#2 Travis Kennedy - Navy SEAL / BUDS Instructor 03:05:26

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Visit genesight.com for more information. So you're going out every day, you get in a gunfight outside of your FOB, then you come home, and then you got to deal with the base getting hit. How many engagements would you say you were a part of in that eight months? Do you have any idea? I lost count. It was that many. Just to put that in perspective for you, because most guys don't think about this, that's 180 fucking engagements.

Our very first op, the helo crashed. Oh shit. Killed everybody. One guy survived. I want to take a call. I have your dad on the line, Jim. Hey Jim, how's it going? This is Sean Ryan. I was just always curious how he really felt when he actually landed in Afghanistan with his team for that first deployment. I kind of just in the back of my mind hoped that you understood or at least somewhat understood what I was actually going to do. Yeah, that was definitely an emotional day for me. I didn't want... I still have that call clearly. I didn't want to vent onto him.

Fucking every night, right when sundown, these dudes would just smash us with small arms, and it would be effective. A lot of times when you lose guys in a combat zone and you know them, it'll create a type of ritual. Did I do anything? I'm going to take another call. We've got a mutual friend on the line who was there that whole second deployment with you, Jeffrey. Dude.

And there's a picture of you and Jeff and another guy's face that's blurred out. Hell yeah, I do. Welcome back to the Sean Ryan Show. Hope everybody had a good Christmas, good holiday, a good new year. We released our first episode at midnight on Christmas Eve out of 800,000 podcasts.

and an estimated 30 million episodes. We ranked number 73 on the top charts overall right off the bat thanks to you guys.

for heading over to iTunes, listening, subscribing, and most importantly, leaving us a review. If you get a chance and you haven't done it yet, please go over to iTunes, leave us a review, even if it's only one word. That's all I'm asking for doing these. With that being said, I'm ready to kick off episode 002. We have a 13-year anniversary.

combat veteran, Navy SEAL with multiple combat deployments. He was a BUDS instructor. This one really strums the heartstrings. We get deep. It gets emotional. Guys, this is better than entertainment. This is the real thing. Please welcome Mr. Travis Kennedy. All right, Travis, I've been dying to meet you. You're finally here in Tennessee.

We're in my studio. I can't fucking wait to get started. Jeff Reed introduced us, what, a couple months back over the phone. And anybody that's a friend of that guy is a friend of mine. And I just want to say it's a real pleasure to finally meet you and to have you on the show. Thank you, man. It's been a long time coming, for sure. A true pleasure to even be sitting right here and spending the weekend with you. Yeah. Thank you, man. Yeah, that's...

This is awesome. I want to dive right in here and I'm going to give you a tough question. Right now, the hot topic on the news is Iran. We just killed Soleimani and without going too far in depth into your background yet, you're a team guy, you're a SEAL, you're an operator, you've been on multiple bases, maybe embassies, FOBs.

but you've been on government facilities in combat zones that have been hit numerous times. I want to hear your take on our president's decision to fire up that drone strike and take out Soleimani. Yeah, it's been a definitely controversial topic, at least from what I've seen lately. However, my opinion is that these decisions aren't made rationally. They're not made hasty. They're very strategic and thought out.

especially with a guy like Soleimani. This is someone that's been on our list for a very long time. So the president had to make a difficult decision, but a decision that, in my opinion, needed to be done. And at the end of the day, we're getting rid of a terrorist that has been responsible for hundreds of, close to thousands of deaths, you know, Iraqis and American lives. So we're doing the world a favor by getting rid of this guy.

Yeah, there's always risk on the table. And these decisions are made every single day. Some don't even come to the spotlight. But all these risks are weighed. They're not just made blindly. Yeah. I mean, as a guy that's a 13-year Navy SEAL, multiple combat deployments, well over 100 engagements, fighting off terrorists that are trying to kill you, I mean, what –

What is it like to hear people say that they're upset that we killed a guy who's responsible for thousands of US lives and they don't support it? They don't think that we should have retaliated. And me personally, I had friends that died in Benghazi and we saw what the fuck happened when we don't do anything, when we don't send help and when we don't, you know,

Stand up for our guys that are over there fighting for the fucking freedom that these Americans have at home. Yeah, it's really honestly, it's truly mind-blowing I try to ignore stuff like that all these people online But it's hard to miss especially with this. It's the reaction of people getting mad because he may stoke

another war, another conflict with Iran. We've already been in conflict with Iran for a very long time. We still continue to be. We have no good relations with them. They're not a friendly country whatsoever. But just one incident because it's been blowing up so much and most likely because he's such a high-level guy that people want to go high and write knee-jerk reaction and think this was so horrible that he was going to cause a war possibly. But I think people just need to

understand and educate themselves on why these decisions are made because decisions like these are made all the time. Yeah. And they just don't, people don't know about it. Yeah. But I just hate, I hate seeing online, I hate seeing people go and uproar over stuff like this. Yeah. I think, you know, it seems like, you never hear anybody who actually did anything for the country

speaking out against things like this it's always the people that are sitting on their fucking ass back in the rear enjoying the freedom that we fucking give them and uh you know maybe those people should just shut the fuck up and enjoy what they have exactly you know but all right enough about politics i hate them i get pissed every time i talk about them but uh

I want to dive right into your childhood and kind of where you grew up and how you grew up and eventually what led you to become one of the world's most elite operators as a Navy SEAL. So where did you grow up? So growing up in Southern California, I grew up in a city called Huntington Beach. It's a beach town. Living in California, I mean, I was just a punk kid growing up, a skateboarder, just doing shenanigans at a younger age.

Bouncing back and forth between mom and dad. They were divorced, typical, kind of broken home, sharing time. - When did they get divorced? - I don't even remember. I was an infant. I mean, I was so young, I can't even remember when they were divorced. I can't remember when they were married. It was that long ago. - Okay, so you never saw them together. - I've never even experienced living, at least from what I did, but at one point when I was a baby, but even remembering living with them in the same household, married.

Grew up like that. It was a normal that was a normal for me, but so Going back and forth between mom and dad growing up. No was normal It was a pain in the ass I actually like spending more time with my mom than I did my dad when I was younger Really and I have no idea why even looking back. I was just I like to call myself an idiot because now me my dad are like we're super mom and dad are super close with me my dad is super tight, but I think it was because

At the time, my mom was dating someone who had a son who was a little bit older than me, and we were like brothers. Okay. Did everything together, always hung out, we were skateboarding, always fucking off. So naturally I was inclined just to wanting to be there all the time, so never wanted to go to my dad's. I did, but not often without bitching. That's surprising to me because I've researched you on social media and

listening to your previous podcast, I can tell that you and your father are extremely tight. My question is, if you were so tight with your mom, what is the thing that kind of drew you closer to your father? As I got older? Yeah. I think as I matured more, I just kind of realized that he was my father, you know, as a father figure, and I just wanted to be around him more. You know, I was like...

Probably around 14 13 14. I wanted to spend more time with him And we became closer because my mom was just dating this guy they end up separating so that Older his son we all like parted ways so that kind of got broken up so then I was kind of left with without him and then I just Kind of leaned towards can naturally just went towards my dad. Okay, and we became a lot tighter and

I spent a lot more time with them, especially once I hit middle school and then going into high school. But still the same thing, still sharing time throughout the whole process. What were you like as a kid? Were you like a nerd? Were you studying, making good grades, or were you a hellion out terrorizing the town? Growing up, I was like a punk kid younger, like middle school.

just a punk skateboarder, just doing shenanigans, fucking around. I was a mediocre student in elementary, middle school, junior high. Probably just mediocre. I didn't really try that hard in school. I was more focused on, especially when I was younger, just fucking off. And then towards the end of, I'd say, middle school, going to high school, I started tightening up. I was never really...

overachiever in school as far as grades are concerned but I got into sports and that kind of changed my mentality it wasn't really until I got into high school and started playing lacrosse and started in a couple other sports that I really started maturing and seeing what the next move was in life you know I heard on some of your other podcasts as well they assumed that you were from a great family it sounded like and uh

I think I heard one say like you know, oh, you know a lot of guys that go into special operations or even the military from broken families and He didn't say a fucking word. They just breezed right over it and My wife actually picked up on that first and so you're not from a picture-perfect family in Huntington Beach, California Like everybody thinks You had some shit. Yeah, most people think and I

it's fine that people from socal or especially those beach cities because they are wealthy cities you know born with a silver spoon in my mouth yeah got everything i had perfect family everything all our together far from it we were good but definitely not normal family uh broken home that but that was normal for me so i was used to it maybe if it happened later in life it probably would have had more of a profound effect on me but

being that it was and i was such a young age not even realizing that was just normal yeah i was just so used to it that didn't really have a really too much of a negative effect on me than my parents being separated but yeah definitely we were just lower middle class family like and just struggles my dad was struggling starting his own business poor but still providing you know my mom same thing so definitely definitely not the

the typical what you think of Southern California, that's for sure. At what point did you start to realize you wanted to become a Navy SEAL or join the military? How old were you? I was about 16, 15 going on 16. I knew I wanted to be in the military because in the beginning,

when I started weighing all these options I knew I wanted to be in the military and then I was really sat down like what I want to do I want to do something above the norm like I didn't want to just join and be a grunt or just the regular sailor I was more focused on navy and I just wanted to join and just be on the ship and just do whatever job I wanted to do something great I did at the time think about

Naval Academy, this time I was discussing with my father what I should do. At first he wanted me to do college. Then he's like, Navy, think about Naval Academy. I thought about fighter pilot. That thought came in and out of my head pretty quickly. I think it was more of the stigma. It was like, oh, that sounds great. That sounds fun. That sounds like a cool job. But the whole Naval Academy, that just wasn't for me.

And honestly, now being an officer, that's my personality, so I'm glad I didn't do that. Fucking cake eaters. Yeah, that's not me. Then, you know, going on with SEALs, my father was a big influencer, major influencer for the SEALs. You know, he's the one...

And you've heard this on other podcasts that he's the one who brought the information home for me. Because at the time, there was minimal. Minimal information online or whatsoever. You know, he brought home a pamphlet, like those little trifold pamphlets that had seals, little blips of information, not much, but just like this is Navy SEALs. And I was like, holy shit. You know, like that was it. Especially him giving it to me.

That was more of maybe a subconscious thing for me. Like at the time I look back and like maybe that was, you know, seeing him give me this like, "Hey, you need to be doing something great." Yeah. Like that set the tone. That's pretty surprising. You don't hear that very often about their parents push their kid into special operations. I think that's cool, but you just, you don't hear that ever. Yeah, I've never heard of it. It's very surprising. What, did you know, I mean, when he gave you the pamphlet what that was or what that would entail?

I knew what they were, but I didn't know what it entailed. I mean, I've heard of them, but just vaguely. I didn't know all that. Like, just a glimpse into that kind of pamphlet thing of what they're about. Because at the time before that, I didn't research them. I mean, I've heard of it a little bit. But that, once I got that in my hands, then I dove deep, you know, I deep dived into it. I just became obsessed because even just looking at that, getting it from him,

Just and then reading it I knew that was gonna be a good fit that was more my style who I was my personality where I would see I would fit and do good and be successful and after that I was like that's it like that's what I'm gonna do and the merit especially with the the water aspect to the because I really that's what drove me kind of Navy the maritime aspect and that was like perfect it's like seals me perfect fit for me. You liked the water growing up. I agree. Yeah, I did. Do you like it now?

I have a different relationship with it now. I think a lot of guys have a different relationship with that after a ride. Takes me about 10 minutes to get in the water though. You just look at it like, oh fuck, I hope it's not cold. Slow crawl into it. You signed up at 17 years old. I mean, you can't even legally do that by yourself. What was that like and why didn't you just wait until you were 18? Yeah, I mean, for me, I knew in my core that I wanted to do this so bad. I was like, I need to sign up and make this happen.

Because when I did that, that even stoked the fire even more because now I had that goal. I already made that commitment and there was no turning back in my mind. But I was so set in that time because I enlisted this summer going into my senior year because I wanted to graduate and go. So you enlisted before your fucking senior year of high school? Yeah. So I was already in the Navy, the debt program, throughout my senior year.

So I knew for a fact I was going. I already knew when I was leaving for boot camp, like halfway through senior year. Holy shit. I left literally a month later, after I graduated high school, one month later. Wow. So looking back now, after all you've been through, do you think you had any idea how big of a fucking decision that was that you made at 17 years old to go? And this is post-9-11. What year is this? 06. 06. So yeah, post-9-11.

So, no. I definitely, I knew I was making a major commitment because I knew SEAL Special Forces, like this is big time. But being at a young age, like just knowing, this minimal knowledge I knew about it, I didn't know the magnitude. I mean, that was way bigger. It didn't really come to life until I actually got there. Wow. But I definitely knew I was making a life-changing decision. A difficult one, a hell of a challenging one too, but...

The magnitude didn't really hit me until I actually got to Bud's and that's when reality struck. But I knew what I wanted to do. That's why I joined so early because I wanted to leave right away. I don't want to, I don't want buffer time because I knew myself was like, if I drag this out, then I'm going to create excuses or something. Yeah.

Because I locked tight my training over a year out when I enlisted. I was so 100% frontside focused. You were locked on from the moment you made that decision. I was my life. I didn't give a shit about anything else. I played a little bit of sports. That helped me. And then trained. I didn't care about it. I finished school, passed. I wasn't exceptional because all I cared about was SEALs. A's, B's, C's, or below on your grades?

No A's. I got a couple B's, C's, and a D in math. I wasn't a math student. I got a D in math. Not a math guy. Actually, I'm pretty good at math now, but not at the time. I think I just didn't put effort into it. I don't know why, but the interest wasn't there. I was so focused on something else. Yeah. So how long after graduation did you go to boot camp? Graduated June of 06. Went to boot camp in July. You went to boot camp.

went to boot camp in july graduated high school in june so a month later i left for boot camp in july of 06 and then boot camp is boot camp and then i went to core school after boot camp oh i joined july of 01. that's weird yeah july 18th was the day i went there wow when you joined you so you joined you had the seal contract or whatever they were calling it at that time

And at that time, did they have, did they make you go through an A school to fill a job with the Navy if you quit? Or did you go straight to BUDS? Yeah, they did. I had to pick a rate. I had to pass the SEAL PST before I...

I got to try out for BUDS prior to even boot camp, and then I had to pick a rate. I ended up picking core school because at the time there was only an approved list. It wasn't any job in the Navy. They gave me a list of five jobs like ordinance, radar, core school. When I looked at it, I was like, maybe I'll just pick something that's practical. That's going to be useful in my life. Medicine. So you did that. Yeah, I had no idea I would be interested in it. It was like, okay, medicine. That sounds more useful than...

