Shawn Ryan Show - #88 Chris Miller - The Hunt for Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi | Part 2

Episode Date: December 12, 2023

Chris Miller is the former Secretary of Defense with a 27 year career in the United States Army. Throughout his career, he oversaw multiple special operations organizations, culminating with his command of the 2nd Battalion, 5th SFG(A). In Part Two, Miller recounts the horrific abduction and murder of human rights activist Kayla Mueller by ISIS forces. This atrocity would later result in "Operation Kayla Mueller," the mission that targeted and killed ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Shawn Ryan Show Sponsors: https://lairdsuperfood.com - USE CODE "SRS" https://bubsnaturals.com - USE CODE "SHAWN" https://meetfabric.com/shawn Chris Miller Links: X / Twitter - https://twitter.com/cmillertigerhwk Book - https://www.amazon.com/Soldier-Secretary-Warnings-Battlefield-Dangerous/dp/1546002448 Please leave us a review on Apple & Spotify Podcasts. Vigilance Elite/Shawn Ryan Links: Website | Patreon | TikTok | Instagram | Download Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Previously on the Sean Ryan show. Something triggered in us, this desire to go serve combat, yeah, that's what we do, right? That's why would you join if that wasn't the goal? Oh, I want to get my college money. Hey, good with you if you want your college money, but you don't go into Navy SEALs or Army Special Operations if you're looking for college money, right? Yeah. They don't.

The only thing that really mattered in my military career was response to September 11, 2001. Dogon pickup trip, high lux comes whipping by. This guy, legendary CIA officer, who I won't refer to here. But you've met with this great bushy bus, my stash, goes, hey cowboy, need a a lift and I remember jumping in into this hole that's where the JDAM hit and I remember looking down Sean and I was like it's been eating hamburger out here oh man you you're showing people that veterans make hey you can do things other than the old,

oh, I'll go be a contractor, which I believe there's over 8 billion podcasts. So we're doing everybody in their sister has a dog on podcast right now and you're number 10. It's gotta be really rewarding. All right, Chris, for back from the break, I wanna cover a little bit more about your career. At what point in your career,

were you out when we got back daddy? I had left government. I mean, I hit, or I'd left the service. I'd, I hit, I got promoted to the colonel. And then I got selected to continue on in command and just, A, I'll just tell you, I needed to take the year off. I needed to be at home.

I made a vow to myself, my family could care less, but I said, each kid, they're senior high school, I will be in the United States for I will not deploy. Sounds silly, but that was just a personal thing I wanted to do. They could, kids could care less. Not like, oh, dad, let's go hang out together. They didn't want to hang out with me, but I wanted to be there for that year.

I'd been selected for command, oh, six command, colonel command, big deal, right? And it would have required me to deploy the year of my eldest kids senior year of high school. And I asked for, you know, a waiver. Could I do this later? I said, hey, I'll go any place in the world next year. I just need one year here. And they're like, thank you very much. No. So I declined taking command. And at that point, I knew my career was over

because you do that. That's fine. I'm not, it's like, hey, no regrets. But at that point, I knew my career was over and I was ready to leave. And because you take that job in the army, it means you're on the short list to advance. And I had to look myself in the mirror. And I said, I never have done anything in my army career for myself. It's always been selfless service. And if I did this, it wouldn't

be about self. Because I get all my buds like, you got to do this, man. We need you. I said, if I do this, this will be about ego. And it'll be about me. And how can you look yourself in the mirror and say that you're true to yourself if you do this? So it sounds kind of really like, I know, flady. But that's where I was in my life at the time, you know,

and decided to leave the service. We're tired and came a contractor at the Pentagon, which was fascinating because you go from being, you know, the guy at the head of the table to be the person that can't even be brought into the meeting that you would have chaired the day before. And now they're like, which I thought was great. You know, the guy at the head of the table to be the person that can't even be brought into the meeting that you would have chaired the day before. And now they're like, which I thought was great. You know, it's really hubris humility. It's great to do that.

And, but man, the contracting gig, I don't know how it was for you. I was like, I need a stick. I couldn't figure out. I need a stable job. So if you're in a government town, what do you do? Go into government. Got a permanent government job,

called General sort of GS job, you know, like where you can't be fired. And you get like 30 days off a year or something. I'm like, I like this. My parents are older. I always need to have some time off. And came a government employee and I had the worst job in the history. I was the guy I used to make fun of.

I was in a thing called intelligence oversight. Do you remember where you'd have to initial your safe each night that you closed it to show that it was locked or the door, remember the door, you had to spin the lock and initial, I'm the guy who goes around to inspect to make sure that you initialed, yeah. Like this is-

You went from being a special operations colonel to that. Yep, interesting. Yeah, and I literally, literally was eight hours a day. I crammed one hour of work into eight hours. It was amazing. And my friend, thank God, called me one day. Chris Costa, he was running counterterrorism at the White House, was leaving. said, would you like to interview for my job? I always tell my children, always interview for a job, you're gonna learn something and who knows you might get it? And so I interviewed, I got his job.

So I'm a government employee on loan from the Pentagon to the White House to run counterterrorism. That's where I get the crazy idea to defeat El Cata. Part of that is ISIS. President Trump, you know, comes in, says we're gonna defeat ISIS like enough of this messing around. Decentralize his decision-making. Let's war fighters make decisions on how to operate. And the leader of ISIS was Abu Bakr, El Baghdaddi, brilliant guy. But I usually don't do good, Neville. When you're talking about your enemy, I don't think it's helpful. I think it colors your judgment. This guy was the definition of evil. He was an evil man. Can you describe some of the stuff? Well, the most

dramatic one is this missionary, Caleb know, basically slave, unbelievable just barbaric, not just with her, but other people. And he was ahead of ISIS and we're like, you know, obviously we've got to kill this guy. And let's get a little more in detail. What was he doing to her? Because I want, you know, this is going to be history here. Yeah, but sorry, I know the family and I really

don't want to cause any more heartache, but it was barbaric. You take the worst thing you could imagine and he was doing that to kill a meal, or we did an operation to go in there one night to get her, she was not there. We, when I say that, our counterterrorism forces did, man, it was a hell of a fight. It was epic, but I wasn't there for that. I was in the White House. But yeah, so that's why I'm really reluctant like the pain and suffering the family has been through But you use your imagination and then some well, let's talk about just ISIS in general, you know So way they took Yazidi women, which is this weird Christian sack and turn them into sex slaves the way they

Well, you remember seeing the videos where they burned the Jordanian pilot, think about the mass executions beheadings. I mean, that was just part of the course. And he was the leader of that thing, and leadership matters. And his forces were a representation of his, you know, barbarity, you know.

