guess we're doing it and let's go.
And then you think about, you think about how, I mean, look at society today. Look at American society today. Look a trend will go across American society today. And you'll think, whoa, that's a trend, we can spot it. But people still do it, right? People are in the trend and they're believing it.
Same thing happens with the Nazis. But here's the thing, you think, have you ever known a twenty seven year old person that got caught up in some trend and kind of went down in some weird way?
Went down?
Went down, yeah, like went, went off, let's say went, changed directions pretty radically in their life. Twenty seven year old human.
Yeah, I mean, yeah.
What about a?
Younger and older.
What about a thirty two year old human?
Yeah.
Okay. Now, once somebody's fifty or sixty, you know, ever known someone that's fifty or sixty?
No.
It can still happen, but more rare, right?
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, basically, as you get older, you're a little harder to manipulate, it would seem.
It seems that way, yeah.
But then when you start talking about ten, eleven, twelve year olds, these are super pliable brains. And so when I start talking about the Hitler Youth, you're going to be thinking, you keep that in mind. Here's a ten year old kid, an eleven year old kid, that's getting indoctrinated, that doesn't know anything else. Then you can see where that's, you can see where that's going to end up. So. The, the thing about the Third Reich from a military and leadership perspective, look, there, there was a lot of them, thirteen, almost fourteen million soldiers in the German army. And they were efficient.
They were efficient and they use, you're gonna see and I don't, I don't speak German obviously, but the translation, they use that term efficiency a lot, almost like it's a little bit scary. You know, you know where it's like, hey, is it, it wouldn't be more efficient if you only had for, three kids instead of four? You know what I'm saying? Like that kind of, that kind of scary thing? So we're, we're, we're gonna come across that word efficiency.
And, and, and the, the, the German military, the Third Reich military was very effective and efficient at the beginning of the war. And many people would, I mean, look at what they did, they rolled, they steamrolled through Europe very easily. And a lot of people would say that they continued to keep up a very efficient methodology until, that's when the Nazi generals were running the show. When you had guys like Rommel that was actually making calls. Rommel, who by the way, eventually got executed by, by Hitler. But he was, you know, he was one of the guys that was running the show and the further along the war went, the more Hitler started calling the shots.
But they had some things that were, that were causing them to be so effective early in the war. You know, they used mission type orders, they utilized decentralized command. Not so much a leadership perspective, but they had some really good weapons. B H Liddelhart, who we've covered on this podcast, he, he, he, here's a quote from him, from, from his studies. "On a man for man basis, German ground soldiers consistently inflicted casualties at about a 50% higher rate than they incurred from the opposing British and American troops, under all circumstances. This was true when they were attacking and when they were defending, when they had a
local numerical superiority and when, as was usually the case, they were outnumbered, when they had air superiority and when they did not, when they won and when they lost." So they, they were good at inflicting casualties on American and British troops. They were better than we were inflicting, inflicting casualties on them. That being said, we had, you know, obviously more numbers and more aggressiveness over an extended period of time. But that's just one example of the effectiveness of the German military in World War II, again, especially in the beginning of the war.
And, and there's, there's more points like that, but I don't want to, I don't want to drill down onto that debate or, or go deeper into that. But there's no one that's going to say that the early German World War II military was not an extremely effective military force.
And of course, I mean, we have to say that it did fall apart eventually against an incredibly adaptive and brave and smart and capable allied force. And, and I would say one of the best things about us Americans is we learned and we adapted. And I think that's something that maybe, you know, part of our culture is that we are able to do that. And when we allow ourselves to do that, it's going to be one of the most beneficial things we can do is go, oh, you know what? This isn't working. Do something else. And I would say that the Germans were kind of the opposite. The further the war went, the less they adapted, the less they changed their, their strategies and their tactics. And what causes you to not change your strategies and tactics? It's when your ego gets too big.
What causes your ego to get big? When you're winning a lot. So what, just look what happened. The Germans are winning a bunch. They don't, they think that everything they're doing is right. We're losing, we're like, okay, we gotta make adjustments. The British are saying we gotta make adjustments. So we start making adjustments. They don't. We win. Look, ultimate simplified terms, right? And I'm not trying to make a historical case. I'm just trying to review an assessment of some mindsets broadly speaking. So
this report is, is an interesting report. Again, it's written in 1942 and um, let's take a look at it. What can we learn from it? That's the main thing. What can we learn from it? So this is September 17th, 1942. The, the report is called German Military Training. And it comes from the Military Intelligence Service of the War Department. Notice the information summarized here is based on a variety of sources, on German manuals, on technical articles in German military reviews, and above all, on the detailed reports of United States observers who saw the German army at close range in its work of preparing for this war and during the first two years of conflict.
That's where it came from. Introduction.
This bulletin proposes to summarize information which will serve three purposes. One, it will permit a better appreciation of the basis of the German military strength. The strength of the German army and its early success in this war owe much to two factors: Planning and training. The Nazi leaders planned this war for years in advance of their attack. They prepared for it by a system of military training which begins with children of high school age. The training system was directed by the old professional army. It depended on effort, thoroughness, and the application of old and tested principles to the means of modern warfare. As an observer remarks, "The Germans believed that by hard work and hard training, they
would 'save blood later.'" And that's almost like a word-for-word quote from Patton. This training gave the German army a time advantage over its rivals, although this advantage is being steadily reduced. Number two, it will contribute to our knowledge of characteristic German tactics. Those principles of tactics and leadership which are emphasized in training are inevitably reflected in the actual conduct of operations. While this bulletin will make no detailed study of German tactics, it will bring out the main doctrines which are applied in battle as a result of training. Number three, it will suggest methods and points of view which may be useful in training
US troops. So like, what can we learn from this? That's what they're saying. There are many basic similarities between US training doctrines and those of the German army, though there are naturally many differences in their use or application. We can learn from the differences as well as the similarities. As far as possible, concrete examples have been given, and in the appendixes there are detailed illustrations at some length of certain phases of the German training methods. So, training and preparation for military service. This is where you start thinking. This is when you start thinking this is gonna be a problem. If you're watching this, and this is from 1934, if you're watching this from the outside, you gotta be thinking to yourself, "This is gonna be an issue."
Here's what they got going on. "The Nazi government from the start was dedicated to the purpose of war of conquest, and from 1934 on, the party controlled and directed every aspect of German life to this aim."
So, right there, if you're looking on the outside, you, you gotta, you gotta realize, we're gonna have an issue. This is like someone that's training, lifting, doing jujitsu, like this whole person's life is for war. That's what the whole German world was. German military leaders have followed Clausewitz for years, but only under the Nazi regime could his key concept of total war be realized. The principle that every agency and every individual of a nation must be used in the effort of war. Nothing is more revealing of Nazi plans and methods than the application of this principle in a very broad program of military training.
The goal of this program was a large and highly trained army, but the shaping of this army was not left to the two years of actual military training for conscripts. From the age of fourteen, boys were to receive a preparation for military service, which would cover much of the basic training ordinarily given recruits. So, starting at age fourteen, you're starting to get trained. At age fourteen. So, you're getting indoctrinated and you're getting trained at age fourteen. In addition, old, men older than conscript age, with or without previous military service, were to be given various types of auxiliary background or refresher training. So, it doesn't matter who you are. If you're not in the military, you're getting military training.
Ages fourteen to sixty.
The Nazi party through its various branches was mainly responsible for civilian training outside the army proper. This included due concern for specialized training and skills needed for mechanized warfare. A National Socialist Flying Corps sponsored instruction in the rudiments of flying and in glider practice. The National Socialist Motor Corps trained a large reserve of youths in all type of driving for mechanized service, and thus relieved army motor schools of many hours of instruction. A German article in nineteen forty claimed that a hundred and twenty-five thousand men had been given experience in military motorization. A Motor Boat Corps cooperated with the army and marines to prepare men for water transport operations. So, think about that.
You've got 125,000 men that have been trained to drive vehicles, large vehicles, military-type vehicles. I mean, right now, there's only 400,000 men, men or women in the US Army right now. So think about having 125,000 people that you can draw on that have this skill, and they haven't even been trained yet. You just got them.
And by the way, you've got people that are, know how to work on the vehicles. And by the way, you've got a whole bunch of people that know how to fly planes. Kids that know how to fly gliders.
"The activities of the party are particularly concerned with the indoctrination of all German citizens for war. The basic ideas in this indoctrination are well-known and are reiterated in Hitler's speeches. The theory of Germany's natural rights, the concept of the master race, the exaltation of the state and leader, the glorification of war and military virtues. The press, the schools, press, radio, and movies are controlled by the party and support its efforts in every direction by propaganda which has no, has to fear no rival. The penal code prevents any free discussion in the field of ideas. Every German household belongs to a local unit, carry, organized to carry out the party educational program."
So they're down for the cause.
There's no, you, you don't know anything else.
And if you think about anything else, you're gonna get found out, and it's gonna, you're gonna get straightened out.
That's what's going on.
"A German lieutenant has summoned up this work of indoctrination. In his parents' home, in school, in the Hitler Youth, in the subdivisions of the movement, in the shop, and in the labor service, the future Army recruit has been bred as a national socialist. He does not know anything else but allegiance to the national socialist state and the life work of being a German."
There you go.
Training of the German youth, the Hitler Youth, at the age of ten. German boys are brought into the Nazi scheme as members of the Young Folk, Young Volk, organization and receive their first taste of official indoctrination. Real shaping for the army begins at fourteen when they enter the Hitler Youth. Even before the war, this organization was mainly concerned with preparing boys for the army, both by instilling military mental attitudes and by military training. A US observer gives the following description of an exercise of German boys carried out on a Sunday morning. So this is a Sunday morning. We got some German boys out there doing some, uh, doing an exercise.
Two groups, one mixed, one of mixed Hitler Youth and one of, one of Young Folk, thirty strong, and the other a similar group of twenty-two cyclists on eleven bicycles marched into Greenwald Forest under the command of a Hitler Youth. This boy appeared to be fifteen or sixteen years of age. He halted his command, dressed it with skill and precision, and announced his mission in a clear and definite manner. The enemy is reported advancing from the south to the north through Greenwald Forest. At seven o'clock, he was reported to be entering the, et cetera, et cetera. My mission is to determine at once and report to headquarters the position and activity of advanced units. My sector is, et cetera, et cetera. It will not be necessary to go into the young commander's estimate of the situation and his orders to his subordinates.
They would have done credit to a professional army officer. This is a fifteen-year-old kid. That boy, still two or three years from active service as a private in the army, was able to estimate a difficult situation and organize and put in execution a rather complex plan to carry out his mission on a sector of, sector nearly a thousand meters wide. This demanded an extended series of rapid-fire orders. It was evident that he had control of his boys. A continuous stream of bicycle messengers carried his reports from advanced units to the leaders' posts. He in turn sent frequent written messages to some posts to his rear. The observer was frankly amazed at this performance and spent the entire morning with this group to be sure there was a certain amount of laughing and horseplay among the boys.
This was not repressed, but any lack of attention to duty called forth an immediate and severe rebuke from the leaders. It was evident that the youngster in charge was on his own. Some other means must have been provided for checking up on how well that youthful commander had accomplished his mission. Two of his units, one boy each, failed to follow instructions. Some were lost and some had difficulty in reporting clearly what they saw. Some failed in their individual missions, but the boy leader did not fail in his. He finally recalled all of his units with skill, marched them to the rear, and very ably praised and criticized individual performance. On the whole, it was a remarkable demonstration of how German military leadership is developed.
Fourteen or fifteen year old leader and then a bunch of ten year old little Nazi soldiers out there on a Sunday.
Another observer saw Hitler Youth organization engaged in battalion maneuvers and reports that their performance would be credible to regular troops.
In 1939, the stormtrooper section of the Nazi Party took charge of the Hitler Youth. And after the start of war, boys sixteen to eighteen years of age were compelled to take six months of regular pre-military work. The aim was to provide the army with the largest possible reserve of mentally, physically, and militarily trained young men. The training includes infantry fundamentals, care and use of weapons, and signaling. The Hitler Youth has been used in a variety of auxiliary services during the war, spotting aircraft, performing office work at airports, painting runways, harvesting crops, tending children in day nurseries, collecting useful junk and trash,
soliciting for the winter help, singing at the hospitals, and putting on entertainment for soldiers at the front.
And obviously, as the war went on and they lost more adult males, the Hitler Youth started fighting as well. But this is where they started off. The following statistics, based on estimate by a US observer, suggests the scope of the variety of the Hitler Youth activities. The National Socialist Flying Corps furnished the Hitler Youth flyers with enough gliders, planes, and instructors to teach 135,000 boys how to fly each year.
The motorized units of the Hitler Youth enrolled 295,000 boys each year. The National Socialist Party set up 1,300 repair shops for the units and each year provided them with 5,000 motorcycles. The Hitler Youth Marines had an annual enrollment of 78,000.
The National Socialist Party supplied the Hitler Youth with 10,000 revolvers a year and a large number of rifles. Enough rifles were furnished to enable 30,000 outstanding marksmen to participate in rifle matches. The Hitler Youth had its own firearms school. During an average 12 months, the Hitler Youth conducted 3,540 official outdoor camps, which were attended by 565,000 boys.
That's every 12 months. That's bigger than the US Army, by the way. 565,000, that's bigger than the US Army. That's bigger than the United States Marine Corps.
Let me ask you this, what's your current, right now, what's your current like feeling about this? Does this sound like real sinister, or does it sound like kind of squared away?
Well, it's both.
Yeah, that's what, that's kind of why I asked, because a part of me is kind of like, well, just because it's overshadowed by the fact that it's the Nazis. It's like, oh my God, this seems real sinister, but you get that part away, like what if it was like for something good? It's kind of like, that's a squared away group right there. You got that much preparation from that early on. Not many capable people starting from that early, but it's kind of solid. Like you could apply that concept. To some good things and that might help us.