AO or something loads this ordinance on ships. Yeah, so I picked that and That kind of paved the way how old were you when he got the buds? 19 19 years old turn 19. Yeah, so you did all this preparation from age 16 you made that decision 17 long tight. Yeah, you get the buds. Did you think you were prepared when you showed up? I did were you prepared when you showed up? I

I thought I was. I mean, everything up until that point, I really thought I did everything I can at all the tools. Thought I knew everything I needed to know about training and to be physically and mentally ready. But once I actually started BUDZ, I knew there was things that I wasn't ready for. I mean, it was going to be a surprise. Yeah. Things you just can't train for. What was that like for you? I mean, you'd seen, I'm assuming you watched every damn show

piece of content you could get your hands on, Discovery Channel, History Channel, books, whatever you could get your hands on. And so you thought you knew the whole process, you saw it all on, you know, or what you thought you saw it all, and then you're there. And you see the bell, and you see the grinder, you see the instructors, and you see the classes. They're already classed up, going through Hell Week, second phase, third phase. Well,

What was that like when you showed up and you saw all that shit for real for the first time? Definitely nerve-wracking. It was a surreal experience. So I remember checking in. I checked in with like a handful of other guys. We walked into the quarterdeck, checked in, and then they marched us through the grinder. And there was a class going on the grinder getting beat. They were doing a PT. And that was definitely a surreal experience for me. Nervous as hell, scared. Also very excited too. Like I had all kinds of emotions in me. I didn't know how to act.

Just stoic face, but internally I was just like this frail, skinny 19-year-old at a boot camp, lost so much weight. So I was just like, I look so damn young. Like I said, prior to that point, I thought I knew what I was going to get myself into until I saw it and I was like, holy shit, here it is. Yeah, you see guys that are mid-20s, early 30s.

Yeah, because I saw first phase guys, see like second, third phase guys running around. He's like brown shirts, these dudes got long hair, look like, you know, more mature, older, like fuck. You know, it was taken back. Yeah, shit, some of them have already been to combat and back from other branches and decided they want to try out for a SEAL. Yep. And you're a 19-year-old punk kid from Huntington Beach, California. I mean, did you...

Did that intimidate you seeing guys like that quit? It didn't intimidate me. I didn't really notice it at first. I mean, I didn't really pay attention to people who quit. I was just, especially in the beginning, there was just so many of us that you wake up and there's the last like 10 guys. How many did you start with? We started around 140, I believe, something like that. And then I ended up graduating buds with 31, 32. Shit, so...

That's, I'd say it's like an 85% attrition rate. And that's, I mean, well above that. So must have been a tough class. Last hardest class? Yeah, I hear that all the time too. When you showed up, whether it's selection or buds, a lot of guys showing up to those kind of training curriculums, they have one evolution, one famous evolution in mind that they're scared shitless of.

Like a lot of guys go to BUDZ, it's the 50 meter underwater swim or selection is the land nav. Did you have anything that you were really worried about? Me was the boats on heads. I saw it and I didn't know how, I went to that point like I knew I had to do four mile run, I knew I had to do the swim. I wasn't really sweating that. I heard about the 50 meter, wasn't really sweating that.

Watching the videos and stuff like that, seeing the log PT and the guys sprinting with this boat on their head. I ended up being right because that's, in my opinion, still the worst evolution in buds. I mean, it's definitely mentally and physically the most taxing, running with that thing on your head, especially when people around you aren't holding their weight in the beginning. When you're all collectively holding your weight, then it's manageable. But when people start slipping, then it's brutal.

For me, that was one of the most challenging, in the beginning, probably one of the most challenging things. Was that as bad as you thought it was going to be? The boats on heads? It was worse. Was it worse? I didn't even know. I just saw it. I didn't even know how bad it was going to be. Those are things you can't prepare for, like boats on heads, log PT,

you know those watching guys on the video it just doesn't really do it justice yeah it's a little bit different watching somebody with a rubber boat on their head and you're like ah you know how bad can it be and then your head's under that boat with a bunch of sand in between your scalp and that boat that weighs i don't know a couple hundred pounds full of sand and water and then uh you know it takes your scalp with it

It crushes your neck. Yeah. Yeah, it's an eye-opener for sure. Did the thought of quitting ever cross your mind going through? Never once. No, and I can honestly say that, no. Never thought about it one time. No shit. Definitely struggled through buds on certain physical evolutions and challenged definitely a lot. But the thought of giving up, no. What did you struggle with? Running. Running? Yeah. Running was my kryptonite.

As it progressed, in the beginning it was okay, and then it got progressively a little worse and worse, and then it kind of set me back. Did it? Did you get rolled back? Second phase, I got rolled back for runs. Oh, shit. How was that? Did that just crush your mindset? Yeah, I was embarrassed, for sure. Especially over runs. I just felt like, what the fuck, Travis? Like, over fucking runs, this is what we do.

You know, maybe I would have taken it better if I failed pool competency or something like that or a dive because that's a difficult task. But a four mile time run that I've been doing for the past eight weeks or longer, I thought I would, I never would have saw myself failing runs because I failed one before pool comp, passed pool comp, failed another one after pool comp, which is a major milestone in the second phase. And then I ended up getting rolled back into another class.

But post pool comp, so I didn't have to do that all over again. For you civilian types, pool comp is a major hurdle in BUDS, which is SEAL training. And basically, long story short, it's scuba diving. You're with open circuit tanks and...

You have to go under and basically what happens is you get the shit beat out of you and you can't breathe and you have to go through all these procedures before you can resurface and get air. Did you have to do that over again? No. Thank God. That's good. Thank God. That was a tough evolution too. That was probably one of the toughest I did in MUDS, if not the toughest. But I luckily got to be able to roll back post that. So I classed up with another class.

And then finished buzz with that class no more hang-ups no more hang-ups Actually came back stronger and healthier and I wasn't even roll back for that long month month and a half Okay, so not very long, but I came back stronger healthier. Yeah, I just focused on I trained I Rehabbed my body because I just I still felt a little broken down to after how week first phase but

So maybe that was a blessing in disguise. I don't know. But I was still ashamed of myself. Like I didn't want to fail and then see my first, my class pass me up, which is a shitty feeling too. So you graduate Bud's, you go to SDT, and then just doing the research, I already know you became a medic. You went to 18 Delta course, correct? Yeah. In Fort Bragg.

That's a hard thing to do because that's a long course. And so the guys that you're in buds with are already at the team. Some of them are already going off to war and you're still in the schoolhouse. Yeah. How was that? That was definitely being a corpsman already.

Right when I got my bird, they just immediately pointed at me like, hey, you're going to 18 Delta. Or SACIM, which is the Special Operations Combat Medic, the short course of the 18 Delta. It's six months. Still very long course. And yeah, I was kind of like taken back. I was like, okay. You know, not really knowing what the hell that was really. And still, I was a little irritated because I was eager to go to the team and start working and get out of the student kind of.

mindset and actually show up to the team and start doing the job and training with the other other team guys, but I took it on the chin. So let's go and I went but we'll get into it, but it was the best course I've ever attended in my entire career. Really? Just backtracking just a second. Get through buds. I mean, I know how influential your dad was in your life and

He originally gave you that pamphlet, which was the initial idea of you becoming a Navy SEAL. At the end of SQT, which is SEAL qualification training, when you got your trident, how good did that feel knowing that your dad, I mean, he must have been so proud. Yeah, that was an incredible feeling.

I mean, not only for me, I know for him, he was there. So was the rest of my family. He got to see? He did, yeah. He get pinned? He did. Yeah, he was there. That's awesome. So it was really cool to have him there. And the rest of my family as well, mom, sister. So that was unbelievable. Best feeling I ever had, best feeling in my life, number one moment in my life up to this point. And everything coming to fruition after all those kind of,

Steps leading up to this point and now it's actually coming true Was great, you know, I knew it was great for him too because you know, he just seen the result That must have been really cool. Yeah, so you're at 18 Delta school You're a little bit pissed off because the boys are at the team already You're in the schoolhouse an army schoolhouse nonetheless, which is always kind of a pain in the ass for To do the cross thing with the with other branches. I

and i know how frustrating that must have been but looking back now now that you know the medic is probably the most important job on the team would you have changed anything no no like i said it's i became passionate about medicine like that's where i fell in love with it there at the squad and even after core school i didn't know about it i mean they just teach you bare bones and then actually deep dive into this course uh

I developed a love for it and a passion for it and I enjoyed every minute of it. Definitely do not regret it because it paid dividends throughout my entire career. Everywhere you go you need a medic. Every op you need a medic. And there I was, the guy that's the medic. Because there's not many medics, far few in between the platoons. Because no one wants to go. Because it's too long, too hard.

But being at Bragg, where the schoolhouse is located, Army base, massive, and it's joint command, so a bunch of different units, majority Army, but there's a bunch. Navy guys definitely stood out, and we're under the microscope for sure. And it was really important to me to perform because I didn't want to be, I've heard horror stories at that point, like I didn't want to be the team guy showing up to the platoon saying he failed 18 Delta. Just straight up turd. That's the first impression. I don't want to be that guy.

They were expecting you to be a medic and show up here. And as soon as you do that, you're screwing over the platoon, essentially. And now you just look bad as a SEAL and as a man. So I definitely didn't want that. I wanted to crush it. How did you do in that course? I mean, that's probably got to be one of the most academically challenging courses in the military, going through 18 Delta. I mean, it's...

It's so much information condensed into what, six, seven months? Yeah. Yeah, it was the most challenging course academically. I ended up surprising myself. I ended up graduating that course as an honor man in my class. No shit. Which I kind of blew myself away doing that because I never graduated honor man anything before that. Yeah. But after graduating that class, finished honor man because leading up to that point, like I said, I was passionate about it. I loved doing it. I wanted to be a good medic.

because it was important to me. It was damn near like being in college, I never had college experience at that point, but it was like being in college. I was in the books 24/7, seven days a week, learning the shit in and out, especially in the first three months, first half of the course. Second half is when you actually get to do the real stuff, the live tissue training, surgical skills, TCCC. So it was a gut check for sure for me, but again, and part of the motivation was too, I wanted

to outdo the army. Yeah. Because before that, it was always like some army guy getting on our man or outdoing the Navy guys because there was only like six of us. So I took it upon myself. I was like, you know what? I'm going to show them what SEALs are all about. We're fucking, we need to dominate here because we're such on the microscope all the time. That's always a pain in the ass doing any type of school with a different branch because of that competitiveness or, what's the word I'm looking for?

You're under the microscope as other units and there's the pissing contest between the two. Yeah. Pissing match. Pissing match with all the branches. They see you, especially if there's only a few of you. We always hung out together and we're in ranks every morning there. We're all segregated. There's only a little small unit of us and

I mean all this staff they're hating the Navy guys. It never goes smoothly that's for fucking sure. But you graduated honor man which is kind of funny considering you're a subpar student in high school you're still I mean you're only a couple years older now in 18 Delta school correct? And you graduate honor man that's I mean that's fucking impressive. Yeah I was 21 when I finished.

Oh, shit. Turned 21 while I was there at the end. So you graduate 18 Delta. You're a combat medic. You're showing up to SEAL Team 4. You show up to SEAL Team 4. I mean, that's a lot of schooling and preparation for a kid to go through. You're finally at SEAL Team 4, 21 years old.

what was that like yeah that was a long time coming i mean towards the end of that once i graduated the schoolhouse even asked me like you got honor man just as you got honor man we're going to offer you to stay longer like hey you want to stay for an additional seven months and be up be here for over a year to do the long course they call it the long course and at the time i was like no i was like i want to go to the team so that's how hungry i was at that point i was ready

ready to finally be there and do the job. I was finally prepared. I knew medicine to be a good medic and I was ready just to actually do the job, to be a SEAL. Because when you're at Salkham, the med school, you're just, all you are is inundated with medicine. You're not learning anything, SEALs,

operators at all. It's just 100% medicine. Okay. Which it has to be that way to make you a good medic. So you get removed a little bit. Yeah. So I was so eager to go to a team and just start operating. Like I wanted to be a SEAL. So I was ready. I was ready to get after it. What was it like walking in the platoon hut that first time? I mean, I know you showed up to SEAL Team 4. I know you jumped in a platoon that was coming back from war. And here you are, green,

Probably overly motivated as most new guys are and these guys are coming home Was it Iraq? Yeah, I was going to one troop these dudes were in Iraq And they were just on like the last month of being there about to be coming home, and they were getting it over there Yeah, and majority of those guys have already been there two times some three so was that intimidating for you and very intimidating because I was only at the time was going only

Me and a couple other new guys were the only ones going into one troop, which was the CENTCOM troop. The guys that were getting out, going to war. So you knew as soon as you showed up, you were going to war. I was going to one troop, Iraq, which is responsible for the AOCENTCOM. So I knew inevitably I was going to go to Iraq. That was kind of in the back of our mind. They didn't say for sure at that time when I first checked in, but I knew I was going to one troop. It's happening. It's happening. That's where I'll be going in the future.

and definitely nerve-wracking i was just super intimidated even go and be going to seal team four and then let alone like going to the platoon space which is like sacred territory for the old guys yeah so definitely nervous especially when they got there when they started trickling in and then because that when i first showed up it was like we got our gear we just got a locker quarter deck watch new guy duties you know just new guy stuff all the time so

not really much of anything until they actually showed up. And then they start showing up and then we actually get to see them. You know, these dudes are war veterans, man. These guys have been there, done that, and we're just over here, just new and green. Yeah. Not knowing shit, you know, just keep my mouth shut. I imagine they probably weren't the most welcoming bunch of guys. Yeah, definitely not, not at first. No, they didn't all show up at once. They kind of just all half came in and the half and they all trickled in.

They all went on leave pretty much almost immediately when they got back. But yeah, once they saw us, it was just like blood in the water. So did you get to do a full train up before you went out the door? Yeah, I did. Full workup. A full workup. A workup is a year and a half. A year and a half, yeah. So you did a year and a half train up on top of all the training you just did to get out the door. How long do you think it took to...

Gain the respect of your peers, your new teammates that you're getting ready to go to war with, who they've already been to war. I mean, that's... It took a while. You've got to man the fuck up and prove yourself to these guys to blend, you know, to get accepted. It was like showing up to Bud's, you know, but now I'm showing up to the team as a new guy. Everyone's done what you've done and more. Now it's like prove yourself all over again.

So that whole stress was again happening and it was just every single day just putting out, putting out, putting out, make sure I'm right place, right time, right kit. I'm always performing, trying to outdo even the new guys, trying to stand out, you know, just prove myself I'm worthy. And I don't think it was until damn near deployment that we got some, we're pretty much got respect like, hey, okay, full workup.