He would burn people alive, he had them put kids in cages, burn them alive, put kids in cages, put them into rivers, drown them to death, just, just groups of kids. Just pick it. You know, heads on poles, all the worst of the worst shit. And, you know, there was a lot of controversy around

when he was killed. If I remember correctly, that was roughly, what was that September or no? Was that December or January of 2019? Yeah. December of 2019, I think it was. What were you picking up? I know the controversy was.

There was a lot of controversy when we killed them with the drone strike. Oh, no, we put ground force in and killed them with the drone strike. My couple of my friends. Oh, no, we put ground force in and killed them. Okay, I'm thinking this is something. This is the American in Yemen. Okay. That they killed, what was that guy's name?

He was an American citizen that went over there. There's a book about, yeah, that's the guy, that was huge controversy. Because the first time we killed an American citizen, right? Yeah. Yeah, man, wasn't it? Yeah. Okay.

So, back daddy, back to back daddy. Back daddy, evil of evil. Everybody's looking for him. His trade graph is really good. He's not, he's using couriers. Nobody gets near him with a cell phone. He's moving. But man using couriers. Nobody gets near him with a cell phone. He's moving, but man, Sean, you know this.

When our intelligence officers put their mind to it and our special operators put their mind to it, you can run, but you can't hide. And we just kept on that guy's trail. And just incrementally, you kept collapse in his space where you could maneuver. And you get, we didn't have good reporting for quite a while. But finally, you know, I think it was a driver or one of, it was one of these functionaries around Baghdaddi said something to one of our people, one of our sources and that word comes back like, hey, Baghdaddi's in this compound.

Here we go again, right? How many times have we heard this? At this point, the whole operation goes, I get cut out of it. Like I'm running counterterrorism. But CIA and our counterterrorism forces decide that they're gonna keep this very close, hold it rightfully so I get that. But I'm in charge of counterterrorism. So I'm a little bit, I'm a little bit buttered.

I'll tell you, just straight up, like what the hell? The thing that I think a lot of those people, the senior officials believe is that they can control, like they know more than we do. The problem was I'd been a grain beret, I had a whole network of people all over the military, and we had a person who was on the task force for Baghdaddi, who was a friend who was keeping us up the

day now and what's going on. So I had a whole separate and this isn't like some leak thing or anything. We're all read on to like they just didn't want to share that particular information to us. So I'm tracking this thing. They don't even know we're tracking it. We get a, we finally get positive identification that, oh, yeah, he's there. Definitely there. And then, and it's just very, it's an example of how we can do things really well in our government when you just let people in the field do it, right? I keep headquarters out of it. Intelligence officers in the field, the special operators in the field, it's just going great, collaborating.

You know, maybe the special operators need a tracking tool that they don't have access to, but the intelligence community does. It's just working great, man. So finally, gets down to like, positive identification, definitely there, forces trained. Here's, you got a great part in one of your episodes, previous episode where you kind of talked about

the evolution of our counterterrorism forces. In the past, like think about Sante, which was this great first Commando raid during the Vietnam War, famous raid. Think about the Ben Laden raid, where you took forces, brought them together and trained them specifically for that mission. And then they did it and then they came home. We had advanced so much in our tactics, techniques, and our procedures, and our professionalism of our counterterrorism forces, that the force that was in Iraq's Syria at the time,

the counterterrorism force, they just took the mission. They're like, another mission, no big deal. Can you believe that? No. Like, just, and it was just, the dudes in the field are like, we got this. Holy shit. When are we going?

Backwards plan, plan our crap, send it back for approval. There's lots of timeline here. Oh, you know, quick. Like somebody will correct me. It seemed like maybe three days. That's it for that kind of an operation. Yeah.

And that, no, the president's got to sign off on that, right? Because we're taking forces that are in this contested area in Syria that is kind of under. It's not under a side, the leader of series control. It's like the rebel area. That's where we are. We're going to fly our forces in, because Baghdad is smart. He's like, I'm going to stay in an area under a side's control, because it'll be more secure, because the Americans aren't going to come in here, right? It'll be an international incident or whatever. So, of course, we're going to go into a side's backyard.

Idlib, I think it was Idlib. I think that's the province, I forgot. So, presence getting briefed on this, right? I'm not briefed, but I know what's going on. So, I'm like, all right, that's okay. Call my buddy at Pentagon. He, he acts like he doesn't know what's going on. I'm like, some friend you are, that's okay.

Get a call. It's a Saturday. Get a call about one in the afternoon from our source in the counterterrorism task force. It's going tonight. Remember all those life insurance ads on the TV and on the radio when you were a kid. Probably not because that was your parents job, right? Secure your family's financial plan in case of an emergency. Well, guess what? Now a lot of you are parents, and it's time for you to take into consideration the livelihood of your family's financial future of something bad were to happen. Fabric was designed by parents for parents

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Warning, this product contains nicotine. nicotine isn't addictive chemical. Blackbuffalo products are strictly intended for use by current adult 21 plus consumers of nicotine or tobacco products. So like, thanks. Chauvin my car. Go to work. Go to the White House situation room. You know, walk in good, the White House situation room. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs staff, Mark Milley's there.

He's got his two communicators. You know, these two, these two kids, they are kids, but these two single computer experts in their job, because on the screen, they're going to have two screens that have the predator, the video feeds coming in live of the target and all this stuff. And I sit down at the big table. My boss is Robert O'Brien, he's a national security advisor. He had not told me what was going on either. He comes walking in later, sees me sitting there, and it's like, Chris, what are you doing here? I'm like, I'm the head of counterterrorism for the president.

My job's to be here, how did you know? I'm like, Robert, it's my job to know. So we're in the situation room, you know, the... I'm kid from Iowa, right? My holy crap. I'm in the situation room. We're going to do one of the one of the probably more important, like this is going to be up there with Ben Laden,, Zawi Heary. This is gonna be up there as the top five commando hits of all time, right? And I'm there, and the operation, the president is playing golf that day.

And you know, they wanted to keep him playing golf so that the press wouldn't pick up on any changes of routine. So he's out there about five o'clock our time in Washington, DC, the assault force launches in their helicopters. And I can't remember how many helicopters it was, 12 helicopters. The issue now, you know this, but for those that aren't, you know, haven't been part of these things or are learning, flat desert, Syrian, Russian controlled Russians are there.