Yeah, well, unfortunately for you, that little that little part about them being Nazis is a real freaking problem.
It's a big deal.
It's a real problem, but there's a whole bunch of things going on there. Just just the fact that they their their their foresight is so strong. That they're going, hey, look, we're going to be fighting a war in X number of years. We need people that can work on vehicles. We need people that can fly planes. We need people that can drive vehicles. We need people that can fight. We need people that can can shoot well, like they're just covering all the bases.
Yeah, and and obviously the part that's very glaring, besides the fact that they're Nazis, is um how they're forced, like the use of for where they have to do it. And if you even think about other stuff, that's a violation.
And we'd have to I'd have to do some more research on this, but I can tell you from what I know. The term forced.
Is not like a a great term to use because everyone was so swept up in the movement. That it was more like, that's like saying, uh, during World War Two in America, you know, Americans were forced to start a victory garden. You know what a victory garden is? Victory garden is where you you go out in your yard and you plant tomatoes and carrots for yourself. So you didn't have to so so you could you didn't have to uh get stuff from the store. So you could so everyone didn't need to take supplies away from the soldiers. Well, you didn't get forced to do that. You did that because that's what we're doing to help out.
Yeah, yeah, okay.
So when you see like the young Hitler youth, they're not like being dragged away to camp. No, they're they're fired up to go. And that's what we're doing and that's what they've been told and and and they're also getting told like, well, this is what we do and this is what makes us better than everyone else.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right. That is that is still. Sinister seems sinister.
Oh, it's a hundred percent sinister.
But yeah, it is different.
Because the the ultimate purpose is we're going to take over the world.
The last part there, it says in one year, six million German boys participated in sports events organized by the Hitler Youth Office.
Next section is labor service. At the age of 18, German boys entered a entered a compulsory labor service for a six-month term. The labor service work gave them excellent conditioning and hardening. Furthermore, it accustomed men to living in groups under military discipline. And again, you know what? This is what's interesting about the military.
That stuff brings you together and makes you feel good and makes you a better person. And it makes you bond with your friends. You want to get people together? You want to want people to bond? Make them do hard stuff together? That's literally how you make people bond. Shared suffering. So we're gonna go out, we're gonna work really hard in the fields. And at the end of the day, we're gonna come back and we're gonna have meals together. And we're gonna go out and do the next thing, the same thing the next day. And and people that work hard are gonna be rewarded. And people that slack off are gonna be cast out. So you see what I'm saying here? This is like a huge unifying thing. It's not it's not forced labor like, oh, God, they're gonna put, no.
Oh, here's your chance. Hey, you're gonna get to go to to get to go to the the the the labor service. Oh, you're old enough to do labor service now. It's gonna be great.
With the outbreak of the war, most of the male labor service units were transferred to the armed forces to serve as construction companies. And the size of the units were increased from 200 to 400, in some cases, 600. On December 20, 1939, a law ordered that normal labor service for men was to continue despite the special war work of the construction companies. The labor service youths performed miscellaneous tasks in rear areas, being kept out of combat areas as much as possible. And also says generally the girls branch performs none of these duties except pertaining to agriculture. They work in factories and do other types of work on the home front. So the females were going into this too. But the males were cultivating farms in occupied
areas, doing agricultural work in Germany, wherever there are labor shortages, constructing and maintaining important highways, constructing and improving fortifications, bridges and airports, salvaging equipment, munitions and material in battle areas, policing battlefields, performing sentry duty in occupied areas, camouflaging and sandbagging military establishments, and assisting in the transportation of food, ammunition, and fuel during rapid military advances. So they're basically just full combat support.
And where does this end up? Here's the conclusion. When German youths at 19 were inducted for military service, most of them had already had the equivalent of basic military training works, were in excellent physical condition, and had been indoctrinated both with Nazi ideology and military attitudes. As a result, their training period as conscripts could move very rapidly through preliminary stages. In two or three months, the conscripts could take part in maneuvers involving divisions or armies. Because of the work done by the Hitler Youth and the Labor Service, the two-year training in the Army could advance much more rapidly and effectively.
So that's a brilliant plan. Hey, when people are finally ready to serve at 19, we're already gonna have them almost completely trained up. They're gonna be almost completely trained up. We don't have to waste, I mean, Marine Corps boot camp is 13 weeks, and then you go to the School of Infantry. The Army boot camp is, I don't know, eight weeks, and then you go to AIT, the Army Infantry Training. So you're gonna, it's gonna take some time. It's gonna take four, five, six months to get someone ready to fight. They're cutting two, three, four months out of that program, which is a big deal.
Furthermore, German boys had received good opportunity to practice and develop qualities of leadership, and officer material was already clearly marked out by the time they reached military age. So they're looking for leaders.
Next section, work of the SA. The Stormtroopers, the brown shirts, which is the Nazi paramilitary wing. One of the most active branches of the Nazi Party, the SA, had particular responsibility and connection with the Hitler Youth. In addition, the SA performed important functions in giving a certain amount of military training to older civilians, both within and outside its own ranks. The SA as a military reserve, when the Nazi Party was rising to power, the SA and the elite guard, the SS, was in effect a private army of Hitler. When he seized control of the state, the SA was gradually merged into the framework of the military system and became more closely connected with the regular army. By 1935, more than 100 divisions, called brigade, of SA troops had been organized,
including men over 45 years old. The regiments were named after their old pre-Versailles units and carried on their traditions. Only a few units were technically part of the armed forces and the main function of the SA was to provide continuous and effective military training for a large mass of civilian populace outside the regular two-year service conscripts in the regular army. By 1939, the SA had been organized to provide specialist training in such lines as cavalry signaling, engineers, medical service, and navy. One of its important jobs was given to military training of men over 21 who had not received any training in the pre-Hitler years, when Germany's army had been restricted to a small standing army.
The SA gave a coveted sports medal on a basis which shows how very well everything in their program was pointed toward military service. The examinations for this medal include, aside from running and swimming tests, rifle shooting, camouflage, hand grenade throwing, marching 25 kilometers with a 25-pound pack, and a 200-meter dash in gas mask, etc. By 1939, this sports medal had been acquired by 800,000 men outside the SA ranks. This is total war and we're all, that's what we're doing. It's crazy to think, as you watch World War II unfold,
that Hitler was able to push as hard as he did and get away with as much as he did without somebody going, "Hey, bro, you're done. You can't do this anymore."
An important aspect of the SA An important aspect of the SA control of reservists was the fact that all these men would remain completely under the influence of the Nazi Party and doctrine and controls.
Conclusion: With the approach of war, the SA members were largely called into the regular armed forces as individuals rather than by units. Enough of the leaders remained, however, to continue to work with the Hitler Youth and with other older civilians not yet called out. According to one estimate, 1,500,000 men were receiving SA training largely on Sundays and evenings in the spring of 1940. The work done by the SA provided a great mass of partially trained men in all age groups who could be quickly organized and used in regular divisions on the outbreak of war. A large part of the German military training had been accomplished with men who were technically in civilian status. As a result, a German division during the war could be sent into combat with a minimum of training. Let's just...
They're just focused on this one thing. And they knew it was coming. And it's strange to think that the rest of the world... I mean, the rest of the world knew it was coming. You can go back and look at those old, like, political cartoons, and you'll see all the political cartoons are showing Hitler and Germany just getting ready to go ham.
This is a very interesting section here. "Procurement and Training of Officers."
In preparing for the large army used in his war of conquest, Hitler faced the serious problem of developing an adequate number of trained officers to operate 300 or more divisions and the various specialized corps and services. This problem was solved in large part between 1933 and the beginning of the war.
One advantage at the start was that the small standing army permitted by Germany, by the Versailles Treaty, had been excellently trained. So after World War I, Germany wasn't allowed to have a big army. They were allowed to have like this little tiny army. And so they focused on that army really hard and got them very well trained. Also, it had preserved the best traditions of the old German army and constituted a valuable reservoir of officer material for the rapid expansion of the new army. In addition, there were available many thousands of men who had served in the First World War and who could be used again. Many of these took part in the SA training activities discussed earlier. Finally, the German general staff maintained its high standards and prestige and was ready to deal with this problem of officer procurement.
So they knew out of the gate that leadership was going to be an issue and that they were going to have to field good officers. And how do you do that? You need to recruit the right officers and then you need to train them properly.
Officer training prior to the war, the program of training which produced most of the regular army officers in this period throws light on the character of the army, its relation to the pre-Hitler army, and the high quality of standards prescribed for officers. The civilian youth wishing to secure admission applied to the particular regiment or unit of his choice. So if you want to be an officer, you got to apply to a specific unit. Hey, I want to be an officer. He must be unmarried, be an Aryan, and have a certificate of graduation from a gymnasium, which is apparently the equivalent to a second year US college work. He was given interviews by an examining board of officers and examinations which tested
his moral qualities and his ability to stand up under strain. Much importance was attached to a psychological test.
After passing these examinations, the candidate, now a cadet, served for one year in the ranks of the unit which received him. So that's pretty cool. So you apply, they screen you, they test you, they see how you respond to pressure. If they accept you, you go in and you you become one of the troops. You don't become an officer, you just become one of the troops and you serve in the ranks. There, he received the same training given ordinary recruits and enjoyed no favors. It was desired that the cadets should thereby learn to understand the mental attitudes, problems, and points of view of the common soldier. On the side and in addition to regular training, the cadets did special study on the use of weapons.
After this year, so after a year of that, so you go in, you're gonna be a normal trooper. After this year, the cadets were sent to a military school for nine months and received basic training in military theory, identical for all branches of the service. So that's a pretty good move. You take everybody from the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, you put them all through the same training, so they all have a baseline of knowledge and understanding.
There were four such schools, admirably equipped without regard to expense. The course included field exercises, about 2,500 officers a year could be turned out in these schools. After these nine months, the cadets went to a weapons school, destined to bring the candidates back to earth from their theoretical courses. Here, they received training appropriate for their particular branch and an opportunity to command and train units attached to the school. Finally, the cadet performed two or three months tour of duty back with his regiment, and then, if elected by unanimous vote of the officers in his unit, he was received for promotion as a second lieutenant.
This method, which bears the hallmark of the old Prussian aristocratic tradition, was modified gradually by provisions which made it more possible for reserve officers and specially qualified NCOs to obtain commissions. That is a thorough screening process to get to be an officer in the military.
Even, I mean, you come back from all that training, and then they have to have a unanimous vote that you're good to go? And only then do you become a second lieutenant?
He said that there's the hallmark of the old Prussian aristocratic system. That seems a lot less aristocratic than than the American system. The American system, you become an officer, you go to college. So if you're my, if Echo is my kid, and I'm like, well, you know, I kind of want you to be in charge. I'm gonna send you to college and then you can go be an officer. Here, you gotta apply, then you gotta get screened, then you gotta serve as a grunt, then you gotta get screened again, then you gotta go to this school for nine months, then you gotta get come and get voted on to see if you're gonna be an officer or not.
Yeah, and what do you think that's based on the American way to do it? Like where you have to go to college first? Like, do you know what the basis for that was?
Yeah, it's, it's, it's an aristocratic thing. Where I want, oh, I'm a rich aristocrat. I want my son Echo to be a leader. I don't want him being with the troops.
I don't want him be with the enlisted swine. No, so I'm gonna send him to college and then he becomes an officer.
Yeah, but then why, why is that the criteria though? You know, like I wonder what, I mean, maybe on the surface you can kind of tell. Cause like, well, if you go to college, that means you're obviously smart. Therefore, an officer as a leader has to be smart or something kind of a thing. That's what it feels like anyway.
That's, that's probably conceptually, but that's, has nothing to do with anything. I mean, to be honest with you.
Yeah, the reality, you mean the reality of it? Yeah, but so, okay.
There, there are brilliant enlisted guys.
Yeah, that's what I think.
That grew up in Wisconsin on a farm and they, their parents didn't have any money to send them to college. So he enlisted in the army.
Yeah, so what, what about?
He might eventually become an officer, he might put in for his commission or whatever. But he's already, he's not gonna be caught up to the guy that was, grew up in, with, with a rich family that was like, listen, son, you're going to college and you're gonna be an officer.
Yeah, so how is that the criteria? Like, why did that come about that that was the criteria?
It's the aristocrat, it's the, that's why I'm laughing because they're saying this is like the aristocratic tradition. I'm like. Hey, if you're whoever wrote this in nineteen forty-two, the officers were aristocratic tradition in America a hundred percent. It's an aristocratic tradition. Oh, well, you've been to college. So then you get to be in charge of all these people that haven't been to college.
Right, cuz you're a higher class.
Cuz you're a higher class. You're an aristocrat, they're not.
Yeah, kinda when you think about it, especially that part about voting them in.
Oh, yeah.
Like, that's kinda like.
And making them a grunt. Now, look, if you go to the Naval Academy or you go to West Point, you spend like the summer on a ship. As like a swabi, right? But that's not the same as doing a year in a line unit. It's not the same, dude. And and that you have to do that in order to get recommended. Because there's a lot of officers, if they actually spent time as a grunt, people would be like, oh, this guy, this guy ain't got what it, this guy ain't got what it takes. He might be be able to graduate college. Being able to graduate college has almost no bearing on being fit to lead troops in combat.
Yeah, that's kinda what I figured. So in a way, and obviously, I don't know, obviously, but in a way, this way that they're talking about kinda seems like more accurate.
It seems like a better way.
System, yeah.
Yes, it does.
So they gotta go through like kinda more more applicable stuff.
Yes.
To to achieve and get get.
Yes. You put somebody with a line unit, where even if they're a machine gunner, they're machine, they spend six months as a machine gunner, then they then become a fire team leader. That person, you'd be able to go, hey, this guy's a really good fire team leader. He should, yeah, he should make it into this, go to the officer school. But if he's a dud.
As a fire team leader, he's not gonna be a good squad leader, he's not gonna be a good platoon leader.
Yeah, which kind of, and which seems like that just cuz you go to college, it wouldn't necessarily screen any duds out.