I like how you just said that you showed up and at the same time you're feeling on top of the world because you just got your trident, you're a SEAL medic, you're checked into SEAL Team 4. The fact that you just said everybody's already done what I've done plus more. I mean that just what you've done already by age 21 is fucking impressive. And to have that attitude going in, I mean that's kudos to you.

Because that's very real. Yeah. You show up, you think you're the shit, and then every single person at that team has already done every fucking thing you've done tenfold. Exactly. And when I first showed up there, Austin and you guys were on top of the world. It didn't really hit home until we saw these seasoned fucking warfighters coming in the doors like, okay, maybe we need to step the fuck back, humble ourselves a little bit. And it did. We...

It's not like we're really arrogant, but we just got to see it and feel like, okay, we know our place. We need to prove ourselves now. Were you glad you knew you were going to combat? Yeah. Right off the bat? Yeah, I was glad because that's what we trained to do. I mean, I think I'm lucky, and I'm grateful that I had to be able to have that opportunity, even as my first pump to be able to go to war. I mean, not many SEALs

Even some of the older SEALs that were in my platoon could even say that. Yeah. So that was even rare at that time. Yeah. Most guys, my LPO at the time has never even been in combat. No shit. You know, so guys going to combat was far between, you know, it's kind of luck of the draw. So I was very grateful and lucky to be a part of that platoon. I mean, that was a very interesting time in the teams. I feel like post 9-11, you know,

up to about that point because there really wasn't a whole hell of a lot going on between Vietnam and 9/11, a couple things here and there. And it created a lot of animosity in the community between the older guys and the newer guys who were coming in and going straight to fucking combat. And other guys, I mean, some guys have retired out of there, you know, and never got a chance to do that. But you went right there. Do you feel like you were ready? I feel like I have to work up everything up to the point I was.

Definitely my mind was right. I wanted to go. I felt confident. I felt comfortable with being a part of the platoon. I felt solid. At first, I thought I was going to Iraq and was all geared up for that. And then I ended up switching troops.

Okay. I needed a medic and then I'm going to Afghanistan. You switched troops or switched platoons. They needed a medic, which means you're the fucking primary medic as a new guy going to Afghanistan, correct? Yeah. That's a shit ton of responsibility. How do you think you handled that? I felt I had it pretty good. I mean, I was mentored up by solid individuals in my original platoon.

solid medics, senior medics and older guys because there's only like five of us new guys. Majority of the platoon is all senior guys. They have multiple combat or if not just one. So seasoned and they brought us up right and definitely gave me the confidence to succeed and do my job well and that's how I felt. I mean I was more excited, I was actually

a little bummed and torn that i had to leave my platoon but then at the same time i was like really excited to go to afghanistan because that was a spot what at what point in the train in the workup did you switch platoons at the very end i was in uh i was done with workout so you just spent a year and a half proving yourself to a new team only to get removed put in another new team where you have to prove yourself as a new guy again and you're the primary medic i mean

Yeah, me and two other guys. Those are some big shoes to fill. It was intimidating because I didn't know anybody besides the two other guys that came with me, the snipers. One was a sniper, so they kind of were a buffer, a little conduit. They were a little more protective. Yeah, because I was their new guy. I knew some of the new guys they had, but yeah, same thing. I had to prove myself because they didn't know who I was. They had some of my other guys kind of vouching for me, but...

Same token, I still got to prove myself. How do you think your dad felt when he found out, I mean, he gave you the pamphlet to become a SEAL. You become a SEAL. Now you're getting ready to go out the door and do this shit for real. It's honestly hard to say because I never asked him how he really truly felt, but I'm sure he was nervous because I did tell him up front. I thought about just lying and just bullshitting my parents and telling them where I was just going to make up some...

just say i was going to europe or something just to be be fine i'll be good and i'll be able to call you whenever that crossed my mind but at the end of the day i was like no i'm just going to tell them where i'm actually going because this is what i signed up to do i thought it was right i mean what do you expect or navy seals is what we do yeah we go to war and handle it but i'm sure he was nervous he was excited because i actually doing what i wanted to do what i love to do but i'm also certain that he was probably scared shitless

I know my mom was. Yeah. Did you try to shelter them from what was actually happening? Yeah. I never, I kept it vague. Yeah. I didn't go to nitty gritty and I kept it very vague. I said I was going to Afghanistan. That was it. I didn't say like where, you know, I just didn't tell him really what I was doing. Even when I was there and I reached, I called him, emailed him, or even I tried to call him once in a while on a sat phone. We got to call him. I just didn't even talk about what the hell I was doing. It's more of this, you know,

How's it going? I'm good. You hear my voice like I'm doing well type of conversation. Yeah, it's funny. You lose almost all emotional communication. Yeah. Somewhere along that pipeline. It seems like almost all guys do. There's no more sense of emotion. Yeah, you put up a shield like not really realizing it. It just happens innately because it's work. You know, you got to solve business.

You know, you can't bring motion into it. And you can't, and I didn't want to do that to my family. Like they're going to be worried sick. Yeah. Like putting undue stress on themselves because I'm over there. You know, I didn't want that to happen. So I'm sure it still did anyway, but I didn't want to feel that far. You're getting ready to leave for combat as a brand new medic to Afghanistan with your new platoon as a new guy.

Going back to your dad who you're extremely extremely close with do you think his? You think his mindset changed at all did he get worried that you were now that it became very real like hey dad I'm going to Afghanistan for six to nine months. I would say so yeah I mean at the time he didn't they didn't really express their worries to me that much because they wanted me to remain focused, but I

I knew, because after the fact I spoke to them, but I knew their stress was high. They definitely were worried. I'd say more fear of the unknown for them at least. Because I was the first one in the immediate family going in the military and they had no experience of anyone in their family going in the military. So this is all new to everybody. So out in your family, you're the first one that's going in the military and you're going to war at the highest level.

Exactly. So they knew, I want to be doing some things. I want to take a call. I have your dad on the line, Jim. Hey Jim, how's it going? This is John Ryan. I've got your son sitting here and we're talking about right before he leaves on his first combat deployment at SEAL Team 4 as a new guy. And I was wondering if you have any questions you'd like to ask him. Hey Dad. I do actually. I've got one at deployment.

How I felt about it? I mean, I was scared. I was talking to Sean about this. I was definitely nervous as hell. I think those nerves turned into more with the excitement and the motivation, but definitely scared as shit because I knew exactly... I was doing it for real. I mean, I wasn't going to Europe or South America. I was actually going to war.

all that training and hard work coming to fruition finally. I couldn't even figure, it's hard for me to even explain in words to obviously you guys what I was going to be doing, but I kind of just in the back of my mind hoped that you understood or at least somewhat understood what I was actually going to do. No, I for sure did. Yeah, the emotional hit for me when you said goodbye. Jim, I got a question for you.

Yeah, it was definitely an emotional day for me. I didn't want to let on to him how emotional it was for me, actually.

But I know he was so driven, he just thought about it, worked hard towards it. I was just so proud of him. At the same time, I was definitely nervous too. You know, he was going to Afghanistan and what would happen. He said he'd be going on missions and he said he would check in when he could. It was definitely a real emotional day for me with that last call. How was that six-month deployment for you as a father? Was that compared to all the other time in your life? Would you say that was probably one of the most stressful moments of your entire life?

Yeah. That's a difficult down... You got anything for... You got anything for your dad? No. I mean, I'm glad that you... I guess after you're saying that, you have a good mindset about it. Because at the time, I was giving him vague information.

Because I didn't know either. I mean, I didn't know when the hell I was about to even call or what type of connectivity I was going to have there, etc. Or I kind of had an idea. I knew what we were doing, but I didn't know how important or much we were going to be doing. So it was even hard and difficult to me to explain to my family exactly what I was getting into. And I purposely didn't. I purposely kept it vague. I said, hey, this is where I'm going. I actually almost thought about...

Lying and be like I'm going somewhere else like I'm just gonna go to Europe. I'm going to Europe for six months I'll build it. I'll call you when I get there or something. Just keep it really vague. You can keep it comfortable But at the end of the day, I felt like I would be doing a disservice. I'll be like no, this is where I'm going Yeah, so this is this is what I do We were always proud of him. He definitely worked his ass off to get there. You know, even through high school he was driven to be a SEAL He got in the buzz. He's never gonna break me

Jim, I got one last question for you before we jump off the line here. What made you hand Travis the brochure on being a Navy SEAL? You remember that?

Wow, so you knew he was going to make it right off the bat. Yeah.

he was like training for buzz all through high school i just saw the driving him as i said where do you think he got his drive from i just think i mean i guess maybe at a young dad maybe i always just we made it live together because he was old when he was born you know he just saw the drive carried over into his life that's incredible definitely and business and having him running his own business yeah and so definitely well jim i really appreciate your time and and for the call and and uh

We'll be home soon. Alright dad, thanks. Alright, bye bye. How did that feel? That was a pleasant surprise. And very unexpected. Was it? Did you know all that stuff before? How he felt? No. Because I honestly never really asked. But I knew they probably did feel that way, like I said, but I just, I mean even to this day I haven't asked him. Yeah. No, no. But...

It's good. I mean, he had the right mindset. Well, you guys are obviously very close and that's really cool to see. But, enough of the mushy stuff. Let's move on to combat. So your boots on the ground, Afghanistan, what year? 2010. 2010. A lot of shit happened right around then. Like, bin Laden got killed. Where'd you land? Did you land in Bagram? Landed in Kath, Kandahar. No shit. You went straight to Kandahar. Yeah.

went to Kandahar and then from there we loaded up and shipped out to a place called FOB Lane. At the time still team three was there. It's a little tiny FOB and back in the day was owned by an SF unit and team guys took it over. It was in southeast Afghanistan, a province called Zabel in the area called Argandab. So it was definitely the hot spot of the time in the area but we ended up

arriving there and then until team three was there like I said and we end up doing you know once we hit boots on the ground you dudes are fired up motivated getting checked in we kind of pretty quickly I'd say within the first week we started planning and for our first turnover up so fairly fast. Just for reference southern Afghanistan down in Kandahar is one of the hottest zones and always has been throughout the what almost two decades of combat going on or wartime

in Afghanistan. And how long were you there before? How long, I mean, did you guys even have time to settle in? Because I did a lot of research and I talked to some of your friends and I mean, you guys were getting it. So. And once we arrived to our FOB. Yeah. Yeah. Like I said, it was pretty quick. We got half, I would say half the SEAL Team 3 platoon kind of left as we arrived. And then the kind of leadership, more senior guys stayed on board to do turnover with us.

But it was fairly quickly before we started turning and burning and have that nice that good battle rhythm and just started going because our Honestly the leadership that I had was eager and hungry. What backtrack real quick before we get into The details what were your living conditions like how many people a lot of people don't understand what a fob is a fob is not like a big base It's a small fortified

A lot of times you're using sandbags as cover. Can you kind of describe your living conditions, how many guys you were with? Were there locals? We had our entire platoon. We actually went there with, I would say, 18 SEALs. I think it was 18 or 19 SEALs, and we had another handful of enablers there.

plus SEAL Team 3 there. So we had almost 60 guys, I would say, on this FOB. We only had one. We had no locals that slept on our FOB with us. None? None, or a partner force. Okay. So they had their own little FOB. I was sleeping, and we had like little bee huts, little wooden rooms.

So this FOB, honestly, was pretty well, it was decently built up because it had been there for a while. Like I said, the Army SF unit, ODA unit ran it and established this thing. So it pretty well built up. It wasn't very big, but it was decently built up. So living conditions, honestly, my first appointment weren't bad. So I was, we were all pretty decently comfortable. Okay. As far as...

Sleeping is concerned, but we we would get attacked on a nightly basis so that comfort wasn't went out the window. Every night you're getting attacked? Pretty much. What are you getting attacked with small arms? Indirect. Okay. Yeah, indirect fire. Any close calls? A few. Some would get into the base, but not near where we slept. But it was mainly just kind of sporadic fire. They were definitely aiming at us and getting close but

Nothing I wouldn't say effective at least on our fob. Well, were you having to defend the base at all? Or was it all pretty much in? No, we got we every time we based offense We had a good we used our RG's we had some RG 31s with the 50 cows on it And we also had a which is the up armored All-terrain vehicle. Okay, so it's big beefed up an all-terrain and we had a

50 Cal they have 50 Cal weapon system a remote weapon system that called RWS is on top of those things So we placed those in position We also had a huge tower with the 50 on it that we use as well and then we also had a mortar pit - Okay, so we would send our own indirect fire what point So how long were there before you started leaving the wire and going out on on your own ops and look? What was your mission there?

So our mission was strike force. We ended up just doing the straight village clearance and direct action. But our very first op that we did, our turnover op, was one that was pretty impactful for everybody that was there. We did a turnover op with SEAL Team 3. Only very few guys in my platoon actually went.

Went on it because it was mostly SEAL Team 3 doing our turnover. Just kind of see how they did business. Kind of SOPs. And they left late that night. And before, you know, the sun even rose. I got woken up in the middle of the night. Loaded a helo because the helo crashed. Oh, shit. Killed everybody. So we lost Team 4 guys, 3 guys, the whole crew. Everybody in the bird went down. We lost one guy survived.

Andrew Dow, he survived. Fuck man. Miracle. But so the bird ended up crashing on the hillside going down. It didn't get shot down or anything, but it was going because we did a lot of overwatch positions. We call them SE positions. And then we had the main element down on the ground during the village and we had the overwatch positions, which we call supporting element up in the mountains. So we did a lot of that at night. So the helos would land at these peaks and sometimes they wouldn't even touch ground.

They would just hover over because they couldn't land on these mountaintops. The terrain was rugged. So this bird ended up just clipping the side of the mountain and lost everybody except one. So I got woken up in that, loaded the bird, went over to hover over it because there was nobody there. Because the other bird was getting dropped off somewhere else on another peak. So I got woken up, loaded the bird, grabbed all my med kit,

I mean that was like something that, hey hello, like fucking reality check, bird just went down. Let's expect everyone to be dead. Get your fucking med kit, get your litters now. Fucking grabbed all my shit. I had it all staged and got all ready to fucking go, but I blowed it as quickly as I can, jumped in the bird, and then we took off. By the time we get there, we hovered over it. By the time we got there, the PJs were there. They started the recovery. So that was our very first op as a platoon.

Jesus Christ. Lost dudes right off the bat. That's fucking tough. Yeah, that was definitely a huge kind of wake-up call for the boys. Yeah. That was tough, too. Because, like I said, up to that point, we haven't done anything. We didn't even go on the nop. We're still fucking trying to get our feet wet, figure shit out. Next thing you know, we lose fucking five guys. So it's real fucking real. Yeah, that's real. This is reality now.