Remember, we're over here. They have their radars on, so they can see exactly what's happening. Because remember, it's flat. It's like billiards. It's like a pool table. So the assault force picks up right away, the chairman says something like, I hope this isn't the start of World War III, I hadn't really thought of it that way. I'm like, oh damn, yeah, Russians, helicopters, if they shoot, there was also the Russians had a fighter up like a suit,

Mi-29. I can't remember what it was. You know, advanced doing combat air patrol over kind of the area. Okay. So now you got Russian radar on, Russian Syrian radar on, he got a dog on fourth generation fighter, orbiting, and they all see our assault force pick up. And as they start flying and they cross the border, you know, that's like the come to Jesus time, right? Are the Russians gonna fire or not? If they fire, we're done. And the Russian radars go, I guess, I don't know this for a fact, but I guess, you know,

they can have their status as like enemy or continue to monitor something. And they turn their radars not off, but they turn their radars, the passive meaning, I guess, in the air defense world, that means like you're not going to fire. It was like, oh, man, okay. And then we saw the MiG-29 move south. So somebody made a call, like, we're not screwing with these guys. Like, I'll let them go. Nothing to see here. Like, look the other way. La la la la la. But that, I, no kid, you know, I'd never been in the headquarters

for something like that, right? I'd always either been in the truck or in the helicopter or something, not of anything this important, obviously. But to see it from that perspective was completely different. I know that feel just being in there. Yeah, come on man, part of me's like,

I would literally give my left, you know what? To be on that helicopter right now. But that's not my job anymore. My job is to be here to provide advice and counsel to the president if he asks. And so I thought that was a hell of a presidential decision because he knew that the decision calculus on that, he knew this whole thing could go bad,

really, really, like, epically bad. Like desert one at, in Iran in 1979, that bad, like that can ruin, you know, that can end your presidency, right? Yeah. And he made the call to go ahead and execute. Because the other one was like, why don't we just put missile strike in on it,

heck with it. And we're like, no, we gotta know we got the guy. Because in this area, this era of information warfare, like they're still arguing about if someone's so still alive, you know. We're like, no, we need to go, like, we need to have some, his flesh to do DNA testing on. Off goes the assault force. You got your drones up, filming everything.

Salt force goes in, lands. And here's the other one. Did you ever do call outs? Like, remember in our day, you just went in and just like blew down the door, assaulted the house or building, didn't give any warning. Well, during the course of the war, as the situations changed, they now, they did a call out,

meaning the assault force surrounded the house, dude with a micro, you know, what do you call it? A full horn or a full horn? It's like, hey, you're surrounded, come out with your hands up and low and behold, bunch of women and kids start streaming out. Like, I can't remember how many, like 20 of them come streaming out of this house. Translators and interpreters are like, what's going on?

There's baggady and they're like, oh, yeah, he's in there. He's in there. He's got a suicide vest on. And he's got three women with him that are also his wives, one of which was like 14 or something. Can you believe this? Can you believe that crap? I mean, I believe it now because the shit's going on right here in the home,

in the home front, you know? Man, it's good. Well, that's another conversation. Do the call out or like he's in there. Okay, well, we're gonna go get time to come to dig him out. And they send the dog in. They sent, no, I think they sent a robot in, robot in first. Oh, he's here. He had built out like a fighting position slash safe room in the back. They're like, oh no, he's here.

Yeah, there are three women here. And the only way we're going to get this done is going to have to put some commanders in here to dig them out, kill his ass. And so then what unit is this? This is the Army. Oh, God. Did you see me, Wink? This is the Army. Did you see me, Wink? This is the Army counterterrorism

that remains nameless that you all know. And you can say it, but I can't say it. And you've had many of their members on your show before. Because they were the task force that was in Syria, Iraq at the time. So they did the operation. And we're all watching the screen, you know, and you know how watching ISR is it's kind of like murky and you can't really tell what's going on.

But you can see it's game on time. You can see the explosions boom, boom, boom. You're sitting there like what's going on. But you don't want to ask because you know they're busy and I got to tell you this. President, Vice President, Millie, senior military leadership were all extremely, you know, patient because there's nothing worse. Remember when you're getting yelled at by your boss, you're like, hey, I'm working right now. I'll give you a situation report. When it's done, stop bothering me.

I was really impressed at it. Nobody, nobody put any stress on. You can see explosions going off and you're like, oh man, this is the fatal funnel. You know, we, nothing we can do about it. Let's see what happens. Not too much later, the report comes back. Yep, suspect or whatever.

The target detonate himself. And we're now gonna collect DNA to see if it was him. And did you say we're now going to collect or we are not going to collect? We are, they are. And then I'm flashing back to like the poor kid who's on sensitive site exploitation, right? He's like, I got to go in there.

And he has suicide dust on. And you know what happens with suicide dust? The dude's head's going to pop off, right? Remember, I tell in my book the story I had a buddy next to me who was flashing back to me in a Iraq when he had to go find the head. And of course, I know what's going on. Like, okay, they're going to find the head. They're going to do the forensics and they're going to do the biometrics and they'll look at the distance between the eyes, ears, you know, all that

crop. But you got to find the head first. And I'm just sitting there going, oh man, can you imagine that kid in there with his surefire, smoked billowing, probably fire going on, looking for the guy's head. And the task force commander, the ground force commander really was impressive that he would not, they call it, you know, call Jackpot. Jackpot indicating that the target that you were going after is either caption or killed. And he would not call Jackpot, even though we know it's bagged atty, right? So like not calling Jackpot. Finally, the four star commander that's overseeing the operation is guys, General McKinsey.

He calls and goes, ground force commander is not going to call Jack pot right now, but he assesses with a strong degree of confidence that the target has been killed. And at that point, you're like, oh, man, think it's done. President leaves. I'm not leaving. Millie's not leaving. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Because we're like, they're still I'm not leaving. Milley's not leaving. Chairman the joint chiefs of staff, because we're like, they're still on target, man. Oh, and then gunfights start blowing up all

around, right? Because it's the classic, wow, something's going on. So things are getting heating up, right? Gunships are making gun runs now. And President's like, what's going on here? We're like, Mr. President, here's a gun fight going on right now. Okay. So is that what he said? Okay. He's like, okay, all right. Then the,

because we're not gonna leave until the task force is back in friendly territory, because there's a lot of bad stuff can still happen. So pretty much everybody's gone. I'm there, Millie's there, maybe a couple of other people. Presence gone, vice-presence gone, secretary of defense is gone. All these people have gone

because it's like mission over, see you later. I'm like, yeah, they're still on target, you know? And because there's still some, you know, for us, there's still tension. Everybody, people that don't know about operations are like, whatever, I five on the way. Yeah, we want to say our guys come home. Right. So, Millie and I are there and casually report comes in. One, a solter had stepped on a nail that had gone through his boot. That was the only casual be. That's it. And I said, amazing. I said, the American public, I'm worried, because this was the

most flawless operation that I've ever seen conducted. And the American public now is going to come to expect that level of performance, which is so hard to achieve in the military, right? Fog friction. And they got it done. It came back and we're shutting it down and everybody, all the commanders in the military people now are like, you know, tension is, and it's not you fork, but everybody's kind of, you know, becoming friendly because we went through this together. And Mackenzie, the four star general that oversaw the operation from Tampa calls in to Millie, who's the chairman of the Joint chiefs of staff, who's advising the president.