It's gonna screen zero duds out, or or close to zero.
Yeah. And then at the end, as a final, I'm assuming, screening scenario.
You gotta give it voted on.
Yeah. If if somehow you maneuvered your way through this and that.
Two or three months there. So you get, what do you think you're gonna go through in those two or three months? I'm gonna be testing you. Like, if I'm one of the other officers, I'm gonna be like, alright, let's see how you're doing. Here, run a raid on this, on this training mission. Let's see how you do, bro.
And wouldn't because like you know how there's it's kind of like Survivor remember you know that show Survivor?
On TV or whatever it's kind of like that it's like the final the final judgment where it's like you can maneuver your way through stuff and whatever. But if they at the end of the day don't want you to win or be on the team or be an officer be whatever. If your team does not want that.
That that show is kind of messed up the way the I think it was an unintended consequence of the show was that you know i- if who the people that got would get crushed first would be the people that had the the the most potential. Do you remember that?
Yeah, you know, yeah, you're I think you're right unintended.
It seems like an unintended consequence.
Yeah, but it did kind of lead to the the natural evolution of the game game like where.
Yeah, there was more game to it.
Yeah, because it's like.
The game within the game.
Yeah, yeah, and that's really what we could say.
Because because you might be like, hey, let what they had challenges, right? Two teams and here's the challenge and your thought should be, hey, I'm going to help the team win this challenge because I'm good at a a rope climbs, right? Hey, I'll we got to do four rope climbs. I'll do three of them. And and and then, you know, someone do the last one because I'm be tired. Okay, cool. Let's get rid of Jaco. He's too strong. You know what I'm saying? So that's actually what happened on that TV show.
Oh, yeah. So it we and I the weird thing is I I actually don't watch that much, but I've watched enough to be like.
One one season of it. I think the first season that came on or maybe the second season. The first season had Rudy Bosch on it, who's like a a epic seal. And you know. One of like most respected, awesome, old school seals and he and he was pretty old when he did it. He he unfortunately passed away, but just a so you know, everyone kind of was watching like see see what the show was about.
Yeah, actually, one season, one of the girls from here from Victor was on there.
Really?
We had one of the uh Kara Kay.
Okay.
Pretty sure that was Survivor.
Right on. How'd she do?
I don't know, I forget, I didn't watch it, but I watched like some of them, you know, I don't know who won though, but um, yeah, well Survivor.
So why are you talking about this again?
Because at the end, they got the council. So that council scenario.
Oh, so if you were a total backstabber.
Backstabber.
The council would vote you out.
That's only one reason though. That's only one reason. So, or like if you're hard to get along with, somewhere along the lines, they would vote you off because of that, but somewhere along the lines, they would utilize those things too. So basically it gave rise to like this game within the game, just like how you said, where you being strong at challenges is an element. It can be used for your advantage or against you, you know, kind of a thing. And that goes for every quality that each individual demonstrates. So the thing about Survivor, unfortunately, it's like a winner take all kind of the thing at the end where they just get money. One guy, actually two people, but.
Did anyone ever make deals to say like, hey, if you and I win, I'll give you half?
I don't know of any, but if that were to happen, that wouldn't surprise me because it's all within the game, you know? Because I think at the end too, or towards.
How much did they win? A million?
I think one million dollars, yeah. And then the second guy, second place got way less, but a significant amount as well. But it, at the end of it too, or towards the end, they would, um, if you got voted off, it's like at the last four or five or however many people. If you get voted off, you get to go on to this council that has a say in who's gonna win or something like that. So see how that weird balance kinda is where it's like, you get voted off, you better be squared away. You better be a good person. You better be whatever, you know? So it's like the final, you know, thing where it's like, yeah, you could be good at this, this and this, but if you don't have at the end of the day,
enough of what it takes that we think everyone else in the group, within the group thinks, but you ain't gonna make it. I don't care what, how cool you think you are.
Yeah, it's good to have multiple assessments, which is the program that we're looking at right here with the Nazis data. Multiple assessments in the actual environment where you need to step up and you're gonna get a decent result.
More decent than said, well, you know, Fred went to college, so he should be in charge of of a platoon of soldiers.
You know, hey, look, there's some great officers.
Well, the interesting thing of is great officers that went to the academies. There's great officers that went to ROTC, there's great officers that went to OCS. There's horrible officers that went to the academies, there's horrible officers that went to OCS, there's horrible officers that did ROTC.
And it kind of surprised me when I first worked with military academy officers. I thought to myself, hey, these, these guys have been training for four years to be leaders. Like this guy is going to be awesome.
That was not always the case.
And I realized that it was more about that you could have some awesome officers that went to the academies and you could have some terrible ones. And you could have all, you know, it didn't matter where they were from, it was who they were as people. That was what was much more important.
Yeah, so when you went to, cause you went after, right?
You were in first. So when you went to college, do you think that that college experience helped you in your officer? Position?
It helped me because I became a better writer and reader.
Like I was an English major. And I, I remember reading like directives and rules of engagement. And, and not that I knew, I knew how to read them so that I would understand them better. And I got that from having to read Shakespeare, bro. I hate to say it. I know it sounds like freaking stupid, but when you read Shakespeare, you, you have to look up the words, you have to see what the context is. And I realized if, when I, before I went to college, I'd be like, I don't really know what that means, but whatever. I get the gist, right? And getting the gist doesn't cut it. And then I realized also writing a report or writing an award or writing an evaluation, same thing. I'm like, you'll, he'll know what I means. No, I'm going to make sure that my boss understands what this means.
And you think that college taught you that?
A hundred percent. I mean, dude, I always, one time I took five English classes in one semester. That was ignorant, bro. That was one of the dumbest things I've done. Cause I was just reading, I was reading and writing just like 10, 12 hours a day. On the weekends, I remember just reading books. It was ridiculous. And I took this one class. I was like, oh, this would be good. Like a nice little skater class, little skate class. It was, uh, literature and film. Cool, well, watch, right? So you got lowered right into it, just like I did. It was like you spend all, you know, you gotta read the book. And then they get, then you watch a movie that they made from the book.
But watching the movie takes an hour. But you still spent 12 hours reading this freaking godforsaken book.
Oh, yes.
So it wasn't, it wasn't good.
I understand.
It bothered me.
Good, that's a good tip right there, by the way. Because in theory, you take all English, you're like, shit, I have to think about anatomy or freaking phys- whatever else class. I don't think about that. I just think about English or literature, whatever we're doing. No, no, no.
Check this out. There's a book called Tom Jones, which is an outstanding book. It's an amazing book. It's probably 700 pages long with tiny, tiny, tiny writing and paper thin little sheets of paper. And it's really descriptive and it's, and it's about human nature. And it tells this story, elaborate story with all these different characters. And so we read this book. And then we watched the movie. In the movie, there's no talking. The whole movie's no talking. They're just acting. They're just doing things. It, it just, it was, it was real like just picture any book, picture any book that you've ever read and there's no, and then you take that.
I mean, just, uh, what's it, what's it like a, take, picture a Tom Clancy. What, what, have you ever read, what's a movie that was a book that you like?
A movie that was a book that I like, uh, Fight Club.
Okay, so picture Fight Club. They take that book and they make a movie and there's no talking in it. Because that's literally what they did.
I see what they're doing though.
I know why they assigned that.
Yeah, no, it was cool. It was cool. It was very cool to watch how they did it and just see the interactions and you could, you could totally tell what was going on just by the way. They were looking at each other, the way they carried themselves, their body language, all this stuff. And, and it was pretty amazing to watch.
For real.
But, but guess what? Still had to read that freaking book. Still had to read that book and it bothered me because
Because I would always read everything that I was told to read, right? And I think I might be the only person in college that has ever done that, right?
Personal challenger.
And I would get, like, they give us a quiz to check to make sure you read, you did the reading.
So they give you a little check, and the check is, these are just questions, you know, if you read it, you're gonna know. And I missed the first que- the first quiz about Tom Jones. I missed, I missed one question, and I was so mad. And here's what made me mad, is it said, this is a, it says basically, this is a book about human nature. And the question was like, what is the, or it said like, the main theme of this book is human nature. And so the question on the test was, hey, what is the main theme in this book? And I put like, the kind of the plot that was starting to unfold, but that was wrong. And I was bummed out, missed it. That's the one question I missed in that class.
You're still mad about it, right?
I'm still mad, obviously. What's that, what's the word, what's the word they use now to describe a little bit mad? Salty.
Salty.
I'm a little bit salty about that.
Uh, so, okay, so, eh, when you go to college?
I think I went to the professor too, and I was like, wait, hey, you marked this wrong.
You contested it?
You contested your quiz.
And actually, that professor was really cool. Uh, she was cool, and I'd had another classmate, and I was like, hey, uh, you know, doctor, you know, you marked this wrong, just wanted, you know, just show you that you accidentally marked this wrong, obviously.
And she was like, oh, no, it's a book of, the theme is human nature. And I was like, well, where are you getting that from? And she points to the sentence that literally says that. And I was like, cool, I won't miss another question this semester.
Oh, nuts.
And she said, I know John, because they all called me John. It's the only place in the world anyone's, that, that group of people called me John. Was when I went to college. Because it was on my, what is it, the, the, what's the roll call called in a college? Attendance sheet to whatever. So then my name was John, and they'd be like, John, yes.
Seems to make sense.
I was me, well, you can call me Joe. I know. That's not my thing, bro. That's not my, it's not my thing.
Yeah, yeah, I dig it. I dig it fully. So it, so when you go to college for, let's say, your situation, I'm seeing these other scenarios, but your situation, you enlisted, boom, time to go to the officer program?
I went to Officer Candidate School.
Candidate School. And then do you go to college after that during?
I happened to go to college afterwards. My, my program was very strange.
Okay, so let's say whatever the protocol is, you go to college, is there, are there like majors that you can and cannot take to fulfill?
Yes, there are. I don't know what they are, but they're pretty, I mean, I don't think you could take like some totally crazy, unapplicable thing. But you can, I mean, I took English.
Yeah, so that, I mean, but the English, it's, it feels like English would be like, if there was a, a, a list of majors that you could have, and then the rest are unacceptable for this program.
You think English would be on the list?
It feels like it, but there were, you, or there were.
You definitely can't pick something that's, like, I don't think you could pick theater.
Like, cause they'd say, hey, when, when actually, you know, you're gonna be standing up in front of, talking in front of people, you might wanna get good at public speaking. Right? But I don't think you could take theater. I don't think, although I had one of my, uh, one of my assistant platoon commanders, he was, you know, as a, as I was getting to know him, like, well, what did you study in college? You know what he studied in college?
He studied percussion.
The drum?
Yeah, that's where he, he, he, that's what his degree was in percussion.
I'm like, bro.
Doesn't seem like.
This is not gonna help you too much in the day.
Yeah, or like, um, you know how people go hard with like French poetry or something like that where?
No, I don't think you could get more useless than percussion. Even French poetry might be more useful than percussion. And I mean, he was awesome, freaking great guy, but.
Was he good at drumming?
Yeah, hell yeah, absolutely.
All right.
So this seems like a very squared away methodology for them to, to, to select their officer. Now we get into the training with the approach of the war. The programs for officer training were enlarged and speeded up. In 1940, US observers estimated that schools were turning out about 6,500 officers every four months. And that 30,000 new officers entered the Army between September 1939 and December 1940. Man, they are on explosive growth curve. Men applying for the, for a commission in the regular Army continued to undergo relatively long training course in principle as thorough as that of peacetime and quite similar in plan. Candidates for temporary war commissions apparently receive a shorter period of training,
sometimes according to observers and reports, for a few months only. All candidates for officer grades must have had 15 months of service and at least two months of experience in the field as a leader of a section or platoon. Although these standards ensure that candidates have had considerable background training, nevertheless, expanding the German Army to six times its peacetime figures has produced obvious problems. Many reserve officers and NCOs have been commissioned from the ranks and from veterans of the First World War. Civilians have been appointed to administrative posts. Older officers and civilian specialists have been thus used to free the line officer for his main task, leadership of troops in combat.
Attention is paid, been paid to the continuation training of officers in the field. So they had a way of taking, hey, like Echo Charles was a video guy in the civilian world, and they're like, oh, you know what? You're going to become an officer, but you're going to be in charge of propaganda. And you're going to go make videos for the Third Reich. And meanwhile, Jaco, who is a sergeant in the Army and was a platoon leader or a platoon sergeant in the Army, we're going to make him an infantry officer. So they had a way of kind of putting people and using, utilizing the, the, the knowledge that they had in a way that's going to help the whole overall effort. Continuation training of officers, this has received a good deal of attention since the start of the war, owing to the relatively short training received by many officers.
The Germans are particularly concerned with the progressive training of company officers on whom depends the combat efficiency of the fighting units. One of the essential duties of a commanding officer in wartime is to ensure the further military education of his junior officers, who must be made to realize that to stand still is to retrogress.
Interesting word, retrogress.
Yeah, yeah, it's like degress.
But this is, this is so important. When you're in charge of people, you're in charge of training them and you're in charge of training your subordinate leaders. There's no training cadre, there's no big group up above you in the chain of command, you are in charge of it. And that's the same, should be the same in any company, should be the same in your life. You're in charge of it, take charge of it. And then, the main thing that they're trying to, they must be made to realize, is that to stand still is to retrogress. That's what the Nazis were about, blitzkrieg, right? We're moving, we're gonna get after it.
The concept of continuation training is broad. It involves a review of fundamentals with constant reference to the manual of troop leadership. It stresses the need for versatility. The infantry officer must be, must familiarize himself with the cap, the capacities of other arms than his own. Above all, the officer must prepare himself for emergency service in the next higher grade, or for replacing comrades in other executive positions. It is the responsibility of senior officers to assist their juniors in training for the next higher grade. So they put such an emphasis on training their subordinate leadership.