So it was definitely, that put a damper on things. I wouldn't say, not for a long time, actually, believe it or not. Probably, I would say for a few days. Yeah. It was tough. But the turnaround, we had really good leadership that they understood that it was important to fucking keep the guys moving. Yeah. Keep the mind focused. A lot of times when you lose guys in a combat zone and you know them, it'll create a type of,

ritual or maybe not a ritual but something that you'll do to prepare yourself before every mission. Like a superstition? Yeah. I would say like a ritual. Did I do anything? Yeah, did that specific incident, because it happened so fast once you got in country, did that create any kind of routine before you would go on a mission? Like some kind of superstition? I didn't develop. We all, as a platoon,

We all took a knee and prayed before we went out. That was kind of a mutual agreement. And I've never done anything like that at that point, but I did it with them just to fucking keep the mind right every time we stepped out the door. And I think it helped to stay focused. But after that event, everyone was locked tight because they knew that doesn't get more real than that. Most guys go to combat...

They may not experience it. You know, some a lot do, but you're going in expecting not to experience it. You don't want your boys to fucking die. You don't want you to lose teammates. Yeah, that's the worst possible scenario, but you still, you hope for the best. You don't want that shit happening to your own teammates. But I think after that event, everybody just fucking locked the fuck on. Everyone was already locked on, but that just a whole nother level. Set it over the top. Yeah. Now you're chomping at the bit. Yeah.

Now that motion's a little angry. Yeah. You know, we're in bad guy country. So now like the motivation is even more to fucking just get after and take it to him. Yeah. A lot of myself included use tragic events or the loss of friends to kind of build that anger and fuel your mindset before going on ops, which is, and that's why I asked that question. Yeah. What was your guys' op tempo like? A few times a week.

I'd say three to four times a week we'd be out the door. All we did was fly away ops, leave in the middle of the night, helos, go into villages. Majority of them were 24 hours to 48 hours. We did longer ones, 72. So we didn't do, the only time we did local, we would just walk to our little local village or something like that. But 95% of them were all flyaways, like I said, three or four times a week.

Village clearance were you guys looking for something specific where you stirring up the hornets nest? What was the we would be in talk about a little bit of both targeting a lot of the presence and establishing more of a green zone for us and just Showing face we would clear the village But at the end of the day the mission was hey clear the village. Let's get the elders together. Let's establish rapport and build relationships and

But we're all at the same time. We're filtering out the bad guys That's kind of the under arching is but the overarching mission was say we need to build make sure it's increase our green zone build relations And show more presence that was our main focus and I spent majority of that deployment If not all that appointment on top of mountains. Yeah Were you guys getting after it? Were you engaging?

Every time you left the wire, was it hit or miss? I wouldn't say, not every time. Okay. Definitely hit or miss, I'd say about 50% of the time we were getting ticks. Okay. We'd get in contact with the enemy. And you're doing flyaways, so you're getting in a tick on foot. On foot. You guys aren't bringing any vehicles, maybe some dirt bikes, something? No, all on foot. All on foot. We get small arms and indirect. And how many guys are going on ops with you, roughly? The entire platoon, so we're...

Almost 30 guys with enablers. Okay and partner force. So we brought the door with partner force as well and platoon You know, that's 18 guys 19 guys plus our enablers another five. So we're up there We had a decent force But we end up having two supporting elements with at least four guys And then the main element was the big element in the ground which was doing the clearance. We had to overwatch position So and where were you I would end up always being on the overwatch. Okay few times I'd go down there on the main element and

But more often than not, I would just volunteer to go on the overwatch position. They would put me on there. My leadership would put me up there too. So I got very familiar with the mountains of Afghanistan. Yeah. Were you watching your guys get into engagements? Yeah, but actually more often than not, we would get in the ticks. Okay. They would see us up there because this is where these dudes are hanging out. Yeah. They're not hanging out on the ground. We're talking night. We're talking day. Daytime. We would go in at night.

Insert at night and then execute during the day just at sunrise Okay, so the helos when you guys would take off for an op they weren't you weren't landing right in the village You would land we would offset from the village the main element not far. Maybe I could click Okay, and then they were patrolling and then right at first light they would you know break that last line to cover and start make start conducting clearance and then we would they would insert us at

some peak we do some false inserts and then insert us at a certain peak and then we'd control up to the top of the mountain wherever we needed to go but believe it or not i've been in a lot of times where we ended up being very close to where the enemy's hanging out yeah these guys are on the ground they don't they didn't from my first deployment my experience then they had the balls to go face to face on the ground with with uh seals with us at least

They would occasionally, but it would be more sporadic and they would be at a distance. It wouldn't be super effective. I got more effective fire when I was up in the supporting element than I ever did when I was on the ground. No shit. That's interesting. Did you utilize your training as an 18 Delta on that deployment? I did only medical treatment. After that deployment, we didn't get any serious injuries. I did...

Low minimal stuff for partner force we end up doing med caps every weekend for the villagers So I would do a lot of treatment for that But as far as combat care no because we didn't have any serious injuries post the helo crash Yeah, so let's wrap that deployment up you coming home as a new guy or I guess you're not a new guy anymore But I mean shit. That's I mean, that's pretty fucking real right off the bat to

cut your teeth into. What was it like for you coming back, going back to the team and seeing the next batch of new guys enter into your platoon and you're going straight back to combat again for the next one? Yeah, I was going right back into one troop again, staying there and I knew

Damn near right away we knew we were going to go to Afghanistan because Iraq kind of stopped. And now they needed to... Actually, at the time, all the troops were going to Afghanistan this next go around. It was that much in demand. So all of them were going. Everyone? Yeah. Even the three troops, South Compatoon, some of the guys were even getting filtered out and going too. So that's how much the demand was. So I knew it was going. Coming back home from deployment, you know, it was...

I don't even know how to describe it, but it was... I was relieved. I was kind of ready to come home at that point. Nervous, too, because I've been gone kind of for so long, it seemed like. Yeah. Being my first deployment, so I really didn't know how to act or behave once I got back. I mean, I wasn't married or had kids or anything, so I came back and it was just me. So I just...

pretty much just continue doing work again yeah i mean i did go home like a month later took some leave took like two weeks came back here california hung out with the family was it hard but i mean interact a little bit because i felt like they wanted to ask stuff they didn't they didn't know how to ask it and they didn't ask it and they really didn't know how to like because i know i noticed this now more than in the past when i was a new guy like

As soon as you're around people that are very unfamiliar with military in general, let alone SEALs and like deployment, they just, they think the things that you've done may have messed you up or something or may have, they put the stigma on you. Maybe no fault of their own because that's just like kind of the mentality. But I felt that way, like, you all right? You know, everything good? You know, how was deployment? You know, you doing good, et cetera. But over time, it was fine. Like, I kind of just...

got back on the grind of being on the back of the team again. And it was a good, it was actually a good feeling once I kind of platooned up again. And I was an older guy, if you want to say that. And then now I got to work with my new mentor, new guys. And, you know,

Watch them prove themselves to me and the rest of the fucking guys that you know been there and done that Yeah as well. Did you find out you're going back to Afghanistan? How fast after you got back from your first pump in Afghanistan? I would say we found out officially probably halfway through but at the beginning we always knew that we were gonna go back so maybe a good

maybe a good six months where you were kind of like iffy and then six months later so you have six months like hey no you're no going to afghanistan now it's where where are we going in afghanistan oh okay so you did know that you knew like right away yeah so it's like okay we knew because like i said everyone was gonna go there but it was more of the question of where exactly in afghanistan are we going because the other troops ended up going like cath

Major bases. Yeah, so this was kind of again ends up with that competition We need to be the best performing fuck of the tune to get the best mission because at the time VSO was coming about village stability ops What we called it and that was the mission the mindset of we need to win the hearts and minds kind of went over the people and that was the mission to be on because that was we were getting you wanted to be sent in the most remote areas and

Yeah. More chance to get in the tank. You wanted to be out there. We wanted that. Yeah. More chance to get into firefights, get after it, less stress of the flagpole. You know, we're on our own. You know, we're doing, we can do our own thing and be effective. You know, we're not, we don't have our hands tied if we're like the units at CAF. We're all like, that's like major hub, which the other two troops end up doing. So, yeah.

We ended up getting the VSO mission at the end of the day and the workup. We had a solid head shed, a lot of experienced dev group guys, and they really groomed the troop well. And we had strong chiefs and, you know, all that leadership was really tight. So your immediate reaction when you found out you're going right back to Afghanistan in a year, year and a half, depending on how long your workup is, were you...

Did you want to go back? Were you excited to go back? Did that become home for you? I was excited to go back. You were? Yeah. I was hungry to go back again. I was, especially after my first experience, I felt I was way more experienced and more prepared. I knew what I was getting myself into. So I was ready to go back. And at that time they're like, "Hey, guess what? You're also going to be staying eight months. Maybe you could be up to 10 months."

10 months yeah so it was like eight to ten because before that still team 10 went out there they ended up staying there for 10 months yeah right before us so that was a change as well because with this new new vso mission they required us to be on the ground longer okay to build relationships that was kind of the mindset the strategy behind it so we knew we were going to be there longer okay so it's gonna be rougher and being that vso mission we knew we're going to be

this deployment was going to be rough. It was too. It was nothing like my first one. The second one was worse? The second one was, yeah. Were you and Jeff together on... This one we were together. Okay. Did you guys know each other before then? Yeah, we did a little bit, but we were in different troops. Where do you fly into for your second deployment? Let's skip the workup and let's just go straight back over there. Where did you fly into this time? Same place, CAF. Right back to an outer base? Right back to CAF, and then we had to...

fly to I ended up going to the same area southeast Afghanistan again Argandab River Valley where my first deployment was but I was just a little further north of where my first FOB was because that FOB hadn't gone away so we established SEAL Team 2 was here they established this VSO site when we got there was nothing it was like three two tents Alaskan tents a couple HESCOs I mean this thing wasn't even a base it wasn't even fully it had a little

I could throw a football to one end. It was less than 100 yards. No shit. Yeah, it was small. So this base is less than a football field. Yeah. Like smaller than a football field. Smaller than a football field. With two tents. Yeah, when we got there, it was two tents. What the hell were you guys using? No running water, no shitters. They were right next to a village, and then their partner force owned a compound that they took over right next to the team guy's little site.

and these guys are rough i mean when we got there like holy you know like these guys were roughing it yeah this was like real deal so that was unexpected we got we had a little kind of they told us a little bit but we had no idea it was like like that magnitude that level no but yeah these guys were roughing it they didn't have anything because you couldn't drive there no no helos would hardly ever come because every time they would come in here

they would get shot at every single time. So, you know, Upper Love was like, "No, we can't bring any helos in there." So it was like very rare that they would even... For us even getting there was a pain. Yeah. Even to change out crews was a pain in the ass. Can you walk us through a little bit more about how many people were on this FOB? Was it just your troop? It was just the platoon. Okay. So there's like 16 guys.

with enablers by pushing 20, a little over 21, 22 with enablers. And then SEAL Team 2 was there, a platoon. They had minimal guys when we showed up because they already shipped some guys off. So I think they had like 12 guys. So it was tight. We were sleeping on top of each other. We ended up making another tent so we could all pack in. We were sleeping on cots literally right next to each other, just racked up, jammed as many as we can in there until we got more gear, more equipment because we didn't even have any more tents. There was nowhere to sleep.

We had to sleep on top of each other until SEAL Team 2 finally get out of there. But we did a couple turnover ops, which ended up going pretty smooth. So that went well, and then they ended up leaving. And then from there, the whole time was literally build-up shop. We needed to establish some sort of living. But the whole time I was there, we had no running water. We always slept on cots. We didn't have a kitchen. It was in like a dirt hut. They would drop us food via airdrop.

Because no helos would come in, hardly ever. Were you living with locals? Yeah, we had locals, a partner force living on our FOB. How many? There was about six of them. What was that relationship like? Did you guys have any confidence in them? A lot of units have different experiences. I had confidence. I ran, actually, these guys...

The role I was in, I ended up being like their handler, paying them, make sure they had their gear. Those guys actually were good. They were our counter IED kind of partner force. They were solid. So we didn't really mind. They were trustworthy. We felt comfortable with them walking around on our FOB and they had weapons. The partner force, our real partner force, the ANASF guys that were with us that lived in the compound probably like 50 yards away,

We're decent at first and like towards the middle of the point we had some hiccups way to get rid of them because we lost confidence that because they were we I think we ended up doing something that they didn't like and then we had to call in counterintelligence guys to interview them and there was some red flags with Kind of attitudes towards us maybe possible like in signs of attacker Aggression this happens a lot. You know a lot of different units and a lot of different agencies

When you guys got rid of them, where did they go? Did you guys just cut them loose and send them back to their town? Because that can create an entire new enemy. No. Toward you. The ANASF was kind of somewhat of established for us, somewhat. So they just got them heat, they got out of there. So we didn't say, hey, walk away from the FOB and just go find your own path. They got on a bird, and we shipped them out of there, got a whole other unit. Okay. So it was fairly easy, but at first,

Up to that point until they left, it was like we didn't trust them. Like, hey, you can't come over here. You can't even approach our FOB, our little VSO site with a gun. Do not. You can come over here. No weapons, though. We searched them. Just a lot of animosity was building up. So you're dealing with that, and then...

You said it was hot on your second deployment. So were you guys getting hit on the FOB too? Oh, yeah. All the time? Once we got there, it was damn near every night. Every night? We would call it tick 30. Fucking every night, right when sundown, these dudes would just smash us with small arms, and it would be effective and indirect. It would be coming through our tents, small arm with PCAM rounds, and then indirect fire as well, landing in our FOB and just right out of it.

Fucking one fucking blew up our kitchen damn near killed the dude He was in there lucky he dove into our little our little med center was attached to our kitchen So he luckily diving into that he got some frag in his back, but he Came out unscathed, but there that would happen on a nightly basis. I mean at first dudes were not expecting that I mean tensions were high we're like at night going to bed. You know we're relaxed our shits ready to go, but

You know, we weren't expecting that. It took some time to fucking get used to. And then before you know it, dudes were in their racks with, like, full cami, full kit, just ready to go because we knew it was coming. Yeah. Just every night would just be the same fucking thing. Shit, man. So, I mean, what was your op tempo like this deployment compared to... More. We were going out on a daily basis on this one. Daily basis. Every day you're going out and are we doing foot patrols? Yeah, we're doing foot patrols.

to local villages, maybe further north, a little bit south, presence, again, increasing that green zone. Because we only go so far because we didn't do any type of flyaways. It was all because of you, so we needed to stay local. Did a lot of ones in the village near us. But every time, it seemed like every time we went out, we were getting into a tick. Wow. Every single time. So you're going out every day. You get in a gunfight outside of your FOB. Then you come home.