He's only a couple of us left. And he goes, Chairman, do you want to know what the task force name was? Because usually they just come up with some bullshit number, right? Task force 52-9 or whatever the hell it was. We're like, yeah, sure. It was, they named it after, Kaelin Mueller. No, Ken. That's amazing.

Is that cool? That is amazing. They're like, justice will be served, man. Don't be f**king with the United States. I mean, come on Sean. What was that guy think? And like, he thought he going to get away with this crap Like we will haunt you to the end of the earth. It might take us 25 30 damn years man

I it just I don't understand why our enemies think that and I know there's this narrative now I go we're soft anybody who believes that crap and There's a lot of reasons they could believe it crap. And there's a lot of reasons they could believe it. Man, I don't know. You put, put an American fighting man pissed off. I'll go with him any day, man. At guy, I'd love to, like, man, I'd love to been lied and thought the same thing, didn't he? Another soft. They won't fight. I wonder what he'd say now, man. We will, we will hunt your ass to the end of the earth, man. I mean, what do you think people think that? Yeah.

Yeah, we go on all day, we get plenty of reasons to think it, don't we? Yeah. They're constant babble about stupid stuff. And, you know, we give them plenty of information that would support their conclusion that somehow, you know, we've lost our martial spirit or how many people have made that mistake. I think a lot of it comes from, we saw a lot of it in this war, these last two wars and prosecuting our own guys for doing their job. That's the other thing, man, with only seven,

I think most people that have served when they heard those stories like, yeah, that's been a trouble or that happens. So, you know, I still can't tell a lot of this stories exactly what happened, but that's my thing is like, hey, when we open the can of whoop ass, when the United States decides to open the can of whoop ass, this is no joke.

Yeah. And bad things are gonna happen. People are gonna be injured or killed. Innocents are gonna be killed. Families are gonna be destroyed, man. Like destroyed. Cause you know, like the point over and over again, that just destroys marital relationships.

Pathologies come out from all of that stress that is completely predictable. And that's why we have to take on the war, hell, a lot more seriously, if you ask me. And I'm good with going to war, don't give me wrong. But let's just accept up front That we're gonna destroy a generation of people That's that's my thing and if it's worth it, let's do it. I this was worth it

Afghanistan was worth it you think I Think in the beginning stages it was yeah, we should have left, you know I do that. I think in the beginning stages it was. Yeah, we should have left. You know, I do that. I think in the beginning stages it was. And then, you know, and then exactly what you say, you know, the PXs started getting built. Burger King showed up. Yeah.

You know, green bean coffee showed up. Pizza on show. It's one of Nashville Airport. I chuckled when I came in. Yeah. Yesterday, it's like, grain beans here. And then, and then you begin, you start to realize, this is a fucking business.

Yeah. This isn't war. This isn't fucking business. It's a business. Well, this is war made to conduct business. And that's when I started to realize a lot of this is bullshit. But I do think in the beginning stages that, yeah, should have dropped the hammer and left.

Yeah. It was when the bureaucracy came in, they tied our hands behind their back. It's like fighting with one leg. I always said that should Afghanistan should have stayed at 200, 300 special operators. That way, and I get yelled at now by the generals and the senior people like you don't understand Chris. I was like, no, I think I do. Actually, I was there. We should have kept that a special operations war. We should have just used, we should have used the host nation. You can't want it more than they do, right?

And when we industrialize that thing, like you described and everybody started getting paid, it's all over then. Yeah. Yeah, you know, it just, it got to a point where I felt like I was fooled to go in. I don't know.

You had the same thing. I felt like, now fooled to go in. I don't know. You had the same thing. I felt like, now I know who this sucker is. It's me. Yeah. You had the same thing? Oh, yeah. Would that feel like I still bothers, I'm still not over it. I say the same thing.

You know, and it sucks. I don't know what to tell kids. You know what I mean? I have a big media presence. Everybody knows I was a seal. Everybody knows that I contracted for CIA and a lot of, I get a lot of emails and messages and DMs and from youth that wanted to fall into those footsteps just like we did. And I gotta be honest, Chris, I don't know what to tell them these days. Oh man, that breaks my heart.

What would you tell them? I backed my dad, like there's absolute integrity and service. If that's something that's strong to you, but take care of yourself too. Yeah. There's great nobility and service. And we always talk about who do you fight for, the guy in person on the left and right.

Yeah, I guess it really comes down to that. But man, it's like accountability, dude. I mean, there's, I sense that our leadership, their example is breaking faith with those that are serving under them. That's, yeah, because I was always raised like, do as I say, do as I do. And I'm telling you, man, working at the Pentagon and you get exposed to all the politics and how that works, and the general officers and how advancement goes there. I literally was like, I'm seeing people that are,

do as I say, not, do as I say, not as I do. No, I'm like, that's bullshit, because that's not the way I was raised. And I'll tell you what I'm hearing it when you see these dumbass these decisions. Now the political civilian leadership can make any decision they want. They're allowed to. That's how it works. There's that military senior military level that is supposed to provide their advice. And the fact there's a disconnect, I think, with a lot of the people that are seeing stupid civilian decisions that are being made and military leadership not standing

up and saying this is wrong. And so they're down there and they're down there in the trenches, right? They're down there in the team room. And they're being brought up in a certain way. Speak your mind, integrity, ethics, morality, all that stuff that we were, was embedded in as warriors, right? And then they see their leadership not acting the same way. There's a dichotomy, a disconnect. And that's, that to me is like, that's what really worries me, man, is like there's a break breaking of faith and trust and confidence.

That's what I'm saying. I say it too, and the few acquaintances, friends, that I have left in the community and the special operations community, which is not very many anymore. They all say the same thing. They don't trust the leadership. You know, did you feel that way

when you were in SEAL teams? No. There was always a one. Yeah, there was always one as a hand for the, but you knew who they were. All in all, no, I didn't feel like that. I did start to feel like that. You know, I'm gonna get my years messed up.