German sources illustrate these principles. In the first place, let us outline the requirements for the development of our officers. The strength of the German army has lain and still lies in the platoon commander at the front. This will remain so in the future, and the example of our lieutenants as he stands and fights at the front cannot be emulated by any nation on earth, according to a well-known saying of Bismarck.
Again, that's some good propaganda. You're telling these young lieutenants, you're the one that's gonna make a difference. It's like the Marine Corps, squad leader makes a difference.
Especially when you say it like that, by the way.
It's good propaganda.
Very good propaganda. One would misjudge lieutenant's mission entirely, however, if one would have him conform exclusively to the services of and requirements for a platoon commander. So it's not just a platoon commander you're gonna be. Actual conditions require much more of lieutenant than mere services such. Any lieutenant may, at any time, have to educate, train, and lead a company, battery, or other similar unit, and any lieutenant may suddenly have to serve as a staff officer or even as an adjutant or aide-de-camp.
The prog- the progressive training of the officer corps must be carried out with this eventuality in mind. So you're not just trained to be platoon leader, you're trained to be a company commander, a battery commander, a staff officer. That's what you're trained to do, everything.
If the officer is ready to serve in several different capacities at a moment's notice, he must be thoroughly indoctrinated in the fundamentals of tactics. This point emphasized in the German source just quoted. One difficulty is that a great many young officers have no knowledge of the fundamentals of tactics. Many dangerous mistakes arise from this fact, and during lessons there is often vague discussion because of a lack of understanding. Lack of indoctrination is the most serious defect. It results in many unnecessary commands. It results in many unnecessary commands. So if you don't know what you're doing, you're gonna make a bunch of unnecessary commands.
One must insist, therefore, that thorough indoctrination of all officers regarding tactical principles is absolutely essential. Young officers must be thoroughly familiar with the tactics of all units up to and including the battalion. In this connection, must- much work is needed. Older officers must work to teach the younger ones, must work hard to learn. It is an open question as to which task is most difficult, but that is immaterial. The important thing is to attain clearly defined objective.
The ideal desire here was summed up by a German officer in a conversation with an observer. We apply simple methods to our leadership. You will find that our lower units are so trained that many in them beside the leader is capable of taking command.
So there you go. Keeping things simple. People, there's multiple layers of leadership ready to take over when needed. And we're training and indoctrinating them into the basic tactics so everyone knows and understands them. Standards for officers. Section five. The German army tradition set high standards for officers, both as to character and as to professional ability. Great attention is paid to this subject in professional journals and books. Particular concern is shown for officers of company rank. This is partly because in a rapidly expanding army, it was necessary to observe and integrate a large number of new officers at lower grades. But it is also due to conviction that efficiency and leadership standards of these officers
are of crucial importance for the combat success of the army. These officers actually lead the units in the frontline combat. With this principle in mind, the German general staff has followed a policy which is described very clearly by a US observer. Quote, "In the German army, leadership is emphasized more than generalship. The general officer must, of course, combine to an outstanding degree, proved qualifications for field leadership, mental resiliency and executive capacity supported by unusual physical stamina and ruggedness of constitution."
German general officers were selected on this basis prior to mobilization. They won their positions in the pre-war, building, training and equipping of the modern army. All of them have had world war experience. As far as we know, none of them has been relieved from command during operations. The efficiency and ability of these German generals seems to be taken for granted. They have received practically no publicity during the war.
Only one general, general of infantry Edward Dietl, who commanded at Narvik, has been brought before the public for his accomplishments, for his accomplishments. This was not for his generalship, but for the qualities of leadership displayed in situations normally met with leaders lower in the command. So they're not even hyping up generals. And you could see this is probably an ego thing, you know, like Hitler doesn't want generals getting any glory. He's like, hey, give the glory to the soldiers. And but what we got one general that kind of acted like a badass. Okay, we'll give him some credit, but everybody else, you're just doing your job. Give the glory to the troops.
You think, well, you think, you think Hitler wanted competition?
No, but okay. So what's the strategy that according to your theory, obviously, I think that's what you're saying is that um,
like, okay, so since the troops aren't really in competition for glory at like the top guy. So give them the glory, give them, you know, kind of the cred and that the, you know, the props.
Right.
Because generals essentially can be in competition with him.
Might be.
Like he looks at them as kind of a threat for the glory in a way.
Like we go to a jujitsu tournament. And and you're the you're a black belt and you win. But I'm like, hey, you know what? Good job. You know, Fred in the white belt category and on Monday I get give a big speech and I give credits all like the junior troops. Cause you're kind of a threat. I'm like, I'm not giving this guy any credit.
See what I'm saying?
Yeah, like, yeah, like some people, like a general is high enough rank that he might kind of like supersede my glory. Cause he's too close to my, my, my lane.
Didn't like that.
He says, on the contrary, leaders in the lower command have received a great deal of publicity since the outbreak of the war. So every young, you know, German soldier that does something awesome is getting this full blown credit. And by the way, what was Hitler during World War One? He was a corporal. He was running around. He was a communicator, run. He was a runner. So he's, he's giving credit to those guys.
Another general principle underlying German training of officers is the view that good leaders can be developed for lower commands by carefully training for leadership is not confined to a few individuals gifted with superior qualities. However, every effort is made to find the right place for each individual. According to his special aptitudes, and a good deal of shifting is done to order accomplices. So they take guys and they go, "Oh, you know what? You're not this. You know what, Echo? You might be want to be over here in the propaganda area because you're not good at making videos, but we're not going to put you up there running troops, your thing."
A German officer in conversation accounted for his German military success in a way which brings out main standards of leadership prized in his army.
And this is what this German officer says, "I would say that the success of our leadership depends upon the selection of officers of proved character and skill, and upon our system of learning each required task and maneuver to perfection by repeated process." One can only learn by doing. The proverb "Wissen ist Macht", "Knowledge is power", is in truth not accurate. Knowledge becomes power only when it is being successfully applied in the gaining of an objective. So just because you know something doesn't mean anything.
And then they talk about character. And again, it's very strange to be reading a book about freaking Nazis and talk about their character. And, and you know, all that being said, and you're going to see some of this here. This, this efficiency, this, this obedience, this loyalty, obviously, all that plays into the why this, why this, this system was able to thrive so much. Because you were being told since you were 10 years old, "Hey, you need to support. You need to support the fatherland. You need to support the Reich." And you, what, you don't go against that. So if something doesn't look right, you go, "Hey, you know what? It's the Reich. We're pushing on."
We're, you know, as you like to say, "Oh, that's what we're doing."
So, character. "The Germans fully realized the importance of character as a basis for successful combat leadership."
Their teaching on military leadership reminds officers constantly of their responsibility to lead by example and self-discipline. A book called Company Commander, and this is a German book, a book called Company Commander says, "The Company Commander is a living example to every man in his organization. To be an officer means to set an example for the men. The officer must be his soldier's incarnation of soldiery, his model. If the German officer is inspired by this mission, the best and deepest qualities of his soul will be awakened. His life's aim will be fulfilled if he succeeds through knowledge, demeanor, and conviction
in forcing his troops to follow him. This is the manly purpose for which it is worthwhile to stake life in order to win life. In Germany, the road to rank of officer is open to every capable soldier. The destination can be reached only by efficiency in time of war and by actions in face of the enemy." The real authority of an officer is recreated daily by his entire attitude. The ancient proverb applies, "Earn it in order to possess it." The more his men are convinced that the authority of his rank is deserved through moral worth,
the stronger will be the influence of the officer's personality. No one should accept that rank attained by promotion will give to his position authority sufficiently high enough for him to relax his effort in the belief that the objective has been reached. Real authority is not dependent upon shoulder straps, stars, and badges. It depends only on efficiency and worth.
Again, you can't argue with that. And this is, you know, I always say if you have to pull rank in an argument, then you're wrong. And that's what they're saying here. It's not your badges, it's not your straps, it's not your stars that give you authority. It's who you are.
And no, this is a great thing to remember. No one should expect that rank attained by promotion will give his position, the authority sufficiently high enough for him to relax his effort. Dude, just because he got promoted, doesn't mean anything. You gotta work harder when you get promoted. That's what they tell you in the Navy. They're like, oh, cool, you got promoted, cool, now you can work harder.
You have more responsibility.
Discipline has always been recognized as essential in German training and the company officers are given the main responsibility for developing discipline by example, as well as in precept. The book just quoted says on the subject, "Discipline is the basic doctrine of the army. The objective of soldierly training must be to make it unshakable principle of every individual. If the officer personifies physical and moral discipline and thereby sets the example for the conduct of his men, he will achieve his aim. Even in difficult situations, his authority will be unquestioned if he has convinced his men of his sincerity and leadership.
He need not be the most clever, but he must be the most faultless man of his unit. The German soldier has an instinctive understanding, particularly the simple man, of the moral qualities of his superior. He cheerfully follows a leader whom he respects, whom he can admire. Daily life on the battleground forces the officer to be under the eyes of his men, day and night. This necessitates a large amount of self-discipline, both on and off duty, which includes not only cheerful and conscientious fulfillment of all duties, but also modesty in requirements
for quarters and food, soberness in drink, self-control in sexual matters, cleanliness in speech, and a balanced character."
End quote.
So what are they looking for? They're looking for that leader to be beyond reproach. Now, I, I, I don't like that they say, hey, the, the leader doesn't need to be the most clever, but he needs to be the most faultless. And what that sets you up for is trying to cover for yourself. It's trying to act like you do, you know, everything. That's a problem.
That's a problem. But the rest of it, trying to set an example on and off duty.
Right? Not over drinking. Discipline in everything that you do. It's weird. They, they talk about self-control and sexual matters. Like, why does that come up? That's weird, right?
Come on, bro. Yeah. What's that? No fap, right?
Yeah. I mean, that's just a weird thing. Like it's, it's strange that they throw that in here. What's going on? What, what caused that to come out? You know what I'm saying?
Well, it's one of those discipline things, right? Where if, if you can, uh, what, uh, refrain from
I get it, but like, why is that in here? This is what this, this is what a, a Nazi book said. Right? Self-control and sexual matters. Cause there's some deviant freaks going on and he's trying to tighten it up.
Never know, I guess.
Um, but cleanliness and speech, a balanced character.
Goes on to say, the German military bible for company officers is the manual of troop leadership. This book gives their basic tactical and combat doctrine, and it's plenty to say on the moral aspects of leadership, the following are some quotations. Here's some quotations from their books. War is the severest test of the spiritual and physical strength. In war, character outweighs intellect. Many stand forth on the field of battle who in peace would remain unnoticed. This is hype trade shit right here for the troops. The officer is a leader and a teacher. Besides his knowledge of men and his sense of justice, he must be distinguished by his superior knowledge and experience. His earnestness, his self-control and his courage. Again, hype.
The example and personal conduct of officers and non-commissioned officers are of decisive influence on the troops. The officer who, in the face of the enemy, is cold-blooded, decisive, and courageous inspires his troops onward. The officer must likewise find the way into the hearts of his subordinates and gain their trust through an understanding of their feelings and thoughts and through never ceasing care of their needs. Mutual trust is the surest basis of discipline and necessity in danger. So, there you go. There's a little dichotomy coming at you. You've got to be the hardest dude, but at the same time, you've got to care about your
troops through never ceasing care of their needs. The Nazi dichotomy of leadership. There. Relations of company officers with enlisted personnel. German directives stress the disreliability of comradeship in units as a moral basis for fighting efficiency. And, again, the company officers are reminded of their responsibility. The company commander, this is a book again, the company commander says, "When the soldier learns by experience that he is being taken care of, and that is the officer as his best comrade who sees to this care, then he is ready.
He will follow such a superior through thick and thin and will cheerfully perform the most difficult duties." Hey, Hitler, you might have wanted to read that paragraph when you left your boys at Stalingrad to get surrounded and freaking die. The officer must always set an example by his own conduct and soldierly qualities. He must never think of himself until his men have been cared for. I mean, this is like leadership 101, right? Never think of yourself until your team is taken care of. Only such an example can convince of the moral right to demand services from others. Only the model life can confirm that right. The officer's own efficiency alone will emphasize the necessity of his orders.
Again, you get that weird use of the word "efficiency." It's a scary word. I don't like it when Nazis say "efficiency." It makes me nervous. If the men copy the example set by the officers, officers and men will be joined.
Comradely association and festivities place the officer in a situation basically different from that in times of peace. He must never represent a contrast to the privations and restrictions which the men necessarily take upon themselves. And he must never forget that their need for association and festivity is no less great or justified than his own. So that's what that's saying right there is that when you're an officer and your team has to sleep in the field or they have to go without food or they have to go without water, you need to do the same thing. Burdens and privations, restrictions and negations are shared mutually and equally.
Every company commander must be a Spartan. Men must feel that privations mean nothing to him, that he rises above such problems and that daily difficulties cannot break his spirit. Again, solid advice. Continuing on, the company officer is advised to be severe when necessary, but without resorting to abuse, to disciplinary punishment as rare, to use disciplinary punishment as rarely as possible. And always in a way that is clearly justified.
To take an interest in the personal difficulties of his men, to maintain a cheerful atmosphere under all circumstances, to visit and converse with troops in quarters, and to take the greatest care in choice of supervision of non-commissioned officers. This does not seem like Nazi stuff.
That's exactly what I was thinking. I was like, oh dang, these guys seem, I'm gonna say it, not gonna sound correct, but they kind of seem like good guys.
Yeah, well, that's the scary thing here.
It's saying like, straight up, like, don't feel like physical discipline or...
Right, yeah. Disciplinary punishment as rare, use disciplinary punishment as rarely as possible. And always in a way that's clearly justified.
Maintain a cheerful atmosphere?
As a Nazi, I'm gonna maintain a cheerful atmosphere, doesn't sound.
Yeah, that's, it's interesting.
It is.