Or maybe this had already happened, but... And then you got to deal with the base getting hit. So, I mean, that's... Yeah, it honestly was like that. I would say all the way up until December, it kind of died down a little bit because it got cold. So we were kind of expecting that. But even still, they still would fucking... Every time we would... The base attacks would lighten up, but every time we went out the door, those would be the same. Wow. They just knew where the fuck we were going.

They could see us before we were coming. That was hard for us because we were just, we didn't do any night ops. It was all bright, middle of the day. They knew we were going there to fucking meet, just meet key leaders, shake hands and establish rapport and just hold up security. We weren't necessarily targeting individuals. We did it a few times. We ended up, I ran intel, so we ended up going on missions purely driven off the intel that

was found via myself, sources, and my other teammate. We were partners together in it. So we would gather our own intel and target that way. Wow. And then other missions we would get from higher as well. And we got creative with it. That deployment, what you said, was roughly 10 months? Nine to 10 months? Yeah, almost. It was about eight. How many engagements would you say you and or your team were a part of in that eight months? Do you have any idea?

I don't. I mean, I lost count. It was that many. I mean, I don't know a hard number. Yeah. It was a lot. I would say pushing 100. Yeah. I mean. With all the ops, FOB attacks, and even just going out the door, like damn near right around the corner, next village up, or even our own village. I mean, just a six-month deployment alone is 180 days.

And if you guys were taking fire and getting into ticks almost every day, and you did longer than six months, just to put that in perspective for you, because most guys don't think about this, that's 180 fucking engagements. That's a lot of engagements. At the time, I didn't even look at it like that, because you don't pay attention to it. Yeah. You're ready for the next one. Yeah, ready for the next one. And then before you know it, I think...

The leadership did keep track of it, but guys didn't really focus on it. But it was a lot. I mean, it felt like every damn night. The beginning it was. They wanted to fucking try something. You've never thought about that until just now. So what's that sound like to you when I put that in perspective and I say, you took part in over 180 fucking engagements in less than eight months? A disbelief. Yeah, that's a lot of fucking on that. I've never really thought of it like that.

Because at the time, you're just doing your job, and you're not thinking of it as a tick, like a check in the box, like, oh, I got one, two, three. That's how many ticks I got. Yeah. What range are you guys fighting at? Is it always different? Is it up close and personal, or are they 1,000 meters away? Throughout that deployment, it was everything. Everything in between. Did you guys have air support? We had some air support occasionally with little birds. And sometimes we had some...

F-18s, fast movers would come in. Nice. But mainly just the Hilo support. That was like the only platform that would really be available even to come in to help us out. So, but not often, not every time. Because you were really out there hanging out there. Yeah, it was just us. It was really just us. We had some Army guys attached to us, a little Army unit that we utilized for FOB security and some other support. So it was really just us doing our thing out there.

it was a you know blessing in disguise i think i mean it was we got so much out of it and i don't think we would have the experience we had if we were wearing anything else i wouldn't have that deployment if i would say went to calf or anything like that i mean really truly was just us that was our deployment we were fully control over it and definitely learned a lot and had a ton of experiences i mean for god's sake helo we had another helo crash at this fob thank god it wasn't as horrific as the first one i experienced

Hilo coming in at 47 came in crashed on our fob shit came in nose down and because our HLZ was kind of a slope came in nose down dust himself out slow rolled into the corner of our our HESCO barriers which has go barriers are filled with dirt on the border of the site and

Hit that, completely destroyed that 47. Split the front end in half, destroyed every blade. There was a Mark 19 in that corner, so grenades are going off. Shit. Like, it sounded like we just... Like, everyone was inside at this time. It was midday, only two people were out there. Thought you were getting hit. Oh, yeah.

I could run out there. I was like in my tent. I remember and I heard this huge explosion grab my med bag fucking ran out there Looked and I see it 47 just blowing up. I mean this thing was shreds Believe it or not the to the crew survived. I was like, oh yeah, these guys were crushed up into the the front end that the two side door gunners were smashed up into it and

Because the whole front end nose crunched and these dudes, they were beat to shit, but they survived. Shit. Yeah, it was unbelievable. Did you guys lose anybody on that deployment? We didn't know. No team guys, no American forces. We lost one of our close partner forces, one of the guys that lived on the base with us. Our counter IED guys, their head dude, their leader was shot in the head, killed during a tick.

Lucky shot. I mean, it was actually kind of... It was a hard loss even for us because we became close with him because there was only six of them and these guys were northern Afghanis and these dudes fucking hate Taliban. Yeah. The Pashtun people that live in the south. So these dudes were...

Really truly there for the right cause right reason fighting for their country, and they're fucking good at what they did to be on the motor Yeah, they're fucking it was good to see that and motivated us. Yeah, if we could just work with them We were like we're just taking you guys fuck everyone everyone else. That's one thing I've noticed about the Afghans Versus my personal experience with the Iraqis is the Iraqis most of them we had those guys attached to us most of them were fucking lazy and they didn't really want to be there but

On the other hand, the Afghans, I mean, those are some fucking dedicated fighters. Yeah. And they want to make shit happen, and they want to fucking be there, which is really cool to see, you know, to see a host nation, you know, wanting to, you know, do the right thing. Yeah, it was humbling to see that shit because it makes you want to do your job harder because you're there helping them out.

fighting for their country in your country you see that it was good it was hard for their team the loss they actually quit they all left because they didn't want to work anymore because they lost their commander but eventually talked them back into coming back to us yeah so it was a difficult time but um experience for the books man yeah sounds like it yeah i'm gonna take another call we got a mutual friend on the line who was there that whole second employment with you jeff reed

About time. Jeff Reed from Frozen Trident. How the hell are you? Pretty good, man. So, I got a buddy of yours that I think you might know on my show right now, Travis Kennedy. Hell yeah. Hell yeah. Good to hear your voice, man. I'm doing good, man. Glad you got to call in. So, I got a question for you guys. There's a

I was scouring through both your Instagrams before you got here, and there's a picture of you and Jeff and another guy's face that's blurred out. And you're sitting against a mud wall with a big shit-eating grin on both of your faces. And you're talking about a big engagement that just happened the whole night before. And I was wondering if I could get both of you guys' perspective on what happened that night. Kick it off, Jeff. So that all... Every...

Yeah, I do man. It's that one, that picture was on the very end of the op. I mean this, the insert X fill, it was over, it was damn near 15k in throughout the night. And that was, yeah, we did on the way there. And then we cleared, did a village clearance. We ended up just laughing because that's where we did a VDO. We were waiting for our VIX to come in.

And it was just so damn long. That was one of the biggest ops I think we did that deployment because it was just so long. And we had a lot of people with us. And again, yeah, Jeff said every time we went out, literally, we were wet. And I think at the end, we were just...

Everyone was just at such exhaustion like so fucking tired We're lean it post up against this wall me and Jeff and then two of our buddies Actually two guys next to us were the our UD guys. I know you remember him, but uh We were just fucking bull shooting the shit just fucking Suffering and laughing at the same time because we were so fucking beat to shit. We just patrolled in Phil all nighter cleared this big-ass village gotten some ticks and

cleared IEDs, we had a lot of overhead, Jeff was dealing all the overhead, and then we ex-filled back, humped it back, and that took us all damn day to hump back that far, and then we were just posted up waiting, sitting there for hours just for our Vicks to come get us. It was pretty funny. Jeff's been dealing with voices in his head ever since I've known him, bud. I'm sorry.

But, Jeff, when I talked to you and asked you to give a call in, you had a question for Travis about some Carl Gustav rounds. And for you civilian types out there, Carl Gustav is basically a big-ass rocket launcher that's shoulder-fired. So why don't you go ahead and fire that question off, Jeff? Hell yeah, I do. Because everyone thought a mortar hit me. Oh, shit. Yeah, dude, I remember that because...

Our LPO thought a fucking mortar hit me. Me and Blake were shooting it. I shot it, he loaded it for me. I staged it right outside in a little tri-wall, little cardboard box outside of my tent. Because there wasn't any room. So I ran out, I knew where I staged it, grabbed the Gustav. He grabbed the rounds and we fucking ran to the corner of the FOB. And fucking launched that thing right at the mountain. The same mountain we always got hit at. Literally the same Zach Mountain every time. Did you get hit from there again?

I think so. Yeah, we got hit there again. See? Let's get our kit on. Keep our boots on. How many rounds did you fire? I think just a couple. Just a couple? Yeah, but I used that more than once. Well, just a couple Carl Gustav rounds. Yeah. We'll take out a fucking shopping mall. Because our LPO was up on top of that little deck above the kitchen. He looked down and saw, like, this massive explosion. And he told me afterwards, he said, my fucking heart stopped. I got shot up because I remember afterwards,

Yeah, yeah, that was a big one dude. That was they thought they had had up on us because we were fresh No shit. Well Jeff Travis tells me this was probably the most the most eventful deployment of the three that He did what what would you say about that? What'd you guys do flip a coin? Yeah, yeah, and we were debating whether we wanted to get our boots wet I

That's the toughest decision of the deployment right there. Yeah, well, if it was worth it, I'll bet it was worth it to dish out some love to the, you know, local haters. Well, he did. Yeah. Well, Jeff, thanks for calling in, man. You got any words for Travis before we end the call? I'll do it, Keith. Thanks, Jeff. It's good to hear your voice, brother. Hope you're well. All right, Jeff. Cool.

You too, man. Tell the wife, tell the kid I said hello, and especially Dancer, too. That's my favorite one. Yeah, I'll go out and get some treats. All right. Be safe, Jeff. Bye-bye. It was good hearing his voice. That's the last call, I promise. But how was that? Did that take you back? It did, yeah. Did it make you miss it a little bit, maybe? Yeah. Made me miss being around guys like Jeff. Yeah.

Honestly, it's been a while since I even talked to him. So it was good to hear his voice and reminisce. I don't get to do that often. - Yeah. And none of us are as good as we'd like to be at keeping in touch. And sometimes the best thing for us, in my opinion, is to separate yourself, at least for a little while, from the majority of the community to kind of find your new way. So we've already established that your second deployment was,

a really eventful one. You come back home again for the second time. Did you know you were going back to combat again for a third time? Or... No, I wasn't going. I knew. I was, at that time, I was going to BUDS instructor. Oh, okay. You went to become a BUDS instructor. Yeah. Did you want to do that? Yeah. You were ready for a break? Yeah, I was ready. They asked me if I wanted to do something different. That was the only way I was going to leave.

They were trying to force dudes out to go to trade at the time. And I was like, no. I was like, I'm not going there. If I'm going to do something I want to do, I want to be a buds instructor. I want to be at the forefront of the training. And I knew I wanted to be a buds instructor at first phase. That was like my goal. Oh, you were first phase. Yeah, I was first phase. And that was my goal. You were a total fucking dickhead then. Yeah. All right. I was like the quiet...

Oh, man. A quiet fucking dickhead, not the outlandish instructor yelling and screaming. That's like the worst kind. You never know what the fuck they're thinking. I knew what I wanted. Yeah. So I said I had the opportunity. It was hard to get because guys going from east to west, it's a fate. It's kind of hard to do. Leadership's not really prone to let guys do that, but I guess they said screw it and let me do it. So you come home from deployment.

It was a rough one. You guys did a lot of good shit, got a lot of combat in. Did you go straight to Bud's as a first phase instructor when you got back? Yes. Got back, obviously did some breaks, some leave, cool down, a little R&R. And then as soon as I was done with that, it was literally I got orders to go to Bud's. I called them ahead of time. I was like, look, I'm coming there. I want to go first phase. And they're like, all right, you got it. No shit. Yeah. And I just...

Checked in simple as that. Well, this is interesting because you were so motivated to become a SEAL and and Talking to your dad that I mean he had no doubt you were gonna make it and then You go to combat or you make it through you go to combat you do two pumps You had some you took some heavies you got a lot of combat time. How did your mentality change? Towards I mean you show up and you got I

200 men, you know, some of them are still fucking kids. Others are, you know, a little older trying to, you know, prove to themselves they can make it. What, I'm always curious, like, what do you think of the, what do you, when you see 200 people that all want to be exactly what you are and none of them, almost none of them have any fucking idea of what they're about to go through, if you're

the unlikely event that they make it. What do you think of the class? Right away I know you know 80% of them are not going to be there and I don't say that overtly but I just know but I take it what I've learned when I was an instructor I was able to it was definitely a growing experience for me I would say professionally and maturity for sure just being

Once you walk into that, it's just like a bubble, its own world, like as an instructor. Even as students, like even as an instructor, you're held, you're on a pedestal whether you think so or not. You know, you're a god to these students, you know, in their mind. They want to be you. So it's definitely upholding the standard and exceeding the standard. But when I look at students, I just, whenever I saw a fresh class, I've always thought,

Took it as a fresh start. I mean, they needed to prove themselves to me. I get blank slate for them until proven otherwise. Okay. We had, sometimes we classed up looking at them. Sometimes I, as classes went on, I became inherently just, I could look at a guy and be like, no. No shit. Not happening. Were you ever wrong? A couple of times. Yeah? Yeah. The nerdiest looking fucking dweeb sometimes makes it, huh? I mean, nine times out of 10 fucking makes it.

That's people think you know so concerned about size weight strength, etc It's those guys are put out more than I've seen d1 athletes guys with everything Like supposed to be athletic studs just quit day one. Yeah, so it's just there's no you can't pinpoint it what I've learned You can't pinpoint like he's me good. He's not he's solid. He's not you know, it's so broad and

You just never can tell who wants it more. It's all proven in action. Someone could say they want it, but that doesn't mean shit until you're out there. I mean, you've been through a lot at this point. Did you have any animosity towards the students? Did you want them to quit? Did you... Talking about when you look at a class and you have just come from what you've come through and you're still at a young age...

I mean, what are you thinking? I'm gonna fucking crush you. You're going to quit. Or are you thinking... No, I definitely had that mindset with certain individuals, not everybody. I could tell I would get really fucking pissed and angry at certain students just based off their performance and just lack of mental strength and just the want to be there because you hear everything in the wind of why they're there, why they're not performing, etc., or quitting.

So it was just frustrating to me as well as the other instructors. And I got to work with some seasoned instructors too. The majority of them, if not all of them, all combat. Really? And all the leadership were damn neck. Okay. So seasoned guys. So the tolerance for not putting out or not wanting to be there was zilch for everybody. The patience were. So it was so easy. What I learned as an instructor was so easy to...