I really started to feel like that. I did a deployment with the agency and a in lash cargo. And that was supposed to be from what I was briefed the biggest offensive force since since Fallujah and I remember when the ROEs came out now. I didn't fall under those ROEs. That was that was the marine The Marines that were gonna take that entire I think that was they were gonna take the entire province remember correctly, but I remember when the ROEs came out from the administration at the time, which was the Obama administration, it was, if you are shot at and the enemy drops their weapon, you're not allowed to shoot back. And when I heard that come out, that was a turning point in my mindset where I was like,

come out That was a turning point in my mindset where I was I These fucking people that were fighting for give a shit more about our enemy Then they do about us these people are chopping our heads off They're dismembering us and stuff in our privates and our mouths. They're burning people alive. They're beheading people they're raping girls and boys and they're rapin boys. I mean, they and this is this is our are we?

The we're doing here. Yeah, what and half and it seemed I mean, you never know, because it's the media, right? But and they do a great job I mean, you never know because it's the media, right? but And they do a great job at propaganda, but you know, and then and then you look at the media and it they make it appear like Everybody in America back home is like for the shit and and and and and you get the feeling like What the fuck am I doing over here, man? These people they don't even they don't give a fuck of them over here the VA's a disaster

It's a disaster for all these guys coming home. I've told multiple I haven't told but I bet that's that's what this show started as is a Platform for guys to tell their story and look at the trauma these guys are dealing with when they come home But we made a decision this country and this is why this is important to me, beyond here. You see how we made a decision as a country, like strategy matters. I don't know what that means, tell you the truth. But we decided to fight a war with one formation, our special operations formation, right? They deployed again and again and again. Now, big army, big Marine Corps, they deployed as well. So I'm not like, this isn't like given the finger

to all those that served as well, because it was necessary, well, it probably wasn't necessary if you would have just kept the special operations war, but nonetheless. So I always get yelled at, like, oh, you're diminishing the sacrifice of conventional forces, no, I'm not.

But the force that fought this counterinsurgency, counterterrorism war, counterterrorism war, were special operators across all the services. And like the sacrifice, man, and that, like, I just remember, there's this thing called mission first men always. This was some sort of act, some sort of thing that we always were trained on. Mission first men always was like, I don't know what that means. And I'd always get yelled at for asking this question,

like, hey, what does that mean? Well, and I get this tap that, so I'm like, actually, they're mutually exclusive in combat. Because I'd be like, but there's gonna be a time where you have to go, this man is going to be destroyed to accomplish the mission. So what are you saying? Why don't we just call it like it is? Let's just be honest with each other. The mission comes first. And I'm good with that. But my problem is we sold the military as some sort of, you know,

opportunity for improvement and all that stuff. And that's good. But at the end of the day, it's about combat. And you as a fighter, like just, you need to recognize you're completely expendable. I always knew I was but I would always get I felt bad You know the moral guilt thing is when you'd have a kid and you like getting a truck, huh?

No, we're going up that road and somebody's gonna get blown up and it could be you Yeah, and the kid to look at you and be like I was, this is what we do. I think we're just more honest about the essence of combat, but then that comes back to your point. Would anybody ever join if they knew? I think they would actually. I think we were just honest with everybody and didn't see this as some sort of jobs program or some shit like that is like, no.

That's my hobby horse, man. I was like, just be honest about the nature of what we do or what they do in the military. And I think there's too much confusion about that. We do, one formation, I mean, yeah, and you just like, it's all right, the trauma that has been inflicted on a whole generation of special operators is, uh,

is, you see it. It's a shame, you know, and I think it's preventable. I think it would help a hell of, I think it would help a hell of a lot of the country was behind us. I think it would help a hell of a lot too if we fought our wars, understanding that you can't. That comes down to special force, special operators can't be mass-produced. You know, like, Shinseki, Army Chief of Staff gets fired because he said, don't fight a 12-division war with 10 divisions when we went into Iraq, Rumsfeld fires his ass, right? But he's absolutely right. Like, these are the decisions that matter. And the American public needs to understand, like, oh, how much we spend to defense matters, how big our army is, and then like don't take on a

12 division war with 10 divisions, don't take on a special operations war with two few special operators. Dude, we just burned through on. We just burned through on. Yeah. Didn't we? Oh yeah, we did. So like, hey, some A, real quick, I'd be in there and, you know, your commander, you care about your men like desperately, right? But you still have to make your mission. Like, well, we're in, okay, we're back. We're back for my rack, refit. Get our equipment ready, get everybody's paperwork ready,

take two weeks off, come back, and get ready to start a pre-mission prep and training for the next rotation. And the only two people that I could really trust to tell me what's going on, Chaplin and the surgeon, the doctor. I just say, like, how are we looking? They're like, sir, coming undone. So can we get them out the door again? Doc would be like, everybody's on, I'm literally shoveling sleeping pills out the door,

shoveling consults with therapy and all this out the door, say, can we get them out the door again, Doc? He goes, we'll get this out the door say can we get them out the door again doc? He goes we'll get them out the door again, sir But that's what's required, you know When you fight a war with two few people and we just shattered a man you're like, oh man So you know your people, right? you're like Emerge isn't gonna survive another deployment. You know you go in you're like, hey, sorry, so and so Why don't we why don't you stay behind this trip on rear detachment?

No, sir, I gotta go. Can't leave my team behind, right? Yep. So that's my, all right, that was pretty dark, huh? It is pretty dark. Yeah, I thought we were gonna be more happy. I thought we were gonna be like, I thought we were gonna be more positive.

That's some dark stuff, man. It is, but you know, people need to talk about it. People need to understand, you know, people need to appreciate what the fuck we were doing over there, you know, they do. And a lot of them don't. But where were you on Gaddafi when we got him? I was, you know, your lead in episode, lead in thing was what you carry, right? And I told you, I want to go in to a denied area with a credit card and a passport. I actually tried to get into Libya. That thing, you know, Obama administration put the red line in and they're like start to bombing them. So I was the Pentagon. I got my boss to agree that I could go to Stuttgart, Germany on a, on a visit. And I just told my boss I'm like, hey, I'm going to Libya. I just want to be completely clear with you. Like I know I'm at the Pentagon.

I know this isn't supposed to happen, but I'm going over there and I'm going to go to Libya and I'm going to raise a guerilla army. I'm like, you to Libya and I'm going to raise a gorilla army. I'm like, you could laugh. So I got my ass over there. My buddy was running a task force, link up with him, Intel folks upstairs over the coffee shop. I knew because I've been through training with them. I was like, okay, I'm your guy.