Well, if, you know, at some point, maybe we'll take the Nazi theories and apply them sort of through a military lens and what it would have looked like. Cause what you end up with is like a tyrannical leader and you must comply. And everyone needs to shut up. And by the way, we're gonna blame, when something goes wrong, we're gonna blame everybody else, which is kind of a key component to Hitler's attitude. Which is the reason that Germany is having these problems isn't Germany's fault. It's the First World War and the Versailles Treaty and the Jews. So it's not our fault, it's everyone else's fault. We're just blaming everyone else. So if we took that sort of higher headquarters Nazi philosophy
and put it through a milit- put it on the military lens, this will look a lot different. Taking it back to the book. "German officers are expected to give attention to the mental outlook of their men, and this includes giving them frequent talks on the war. The soldier must know what the war is, that the war is his personal affair, and he must be instructed on its causes, meaning, and progress. It is believed that the soldiers who are informed as to why they are fighting and of their part in the battle will show improved discipline in combat." You've got to explain the why. "Newspapers, radio, and books are used to assist toward this end.
An article in a military review advises the company commander to assemble his unit once a week for discussion. The father of the company should speak on all matters, official and unofficial, current events, politics, which influence the mental attitudes and morale of the men. Troop leadership reminds officers that, quote, "The leaders must live with their troops, participating in their dangers, their wants, their joys, their sorrows. Only in this way can they estimate the battle worth and the requirement of, the requirements of the troops. Man is not responsible for himself alone, but for his comrades."
He who can do more, who has greater capacity of accomplishment must instruct the inexperienced and weaker. From such conduct, the feeling of real comradeship develops, which is just as important between the leaders and the men as between the men themselves. Troops welded together only superficially and not through long training and experience more easily fail under severe strain and under unexpected crisis. Therefore, before the outbreak of war, the development and maintenance of steadfastness and discipline in the troops as well as their training is of decisive importance. So, look, that's from their book. The exact same stuff that you'll hear in the US military.
The precepts outlined above have been actually carried out as US observers have reported during the past few years. One report states, "German leadership is based on mutual respect between officer and man." We were again impressed with the fact that cooperation between officers and men works both ways. We're going to get into Principles of Leadership. Section 6, "The training of German officers of all grades for the present war has been so conducted to emphasize certain basic doctrines. While these may seem rather general in character, they must be understood in order to appreciate German tactics. According to observers, German combat tactics reflect the application of these doctrines,
which are by no means pious phrases of military theorists. The very concrete and practical manual on troop leadership is full of references to these principles, as later quotations will show." The German Army has been organized and trained to operate as the task force principle. According to the definition of task force, is a unit of arms, of all arms and services under one commander for the accomplishment of a single specified mission. This principle operates at all levels of command. When a mission is assigned to a commander, he is given the means judge necessary to accomplishment, to accomplish it. These means are turned over to him for combined training by which his men are molded into a combat team.
The members of this team must know their mission and work together for its accomplishment. Individual units are called upon to merge into the structure of the combat team. The training phase permits commanders and staff to become thoroughly acquainted with all their officers. In this way, they... Learn one another's shortcomings and strong points so that many later misunderstandings are prevented in the stress of combat. Personal combinations thus built up often become so strong that they are maintained through successive campaigns.
Every effort is made to discourage rivalry between components of a team. For example, through march song, though march songs are highly regarded and developed, there are no songs about the superiority of infantry to engineers or artillery, etc. There are no inter-company or inter-battery athletics to develop useless competitive emotions. Commanders of subordinate units are so imbued with the feeling of cooperation that they go out of their way to assist one another. They cover and move for each other.
Considerable attention is given to the acquainting of officers of one branch with the weapons and tactics of another.
Even the manual of a specialized branch shows this effort. Anti-aircraft Gunners Manual has a section on what these gunners must know about their employment as part of ground forces teams, including a discussion of divisional tactics.
The greatest factor in successful deployment of armed troops is speed in obtaining the initial coordination of arms and in the execution of a coordinated missions by various arms. So they are absolutely pushing for everyone to work together. That's what they're pushing for. We have to cover and move for each other.
Their next principle is aggressiveness and initiative. Some people say default aggressive, I've heard.
The prime characteristic of German tactical doctrine is maintenance of the initiative and avoidance of stabilization. The Germans believe absolutely that if a trained commander prepares and executes aggressive moves, even with even average ability and reasonable speed, the enemy will be kept too busy meeting them to carry out a successful offensive measures.
If a German officer phrased the concept in a way that can be understood by troops, our men are taught that their own safety depends upon their getting to the enemy's rear and not staying in front of him. This is fundamental of our training. These guys are looking to flank all day long.
Aggressive tactics require the use of initiative by combat leaders down to the platoon commanders and non-commissioned officers. Development of this capacity for taking the initiative is stressed at all points in military training, whether theoretical or practical. No illusion surviving the First World War is more dangerous than the notion that German leaders, especially of small units, are bound by rigid and mechanical regulations and can move only in accordance with detailed prearranged plans. So, again, that's what they started this war off. This is 1942. By the end, Hitler was dictating. They lost this. In actual fact, German leaders of small units have shown great skill in this war in adapting their tactics and flexibility to meet new situations.
They have been trained to do this. The handbook on the German squad in combat illustrates this doctrine. Quote, "In the execution of battle missions, one should be most careful to avoid the idea that only one solution can be right, can be the right one. Only success in an actual case could prove that a given solution was the right one. A model solution must not be drilled into the soldiers. They, and particularly the squad leader, should be trained to be flexible and should learn to be equal on any occasion." So, this is kind of the antithesis of what you think of a Nazi, right? Just calling out for flexibility and for free thought.
I mean, free thought is the antithesis of Nazi attitude. Nazi attitudes, we're all gonna think the same thing. That's why we're gonna start indoctrinating you when you're 10 years old. No, we want you to have free thought. And ultimately, this kind of thing, this is one of the things that leads America to have that open mind on the battlefield, to see what we can adjust, to figure out what we need to change, and start winning.
German regulations place due value on getting as much information as possible about the enemy as a prerequisite for action, but regulations also prevent this from becoming a requirement that cripples action.
This is a dichotomy of leadership. Hey, look, you gotta get good information, but don't let it cripple you and wait for it.
Quote, obscurity of the situation is the rule. Seldom will one have exact information of the enemy. Clarification of hostile situation is self-evident, is a self-evident demand. However, to wait in tense situations for information is seldom a token of strong leadership, but often one of weakness. You gotta take action. You gotta be aggressive. That's gotta be your default mode.
So the officer is taught to attack in order to clear up the situation. That's a great quote. You wanna know what's going on? Attack. You'll figure it out. And gain a basis for an estimate of further action. Battle itself proves the most reliable means of estimating the enemy. Oh, that's a good one. I don't recommend that in a bar fight. Let's see how tough this guy is. All right. Omission and delay are regarded as greater crimes than the choice of the wrong method of action. In training exercises, the choice of a tactical method is subject to full criticism by reviewing officers, but no man is reprimanded because he tried to do something and failed. They want you to do something.
Even, that's a big one. I mean, kinda, it wouldn't seem that way, but it seems like that's a very surprising one, right there.
They want you to take action. That's the crazy thing about this. This is what we don't think.
The specific fact that like, you'll be, you'll be less reprimanded if you do the wrong thing.
Like you think, oh, you know, okay, so, you know, like the expression, right? Don't be a Nazi about it, like grammar Nazi, or soup Nazi, or I don't know, like that, just as a whatever, that kinda expression, it kinda says the opposite of that. Where it's like, you better do it correctly, or almost feels like they're saying do it correctly or don't do it all, almost kinda thing. It's what it feels like. Nonetheless, it does feel like. Do not make a mistake.
Or die, kind of a thing, kind of a feeling.
That's kind of funny. Like if you were to, like the grammar Nazi one.
Think about if you were legitimately just paranoid about making a mistake and having the grammar Nazi come at you. And so what are you gonna do? You're not gonna write it.
Yeah. So you can do what?
Yeah, you're just gonna sit there.
You're not gonna put the word out. So you gotta be like, hey, grammar Nazi, no.
Get, you can say, hey, you might want to make adjustment here, but good try. That's what they're saying.
That's being a grammar Nazi right there.
That's.
Uh, all right. Here's some quotations from the troop leadership manual. The teaching of the conduct of war cannot be concentrated exhaustively in regulations. The principles so enunciated must be employed dependent upon their situation. It's the same thing. Dude, it's not about regulations. You gotta figure it out. The emptiness of the battlefield depend, demands independent thinking and acting of fighters who, considering each situation, are dominated by determination to act boldly and decisively and to arrive at success. We just want you to go, figure it out. We don't care how you do it. The first demand in war is decisive action.
Everyone, the highest commander and the most junior soldier, must be aware that omissions and neglect incriminate him more severely than mistake and choice of means. Great success presume boldness and daring preceded by good judgment. They're just telling us these troops over and over again, make something happen. We never have at our disposal all the desired forces for the decisive action. He who will be secure everywhere or who fixes forces in secondary tasks acts contrary to the fundamental. Yeah, oh, I just need a few more troops to go. No, go. Hold on, we're gonna hold, we got in set security. No, go.
Hold on, I need to figure out what the enemy is doing. No, go.
The weaker the force through speed, mobility, great march accomplishments, surprise and deception, the utilization of darkness and terrain to the fullest can be stronger at the decisive area. Time and space must be correctly estimated, favorably situations, favorable situations quickly recognized and decisively exploited. Every advantage over the enemy increases our own freedom of action. The attack is launched in order to defeat the enemy. The attacker has the initiative. Superiority of leadership and of troops shows to the best advantage in the attack. Success does not always come to the superiority of numbers.
A German officer commenting on the clearly commenting early on the early campaigns of the war recognized the capacity of very young officers to meet these standards of leadership. So this is pretty impressive. Before the campaign in the West, we underestimated the wonderful leadership of our 22-year-old company commanders. They acted without hesitation where older men would have paused for long consideration and heavy artillery reinforcements. Time and time again, we found these young commanders calling for a few 88-millimeter anti-aircraft guns, a handful of anti-tank guns and a platoon of pioneers to assist them in taking a famous fortress and then actually capturing it with no delay and relatively few losses. The enthusiastic leadership of youth was one of the great features of our advanced West.
So they did, they actually, this is like one of those things where you program the robot and then it like does even better than you thought it was gonna do. They told these guys, advance, you know, fight, go, be aggressive. And that's what they did and it worked and they were surprised by it.
Next section is orders and communications. Aggressiveness cannot serve as the sole principle of tactics without leading to disaster. So there's the dichotomy. We want to be aggressive, but if you're just being aggressive, it can be a disaster. German training supplements that principle with careful attention to all measures which provide that action taken shall be considered and intelligent. These measures include orders, clear orders, and an efficient system of communications.
Simple, clear and concise orders. That's what this goes into. Orders should be clear and direct, should confine themselves to the main lines of a mission assigned to the lower command, giving the lower command latitude of choice of the means to execute the mission. So here's what you gotta do. We don't care how you do it.
The Germans believed that one of the signs of deterioration in their armies toward the end of the First World War was the growing verboity and ambiguity of orders. They proposed to avoid these mistakes by constantly drilling conciseness and clarity. Isn't it interesting? As I'm talking to you more, it's becoming more ambiguous. That's what they're saying.
We started falling apart at the end of World War I. Why? The more we talked, the less people understood what was happening.
That's a, that's a freaking very interesting, very interesting dichotomy.
This is an interesting statement here.
When we start talking about the way these guys are sort of living their lives. No German officer begins the day without a mission. If the mission has not been received, received from higher authority, he gives himself a mission for the day. And one which is definitely not a mere compliance with a printed schedule. The printed schedule is nothing but a time allotment or control. He approaches, this is the German officer, approaches each day's task as he would a battle, in order that eventually he will approach battle as he would a day's task.
Just kinda living the life.
The manual of troop leadership says on this subject of orders, "The order puts the decision into effect. Clear orders are essential for the frictionless cooperation of all commanders. For the higher commander, the written order provides the foundation for leadership. It is communicated to the lower units printed in carbon copy, typed written or written by hand or by technical communication means, frequently as dictated over the telephone.
In every instance, the most sure and suitable method of transmission is to be chosen."
The more pressing the situation, the shorter the order. This is a mistake everybody makes. What's, what's challenging about that is
in order for me to give you an order in a pressing situation, I have to be able to look at the situation, simplify it and then distill it, the, the order down into something that's like, hey, we need to move north now. And there's a lot of other things going on. What we need to do is we need to move north now and get this terrain feature solidified. Boom, that's it. Go. That's one of the most challenging things that leaders, one of the most challenging things for leaders to do is to look at complex situation and simplify them and then verbalize what needs to happen.
That's something you can practice. That's something you should think about all the time.
That's something when you, when you are going to talk to your team, you should write down what you're going to say and say it in as few words as possible. That's one thing I kind of liked about Twitter, back, back in the day when I was on Twitter a lot.
It was fun. You had to like, you had to like, you had 140 characters. And then they made it easy, gave you 280 characters. But back in the day, 140 characters, you had to, that's what you're gonna do.
It's good practice.
Became ambiguous after a while.
Yeah, it did.
You know, there's a, that all, it always reminds me of the, I think it's life. Maybe, yeah, yeah. Life tells the story of, uh, BTF Tony or life will go through his, his orders or whatever he's, he's telling everybody. And then BTF Tony will be like, hey, I'm gonna remember three of those things. Which of them do you want them to be?
Yeah. Classic BTF Tony.
That, I mean, that would be so fun to say in a real situation. I don't know how many people I could pull that off with without them getting kind of mad at me. But if you pull it off, that'd be sweet.
Yeah. Well, you can't get mad at BTF Tony for a bunch of reasons. Number one, he's awesome. Number two, cause he's right, you know, and he's telling you the truth and you gotta be happy.