To see the negative in somebody too. Like we are so quick. That's how we spoke about it, like eating your own so fast. Yeah. We are so fast. I found it because I did it just to find so negative performance in somebody. And they may be doing okay, but as soon as they slip up just a little bit, we're on it. He may be okay. He may be like overall decent, like up to that point, but maybe he's having a bad fucking day or something. But as soon as he has a bad fucking day, we're on him.

trying to get him out of there. You know, we're just very, it's, I found myself jumping to the negativity so fast by looking at everything. Like, is this guy performing? Is he, what is he doing up to this point? What's his reputation in class, et cetera. Looking at the bigger picture. Yeah. I was always front side focused on making dudes quit. Yeah. At first, which I found out that was kind of like, that was the wrong approach. I shouldn't,

I shouldn't have done that, like, right out the gate. You know, our goal wasn't just to fucking make dudes quit. We want to get rid of the guys that want to be there. And the program gets rid of the guys itself. It hasn't been changed, a proven system. The guys are going to leave because the curriculum is what it is. Instructors are just there to uphold the standards. Did your mindset start to change while you were at first phase as an instructor, or did your mindset change, like...

after you left thinking back on how everything went? It changed while I was there. I would say it changed when I became a proctor of a class and I was like the lead instructor of class 305 and I really got to get to know the class. I was their guy, I was their conduit between the rest of the instructors. I would meet with them, talk with them, make sure they have all their shit squared away for the next day, meet with them on the weekends.

I became close and built a relationship with the guys. At first, I'm there to help with scheduling and just help the class and weed out the people that don't want to be there. But as time goes on, you build a relationship because you're with them the entire seven weeks of first phase. So that's where I think I definitely grew as an instructor and as a SEAL as far as maturity is concerned. No shit. Because that responsibility too.

because you're the go-to guy you're not just another instructor out there yelling and screaming yeah you know at another student they're looking up to you like hey they're meeting with you every night they can go to you to talk to you and i would meet with them at night and tell them hey you're this is what you're up this is what you're doing good this is what you need to be squared away or i'd remediate them to let them know that hey you've been up this whole this whole day so i definitely

definitely grew during that one class. And then after that point, the rest of the class I was there, I was there for another six, seven classes. It definitely carried with me throughout. Would you say, maybe not right off the bat, maybe this came later, maybe it didn't come at all, but would you say there is, is there any specific common denominator that you're looking for in the guys that are coming through the training? I'm looking for that strong why. That strong why, why they want to do it? Yeah.

And everyone has their own. And there's not some blanket statement that's going to be good enough. But everyone has their own reasons why. But it has to be, for me, what I saw a lot of, it wasn't about the job. It was more about, I just want to do buds. Or I just want to try a challenge. That was it. That was like the sole focus. In the eye and in itself, it is a challenge. Yeah, you should want to complete buds. But that's just a stepping stone to becoming a Navy SEAL. That's not the end-all, be-all.

And I found a lot of the students didn't really know why the hell they were there, vice just being there just because they saw it online or, you know, they woke up one day and started to prepare six months or less than that for BUDS. Yeah. And, yeah, they met the standards to get there, but that's it. Yeah. Just because you could pass a COPST doesn't mean you're going to make it through. And it doesn't – and honestly, when you have a week – I tell these guys, people all the time, if you have a week, why? Right.

That trickles down in your motivation, everything. You're going to get weeded out quick. That why is not going to hold up against all the demands that especially first phase requires of you. Yeah. That's going to get in and out of your mind quick. So if you don't want to be a seal and do the fucking job down range, when I was there, there weren't too many people still going overseas. Yeah, it kind of died down there for a little bit. Yeah, it died down right when I got back because my last point, I finished in 2013, and then we're slowly kind of,

Removing guys from Afghanistan, especially the team guys. Yeah, so barely anyone was going there when I was an instructor So I don't think they maybe just didn't have a clue or didn't really think about it But again, this is not a blanket statement for every student but for the people that Quit or I saw lack of performance and when I especially when I was a proctor and spoke to him It was that it kind of all boiled down to that. It wasn't like all my legs hurt. I'm tired It was like I always I like why the hell you're even here and

Makes sense. As much as we eat our own, and we do eat our own, we're probably the best out of all the other branches, which I don't necessarily think is a fucking good thing. But at the same token, we're also extremely fucking tight-knit, and we have each other's back on deployment. I might not like you,

I might not want to be around you, but when you're on deployment, things change, and you have to have that fucking teamwork. So as an instructor, do you teach that, or is that something that you think that guys come to the table with, that it's just like in their heart? I think guys show up with that. They come to the table with that kind of mentality already. That's why they're there. That's what...

kind of drove part of the reason why i probably drove into the program there's we don't give them no powerpoint on being a team player teamwork it's just it's driven into them like right away even before they even phase up to first phase it's like you're in boat crews you're in a class you're part of a team you're part of a unit you need to work together otherwise you're going to fail you know so that the program doesn't inherently and then we're there to reinforce it and make sure that that standard is held when you have guys that show up that

aren't team players and a lot of times these are your division one types division one athletes olympic athletes sometimes it's guys from other branches that are just crushing the fucking runs crushing the swims they're the top performers but and then they want to gloat and they want to be fucking praised for how well they're performing but they're not a team player how do you

Is it hard to get those guys to quit? Do you try to get them to quit? I've always seen, just like you said, the program kind of takes care of itself. How do those guys wind up washing out? I think the majority, they do wash out. The program will expose them. And then so will the class, to be honest with you, because they see right through that shit.

They're not and even the class leaders and the Bochum leaders. They may be in charge may not be you know Even they may be just a lower ranking but a d1 athlete or something or maybe an officer but even still They're gonna get exposed and they'll be oust by the by the class pretty quickly when I see when I was instructor We touched on it that social pressure and if you're not a part of the team You're gonna be quickly cut out of the team. Yeah, because it and that happens quick and

And then instructors will kind of help reinforce that as well. We help, hey, what's up with this guy? You know what, he's going to do something about it. Talk to the class leader, maybe he's a boat crew leader, or maybe he's an officer. We talk to the class OIC to talk to him. So there's ways to expose that if we see, because maybe he'd be crushing passing every test, but again, he's standing out because he's not being a part of the team. He thinks he's above the rest. Those things you can see quickly in Bud's work.

Those little discrepancies in people. Even as an instructor? Yeah. Do you think you see it faster as an instructor as you do as a student? This class would see it before us. Okay. Yeah, his own boat crew would definitely see it before us because those occasions, that arrogance, that entitlement,

May not show because he could be passing tests. He could be passing all the runs a swim So he could kind of slip by a little bit because he's performing just on a performance standard But as soon as we start doing team evolutions the boats the logs Rock pour and surf passes etc. That's when people like that start showing. Okay, he's not putting out He's just in the same position all the time. He's not moving holding his weight. He's not shifting like I

for the boats boats on heads like number two spot which is directly in the middle of the boat the heaviest spot where all the water goes kind of rests in the center and it bows too so all the weight kind of centers in the boat he'll never go to that position or if he's on the logs he'll never go to the end of the log where all the weight lies everyone tries all the turds and people who don't want to put out don't want to be part of the team go to the center where they could

pretend like they're carrying something. Yeah. Because everyone else in the end is carrying the weight. So there's, they know, they find out these little tricks that we know of. The instructors see this, we see it all the time and we pick up on it because we see the same faces. And the class will see it too, but we notice the same exact faces, the same spot every time. Yeah. How do you deal with that as an instructor? Do you, do you give them like a little,

Give him extra attention. Extra benefit. Oh, yeah. To entice him to ring the bell. We'll give him some extra motivation. Yeah. How would you do that? If we notice something during the evolution, we'll shift him to the spot where we think is the toughest. Would you humiliate him in front of the entire class? Humiliate him? No. No? Not humiliate. Okay. We would tell him if he was doing what I just described, we would tell him to go back to the position, to the two spot at the end of the log and stay there.

Okay, and you're gonna stay there until you either quit or you start putting out for your boat crew More often than not they tend to fall out. Yeah or start Collapsing their whole tire boat crew because they're not holding their weight and everyone else starts carrying more load more tired It's just like a snowball effect and one starts dying off. So I was always I've always been like really curious about like

You get these guys sometimes, and I never was an instructor so this is why I'm so curious. You get these guys that they just can't fucking hang, they don't put out. The bow crew is basically carrying them through hell week especially. Nobody seems to be able to force these fuckers to quit. But they do wind up disappearing.

If you got a guy and you're an instructor who he's not cutting it, his bow crew's suffering, he's not a team player, he's hanging on by a thread because he just won't ring the fucking bell. Like, how does he, like, disappear? It's pretty easily, actually. We just write him up performance-wise. You just performance drop him right there? Performance drop him. No shit.

He's over a series of evolutions, not just one time, but over a series of evolutions, over a couple of days, maybe a week, of just not performing or hacking it after being warned, done. And we just pull him from the class. Okay. Sometimes people do squeak by, though, that being said. But yeah, performance drop would be the way to get rid of these guys. I have another question, too.

I've never actually met a Buds quitter. I don't know if you have this too, but everybody seems to get medical dropped. You know, I mean, I've met a ton of Buds quitters, but nobody ever admits it. They always say, oh, I've been med dropped. And I know when I was going through Buds, they would actually give, they would give them a choice like, well, you know, would you like to be med dropped? And is that, is that?

How that goes, you just tell them, yeah, you don't have to ring it. No. Okay. Nope. If a student clearly just wants to DOR or drop on request, he has to ring the bell. Okay. Cut and dry. But if it's for a medical, it's the only reason he's going to get med dropped if it's for a severe medical issue. I'm talking severe because right now they, at least when I was there, my experience was

has a very good medical system there and they'll rehab you up. Yeah. They'll rehab the student back to full health and put them back in the class. If he injured stress fractures or whatever that was like kind of induced because of the training, they'll rehab you up and get you back in the class. If you're performance dropped, you're performance dropped. It's not like, Hey, do you want just to write down a med drop? But you really got performance dropped or you DOR'd and we just wrote down, you got med dropped. No way. Yeah. You quit, you quit. I think it,

And I've come across that to myself. They're lying. They're just straight up. They don't want to admit to themselves or others that they just quit. Just a flat-out liar. Just a flat-out liar. And I have met a couple guys where they've approached me like, no, I quit, or they're just straight up. And those are far few in between. But I respect that more than, you know, I don't hold it against them. I don't give a shit. It's not for everyone. Yeah, it's not for everyone. But, yeah, if you're straight up. Those people who do that are just straight liars.

So they're lying to themselves, but because we don't give a shit. Yeah, I've got a ton of mid drops. I've never met a quitter. Yeah, so yeah, same here. It's kind of funny. Let's dive into the infamous hell week. You went through it. I went through it. When you go back as an instructor and you see what these guys are going through in hell week and you've already done it. I mean, does it does it look as bad as when you were going through it? Does it look worse?

Does it look the same? I don't know. As an instructor, it's like that behind-the-curtain look. Yeah. But it definitely looks worse as a student. Does it? Yeah. As an instructor, it's not that bad. But by no means has it changed. It's tough as hell. But I don't know. I can hardly remember. When I think back at my hell week, I can hardly remember some evolutions. Yeah. As an instructor, I can remember it because I used to work with tons of them. Yeah.

Working him as an instructor. So I remember everything would you say that was your favorite evolution to work as an instructor? Camp surf camp surf. Okay, I'm sorry. Yeah, we call the camp surf is like Wednesday night. So midweek kind of Wednesday night dudes made it because that following day is like messing around and doing the round the world - you're done but camp surfs like middle night and

Buy the old course, build this huge fire pit, and then huge pit right next to it where all the students lie. And it's like we make a little stage, and they tell us jokes, and their jokes shit. We send them to the surf zone, laugh at them. And if they're good, let them go stand by the fire for a couple minutes, warm them up. And the whole class will go through it, and then we'll punish them. Occasionally, we had a tradition where we brought them food. Punish them how?

If they've fallen asleep, we fucking wake them all up, send them to the surf in the middle of the night. Surf hit after surf hit after surf hit. That's the worst thing in Hell Week. We would just do hundreds of hit the surf, hit the surf, hit the surf. I mean, these guys are just back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And that water is freezing ass. Freezing ass in the middle of the night. What's the time? 50s. 50s? Yeah, mid-50s at night. Summertime, it's a little bit warmer. I would say low 60s to mid-60s, even then.

Whether it's summer, winter, doesn't matter because we just keep you in the water longer. And trust me, you're going to freeze just as much if you froze in the wintertime, even in the summer. Yeah. You know, like you watch Discovery, you watch, you know, all the Hollywood class and the documentaries and you read the books and now they see all the pictures on social media and stuff. But

These guys watching Discovery Channel, they see guys rolling around in the surf and carrying logs and carrying boats, but what they don't see is the shit that you can't see that you know as an instructor and you find out real fast as a student, like the chafing from the sand in your armpits, on your groin, on your junk, and from the sand rubbing back and forth, and that dries up.

and I feel like the instructors know it dries and that's camis are like stuck to the side of your sack and as soon as the class is dry it's like hey we're going to go for a run as soon as you run those pants are crusted to that chafing and it rips the skin right off everything and then so that burns like hell and then it's hey get your ass back in the water and then you're throwing an open wound into the water and are do you guys I mean do you guys take

Do you remember that shit when you were going through? Do you know that's going on with the class? Oh yeah, we know what's going on because it's happening. When I was a student, I knew what was going on because I was living it, so was the rest of the class. Some got it worse than others. Like I said, every morning they get med checks. They get seen by a doctor. If it's horrible, they'll get it treated or they'll get it bandaged. But again...

As instructors, we're not holding up training because we know some students have chafing. Some may have it way worse than others. I mean, I've seen students that were literally covered in chafe. Arms, armpits, chest, waist, groin, legs. I mean, it looked like they just fell off a motorcycle in the street. I mean, it's horrible how bad some people get affected. Some people get affected more than others. I don't know why. But it doesn't... We don't alter training regularly.

Because students are experiencing some burn pains. If anything, that's just part of the process. And hey, man, if you can't handle that, then get out of here. Yeah. I got a burning sensation in my groin. Welcome to the SEAL team. Welcome to the SEAL team. I think that's just part of the process. Welcome to the SEAL team. Yeah. In Hell Week, is there a specific evolution where guys start dropping off immediately or...

Is it always random? Like is it break out when you're breaking them out of the tents? Is it log PT? It's not break out, to be honest. We don't lose a lot of guys. If we're gonna lose a lot, only time we ever lose right when Hell Week starts is before it even kicks off. Because we lock them down into a tent or a room before Hell Week kicks off like three hours prior.

And we'll get some stragglers that will just walk up and ring out before Hell Week even because they can't handle the stress. And not even do anything. They're just watching a movie, laid up, eating. So we'll get some stragglers. But it's not until maybe that night. We're doing base tour, boats on heads. Oh. Running all over Bud's compound and across the street to the dry side. Running all over there. And then maybe doing also another one, Steel Pier.