Tell me when I infill. They're like, okay. The Brit, the Brit ended up, you know, the Brit's went in and got rolled up. By, I couldn't tell what faction, you know, there were two, there were all these different factions. The Brit's went in, it's all public records, so it's not secret. They rolled in, you were talking about link up in Afghanistan. They did that, but at a commercial airfield and the opposition element said, thank you for visiting Tripoli or wherever, clean, clean. You know, you're worst nightmare, right? Getting compromised on infill.

And I was like, I don't care, I'm still good. A Secretary of Defense at the time was Gates, and he said there will be no American boots in the ground. I thought he met everybody but Intel officers and special operators, he met everybody Intel got in there eventually, so no, never got to do it, but was desperate too. But when they got Kadafi, I was back at the Pentagon. You were? Yeah. Did you have any any part in that? No. You, you know anybody? No.

Hey, so I just remember this old dude, Vietnam vet, it's like this is bad. This country Libby is going to come undone all the weapons stores because Kadoff he had like tons of guns and ammo. He said all the terrorist elements are going to come up from the South, get all that shit and take it back South down to Mali, New Jair, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, and it's going to be game on. I just remember listening to that old guy, oh my God, here he goes again, given a history lesson, was he right?

We opened that can of worms, dealing with it now, right? Yeah. How did you get the Secretary of Defense to position? I think that Baghdaddi operation actually to get the Secretary of Defense to position. I think that back daddy operation actually had something to do with it. President didn't know me from anybody. I'm a government employee, remember?

I'm just, I work for whatever president. I'm on loan from the Pentagon. I'm doing counterterrorism for the president. President didn't know me from anybody. I told you I had this idea about Al-Qaeda, had a partner that came in with me, Kash Betel, who had access to the president. And so I explained what I was doing,

what we wanted for Al-Qaeda. Kash is the only person that can make this calls the president because Secretary of Defense, head of the CIA, head of State Department, aren't interested in this. So we're going to have to have the president get involved. And I'm like, you talk to him a lot, right? He goes, oh, yeah, I talk to him a lot. I'm like, let's partner.

The baggatti hit the next day, the president gives a public announcement and does the rollout. And I got to go to it and I got to see how it works behind the scenes. He goes and gives a speech. He comes out and he turns to me. Me, my crappy just to fake bank suit. Remember the one I was telling you about? Five for $200.

I'm probably wearing one of those. I think I just threw it out or donated it. And he turns to me. The president of the United States turns to me and goes Chris. And I'm literally like, uh-huh, It's like shit. I go up to the present and he goes,

don't let them walk back my comments. I was like, Rodgerser, he goes, said some stuff in there on purpose. Don't let them walk back my comments. And I was like, okay. And I left and I went back to my office

and I sent a note out to the community, heads of the community. And I said, the president was very deliberate about what he was saying today. His target audience was not the American people. It was young people thinking about joining ISIS. That's why it was very bombastic. The president was like, you know, you will die. You know, you will die if you join ISIS. Don't even think about it. I know information operations, psychological operations. I was Greenberry. I knew exactly what he was doing, right? It's like his target audience is not, you know, my mom. It's the world where kids are thinking about joining ISIS. I

said, we've completed this phase of the operation with the death of Baghdaddi. We can transition to a more steady state. You know, I used all the buzz words. More steady state counterterrorism operations. Thank you for all you have done. If you have any questions about next, this, this announcement in the next stage, feel free to call me. Nobody normally, you know, in Washington, D.C.

Somebody like that. That was a little, I don't, I'm going to go talk to the press and say, that's not exactly what happened. Nothing leaked. So I think that was the one where the president goes, this guy, the tall white hair guy, wearing, I had better glasses, then, you know, that guy with the cheap suit, he can get stuff done, and that's where I came to the president's attention. And then there was a guy that had worked on the campaign, a young gentleman who was basically an administrative assistant secretary type, who, like you, I work with everybody. I don't care what your rank, station, and life is.

If you're interested, come on along. I met this guy. His brother was going to school at the University of Iowa when I was city. I said, oh, my God. And he had worked on the campaign. And I helped develop him as a counterterrorism person and took him to meetings that he normally wouldn't get to go to. And having, I have to go back to the Pentagon. I told you I had the worst job in the history of the Pentagon

and intelligence oversight. I have to go back to that, Sean. And I'm like walking across the street between going into the White House, he's coming out. He goes, Chris, how are you doing? I said, I am, and I'm a cup half full guy. I said, I'm in a bad place because what's going on? He says, I got to go back to the Pentagon.

He goes, do you want a political job? I was like, what's that? Do you want to be appointed want a political job? I was like, what's that? Do you want to be appointed as a political official? I was like, I'll do anything. Anything to not have to go back to the Pentagon. He goes, come with me. Now this guy that everybody kind of was just, you know, off in the corner and nobody knew what he was.

We walk into the personnel office. He walks in, looks at one of the senior officials and goes, hey, get Chris a job. They all like jump to attention. This 24-year-old kid was a big, he's a serious player in the political side. I didn't know it.

And so I got a political job. And I went back to the Pentagon. So I changed from a government employee to there are usually about 3,000 political appointees that the administration gets to pick. And then you go in and you run the large agencies, in this case the Department of Defense. There are probably a couple hundred civilian, and they rotate out every time the administration changes. And I got one of those jobs and started there. And then I got a call and said, hey, we think you can do more.

I'm like, I'm good, because I'm fighting El Cater, right? I'm good. Pentagon, $18 billion for special operations, 68,000 forces. I'm good. And they offered me to take a presidential appointed Senate confirmed position, which I talked about, which means you are now, you're no longer just a, you're a political pointy, but you're at the top of the top shelf. And back to greatest strength, greatest weakness.

Parents always said, if you're going to do something, do the very best you can. You don't do it halfway. So I'm like, well, sure I'm interested. I mean, it's the way I was raised. President asked you to serve, so then I got that job at the National Counterterrorism Center. I'm out there loving life. All good, don't want anything else. Anybody who knows any, if you're doing what you're supposed to do, you always have your reconnaissance network out, just keep and track on what's going on, seeing what tax are coming in on you. And the word was out

that Esper, who was a Secretary of Defense, was gonna get, was, present was unhappy to him. After Lafayette Square, George Floyd, all that stuff, you know, where the president went out, you know, they cleared, remember that? Where they cleared the park, the president went across the street to that church. I do. Yeah, well Esper got a lot of flack for that and started kind of getting awfully

about his role in that and that ups I would I understand is that upset the president and then the other one which let's talk about later was Warren drugs. Like president was flippant, serious about securing our border. Everybody thinks it's just about like immigration. No, it's everything. And you know, the Department of Defense was not doing enough to stop the illicit flow of narcotics in the United States. I know this. So the president was upset that he wasn't getting support from the Pentagon.