With important orders, it is often advisable to use two or more means of transmission. Well, that makes sense. It is easy to underestimate the time required to get an order through. Oh, that's an important one. I told those guys yesterday. Oh, they didn't get the word yet. Big shocker. Too many orders, especially in battle during which communication means may miscarry, produce the danger of an impairing independence of action of lower commanders. So if I'm giving you orders all the time, eventually you're just waiting for orders. That's just, I'm centralizing command and I'm micromanaging and it's going to be a problem. An order shall contain all that is necessary for the lower commander to know in order for him to execute independently his task. It should contain no more.
Then they got a, they got a chunk in here about communications, but they're starting to talk about like their technical communications, so no factor here.
As contact is gained with the enemy, it is better that the division commander be where he can observe. Therefore, he belongs early on the field of battle and in the decisive area. His location must be easily found, easily reached. In attack, the division command post should be located as far forward as possible. Standby for dichotomy. Yet so selected that the communication net to the side and rear is effectively shielded from hostile fire. To be desired are observation of the battlefield, either from the command post or a nearby observation post, and the possibility of establishing an airplane landing field nearby. So there's a dichotomy. The Nazi dichotomy.
I've said that twice now, I'm a little scared.
I don't want to make that a thing.
Knowledge of terrain.
The usual attention is paid in German training to correct use of maps as a basis for utilizing terrain and maneuver. But the German doctrine is that maps should be so thoroughly studied that they can be largely dispensed with during maneuvers. An observer who commented on the small use of maps during tank exercises was told that the officer who must constantly refer to a map for orientation purposes is considered poorly trained. The map once studied should be carried in the mind rather than in the hand. That's.
When you get in the military, that's sort of like,
from a leadership perspective,
understanding terrain is like blue belt level, like, and you know the difference between someone that doesn't train in a blue belt is massive. That's when you start to look at terrain and understand terrain, that's like when you get your blue belt, you're like, okay, I understand. I understand how I can utilize the terrain that we're facing to our advantage.
Yeah, and what you're saying, just the the the method to do it, like the skill of it.
Yep.
Versus no skill.
And even when you train, when we train as SEALs, like when we first go out and do immediate action drills, so we practice getting in gunfights and breaking contact with the enemy or assaulting the enemy. The first thing we do is we do it on a big, flat, open field. It's desert, but it's a big, flat piece of sand. There's no terrain, it's just flat, and you're just going through the mechanics. And then as you get better, you start incorporating little pieces of terrain, and then eventually you're using like wild terrain features.
Next section is called surprise. During the training phase, the importance of the principle of surprise in combat is constantly featured. According to German doctrine, surprise depends on the use of secrecy, deception, and speed. Secrecy depends on maintaining the strictest discipline among troops. According to German military authorities, the use of deception to achieve surprise is comparatively unexploited.
Speed of execution of any maneuver is an essential, is essential for achieving surprise. This principle is extended to artillery practice, and Observer notes that as much importance is now put on the speed of opening fire as on accuracy, and as the attainment of heavy volume of fire. So give us surprise to people.
Again, this is a speed, surprise, and violence of action. That's what you learn day two at the SEAL team.
Section 7 Training Methods, subsection 20 Physical Conditioning and Marching.
The importance of physical condition is fully recognized in German training doctrine. One of the services of the Hitler Youth with its emphasis on sports and the labor service is to furnish the army with recruits who are fully conditioned and toughened. The training period is thereby shortened and made more effective. A US observer saw an infantry battalion on maneuvers in January 1940. With the temperature at 20 degrees, the troops lay patiently in four inches of snow, waiting their orders for over an hour. Many men had no gloves. This difficult period seemed to have no effect on their performance later.
The hardening.
Other observers of a German division in field exercises before the outbreak of war reported that fitness and endurance were made a fetish by both officers and men. The training purposes officers, oh sorry, for training purposes, officers often went 24 hours without food. Troops carried heavy loads of mortars, machine guns, and other equipment as far as 1,200 yards in fast rushes of 50 yards. Just before the exercises, one engineer battalion had marched 85 miles through the mountains in three days.
Good physical condition has been a basis for the notable march achievement of the German infantry. Despite all the mechanization of modern armies, German doctrine foresaw the possibility that motorized personnel might lose their equipment and have to move rapidly on foot. In some cases, German troops under the prolonged strain of combat operations have covered 30 to 40 miles a day for several days, and German sources claim a march of 44 miles in 24 hours during the Polish campaign.
Reserve formations of older men are hard are held to nearly the same high standards. Despite these achievements, demand is made for even grading greater attention to marching. An article in a German military review from nineteen forty states. Peacetime marching practice, though good, was not strenuous enough to prepare men for wartime marching conditions. In peacetime marching, too much consideration is given to the comfort and convenience of the troops.
Despicable tone added by me.
Yeah, so you had these American observers over there in nineteen forty. Actually, no, my grandfather was in the army and he was over in Nazi Germany in nineteen thirty nine. And he was, he was talking to Nazi, I have, I have his passport. And he actually, he was an engineer. And he
ended up befriending one of the Nazi German or Nazi army engineers that worked on weapon systems. And he, he became friends with him and got a bunch of blueprints of their weapon systems and stole them and brought them back to America and turned them over. He did a little espionage.
But I have, uh, I had his passport. I don't know where it is right now. I think my, my dad might have it, but he, his passport has like all the, the Nazi swastika stamps in it and stuff when he was over there. And you know, my grandfather spoke Dutch. And so he, he met someone that they could, he could communicate with.
Like, oh, he spoke to, when did you, cause obviously he was American citizen. Wait, do you know when your family moved?
Yeah, that side of the family came here on the boat. In like
nineteen hundred or something like that.
It's crazy thinking about those times, like those, those were actual real times, you know? Like before you were born, you know, it feels like in your brain, it's almost like, oh, that's just, it's almost like a movie, you know? Before you were born is more like just a movie and all this stuff. But it was like an actual time where people were actually living, actually going through their day to day life.
And you actually weren't.
And you were like, you did not exist.
It's a hard one to contemplate sometimes.
I will, I regret to inform you that the world has been here before you were here. Echo Charles.
The world was not created the moment I was born. Alright, alright, cool.
Just saying.
Emphasis on field exercises, even the training at the German General Staff avoids abstract theory in tactics and strategy. The student is thoroughly grounded in fundamental principles of tactics, but he is taught to apply them concrete by case study method in which a specific situation must be stated and solved. Tactical training at the school is given almost entirely by means of free maneuvers on the map and on the ground. No fixed divisional organization is used in this training, and the combination of arms in the division is continually varied. The exercises are so conducted that the officer student as commander and his staff oppose either the instructor or another student group. The student is given very little information of the enemy positions and is required to make immediate decisions put into verbal orders. Movement is controlled by factors of time, space,
terrain, firepower, and mobility, and by no other control features. Coordination of effort is assured by staff action during movement rather than by attempting elaborate plans in advance. Field work is done, is, field work is given central emphasis in the program of training for troops. Small units carry out tactical problems day in, day out. Tactical exercises fill in half the time of training. This is just squared away. And you can have a, you can do, you can do such awesome rope, and we've, we're doing a bunch of stuff at Ashland Front. We've got the FTX going, obviously, where this is what you're doing. You're gonna get, you're gonna get like, little bit of information, you've got a timeline that you gotta meet, you've got enemy moving, you've got friendly forces, you've got all this stuff going on. And that's why we do it. So you can learn how to lead.
We're doing something now we call the, the Leadership Lab where it's not a combat scenario, it's a business, it's business scenarios. So you're going in, and you've got a staff that you've got to work with, and you've got things that are happening at your company.
Who plays the staff? Other people in the company or role players?
Role players. Role players play the staff. It's, it's pretty awesome. Like, oh, hey, we've got, hey, hey, listen, boss, or listen, uh, whatever, plant, plant manager, hey, plant manager, you got a complaint, one of your, one of your employees is flying off the handle right now, who says that they're getting treated unfairly, they're coming to your office right now, they'll be here in three minutes.
Oh, by the way, as soon as that's over, you, you, there's a, there's a reporter here. You've got to do a small press conference as a group of reporters here. They want to know about this product that you made that's made a bunch of kids sick in the local neighborhood. So get ready for that press conference and then you go into the press conference. Guess what? Guess what happens? You could ask them a bunch of questions by role players. Do you, are you saying that your profit is more important than the safety of the children? You know, like all that kind of stuff? So good.
Yeah, that makes sense.
Yeah. Echelonfront.com leadership lab. Check it out. You want to put your key executives through some awesome training where they learn these, these types of leadership skills? That's it.
Fast forward a little bit. The concept of wartime training stated was stated in a German training directive in 1941. In spite of greater difficulties than in time of peace, training must be conducted as thoroughly and methodically as possible. It is only by inspiring a desire for intellectual cooperation and by constantly keeping it alive among the lower ranks that the correct tactical conceptions can be successfully inculcated in the ranks down to the most humble non-commissioned officer.
Realism.
The realism of training. No element of training doctrine is given more stress than the demand for a maximum effect of realism. Clausewitz, the guide of so much modern military theory stated the principle very exactly at a period when the methods and techniques of warfare put less strain than they do now on the troops entering battle for the first time. That's an interesting statement. Like, hey, back in the day is nothing compared to, you're going into combat in 1942 and there's machine guns and, you know, Messerschmitt's overhead strafing your area and people are just getting blown up like this is a totally different ballgame.
But this is a good way of putting it from Crosswoods. No general can supply his army with war experience. And the substitute of peacetime drills is a weak one when compared with the actual experience in war. It is much more important that peacetime drills be so arranged that a part of the causes for friction occur. And that the judgment, the wisdom, the prudence and the decision of the individual leaders are tested. That is believed by those who do not know from this experience. So you gotta go, if you haven't been to war, you gotta go even harder than you think. It is of utmost importance that the soldier of high or low grade, no matter what position he may occupy.
Should experience those difficulties which perplex and surprise him in actual war. If they have happened to him, but once before, he's already somewhat familiar with them. This even applies to physical strains. They must be practiced, not so much that nature, but that the brain becomes accustomed. This is so absolutely critical. And you know, I was so lucky to have been where I was. And be able to run training in the SEAL teams. Because we just were able to execute on this. We were just absolutely able to execute on this 100%. And give super hard training, stressful training, decisions that need to be made under time, under stress, under pressure.
With mayhem going on, communication breaking down, like we were able to do this over and over again. If you were a platoon commander, you were going to do this 12 times. In 12 nights or in three nights or four nights. You're going to be put in these stressful situations, you would start to get used to it. And your troops get used to it. This is why law enforcement training needs to step it up. Needs to step it up about a thousand percent. So that people get used to these scenarios from training.
The Germans have gone to great trouble and expense to carry out this principle in training. For one thing, troops and training exercises are provided with large amounts of practice ammunition of all sorts, including grenades, usually with reduced charges, but nevertheless requiring careful handling and involving some risk. Machine gun fire ball ammunition over the heads of attacking troops with very small safety margin and trench mortars support the infantry within 50 yards of its objective. A German officer of engineers told an observer that we have considerable losses in wartime training, but this is unavoidable in familiarizing the men in handling of explosives and becoming an expert. The men know that losses in training would mean fewer losses in battle.
In field exercise, the enemy is always represented by actual soldiers who advance and retreat, delay fire, fire blanks, and otherwise conduct themselves as the enemy should. Barbed wire, shell holes, trenches, artillery emplacements, and all the other features of actual combat are introduced as far as possible in every exercise.
Remember when you, uh, guys for training got the laser tag system, whatever it's called? Um, when you shot it, was it, what did the gunfire, was it like?
It was a blank.
Oh, so it was, so it sounded real?
Well, blanks don't sound as real as real guns, but yes, it went bang.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And then it shot the laser at the same time.
What's the difference between the sound? I don't think I've ever heard a blank.
There's a choir. It's, it's, it's considerably quieter, although the machine gun blanks are pretty freaking loud. But like a, an M4 or M16 type blank is pretty weak. Like you probably don't need air pro.
Oh, for, oh.
I mean, it's loud, but it's not, it's not crazy. Yeah.
Yeah. You ever watch, uh, Snatch? That movie?
Yeah, I don't remember too much about it.
Kyrichi. Anyway, they, they had these, uh, Replica, they're gonna do some robbery.
Oh, yeah, this is the, this is the fifty cal that says replica on it, right? The Desert Eagle fifty cal that says replica on it?
No, no, no.
Isn't that in that movie, though?
Yes, but they're closed. That's not what, what happened was, actually, yes. So it was like the, that scene.
Hmm.
Or the part of that scene anyway. So they're, these guys, these three thugs, go and they get these guns that are replica guns. He's like, I even got extra loud blanks. So that actually now kind of makes a little bit more sense. It's like, okay, there's extra loud blanks. Well, yeah, if the, if regular blanks are more quiet.
Then that makes sense. But then even though they were making jokes, they're like, why? In case we got a deafen them to death or whatever.
He said, whatever. No, so the Desert Eagle wasn't the replica. The Desert Eagle was real.
Oh.
They had the replicas. So they came in, they did, I don't know, they did whatever they did, then they came in.
Didn't one of them say replica on it, though?
All their guns, all the thugs' guns. So they were pointing it at Vinnie Blue, or Vinnie's is his real name. Uh, Bullet Tooth Tony.
Uh huh.
Who's this big, played by Vinnie, I forget his last name. Um, and he's just cruising there having a beer. And they're like, you know, they try to intimidate him or whatever. And then Vinnie goes into this, or Bullet Tooth goes into this kind of cool speech. And then at the end of the speech, it says, and the fact that you have replica written down the side of your guns. And it kind of zooms, you know, Guy Ritchie has this good cinematic style. Shows the replica words. And then it goes, and the fact that I have Desert Eagle. And he pulls it out. Written on mine. And then he goes back into his speech or whatever. It was just a super good scene, but the Desert Eagle was real. They had replicas.
You know what I'm saying?