We call it, which we just, the whole evolution is just all about freezing the students. Yeah. Just a mental gut check. What happens when a student gets hypothermia? Is that end of the evolution or is that end of the evolution for that specific student? Depends on the severity, but it's just that the evolution continues on. We just pull him out. Okay. Rewarm him if we can, if it's something we can deal with. If it's severe, then we'll, with our ambulance, drive him back to the clinic. But, yeah.

Nine times out of ten, we could just handle it on the spot. Get a quick temp, warm him up, put a blanket around him, dry him off, beanie, coat, et cetera, for a little while, which I feel is like the worst thing because we warm him up, and then as soon as he's good to go, like he's coherent, he's back to normal, he's like all cozy and falling asleep, we're like, hey, wake the fuck up. Go hit the surf. Get your ass back out there. Get your ass back out there. Start training if you want to be here. Yeah. Would you say the majority of the quarters come from the first night?

So the first, yeah. First 24 hours. Yeah, first 24 hours, 24 to 32 hours, let's say, you get the majority. By the end of the middle of the week, Wednesday night, you pretty much have what you're going to have at the end of the whole week. Yeah. Whether someone gets hurt, but as far as quitters are concerned, pretty much stop Wednesday night going to Thursday morning. When whole week is secured as an instructor, do you, and you're looking at 20 guys out of 150 who just made it,

Through what's only what three or four fucking weeks in do you feel any sense of pride for those? Individuals that have gutted that out as an instructor looking looking at them and knowing what they're getting ready to go to Oh, yeah, definitely a huge accomplishment on their end and they've earned a level of respect and

At least how I viewed it and other instructors did too when I was there. It kind of proved to me that for one they want to be there, for two they're ready to get trained. Up until that point now we could start, we had the core of guys in this class that want to be here. Because they just passed the most grueling part of selection. Now it's time to kind of put them to the test other ways.

we have a solid foundation of the guys that want to be here because not going to get any quarters after that very very rare yeah it's mostly just performance or medical issues but that it's definitely level respect and they prove to us that they're ready to be trained after how weak it becomes man i don't want to word this wrong but it's a little bit of pressures off you just made it through you know the heart it is the hardest evolution in buds in my opinion

and it is a night and day difference coming from hell week into into uh post hell week you know one day you're wearing a white shirt you graduate whole week you're a brown shirt and then you get a little bit more respect at least when i was going through you get a little bit more respect is it hard to like switch that mindset as an instructor or is it still like that no it's still like that you do get a little more of a level of respect from the instructors because like i said after that we

The training kind of shifts. They break up into their own squads and we start kind of building that platoon mindset and actually start teaching them some core skills of being a SEAL. But that is a real fine line though because sometimes students take it a little too far like they've made it. They're good to go.

But then we'd quickly crush that if they were getting a little too arrogant. Yeah. So I've seen that happen a lot with classes. You know, they finish Hell Week, they think they're fucking good to go, they made it, got the brown shirt, or fucking a Cloud 9. But we squash it and it never happened again. It's usually the proctors that sniff through that shit and they hammer it. You're looking at one. I got squashed right after Hell Week. But...

You know, and looking at these guys as they're going through, I mean, you always have in the back of your mind, you might be with that guy that you're instructing in, I mean, fuck, what, a year? In combat, taking fire, engaging the enemy, and that's always in the back of your mind. Have you ever worked with any of the guys you put through BUDS when you went back to the team? Yeah, I worked with a couple. How was that relationship? It was good.

I mean it was definitely knowing them when the instructor was different dynamic but I didn't be in some of them out there LPO yeah so it was actually a good relationship it wasn't uncomfortable or because but at first they saw me as like an instructor when they got to the team and in my platoon so they already had that mindset like holy shit you know that's instructor Kennedy but that quickly faded when I just

Set the tone of hey your new guy. I'm your teammate, you know, I'm your LPO But but it didn't it wasn't a negative thing at all I actually kind of liked it was kind of it was kind of really cool to see them there and buds progression the progression now they're actually with me and Actually the team doing the job. So it was cool to see that process. That's why I liked first phase Oh, that's why I wanted to go to first phase of that that growth. Yeah through all that the meat of the selection and

and then the outcome at the end so that's what that's the reason why i like that phase a lot i mean it's pretty cool i mean you're i mean you're basically like the gatekeeper of the community being a first phase instructor or the you know the biggest i mean that's the biggest hurdle yeah being an instructor and and uh going back when these guys graduate buds and sqtd i mean because you're part of that entire pipeline at least a little bit

Do you feel like these guys are ready? Once they finish BUDZ or SQT? Yeah, are they ready to go? Yeah, I feel like they're ready. The end product is solid. Even while I was an instructor, I know today it is too. The program is what it is for a reason and it produces really good team guys. That's my opinion and that's what I've seen and that's what I know is true, but the outcome is great.

Here and there, you know, we get some stragglers that get to the team and don't perform, and they kind of look back and like, what the fuck, Buds, why'd you let this guy slip through? But that's small. It happens sometimes. We can't really, we do our best to mitigate it, but it can only do so much. Is there anything you would like to see implemented in Buds that you think will prepare guys more for showing up to the team or prepare them more for, like, the mindset of,

They make a better seal. Is there anything you would like to see implemented in the BUDS program as an instructor that would make a better team guy, an end result? Yeah, I would say for the leadership, let the instructors do their job, which will produce a better result as per a student. Because if you give them restrictions, they're not going to be able to enforce the standards, which then trickles down to they're not going to have the right mindset.

Going forward. They're not they're not doing well with the teamwork, you know that meant team mentality Etc mental toughness so when your hands are tied from the top that's gonna trickle down into the class because that your the class is a direct reflection of the instructing staff and how much they uphold the standards and all the physical aspect and everything else so

What I do like, what I was there at the very end, they did implement the mentors. I think they need to hammer that a little bit home more. They assign instructors. They split the class up into squads, and they assign an instructor to each squad as like a mentor. Oh, really? So they kind of hammer down, go full force on that. That way you build relationships with these guys. And I got to do it one time because they started. It was a fairly new thing.

But those guys that I mentored were later on in my platoon working for me. No shit. So I thought it was a really cool tool. You really get to like get in the mindset. They could ask you questions and you're actually out there teaching them kind of the fundamentals of being a SEAL and building that relationship. And it paid dividends, which I saw throughout the rest of the phases. Because like you said, you know, you're going to be working with majority of these guys. Yeah.

Most of the instructors, if they leave buds and go onto a team or something, you're going to be working with these guys. So you need to have, and you get to understand where they're at too, mentally. You know, are they in the right mindset? Do they have the right characteristics? You know, whether we, that's how we get to know these people. Some psych exam they took before is not like a good, very good marker, whether they're going to be a good team guy or not. They're still trying to figure out how to find the best candidates today. They still can't. And I don't think they ever will, but yeah.

being more intimately involved and like knowing the guys, that's going to help. Getting to know actually who they are as a person. What's inside them. Who they are, then you understand like why they're here. Yeah, that makes a whole lot of sense. Where they come from, you know, what they used to do, what are they into, why do you want to be a SEAL?

What are you interested in doing? And I think, because at SEAL, which I like the SEAL community, we're from everywhere, you know? So many different backgrounds, so many different professions. And that's what, you know, come together for just one purpose. That's what I like. Teams a lot. One of the great aspects of it. But they just hammer home on that a lot more. And I think they still are, but just really focus on that. Post-health week, end of first phase. I mean, that's, you know, that's actually...

Very refreshing to hear that you as an instructor, as a combat vet, are comfortable with the product that's coming out of the training center and showing up to the teams. I mean, that's like, I mean, shit, that's all you can ask for. You know, there's a solid individual coming out of that pipeline ready to fucking go to work. Yeah, 99% of them are freaking solid. It's the one percenters that...

mess up and then they make everybody look bad. And that's just how it's always been. It's how it always will be. As soon as someone messes up, then everybody looks bad. Then they start spotlights, like what kind of product you've given us. When one turd shows up into the team not performing, when the 15 other team new guys that showed up are doing solid, then all of a sudden we're producing bad people. It's just a numbers game of probability at that point. But like I said, going back again, we're always so quick to

talk about the negative or bring that about advice you know hey let's handle it internally so that's going back again that's what i've learned as an instructor like let's take a bigger picture like hey let's get to know these dudes and that'll leave you a lot of problems in the future a lot of issues when they get to the team out and leave liberty etc like their personal time getting in trouble with the law etc like all these little things probably could have gotten caught going through the program knowing where this guy is what he's been doing

Maybe has all these fucking red flags throughout buds like drinking etc, which there has been Mm-hmm, so that could have been found a lot earlier before they showed to the team causing a scene Yeah, so so moving along you finish up your time at buds and then you go back to the teams What team did you go back to for again? It went back to four. Where were you going this time? This time I got assigned to three troops I knew a South com

At the time, one troop was going to Africa, two was UCOM, three troop was Salkom. Team four went back to its roots. Salkom was its AO because all CENTCOM kind of died off. East Coast teams were not going there at all. The most kinetic place was Africa and even that wasn't nearly as kinetic as Afghanistan when I went there. So I ended up going to Colombia, did my LPO tour and went to Salkom. How was that deployment?

I liked it. It was a really good deployment. I enjoyed it. It was very, very different than the first two I experienced. I mean, it was a little night and day difference. Working with the embassy, other host nation partner forces, a lot of FID, those who don't know Foreign Internal Defense, we're just training the local special forces.

Lot that was the main kind of main gig there. We're looking working with a lot of interagency. There's de a mmm CIA there so we worked alongside of them we helped train their forces So a lot of joint will joint advise and assist ops. What kind of ops were they counter John or not counter drug count? All of them were counter narcotic and local within like their city they utilize their military special forces to do

Basically police work. Okay in the city So it's a little different dynamic than like investigation type work or undercover work or as a DA's I was going and all the target and like hey, we're gonna go and arrest this guy Okay, so they're hitting houses. They're hitting houses. Yeah. Cool. Yeah with them Yeah, we're parked a block over in the street. Okay, you're commanding control. You're yeah, we did a

Advising and assisting them. We're not up there on the train or anything We're just sitting in our up armored Vic a block over doing overwatch. Okay, make sure everything goes smooth Are you proud of these guys you get attached to them towards the end? I did. Yeah, we helped it also helped develop their whole selection Process as well for their special forces unit. So I myself being like the lead lead guy down there in that part of Columbia and

had a lot invested in this and I was proud of the product because we helped stand up their course which produced their "operators" and I was pretty pleased on how motivated and effective it was and how much time and effort they put into it. They took it seriously. So this is like a whole new, this is a completely different mission than what you're used to being overseeing

foreign nationals operate in their own country and Training them what to do and how to do everything and it sounds like you really enjoyed that and it was a nice change from yeah, I was at least It was definitely in a complete 180 I did a little bit of FID when I was in the Middle East Just a little bit but this one was that was kind of the main focus to give us access and placement in that country regardless and that's

That's what SEALs do. I mean, that's what we do the majority of the job. When we're not at war, that's what team guys do. So we got to have the fit is important. It's part of the mission. Guys don't like it, but it needs to be done. So we did a lot of that, but I enjoyed my time there. I mean, it was being in that AO was pretty comfortable in Columbia. And that was your last deployment? That was my last one, yeah. How long after your last deployment did you leave, decide to separate out of the community?

So I finished that deployment and then went to trade at the training command for two years. Oh good. I ended up being, I made chief, I ended up being the chief of SAUC, Special Operations Urban Combat, just another, it's just a training division in the big umbrella of all of the divisions. Just, I just taught, was in charge of one of them. And I did that for two years, spent a lot of time in Kentucky. That's where our training was out there. So...

So Mount for you civilian types is basically urban warfare. It's moving as a team, small unit tactics in and out of urban environments, downtown cities, stuff like that. Heavily focused on that leadership skills, communication. We did a lot of shooting, CQC, post-quarters combat. That was kind of the culmination of the workup for guys, the assaults block.

kind of what everyone all the team guys look forward to because the best block all the team guys want to do assaults they'll want to do cqc i want to shoot i want to do das so that's what that block is but so i learned a lot i i learned a hell of a lot of you know things about being a seal new skills sharpen my skills learn a lot more leadership stuff just big kind of bigger pictures

kind of staff stuff being in that role, being like a chief of a cell. Yeah. But it was two years. I mean, for our generation, that block of training, CQC, Hidden Houses, Urban Movement, all that kind of stuff, I mean, that is the, I think without a doubt, the single most important training block that we have with what's going on in the world today. And I'd love to hear your take on, I mean, you've been out, you've done it,

three times night you were a buds instructor now you're teaching in your same your you're seeing the final product do what they want to do in what they do best what does that look like from the outside kinda looking and I mean are you like holy shit like these guys are fuckin good or we got a lot of work to do I think it's majority are pretty solid but

Again, more time needs to be spent on it. We don't spend enough time. They took away a week from the training. The training's three weeks long. Salk was salt blocks is two weeks long, so a total of five weeks, total of salt block. But more time is needed because that is like the meat of the skill set. And if we're focusing more of attention on training

diving or mobility or we're taking away if they people higher up see that maybe more of a priority then they're gonna take away they took they've have taken away time from the salts block because they don't see that it's necessary we need to focus our efforts maybe on more mirror time were you impressed with the product coming out of that the team's I had mixed feelings sometimes no shit I think it was I

I could name the teams. I'm not going to, but I can name the teams that I liked that really impressed me, but I can, the teams that were like, like they need more work. They just need more time. They just didn't do it enough. They didn't know what happens is that they just don't do enough prep work prior to the assaults block on their own time. Okay. So they're not taking it upon themselves to go rent out the kill house to do runs with older guys, teaching new guys.

and just doing those reps before they get there to set themselves up for success and it shows yeah let's move on towards transition and i mean there's all this preparation that goes into going to combat doing the job right making sure your team player all that stuff and when i was in there was no preparation for guys that are leaving uh that kind of a job that kind of

you know the things that you see and the things that you do there was zero preparation for it and what do you think about that and how was your separation were you nervous yeah I was nervous I knew about a year out that was I was gonna make the decision so I've already stuck to what I felt was right for me so I knew I was gonna get out but as far as like knowing what to do are people helping me none I mean very limited other than I really had to seek out

And more often than not, it was people outside the community, not inside. Yeah. Because if I told, the first time I told my leadership, I mean, jaw about dropped to the floor, like, what the hell are you doing? You know, it was more like, and then afterwards, I felt more like, hey, they're like, hey, fuck you, like, you leaving? Yeah. So that stigma is still floating around. It's just kind of, what I've noticed is based on person to person. It's not in general, but...

But about a year out, I prepped, tried to line everything up myself, get as much information as I can. At the time, I was thinking, I was like really going back and forth what I wanted to do with my life after the teams. Before we get into that, before we get into after you're gone, I heard you say in another podcast about you talked about going and seeing psychiatrists and docs on your way home from deployment.