And so I'm hearing all this and there are only three of us that are eligible to replace him because you have to be presently appointed, Senate confirmed. There are only three of us that have some military background that are eligible. I did not politic, I didn't want the job. And you get these calls. You better be ready, something

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Thank you. Let's get back to the show. Nothing happens. Thank God, election happens. There was some thought that he was going to clean house that night. That doesn't happen. Like, thank God, I'm just going to stay here at the National Counterterrorism Center. I love these people. I love this mission. El Cata, we're making progress. This is awesome. And Monday morning I go into work. It's COVID. Nobody's there. I'm like the only one

in the office. Get in there early. Beautiful day, man. Drinking my dunkin' dough in its coffee, phone rings. Nobody picks it up. Finally, I'm like, so I'm gonna get the phone. Hello, like, uh, director Miller? Yes. Get to the White House now. I'm like, no. Oh, they're like, yep. So the president made the decision and selected me. I think it was probably because of my coworker, Cash Patel. So I'm working counterterrorism at the White House. Cash is working with me.

When I leave, he replaces me. So I'm just guessing, I don't know. I don't know, but you get the call and you go over there and send my book. It's a pretty funny story. I was dressed pretty poorly. And they always ask you, you know, they're not going to send you in to see the present if you're going to say no. So, you know, like, hey, present's going to offer you this job, or you're going to take

it. And, and, you know, it's so funny, you can watch the West Wing, you know, that show from whenever with Martin Sheen or whatever, serve at the pleasure of the President, you know, it's like this great show where everybody just serves, you know, but that seems to work for that show, but it actually works for my show too,

because when the President of the United States asks you to serve, I don't know where are you on this. I'm like, I don't care what flavor, fashion, or whatever. It's president of the United States, and they're asking you to serve. You're gonna serve. So obviously I said, yeah, knowing it was gonna be a hell of a ride, which it was.

Yeah, it sounds like it. What was, so what did that conversation go like when you got into the White House? Go in there. I'm wearing crappy shoes because I decided that I was gonna turn the National Counterterrorism Center into business casual. Like try to change the, you know, the culture.

So I'm wearing crappy shoes. I've got khaki slacks on. I didn't have a tie. I had to borrow a tie. Fortunately, I'd thrown a blue blazer into my car. And all I can think of is the president's going to look at my shoes and go, I've got a better idea. You know, what's wrong with you? So I'm hiding, I'm trying to hide my feet. You go in, president's sitting behind the resolute to his desk, right? There's a chair in front of him and I sit down and I say, you know, morning, Mr. President goes,

a Chris, I'm fire and Esper, you're up. I was like, God, it's her. He said, okay, you ready? I'm like, God it, sir. Because okay, you ready? I'm like, yes, sir, I'm ready. Because okay, come back this evening, we'll talk more. That was it. Solutinex, keep move out. Went back that evening and got guidance,

which was pretty simple. It was like, hey, listen. I've been saying we're gonna ride down these wars. Nobody's listening to me. Do it. Of course, I believe in that. We talked about that. Like, yeah, I got it.

I'm with you, sir, because, okay, go get it done. I said, all right. There was no talk about, like, oh, let's overthrow the government using the military. People, you see this crazy conspiracy shit. It's like, most professional conversation, boss gave guidance, salute and execute. Totally within the boundaries, I'm like, got this, let's go do it. And off we went.

Did you have time to come over the plan on how to wind those down or do you have any idea how you were thinking about it? How are you gonna do it? Well, I looked at Afghanistan, we had 8,500, no, 8,800 there. It was when I was working at the White House in counterterrorism. When I still government employee, when I was, you know,

on loan from the Pentagon, you could see that negotiations were ongoing. It didn't take like, it didn't take like a genius, You could see that negotiations were ongoing. It didn't take like a genius. It didn't take Henry Kissinger to figure out that this war's coming to an end. There's gonna be a negotiated settlement. I mean, not the smartest guy in the world, but I'm like, oh yeah, we're gonna get in agreement. It's not gonna be pretty.

Wars aren't end and wars is tough, you know? Nobody's gonna be happy, but we got an agreement going. So we need to figure out what Afghanistan will look like with our presence post-peace agreement. So the Department of Defense was like, if we are minimum force required to protect the United States from attack from Afghanistan is 8,800 people. I was like, that's bullshit. Here they go again. Cause I'd been through this circus before, where they would give a number

and they'd like, the world will come to an end. And then we'd drop below nothing bad would happen. Serious an example. If we go below 1600, the world will come to an end with the 800 or 800 there now, nothing like what? World didn't come to an end. So check this one out. A commissioned a young government employee to do a war game with all of the key players

to determine what the minimum force structure in Afghanistan was necessary to do this. Keep Intel on El Cata or terrorist groups that could pose a threat to the United States, have a strike force sufficient to execute targets when they're identified. So they all worked it and we used mid-level people because the senior level people didn't want to participate because they knew, I suspect they knew that it was bullshit, right? That 8800. So they are like, we're not doing this. So I did a bunch of bureaucratic tricks and forced them to provide subject matter experts,

which is what I really wanted. I didn't want like political figures. You know, I didn't want to like stuff shirt, stuff suit talking heads. I want to like professionals in there. So government works great when you just let the professionals talk and take politics out of it. So they all did this big war game and they came up with we want to have one operating base.

We need 800 people there. Commandos, we need helicopter pilots, we need cooks and bottle washers. They did the whole thing and we'll have one counterterrorism base that we can keep fly predators out of all that stuff. I was like, thanks. This is in the, you know, some day somebody's going to get those things foyer, declassified, because I still get tons of shit from people like that didn't happen, that didn't happen. Well, I wasn't stupid, it's in the official records

of the White House, and they're all classified, that's fine. Someday, people are gonna look at it, I'm like, oh wow, that really did happen. I don't have anything, I can't give you a briefing chart, maybe the kid from Massachusetts, International Guard, that was a bad joke. That was a bad joke, why didn't it? Yeah, but it was kind of funny.

It was good to go. I feel, I mean, not for that kid. You know, the kid who got rolled up. Oh, I know, I know. Okay. The kid that just got rolled up for embarrassingly US government. Yeah, with all the secret slides from the Pentagon and other places.