We, we, you know, this guy's talking about barbed wire, shell holes, trenches, artillery emplacements, like all the stuff to make it real. We had Hollywood set designers come down and square away our training sites. And it was freaking awesome. It was awesome. And then, uh, like we do what the Moog would do, which is like set tires on fire in the middle of the streets. You come down there, your night vision's getting all messed up from that. There's graffiti on the walls. There's speakers that are playing the call to prayer. It would be. It would be realistic, man.
Yeah, and that's so good too, because when you first started saying that, I was like, oh wait, you got Hollywood. So I mean, that's kind of going, is it that deep, bro? Like, did you?
Yes, it is.
But then I thought about it. So when I first started playing football, I was eleven years old, Pop Warner football. And, you know, in a regular football practice, especially back then, might be different now. But back then is, you know, you warm up, you do some exercises, push-ups and stuff. You do like these kind of, they're called grass drills, but they're like essentially coordination drills, you know? And then you do some technique stuff, and then you do a scrimmage, pretty much every day with your pads on too. So it's, so it's essentially, it's essentially full contact scrimmages, right? So, but the scrimmage would have, and this is, this is pretty standard, where you have like kind of the starting team and the secondary team.
And then you have everyone else who's not on the first or second string plays the defense, right? But they, they show the defense that the team that we're going to play that week, what defense they play. So, and then if the player, and here's what our coaches would do, if there was a star player somewhere, like maybe the defensive end or something like that was a star player, the safety or the linebacker was, was kind of the star player. Especially when you're young, it kind of, it stands out more. They would get like one of our really good players to play that guy. And if he did something unique, they would make that guy do that unique thing. So they tried to, try to make it realistic like and replicate it, right? So I remember them, I remember thinking like, alright, I mean, you know, we run plays, but
I didn't realize how much of a difference it is from running plays against a generic defense versus running plays against a very specific defense. So, and, and you know, I'm eleven years old, so it's not dawning on me, right? So I'm like, whatever though, we'll, we'll practice or whatever. And from week to week, it'd be different. You could feel the difference with who we're playing, and they'd all be the same guys, guys on our team, right, in practice? But rewind back to that first game, and the first time you play, and you see the exact same thing as we were practicing, it's different jerseys, which is weird. But even that little detail, it's kind of like, whoa, that kind of stood out. You could see the little differences, like, oh, I've been used to this practice so mu, you know, over these weeks or whatever. The littlest difference stands out.
So the more accurate you can make it, the better, so you don't get distracted by all these little differences, right? So then I thought back to your. You know, scenario where you're hiring um set designers and you're like talking about burning tires and doing all this little stuff that I'm like cares if there's a burning tire or not, you know, like, but you're here to do the mission, the burning tire is not going to distract you. The thing is, it wouldn't be surprising to me, given what I already know, everything would be distraction if you haven't seen it before. The burning tires, that's kind of a big distraction, actually, when you think about it, or it could be.
Yeah, yeah, how's it affecting your night vision? What are you gonna do?
It's a little thing, but it makes a big difference.
That's so true, so true, even like, okay, so like football there, I remember, so this guy, his name is Kelly, he's kind of a, you know, kids are bigger. So they'd replicate him in practice, they'd put my brother or something, somebody there, right? Someone who's just like a, like a big, a good athlete for practice, but this guy Kelly, he wasn't just a good athlete, he was kind of a mean person. So it was like, you could tell the difference between an athlete and being a mean person. The difference between that, you know, and it was like a thing, it was like, man, they should have told my brother, whoever else was praying, just to be mean or something like that. That would have helped, that little detail would have helped.
They were a little surprised.
Yeah, well, I always tell people like, I'm doing my first jujitsu tournament, what should I be ready for? And I'm like, oh yeah, be ready for your opponent to go crazier than anything you've seen in your jujitsu academy. Cause that's what's gonna happen.
It might not be the first match, might be, but like, it's almost guaranteed, it probably is gonna be your first match, person's gonna get nuts.
You need to be ready for that.
Yeah, and actually, there's ways to get ready for that, even though it does get a little bit more, just like football.
Extra nuts.
Like anything, it gets dangerous after a while, if you start practicing that hard with it, you know?
Yeah, you can't.
But to do like an in-house tournament, or like, or a replicated tournament, like they, we did it a few times, where it's like, oh, everyone like, make a big circle, we're gonna do a thing, the points matter, yeah, yeah.
Start tracking points, that's the thing.
You know, and people watching and yelling and cheering, and there being a ref, counting your points, it's kind of like when things matter a little bit more, it's like, right, even, it's all just psychological, but it helps.
Isn't everything? The handbook on squad combat says, one should use real troops as much as possible to represent the enemy. The soldiers will much less, will be much less likely to make mistakes in wartime, if they see during the training, instead of a dummy, a real and active enemy. This is, you know, you talked about using that laser tag system, and when we started using simunition, and paintball, it was just totally different. I mean, imagine that. That paper target doesn't shoot back, it doesn't move. That's the main concerns of the enemy. They're gonna shoot back, and they're gonna move. A paper target doesn't shoot back, it doesn't move. So, that training is,
even though live fire training, you have to do it, and you need to do it to a point where it's second nature, live fire against targets, but the real stressors should come when you start doing force on force training.
Yeah, that's a, just the person or the enemy, whatever, shooting back, just that. Not the moving thing. Like, what if there was stationary targets that actually shot back? Just that alone, huge deal. On the flip side, just them moving around versus not moving, huge deal. And then now you're missing in live fire training, and this is obviously my little theory, I don't sit in the scenario, but those two put together, isn't that kind of night and day? It's a whole different training scenario.
And we adjusted our tactics when we figured that out. Because our tactics had evolved from Vietnam, they had evolved to a point where they weren't realistic anymore. Because we spent all these, we spent 20 years shooting at paper targets that weren't moving. And so we developed tactics to do it very quickly, but it was against inanimate objects. The minute we started getting
Paintball and simunition into the game, you start realizing, oh, that's not gonna work. We can't all stand in a big group like this. We need to take this into consideration. We need to take that into consideration. So things, we got a lot better. We started doing force on force training. It's the same thing to be said for jujitsu and UFC. Right? When you just, when I used to walk up to you and throw like a whatever punch and you would fall down. Like I threw a simulated punch and you simulated falling down and I simulated broke your, you know, your heart with a, with a two finger punch or whatever, you know what I mean?
It's called the dimak.
Yeah, with the dimak. Then it's like, it seemed to work good. Like, it was pretty awesome. But then the minute I got into a fight with some drunk wrestler, I got caught a beat down. I'm like, this doesn't work. And what jujitsu is, jujitsu is like, oh, you're training to, you're training as hard as you can to put the person in a submission hold that then they don't die because they tap. Well, it's the same thing. I shoot you with paintball in the neck or the thighs, which is where I'm aiming, because the heart's the worst. So when I shoot you there, you don't die, but you learn a lesson.
So how different is it? You ever played regular paintball?
Just regular? Okay. So simunition, that's the paintball that you guys have. What's the difference? Is there any difference?
Simunition, simunition, you shoot from your real weapon.
Yeah. And it, and it goes bang.
It goes, it goes bang, not loud. You know, it's not, it's just a little, it's a little tiny bang. You have to change your magazines. It's not like where you have 400 paintballs and a freaking hopper on top of your gun. You're just laying waste, right? You have to change magazines. They kind of, simunition does jam a little bit, uh, which is a bummer.
What's the, um, what do you, what would you call it? The propellant or whatever? Like, how does it?
It's an explosion. Yeah. It's like a little explosion. And so, and it comes out, I would, I don't know if it comes out like faster, it seems to, I think it's a little bit faster. I think it's hits a little bit harder. Then it's a smaller projectile, so it hurts a little bit more.
Oh, okay.
But it, but it is, it has paint in it and you get, you know, you get a little paint on you. And it's very effective. It's the thing, the reason that we also use the laser tag system is because the paintball and the simunition is only good for, you know, thirty, forty yards. And so it's good in the house, it's good in the hallway, it's good in a CQC environment, but out in the field, it's no good. It doesn't work good. You can use a little bit, like even in a mountain environment, you need to use regular paintball guns eventually so that you can get some distance. You can put down cover fire like across the street, but even that's not very, that's not very accurate.
But then, but then the lasers, they're good at like three, four, five hundred yards, well, maybe three hundred yards, but, but that's, that's legit. But you can get them legit training.
And the, do the laser, and this is just my predicting or estimating kind of imagining, so the, when you're with the lasers, don't you lose an element of stress a little bit because there's nothing actually coming and hitting you?
Yep. And what, what was funny was, so we use those in the desert. And if you got shot, you were gonna get put down. And if you got put down, someone's gonna have to carry you out. And if you're getting carried out, you're gonna get dropped, you're gonna get flipped, like it sucked for everyone. And so when, it would actually, when you would watch guys going through like a, an urban scenario, getting shot with paintball, they would just charge through it like they didn't care. Like in instructors, if they're gonna put you down, they put you down. But when, on the laser tag system, it had a near miss little, you had a speaker on your shoulder. So when you would get shot at it, it would go, you know, it would make a little noise and you knew that you were getting shot at.
Oh, that's cool.
And when you would watch guys as those near misses started coming, they would dive for cover. Like they were getting shot at for real. I'm not kidding. They were diving like they were getting shot at for real because they if they got shot. Everything was gonna go to shit. They were gonna get bogged down. Other people were getting shot. They were gonna have to get carried out. Which is a total gut check and and it would happen a lot, but you'd see those guys. It was very effective training, but sometimes, you know, when you're just doing a laser tag with no punishment whatsoever. You can definitely get a little bit cocky. With paintball, you don't really get too cocky because it hurts and you don't want to get, you know, you'll you'll move from cover to cover.
Because you don't want to get lit up.
Yeah. Yeah. Funny. There's all those little details that you don't really think about that play such a big role in the whole scenario.
Oh, yeah. The guys diving for cover in using the laser system was that's when you knew like, oh, this is really effective. So and you could also put down suppressive fire. Because if you were, you know, over in a building, I could just shoot at the building and as soon as you started maneuvering out so you could shoot back, you'd like get near misses and you'd hide.
So that means I could, you know, I could put down cover fire while my buddy moved.
And it was totally effective.
Speaker kind of makes a big difference. I didn't really think about it where especially if you have that association like, oh, if I get put down, it's major consequences.
Sucks.
Because without the speak, because I'm not thinking speaker does all that, which obviously is more advanced than I thought. So the if you're just like, oh, you only get the indicator that you got shot, right? Which is kind of like the regular laser tag that I played when I was young. You don't they don't know near misses, nothing like that. So you think, oh, yeah. Cover firing won't work that good because yeah, part what basically the whole concept of cover fire is you being scared of those bullets coming even though they don't hit you. But then, yeah, if you got that speaker buzzing in you.
Oh, but then, but laser doesn't like hit the building doesn't because a bullet hitting the building is like kind of a big thing, right?
That'll get your head down.
So cover fire in a way potentially is way more effective in real fire for all because it's everything.
Yes, and that was one thing that was even with even with the laser tag, you'd still see guys do like stuff where you're like, would you have really done that? Because you got shot nineteen times or whatever, you know? And so it was a little hard to simulate the fear of death.
But I'll tell you what, getting getting buddy carried or having to buddy carry someone out for six kilometers in the desert on night on night vision, it sucked and guys hated it. And so they would do everything they could to stay alive and accomplish the mission.
Yeah, that feels like a solid little like proxy.
For.
Uh, it it was a solid little proxy. I mean, obviously you can't shoot the guys and kill them.
But man, it's you don't want to hump someone out in the desert. It's freaking terrible.
Especially someone like you.
Yeah, and in and sometimes guys would, you know, a a task unit would have
twelve down there. It would just be awful. Like if they did, if they didn't, if the leadership wasn't making good decisions and they weren't covered and moving and things weren't, you know, simple and clear and they didn't prioritize, you would get twelve, thirteen, fourteen. And sometimes, you know, we'd kill so many of them that'd be like, all right, you guys are done. Just walk back. You you failed. And that's when you're getting reloaded and now you got a whole nother stress, right? Because they don't want to get, they don't want to fail, of course. So be a bummer. But it was really good. It was it was great to be able to be a part of that training.
Yeah, that that's that's cool how it evolved into like that that close to realistic.
Those paintballs, like especially if the simulation hurt more than like paintball kind of hurts.
Like simulation hurts too.
But I'd say it's probably about the same.
Probably about the same.
Bro, I got whacked like a couple of times, like in the side.
And I wasn't wearing like padding or nothing, just the face one.
And yeah, I get and leaves like a straight up wound like on your thing, like a welt or whatever. Yeah, that's something. It's not nothing. I'll tell you that.
Thoroughness. Realism in German training methods is one aspect of their general demand for thoroughness. German officers in particular, and the enlisted men as well, are taught to regard themselves as men engaged in a highly skilled and highly honorable profession, and to take pride in acquiring the details of military techniques. To encourage this point of view, soldiers are put as little as possible on fatigue work and non-military labors which are performed by civilians. And the last thing we'll talk about from this document is marksmanship. German training has tended to put emphasis on volume of fire rather than accuracy. An observer believes that their ability to concentrate fire at vital point is superior
to our own, but that their standards of marksmanship are inferior. However, a German article in late 1941 makes the point that volume of mechanical fire will not replace accurate individual shooting, and that sharpshooters can perform invaluable tactical missions. So, they, they did concentrate on volume of fire, and they concentrate on marksmanship. The basic skills of shooting. And there you have it. And, and as you can see, um, many of those principles are, are the same principles that are taught in the US military, and really the same principles that are taught by any sort of leadership. Education.
Right? And, and that's why it's very strange to read this document and recognize that these principles are being utilized by the most evil, or at least one of the top evil empires to have ever existed. And yet, they're talking about taking care of their people, and, and making sure everyone understands the why. And you can see, as I mentioned earlier, that, that while these principles were implemented down the chain of command, clearly, at the top, these principles didn't exist at all. A tyrannical leader of Hitler, massive ego, driven by his own insecurities, driven by
paranoia, lack of trust, like all these things that these book, this book talks about, Hitler didn't have. And that's why you end up in this disaster and this horrific, the horrific atrocities that the Nazis created and the horrific atrocities of the war. Which, you know what you were talking about earlier, I kind of made fun of you about like, "Oh, the world didn't exist before I was here," right?