We didn't have that when I was in, and even if we did, I don't know that any of us would have opened up. Maybe it would have helped us. Maybe it wouldn't have. What kind of questions were they asking? Did they seem genuine? Were they there to help? Did you open up to them? The ones post every deployment, I didn't really feel they were genuine. It was more of a check in the block. Okay. Because after the Afghan deployments, both of them, we stopped –

in a town to take a weekend break before um it was in the states we just took a weekend break and then we had every morning we wake up meet like a certain type of doctor and it was more of a check in the block block for them like hey you feeling good check oh he's all right get out of here it wasn't until like i was actually getting out now they have programs set in place they have warrior concussion clinic yeah so they have like these clinics set up for guys especially special operators that they really dive deep

Get a full body like what's going on with you open it up. They you know everything from head to toe They do and honestly, it's a really good program and they take it seriously now because in the past any of two shits about this stuff Yeah, it's they even think about it nor paid attention to it. So nowadays it's more prevalent So they did what I went through that saw the psycho handful of times At first I would I don't think I ever really opened up. I mean I talked a little bit and

The beginning, the first couple times I went, no, I didn't at all. I only went five times, but the last three times I talked a little bit. I opened up some, I progressively opened up a little bit more, but by the time I was already out. Yeah. I was already like front side focused on, I wanted to get this done. It was part of the transition to go through this medical exam. It was like a month long. Yeah. So I needed to get that done before I got out. Yeah.

But that being said, I felt it did help me though. It did. Because a part of that program to see all these different doctors and talk to them, it did help me. And there was a whole other... I got to do a physical thing for physical rehab plan. Got to see chiropractors, massage therapy, float tank therapy. Shit, they really stepped it up. Yeah, so that's a whole other month long too. So there are these programs to really kind of... Before you get out to kind of just...

get your head right. I felt like it did for me. It got my head right a little bit. Got me back on level ground and kind of kept me focused on my next move. Because before that, I was like, I thought I knew what I was going to do, but we'll get to that. But it's like, I'm really grateful that they have that now. You got out. I know you tried out for a law enforcement agency. I'm not sure which one. You didn't make it. And why don't you tell us a little bit about who you were trying out with and

why you think maybe you didn't make it? So I applied for the FBI, I would say, a damn near a year before I got out. Me and a couple other guys did. About, I would say, about the last 10 months. I went through the entire, not the entire because I didn't make it, but three quarters of the process. And I thought, this is it. This is what I want to do. Great job. Do good things. Serve my country still, just in a different capacity.

So I was really stoked about this. I thought I was gonna be the exception to the rule. I've told you this about having issues transitioning. I thought was me boom just transfer right over like get out get right back into a federal job simple. I try to time it just right so I wouldn't there's no lag time whatsoever. I went through all the process and it was after the background check all the background stuff. I got a letter saying no so I it's had something to do with the background for me probably the polygraph and

Don't know why they don't tell me. Yeah, they don't tell you there is more I just took it did all the background check paperwork everything and Simply I didn't know until about a month after actually got out and moved to California Actually, I drove to California just to visit no intentions on staying because I still had The foresight of I made it like I'm good I'm gonna get this job because I thought at that point because I crushed everything up to that point and I thought I

My polygraph and background was pretty solid. It was solid. But then I got an email saying, nope. It was a formal thing. I can't remember what it said, but it was very vague. It was like, hey, you didn't meet the requirements, etc.,

You know, it's always interesting to me because so many guys from special operations community, I mean, there just aren't that many jobs that translate. I mean, there's barely any to what our experience is and what we can offer. And a lot of guys seem to flock to the federal side of law enforcement or other government agencies and, you know, state and local agencies.

law enforcement agencies and it seems like it's the same story over and over. These guys get out just like yourself, they apply for some type of law enforcement organization and then they get the letter that says they're not, they don't have what they're looking for. Yeah, some bullshit. Which I find really odd. You know, you're a shooting instructor now, you teach tactics.

and you teach law enforcement. Don't you find that kind of odd that so many guys come out, they apply to law enforcement agencies, the law enforcement agency tells them, "Hey, thanks, but you're not good enough." And then six months later, they're fucking calling you up wanting you to come and train their top fucking tier guys at that agency to do their job. Don't you find that a little odd? Yeah.

It's mind-blowing actually. Yeah, and I didn't really think about it. So I trained my first group of law enforcement But you're right. It's like it's unreal to me that they would pass up such my mind solid individuals that would do good things for Their community. Yeah So I don't know their agenda on that one. But again, yeah fast forward today. I train cops all the time. Yeah, but yet I

these even state department would say no because i've actually after that after i got that letter and i was like internally humiliated and ashamed because i was like a huge blow to my ego i didn't tell anybody at first because i was at my dad's and he was standing right there and i was like i didn't want to tell him but he's standing right there i was like well here we go no go on this and i was like kind of like damn yeah now what

Because I didn't have any plan. At that time, you put all your eggs in one basket. You were going to work for FBI. You thought you were a shoe-in, only to find out, according to them, you're not good enough. And I heard you on a podcast also. I think it was right before that happened, maybe. They asked you about transition, and you were like, oh, yeah, it's a fucking breeze. And now...

You've got nothing. No plan. Nothing going on. You've been denied. I mean, you're living with your dad. Yeah, it was horrible. And you're a fucking 13-year veteran Navy SEAL. Yeah, I was embarrassed. I mean, because I didn't have anywhere to go. I moved out of my place in Virginia. I left some things there, but I brought the majority of my... You know, I had some stuff here. I just drove across country to spend some time with him. That was my intention. I got the letter saying no go. Then I was there at my dad's...

Living there. I was living my dad's like in 31 years old Just did almost 13 years service seal had everything going for me and now I'm like now what so it was it was pretty tough like mentally for me Mm-hmm. So I was like scrambling how tough on a scale of 1 to 10 Probably one of the hardest things I do probably 10 9 10 way up there as far as mentally. Yeah, but just like ego just

Because I thought I had my shit together. Yeah. I like to think I still do, but at the time I was like, damn, like I never would have thought in a million years I'd be like at 31 living with my dads. Yeah. I didn't live there very long, but I had to live there because I had nowhere to go. Yeah. And I had no job, so, and I had no idea what the hell I was going to do. So I was living off savings. I had money, but I was living off my savings just from work and stuff like that. I was in the service. But again,

Me being who I am, I was stressing. Yeah. And again, I applied for another local law enforcement. I don't know why I did that, but I did because I was like, what's the quickest thing I could do here? Applied for the Orange County Sheriff's. I didn't go through the process. I just didn't even show up. I got invited to do an interview and all that. I just didn't even show up because I was like, fuck that. I just, in my gut, I had a gut feeling it just wasn't for me. So I just didn't go. I don't know.

But now I am where I am now. But that little, I would say, two-month window from April, May, end of March, April into May was tough because that's when I was staying with my dad. Yeah. And I didn't have my shit. I didn't even know what the hell I was going to do. So what did that lead to? That led to, fast forward to my business now, but only reason being is I was just there. One day it was like, hey, my dad has some friends that are gun owners.

He's known him forever. One's a firefighter, the other one just works alongside him. And they wanted to go shoot. They knew I was in town. I know him too, but so I was like, all right, let's go. Take me to your range. Went out there with them, had a blast, shot all their guns. And I ended up just teaching them just a couple of things here and there, like how to hold it properly because they were all assed up, just the basics. So we had fun. I think literally that night I came back because before this, I interviewed a couple of jobs. What other jobs did you interview with?

interviewed for another instructor job I worked a security job for like a week and I fucking quit that and this other instructor job for firearms training that was another that end of the day I just didn't like it and after that range day I went with my friend my dad and his friends I was like I could do this I kind of like I don't know I just had like this epiphany like slapped in my face like I always loved it enjoyed shooting you

I don't know if you ask any team guy who doesn't enjoy shooting because that's what we do. You know, we shoot all the damn time. But I really enjoy it. It's a really good stress reliever for me. And also like being a buzz instructor, being a teacher and a mentor, that grew on me too. I like teaching people new things and watch them grow into a better person, etc. New skill set. So that...

On top of that experience, it kind of like, "Hey, I could do that. I want to make a business of this. You know, I could do this on my own. I don't need to go work for someone else who's already doing it." Put my time and effort into that or some other company. I could focus my 100% of my attention energy onto something of my own, which I felt way more comfortable about. Yeah. It was just way, I don't know, I just... Because I also wanted that freedom too. That's part of why the reason I got out too. Freedom maneuver, you know, building to do what I want, set my own schedule.

Just have a regular life. Have a family. Have a family. Yeah. A good relationship. So working for someone else for eight to 10 hours a day in an office or wherever or standing doing security, I was like, no. Yeah. Yeah. It was no way. I tried it. Yeah. I tried it for one of those jobs for a week and I said, I'm out because I just, and it was actually a pretty good job. But as at the end of the day, I was like, hell no.

I couldn't do it. So the business idea dawned on me and I just went full force into it. 100%. That night literally just me and my dad brainstorming because he started his own business too. And he has a successful one. So he, on top of that, again, fast forward to today, now he's sitting there mentoring me on business too. Yeah. So it was kind of funny to see how all the things worked out like that. But then I invented this company, the company I have now. So I've been full force with this. So Kennedy Defensive Shooting is born today.

brand new company just a baby right now i mean i think that's what pulls a lot of guys out of the the darkest part of the transition which a lot of times um you know leads to suicide addiction all that kind of stuff did actually before did you deal with any of that before living the last year like when i was at trade at part of the reason why i got out because

I mean, I was single, no intention. I was like 100% focused on work. And every time I was out drinking all the time when I was home, even on trips, I would be out fucking drinking every weekend. I just saw where I was going while I was still in like the last year and a half or so in my personal life. I didn't want that to continue. So I knew I needed to separate myself because I was all I cared about was work. And then when I didn't work, I just was home, partied all the time. I drank. Fighting. Yeah. Yeah.

Rarely occasionally I wasn't like a fighter, but I would just go out and booze all the time Yeah And then just fucking wake up with hangovers every fucking day three or four days a week And I was like the fuck am I doing yeah, you know not getting anywhere Just just repetitive and then rinse repeat rinse repeat rinse repeat every trip. Yeah, and it just it took a toll too for sure and I

I saw where I was going and where I would go to because if I stayed in I would just probably continue to do that yeah and just push kind of I had some friends by just relationships if I wanted some family probably wouldn't have happened because I would just cared about work because I was always so fucking nervous to like be gone yeah I always wanted to be there be that guy like I would let everyone else go I wouldn't even come home for like holidays because I was like I didn't want to leave holy shit I was like I just want to stay

So do you think that your business kind of drew you out of that cycle? It did. I'd say they gave me a purpose. Because once I got that bug that dawned on me, I was like all in. Frontside focused on it, pulled me out of that rut. I was still at the time still living my dad. But I was like, all right, got the name, started doing all the back end stuff, established the website, and just kind of just building somewhat of a business foundation there.

so i actually get out there and get clients it's a new addiction yeah it ended up being a new addiction for me and now it is still addiction yeah you know but i mean a lot of guys sorry go ahead it did bring me out of that hole like you said yeah before that i was literally just sitting in my dad's house like twirling my my thumbs like no purpose no no reason to even be there just like i'm just sitting here because i'm a bum yeah

It's almost, you know, I see a cycle and this is my own theory, it could be just a bunch of shit, but you know what I see, what draws a lot of guys out of that downward spiral, which a lot of times doesn't end well, you know, you get that addiction to adrenaline being a SEAL. Just like we talked about, you had over 180 fucking engagements, you know, in less than a year.

and you become addicted to that. And then that addiction a lot of times I believe gets replaced with drug addiction and alcohol, which are also coping mechanisms. And then just from my own personal experience and watching guys like you and other close friends of mine, the business becomes the new addiction, which pulls you out of

the drugs and alcohol a lot of, or adrenaline. And I mean, and you're fucking crushing it now. You're already training Huntington Beach SWAT team, which is incredible. - Yeah, that was kind of a surreal experience for me. The city I grew up in, now I'm training their SWAT team. - Yeah. - So, and those are the seasoned officers too, not young. All of them probably had six, seven years on me. - Yeah.

What would you say your most challenging thing is in business right now? It's client acquisition. Getting new clients and just in content creation. It's constantly just in developing new ideas for growth. And I always, I don't want to be stagnant. I don't want my sole purpose just to do in my business, just to do private lessons. I want it to be a little bit, I want it to be bigger than that. And it can be. Do you have any idea what you'd like it to grow into?

I would like to grow into more in the works of developing some courses to expand outside of just privates, possibly doing group classes, 10 to 15 people, or in multi-day courses which I'm developing now with one of my close friends of mine. And then work more with law enforcement too. I'd like to work with a lot more law enforcement, maybe a little bit more heavy on law enforcement, a little less on the civilian.

Got more fulfillment out of training the HP SWAT than I did, you know, not it's just those in my mind people like that They need to learn the skills. Mm-hmm that I had to offer because they don't get it enough Yeah, hands down any department SWAT or not like they don't get to behind the gun enough You're either SWAT or you're not or you're not

but that's in my that's true you know like i train cops on their own dime they you know they come to see me and pay a private lesson from with me not they're not getting the department paying for it they're paying for out of pocket so focusing more maybe i could work with more departments and work with them yeah i mean that's definitely understandable because turning a law enforcement guy i mean he might i mean he might put what you just taught him into or at least has a higher chance of putting what you just taught him into

real-world situation like within a couple hours exactly and and I'm sure a lot of them probably do but Well Travis, I know you got a flight to catch. Is there anything else you'd like to cover before we wrap this thing up? I think we touched it all Again, thank you and for your mentorship and I test your mentorship and advice to the majority of my success in my business in the beginning and even to this day really seriously and

So thank you. Oh, you're welcome. Thank you for coming. And I don't think after the experience you just shared with us, I don't think you're going to have any fucking problem filling an open enrollment course or finding private lessons or trying in law enforcement in any part of the country. So guys, check Travis out on Instagram. What's your handle? You can find me at TravisKennedy267 or KennedyDefensiveShooting.com.

And you're starting a YouTube channel up as well. Yeah, YouTube channel at Kennedy Defensive Shooting, Facebook, and then website as well, kennedydefensiveshooting.com for all the information. Well, I'll be sending everybody I know over there. So I just want to wish you the best of luck, and I want to thank you for coming out. And I know some of that stuff that you shared is not fucking easy to do, and I just want you to know that me and the audience really appreciate it.

And thank you for your service. Thank you, brother. Appreciate inviting us. It's been a true pleasure being here. Cheers. Finding suitable mental health medications can be a challenge. The gene site test may help. Did you know that genetics can play an important role in gaining insight on how a person may respond to various medications? Understanding this may help reduce medication trial and error.

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