Yeah. So maybe he's got the, maybe he has the official record of this war game that indicated 800 people was the minimum force required to maintain a counterterrorism presence in protect America. I then went out and I talked to the commander on the ground who I had grown up with and said, hey, well, President wanted to go to zero. I knew the number was 800 when the decision was made, a bunch of us agreed that 2,500 we would draw down from 8,800 to 2,500. And the reason we did that is, I thought it was weird because I thought that was one of

the really good decisions we made where we gave plenty of trade space for the next administration. We're like, we didn't go to zero. We didn't go to 800, which is minimum force because we knew that. We actually went to 2500 and I talked to the ground, the commander there. I said, 2,500, can you work it? He goes, we can do it. We're good. Got it. So lo and behold, I actually talked to the people on the ground because the echo chamber in DC was all 8800, 8800, 8800. So at that point, the president made the decision to go to 2,500. And that's what we left with in Afghanistan because quite honestly, and it's in the books

right now, most people don't care about this. I understand that. And it's all right. But it's still pretty raw, I think, for a lot of us in our generation that did that. I thought it was like 2,500, we can maintain pressure, and it will give the incoming administration a chance to recalibrate if they want to. I actually thought it was a good solid plan. Of course, it's been destroyed.

Like now that we jammed the Biden and ministers, hey, can I give you my final, not CYA, but bitch. I'd learned in the military that you can blame last guy for 30 days. Up to 30 days, you get out of jail free card. It's, oh, last guy. I would never have done that. But once you go over 30 days as a commander

and as a leader, you own it, right? Have you ever heard that? I haven't. Yeah, I wonder if I'd just heard that wrong. That's why I was asking. But I always learned that. You got 30 days. So this is why this whole thing, like we got jammed

by the Trump administration, it was a shitty deal. You had a chance to change things. I thought we gave enough trade space in there, maneuver space to do something. Well, they would have started killing, they would have started fighting again. Who cares?

We were gonna drop the hammer on them, man. Like our counterterrorism forces, they pulled back an operational tempo to the point where you can talk to people, they'd be like, this is the most boring deployment I've ever done. I'm thinking, thank God, we only hit one target in three months. You're like, okay. But during that time, our counterterrorism forces had built out like the target list.

And everybody was getting lazy. The enemy was getting lazy. And we had on the table, like Vietnam War, you know, they did the bombing, like when the North Vietnamese attacked in the South in 73 They did this huge bombing offensive, right literally bomb them back to the negotiating table Clearly counterinsurgency is different war, you know, you didn't have tanks coming down Coming down the main supply routes and the main roads But I felt we had the capability if they decided to start attacking

us again, they being the Taliban primarily, that we would have dropped a hammer on them. And it would have hurt them so bad. It would have been like, hey, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, pit foot off the gas. Like, can we meet for conversations again? Can we start the negotiation? So I was not, I thought we had meaningful way to terminate the war in a way that wouldn't be embarrassing to the United States and would still allow us to keep a counter terrorism presence there. That's pretty heavy man, but it'll all come out in the history someday. Right now, it's just too political. Everybody's like

Yeah, it's it's um, I mean, what were your thoughts when you saw how it all went down? Up so Friday the 13th fitting, right? Where were you? Yeah, just that worked. Just a normal work day. Got up was watching the news Uh new new the Taliban was on the offensive. A new that the technique we use, remember when I was telling about like, call them on the walkie talkie. They were doing it in reverse this time, right? They were calling the Afghan security forces

and going, you know, Uncle Ahmed, this is cousin, or this is your nephew, standby. You want a surrender? Nope. White flag goes up. I'm your, hello, how do I become a member of the Taliban? So I'm like pattern recognition. They're doing it now. They've got the momentum. It's working well very predictable You'd hear this you'd hear this dentorian voices of like oh the Taliban won't take over the country for 90 days or something. I'm like this thing's over right I'm like this thing they've got the momentum. They're doing exactly what we did, but in reverse,

got up that morning, Friday the 13th, turned on the news. They said, Taliban forces are masked on the outskirts of Kabul. And I flash back, forgot the name of the circle at the south of, you've been there, the south of Kabul, that's on highway one, that's like, you'd always there, the South of Kabul. That's on highway one that's like,

you'd always use that as a rally point when you were heading south on the road, or when you were coming back in, you'd always use that as like a place where you kind of like rally and stuff. And I had this vision of like a line of high looks, pick up trucks full of Taliban fighters, right? You got the picture?

Yeah, you got the picture. I saw him lined up there. I could just see it in my mind. I'm like, we got him right where we want him. Cause what's the one good, one thing we do well as an American military, we can blow shit up with air power. And the whole problem with counterinsurgency

is getting the enemy to mass, right? When you get them to mass, like, don't do that because we are going to bring in, we're going to drop the hammer on you. I was like, we got them right where we want them. We're going to smoke their ass. And we're going to bounce them back for a couple of weeks. They're going to have to refit, rearm, probably retrain and then about an hour later, the announcement comes to the Pentagon that the United States will provide no additional support to Afghan government. And I was like, the war's lost. That's invi're getting. Did some furiorating? I was a mess.

I think a lot of us were. Well, on that note, here we are. Yeah, man. I had a complete meltdown dude. Yeah. And I'm supposed to be a well-adjusted veteran, right? Ooh, man. I'm like, wow, if I'm feeling this way, can you imagine?

What others are feeling, man, I just feel horrible. Yeah, me too. Too much information, my friend. Well, let's take a break. All right. Next on the genre and show. I've heard you say that the biggest threat to the United States right now is the fentanyl crisis.

Mm-hmm. Why do you think that? Over everything else, over China, over Russia, over all the other things that we're facing. First meeting, I got to go into the Oval Office. A Mormon segment had been attacked and a bunch of people had been killed. Americans had been killed.

One of the drunk cartels took over a town in the south of Mexico and just like was basically took it from the town over because I was doing transnational threats as well as counter terrorism. And at the time, the president said 77,000 Americans were being killed each year due to illicit drugs coming in from south of the border. Former Navy SEAL Mike Ritland keeps it real on the Mike Drop podcast.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the stage Rudy Reyes. The ethics of the martial art is why I joined the Marine Corps. I never thought I was going to join the military because I'd been around so much I never thought I was going to join the military because I'd been around so much gun violence and I wanted to be the antithesis of that. I loved fighting hand-to-hand, it's fair. You don't have to kill your opponent. You can beat them with ability and skill.

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