It's kind of inconceivable in some ways to understand the broad absolute horror of World War II and the Holocaust and the deaths,
the woundings, the loss of life, the destroyed
communities.
It's kind of hard to really, truly understand that those things occurred at all. It can be very, very difficult to understand that. They seem inconceivable, I guess. If you truly look at them, it seems inconceivable. If you think about the millions of people, millions of people dying.
It's hard to understand a million dollars. It's hard to understand, you know, a million people going to, you know, at a big giant arena. There's only 100,000 people there. Picture that times 10.
Then that's, there you have a million. And each one of those people is an individual with a family and dreams and a life and thoughts. And when you start talking about the scale of death and destruction of World War II, it's just, it's hard to conceive what that really means. But it did happen. And we have to study history and have to study our enemies and what their thought processes were to make sure that history does not repeat itself.
With that, we appreciate y'all listen to the podcast. If you want to support the podcast and support yourself at the same time. Might as well support some good causes out there, right? Let's support some good.
It's true.
Let's make the world a better place. Let's start with ourselves.
Make yourself better.
Physically better. Mentally better. Spiritually better.
Let's do all those things.
Yep. It's true.
Take care of yourself on every front. That's what we need to do. And then you can take care of other people. Then you can help other people. So if you want to help yourself from a fuel.
And I'm not talking about gasoline for your car or maybe diesel for your truck. I'm talking about for you. You need fuel.
Yeah, similar concept.
Similar concept. You want to get good fuel. You kind of want to get the best fuel.
Yes, sir.
You might want to get for yourself some Jaco fuel.
It's true. Yeah, it's very true. You know, as I keep reminding you off air. That I am on the path, kind of strict.
Yeah, like kind of legitimately strict. Ever since um. Covid. Started. I put on some pounds, some good, some bad.
And you know, varying levels of success in going back to, you know, to where I was before that. Also, I just got back from the motherland, Hawaii.
And you know how that can go sometimes, but nonetheless, point is I'm on the path. So routine, back in full swing, 100%.
Bro, Covid was like three years ago.
Yes, sir. Yeah, yeah, it was. You know, like I said.
Let's make a record. Don't go off the path for three years, everybody.
I would say this, so.
Was it two years? It's coming up on three years, maybe?
Two years.
Two and a half. I don't know, something like that.
So it's like, I'm off the path because of Covid.
Well, you know.
Two and a half years ago.
Well, jiu jitsu stops for a long time. The routine jiu jitsu, okay, we got little pockets here and there. I get it. And this is true. But the routine stops. You know, I still can work out at the house or whatever, but cardio goes way down. Sometimes like off the grid, let's face it. So I'm just lifting some boom and.
Please just put yourself on full report.
Maybe someone else out there can relate to the realities of situations like this. Nonetheless, boom, yeah, sure, I got back on the path, but I never really got back to where it was. And after a while, you know, we just got tired of that one, you know? So we just went more strict, you see what I'm saying? But there are certain elements in there that have always been on the path. Especially with the fuel, with the Jocko Fuel, part of it, part of the point as well, so.
Well, thank God you had Jocko Fuel, because apparently you need, you were just, you were just wandering around, never mind, off the path, you're off the reservation.
No, I know, and the way I'm putting it is more like I just freaking just let myself go. I didn't let myself go, but I put on like a good
ten, fifteen pounds, which isn't, yeah, I know it's not like night, night and day kind of a scenario, but and that's probably why I didn't get back right away, because it wasn't like that big of a thing, but it was still a nagging thing, I feel like. You see what I'm saying?
You drinking milk?
I'm drinking milk, yes. And actually, I just got on this um, protocol, which I always knew about, but you know, sometimes it takes a little bit for, to implement. Where if you, if with your diet, if you just control for like the protein, getting enough protein, whatever your workout program kind of requires or whatever. And then you fill in the rest of the macros accordingly, depends on where you want to go, what your goal is or whatever. That's like a really good way to stay on it. See what I'm saying? Like if, because if you don't control for protein and you don't get enough protein, you don't build your muscle the way you want to do it. You risk overtraining, you do all this stuff, whatever, nonetheless, it's a better, it's a good way to do it.
Yeah, you gotta get that protein, a hundred percent. How much are you getting?
A hundred.
One gram per?
No, like point six.
Point six grams per?
Bro, you need to, you need to up it, man.
You need to up those numbers.
From what I understand, I mean.
I wonder you're losing weight, you're starving to death over there, right? You're losing muscle mass.
No, bro. No, it depends on where, what you read and where you read it, um, it's gonna go anywhere from like point five all the way up to like one.
Oh, is it per pound, per, or per pound, or per kilogram?
No, per pound.
For real?
It depends. So, um, I don't know. Hey, look, that's, that's your journey. To look into that kind of stuff and figure out what's right for you. Bruh, okay, so let's say I weigh two twenty.
Mm hmm.
And I'm taking, you want me to freaking eat two hundred twenty grams of protein in a day? That, that's what you're saying? I don't know.
That's ten moles.
I love mole. I like mole a lot, but I could, you know, ten, ten.
Even if you break it up, three mole shakes per meal? I don't know. I don't know.
Okay, we don't recommend that.
I'm not saying yes, I'm not saying no.
We like mole, but not that sort of much.
Currently, I'm not at ten. No, I'm at one, sometimes two. Actually, but mine are doubles.
Yes, aren't mine.
I only have doubles.
Okay, yeah, there you go. Boom. Nonetheless, we're on the program. Hundred percent.
Check.
Um, also, good news with the energy drinks, if you didn't know already.
Yeah. Real good news.
All the old good news is still there. Healthy for you energy drink. No sugar. Sugar is more evil than you think, by the way.
Yeah, hundred percent. I think it's evil, so you're not catching me on that one.
I know.
It's as evil as I think.
If you were to, you know how like, I'm sure there was some point in your life where you like looked into sugar a little bit deeper than maybe you do daily? And then realized, oh, shoot, this is kind of, there's some issues with sugar.
Sugar is really like
evil.
You could start looking back into it and probably find some more stuff.
That's all.
So, so you're saying it is even more evil than even I thought? And I thought it was pretty damn evil.
That is my contention, yes. And good news, like I said, old good news, but good news, no sugar in this one. It's all healthy stuff.
So boom, that's still the case. But the additional good news, we got a reformulated tastes in there.
For all of them.
Oh, yeah, all of them.
All the, all the discipline go taste good as hell now. Like, it will ta- we're gonna win on taste.
We're gonna win on taste. Taste better than the other. Let's go, what do we call them? Energy drinks?
Energy drinks.
Taste better than the other ones.
Straight up better. Yeah.
And still no sugar.
Still no, still no chemicals in there.
Just good for you. And now it tastes good, too. The other flavors, you might have had one or two flavors that you liked, but the other ones you kind of now you'll like them all.
You'll and you'll love one or two of them. That's the difference. That's what we just did. And there was a few before that you hated, you won't even hate any of them. Now you're gonna, you're gonna like them all, you're gonna love two or three of them. And you're gonna be good to go. You're gonna find your little thing.
Yeah, man, it's true. It's all true.
Jaco Fuel dot com.
Yep. Uh, don't forget, don't forget a lot, but we don't, we haven't actually talked about it, whatever the joint stuff, that's a big deal. Cause you can be on any program, but yeah, if your joints, your knees start giving out, shoulders, all this kind of stuff, right? You're kind of off the program.
Voluntarily off the program.
So yeah, keep that in mind. You want overall health. You want to be able to keep going. Yeah. Endurance. Endure durable, be durable. That helps big time. Um, yeah, some vitamins in there, vitamin D, cold or immunity. But just checking Jaco Fuel.
Jaco Fuel dot com. Go to Wawa, get some drinks. We got a, we got a ready to drink coming, milk coming. Have you seen that yet? Have you tasted it yet?
Nope.
It's hella good.
Yeah, perfect, perfect.
Do they add like, um, you know how, for example, I'll put like half a banana in there or something like that. Do they add anything else in there?
Just straight up milk formulated.
Perfect ratios.
You could throw a banana in there.
Scientifically proven, perfect ratios. Okay. All right. It's good.
Uh, go to Wawa, get the drinks, go to vitamin shop, get this stuff, go to, if you're in Texas, go to HEB, go to HEB rolling hot and get yourself some milk.
That's what I'm saying. Uh, also get some. Origin Hunt, originusa.com, you can get a bunch of, you can get jeans, boots, you know, you can get, but you can get stuff that's made in America. Not stuff that's literally made. In a tyrannical country, like the one we just talked about. It's a little bit different, but the principles are kind of there. Let's not support that. Let's support America where people are free. How about that? That's a good idea. OriginUSA.com, get yourself some boots, jeans, some jujitsu gear, gi.
It's true. Also, you want to represent why you're on this path like I think a lot of us do pretty much every day. Jaco's store.com shirts, hats, hoodies on there. Well, I know it's summertime, I get it. But at some point, it's gonna be fall, then winter, you've got some hoodies on there. Um, discipline equals freedom. That's what you're representing. The Jaco store stuff. Uh, short locker, by the way. What? I don't know that I've, that you've ever told me your assessment of the shirt locker in any thorough way.
See, I, I like it.
There's my assessment.
If you didn't know what that is, subscription situation, you get a new shirt every month. Creative, they're different, different designs. Pretty much every single one has been a success, varying levels of, you know, there are sporadic, um, outliers. That might, you know, they might be too hard.
There's a couple objections over.
Objections, they, they, the, the conceptual element behind them might have went.
Over some people's heads.
Or maybe hit them too hard.
Or hit them too hard right in the face.
Yeah, a little bit. That's what it seemed like.
Shirtlocker.com. Is that a thing?
No, it's just Jaco's store.com. I'm just making up my own dot coms.
Jaco's store.com, you click, it's a big thing, click Shirtlocker, boom, check it out. You can see some previews too, that's the thing. Look, I'm not gonna give it all away. You know, as far as what designs are what or whatever, but you can see some previews, some hints of like what the next one is, what some past ones were. Also, if you're a member, you can buy any of the past ones, by the way.
That's pretty legit.
Yeah. So, you know, you, you thought you missed out on one, then where you can.
You brought it back.
But you can bring it right back. You want your neighbor, because this is, this happens a lot. Where you're gonna be wearing one, and someone will be like, bro, where'd you get that shirt? Like the one that says good, right? You know, we have some good shirts on the store.
Now we got a better one.
There's.
Or a different one.
A slightly, and it's like, it's cool, it looks really good. And I got a literal phone call saying, where, who got that shirt? Where can we get that shirt? My wife wants it. You sign up, you can get your wife one, your neighbor one, whatever you like. See what I'm saying?
Check. Uh, that's jocklestore.com. Subscribe to the podcast. Check out the Jaco Underground. We just recorded a couple of episodes of that, talking interesting information. Talk about keeping our own little platform. We have our own little platform. We don't own this platform that you're listening to unless you're in Jaco Underground right now. But we don't own iTunes. We don't own Spotify. We don't own YouTube. We get kicked off any of those. I don't know.
We talked about the Nazis today. Will that get us kicked off?
I mean, who knows?
Yeah, there's like terms that get you like
Get flagged.
Kind of flagged. Yeah. Yeah, they're for real art. In fact, it's so apparently
We've been flagged before.
We've been flagged a few times. And that's kind of what prompted this jockleunderground.com. Cause we don't know when we're gonna get kicked off for saying something.
So if you want to support that, eight dollars and eighteen cents a month, we appreciate it. Check out the YouTube channel. Check out Psychological Warfare. Check out flipsidecanvas.com. Dakota Meyer, making awesome stuff to hang on your wall. I've written a bunch of books. Check them out. You know what they are. Echelon Front. Talked about that a little bit today. Leadership Lab, FTX. We got the muster coming up.
So I think that's the next one is in Atlanta. Hotlanta, October 12th to the 14th. We sold out all these things. So if you want to come, get there early, register, go to extremeownership.com for our, or that's echelonfront.com. If you want to do online training, go through some courses, you want to understand this stuff at a deeper level, go to extremeownership.com and take some courses, some online courses. I'll be sitting there telling you what's up. You can come and ask me questions. Extremeownership.com. And if you want to do your duty from a charity perspective, check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got a great charity organization.
And if you want to donate to her organization, or you want to get involved, go to AmericasMightyWarriors.org. And you've also got heroesandhorses.org. Micah, he's up there in the wilderness. They're wrapping up their course right now, forty-one days out in the bush. Reconnecting with your soul.
That's for veterans. Check it out heroesandhorses.org. And if you want to, well, if you want to see us on Twitter, or the Gram, or the Facebook, Echo and I are on there. But look, just be careful. Fair warning, the algorithms there, the brainwashing out, we saw people getting brainwashed by the Nazis. You're getting brainwashed too, when you're staring at that little screen. Don't let it happen. Watch out for the algorithm. And finally salute to the greatest generation. The World War II veterans that fought against the Nazi power. The tyranny, the oppression.
The greatest generation that saved freedom in our world. So a salute to them. And also thanks to the soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines that are out there right now as we speak, holding the line. Thank you to all of you. And the same goes to our police and law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, EMTs, dispatchers, correctional officers, Border Patrol, Secret Service, and all the first responders that keep us safe every day. Thank you for holding the line here at home.
And everyone else out there, remember this idea.
Remember to begin your day with a mission.
Begin the day with a mission.
And if you approach every day, and you approach every task as if it was a battle, eventually you can approach battles like they're a task.
That's what we've got for today. Every day is a battle. Go get in the fight. And until next time, this is Echo and Jaco, out.
Page updated October 26, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated
