F-15 Pilot Reveals Why He Broke the Rules to Save a Navy SEAL | Ep. 310

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[UNKNOWN]: This was maybe within like a hundred miles of ballroom.

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[UNKNOWN]: They say, hey, there's a seal that's pinned down, separated from his team, we need you guys there now.

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[UNKNOWN]: We blast off or sitting reserved, and I'm trying to get there as fast as I can, but I have these GB12s on my jet.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so I'm like, if I show up to this thing, with no bombs I can drop, then I'm really going to hear about this.

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[UNKNOWN]: As we get closer, we start to hear that, hey man, there's a group of people coming from this town and they're going to where this guy's at.

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[UNKNOWN]: What do you want to do?

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[UNKNOWN]: I was like, let's just fly right over the crowd right now and let them know we're here and I'm thinking of myself, alright, how do I get this crowd away from this guy?

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[UNKNOWN]: And so I just called to the back seat, I was like, hey, check the laws off.

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[UNKNOWN]: The last altitude I remember seeing was about 150 feet.

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[UNKNOWN]: I'm about 400 knots and take this thing down to somewhere between 100 feet in the ground.

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[UNKNOWN]: And dust just goes everywhere, right?

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[UNKNOWN]: And the J-Taxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

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[UNKNOWN]: Ladies and gentlemen, as always, it's both an honor and a pleasure to welcome my next guest to the podcast.

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[UNKNOWN]: He's a former F-15E strike eagle combat pilot, the U.S. Air Force Thunderbird, number two.

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[UNKNOWN]: He's the founder and host of the immensely popular YouTube show, Max Afterburner, Ladies and Gents.

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[UNKNOWN]: Welcome to the stage Ryan Bodynheimer, aka Max Afterburner.

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[UNKNOWN]: Michael, it's up, man.

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[UNKNOWN]: Thanks for coming, man.

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, we sit here recording on September 11th, 2026, 25 years after what I would say is arguably kind of your entire origin story, you know, sitting in high school as a junior on 9-11 and that being kind of the springboard into your entire career.

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[UNKNOWN]: I find it, you know, pretty fitting to have this interview on on a day like today.

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[UNKNOWN]: I appreciate you coming and I'm curious what does that mean to you 25 years as we sit here?

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, 100% thanks for bringing that up.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it's really special to be here today on this day with you.

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[UNKNOWN]: It'd be special in general, but today's even more so.

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[UNKNOWN]: So I remember being a junior in high school watching the towers fall.

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[UNKNOWN]: And I think that is imprinted forever on my mind.

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, just like an entire generation.

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[UNKNOWN]: Seeing that happen.

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[UNKNOWN]: My friends went into the Marines, Army, Navy, after that happened, and it just sparked something inside me.

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[UNKNOWN]: I'd military service in my family.

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[UNKNOWN]: I got to grow up around it, and so it's kind of a no-brainer to me to just go and do something to contribute and help.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, seeing that happen to our country, I think it just showed me that people that have the ability to stand up and fight need to.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, we need real men and women that are ready to just take it to the enemy.

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[UNKNOWN]: And I think that started this small explosion of that warrior mindset that I'd seen from my dad and seen through seeing his military service.

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[UNKNOWN]: It kind of just awakened it just like it did a whole generation.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's interesting.

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[UNKNOWN]: The impact, you know, it's the, it reminds me of, like here, my parents talk about JFK being shot, you know, that kind of integral moment where everybody who went through it, you know, remembers that day, you know, in perpetuity and, and remembers where they were at, how it made them feel, I mean, just, and it's such a, such a similar moment.

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[UNKNOWN]: As you were watching that, I mean, did you think that it was a terrorist attack immediately or was it the second tower like most people or what was kind of going through your mind as a junior in high school watching it?

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[UNKNOWN]: So I've never been sitting in the parking lot before going into school that day and the radio announcer said, sounds like there's a sessina, some small aircraft that hit a tower.

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[UNKNOWN]: It was very interesting at an aviation, even though I wasn't set that I was going to go into the military yet at that point.

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[UNKNOWN]: But that morning sitting in the parking lot, and I don't know just a fair back on the back of my neck stood up, and I was like a sessin' the ran into the world trade center, like that just seems weird to me.

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, and then once we got inside, started to see the footage, I think it took a while to click to what it actually happened.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so, it just started this whole investigation to me of like, oh, wait, there's people that hate us this much?

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, I don't think I knew that.

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[UNKNOWN]: I didn't know that there were people that literally wanted me dead, one of my family dead.

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[UNKNOWN]: I knew the military, you know, roughly what the military did, and I got to see it, but I didn't really know where the rubber met the road of, no, the military actually exists to eliminate people that want American's dead.

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[UNKNOWN]: And these are the people right here taking it to our homeland.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it was,

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[UNKNOWN]: It was an impactful moment and I love the fact that now today, you know, we've talked about 9-11 as Patriots Day.

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[UNKNOWN]: I think that's amazing because it's the American spirit that whether you agree with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan or Iran, I think the U.S. military is the greatest force for good in the world, and to me that was starting my journey of learning that.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it was interesting being and I was in a seal platoon at Team 3 at the time and kind of similarly, I kind of remember that same, same verbiage, like a sess, and I was like, do the sess number bounce off the world trade center, like a broken window, like we wouldn't do anything.

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[UNKNOWN]: And then on on the drive down the coast to get on to base, you know, hearing the second tower, I was just like,

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[UNKNOWN]: Holy, I may I couldn't believe it, it was just like, man, I guess it's go time, you know, yeah, and such a, such a perfect spot, you know, a military career-wise to be in, you know, when it happened, but it was, it was sure sobering.

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[UNKNOWN]: Transitioning into just a little bit of childhood before we kind of get into the full career stuff.

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[UNKNOWN]: What was your favorite thing to do growing up?

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[UNKNOWN]: So I loved motocross, you know, motocross was one of my favorite things.

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[UNKNOWN]: So race motorcycles for probably like six or seven years.

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[UNKNOWN]: And, you know, I do off-road adventures with my family, but then I actually competed and I think the competition itself.

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[UNKNOWN]: That was my first real exposure to what in my mind as a kid was high stakes competition.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it is.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, you look at motocross nowadays.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, there's some...

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[UNKNOWN]: there's some ballsy people out there race and motor cross right so I got to see the older kids doing that and it kind of sparked my desire for more and more competition so that teamed up with outrooted or outdoor adventures of my dad we would get together with a lot of the other families and the squadres a group on military bases moved I think eight times in childhood wow

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[UNKNOWN]: So, moving, I think motorcycles to me were kind of a little source of therapy as a kid.

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, brought me back to center, no matter where we went, you know, the motorcycle came with us.

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[UNKNOWN]: So, you know, whether I was off-roading in Idaho or Colorado, Alaska, I mean in Alaska, we had snow machines.

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[UNKNOWN]: So, just kind of my journey of teaming up with a machine, you know, being one with a machine, started really young.

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[UNKNOWN]: I don't know if my dad was doing inception, putting that in my brain as a kid.

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[UNKNOWN]: If it was just a happy accident, yeah, was there a favorite place that you lived motor cross-wise?

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[UNKNOWN]: So I really got heavier in the competition when we were in mountain home Idaho.

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[UNKNOWN]: It's a little town central Idaho And there's a place called a Wahi motorcycle club and so every weekend we go and I'd compete You know, it's high stakes competition, you know 15 20 other kids racing Think PW80 was the name of the motor motorcycle.

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[UNKNOWN]: I had at the time

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[UNKNOWN]: So that's where I really got into it and stars the competition.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: Did you ever get into street bikes at all or just off road?

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[UNKNOWN]: We had the Enduro, so the dual sports.

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[UNKNOWN]: So I had an LC4, six to 80.

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[UNKNOWN]: I think it was something like that.

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[UNKNOWN]: Pretty high CC bike.

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[UNKNOWN]: But it was more just using that to get to and from the trails.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: What did your dad do military-wise?

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[UNKNOWN]: So he started out in the OV10.

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[UNKNOWN]: It's like a four-air control aircraft.

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[UNKNOWN]: Maybe like a little predecessor to the A10 in a sense where you're like marking targets doing intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, and then from there you went to fly the F4, so he was on his way to Vietnam once he graduated F4 training and the Vietnam more ended, and so then he became an F4 pilot throughout the Cold War, that was kind of his main focus, and then after that he went to the F16, and

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[UNKNOWN]: And did a couple assignments where he was doing countered, nor had stuff where he'd counter, you know, threats coming into the United States, scrambling F-16.

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[UNKNOWN]: So he was one of the squadrons where he'd be sitting in the alert, you know, some threat was coming from somewhere around the country, after 9-11, where we kind of uped that ability.

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[UNKNOWN]: He was in charge of some of those squadrons, where they'd scramble F-16s, F-15s.

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[UNKNOWN]: But he did a lot of counter drug work, actually.

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[UNKNOWN]: It turned into counter-drug work in the F4, where we're supposed to be countering the Soviets out of Cuba.

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[UNKNOWN]: But their fear was that the Cubans would launch MIG-21s or some sort of Russian fighter towards Florida.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so he actually sat a alert in the F4 during that time as well.

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[UNKNOWN]: And I mean, the stories he tells about intercepting these SESNIC caravans in the middle of the night seeing bales of drugs fly out of the...

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[UNKNOWN]: aircraft as he flies past and you know at the time they couldn't really do anything about it they didn't really talk to homeland security or anything like that he was just going up there to make sure it wasn't a make coming in with bombs to bomb my amy right you know but he said pretty much you know at well every time he intercepted those aircraft they were just drug runner aircraft

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[UNKNOWN]: We're nowadays, they'd be blowing them out of the sky, probably.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's a good time to be a fighter pilot in Florida.

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[UNKNOWN]: No, sure.

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[UNKNOWN]: That's wild.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I can only assume that that had a significant driving force into your desire to want to do the same thing.

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[UNKNOWN]: yeah it does and i think the thing i saw in my dad that now that i look back on it it was yeah the fighter jets were insane i mean it's amazing right see in the the afterburners light as i'm a seventh grader sitting on a flight line in Alaska sunset like i didn't know what that was and i felt that in my chest i'm just like oh this is incredible not sure what it is i'm sure that was part of the spark right later uh when i saw that when i saw nine eleven happened that just instantly clicked

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[UNKNOWN]: But I saw him lead, and I saw him give speeches, and I saw the way that he treated people, and the way that people would talk about him to me, even as a kid, saying things like, you know what, I would follow your dad anywhere.

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[UNKNOWN]: I'd go to war with your dad, no matter what.

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[UNKNOWN]: And that even happened all the way through high schools, living near the Air Force Academy, just going on base, and there was a staff sergeant.

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[UNKNOWN]: He was manning the gate and he was like, Bowdenheimer, it's like, I served under your dad in Alaska.

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[UNKNOWN]: Your dad was favorite commander I ever had.

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[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so I feel like that just something about that, like known how good of a dude he was and how he was respected by people.

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[UNKNOWN]: That's maybe even more impactful now.

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[UNKNOWN]: But as kid, you know, it was like the fast fighter jets after burners and all that.

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[UNKNOWN]: And I don't think you have the full appreciation for having a dad like that, you know, and tell way later, you know.

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[UNKNOWN]: I won the lottery, man.

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[UNKNOWN]: That's something I talk about now.

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[UNKNOWN]: I know not everybody, all the viewers watching might not have that.

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[UNKNOWN]: And I feel for him, because I realize how much I won the lottery with my mom and my dad.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, that's amazing.

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[UNKNOWN]: What did mom do growing up?

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[UNKNOWN]: She was a teacher, so kind of the most fighter pilots that people that become fighter pilots, their dads, or either former fighter pilots, or farmers, and then their moms or teachers.

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[UNKNOWN]: So kind of, you know, right there in that exact pocket, but yeah, she got an education, and got a master's degree, got a PhD, and then became a principal.

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[UNKNOWN]: Oh wow.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: Sublings?

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[UNKNOWN]: Yep.

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[UNKNOWN]: Two older half-brothers from my mom, my mom, previous marriage, and then two younger sisters, one of them was adopted from Korea.

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[UNKNOWN]: We went to Korea when I was probably third, fourth grade, and my dad was selling F-16s to South Korea.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: So he was, you know, working in the headquarters, talking with the higher-ups there, getting them outfitted with the F-16.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so while we were there, we adopted my little sister.

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[UNKNOWN]: So.

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[UNKNOWN]: Oh, that's cool.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: Um, so favor place probably Alaska growing up there.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, there's you know, as a kid I was six seventh grade running around playing games till three four in the morning because it was a light outside, you know, so we'd be playing man hunts or, you know, playing football or whatever until

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, way into the early morning hours, because it was light, and there was moose, there was, you know, the threat of bears were around, it was just kind of like magical, a little bit dangerous, exciting as a young man, you know, so I'll never forget just the experience of being on a snow machine as an eighth grader, you know, raging around a lake with moose in the background, yeah, I mean, phenomenal.

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[UNKNOWN]: that was favorite.

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[UNKNOWN]: I'd say least favorite.

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[UNKNOWN]: I mean, and then wasn't even for the place because now I love this place, you know, it was around 10 to layer four space.

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[UNKNOWN]: I went there in, I think it was 9th or 10th grade and moving every couple of years is pretty tough, but as you get older, it's harder, right?

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[UNKNOWN]: And so I remember going there and it was an inner city school, you know, I was, you know, one of the only white kids in my class, so I got to feel like what it was like to be a minority, so I feel for people out there.

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[UNKNOWN]: That have that experience on the other end as well, but I got to feel that especially from sports I was a new kid coming in 10th grade who is this guy?

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[UNKNOWN]: You know, I didn't really compete at that high of a level either.

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[UNKNOWN]: It was serious.

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[UNKNOWN]: The sports were serious, right?

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[UNKNOWN]: So that was a shock to me and like dude these guys are really good

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[UNKNOWN]: And so I feel like you're just a little hard corner to square.

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[UNKNOWN]: I eventually did and it a plane basketball and football there.

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[UNKNOWN]: I wasn't the star of the team, but now I got plane time.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's amazing.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: At what point were you fully committed to joining the military?

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[UNKNOWN]: Was it 9-11 or was it before even before that?

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[UNKNOWN]: No, I think it was it was it started at the 9-11 was a catalyst I think I wanted to I don't know for some reason.

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[UNKNOWN]: I was white I broke a couple bones playing basketball as a kid and for some reason this orthopedic surgeon that I went to He was just a super cool dude and he told me he had Friday's off every Friday off and I was like I want to do that

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[UNKNOWN]: I want the three day weekend.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah.

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[UNKNOWN]: If you get it at three day, we can every weekend.

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[UNKNOWN]: So I wanted to be in orthopedic surgeon and then after 9-11 happened, I was like, okay, how else can I help people?

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[UNKNOWN]: I've seen my dad as a fighter pilot.

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[UNKNOWN]: This is the coolest shit I've ever seen.

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[UNKNOWN]: And you know, as a patriotic kid, I wanted to pitch in and give back.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so then I think it just kind of started building from that moment.

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[UNKNOWN]: And then probably six months after 9-11, I applied for Razi.

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[UNKNOWN]: Oh, wow.

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[UNKNOWN]: Didn't get the scholarship, they had like different rounds.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so didn't get it, didn't get it, didn't get it, didn't get it, didn't get it.

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[UNKNOWN]: And I'm like, okay, well, I'm going to join the guard, which at the time the guard wasn't as important as it is now.

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[UNKNOWN]: It was kind of like, well, the guards maybe you'll get a pilot slot, maybe you won't kind of a crap shoot.

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[UNKNOWN]: But that was my plan and then two weeks before I graduate high school I got the wild card round story of my life honestly The wild card round Same thing happened on the Thunderbirds.

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[UNKNOWN]: So I don't know what would God is trying to teach me But like basically hold out and wait and be patient and maybe you'll get something awesome is the lesson that keeps repeating in my life

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[UNKNOWN]: But ended up getting that scholarship two weeks prior for a non-technical major, so if people out there Probably understand that as going in as an officer, I don't know if it's the same in the Navy, but they want you to have a technical degree And I just knew that wasn't for me.

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[UNKNOWN]: I was like if I try to get this technical degree I looked at some of the stuff took some of the test.

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[UNKNOWN]: I'm gonna suck

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[UNKNOWN]: So what else can I do?

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[UNKNOWN]: So I've got it.

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[UNKNOWN]: I wanted to be a PE teacher.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, or something that was outside of Technical like my mom was a teacher.

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[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so I oh my scholarship application to Rodsey, which might be why they waited for the last second I've put I want an education degree specializing in PE.

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[UNKNOWN]: So yeah, that's amazing.

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[UNKNOWN]: So where do you end up going to school?

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[UNKNOWN]: So I ended up going to a CU Boulder, did Razi there.

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[UNKNOWN]: I started out at University of Colorado.

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[UNKNOWN]: My sister got cancer when I was a sophomore freshman in college.

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[UNKNOWN]: Really critical brain cancer, she survived, but it made me want to make a shift and be closer to my family.

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[UNKNOWN]: So I did a half a year at the University of Northern Colorado and then I shifted, I actually moved back home and then I did ROTC, lived at home, and then drove to college at University of Colorado Boulder.

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[UNKNOWN]: And did you end up sticking with PE?

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[UNKNOWN]: No, I shifted to communication and media.

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[UNKNOWN]: So kind of brought me to this whole YouTube thing.

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[UNKNOWN]: When I was growing up, you know, I was moving around.

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[UNKNOWN]: I think it was eight different schools.

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[UNKNOWN]: I think something like that.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so whenever I'd go to these new schools, I'd be the loan kid at the lunch table, right?

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[UNKNOWN]: Just sitting there like, oh, okay, what do I do?

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[UNKNOWN]: And it seemed like the people I started making friends with, you know, it wasn't the jocks, it wasn't the popular kids, right?

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[UNKNOWN]: It was the kids that didn't really care about any of that stuff.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so I got in with some film Geeks, you know, and I was like, this is awesome.

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[UNKNOWN]: You guys are doing videos, this was probably, you know, maybe eighth grade or so.

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[UNKNOWN]: And so I started editing videos that young, doing it for the morning announcements for the school.

16:46.883 --> 16:52.965
[UNKNOWN]: stayed friends with those that type of crowd moved a couple of different schools but every school I went to I would kind of that's where I would link into.

16:53.165 --> 17:13.073
[UNKNOWN]: I'd be then morning announcements, editor guy, maybe ever now and then be on the camera but I was really behind the camera doing editing and things like that and I noticed that a lot of those kids they didn't care about the popularity, they didn't care that you were new, they didn't care that you didn't have the coolest shoes or shirts and those were my people so that's what kind of got me to go back into that when I was in

17:14.193 --> 17:18.015
[UNKNOWN]: And so I just pumped my schedule full of film classes as much as I possibly could.

17:18.315 --> 17:19.215
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's awesome.

17:19.255 --> 17:24.077
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, what a fortuitous precursor to what you're doing now.

17:24.378 --> 17:24.598
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

17:25.078 --> 17:32.181
[UNKNOWN]: All right, so you graduate college walk us through getting into OCS and then ultimately becoming a pilot.

17:32.919 --> 17:37.361
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so in RTC, they do a selection process while you're there.

17:37.681 --> 17:39.062
[UNKNOWN]: And it's like this pie chart thing.

17:39.782 --> 17:44.284
[UNKNOWN]: It a lot of it's based on command and recommendation, you know, do people respect you?

17:45.105 --> 17:46.766
[UNKNOWN]: Are you someone that they see as being a leader?

17:47.366 --> 17:48.927
[UNKNOWN]: So with Air Force RTC,

17:49.827 --> 17:57.172
[UNKNOWN]: It was like twice a week, you show up, you become, you get a position, you become like a flight commander, show up for PT, PT three times a week.

17:57.212 --> 18:02.235
[UNKNOWN]: Nothing that's too crazy, but they're kind of just testing you right there to see, like, hey, can you make, can you make this bar?

18:03.236 --> 18:08.499
[UNKNOWN]: And that's the big part of your ranking, and then another part of it is you do some tests, some aptitude tests for flying.

18:08.980 --> 18:16.004
[UNKNOWN]: You can study for some of them, but a lot of it's hand-eye coordination, memory recognition, things like that, and then I was getting my private pilot license on the side.

18:17.285 --> 18:22.348
[UNKNOWN]: And then you tell your name in the hat to become, you know, something in the cadet wing that's higher in higher up, right?

18:22.368 --> 18:28.151
[UNKNOWN]: So I ended up getting selected to be the commander of the cadet wing, and so that's just, it was a beautiful experience.

18:28.171 --> 18:28.932
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it was amazing.

18:29.392 --> 18:31.373
[UNKNOWN]: But it was kind of a rude awakening, because you know, here I am.

18:31.413 --> 18:37.216
[UNKNOWN]: I can charge of everybody, and then I get commissioned, and you go from being like, oh, I'm important, you know, like everybody listens to me.

18:37.236 --> 18:42.119
[UNKNOWN]: It's like, you're a second lieutenant, you're in pilot training, and shut up, and learn how to fly this plane.

18:42.359 --> 18:43.399
[UNKNOWN]: It was like a big switch, man.

18:44.780 --> 19:01.683
[UNKNOWN]: So I got selected for Ingept, your own NATO joint jet pilot training, here in Texas, North Texas, switched off walls, and went there, just, you know, Brideide bushy tailed, ready to rock and roll, and the way that the pilot training pipeline works is it's oriented towards fighter pilots.

19:01.843 --> 19:05.884
[UNKNOWN]: So that was like the, that was the criminal agreement, that was where I wanted to be.

19:05.984 --> 19:12.125
[UNKNOWN]: So I got it, I get there, it's NATO oriented, so there's instructors from Portugal, Italy, Germany.

19:12.865 --> 19:21.812
[UNKNOWN]: And my flight had kids from Norway, Germany, Italy, and so I'm learning how to fly next to these people from these other countries and learning about their countries as well.

19:22.193 --> 19:32.301
[UNKNOWN]: And the whole point is for later if you become, you know, no sex or flag officer or something, you started to build relationships with these high move, like these fast movers and the other nations, NATO's military.

19:32.881 --> 19:34.502
[UNKNOWN]: So, um, this is incredible.

19:34.743 --> 19:40.767
[UNKNOWN]: Like I remember being up and up and uh, witched off walls and the Norwegian guys, they were like, they're oil money is insane.

19:41.047 --> 19:43.689
[UNKNOWN]: So they were making like 10 times what I made as a lieutenant.

19:43.709 --> 19:45.790
[UNKNOWN]: I was probably making like 1,500 bucks a month.

19:46.051 --> 19:47.231
[UNKNOWN]: They were making 10 times that.

19:47.412 --> 19:47.752
[UNKNOWN]: Really?

19:48.052 --> 19:48.372
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

19:49.373 --> 19:54.917
[UNKNOWN]: And they would buy like brand new corvettes, porches, Lamborghinis, like one new bottle, Lamborghinis.

19:55.918 --> 20:06.384
[UNKNOWN]: So we would just like, as soon as the weekend we would get in their Lamborghinis and Corvats and just drive down to Dallas and go to Piano bars and just raise it and say, did you say oil money or oh money oil?

20:06.764 --> 20:15.390
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think the oil industry in Norway, they have some sort of system that's like in Alaska where you get a dividend check, something like that.

20:15.410 --> 20:17.351
[UNKNOWN]: I think their population gets because they make whatever.

20:17.371 --> 20:18.091
[UNKNOWN]: Everybody gets it.

20:18.111 --> 20:19.372
[UNKNOWN]: It's not specific to the military.

20:19.452 --> 20:41.009
[UNKNOWN]: I think everybody gets it, but their fighter pilots get that plus a lot more, because it's such a prestigious thing, even when you're just starting out, and it's their selection process, do they tell me they would give them a, like a map, like a topographical map of, let's say, slice of Russia, or somewhere like that, where they might be flying a mission, and they would show it to them for 30 seconds, pull it away, and be like, draw that.

20:41.870 --> 20:44.092
[UNKNOWN]: And they would literally, these guys had photographic memories.

20:44.152 --> 20:46.913
[UNKNOWN]: I swear, like they were some of the best pilots I've ever flown with.

20:47.134 --> 20:49.795
[UNKNOWN]: Damn, that sounds like such an amazing program.

20:49.815 --> 20:51.116
[UNKNOWN]: Do you know if they still do it that way?

20:51.717 --> 20:55.359
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know how Norway does it, but we did something similar when we were up there.

20:55.439 --> 20:57.641
[UNKNOWN]: It wasn't to that quite complexity for us.

20:57.681 --> 21:01.063
[UNKNOWN]: It was like, okay, here's a diagram of the air space that you're actually me flying with.

21:01.463 --> 21:03.104
[UNKNOWN]: Look at it, okay, now draw it.

21:03.505 --> 21:09.288
[UNKNOWN]: So it wasn't quite like the topographical lines that, you know, wear it a valley crests and goes down.

21:11.670 --> 21:19.216
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I got to see I guess the the flight program that was in which tough alls is is it still Oh, yeah, it is yeah, it's still going on.

21:19.476 --> 21:20.877
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's the it's the pinnacle.

21:20.957 --> 21:24.841
[UNKNOWN]: It's where everybody wants everybody in Air Force RTC or the Air Force Academy.

21:25.281 --> 21:37.110
[UNKNOWN]: If you get that you're pretty much assured you're going to get a fighter but every now and then they don't have a fighter slot or you'll go fly the B52 B1 because a big thing of a fighter pilot is can you fly information and and you don't know that till you get there, right?

21:37.130 --> 21:40.313
[UNKNOWN]: You can be a great pilot on your own doing low levels beautiful.

21:40.733 --> 21:47.490
[UNKNOWN]: But until you get right next to another plane right next to you, I mean, how do you teach that until you're there right so some guys just can't swear that corner.

21:48.048 --> 21:51.409
[UNKNOWN]: is there a secret to it or you just kind of have it or you don't?

21:51.729 --> 21:54.690
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I think it's a, man, that's a really good question.

21:54.710 --> 21:56.530
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's a little bit of both.

21:56.690 --> 21:58.751
[UNKNOWN]: I think you have to have some natural talent and ability.

21:59.391 --> 22:01.251
[UNKNOWN]: And to me, it was always the smart athletes.

22:01.351 --> 22:03.232
[UNKNOWN]: Something I looked up about Navy SEALs.

22:03.252 --> 22:10.974
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know if it's the current motto, but someone in Navy SEAL recruitment said, you guys are looking for people that are PhDs that can win a bar fight.

22:11.214 --> 22:15.916
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, right, like to me that's a perfect definition of a successful Navy seal.

22:16.316 --> 22:21.178
[UNKNOWN]: So our version of that would probably be a PhD who's an athlete.

22:21.338 --> 22:22.478
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, like that makes sense.

22:22.618 --> 22:22.798
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

22:23.359 --> 22:24.639
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's fascinating.

22:24.939 --> 22:26.120
[UNKNOWN]: How long is that pipeline?

22:26.860 --> 22:38.523
[UNKNOWN]: So pilot training itself is a little over a year and then there's a cap off course right at the end if you get a fighter slot, it's about 10 weeks where you're doing more fighter pilot oriented stuff in that T-38 jet.

22:38.543 --> 22:45.565
[UNKNOWN]: So I flew T-37, so I was an old like SESNA built jet and old schoolman.

22:45.665 --> 22:47.526
[UNKNOWN]: Looks like the Apollo space capsule inside of it.

22:47.646 --> 22:50.947
[UNKNOWN]: Like you look at it and I remember looking at it being like, wait, you guys want me to fly that?

22:50.987 --> 22:52.087
[UNKNOWN]: Like there's no chance, right?

22:52.107 --> 22:53.948
[UNKNOWN]: That's what your brain tells you at the beginning.

22:54.988 --> 23:07.655
[UNKNOWN]: So you got to fight through that, but now they're flying the T6, which is a turbo prop aerobatic aircraft, and then the T38 is the supersonic jet, and now there's a replacement on mine called the T7, and that's going to replace the T38, but they're still T38's operating up there.

23:08.496 --> 23:09.116
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

23:09.616 --> 23:16.040
[UNKNOWN]: So once you make it through all of that, at what point did you get your assignment for what you were going to fly and where you were going and all of that?

23:16.580 --> 23:25.948
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so T-37's, I mean, side story in T-38's actually lost my best friend, crashed right next to me in a T-38.

23:26.769 --> 23:33.955
[UNKNOWN]: So it was a pretty rocky pilot training experience for me, so we had a delay of about three months, so they stood down T-38s for a while.

23:35.036 --> 23:36.697
[UNKNOWN]: But I can go into that story a little bit if you want.

23:36.777 --> 23:38.979
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that doesn't mean that's hard breaking.

23:39.019 --> 23:39.759
[UNKNOWN]: It's hard breaking.

23:39.839 --> 23:40.760
[UNKNOWN]: Pretty formative, too.

23:40.960 --> 23:46.783
[UNKNOWN]: You know, for what happened, just my mindset from there was pretty wild ride.

23:46.883 --> 23:49.985
[UNKNOWN]: But I'm so in touch with this family.

23:50.005 --> 23:51.906
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, great, amazing family to this day.

23:52.506 --> 23:58.470
[UNKNOWN]: But he was coming into land and, you know, aviation is unpredictable, right?

23:58.490 --> 24:01.412
[UNKNOWN]: They're practicing a single engine that T-38's already underpowered.

24:01.992 --> 24:08.195
[UNKNOWN]: So they're coming in a land and a huge turkey vulture size bird wham right into the side of the canopy.

24:08.876 --> 24:10.236
[UNKNOWN]: We don't know where exactly it hit.

24:11.477 --> 24:15.099
[UNKNOWN]: I didn't learn these details until like eight years after this event, by the way.

24:15.479 --> 24:21.142
[UNKNOWN]: So again, the mental gymnastics that I was doing for eight years of understanding what happened to him was tough to

24:22.903 --> 24:27.168
[UNKNOWN]: But when that happened, I see it, I'm up above the pattern.

24:27.188 --> 24:28.949
[UNKNOWN]: So our flights would all fly around the same time.

24:29.510 --> 24:31.692
[UNKNOWN]: I see a jet explode.

24:31.832 --> 24:33.814
[UNKNOWN]: Like jet hits the ground, explodes.

24:33.835 --> 24:35.036
[UNKNOWN]: That's what catches my eye, right?

24:35.056 --> 24:35.877
[UNKNOWN]: Huge explosion.

24:36.497 --> 24:41.202
[UNKNOWN]: And then ELT's going off towers saying, like everybody go around.

24:42.203 --> 25:01.728
[UNKNOWN]: So we go up and we hold and we wait and then like we come back and we land and as we're landing I look over and I see the instructor laying there with his parachute he's laying there no one's attending to him I'm like what's going on right and I found out later the front seat came up and hit his seat So it was clear that he was deceased so that they weren't giving him any medical attention

25:02.448 --> 25:05.232
[UNKNOWN]: They focused on out like my buddy who's in the front seat.

25:05.832 --> 25:23.232
[UNKNOWN]: He didn't have a seat that was zero zero So at the time those jets this a zero zero seat means you can be sitting or you guys be descending a little bit And you can punch out and you can survive So at the time they didn't have those seats, which sucks right I mean probably to budgetary thing right because we had the seats and other jets Those trainer jets just didn't have them

25:23.792 --> 25:30.214
[UNKNOWN]: So, he hits the ground in the seat before he gets, I mean, I don't think he got any swings in the shoe at all.

25:30.234 --> 25:32.175
[UNKNOWN]: He hits the ground, but he still alive.

25:33.316 --> 25:37.517
[UNKNOWN]: So, he gets taken into an ambulance and just, they're doing everything they can to save his life.

25:38.017 --> 25:45.200
[UNKNOWN]: I talked to the flight surgeon afterward who responded right then and he was like, dude, the G-suit was the only thing holding his body together.

25:46.240 --> 25:52.523
[UNKNOWN]: And so he was still alive though, he was a stud, super good shape, just larger than life type dude.

25:52.623 --> 25:56.765
[UNKNOWN]: So that was the only reason that he held on as long as he did, but then he perished as well.

25:57.326 --> 26:00.487
[UNKNOWN]: So I mean, that was a dark night of the soul for all of us.

26:00.607 --> 26:04.349
[UNKNOWN]: That were in that flight, you know, this larger than life dude, by the way, he was at the top of the class.

26:04.949 --> 26:09.632
[UNKNOWN]: Number one dude, way better pilot than I was, way harder work ethic than I ever had.

26:09.992 --> 26:14.354
[UNKNOWN]: And he died, like that's a wild situation for all of us, right?

26:15.115 --> 26:20.520
[UNKNOWN]: So, we got like two weeks off, I had the, you know, the, the moment of, do I quit?

26:20.801 --> 26:22.282
[UNKNOWN]: You know, and everybody was thinking that's right.

26:23.564 --> 26:27.668
[UNKNOWN]: And I remember an instructor pulled me aside and he was like, he was flying with me.

26:28.169 --> 26:29.931
[UNKNOWN]: And as we landed, he saw everything, right?

26:29.971 --> 26:31.693
[UNKNOWN]: He was like, dude, what we just saw?

26:31.713 --> 26:34.676
[UNKNOWN]: You're gonna have to process that, because that's not normal.

26:34.956 --> 26:35.497
[UNKNOWN]: What we just saw.

26:37.434 --> 26:40.358
[UNKNOWN]: And he said, by the way, you're now the leader of this whole place.

26:40.659 --> 26:43.302
[UNKNOWN]: Like, this, all these, everybody in your flight, they're going to be looking to you.

26:43.743 --> 26:44.865
[UNKNOWN]: So I just want you to know that.

26:45.465 --> 26:47.488
[UNKNOWN]: You know, and that was, I was like, oh, no pressure.

26:47.668 --> 26:48.129
[UNKNOWN]: No pressure.

26:48.430 --> 26:50.953
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, because he was, he was the guy that everybody looked to.

26:51.193 --> 26:53.457
[UNKNOWN]: He was like the flight commander, leader of our flight, right?

26:54.197 --> 27:00.503
[UNKNOWN]: And so, yeah, man, a couple of different times in a chaplain's office asking the chaplain, you know, what happens if I quit?

27:00.543 --> 27:05.087
[UNKNOWN]: What does that mean for me and, you know, thank God for the ability to go to a chaplain.

27:05.107 --> 27:11.873
[UNKNOWN]: At the time, we couldn't go to, well, I guess we could go to a therapist or something, but I'd be a big, at the time, as a big black mark, right?

27:11.893 --> 27:13.334
[UNKNOWN]: We probably wouldn't get back in a cockpit.

27:14.035 --> 27:17.518
[UNKNOWN]: So, I went to the chaplain and he was like, what do you want your story to be?

27:18.119 --> 27:20.581
[UNKNOWN]: You know, like, if you quit, no one's going to fault you.

27:22.157 --> 27:24.359
[UNKNOWN]: But what is that story then after that?

27:24.379 --> 27:25.399
[UNKNOWN]: And I just want you to think about that.

27:27.160 --> 27:36.207
[UNKNOWN]: So yeah, I just wrestled with that for a long time and went through that dark night of the soul for a while and handed the flag to his parents, you know, processed that as best I could.

27:37.287 --> 27:38.428
[UNKNOWN]: And then decided to stay.

27:39.349 --> 27:41.871
[UNKNOWN]: But three people in our flight didn't ever want to fly.

27:42.351 --> 27:45.333
[UNKNOWN]: They ended up flying, but then they went to drones on purpose.

27:45.353 --> 27:45.913
[UNKNOWN]: They chose to.

27:46.374 --> 27:47.274
[UNKNOWN]: They finished pilot training.

27:47.815 --> 27:49.296
[UNKNOWN]: They went to drones and some of them

27:52.618 --> 28:11.831
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I can only imagine as cheesy as it may sound, I mean, it kind of reminds me and I'm curious if the top, the original top gun, if that scene resonates in that way because it's kind of similar vibe, at least that you get from Maverick's character of quitting and then coming back and yeah.

28:13.132 --> 28:17.494
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, 100% I was the kid who had the top gun poster on my wall growing up, right?

28:17.534 --> 28:18.814
[UNKNOWN]: To me aviation was sexy.

28:19.314 --> 28:19.935
[UNKNOWN]: It was awesome.

28:19.995 --> 28:20.935
[UNKNOWN]: Nothing bad could happen.

28:20.955 --> 28:24.576
[UNKNOWN]: It was just after burners and, you know, rock and roll.

28:25.537 --> 28:27.878
[UNKNOWN]: But seeing that happen, I think it started.

28:28.018 --> 28:31.139
[UNKNOWN]: That was another start of, hey, okay, 9-11 happened.

28:31.919 --> 28:49.589
[UNKNOWN]: This happened like this is a deadly serious business and it shifted a little bit more what this all meant to me And it shifted more to leadership where I was like, okay, I got to lead myself I got to take command of my self if I'm gonna make it through this program But I also if I'm gonna be a leader then I got to set an example.

28:49.949 --> 28:50.710
[UNKNOWN]: What does that look like?

28:51.190 --> 28:59.194
[UNKNOWN]: And so yeah, I think when I when I see top when I look back at top gun and even top gun Maverick now when they lose ice man, you know, I left the theater in tears.

28:59.214 --> 28:59.714
[UNKNOWN]: I'll be honest.

29:00.095 --> 29:07.158
[UNKNOWN]: A lot of my friends did too and I'm sure you've seen it with some of the maybe seal movies where you're like, okay, they did a good job here.

29:07.238 --> 29:07.738
[UNKNOWN]: This is good.

29:07.758 --> 29:12.401
[UNKNOWN]: Some of them maybe not, but I think top gun Maverick, they did a great job kind of capturing that.

29:13.321 --> 29:20.103
[UNKNOWN]: And so, I always thought the goose sting was just, you know, fairy tale, oh, that sad story, but yeah, I got to live a different version of that.

29:20.643 --> 29:20.883
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

29:21.503 --> 29:22.403
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's powerful.

29:22.463 --> 29:29.005
[UNKNOWN]: I, um, astonished at how often large birds are the cause of playing crashes.

29:29.385 --> 29:29.605
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

29:29.665 --> 29:34.706
[UNKNOWN]: It seems like it happens not often, but of a lot of the playing crashes are here a lot.

29:35.006 --> 29:37.227
[UNKNOWN]: It seems like a lot of times it's because of birds.

29:37.407 --> 29:38.549
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, for sure.

29:38.569 --> 29:51.668
[UNKNOWN]: And I've heard people ask, like, well, especially with big airliners, like, we've lost an A-wax to huge, I think they were like, hawks or something, or no, it was turkey vultures again, I think, some big huge birds in Canada.

29:52.649 --> 29:56.531
[UNKNOWN]: And they got ingested in both engines and at that point, what are you going to do?

29:56.891 --> 30:00.813
[UNKNOWN]: But people have asked why isn't there some sort of net or something around the front of the jet engine?

30:00.833 --> 30:05.296
[UNKNOWN]: And I've wondered that before, someone way smarter than me probably knows why that can't happen.

30:05.316 --> 30:07.617
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, the performance, you got to get so much air in there.

30:08.418 --> 30:12.280
[UNKNOWN]: And maybe the mesh net itself wouldn't allow that to happen.

30:12.440 --> 30:13.520
[UNKNOWN]: But I think that's a great question.

30:13.560 --> 30:16.142
[UNKNOWN]: Why isn't there some sort of protection on airliners?

30:16.202 --> 30:20.364
[UNKNOWN]: And I was solely the incident that happened on the Hudson, birds took that one down as well.

30:20.890 --> 30:35.031
[UNKNOWN]: I'm certainly not an engineer nor a pilot so what I'm about to say is as useless as it sounds but I would think that like even if you had some sort of mesh, you know at that speed and with the wind that's moving through there.

30:36.012 --> 30:39.954
[UNKNOWN]: it's still gonna put a puree of bird into that anyway.

30:39.994 --> 30:40.414
[UNKNOWN]: You got it.

30:40.574 --> 30:42.235
[UNKNOWN]: Would be my guess, but I think you're right.

30:42.335 --> 30:51.098
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, they do testing where they shoot literally frozen turkeys, when screens of fighter jets, but it's just that front part of the windscreen, because that's like the most vulnerable part.

30:51.278 --> 30:54.379
[UNKNOWN]: And they can hold up to getting a turkey shot at it.

30:54.559 --> 30:55.039
[UNKNOWN]: Frozen one.

30:55.940 --> 31:03.143
[UNKNOWN]: So I think you're right, a sparrow, when you're going 600 miles an hour, or even an airliner going 500 miles an hour, it's gonna go through that mesh.

31:04.183 --> 31:18.436
[UNKNOWN]: I guess I, you know, not that this is an engineering podcast, but almost like a, like a spiked cone, like that's made out of blades so that anything that hits it at disperses out of it maybe, but better idea for sure.

31:18.556 --> 31:24.501
[UNKNOWN]: But obviously, I mean, there's no way they haven't thought of everything we could sit here and think of and, and have probably tried it.

31:24.541 --> 31:28.425
[UNKNOWN]: But directed energy lasers on the front of the plane just just saps the birds.

31:28.505 --> 31:28.925
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

31:29.065 --> 31:30.166
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, why not?

31:31.928 --> 31:39.533
[UNKNOWN]: Man, so obviously a tough detour through the actual training portion of becoming a pilot.

31:39.553 --> 31:47.138
[UNKNOWN]: You decide to stick with it once you actually graduated and I guess when did you find out you were going into an F-15?

31:47.778 --> 32:14.592
[UNKNOWN]: So towards the end of T-38, so T-37's was six months, T-38, six months, and then last, you have about a month left or so, and then you do an assignment night, and so I put down my first choice, A-10, second choice F-15E, and the A-10 had a wingspar issue at the time where the wings had to be, they had to ground the fleet for a while, so they didn't take any A-10 pilots, so I mean I got the F-15E man, I got literally no regrets, I'm so grateful I got that, yeah.

32:15.712 --> 32:38.085
[UNKNOWN]: I'm not surprised to hear that you wanted the A10 to start though, I mean, that thing's been a monster slash beast for decades, and I will say, I mean, both aircraft or ones that, from the special operations community that we, you know, there's no more beautiful sight in the world than seeing either of those flying flying overhead.

32:40.226 --> 32:45.428
[UNKNOWN]: So the F-15, what does the strike you'll do that no other plane does?

32:45.508 --> 32:46.128
[UNKNOWN]: Is there a thing?

32:46.448 --> 32:47.689
[UNKNOWN]: I had to wear the shirt too, right?

32:47.729 --> 32:47.969
[UNKNOWN]: Yes.

32:48.189 --> 32:49.710
[UNKNOWN]: So I don't have to tell everybody in the pilot.

32:49.730 --> 32:51.030
[UNKNOWN]: I just get to see it right away.

32:51.390 --> 32:51.850
[UNKNOWN]: It's subtle.

32:52.211 --> 32:52.911
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

32:53.511 --> 32:55.312
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, the F-15 is the workhorse man.

32:55.332 --> 32:57.272
[UNKNOWN]: And you see it right now and Iran doing its thing.

32:57.893 --> 33:06.836
[UNKNOWN]: It's the jet where if you need anything from strafe 20mm to a 5,000 pound bunker buster bomb, the F-15 he can do it.

33:07.556 --> 33:13.659
[UNKNOWN]: It can carry everything in the U.S. bomb inventory besides the Moab and the GV-5730,000 pound bomb.

33:13.699 --> 33:14.819
[UNKNOWN]: That's how first a tile it is.

33:15.679 --> 33:25.904
[UNKNOWN]: The thing I noticed with it a lot is it's just the ability to adapt because you've got two people in there so you can handle a lot more of a workload so you have a whiz-o in the back, fighter pilot in the front and you guys are working like a well-oiled machine.

33:26.204 --> 33:34.147
[UNKNOWN]: You know, you're working like a basketball team that whole time where you can see what's on their screens, they can see what's on your screens, they can be talking to the J-TAC, you can talk to the J-TAC.

33:34.687 --> 33:47.977
[UNKNOWN]: The way that we got divided up was typically the Wizzo would talk to the J-Tak for most of the talk on, and then when it came to calling in, getting clearance, getting the cleared hot, the fighter power, the front would talk, because you're the one pushing the button in the front.

33:48.538 --> 33:52.361
[UNKNOWN]: So the Wizzo in the backs run in a pod, like a sniper pod.

33:52.401 --> 33:54.622
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that thing can see license plates from miles away.

33:54.862 --> 33:55.203
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, wow.

33:55.283 --> 33:55.483
[UNKNOWN]: Right.

33:55.523 --> 33:57.004
[UNKNOWN]: I got a lot of cameras to shame.

33:57.324 --> 33:57.564
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

33:57.765 --> 33:58.365
[UNKNOWN]: Exactly.

33:58.385 --> 33:58.605
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

33:59.686 --> 33:59.886
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

33:59.906 --> 34:00.507
[UNKNOWN]: That's amazing.

34:02.108 --> 34:05.771
[UNKNOWN]: You got two girls, one cup on one hand, two guys, one cockpit on the other.

34:07.633 --> 34:12.337
[UNKNOWN]: Explain the other relationship between Wizzo and Pilot, and are those interchangeable?

34:12.377 --> 34:14.078
[UNKNOWN]: Do you ever switch back and forth?

34:14.719 --> 34:16.040
[UNKNOWN]: So you don't switch back and forth.

34:16.080 --> 34:18.182
[UNKNOWN]: You're really finely tuned for that cockpit.

34:18.202 --> 34:24.788
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, when you look at the Wizzo's cockpit in the back, they've got two hand controllers, like hands on stick and throttle, you know, with all these different buttons on it.

34:25.348 --> 34:26.589
[UNKNOWN]: different than what you have in the front seat.

34:26.809 --> 34:38.235
[UNKNOWN]: So, there's whistles that have left the community, gone to pilot training and then come back as a front seater, but they have to go back through pilot training for a year, initial qualification for about another year and a half or so.

34:38.575 --> 34:44.498
[UNKNOWN]: It's about three years to get a fully functional, maybe three and a half years, fully functional combat F-15E pilot or whistle.

34:45.078 --> 34:53.363
[UNKNOWN]: So, it's not interchangeable, and then when it comes to the F-16, man, transitioning to that, I mean, it's a sports car to me that F-16,

34:54.403 --> 34:56.224
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's like the sports car, it's the crotch rocket.

34:56.324 --> 35:00.005
[UNKNOWN]: It's just fast, responsive, fast, anything you want.

35:00.385 --> 35:06.907
[UNKNOWN]: Kind of like your body is a little more connected to the F-16 I would say, because the stick barely moves, so it's fall pressure oriented.

35:07.427 --> 35:12.608
[UNKNOWN]: So I felt like there were times, especially on the Thunderbirds towards the end, where I was like, yep, that's three inches movement.

35:12.728 --> 35:13.769
[UNKNOWN]: That's six inches movement.

35:13.789 --> 35:15.589
[UNKNOWN]: Like that's how much I could control the F-16.

35:15.849 --> 35:18.210
[UNKNOWN]: So flight controls are so tight, so dialed.

35:18.830 --> 35:26.978
[UNKNOWN]: So when it comes to piloting and just raw pilotage, the F-16's kind of an extension of your body built for dog fighting, 9G monster.

35:27.739 --> 35:29.821
[UNKNOWN]: The 9G's can get you in trouble in the F-16.

35:30.001 --> 35:34.866
[UNKNOWN]: Like I remember flying it, 9G's 400 knots accelerating.

35:35.426 --> 35:39.709
[UNKNOWN]: I used to just push through bad sleep like it was something I had to earn my way out of.

35:40.069 --> 35:47.615
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35:48.095 --> 35:49.256
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35:49.556 --> 35:54.479
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35:54.880 --> 36:03.746
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36:04.172 --> 36:07.533
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36:07.913 --> 36:16.935
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36:17.355 --> 36:23.597
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36:24.077 --> 36:27.880
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36:28.200 --> 36:31.403
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36:31.743 --> 36:39.570
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36:39.790 --> 36:44.754
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36:45.054 --> 36:47.856
[UNKNOWN]: HelixSleep.com slash mic drop.

36:48.880 --> 36:51.382
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, oh, dude, this thing can get me in trouble.

36:51.402 --> 36:53.665
[UNKNOWN]: So you got to have your left hand's got to be there.

36:54.025 --> 36:56.868
[UNKNOWN]: To pull the power back, otherwise you can glock like that.

36:57.008 --> 36:59.150
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it'll just, it's very unforgiving.

36:59.170 --> 37:05.316
[UNKNOWN]: Lost dozens of pilots in glocks because of the F-16's ability to just wrap it on said g. I'm so excited.

37:05.336 --> 37:06.157
[UNKNOWN]: What did you lock in?

37:06.737 --> 37:15.487
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so G-lock, it's kind of, it was in the top-can-maver if they kind of represented it a little bit, but it's when your body doesn't have blood in your brain.

37:16.127 --> 37:24.737
[UNKNOWN]: And so everything, all the blood that's supposed to be running your breathing, your eyes, all that just totally drains in the rest of your body and

37:26.018 --> 37:29.380
[UNKNOWN]: So anybody that stood up fast, it has a low blood pressure, I have a low blood pressure.

37:29.820 --> 37:39.805
[UNKNOWN]: So if you stand up really fast and you feel the stars and all that coming on, and you see the vision kind of goes like this, that's like the beginning sensation of what happens in a G-lock, it's just on steroids.

37:40.546 --> 37:45.929
[UNKNOWN]: So can you say the max speed of the F-15 and F-16?

37:46.741 --> 38:11.132
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, the F-15E that I flew, I think the max speed somewhere around like 1.3 or 1.4 mock, and then the F-15 that has the F-15, I flew has conformal fuel tanks, so it carries like an extra 8,000 pounds of gas, because it's the interdiction strike aircraft, you're going deep into enemy territory, low level, you know, hundreds of miles, drop in bombs, and then fighting your way out, shooting amraams, that makes things like that, so you need a lot of gas.

38:11.692 --> 38:22.597
[UNKNOWN]: So it's not quite as maneuverable, but that's why it's a little slower because of those tanks that are on the side, and then the F-16 People can look it up, I'd say it's a 1.5, 1.7 mox, something like that.

38:22.897 --> 38:23.477
[UNKNOWN]: A little quicker.

38:23.717 --> 38:24.257
[UNKNOWN]: A little quicker.

38:24.277 --> 38:25.098
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, because it's slicker.

38:25.338 --> 38:27.479
[UNKNOWN]: It might even be close to 2 mox 2.

38:28.219 --> 38:31.180
[UNKNOWN]: Just slick jet, especially in F-16 with nothing hanging on it.

38:31.480 --> 38:32.721
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I think just wants to fly.

38:33.301 --> 38:36.285
[UNKNOWN]: And the thing I noticed too is it's speed brakes are like little chopsticks on the back.

38:36.686 --> 38:37.968
[UNKNOWN]: So it's like it's so cute.

38:37.988 --> 38:40.131
[UNKNOWN]: You're going like, you know, mock one.

38:40.151 --> 38:42.754
[UNKNOWN]: You put out these little chopsticks and the air streams like, oh, that's cute.

38:43.155 --> 38:44.416
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you're not slowing down at that time.

38:44.436 --> 38:44.577
[UNKNOWN]: See.

38:45.496 --> 38:46.476
[UNKNOWN]: that's awesome.

38:47.477 --> 38:53.898
[UNKNOWN]: Going back to your first deployment in the F-15 yet 70 combat missions roughly 300 combat hours.

38:56.419 --> 39:00.500
[UNKNOWN]: Talk about working through that deployment, working with special operations.

39:01.460 --> 39:08.342
[UNKNOWN]: I'd love to hear your experience there and the close air support experience from the guy in the air.

39:08.662 --> 39:11.123
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, uh, loved it man.

39:11.163 --> 39:12.424
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, 70 combat missions.

39:12.444 --> 39:13.384
[UNKNOWN]: I did one deployment.

39:13.504 --> 39:22.328
[UNKNOWN]: It was about seven months, long total, six months, six and a half months in Afghanistan, two or three weeks in Qatar at the headquarters there, setting up the airtasking orders and stuff.

39:22.828 --> 39:31.052
[UNKNOWN]: But, yeah, as soon as we hit the country, I mean, we were flying combat missions within 48 hours, and so we did a lot of prep prior to getting there, and then you get in theater.

39:31.952 --> 39:34.813
[UNKNOWN]: And we'd done so much work with J-Tax prior to that, that it was so nice.

39:34.833 --> 39:39.096
[UNKNOWN]: So it was hand-in-glove as far as communications and standards and things like that.

39:39.436 --> 39:40.916
[UNKNOWN]: So then you're just learning the local area.

39:41.096 --> 39:48.720
[UNKNOWN]: So I think that was kind of the big shock to me was, okay, you know, we got Afghanistan broken up and it all these provinces, all these kill boxes.

39:49.060 --> 39:54.443
[UNKNOWN]: So how do I understand this place and know if someone says, hey, there's something going down and coast?

39:54.503 --> 39:56.484
[UNKNOWN]: How do I know, like, immediately where that's at, right?

39:56.504 --> 39:58.205
[UNKNOWN]: So just studying that kind of stuff.

39:59.425 --> 40:07.427
[UNKNOWN]: Even on the way there, studying that kind of stuff, but big picture getting into combat, the big thing was when am I gonna drop my first bomb?

40:07.527 --> 40:08.907
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, my heart was racing, right?

40:08.967 --> 40:10.787
[UNKNOWN]: Every mission up until I drop my first bomb.

40:11.507 --> 40:17.748
[UNKNOWN]: And I think that's the one you kind of get out of the way, and then you're a little more calmer, you can see clear things slow down a little bit.

40:18.269 --> 40:25.370
[UNKNOWN]: So initially, as a young flight lead, I was pretty much a brand new flight lead, going to Afghanistan, that team you up with some of the more experienced weapon systems officers.

40:26.250 --> 40:50.267
[UNKNOWN]: I'm not sure if you guys do something similar with new guys on the team kind of look a little mentor Yeah, yeah, so basically I flew with the same whizzo for about five or six combat missions and they're helping me kind of understand Female whizzo incredible at what she did and so we just walked through you know five or six different combat missions on the fifth or six one We dropped our first bomb Gb38 into an enemy fighting position and then it was on but it was real.

40:50.287 --> 40:51.088
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's awesome.

40:51.308 --> 40:51.468
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah

40:52.808 --> 41:11.171
[UNKNOWN]: What was the emotion I guess you felt if you kind of looked back to junior year of high school, you know, 9-11 all the way now, now you're actually active duty combat pilot dropping a bomb in Afghanistan on an enemy position, you mean how full circle moment is it?

41:11.391 --> 41:12.272
[UNKNOWN]: Dude, it was badass.

41:12.412 --> 41:14.332
[UNKNOWN]: It was like, okay, now I'm in the Super Bowl.

41:14.892 --> 41:19.933
[UNKNOWN]: Like I've trained for the Super Bowl, I've always wanted to be in the Super Bowl and combat missions are

41:20.933 --> 41:23.754
[UNKNOWN]: You know, high stakes, but training missions or high stakes do in a fighter jet, right?

41:23.794 --> 41:31.856
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it's people die just as much in training in these jets as they do in combat, but I feel like at that point I knew that I was at the right place and the right time.

41:32.296 --> 41:35.977
[UNKNOWN]: It's like, okay, I've been prepping for this moment, my whole life, everything's led up to this moment.

41:36.277 --> 41:39.677
[UNKNOWN]: And it was kind of this, you know, it was a calming sensation of like, all right, cool.

41:39.697 --> 41:41.878
[UNKNOWN]: I'm dialed in, I've done the work to get here.

41:42.038 --> 41:44.539
[UNKNOWN]: I know that I'm here for a purpose and I'm making a difference.

41:44.979 --> 41:49.260
[UNKNOWN]: And for me, the big difference was being there for the special operators and the coalition

41:50.520 --> 41:53.764
[UNKNOWN]: I didn't necessarily agree with Iraq and Afghanistan, but I didn't really matter.

41:54.184 --> 41:55.586
[UNKNOWN]: It was about the mission I was flying that day.

41:55.606 --> 42:05.897
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, definitely we'll get into that as well as Iran, but was there a most typical sort of mission that you flew on the Afghanistan appointment?

42:06.577 --> 42:12.621
[UNKNOWN]: A lot of them, the first three months, I was all nights and it was all high value targets with guys like you.

42:13.241 --> 42:15.543
[UNKNOWN]: Some of you guys, we had no idea what unit they were from, right?

42:15.563 --> 42:20.366
[UNKNOWN]: We chope and either brief over the phone or just not brief at all and then do some afteraction stuff, maybe.

42:21.327 --> 42:30.452
[UNKNOWN]: But just whoever would need us that day, it was more high value targeting, scanning the different infill ex-fill routes, looking for anybody trying to ambush, things like that.

42:31.033 --> 42:33.794
[UNKNOWN]: And then hiding our noise signature was one of the big things, right?

42:34.075 --> 42:34.595
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that was...

42:35.055 --> 42:45.221
[UNKNOWN]: That was the first three months was nighttime, and then after those three months that I went to daytime, and then that was seemed like it was more big army type operations going on, still some high value targeting stuff.

42:45.761 --> 42:49.803
[UNKNOWN]: But at that point, I dropped a lot more bombs during the daytime, and I did a night.

42:50.784 --> 43:05.372
[UNKNOWN]: was there a most commonly used munition that you dropped so when I got into theater we had just started bringing on GPU 54s and actually so our formation dropped so many of them one day that they but we had to pause on the GPU 54s because

43:06.893 --> 43:21.864
[UNKNOWN]: They were they had like 40 of them or something rolling in to they were on their way there and we had like I don't know Eight of them between my formation and we dropped all eight one day Tour of the manufacturers sent you a plaque for a customer of the mountains pretty much yeah, exactly.

43:21.984 --> 43:27.568
[UNKNOWN]: What's the specs on that so the difference in that GPU 54 is it's a 500 pound bomb.

43:28.028 --> 43:34.873
[UNKNOWN]: It's GPS guided and laser guided so the thing that's amazing and why it was great for Afghanistan was the mountainous terrain

43:35.493 --> 43:38.075
[UNKNOWN]: So with GPU 12s is what we are dropping up until that point.

43:38.895 --> 43:47.500
[UNKNOWN]: You know this, as soon as you take the laser off of a target, some of those GPU 12s with that older technology, they'll try to go to wherever the laser is.

43:48.081 --> 43:51.363
[UNKNOWN]: And they might go stupid if the laser turns off in flight.

43:51.463 --> 43:55.605
[UNKNOWN]: And so that's a big problem with mountains and masking and things like that.

43:56.306 --> 43:58.407
[UNKNOWN]: And so that's why they brought on the GPU 54.

43:58.447 --> 44:02.630
[UNKNOWN]: So it actually, as you're lasing it in, it's updating the GPS coordinates.

44:05.091 --> 44:11.814
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and you can just turn if you're going to mask it and go around a mountain just turn the laser off and it'll go to the last point of the laser as a GPS coordinate.

44:12.214 --> 44:13.295
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, what kind of does both?

44:13.395 --> 44:14.496
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, let's go.

44:14.976 --> 44:20.078
[UNKNOWN]: Do you know, is it 500 pounds of explosives or the entire thing weighs 500 pounds?

44:20.098 --> 44:21.239
[UNKNOWN]: The entire thing weighs 500.

44:21.339 --> 44:23.980
[UNKNOWN]: Do you know about how much explosive weight that is?

44:24.120 --> 44:33.123
[UNKNOWN]: I would say you're looking at a solid 300, maybe more, the other parts are just, you know, thin, thinner metal, thins, guidance kits, and things like that.

44:33.143 --> 44:35.764
[UNKNOWN]: So it could be 400 pounds of Tritonol.

44:35.804 --> 44:42.867
[UNKNOWN]: You know, ballpark kind of what the max effective range in a relatively wide open space of a bomb like that's going to take care of.

44:43.107 --> 44:57.716
[UNKNOWN]: Yes, look, the CD numbers, those were classified right, the exact numbers that we could drop to enter close and all that stuff, but I would say probably within 30 yards, like a kilzone of like 30 yards or something like that for a 500 pounder.

44:58.737 --> 45:04.159
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, there's a part of me that thinks it should be wider than that, you know?

45:04.339 --> 45:07.180
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and sometimes you want, you could do an air burst.

45:07.480 --> 45:12.102
[UNKNOWN]: So you could have these things air bursts above, and we would do that with the 2,000 pounders more.

45:12.162 --> 45:15.623
[UNKNOWN]: So just if there was enemy fighting positions, dudes up on a hillside,

45:16.304 --> 45:32.241
[UNKNOWN]: Treating mortars at a fob or something like that then we would just do a 2000 pound air burst over top of the whole hillside a couple a couple of those that that was kind of the best use of the air burst with a bigger bombs The 500 pounders you could air burst them, but yeah, their effective range didn't come close to the 2000 pounders.

45:32.341 --> 45:32.481
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah

45:33.222 --> 45:37.945
[UNKNOWN]: Would you say the 500 and the 2000 or the two most common munitions you carried or dropped, I guess?

45:38.225 --> 45:54.756
[UNKNOWN]: Yep, they were, you know, a 20 mic mic as well with high explosive incendiary tips on the bolts, like little mini grenades, but the F-18s, blasted off of a carrier, I believe in the F-18 pilots out there can correct me on this, but a thousand pounds is as heavy as they get, coming off of a carrier, but for air force,

45:55.957 --> 45:58.620
[UNKNOWN]: F-15E's 2,000 pounders and 500 pounders.

45:58.640 --> 45:59.882
[UNKNOWN]: The Viper, the F-16.

45:59.902 --> 46:02.125
[UNKNOWN]: I don't think it carries the 2,000 pounder very often.

46:02.426 --> 46:05.810
[UNKNOWN]: I think it can on the centerline, but it's not very maneuverable with that on there.

46:05.930 --> 46:06.111
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

46:06.611 --> 46:07.693
[UNKNOWN]: So, in kind of a...

46:09.039 --> 46:16.802
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know, habadashery, style armament, like what's the maximum armament and F-15 that you flow could carry, like a combination of everything.

46:17.042 --> 46:18.603
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so it could be loaded to the teeth.

46:18.663 --> 46:28.226
[UNKNOWN]: So our main combat loadout would be 3 GB of 54s, 3 GB of 38s, and then a 2,000 pounder on the center line, and then AMRAMs.

46:28.286 --> 46:31.808
[UNKNOWN]: So we always flew with AMRAMs, always flew with AM9X's just in case.

46:32.388 --> 46:37.170
[UNKNOWN]: And yeah, I got close to using an AMRAM on an Iranian jet one day, you can cover that story in a little bit.

46:38.590 --> 46:41.131
[UNKNOWN]: Air, air, air, air, air, air, air missile.

46:41.251 --> 46:49.155
[UNKNOWN]: Amrams, like the medium range missile, it's using radar guidance, and then the Am9Xs, those are the ones that use the heat seeking, and that's, I mean, it's amazing how it works.

46:49.175 --> 47:04.162
[UNKNOWN]: You have a Gehamex helmet, joint helmet mounted cuing system, and so you're looking out, and you can see, you know, like a circle over friendlies, triangle over enemies, you can see, you know, ground forces, where different people are along the battle space, pumps it all into your helmet.

47:04.542 --> 47:08.645
[UNKNOWN]: And then you can actually use that helmet to target and it's called Slave, the Am9.

47:08.685 --> 47:16.470
[UNKNOWN]: I actually can slave it to wherever you want so I could select a button with my hand and just move the Am9x around like this and just lock on to what I wanted to.

47:16.490 --> 47:17.891
[UNKNOWN]: It's like a video game.

47:17.931 --> 47:18.272
[UNKNOWN]: Cool it.

47:18.432 --> 47:19.112
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

47:19.132 --> 47:20.893
[UNKNOWN]: That's amazing.

47:20.933 --> 47:22.014
[UNKNOWN]: The technology's insane.

47:22.194 --> 47:22.815
[UNKNOWN]: And I love tech.

47:22.835 --> 47:26.817
[UNKNOWN]: Obviously, if you can't tell from the channel I created, I go back to tech all the time.

47:33.704 --> 47:50.991
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so it would be like six, 500 pounders with three of them being GV-54, three of them being GV-38, GV-38s, GV-38s are only GPS, no laser guidance there, and then a 2,000 pounder on the center line, and then two AMRAMs and two AMRAMs and two AMRAMs and two AMRAMs, and then how many, 20, 180 millimeter, 500, 500 rounds.

47:51.471 --> 47:54.833
[UNKNOWN]: Dude, that's a hell of an armament, I mean, dude.

47:55.153 --> 47:56.133
[UNKNOWN]: That's why it's the workhorse.

47:56.153 --> 47:59.734
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that's what, how many thousands of pounds total is that?

48:01.155 --> 48:04.378
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, I want to say the thinking carry 20,000 pounds of ordinance too.

48:04.398 --> 48:04.978
[UNKNOWN]: That's crazy.

48:04.998 --> 48:07.360
[UNKNOWN]: Total because you can carry a 5,000 pound bomb in the center line.

48:07.380 --> 48:07.900
[UNKNOWN]: No problem.

48:08.060 --> 48:12.444
[UNKNOWN]: You just carry 2,000 pounders just because 5,000 would be a little too much firepower.

48:13.164 --> 48:16.227
[UNKNOWN]: It's going to seem like a five year old's asking in this question.

48:17.147 --> 48:25.216
[UNKNOWN]: I'm into bikes as well, and I know something as simple as a full tank versus an almost empty tank you can tell in the handling.

48:26.978 --> 48:31.403
[UNKNOWN]: If you're dropping a 2,000 pounder, do you feel it?

48:31.604 --> 48:34.567
[UNKNOWN]: Is it all of a sudden way more maneuverable?

48:34.747 --> 48:38.191
[UNKNOWN]: Or you can tell you dropped it and it moves the aircraft when you drop it.

48:38.331 --> 48:39.231
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you got it man.

48:39.332 --> 48:39.872
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you do.

48:39.952 --> 48:40.432
[UNKNOWN]: You feel it.

48:40.632 --> 48:41.473
[UNKNOWN]: It falls off.

48:41.493 --> 48:42.253
[UNKNOWN]: You feel like a drink.

48:42.393 --> 48:43.173
[UNKNOWN]: You can hear it.

48:43.193 --> 48:43.834
[UNKNOWN]: You can feel it.

48:44.194 --> 48:45.474
[UNKNOWN]: And then we would always check the bomb.

48:45.615 --> 48:48.196
[UNKNOWN]: So as soon as you release it, you just roll up.

48:48.496 --> 48:49.336
[UNKNOWN]: Slightly upside down.

48:49.416 --> 48:51.037
[UNKNOWN]: Look, make sure the fence all looked good.

48:51.097 --> 48:51.777
[UNKNOWN]: Do a quick check.

48:52.038 --> 48:57.320
[UNKNOWN]: Because if you release it and for some reason, you see a fin broke and it's going off this way.

48:57.420 --> 48:58.240
[UNKNOWN]: Okay, we got to read a tack.

48:58.481 --> 48:58.961
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

48:59.021 --> 49:01.342
[UNKNOWN]: And oh, by the way, let's take a peek where is that bomb going.

49:01.522 --> 49:01.742
[UNKNOWN]: Right.

49:02.202 --> 49:03.382
[UNKNOWN]: You should probably keep track of that.

49:03.983 --> 49:06.763
[UNKNOWN]: So you feel it right away, the jet handle is so much better.

49:07.503 --> 49:10.024
[UNKNOWN]: And then we were fly with also big wing tanks.

49:10.324 --> 49:12.764
[UNKNOWN]: So not only were we carrying all those bombs I talked about.

49:12.784 --> 49:15.305
[UNKNOWN]: We were carrying 9,000 pounds of gas.

49:15.825 --> 49:17.445
[UNKNOWN]: And those big, they're called bags.

49:17.845 --> 49:21.546
[UNKNOWN]: They look like some people think their bombs, but they're actually big bags of gas.

49:22.046 --> 49:27.747
[UNKNOWN]: So that's why we would carry that on there because you get a huge loss in performance, but we could loiter.

49:28.087 --> 49:28.227
[UNKNOWN]: Right.

49:28.247 --> 49:29.868
[UNKNOWN]: We could stay above for two hours.

49:30.028 --> 49:30.508
[UNKNOWN]: We needed to.

49:32.328 --> 49:37.851
[UNKNOWN]: You said you almost used one of your air-to-air missiles and that was over Iran?

49:38.452 --> 49:39.752
[UNKNOWN]: It was about to be.

49:40.072 --> 49:40.253
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

49:40.493 --> 50:00.143
[UNKNOWN]: So, we've come back from a mission, your mission were like four or five hours, we're just getting done, some came up, we're doing low-level flying on the way back so we would just keep our low-level currency high because a lot of our missions were up in the cast wheel, right close to our support wheel and so on the way home from wherever we were, I don't know where I was and this maybe I was in Hellmander or something like that.

50:00.663 --> 50:03.884
[UNKNOWN]: And then we're coming back to low levels there, insane, by the way.

50:03.924 --> 50:10.827
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it's the most gorgeous place you'd ever think of, but we're doing our low levels, going back through, and then all of a sudden we get a message from Pyramid.

50:10.907 --> 50:24.891
[UNKNOWN]: And that's when it's, I think it was like Pyramid was the main general or something, as soon as we got a Pyramid directs, that means, hey, dude, this is serious, drop everything you're doing, look what's going on, look at, look at, look and see where the target is, because you were about to drop a bomb.

50:25.231 --> 50:29.213
[UNKNOWN]: That's what I always, every time I heard Pyramid directs, I'm like, okay, get ready, we're about to drop a bomb.

50:29.713 --> 50:34.377
[UNKNOWN]: But this time it was pyramid directs and it had the screens are incredible on the F-15.

50:34.437 --> 50:40.382
[UNKNOWN]: So it's basically like a text message, high fidelity text message, but it has graphical aspects to it.

50:40.842 --> 50:49.770
[UNKNOWN]: And the line was pointed over towards Iran and there was a red Dorito, which is that's the ultimate sign of a hostile bandit that you're supposed to target.

50:50.170 --> 50:52.252
[UNKNOWN]: And so I'm like, well, this is way different, right?

50:52.292 --> 50:54.014
[UNKNOWN]: Never seen that before, since I'd been there.

50:54.474 --> 50:56.235
[UNKNOWN]: So I get the pyramid directs message.

50:56.896 --> 51:22.926
[UNKNOWN]: with own ira like let's go man we get where the flight lead so I go up into a wall formation and we select max after burner and we're just just humping up hillman just getting up as high as we can because we're in that heavy jet we've got I think that day we didn't hadn't dropped any bombs so we got six bombs two thousand pounder full bags of gas and like we're about to do an air to air engagement this is not the place you want to be and this is not the energy state you want to be in if you're going up against you know a

51:26.087 --> 51:33.550
[UNKNOWN]: But I'm not about to punch my bombs off right now because maybe this turns out to be nothing and then I need to go to a troops and contact situation And I show up with nothing, right?

51:33.650 --> 51:48.097
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that's that's yeah, it's not a place you want to be in So We start going uphill just as much gas as I can throw on those flames man as high as we can get You know, so we're getting up into the high 20s or so and then I start to get some information

51:48.917 --> 51:53.220
[UNKNOWN]: Now, the fidelity of that information is classified, but the fact that we can get it isn't.

51:53.320 --> 51:57.763
[UNKNOWN]: So I can basically use systems on my jet to determine what aircraft I'm going up against.

51:58.283 --> 52:00.484
[UNKNOWN]: And so in this case, I was like, hey, this is a fast mover.

52:00.524 --> 52:03.406
[UNKNOWN]: It's going 500 miles plus, 500 miles an hour is plus.

52:04.306 --> 52:13.172
[UNKNOWN]: And I won't tell you the exact print that I saw, the print is the type of jet you're seeing, but it's probably, I would assume F5, F4 or F14.

52:13.312 --> 52:14.813
[UNKNOWN]: I think it was probably an F5 or an F4.

52:15.793 --> 52:18.015
[UNKNOWN]: But it's going to give you a lot of information that help you fight it.

52:18.515 --> 52:28.221
[UNKNOWN]: So it's telling me, okay, here's how I need to fight it, here's how it might, and then my brain on my cows that are going to try to jam me, all these different things, what's my offset, how do I put myself in a position to shoot this guy not get shot down.

52:28.721 --> 52:38.967
[UNKNOWN]: So my brain is switching from close air support mindset, which I've been in for three months at that point, to now offensive counter air or defensive counter air, depending on what this guy is planning on doing.

52:39.647 --> 52:55.330
[UNKNOWN]: And so we get up to about 30,000 feet, and we're above where I think we were actually below supersonic barely because our bombs were limited to keep us under supersonic, but the goal would be to get supersonic as fast as you can and get your missiles at this guy's face as soon as possible.

52:56.111 --> 52:59.193
[UNKNOWN]: But I didn't go over supersonic so I didn't over speed my bombs again.

52:59.213 --> 53:12.762
[UNKNOWN]: I might need to use those in a little bit And so my wingman and I are literally 30 seconds away from release in an amrim and then this this jet crosses over the border in Afghanistan And it turns around about 30 seconds before I was about to hammer down amrim master.

53:12.802 --> 53:14.823
[UNKNOWN]: I'm hot everything's ready to rock and roll

53:15.723 --> 53:16.484
[UNKNOWN]: We got the shoot queue.

53:16.624 --> 53:18.925
[UNKNOWN]: You had a shoot queue in your HUD that shows you how you're in-range.

53:19.246 --> 53:20.026
[UNKNOWN]: This is a hostile.

53:20.506 --> 53:21.207
[UNKNOWN]: Everything's good.

53:21.227 --> 53:24.509
[UNKNOWN]: You know, we've got clearance to fire from Pyramid and he turned around right at the right time.

53:24.870 --> 53:25.130
[UNKNOWN]: Damn.

53:25.210 --> 53:25.410
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

53:26.291 --> 53:31.735
[UNKNOWN]: Is it like in Top Gun where if that's the case his dashboards lighten up saying, oh yeah.

53:31.895 --> 53:32.075
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

53:32.395 --> 53:32.615
[UNKNOWN]: Oh yeah.

53:32.655 --> 53:33.496
[UNKNOWN]: He was fully lit up.

53:33.556 --> 53:33.736
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

53:33.796 --> 53:34.797
[UNKNOWN]: That's absolutely cool.

53:34.997 --> 53:35.657
[UNKNOWN]: If it was working.

53:35.858 --> 53:36.998
[UNKNOWN]: If his technology was working.

53:37.139 --> 53:38.700
[UNKNOWN]: So a lot of times those are Ronnie and Jets.

53:39.880 --> 53:41.401
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, they're fighter pilots are smart.

53:41.421 --> 53:48.244
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, even Reza Palavi, the leader of the opposition, he was in F5 pilot back in the day before everything went to hell.

53:48.824 --> 53:51.225
[UNKNOWN]: And so, they know that there's certain ranges.

53:51.245 --> 53:54.947
[UNKNOWN]: They don't know the exact range, but they probably have done their own math and study.

53:54.967 --> 53:57.028
[UNKNOWN]: And they know, okay, we're going to test this.

53:57.048 --> 54:01.550
[UNKNOWN]: We're going to see the US response, see what they can do, and then turn around right before we die.

54:02.470 --> 54:06.913
[UNKNOWN]: But I don't I don't have any thought that their systems are on point all the time.

54:07.133 --> 54:16.079
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, they're maintenance is terrible You mentioned we'd just say over aired your bombs or over what your bomb over sped over sped what does that mean?

54:16.379 --> 54:29.408
[UNKNOWN]: So over speeding so those especially when you're carrying Gb12s they have that little Conical seeker on the front and if you look at it, it's it just flows in the air stream I mean like so during the walk around so we would go and that's it's a little laser seeker on the front

54:29.868 --> 54:45.254
[UNKNOWN]: and you can just move it until you pull a pin prior to take off and then that laser seeker now can as it's in the air stream the bombs fly in this way but the laser seeker's here and it can look down and see where you're shining your laser and so that things like some sort of carbon fiber I would say but it's

54:46.014 --> 54:46.434
[UNKNOWN]: fragile.

54:46.474 --> 54:53.076
[UNKNOWN]: So when you get into supersonic shock waves and things like that, you can break that seeker and then the bombs likely knock in a work.

54:53.396 --> 54:53.716
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, wow.

54:53.976 --> 55:01.618
[UNKNOWN]: So I have a situation too with that where I was going to help a seal and I'm like trying to get there as fast as I can and I was so pissed at those bombs.

55:01.678 --> 55:07.120
[UNKNOWN]: I was like, I'm about to punch these bombs off of my jet because they're keeping me under supersonic while this guy's under fire.

55:07.760 --> 55:10.282
[UNKNOWN]: We can get to that a little bit later, but that is a limitation.

55:10.302 --> 55:14.465
[UNKNOWN]: That's another reason why they brought in the GB of 54, because that didn't have that conical seeker.

55:14.885 --> 55:16.566
[UNKNOWN]: It had the ability to not use that.

55:16.987 --> 55:18.228
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, yeah.

55:19.308 --> 55:27.755
[UNKNOWN]: Kind of in that same realm of going too fast for that, I am curious the amraims in the any air to air missile.

55:27.975 --> 55:34.319
[UNKNOWN]: If you're at, this is going to seem like another five-year-old question, but I've always wondered, like, how fast are those things going?

55:34.339 --> 55:35.761
[UNKNOWN]: Because if you're at full tilt,

55:36.641 --> 55:50.315
[UNKNOWN]: can you still shoot them at full speed and it will still obviously go away from you I mean what is it like mock five yeah, don't worry about something like a five rule because if I start asking questions about seal operations, I'm gonna sound like a two-year-old so we're good

55:51.837 --> 56:03.985
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, the goal is to get your jet up above supersonic and then you're just giving it a boost and then those things I think go mock three If I'm right, so if you're supersonic and then it's going mock three, so you're looking like I mean, dude.

56:04.005 --> 56:04.826
[UNKNOWN]: Really fast.

56:04.986 --> 56:11.871
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, well, are there any of the 70 combat missions you flew or are there some that

56:12.431 --> 56:17.775
[UNKNOWN]: that you haven't already mentioned that really stand out as being memorable or impactful kind of looking back on.

56:18.116 --> 56:21.278
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, I could just start going down the list.

56:21.318 --> 56:22.339
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, if that's okay.

56:22.399 --> 56:23.840
[UNKNOWN]: It's coming off if I go too long.

56:23.860 --> 56:24.241
[UNKNOWN]: No, no.

56:24.261 --> 56:25.922
[UNKNOWN]: No, no, no.

56:25.942 --> 56:29.725
[UNKNOWN]: Well, the one I'll start with just since it's fresh on my mind was that that one where

56:30.926 --> 56:34.770
[UNKNOWN]: We were sitting alert, we get called to a troops and contacts.

56:35.330 --> 56:39.354
[UNKNOWN]: This was near-boggrum, maybe within like 100 miles of boggrum.

56:40.075 --> 56:44.459
[UNKNOWN]: And we get called and they say, hey, there's a seal that's pinned down.

56:44.960 --> 56:45.760
[UNKNOWN]: Separated from his team.

56:45.780 --> 56:46.761
[UNKNOWN]: We need you guys there now.

56:47.402 --> 56:49.184
[UNKNOWN]: And so we're like, yep, on it, right?

56:49.224 --> 56:49.844
[UNKNOWN]: It's by himself.

56:50.883 --> 57:00.109
[UNKNOWN]: The team was there, but from this from what the J-Tak had told me there was a separation that occurred where he was somehow isolated and then they were taking fire.

57:01.550 --> 57:08.454
[UNKNOWN]: And so we blast off or sitting reserved, and I'm trying to get there as fast as I can, but I have these GB-12s on my jet.

57:08.715 --> 57:11.957
[UNKNOWN]: And so I'm like if I show up to this thing with no bombs I can drop.

57:12.517 --> 57:14.659
[UNKNOWN]: Like, then I'm really going to hear about this, right?

57:14.720 --> 57:16.842
[UNKNOWN]: But I want to get there as fast as I can at the same time.

57:17.262 --> 57:18.764
[UNKNOWN]: So I'm like sitting there like, God damn it.

57:18.784 --> 57:19.925
[UNKNOWN]: Like, let's go, come on.

57:19.945 --> 57:21.928
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I'm just saying there are mock 0.99.

57:21.968 --> 57:24.010
[UNKNOWN]: Let me just watching it on my hood and just like, God damn it.

57:24.871 --> 57:25.652
[UNKNOWN]: mock 0.99.

57:25.712 --> 57:26.333
[UNKNOWN]: Okay, here we go.

57:26.513 --> 57:28.675
[UNKNOWN]: And so that's again, another reason why we were all frustrated.

57:28.735 --> 57:30.257
[UNKNOWN]: Sometimes about those GPU 12s.

57:31.430 --> 57:41.535
[UNKNOWN]: And so as we get closer, we start to hear that, hey man, there's a group of people coming from this town and they're going to wear this guy's hat, like what do you want to do?

57:41.615 --> 57:43.536
[UNKNOWN]: Kind of the J-Tax working with us, what can we do?

57:43.556 --> 57:47.238
[UNKNOWN]: Because we're working this before we got there, we're probably, you know, five, six minutes out.

57:48.744 --> 57:59.857
[UNKNOWN]: And so I'm talking with my whiz on, I'm like, look, if we try to, if these people are going to get closer and closer to this seal, and we try to get up there and get an eyeline, whereas the friendly's at, there's two locations of friendly's, right?

58:00.197 --> 58:06.844
[UNKNOWN]: At this point, there's hostels that are coming from a town that's going to take, that's going to take 70 minutes, potentially to get a bomb off.

58:07.465 --> 58:11.950
[UNKNOWN]: like this doesn't make sense, and so I'm like, hey, tell them we're gonna just, we're gonna float, where's the crowd?

58:12.230 --> 58:17.516
[UNKNOWN]: Tell them to give us the coordinates to where the lot, like where's the main part of the crowd massing and where are they moving to?

58:18.036 --> 58:19.558
[UNKNOWN]: Where's the sky that's isolated?

58:20.339 --> 58:24.062
[UNKNOWN]: And then I just talked to my whiz, and I was like, let's just fly right over the crowd right now.

58:24.603 --> 58:39.631
[UNKNOWN]: Like as soon as we can and let them know we're here and then we'll pop up and grab a nine line and if they're still messing around we'll try to drop old strafe because it's probably gonna be danger close at that point and so we're coming in and I'm thinking to myself alright how do I get this crowd away from this guy?

58:40.251 --> 58:48.416
[UNKNOWN]: Well if I flow over 500 feet okay I've been in an air show 500 feet's nice it's pretty but I don't know that's gonna probably affect anybody's behavior.

58:49.676 --> 58:52.920
[UNKNOWN]: So I'm like, hey, are you okay if we go low talking to the whiz on the back?

58:52.940 --> 58:53.581
[UNKNOWN]: I didn't say hello.

58:53.601 --> 58:55.343
[UNKNOWN]: I was like, are you okay if we go low?

58:56.224 --> 59:01.870
[UNKNOWN]: And he's like, yeah, so we're going in and then as I'm rolling in, I get a contact on my radar and it's a helicopter.

59:03.171 --> 59:08.577
[UNKNOWN]: Prior to if the location here where the seal is isolated is here,

59:09.638 --> 59:25.249
[UNKNOWN]: There was a helicopter like right here and there was a lot of civilian helicopters in that area where you had to be careful because they weren't talking to anybody It's like the equivalent of a crop duster like they would be dropping off mail or doing something like that and so I'm coming in and the helicopters at 400 or so feet

59:26.510 --> 59:37.735
[UNKNOWN]: So I'm thinking to myself, if I come over at 500 feet anyway, I'm gonna go belly up to his helicopter Maybe he climbs and I hit a helicopter like I'm not doing that So I got to go lower and so I just called to the back seat.

59:37.815 --> 59:49.100
[UNKNOWN]: I was like hey check the laws off Losses the low altitude warning system and I'll never forget it the wizard was like it's already off I was like yeah, buddy.

59:49.620 --> 59:50.041
[UNKNOWN]: Let's go.

59:50.081 --> 59:52.422
[UNKNOWN]: We both know we're going low today and so

59:53.382 --> 01:00:08.456
[UNKNOWN]: The last altitude I remember seeing was about 150 feet in my hood and we're coming up over this ridge across the ridge line and I know the town is right over at the Wizos got the target right over where the last known position of that crowd was, that was making their way there, supposedly with AK-47s and pitchforks or whatever.

01:00:09.116 --> 01:00:12.400
[UNKNOWN]: And so we come over the ridge line and I roll over and I just take this thing down.

01:00:12.520 --> 01:00:20.508
[UNKNOWN]: I'm about 400 knots I take this thing down to somewhere between a hundred feet in the ground and I selected Max afterburner right over top of his little triangle.

01:00:20.528 --> 01:00:28.136
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, and Doss, I look back and I pull up right over top of that triangle and dust just goes everywhere, right?

01:00:28.937 --> 01:00:32.199
[UNKNOWN]: And we climb up and the J-Tax like, they're dispersing.

01:00:32.920 --> 01:00:39.564
[UNKNOWN]: I was like, yes, and I think that was one, another one of those moments where I was like, I'm exactly where I need to be, no where else I want to be.

01:00:40.105 --> 01:00:41.265
[UNKNOWN]: But I broke the rules, right?

01:00:41.365 --> 01:00:43.687
[UNKNOWN]: Like, we're supposed to be at 500 feet below the hard deck.

01:00:43.707 --> 01:00:44.447
[UNKNOWN]: We'll blow the hard deck.

01:00:44.948 --> 01:00:45.148
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:00:45.588 --> 01:00:48.010
[UNKNOWN]: But that rule, that rule that day would have got someone killed, I think.

01:00:48.070 --> 01:00:48.310
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:00:48.450 --> 01:00:48.930
[UNKNOWN]: Potentially.

01:00:49.090 --> 01:00:49.271
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:00:49.511 --> 01:00:49.751
[UNKNOWN]: You know.

01:00:50.071 --> 01:00:53.252
[UNKNOWN]: Summer loosened everything up and now it's all coming back at once.

01:00:53.732 --> 01:00:59.214
[UNKNOWN]: Earlier alarms, packed calendar, more on your plate before 9 a.m. and you had all day in July.

01:00:59.594 --> 01:01:04.355
[UNKNOWN]: When everything picks back up like that, the first thing most people do is drop their routines.

01:01:04.875 --> 01:01:06.856
[UNKNOWN]: But AG1 is the one thing.

01:01:07.316 --> 01:01:08.417
[UNKNOWN]: I didn't renegotiate.

01:01:08.838 --> 01:01:13.542
[UNKNOWN]: AG1 sent me their product and I use it every single day, then you should too.

01:01:13.822 --> 01:01:18.246
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01:01:18.606 --> 01:01:23.630
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01:01:23.931 --> 01:01:31.778
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01:01:32.358 --> 01:01:43.991
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01:01:44.411 --> 01:01:51.900
[UNKNOWN]: It can help maintain energy and support immune health, which matters a lot heading into fall when everything is running at full speed again.

01:01:52.280 --> 01:02:03.269
[UNKNOWN]: For a limited time, save 20% on your first subscription order of AG1 next gen or AG1 pro at drinkag1.com slash mic drop.

01:02:03.530 --> 01:02:07.233
[UNKNOWN]: That's drinkag1.com slash mic drop.

01:02:08.634 --> 01:02:09.855
[UNKNOWN]: Do that's so cool, man.

01:02:10.796 --> 01:02:18.422
[UNKNOWN]: Do you ever have conversations or the ability to link up with guys that you drop for on the ground after the fact?

01:02:19.395 --> 01:02:38.106
[UNKNOWN]: A couple times, I had a situation where I was working with this J-Tech, I'll never forget his call sign, Jaguar, eight, four, and I won't say his name because I don't know if his family wants to release, but unfortunately he died a couple months after I left, but we worked together for weeks targeting these teams out of Pakistan.

01:02:38.667 --> 01:02:46.711
[UNKNOWN]: They were like, either cudsforces or touching rebels or someone that was really good at what they were doing, and so for whatever reason, the

01:02:47.812 --> 01:02:51.176
[UNKNOWN]: ground forces commander at the time made that these guys like priority number one.

01:02:51.596 --> 01:02:55.560
[UNKNOWN]: And so Jaguar eight foreign eye we worked together with those blimps that would go up.

01:02:55.580 --> 01:03:00.585
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know if you saw a lot of that but they would just go up on tethers and they really high fidelity cameras.

01:03:01.486 --> 01:03:10.316
[UNKNOWN]: And so we got to talk a lot because we were talking about how do we use this technology to give us higher fidelity data, how do we interact with

01:03:11.156 --> 01:03:19.645
[UNKNOWN]: With you having maybe more information than most J-Tax would have and can we be cleared type 3 if we get type 3 means?

01:03:19.725 --> 01:03:20.826
[UNKNOWN]: It's just like weapons free.

01:03:20.846 --> 01:03:25.190
[UNKNOWN]: You know, like if you have high fidelity data on these guys can we be cleared type 3 early?

01:03:25.791 --> 01:03:28.133
[UNKNOWN]: Little conversations like that made us way more lethal.

01:03:28.614 --> 01:03:31.357
[UNKNOWN]: So I remember rolling in one day with him with Jaguar 84.

01:03:31.597 --> 01:03:34.239
[UNKNOWN]: Sure enough, we see this little team probably like

01:03:34.880 --> 01:03:55.210
[UNKNOWN]: nine guys that were carrying mortar tubes and IED making equipment like huge backpacks, a couple Russian mortar tubes or whatever they had, and he was like reading, he was telling us like the color of the guy's sandals, you know, and he's like, I want you to take out this guy first because he's got the mortar tube, so if we take him and even if some of these other guys get away, like at least they won't have the mortar tube, right?

01:03:55.650 --> 01:03:57.031
[UNKNOWN]: And so we rolled in as a formation,

01:03:57.931 --> 01:04:23.085
[UNKNOWN]: dropped two sign of the nice thing with the F-15E is just like the way that you can see where your flight mates are at is second and then it's done so I could put my wingman right next to me see my wingman's lock line making sure it's going to the right target making sure I knew where the friendly is where I can see all that as the flight lead in my F-15 so we do a 180 we spin around and we queue up to GPU 54s and then we simultaneously drop on the two dudes that had the mortar tubes I mean that they were probably

01:04:23.625 --> 01:04:42.820
[UNKNOWN]: ten feet from each other but they just have instantly evaporated right and then all the other guys scatter out into the woods and so not all of them some of them also you know we're eliminated then but a few of them scatter out into the woods and then so with his with that camera we're watching where they went we're getting direct coordinates on where they are so we come back around we do it again.

01:04:43.460 --> 01:05:04.966
[UNKNOWN]: Two more GB 54s and then we come around and do it a third time and that's when we actually reduce the Cape the quantity of GB 54 so much We had to go back to GB 12s for a little bit Because we didn't have many of them in the theater, but yeah, I think it was six GB 54s and then after that we rolled in and strafed that whole area to try to get rid of the backpacks the any of the weapons the bombs I run the backpacks

01:05:05.826 --> 01:05:07.947
[UNKNOWN]: How many targets total did you guys take out?

01:05:07.987 --> 01:05:09.308
[UNKNOWN]: Do you know or roughly?

01:05:09.548 --> 01:05:11.028
[UNKNOWN]: We got all nine of those guys.

01:05:11.068 --> 01:05:12.489
[UNKNOWN]: Wow, do you have some amazing?

01:05:14.890 --> 01:05:19.332
[UNKNOWN]: Do you know longest time in seat, sort of you ever conducted?

01:05:19.512 --> 01:05:19.812
[UNKNOWN]: I do.

01:05:20.192 --> 01:05:20.772
[UNKNOWN]: Never forget it.

01:05:21.693 --> 01:05:24.734
[UNKNOWN]: It was actually the 10,000th hour of flying.

01:05:25.675 --> 01:05:27.995
[UNKNOWN]: There's a jet that went over 10,000 flight hours.

01:05:28.056 --> 01:05:29.696
[UNKNOWN]: I flew in combat and on that mission.

01:05:30.216 --> 01:05:31.217
[UNKNOWN]: We're up and flying.

01:05:31.297 --> 01:05:32.237
[UNKNOWN]: We flew our four hours.

01:05:32.257 --> 01:05:33.758
[UNKNOWN]: Typically it's about four hour combat missions.

01:05:34.338 --> 01:05:50.093
[UNKNOWN]: And then a snowstorm rolls in the massive snowstorm rolls in over Bogram just starts dumping and so it hung out over the field for about another three hours So seven hours total in that aircraft and actually so shameless plug, but I'm building an energy drink brand called max afterburner and

01:05:51.094 --> 01:06:11.011
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and the goal of my drink is to make it last seven hours because that's what my longest combat mission was and I was struggling Yeah, I've if all the veterans out there if you've drank a rip it and you know what that's like getting a heartburn the crash afterwards And so I was chugging those rip-its, but then it wasn't enough so I took decks the go pill on that mission to just stay alert stay away Provincial

01:06:12.112 --> 01:06:12.952
[UNKNOWN]: That sounds right.

01:06:13.232 --> 01:06:15.973
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you guys took the kind of, or you had that as an audio.

01:06:16.113 --> 01:06:20.395
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, whether there was a stay awake or sleep or numb, you name it.

01:06:20.535 --> 01:06:24.276
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's a bad bad cocktail stuff for sure.

01:06:24.656 --> 01:06:28.838
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, with with the max afterburner energy drink may be two cases.

01:06:28.878 --> 01:06:34.980
[UNKNOWN]: You get like a free box of depends because if it's seven hours, which makes me question like I assume you piss

01:06:35.740 --> 01:06:51.633
[UNKNOWN]: Like do you wear like a tube thing or like a depend kind of thing or so that was that'd be like in the YouTube So maybe we'll offer that for like truck driver something just connects and you can just constantly go out of the bathroom You need for dudes Let's go into business, might we can go to the moon with this?

01:06:52.214 --> 01:06:54.175
[UNKNOWN]: So I mean on on up seven hour fly.

01:06:54.195 --> 01:06:56.237
[UNKNOWN]: I mean do you guys wear stuff like that?

01:06:56.797 --> 01:07:03.483
[UNKNOWN]: No, we have pedal packs so there's these little packets you carry and and you don't want to be the guy that forgets to bring them with you Yeah, it could be a bad day

01:07:04.403 --> 01:07:10.166
[UNKNOWN]: But I'd bring like six, seven of those things just in case you get stuck up there and They're just a plastic bag.

01:07:10.186 --> 01:07:18.429
[UNKNOWN]: They have like some weird crystals stuff in it that probably you know inhaling that was probably great And you open it up and it's crystal slid out of the bag you inhale all of it.

01:07:18.449 --> 01:07:30.255
[UNKNOWN]: I'm sure that explains a lot of the weird quirks I have today, but you pee in that bag and then it like formulates it and so it makes it solid so it's not like watery You kind of hold it up and then you put in the the side pouch of the jet.

01:07:30.435 --> 01:07:30.575
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah

01:07:31.675 --> 01:07:34.678
[UNKNOWN]: Did you ever bring like food and drinks and other stuff like that with it?

01:07:34.939 --> 01:07:35.559
[UNKNOWN]: I did man.

01:07:35.579 --> 01:07:51.995
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, almost got killed by a drink really Yeah, you're gonna barrel roll and the chest flying around or what I wish it was that cool Yeah, so you bring drinks you bring Food and all that kind of stuff, but I mean the biggest thing is like caffeine right just make it sure you have I have enough to say awake

01:07:53.036 --> 01:07:57.281
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, if you want to hear it, I almost died in a decompression incident in a jet.

01:07:57.761 --> 01:07:58.922
[UNKNOWN]: It was on the Thunderbirds.

01:08:00.084 --> 01:08:01.385
[UNKNOWN]: So we're flying from Nellis.

01:08:01.425 --> 01:08:02.887
[UNKNOWN]: We're going to do an air show.

01:08:03.447 --> 01:08:05.209
[UNKNOWN]: And you check your Cabin Altimeter.

01:08:05.249 --> 01:08:07.392
[UNKNOWN]: You make sure that it's good passing certain altitude.

01:08:07.432 --> 01:08:09.634
[UNKNOWN]: So we're going up past 18,000 feet.

01:08:09.674 --> 01:08:10.175
[UNKNOWN]: I check it.

01:08:10.275 --> 01:08:10.775
[UNKNOWN]: I'm like, yep.

01:08:10.955 --> 01:08:11.816
[UNKNOWN]: Cabin Altimeter is good.

01:08:11.856 --> 01:08:13.438
[UNKNOWN]: It's showing whatever 5,000 feet.

01:08:13.498 --> 01:08:13.719
[UNKNOWN]: You know?

01:08:14.823 --> 01:08:20.284
[UNKNOWN]: get up to altitude, crack the mask down, just take a big chunk of a drink, you've got to sandwich or whatever.

01:08:21.244 --> 01:08:28.665
[UNKNOWN]: And then all of a sudden, literally within 15, 20 seconds, I just felt extreme tingling in my hands and feet.

01:08:29.025 --> 01:08:30.106
[UNKNOWN]: Instant, it was weird.

01:08:30.126 --> 01:08:36.347
[UNKNOWN]: You know, if you're gonna get a leg that goes to sleep or something and it kind of builds a little bit, or something, this one didn't build.

01:08:36.467 --> 01:08:43.528
[UNKNOWN]: It was like instant, like just numbness and this spiny prickly sensation.

01:08:44.188 --> 01:08:48.231
[UNKNOWN]: And so I've been through altitude chamber training, so I pretty much knew at that moment what it was.

01:08:48.251 --> 01:08:54.575
[UNKNOWN]: I looked down at my alcimiter and sure enough, 28,000 feet or whatever, and I was like shit, okay.

01:08:54.995 --> 01:08:57.216
[UNKNOWN]: Well, this is gonna, this is gonna be a ride up.

01:08:57.276 --> 01:09:05.661
[UNKNOWN]: I'm like, oh, I'm gonna have to write this one up, and I go to lift my left hand to go like this with my mask, click it up, and my left hand's not moving.

01:09:05.762 --> 01:09:10.945
[UNKNOWN]: I'm trying to move it, and I'm like, you know, my brain, I'm like, oh no big deal, calm, cool, and collected, left hand's not working.

01:09:11.505 --> 01:09:12.866
[UNKNOWN]: and so on my shit.

01:09:13.046 --> 01:09:14.146
[UNKNOWN]: Okay, this is really serious.

01:09:14.626 --> 01:09:20.309
[UNKNOWN]: So I kind of dug duck my head by my mask, because there's oxygen still coming out of that mask, but it's down.

01:09:20.829 --> 01:09:31.874
[UNKNOWN]: And then I reach reach over my right hand was working and I just went to 100% oxygen and then my next thought was, okay, Neo, get your mask up and just click your mask up.

01:09:32.534 --> 01:09:34.675
[UNKNOWN]: And so the last thing I remember is my

01:09:37.276 --> 01:10:01.608
[UNKNOWN]: And I went out and I can say that now, I, you know, at the time, you know, I couldn't really say that I went completely unconscious because then My not flying jet again, but now I can say it since I'm out in the cockpit right now So I went completely dark completely black and then I woke up and my mask was up And I look around and there's five other F-16s next to me and I'm like Holy shit like I almost just just died like it was it was that close

01:10:02.788 --> 01:10:07.413
[UNKNOWN]: And I was hard to like tell you how it was to breathe.

01:10:07.473 --> 01:10:09.234
[UNKNOWN]: I feel like there was a thousand pounds on my chest.

01:10:09.435 --> 01:10:12.257
[UNKNOWN]: Because at that point, all the oxygen was out of the cockpit.

01:10:13.519 --> 01:10:18.323
[UNKNOWN]: And on the regulator and on the tape afterwards, I mean, it sounds like a horror movie.

01:10:18.483 --> 01:10:20.825
[UNKNOWN]: My voice, the way I was speaking and breathing and talking.

01:10:20.865 --> 01:10:23.108
[UNKNOWN]: Literally, it's, you know, just wild.

01:10:23.148 --> 01:10:25.290
[UNKNOWN]: You wouldn't expect someone to be alive with a voice like that.

01:10:26.210 --> 01:10:29.093
[UNKNOWN]: And I just said, hey boss, I'm hypoxic, I'm descending.

01:10:29.794 --> 01:10:35.459
[UNKNOWN]: And my buddy next to me in formation, he like immediately came onto my wing.

01:10:35.680 --> 01:10:44.048
[UNKNOWN]: And he was like dude, I was ready to tap your jet or be underneath your jet to try to keep you from descending or try to help you get down to 10,000 feet.

01:10:44.068 --> 01:10:46.831
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that's how tight that team is, right?

01:10:47.131 --> 01:10:50.134
[UNKNOWN]: The teammates around you are literally willing to sacrifice their jet to try to

01:10:50.634 --> 01:10:51.315
[UNKNOWN]: keep you alive.

01:10:51.736 --> 01:11:11.338
[UNKNOWN]: So I'll never forget that moment, tread everling was that guy's name and he was like I was ready to just pull up underneath you But then when I heard you on the radio, we knew that you were, you know, at least able to hopefully control the jet Well, we get past the there was a huge cloud bank too and I'm disoriented and so I knew that if I go into that cloud bank disoriented even though now I'm getting oxygen, you know, I could go

01:11:11.918 --> 01:11:29.441
[UNKNOWN]: into a place where I'm spatially disoriented and now I end up crashing anyways so I stayed high like 27, 28,000 feet for like another five minutes which was the most painful five minutes of my life right because my chest's something's not right I'm feeling like pains in my knee pains in my ankles and then we get past that cloud deck and I descend down

01:11:30.262 --> 01:11:32.923
[UNKNOWN]: And then Albuquerque was a closest place to us.

01:11:32.983 --> 01:11:37.825
[UNKNOWN]: So we go down to like 5,000 feet or so above the ground, where there's a lot of oxygen.

01:11:37.885 --> 01:11:40.065
[UNKNOWN]: So then you're at 5,000 feet.

01:11:40.365 --> 01:11:42.306
[UNKNOWN]: Your cockpit's supposed to keep you at 5,000 feet.

01:11:42.626 --> 01:11:44.687
[UNKNOWN]: But now we just went down to 5,000 feet, right?

01:11:44.707 --> 01:11:47.408
[UNKNOWN]: So the ambient air is going to keep me alive.

01:11:47.428 --> 01:11:52.109
[UNKNOWN]: In case that oxygen system fails or something like that, which has happened to multiple dudes unfortunately.

01:11:52.129 --> 01:11:53.150
[UNKNOWN]: Happened in an F-22.

01:11:53.490 --> 01:11:54.530
[UNKNOWN]: Same exact situation.

01:11:54.850 --> 01:11:56.811
[UNKNOWN]: He clicks his mask up, but the regulator failed.

01:11:57.411 --> 01:12:00.773
[UNKNOWN]: and then he died of great dude, Moose, I think was his call sign.

01:12:01.394 --> 01:12:07.437
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, so we get past the cloud bank or low level and just the, I would say one of the most challenging landings on my life.

01:12:07.638 --> 01:12:11.720
[UNKNOWN]: I just felt like I was not on this planet as the best way to put it.

01:12:11.820 --> 01:12:16.924
[UNKNOWN]: Dude, brain was scrambled, just felt completely off, but I ended up getting the jet down at land.

01:12:17.584 --> 01:12:21.246
[UNKNOWN]: The fire trucks pulled me out of the cockpit thrown me in an ambulance.

01:12:21.266 --> 01:12:22.047
[UNKNOWN]: There's a picture of it.

01:12:22.727 --> 01:12:25.851
[UNKNOWN]: And in the picture, I'm like kind of smiling, like half smiling.

01:12:26.912 --> 01:12:28.173
[UNKNOWN]: But the boss was in there with me.

01:12:28.573 --> 01:12:30.576
[UNKNOWN]: And the first picture he was like, dude, you look like death.

01:12:30.996 --> 01:12:34.520
[UNKNOWN]: He's like, you're going to want to be smiling in this picture one day because you made it.

01:12:34.960 --> 01:12:37.583
[UNKNOWN]: You know, and so I'm kind of like cracking a little smile on the photo.

01:12:38.544 --> 01:12:40.566
[UNKNOWN]: But dude, that was a wild day.

01:12:40.606 --> 01:12:43.069
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that was another day looking death in the face and just saying, okay.

01:12:43.909 --> 01:13:05.503
[UNKNOWN]: Do that's not, man, I, so many questions from that one, when you say an energy drink is it because you took your mask off to take the drink and when you took it off, it made the thing shut down, made the regulator stop, or- Oh, yeah, no, that's a great to tie it all together, so when I pulled my mask down, I didn't know this, but there was a slow leak in the pressurization of the cockpit.

01:13:06.303 --> 01:13:15.912
[UNKNOWN]: And then later, we found out that like when you see a Thunderbird show and they're slamming those ladders up on the railing of the jet they used to just be metal on metal just because never really cause an issue.

01:13:16.312 --> 01:13:20.275
[UNKNOWN]: But what had happened on my jet just over the the months or years of slamming that metal.

01:13:20.916 --> 01:13:22.758
[UNKNOWN]: It's ladder onto the rail of the canopy.

01:13:22.818 --> 01:13:32.085
[UNKNOWN]: It just put a couple little nicks in it, and then as the canopy would pressurize and open over the course of months, it just ripped that fabric, and that was the day it finally gave loose.

01:13:32.586 --> 01:13:35.328
[UNKNOWN]: And so there was a cut in the fabric of the canopy seal.

01:13:35.408 --> 01:13:36.469
[UNKNOWN]: That was probably that big.

01:13:36.870 --> 01:13:42.714
[UNKNOWN]: And so it sealed initially, and then it was like deflating slowly as after it sealed.

01:13:42.754 --> 01:13:49.100
[UNKNOWN]: So when I dropped my mask, it had already fully deflated without any warnings or anything like that because it was a slow depressurization.

01:13:49.380 --> 01:13:53.181
[UNKNOWN]: So you went from 5,000 to 28,000 pretty quickly.

01:13:53.201 --> 01:13:55.242
[UNKNOWN]: Over the course, it probably a minute or two.

01:13:55.382 --> 01:13:56.782
[UNKNOWN]: Wow, damn, that's wild.

01:13:58.822 --> 01:14:06.324
[UNKNOWN]: I also, I didn't realize the other pilots that were thinking of nudging you, like you can do that.

01:14:06.384 --> 01:14:16.827
[UNKNOWN]: And obviously, only at that level Thunderbird caliber where you're that controlled, but you could actually nudge other planes and move them around a little bit.

01:14:17.021 --> 01:14:21.846
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, and there's a famous story about it happening in Vietnam where they took battle damage over a target.

01:14:21.986 --> 01:14:26.230
[UNKNOWN]: Number two's jet is about to go down and his engines are sputtering.

01:14:26.270 --> 01:14:28.933
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's actual fuel tanks were just blowing out fuel.

01:14:29.634 --> 01:14:35.259
[UNKNOWN]: And so they dropped their bombs, they're turning, and they're still, you know, 60 miles inside enemy territory.

01:14:35.419 --> 01:14:37.862
[UNKNOWN]: Like, you're going to prison on a war camp if you eject there.

01:14:38.522 --> 01:14:41.385
[UNKNOWN]: And so the flight lead pulls behind that jet.

01:14:41.405 --> 01:14:42.506
[UNKNOWN]: It's called Porto's push.

01:14:43.146 --> 01:14:44.768
[UNKNOWN]: And he tells that jet to drop its hook.

01:14:45.108 --> 01:14:46.970
[UNKNOWN]: So the jet drops, it's hook.

01:14:47.050 --> 01:14:52.775
[UNKNOWN]: Each fighter jet has a hook for catching cables, whether it's on a carrier or a land-based cable if you have hydraulic failure.

01:14:52.875 --> 01:14:58.420
[UNKNOWN]: So he drops that hook and then he pulls up behind it and pushes with the front of his canopy screen.

01:14:58.440 --> 01:15:03.665
[UNKNOWN]: That's strong part that I told you about where it can take the turkey, frozen turkey hitting it, it's really strong glass.

01:15:04.785 --> 01:15:08.949
[UNKNOWN]: puts that right on that and then it pushes them an extra 45 miles out into the ocean.

01:15:09.329 --> 01:15:13.592
[UNKNOWN]: And they both that had like done some damage to his jet to use so they both had to eject.

01:15:13.933 --> 01:15:17.676
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, but he got him an extra 45 miles and they got rescue by the Navy.

01:15:18.096 --> 01:15:18.957
[UNKNOWN]: No prisoner work camp.

01:15:19.117 --> 01:15:20.077
[UNKNOWN]: That is nuts, man.

01:15:20.097 --> 01:15:26.002
[UNKNOWN]: So that's in all of our brains as fighter pilots, you know, just thinking creative, we have like what could we do with this jet to help save our bros?

01:15:26.522 --> 01:15:33.248
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's incredible, I had never heard that man, what a dicey scenario and I guess that's

01:15:35.102 --> 01:15:42.244
[UNKNOWN]: Well, I mean, come to think of it, even if you're in a two-seater and you have that problem, you're both going to experience that I assume.

01:15:42.544 --> 01:15:45.325
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, if you're in a two-seater, yeah, those can't-a-piece are connected.

01:15:45.345 --> 01:15:47.085
[UNKNOWN]: There's no, like, seal in between that.

01:15:48.125 --> 01:15:53.807
[UNKNOWN]: With your mask on, it could be the canopy, it could be completely depressurized and you'd still be, okay?

01:15:54.047 --> 01:15:54.287
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:15:54.627 --> 01:16:11.748
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you could be you would what I noticed though is I started to get some weird pains and so after that I have I have under observation for like 24 hours in a hospital I think I was just below the altitude of having to go into a decompression chamber But I noticed some just like weird pains in my knees and elbows and stuff

01:16:13.216 --> 01:16:14.298
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's wild.

01:16:14.498 --> 01:16:21.848
[UNKNOWN]: Before we get fully into the Thunderbird stuff, any other combat missions you wanted to share.

01:16:21.888 --> 01:16:26.194
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I remember just an overall strategy, right?

01:16:26.214 --> 01:16:28.036
[UNKNOWN]: I'm a big and a strategy of warfare and

01:16:29.778 --> 01:16:36.241
[UNKNOWN]: This one was more like what are we there for in Iraq and Afghanistan like what's especially Afghanistan for me.

01:16:37.361 --> 01:16:42.424
[UNKNOWN]: Just seeing some of the like Unstrategic ways that the fobs were placed.

01:16:42.444 --> 01:16:45.165
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know if you were you in Afghanistan as well or Iraq

01:16:45.705 --> 01:16:46.246
[UNKNOWN]: just a wreck.

01:16:47.266 --> 01:16:54.172
[UNKNOWN]: So I don't know what you saw over there but in Afghanistan I remember going into some of these places and the fobs were at the bottom of like slot canyons.

01:16:54.392 --> 01:17:02.658
[UNKNOWN]: Essentially there was like one road going in massive canyon and the fob and then they're taking fire from all around, you know, the fob on any given day.

01:17:03.279 --> 01:17:08.043
[UNKNOWN]: And so I remember asking a ground forces commander-als like why are these built here?

01:17:08.163 --> 01:17:09.824
[UNKNOWN]: Like why why don't why do we have to have these

01:17:12.386 --> 01:17:35.575
[UNKNOWN]: Why can't we put this a little somewhere else or have it have a few outposts at the top of the hills instead of this one just big target right there the shoot me kill me zone and he was like well we were told from the very top that we needed to be able to draw out the enemy and bring the enemy to us and then we engage them but I remember going on different missions where you know army guys would be getting maimed or killed from mortars you know and so it's it's just a disgusting strategy to me

01:17:36.375 --> 01:17:41.898
[UNKNOWN]: And I think that really started my questioning of, like, what are Bush and Cheney doing?

01:17:41.938 --> 01:17:42.858
[UNKNOWN]: I really got pissed off.

01:17:42.998 --> 01:17:43.898
[UNKNOWN]: I think at a certain point.

01:17:43.918 --> 01:17:48.360
[UNKNOWN]: And then I started looking to Haliburton and all the different dining facilities.

01:17:48.400 --> 01:17:51.242
[UNKNOWN]: You know, they had like Haliburton contracts and all the different buildings going up.

01:17:51.542 --> 01:17:52.922
[UNKNOWN]: All the contractors were Haliburton.

01:17:52.942 --> 01:17:53.943
[UNKNOWN]: So there's a big job thing.

01:17:56.268 --> 01:17:59.149
[UNKNOWN]: But there was a mission I went on to one of those files, just like that.

01:17:59.589 --> 01:18:03.331
[UNKNOWN]: And I mean, it was probably what you would expect.

01:18:03.531 --> 01:18:08.272
[UNKNOWN]: But we roll in and they said that there was ice blocks, that they were using to trigger things.

01:18:08.312 --> 01:18:12.554
[UNKNOWN]: So they would like set ice blocks, let the ice melt, and somehow that would then set off a mortar.

01:18:13.074 --> 01:18:15.015
[UNKNOWN]: You probably know way better than me how that works.

01:18:16.656 --> 01:18:30.466
[UNKNOWN]: My assumption would be is that, you know, it's probably some sort of kind of like a pressure switch or even an electrical connection where once the ice melts it makes two things connect and then it goes off would be my bet.

01:18:30.746 --> 01:18:31.106
[UNKNOWN]: Gotcha.

01:18:31.367 --> 01:18:31.587
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:18:32.307 --> 01:18:43.936
[UNKNOWN]: And so a few of those had gone off and then we knew a few different enemy fighting positions, but the challenge on this one and this is happening in Iran too is like when you're dropping in bombs and in mountains, what angle do you come in?

01:18:44.396 --> 01:18:46.558
[UNKNOWN]: How does the bomb come in to actually do the most damage?

01:18:47.238 --> 01:18:51.561
[UNKNOWN]: And so for us for our squadron, this is when we kind of invented the double tap, which was

01:18:52.542 --> 01:19:04.128
[UNKNOWN]: Essentially, you go in, you have a bomb that drops at a direct angle where it hits straight down, so like 85, 90 degrees explodes, and then you're winging behind you, comes in and drops an air burst.

01:19:04.168 --> 01:19:16.595
[UNKNOWN]: So the bomb that goes in and hits will make who's ever hiding in the rocks, get up and run, because it's probably not going to kill him, because the rocks are going to protect where that explosion's happening, and like we talked about with the GB38, it's, you know, 30 yards or so.

01:19:17.055 --> 01:19:21.057
[UNKNOWN]: And if there's rocks around, it's going to be a lot less, probably right, it's going to absorb that impact.

01:19:21.657 --> 01:19:34.947
[UNKNOWN]: And so, on this day, we've just used in our fighter pilot brains for like, okay, why don't we drop a couple of these things in the rocks, get them to get up and move, and then have number two roll in with a proximity air burst, 2000 pound bomb.

01:19:35.688 --> 01:19:41.011
[UNKNOWN]: And so, that's what we did there, and that was a tactic that we kind of continued to do for the rest of the deployment.

01:19:41.832 --> 01:19:45.054
[UNKNOWN]: So, just innovating real time was what that mission was to me.

01:19:45.895 --> 01:19:52.658
[UNKNOWN]: There was another mission too where it was kind of the bomb I didn't drop, that became something I was proud of.

01:19:54.039 --> 01:20:00.042
[UNKNOWN]: So in and around Kabul, we get tasked to take out these guys coming out of a mosque, there's

01:20:01.102 --> 01:20:13.166
[UNKNOWN]: Eight of them, they've got big huge radios, they walk out, you know, at the big, the, I think the motorcycle's had the radios on them or whatever, and so they, they get on their motorcycles to get ready to leave and the J tax like, all right, you're cleared hot, they're ready to go.

01:20:13.366 --> 01:20:18.727
[UNKNOWN]: And so we're going to strafe just because lower collateral damage with the 20, 20 millimeter.

01:20:19.328 --> 01:20:30.051
[UNKNOWN]: And so we're rolling in and right away, after the roll and after the cleared hot call, I look at my, my Wizzos pod and I see little heat signatures all around the sides of the town square, right?

01:20:31.370 --> 01:20:36.034
[UNKNOWN]: And at this point, all these things, I'd read the counter-insurgency manual and I'm like, okay, why are we here?

01:20:36.395 --> 01:20:42.440
[UNKNOWN]: You know, we've got these fobs that are trying to bring out the insurgents to us, you know, not strategically placed.

01:20:43.281 --> 01:20:44.722
[UNKNOWN]: I'm about to strafe these guys.

01:20:44.742 --> 01:20:45.783
[UNKNOWN]: We're clearly bad dudes.

01:20:45.903 --> 01:20:49.166
[UNKNOWN]: I know that the JTEC had given us a little backstory on them.

01:20:50.590 --> 01:20:55.573
[UNKNOWN]: why he wanted him gone, you know what they had done the day before, and like, okay, these guys need to go away.

01:20:55.953 --> 01:21:00.376
[UNKNOWN]: But as I'm rolling in, I see these little heat signatures, and I'm like, hey, what are those?

01:21:00.596 --> 01:21:03.118
[UNKNOWN]: And I was on New Exactly what I was talking about, and you guys, kids.

01:21:04.298 --> 01:21:08.141
[UNKNOWN]: I was like, I was like, I was, I was the flight lead that day, I was like, once after I.

01:21:09.061 --> 01:21:23.990
[UNKNOWN]: you know, so we pull off dry and again that was like this moral dilemma because I knew these guys needed to go away and clearly like their bad dudes, but again if I kill 15 of these kids, I've just created 30 more of these bad dudes because each one of their parents is going to be an

01:21:25.891 --> 01:21:38.501
[UNKNOWN]: And so I, I was grateful because I think a group, a few of us, had banded together and decided like, we wanted to read the counteratsurgency manual, we wanted to know why we were there, we wanted to know what the objective was, and we wanted to be able to sleep at night when we left, right?

01:21:38.541 --> 01:21:43.164
[UNKNOWN]: So to me, that meant number one thing, don't ever hurt a friendly, right?

01:21:43.184 --> 01:21:44.045
[UNKNOWN]: That was my number one thing.

01:21:44.205 --> 01:21:46.107
[UNKNOWN]: Number two was don't kill any kids.

01:21:46.247 --> 01:21:48.789
[UNKNOWN]: And I had that conversation with those guys before even going.

01:21:49.729 --> 01:21:54.694
[UNKNOWN]: And so we go after I and you know frankly the Jay Talk was pissed and I get it.

01:21:54.774 --> 01:22:15.073
[UNKNOWN]: These are bad dudes But he couldn't see what I could see right and we didn't have time to communicate that to him And so they get on their motorcycles and leave and then we ended up engaging them on the outskirts of town But I think you know two or three of them got away as the motorcycle scattered away We dropped like two bombs, but you know movers on motorcycles a lot harder to target right then when they were right there in front of the

01:22:15.813 --> 01:22:25.498
[UNKNOWN]: The mosque, so it was frustrating, but again, one of those times where I had to assess what's my north star here, what's the goal here, how do I go home and sleep at night after this, too?

01:22:25.979 --> 01:22:29.921
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, I would have done the same thing being in that position, you know, for sure.

01:22:31.662 --> 01:22:41.307
[UNKNOWN]: To me, that wouldn't even, I don't think that that would even be a hard decision frankly, but yeah, did he have any words with you afterwards, did you explain it after the fact of what the deal is?

01:22:42.127 --> 01:22:43.008
[UNKNOWN]: Yes, yeah, we did.

01:22:43.268 --> 01:22:45.589
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, because I think we got that one.

01:22:45.609 --> 01:22:47.670
[UNKNOWN]: We had some higher ups, ask us why we didn't do it.

01:22:47.850 --> 01:22:48.030
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:22:48.331 --> 01:22:50.272
[UNKNOWN]: And so we just had to provide the pod footage to them.

01:22:50.292 --> 01:22:53.213
[UNKNOWN]: And then as soon as we gave them the footage, they were like, okay, no problem.

01:22:54.334 --> 01:23:01.198
[UNKNOWN]: What does a special operations unit on the ground on the radio sound like when shit's gone totally wrong?

01:23:03.579 --> 01:23:05.780
[UNKNOWN]: So I think it's

01:23:06.943 --> 01:23:14.187
[UNKNOWN]: It's pretty interesting, because I had, when it came to the special operations unit, I don't know, a lot of them just seemed calm, cool, and collected.

01:23:14.627 --> 01:23:16.008
[UNKNOWN]: It didn't seem like it was a big deal.

01:23:17.269 --> 01:23:21.831
[UNKNOWN]: There was sometimes where we would talk to Romads, and they weren't trained as a J-tak.

01:23:21.911 --> 01:23:22.812
[UNKNOWN]: That's when it got wild.

01:23:23.052 --> 01:23:24.213
[UNKNOWN]: That's when people just seemed like.

01:23:25.201 --> 01:23:27.262
[UNKNOWN]: they were thinking we're about to drop a bomb on them.

01:23:27.362 --> 01:23:28.802
[UNKNOWN]: And I'm like, look, do you know I'm not ready to drop a bomb?

01:23:28.822 --> 01:23:30.323
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I need to know exactly where you are.

01:23:30.343 --> 01:23:31.443
[UNKNOWN]: Just tell me and trucker com.

01:23:32.244 --> 01:23:42.167
[UNKNOWN]: So kind of, if it was a high pressure situation, being very assertive with someone who wasn't J-Tech qualified, but when it came to talking to special operators, it just seemed to chill.

01:23:42.428 --> 01:23:46.069
[UNKNOWN]: It just seemed like it was another Tuesday, which I think helps give us confidence too.

01:23:46.089 --> 01:23:51.111
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, maybe it was vice versa, but we weren't even in harm's way, you know, and they were just icing their veins.

01:23:51.371 --> 01:23:51.531
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:23:51.931 --> 01:23:53.132
[UNKNOWN]: have you seen the movie warfare?

01:23:53.812 --> 01:23:54.833
[UNKNOWN]: No.

01:23:55.333 --> 01:24:14.765
[UNKNOWN]: Kind of like, you know, your assertion of top gun being kind of getting it right in certain aspects, and it's actually written and directed by a former team three sealed, but which I am sure is the overwhelming reason why it's the way that it is, but I don't think I've seen a movie that

01:24:15.678 --> 01:24:18.040
[UNKNOWN]: as accurately depicts kind of everything.

01:24:18.080 --> 01:24:30.870
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, from the culture and kind of vibe within the group and how they're funny, but not that like overdone military, bro speak, that's in every other movie that you ever see.

01:24:30.910 --> 01:24:33.952
[UNKNOWN]: We're like, fuck, yeah, but it sounds like WWF in the 80s.

01:24:33.993 --> 01:24:36.655
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's like, we don't, nobody talks like that, you know?

01:24:37.015 --> 01:24:40.578
[UNKNOWN]: But yet it's in, you know, every movie where, you know, it's totally overdone that way.

01:24:40.638 --> 01:24:40.758
[UNKNOWN]: But,

01:24:41.295 --> 01:24:58.687
[UNKNOWN]: same kind of thing like they'll mess with each other, but it's a super dry, you know, just like they're talking on the radio to, you know, if Colin and Cass were communicating or busing each other's balls, like it all sounds like the teacher from Ferris Bueller's day off, you know, it's just like this monotone, you know, whatever.

01:24:59.728 --> 01:25:02.450
[UNKNOWN]: I remember dropping GB38's up in Northern Afghanistan.

01:25:03.070 --> 01:25:21.882
[UNKNOWN]: and same thing like there's these guys fire three groups of insurgents firing at this convoy going through and we lit up their little three-fighting positions with GB38's like simultaneous and then there was I don't think there was much fire coming anymore but one of the guys was like alright that looked good I want to bring you in for some 20 mic mic now

01:25:24.383 --> 01:25:26.464
[UNKNOWN]: We were like, okay, okay.

01:25:26.484 --> 01:25:31.767
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, might not have needed that, but hey, if it keeps you guys motivated throughout the night, let's do it.

01:25:32.068 --> 01:25:32.668
[UNKNOWN]: That's awesome.

01:25:32.788 --> 01:25:32.948
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:25:33.288 --> 01:25:36.850
[UNKNOWN]: A few years back, I started noticing things were just off.

01:25:36.870 --> 01:25:41.093
[UNKNOWN]: Same training, same discipline I'd had for years, but recovery was taking longer.

01:25:41.533 --> 01:25:47.459
[UNKNOWN]: My energy was inconsistent, and that sharp mental edge I'd always counted on started feeling dull.

01:25:47.759 --> 01:25:51.362
[UNKNOWN]: I kept pushing through it because that's what we do, but something wasn't right.

01:25:51.603 --> 01:25:53.224
[UNKNOWN]: Here's what most guys don't know.

01:25:53.745 --> 01:25:59.770
[UNKNOWN]: Many men start losing testosterone around age 30, it's about 1% every year after that.

01:25:59.990 --> 01:26:05.656
[UNKNOWN]: And even when your body is still producing it, there's a protein called SHBG that binds to it.

01:26:06.176 --> 01:26:08.617
[UNKNOWN]: and locks it up so your body can't actually use it.

01:26:08.817 --> 01:26:11.577
[UNKNOWN]: It's like having money in the bank, but your card doesn't work.

01:26:11.877 --> 01:26:13.958
[UNKNOWN]: That's when I started taking Mars men.

01:26:14.298 --> 01:26:18.799
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01:26:19.319 --> 01:26:27.061
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01:26:27.221 --> 01:26:29.022
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01:26:34.563 --> 01:26:40.447
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01:26:40.747 --> 01:26:44.530
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01:26:44.910 --> 01:26:52.895
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01:26:53.195 --> 01:26:59.258
[UNKNOWN]: That's men go to Mars.com for 50% off and three-free gifts when you check out.

01:26:59.578 --> 01:27:02.180
[UNKNOWN]: After you purchase, they will ask where you heard about it.

01:27:02.200 --> 01:27:05.101
[UNKNOWN]: Please support our show and tell them our show sent you.

01:27:05.402 --> 01:27:09.164
[UNKNOWN]: These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration.

01:27:09.224 --> 01:27:15.067
[UNKNOWN]: This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease or condition.

01:27:16.667 --> 01:27:17.748
[UNKNOWN]: Did you ever get it wrong?

01:27:18.789 --> 01:27:19.549
[UNKNOWN]: Like in combat?

01:27:19.629 --> 01:27:19.829
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:27:24.797 --> 01:27:26.117
[UNKNOWN]: Nothing that really stands out.

01:27:26.398 --> 01:27:32.740
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, there was, oh, actually, actually, no, I have glossed over this one on my brain apparently, but no, it just popped in.

01:27:33.580 --> 01:27:38.722
[UNKNOWN]: And arguably, whether it was me getting it wrong or not, I'm willing to take the fall for this one.

01:27:38.782 --> 01:27:42.943
[UNKNOWN]: But we were setting up for a strafe.

01:27:43.223 --> 01:27:46.244
[UNKNOWN]: It was me and this wingman that had had some issues.

01:27:46.404 --> 01:27:49.145
[UNKNOWN]: He had had some low performance issues.

01:27:50.406 --> 01:27:53.867
[UNKNOWN]: And so we're out strafing this is daytime.

01:27:55.354 --> 01:28:11.038
[UNKNOWN]: And when you're flying a fighter in Afghanistan or close air support, I mean even in Iran likely right now when they're doing the patrols, not just direct strike missions in back, but if you're kind of waiting, you're doing what's called yo-yo, so you're going to tankers, you're getting gas while your wingman's on station and then you trade sides.

01:28:11.058 --> 01:28:12.358
[UNKNOWN]: You've heard of this before I'm sure.

01:28:13.798 --> 01:28:17.179
[UNKNOWN]: And we're both running low on gas at this point.

01:28:17.359 --> 01:28:19.159
[UNKNOWN]: And we're getting a talk on from a J-TAC.

01:28:19.339 --> 01:28:21.400
[UNKNOWN]: There's these insurgents that are in a little,

01:28:22.440 --> 01:28:46.212
[UNKNOWN]: alleyway between these two mud-hut type-looking style buildings and we're getting it's like this long delay to get us a clear hot I don't know why it's just hey man we see him they're there let's go like and I'm I'm kind of like getting a little bit impatient because I know our gas is running low and he's like I'm just waiting for clearance waiting for clearance ground-force commanders gotta sign off on this and it's just taking a long time

01:28:48.607 --> 01:28:52.490
[UNKNOWN]: And I should have sent my wemen to the tanker, probably right then, right?

01:28:52.771 --> 01:28:54.592
[UNKNOWN]: But in my mind, like, it's about to happen in any second.

01:28:54.612 --> 01:28:57.335
[UNKNOWN]: And I want two relatively quick bursts.

01:28:57.355 --> 01:29:01.238
[UNKNOWN]: I don't want to strafe and then wait two minutes while I go back around and then do it again.

01:29:02.719 --> 01:29:05.442
[UNKNOWN]: Finally, wait five minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, I don't like.

01:29:05.942 --> 01:29:08.804
[UNKNOWN]: Okay, I got to go to the tanker first because I'm lower on gas than you.

01:29:08.864 --> 01:29:10.505
[UNKNOWN]: So hey, you stay on station.

01:29:10.665 --> 01:29:13.447
[UNKNOWN]: I'll go to the tanker and as soon as as soon as I'm back, we'll strafe.

01:29:13.867 --> 01:29:16.428
[UNKNOWN]: I go to the tanker and literally as soon as we depart the station.

01:29:16.448 --> 01:29:17.689
[UNKNOWN]: And at this point, I'm committed.

01:29:17.729 --> 01:29:18.630
[UNKNOWN]: I got to go to the tanker.

01:29:18.930 --> 01:29:19.390
[UNKNOWN]: The J-Tax.

01:29:19.410 --> 01:29:20.311
[UNKNOWN]: Like, okay, I got clearance.

01:29:20.351 --> 01:29:22.452
[UNKNOWN]: I'm ready for where any of you guys are on my shit.

01:29:24.212 --> 01:29:27.454
[UNKNOWN]: That's a worse situation you want to be in as a flight league, because you want to be there to lead it, right?

01:29:27.614 --> 01:29:34.219
[UNKNOWN]: But I had to get gas, because more or worse than not leading it is running out of gas and having to punch up over Afghanistan.

01:29:34.799 --> 01:29:44.325
[UNKNOWN]: So we get to the tanker, I'm getting gas, and while I'm getting gas, I'm listening to the talk on, because the guys are not going to be there forever, that we're trying to hit, right?

01:29:44.966 --> 01:29:49.649
[UNKNOWN]: And so I'm like, if I wait till I get back there, it's going to be like another eight to ten minutes, they're going to be gone.

01:29:49.929 --> 01:29:50.829
[UNKNOWN]: My wingman's right there.

01:29:51.930 --> 01:29:54.193
[UNKNOWN]: I'm going to help him set up for this straight.

01:29:54.494 --> 01:29:57.778
[UNKNOWN]: He had had some performance issues, but he's a fully qualified fighter pilot, right?

01:29:59.220 --> 01:30:03.666
[UNKNOWN]: So I tell him take check tapes on.

01:30:06.000 --> 01:30:07.900
[UNKNOWN]: and talk to the J-Tack or something like that.

01:30:07.940 --> 01:30:13.281
[UNKNOWN]: But you're supposed to say, melt-check, check a melt-check, which is master arm energy laser tapes on.

01:30:13.921 --> 01:30:15.102
[UNKNOWN]: But I mess up the com.

01:30:15.522 --> 01:30:16.342
[UNKNOWN]: I say the com wrong.

01:30:16.842 --> 01:30:18.542
[UNKNOWN]: But as a fighter pilot, you should know to do that.

01:30:18.582 --> 01:30:20.103
[UNKNOWN]: But again, this guy's lower performance.

01:30:20.123 --> 01:30:21.523
[UNKNOWN]: He needs a little more help, right?

01:30:21.543 --> 01:30:22.443
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe he's having some issues.

01:30:23.303 --> 01:30:25.484
[UNKNOWN]: But for some, I'm on the tanker, too, right?

01:30:25.524 --> 01:30:28.284
[UNKNOWN]: So I'm like, maybe not saying the exact right com, because I'm focused on this.

01:30:28.304 --> 01:30:31.645
[UNKNOWN]: Whatever excuse you want to insert here, why I'm not giving him the right com.

01:30:34.448 --> 01:30:39.632
[UNKNOWN]: He's got a whizzo with him as well, sharp whizzo, high-performing whizzo, so I'm kind of leaning on that a little bit.

01:30:40.552 --> 01:30:42.994
[UNKNOWN]: And then they roll in, they get the cleared hot.

01:30:44.035 --> 01:30:47.858
[UNKNOWN]: I hear, I'm like, off-hot, J-Tax, like, doesn't say anything.

01:30:48.498 --> 01:30:51.160
[UNKNOWN]: Nobody says anything, and I'm like, what's going on down there?

01:30:51.180 --> 01:30:52.021
[UNKNOWN]: I'm like, two status.

01:30:52.601 --> 01:30:54.062
[UNKNOWN]: And he's like, we're off-hot.

01:30:54.502 --> 01:30:57.484
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, okay, it's weird, right?

01:30:58.065 --> 01:31:02.188
[UNKNOWN]: And the J-Tax was like, the hits, said something like non-effective, non-effective hits or something like that.

01:31:02.828 --> 01:31:28.244
[UNKNOWN]: We give back on station, and I think it was just this moment of like I wish I would have been there I wish I would have said the right calm because something clearly didn't go right the bolts and hit were there supposed to hit and then for the rest of the mission Or on station there I'm like hey what just happened it give me a break give me a break down and he's like well I overjeed my jet I was like okay, well, you know, I guess you're done for the day because if you overjeer jet your bombs are probably overjeed

01:31:28.904 --> 01:31:30.966
[UNKNOWN]: So I don't know, all these little alarm bells going off of my head.

01:31:31.486 --> 01:31:33.048
[UNKNOWN]: And I wanted to blame him so bad on my hand.

01:31:33.068 --> 01:31:35.970
[UNKNOWN]: This guy sucks, he's this, he's that, and all these little excuses.

01:31:36.631 --> 01:31:39.333
[UNKNOWN]: When I look back on it now, I was on the tanker.

01:31:39.473 --> 01:31:41.194
[UNKNOWN]: I could have said, hey, wait, just hold for me.

01:31:41.315 --> 01:31:50.923
[UNKNOWN]: Wait, I know the guys are gonna be coming, you know, at some point, and we gotta, this is fast, but just wait for me, like a little bit more patience, instead of just wanting to get things done right now, get the mission effective right now.

01:31:52.418 --> 01:31:58.801
[UNKNOWN]: And then we get back and we look at the tapes, and he had forgot to turn his master arm on, while he's going down the shoot.

01:31:59.041 --> 01:32:13.207
[UNKNOWN]: And there's this rule in fighter-polyde aviation that if you turn your map, there's no switch changes on final, because so many guys have died, because you're screaming at the ground at whatever, you know, 5,000 feet a second, or however fast you're going in a straight run.

01:32:14.087 --> 01:32:15.148
[UNKNOWN]: And so he reaches down,

01:32:16.130 --> 01:32:28.923
[UNKNOWN]: As he's in the strafe run, puts his master arm hot, and then rescenters, refocuses, and then he gets ground rush, and shoots, and so the bullets don't hit where they're supposed to hit, and he recovers to 200 feet or so above the ground.

01:32:29.423 --> 01:32:31.005
[UNKNOWN]: In almost, we came a smoking hole in the ground.

01:32:32.166 --> 01:32:37.611
[UNKNOWN]: And so, I mean, that would have been the ultimate worst situation, and I was like this close to having it as a flight lead.

01:32:37.631 --> 01:32:39.313
[UNKNOWN]: You never want to lose your weight, man, right?

01:32:39.773 --> 01:32:48.817
[UNKNOWN]: So, yeah, I haven't thought about that in a while, and I appreciate you bringing it up, but I'm trying to break down, without unnecessarily beating myself up, what was my role in that?

01:32:49.297 --> 01:32:49.597
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:32:49.657 --> 01:32:50.578
[UNKNOWN]: I could have been more patient.

01:32:50.818 --> 01:32:53.979
[UNKNOWN]: Hey, Jay-Tak, got it, understood, but we want to have a two-ship on station.

01:32:54.059 --> 01:32:55.840
[UNKNOWN]: And that'd be totally... Jay-Tak's get that.

01:32:56.100 --> 01:32:56.881
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:32:56.961 --> 01:33:04.744
[UNKNOWN]: So, do you know if anything, were there any casualties because of the rounds not being going where they needed to go, do you know of?

01:33:05.224 --> 01:33:10.126
[UNKNOWN]: I don't think not that I know of, but they definitely didn't go where they needed to go, and then he got sent home after that.

01:33:10.307 --> 01:33:11.387
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, that's, yeah.

01:33:11.507 --> 01:33:12.488
[UNKNOWN]: What if fired fired?

01:33:13.508 --> 01:33:15.949
[UNKNOWN]: I don't, he got sent back to training command.

01:33:15.989 --> 01:33:17.570
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know if you ever flew in F-15 after that.

01:33:18.671 --> 01:33:21.352
[UNKNOWN]: Flying a cargo plane for the rubber dog shit out of Hong Kong.

01:33:21.372 --> 01:33:25.874
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that, yeah, honestly, yeah, classic.

01:33:26.034 --> 01:33:30.676
[UNKNOWN]: Is refueling at altitude as dicey as it seems like it would be?

01:33:31.597 --> 01:33:32.397
[UNKNOWN]: Man, it can be.

01:33:32.577 --> 01:33:33.238
[UNKNOWN]: Honestly, I'd get,

01:33:34.098 --> 01:33:38.499
[UNKNOWN]: I'd get a little bit of anxiety knowing it was time to tank in certain situations.

01:33:38.899 --> 01:33:48.701
[UNKNOWN]: So if it was a thunderstorm, rough weather, you literally can come off the boom sweating, just dripping sweat because you're in air that's just so rough.

01:33:48.942 --> 01:33:55.623
[UNKNOWN]: So on those days, yeah, but then besides that, when it's not a day like that, it's pretty routine.

01:33:55.763 --> 01:34:00.284
[UNKNOWN]: The F-16 to me was a lot easier to refuel in, just easier set up with the flight controls,

01:34:04.406 --> 01:34:09.040
[UNKNOWN]: 15 loaded down with bombs and fuel what we would have to do sometimes is put one of the

01:34:10.218 --> 01:34:15.821
[UNKNOWN]: engines and afterburner, just like men afterburner, which is maybe that should be the name of my book, men afterburner.

01:34:17.763 --> 01:34:25.407
[UNKNOWN]: You put it in men afterburner, and then the other throttle you would use to kind of adjust your position, but you needed more smash to stay there and knock it, drug out.

01:34:25.487 --> 01:34:30.370
[UNKNOWN]: So there was little things you would do, little art of the refuel that, you know, it wasn't nothing.

01:34:30.631 --> 01:34:30.831
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:34:30.971 --> 01:34:31.151
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:34:32.011 --> 01:34:35.513
[UNKNOWN]: In really rough weather, do fighter jets feel like

01:34:39.796 --> 01:34:42.077
[UNKNOWN]: So it actually feels a lot rougher in a fighter.

01:34:42.677 --> 01:34:49.380
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you're getting bumps around a lot more, but you're so connected and in that your whole body is moving as the jet moves.

01:34:49.861 --> 01:34:51.581
[UNKNOWN]: So you feel every little bump.

01:34:51.601 --> 01:35:00.665
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, especially on the Thunderbirds, going out and training near the ranges in Nevada, like a lot of those heat, those thermal pockets of air, you get big drops and things like that.

01:35:01.226 --> 01:35:04.707
[UNKNOWN]: Typically though, when you're information, all the jets are going through it at the same time.

01:35:04.947 --> 01:35:06.128
[UNKNOWN]: So you're kind of doing this together.

01:35:06.868 --> 01:35:15.977
[UNKNOWN]: But I remember days flying out of Nellus where you're you're like getting shook and up in a 10 can You're just like oh my god, like way more violent than on an airliner.

01:35:16.117 --> 01:35:27.307
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, just because it's way lighter and faster Yeah, so tell us about how how you transitioned from 70 combat missions and Afghanistan to the Thunderbirds

01:35:28.458 --> 01:35:30.960
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, again, I told you the wildcard thing early on, right?

01:35:30.980 --> 01:35:33.323
[UNKNOWN]: I feel like story in my life, wildcard.

01:35:33.563 --> 01:35:40.029
[UNKNOWN]: But my goal was to get a something different, do something different after your combat, go fly jet.

01:35:40.309 --> 01:35:44.153
[UNKNOWN]: I put in front an exchange to Ernastrolia where they sent to our pilots to go fly F-8 teens.

01:35:44.934 --> 01:35:47.877
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, late 20s, go to Australia, fly F-8 teens.

01:35:48.377 --> 01:35:48.938
[UNKNOWN]: Yes, please.

01:35:49.058 --> 01:35:50.199
[UNKNOWN]: Not bad deal.

01:35:50.259 --> 01:35:51.480
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:35:51.520 --> 01:35:51.901
[UNKNOWN]: So I was...

01:35:52.501 --> 01:35:57.702
[UNKNOWN]: In line to get that, and then last second, somebody else outperformed my packet and they got selected instead.

01:35:58.222 --> 01:36:02.663
[UNKNOWN]: So then I go to a second operational assignment in Mountain Home, which is amazing.

01:36:03.124 --> 01:36:13.946
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I don't know, maybe not as cool as Australia location-wise, but like the experience of flying jets in Idaho, the low level through those mountains, I mean, blows my mind, and I was into the outdoors too.

01:36:14.006 --> 01:36:20.468
[UNKNOWN]: So, you know, motorcycles, being outside, horseback, riding, I mean, just Idaho's amazing, big, big fan, right?

01:36:23.109 --> 01:36:31.658
[UNKNOWN]: Two years into that assignment, I became a flight commander, and that's when you kind of, that's kind of like the pinnacle as a young aviator to be a leader of a flight, and that's what I got.

01:36:31.878 --> 01:36:42.350
[UNKNOWN]: Super stoked, excited, so I was like, cool, I'm just going to ride this opposite sign out, maybe deploy one more time, and then who knows what I'll do after that, maybe go to the pinnacle on her, who knows where they'll send me, right?

01:36:42.890 --> 01:36:49.013
[UNKNOWN]: And then I got an email from a friend of mine that I deployed with an Afghanistan, and he was like, hey, do you ever thought of applying to the Thunderbirds?

01:36:49.473 --> 01:36:53.095
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, oh, yeah, but like, that's such a small chance.

01:36:53.115 --> 01:36:55.176
[UNKNOWN]: Like, why would I, I, it doesn't make sense to me.

01:36:55.816 --> 01:36:59.577
[UNKNOWN]: And he was like, well, we're doing a hiring round, like, maybe just think about it.

01:36:59.898 --> 01:37:00.598
[UNKNOWN]: I was like, okay, cool.

01:37:02.081 --> 01:37:07.143
[UNKNOWN]: So I go to my squadron commander in my case, so I want to put my name in the hat, and he was a prior Thunderbird, the squadron commander was.

01:37:07.703 --> 01:37:10.924
[UNKNOWN]: And so he's like, yep, cool, I'll back you up.

01:37:11.104 --> 01:37:14.285
[UNKNOWN]: So we submit my packet to the wing, and this is how things work in the Air Force.

01:37:14.745 --> 01:37:15.866
[UNKNOWN]: You've probably seen a lot of this.

01:37:16.026 --> 01:37:20.507
[UNKNOWN]: There's bureaucracy involved, right, when it comes to promotions and packets and stuff like everything.

01:37:22.268 --> 01:37:32.390
[UNKNOWN]: So we submit it to the Wayne Commander and the Wayne Commander, let's it sit for a week and then my boss comes back to me and he's like, hey dude, sorry, Wayne Commander was like, not going to happen.

01:37:32.470 --> 01:37:35.651
[UNKNOWN]: And to be honest, like I wasn't the top dude on the base.

01:37:36.611 --> 01:37:41.392
[UNKNOWN]: I was someone who was, you know, I do my 10 to 12 hour work days and that was my second office assignment, right?

01:37:41.412 --> 01:37:45.453
[UNKNOWN]: So I was like, I want a personal life and that's still didn't work out for me, either.

01:37:45.873 --> 01:37:47.153
[UNKNOWN]: But I wanted more time in my life.

01:37:48.554 --> 01:37:49.876
[UNKNOWN]: to not be sitting in a vault.

01:37:49.936 --> 01:37:54.503
[UNKNOWN]: And so first off, the assignment you're expected to be in that vault, you know, 16 hours sometimes.

01:37:55.104 --> 01:37:59.911
[UNKNOWN]: This office assignment is like, okay, I'm gonna do my 10 to 12 hour work day and I'm gonna go home, try to have some balance in my life.

01:38:00.311 --> 01:38:02.314
[UNKNOWN]: So I wasn't the favorite of the bosses at the top.

01:38:03.375 --> 01:38:07.919
[UNKNOWN]: And maybe I spoke truth to power a few times too many on certain things or why are we doing this?

01:38:08.059 --> 01:38:08.480
[UNKNOWN]: Why is that?

01:38:08.500 --> 01:38:09.701
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that's why I got the call sign.

01:38:10.121 --> 01:38:12.463
[UNKNOWN]: Neo was because I was always trying to break free the matrix.

01:38:12.943 --> 01:38:13.524
[UNKNOWN]: Right.

01:38:14.725 --> 01:38:16.967
[UNKNOWN]: So it wasn't the no shocker.

01:38:16.987 --> 01:38:20.250
[UNKNOWN]: I wasn't the first choice of the boss of the base at the one star general.

01:38:21.231 --> 01:38:26.056
[UNKNOWN]: And so that dream, I was like, okay, I tried, did my thing, then they push another guy, right?

01:38:26.136 --> 01:38:28.579
[UNKNOWN]: His favorite guy goes and gets pushed for the Thunderbird.

01:38:28.599 --> 01:38:36.046
[UNKNOWN]: So I just go back to being a flight commander, cool, two weeks later, we get an email from the Thunderbirds, Air Force wide, and it says,

01:38:36.947 --> 01:38:43.791
[UNKNOWN]: Hey, we didn't get enough candidates that were qualified this year to give us enough to feel like we could find the right pilots.

01:38:44.511 --> 01:38:46.872
[UNKNOWN]: If you want to be a Thunderbird, just send us an email.

01:38:47.333 --> 01:38:51.055
[UNKNOWN]: And this is, this doesn't happen because everything's changing command training command training command.

01:38:51.755 --> 01:38:53.556
[UNKNOWN]: And so they just said send us an email.

01:38:53.716 --> 01:38:57.198
[UNKNOWN]: And so I was like, okay, with a resume or, you know, picture of yourself or whatever.

01:38:58.419 --> 01:39:12.037
[UNKNOWN]: So I send the email and then I get a email back like four days later and it's like congratulations you've been selected to go to the semi-finals or the trials, the first triale, which is essentially the semi-finals.

01:39:12.057 --> 01:39:13.259
[UNKNOWN]: So you get to just two trials.

01:39:14.160 --> 01:39:27.903
[UNKNOWN]: So like what's this crazy my boss walks in he's like did I never seen this happen before but go give him hell Yeah, you know, and so went to an air show so they take you out to an air show Four days or so so I'm hanging out at the air show talking on camera.

01:39:27.943 --> 01:39:40.766
[UNKNOWN]: They're asking you Questions how do you you know Perceive this about the air force of this current event to see how you act to the media But they're doing it with their own media to to see if you're someone that can put on camera or if you're gonna look like an idiot

01:39:41.546 --> 01:39:50.353
[UNKNOWN]: And so did that for a week, hung out, had a great time, and just, I don't know, I'm just trying to enjoy it, because I was kind of like, I mean, this is such a small chance anyways, what do I have to lose?

01:39:50.373 --> 01:39:50.934
[UNKNOWN]: I'm just going to have fun.

01:39:51.614 --> 01:39:57.759
[UNKNOWN]: And they just made friends with the people on the team, the best I could to see if those actually group I wanted to hang out with, those my life too, right?

01:39:58.560 --> 01:40:02.723
[UNKNOWN]: So if I want to be in the road 200 days a year with these people or not, you know, that's another thing I was thinking.

01:40:03.704 --> 01:40:07.886
[UNKNOWN]: and then I go back to the mount home and then I get a call a week later hey you made the finals.

01:40:08.386 --> 01:40:16.189
[UNKNOWN]: Well I was like dude this is crazy this is legit and mainly crazy and then I'm like well this will be a good experience there's no chance I'll make the team but that's okay I'm going to go have fun again.

01:40:16.930 --> 01:40:19.651
[UNKNOWN]: So I go to the next air show same type set up.

01:40:20.051 --> 01:40:42.588
[UNKNOWN]: And then on that final interview, it culminates with your getting interviewed with like three-star, two-star, one-star general, and then the last one is like the entire teams, like 15 of them, so not just the pilots with the support officers, maintenance representatives and things like that, you're on one side of the table, they're on the other side, you know, and they're asking you questions like, you have an engine failure over a crowd in Arizona, and what do you do with the jet?

01:40:42.809 --> 01:40:46.632
[UNKNOWN]: You know, things like that, just putting on the spot, seeing how you act, right, and seeing if

01:40:47.973 --> 01:40:48.713
[UNKNOWN]: That was a big part of it.

01:40:48.733 --> 01:40:49.694
[UNKNOWN]: How do you act on her pressure?

01:40:50.014 --> 01:40:51.695
[UNKNOWN]: And then again, they're interviewing you.

01:40:51.775 --> 01:40:53.437
[UNKNOWN]: We want you on the road with us two hundred days a year.

01:40:54.378 --> 01:40:56.579
[UNKNOWN]: And so, went back from that.

01:40:56.719 --> 01:40:59.201
[UNKNOWN]: And then I remember being in my squadron in Mount Home.

01:40:59.521 --> 01:41:01.303
[UNKNOWN]: Just got to don't fly in for the day of flying the F-15.

01:41:02.124 --> 01:41:04.886
[UNKNOWN]: And the one star general of the base, you know, the guy that I wasn't his boy.

01:41:05.306 --> 01:41:07.388
[UNKNOWN]: I see him walk in, you know, and it's fought in Tentut.

01:41:07.408 --> 01:41:08.609
[UNKNOWN]: Everybody comes to attention.

01:41:09.069 --> 01:41:09.829
[UNKNOWN]: I see him walk in.

01:41:09.870 --> 01:41:10.830
[UNKNOWN]: I'm like, hey, sir, how's it going?

01:41:11.231 --> 01:41:12.431
[UNKNOWN]: Not thinking he's going to talk to me.

01:41:12.832 --> 01:41:13.853
[UNKNOWN]: And he's like, Neo, get in here.

01:41:14.473 --> 01:41:20.896
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, okay, just like the scene on a tap gun where he's sending them to tap gun, it sounds like.

01:41:21.897 --> 01:41:23.257
[UNKNOWN]: I guess all these things got created.

01:41:23.297 --> 01:41:25.158
[UNKNOWN]: Just history doesn't repeat the rhymes, right?

01:41:26.079 --> 01:41:28.820
[UNKNOWN]: So he sits me down in this office, and he's like, so.

01:41:32.782 --> 01:41:34.544
[UNKNOWN]: You're the newest son or bird for the U.S. Air Force.

01:41:35.385 --> 01:41:38.328
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, he was like, kind of grinning his teeth a little bit.

01:41:38.788 --> 01:41:39.869
[UNKNOWN]: And he's like, how does it feel?

01:41:40.049 --> 01:41:41.611
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, well, it feels great, sir.

01:41:42.031 --> 01:41:43.372
[UNKNOWN]: And he's like, well, good.

01:41:43.913 --> 01:41:44.794
[UNKNOWN]: Because you beat the system.

01:41:45.054 --> 01:41:46.696
[UNKNOWN]: And you just stood up, walked out.

01:41:47.256 --> 01:41:48.838
[UNKNOWN]: That's the last time I've ever talked to him.

01:41:49.198 --> 01:41:49.378
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:41:49.639 --> 01:41:51.781
[UNKNOWN]: And then got a phone call from the team the next day.

01:41:51.801 --> 01:41:54.243
[UNKNOWN]: They were like, hey man, we can't wait for you to be a Thunderbird.

01:41:54.263 --> 01:41:54.824
[UNKNOWN]: This is epic.

01:41:55.344 --> 01:41:57.325
[UNKNOWN]: And you know, my squadron commander was stoked for me.

01:41:57.345 --> 01:41:58.285
[UNKNOWN]: He was a Thunderbird before.

01:41:58.825 --> 01:42:00.085
[UNKNOWN]: So that's so cool.

01:42:00.125 --> 01:42:01.186
[UNKNOWN]: The wild card around, man.

01:42:01.786 --> 01:42:02.146
[UNKNOWN]: But I don't know.

01:42:02.166 --> 01:42:07.188
[UNKNOWN]: I think a part of it goes back to like, so two guys on the team I deployed to Afghanistan with Floon Combat with, right?

01:42:07.668 --> 01:42:13.149
[UNKNOWN]: And so I think a lot of these things people will ask me, well, how do I get selected for the Thunderbird?

01:42:13.169 --> 01:42:14.510
[UNKNOWN]: How do I get selected as a fighter pilot?

01:42:16.070 --> 01:42:20.493
[UNKNOWN]: I think if you have a focus on the end result, you're going to fail every time.

01:42:20.533 --> 01:42:24.295
[UNKNOWN]: If your life was meant to be a Thunderbird, my life was meant to be a fighter pilot.

01:42:24.835 --> 01:42:41.104
[UNKNOWN]: But if your life is meant to be someone who stands up for your peers and who speaks truth to power with good intentions, like maybe you get noticed by the right people and maybe that matters more than you pinning on the next rank and it gets rewarded in some places.

01:42:42.285 --> 01:42:45.810
[UNKNOWN]: And it's such a cool, cool story of how you wound up there.

01:42:46.130 --> 01:42:49.334
[UNKNOWN]: How many Thunderbird pilots are there at any one time?

01:42:49.795 --> 01:42:50.336
[UNKNOWN]: There's six.

01:42:50.636 --> 01:42:52.238
[UNKNOWN]: No, six at any given time.

01:42:52.258 --> 01:42:57.365
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and I think there's been like 300 or maybe a little more than that, maybe 500 throughout all of time.

01:42:58.092 --> 01:43:00.114
[UNKNOWN]: that's about as a lead of a group as it gets.

01:43:00.154 --> 01:43:01.895
[UNKNOWN]: I didn't realize there was only six at a time.

01:43:02.095 --> 01:43:04.957
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, there's six pilots on the actual demonstration itself.

01:43:05.218 --> 01:43:09.361
[UNKNOWN]: And then there's a narrator pilot so we actually flies a jet but not in the air show.

01:43:10.021 --> 01:43:14.725
[UNKNOWN]: And then there's a DO director of operations who doesn't fly in the air show but does fly.

01:43:15.085 --> 01:43:18.228
[UNKNOWN]: So there's eight total pilots six that are actually in the show.

01:43:18.828 --> 01:43:28.920
[UNKNOWN]: And you don't replace like everybody's you got your position if someone's sick or has an injury you just fly without that person So specialized that you just can't you can't have someone step in as a backup.

01:43:28.960 --> 01:43:29.901
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, man.

01:43:29.921 --> 01:43:37.190
[UNKNOWN]: That's super cool How how close are you actually getting to the other plane when you're in those tight formations?

01:43:37.670 --> 01:43:55.734
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I think there's times where you can get as close as two feet, but I think the norm where you kind of live is around the three foot mark, that's where you live and then the two foot mark is where you're seeing signs of, okay, I need to move away, like two, it's like kind of like a yellow light green light red light situation, right?

01:43:55.754 --> 01:43:59.815
[UNKNOWN]: So green light's about your nice three foot mark hanging out kind of in the pocket.

01:44:00.775 --> 01:44:08.057
[UNKNOWN]: just dialed in, you see all these little cues that you have, you know, memorize some study and we have GoPro footage to practice with and you're just like dialed into those cues.

01:44:08.477 --> 01:44:11.338
[UNKNOWN]: The yellow cue would be, you know, I'm trending towards like a two-foot mark.

01:44:12.138 --> 01:44:14.478
[UNKNOWN]: And we have certain specific things on the jet that show you that.

01:44:14.518 --> 01:44:20.480
[UNKNOWN]: And then the red light is like, hey dude, if you don't react within the next one to two seconds, you're going to impact the jet next to you.

01:44:20.920 --> 01:44:25.142
[UNKNOWN]: and that's your red light cue, and so then you're going to aggressively get away, but you can't be too aggressive, right?

01:44:25.162 --> 01:44:28.764
[UNKNOWN]: Because if you're close in and you try to do one of these turns, you're going to clip a wing.

01:44:28.824 --> 01:44:39.749
[UNKNOWN]: So you have to totally reorient the way your brain thinks as a fighter pilot, and then instead of using the ailerons to slide out, you're going to use rudder to pull away, or maybe there's times where you need to actually tuck in a little bit in a roll,

01:44:40.429 --> 01:44:42.331
[UNKNOWN]: So it's just a whole different way of flying.

01:44:42.611 --> 01:44:44.092
[UNKNOWN]: I was so grateful I got to do it, man.

01:44:44.112 --> 01:44:48.016
[UNKNOWN]: It was like the dream come true, because you're using all types of different tactics.

01:44:48.036 --> 01:45:01.328
[UNKNOWN]: Like I remember using the rudder as a speed break because I was doing these rejoins with like 400 knots of closure at half a mile, which is totally out of the realm in a combat squadron, but we had to do this to get back into position, right?

01:45:01.788 --> 01:45:05.071
[UNKNOWN]: And so I remember flowing back in, and then instead of just using the speed break,

01:45:05.812 --> 01:45:10.835
[UNKNOWN]: or G, I just use full opposite rudder, so I'm coming in and I went, uh, and like, squeaked it in.

01:45:11.596 --> 01:45:14.377
[UNKNOWN]: And then we had to contact Lockheed Martin and we're like, hey, are we allowed to do this?

01:45:14.818 --> 01:45:15.678
[UNKNOWN]: Can the rudder handle this?

01:45:15.898 --> 01:45:17.179
[UNKNOWN]: And they're like, we think so.

01:45:18.360 --> 01:45:19.340
[UNKNOWN]: I need you to know so.

01:45:19.740 --> 01:45:20.681
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, exactly.

01:45:20.861 --> 01:45:22.942
[UNKNOWN]: They're like, no one's ever tried doing that before.

01:45:23.002 --> 01:45:23.163
[UNKNOWN]: So.

01:45:24.003 --> 01:45:29.867
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01:45:30.508 --> 01:45:32.369
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01:45:32.630 --> 01:45:34.671
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01:45:35.051 --> 01:45:40.075
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01:45:40.455 --> 01:45:42.197
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01:45:42.617 --> 01:45:46.720
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01:45:46.940 --> 01:46:00.889
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01:46:01.089 --> 01:46:03.111
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01:46:03.551 --> 01:46:12.636
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01:46:19.300 --> 01:46:25.204
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01:46:25.644 --> 01:46:30.487
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01:46:30.947 --> 01:46:48.818
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01:46:50.715 --> 01:47:02.478
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it seems like, kind of like what you mentioned earlier is you need to be professional athlete level in shape and hand-eye coordination and kind of on top of your game.

01:47:02.498 --> 01:47:17.602
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I imagine that the lifestyle of being a thunderbird just because I know the blue angels and like, I mean, it's the same thing with the parachute teams and special operations like that's such a rock star kind of lifestyle, you know, that it's kind of, it seems

01:47:20.163 --> 01:47:27.849
[UNKNOWN]: having to not be hung over and dehydrated and in shape and eating clean because inches are the difference between life and death.

01:47:27.869 --> 01:47:32.552
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I imagine you have to take your lifestyle pretty serious in that role, don't you?

01:47:32.992 --> 01:47:33.893
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think so.

01:47:34.033 --> 01:47:38.216
[UNKNOWN]: And I think on the Thunderbirds, you do, I mean, you can get away with a lot of stuff when you're young, right?

01:47:38.376 --> 01:47:46.442
[UNKNOWN]: Well, your body just handles it, but yeah, I could, I could notice, you know, if I had a couple beers, because we would go to PR events every night after flying, right?

01:47:46.502 --> 01:47:47.063
[UNKNOWN]: And you'd have a couple

01:47:49.544 --> 01:47:55.448
[UNKNOWN]: But I always say like being a Thunderbird is like being a rock star with a curfew Because at a certain point you can't you got to stop drinking.

01:47:55.468 --> 01:48:00.431
[UNKNOWN]: I think the team has an official rule where you can't drink after like 10 pm or something like that

01:48:00.789 --> 01:48:22.521
[UNKNOWN]: It's not a, we had, it was a jigger to trigger, they called it, or yager to drag her, but if you were diving, I think it was eight hours, which seems kind of short to me, depending on how many you had, but it was a time that you had to stop drinking by if you were flying the next day.

01:48:23.081 --> 01:48:27.125
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and I think in the Air Force it's 12 hours, but on the team it's a little more restrictive.

01:48:27.305 --> 01:48:28.766
[UNKNOWN]: I got a stop trick and by 10 or whatever.

01:48:28.966 --> 01:48:30.848
[UNKNOWN]: Did you guys have it on the normal on SILTEAM 3?

01:48:30.928 --> 01:48:32.169
[UNKNOWN]: Or was it just when you were diving?

01:48:32.590 --> 01:48:35.312
[UNKNOWN]: No, it was all the time, it was eight hours.

01:48:35.553 --> 01:48:42.979
[UNKNOWN]: Like, if you had drank, whatever the last drink you had, it had to be at least eight hours from when you were starting the next day.

01:48:43.840 --> 01:48:58.273
[UNKNOWN]: getting in training and maybe part of that is, no matter what time you're starting, you're not actually going to be pulling the trigger or doing anything super dangerous for probably several more hours, you know, but yeah, that was always the rule was eight hours, but can I add one more thing to that?

01:48:58.434 --> 01:49:04.719
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, just the, man, what I saw and as I was kind of like leaving the military to, like I feel like I was in the change of the guard where,

01:49:05.400 --> 01:49:14.127
[UNKNOWN]: Guys would, you know, old school guys would show up, they'd pound four, five cups of coffee, eat a slice of apple pie and then jump in the jet and fly and never touch the gym, right?

01:49:14.167 --> 01:49:16.909
[UNKNOWN]: And it was, they'd come back and be just like crush and cigarettes.

01:49:17.930 --> 01:49:28.979
[UNKNOWN]: So I saw that and, you know, we'd come back from missions, even in the combat squadrons and we would drink three, four beers, whatever, you know, and you told the legal to do it, but then you're not gonna work out after that.

01:49:29.479 --> 01:49:32.642
[UNKNOWN]: You know, you're gonna feel like crap, maybe you go home or groggy or whatever.

01:49:33.142 --> 01:49:42.468
[UNKNOWN]: And so, I don't know, I just started to see the writing on the wall, and I wanted it to be a sustainable lifestyle just for myself to get out and not have a completely destroyed body.

01:49:43.128 --> 01:49:52.374
[UNKNOWN]: And so, I was the guy who was like, why don't we have like cryotherapy, cold plunges, sonas, like chiropractors, and here, and dude, the old guard thought I was...

01:49:53.254 --> 01:49:59.198
[UNKNOWN]: Which which I get it like they didn't they they called me a soft new age pilot or never snap You know when I would say something like that.

01:49:59.339 --> 01:50:03.161
[UNKNOWN]: I don't like look guys like I want to be jacked I want to be like in good shape.

01:50:03.181 --> 01:50:09.786
[UNKNOWN]: I want to be able to like go home and feel good But I want to fill out the flight suit for walking through the hotel afterwards exactly.

01:50:09.806 --> 01:50:10.947
[UNKNOWN]: I got objectives here, man

01:50:11.507 --> 01:50:13.929
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and so I think that's shifted in change, though.

01:50:14.129 --> 01:50:16.650
[UNKNOWN]: So I've noticed a lot of my boroughs that are still in right now.

01:50:16.750 --> 01:50:23.274
[UNKNOWN]: Like there's high performance mindset of a fighter pilot as shifted to where it's treated a little more like a professional athlete.

01:50:23.534 --> 01:50:26.856
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I would say soft as the exact same way.

01:50:26.977 --> 01:50:30.959
[UNKNOWN]: I remember I was probably at the start of the trailer.

01:50:30.999 --> 01:50:33.521
[UNKNOWN]: I got out at kind of the start of the transition.

01:50:33.601 --> 01:50:33.721
[UNKNOWN]: So

01:50:34.781 --> 01:50:50.367
[UNKNOWN]: You know, my first deployment was pre-9-11 and even like going through seal training, I remember our instructors, I mean, like, our remember graduation week, you know, I'm 18, 19s and my parents are driving me on the base to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to, to,

01:50:51.328 --> 01:50:56.713
[UNKNOWN]: for it was the day before graduation, I think, and our class proctor and third phase.

01:50:56.733 --> 01:51:03.059
[UNKNOWN]: I keep in mind, we had gone out the night before, and we were at this local seal dive bar.

01:51:03.319 --> 01:51:12.387
[UNKNOWN]: And I remember leaving, like, three in the morning, and he was literally passed out, because we all knew he was leaving our PT the next morning.

01:51:12.408 --> 01:51:13.368
[UNKNOWN]: He was like the last.

01:51:14.089 --> 01:51:38.386
[UNKNOWN]: PT of buds that our third phase class proctor is going to lead and he's going to crush us and he was notorious for being just an absolute mutant of an athlete that would just ruin us and so we devise this plan of what we're going to get him so drunk that like he can't crush us tomorrow and so like people are just feeding and shots left and right trying to just floor him so that you know he'll take it easy on us and

01:51:39.748 --> 01:51:42.650
[UNKNOWN]: When we left, he was passed out face down at the bar.

01:51:43.571 --> 01:51:48.055
[UNKNOWN]: And 630 in the morning, my parents are driving me to the base the next morning.

01:51:48.535 --> 01:51:50.397
[UNKNOWN]: And he's on a fucking mountain bike.

01:51:51.078 --> 01:51:53.059
[UNKNOWN]: We're the cigarette hanging out of his mouth.

01:51:53.640 --> 01:51:55.462
[UNKNOWN]: Hall an ass to base.

01:51:56.402 --> 01:52:02.923
[UNKNOWN]: And then proceeds to just absolutely destroy every one of us, you know, and you guys as a jossardous driver.

01:52:02.943 --> 01:52:20.967
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, we were just like, who it like the students in Alien, you know, and yeah, like to till your point, like that old schooled guard, like that's just how guys were then, you know, and so, you know, going through training and then, you know, in the early 2000s to mid 2000s, you know, the optempo picks up quite a bit.

01:52:21.788 --> 01:52:40.905
[UNKNOWN]: And just I think inherently between technology, sports science, the nature of the job, like you can't keep putting your body through that and going on deployment after deployment after deployment and expect to have any kind of longevity, coupled with between I think social media and just the possession and transfer of knowledge.

01:52:41.666 --> 01:52:52.059
[UNKNOWN]: exercise and nutrition science wise that nowadays it's like they're like seals or professional athletes, you know, it's a very different culture from what I understand.

01:52:52.319 --> 01:52:54.021
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, which I think is good.

01:52:54.041 --> 01:52:55.123
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, there's a part of me that

01:52:56.365 --> 01:53:14.617
[UNKNOWN]: you know, kind of longs for that old school, you know, salty dog, you know, mentality, because I think there's just a, maybe an overall man to size, but there's just an aura to that guy that's like, it kind of reminds me of the no country for old men kind of, you know, it's just, it's like a culture of the military that,

01:53:15.197 --> 01:53:21.104
[UNKNOWN]: is a dying breed that just, you know, rarely if not ever exists anymore, you know, but but I'm sure it is for the best.

01:53:21.404 --> 01:53:22.765
[UNKNOWN]: But that'd be like Richard Mersinko?

01:53:23.066 --> 01:53:23.466
[UNKNOWN]: For sure.

01:53:23.566 --> 01:53:24.007
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:53:24.447 --> 01:53:28.952
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, just, you know, work hard, party harder, but always get the job done.

01:53:29.092 --> 01:53:36.560
[UNKNOWN]: Like there's, it's like, party as hard as you want and you're expected to, but you're also expected to show up the next day like it never happened.

01:53:36.660 --> 01:53:36.881
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:53:37.761 --> 01:53:48.771
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's like, yeah, the just the expectation in every way is 11 out of 10, you know, you're doing everything at Max Afterburner, you know, but thank you for the play.

01:53:48.851 --> 01:53:49.411
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah.

01:53:49.791 --> 01:53:55.956
[UNKNOWN]: Alright, so the, I guess, moving on from the old guard and kind of getting back into the, the Thunderbird stuff.

01:53:56.817 --> 01:54:05.580
[UNKNOWN]: schedule lies like what's what's kind of the typical schedule for you guys are you gone way more than your home and kind of constantly traveling or how many days a week are you flying?

01:54:05.980 --> 01:54:20.425
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah so in the training season it's about you go to the Thunderbird six months of training and sometimes you'll fly twice a day but typically you're flying I'd say maybe eight to ten flights a week minimum while you're getting spun up and getting ready for that so

01:54:21.105 --> 01:54:30.468
[UNKNOWN]: It's, you know, fly, show up at six, fly, one-sorty, grab some lunch, second-sorty, you know, do a little bit of studying and then you're home by like, you know, five or so, whatever.

01:54:31.188 --> 01:54:33.789
[UNKNOWN]: And that is a pretty grueling season, though, right?

01:54:33.829 --> 01:54:42.031
[UNKNOWN]: Because you're doing chair-flying, you're trying to figure out how this works, you know, there's a little thing in the back of your head that's like, all right, I got a certain amount of time to make this, otherwise, you know, I'm not going to make the team.

01:54:42.431 --> 01:54:45.892
[UNKNOWN]: So it's pretty intense, the training season is something that, you know,

01:54:46.412 --> 01:55:03.043
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I remember coming home and you know your arm just because you're you're doing something weird with a jet Which is you're trimming the jet all the way down So you're taking these little flight controls putting it to where there's a whole bunch of tension on the stick and that just gives you the ability to move it a lot more precisely

01:55:03.583 --> 01:55:07.345
[UNKNOWN]: But it's not how you would ever fly in F-16 in the combat squadrons or in F-15.

01:55:07.826 --> 01:55:13.629
[UNKNOWN]: So it's basically like your whole thing about they say like 27 pounds of pressure, just constantly for, you know, 45 minutes.

01:55:14.049 --> 01:55:17.871
[UNKNOWN]: Just holding it in your maneuvering it around, but it's like doing an isometric exercise.

01:55:18.391 --> 01:55:24.215
[UNKNOWN]: So it might not seem like a lot, but when you think about doing that for 45 minutes under the knee, you know, your arms pretty shot.

01:55:24.255 --> 01:55:27.897
[UNKNOWN]: Like I've had friends on the team that have blown tendons in their arm and things like that.

01:55:28.918 --> 01:55:39.554
[UNKNOWN]: So, yeah, it's pretty intense for that training regimen, and then once you get done with training, the Daytona 500 is kind of like typically that's the sign of like, Cam gonna make it through this course.

01:55:40.355 --> 01:55:43.520
[UNKNOWN]: So, you do the Daytona 500, you come back and do a little bit more training.

01:55:44.080 --> 01:55:50.522
[UNKNOWN]: and then you get certified and tested by a four star comes out and watches you gives you the check mark and then you hit the road.

01:55:50.822 --> 01:55:56.864
[UNKNOWN]: And so the road is you leave on Wednesdays, Wednesday night and then you get home on Sunday.

01:55:56.904 --> 01:56:01.605
[UNKNOWN]: So Wednesday night you fly out, you do like a site survey, you do a practice and then two shows,

01:56:02.445 --> 01:56:11.967
[UNKNOWN]: And that can shift a little bit, you know, you might leave on Thursdays or something like that, do the shows either Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or you know, two a weekend or three a weekend, and so you're flying a ton.

01:56:12.528 --> 01:56:14.968
[UNKNOWN]: The most flying I've ever done was on the Thunderbirds.

01:56:15.008 --> 01:56:15.228
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:56:15.648 --> 01:56:19.269
[UNKNOWN]: Are you assuming you're flying the jet to wherever you're going to be doing it, right?

01:56:19.309 --> 01:56:19.569
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:56:19.629 --> 01:56:22.090
[UNKNOWN]: And that's that situation where I had that rapid decompression, right?

01:56:22.110 --> 01:56:28.752
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe they shouldn't let us fly it from place to place, just put us in a commercial plant, though it's in the jet like a show pony and let us fly once we get there.

01:56:30.012 --> 01:56:34.253
[UNKNOWN]: So, I mean, in a case like that where I assume you're doing an emergency landing, right?

01:56:34.454 --> 01:56:40.616
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, are you going to an air force space or a military air strip?

01:56:40.976 --> 01:56:46.337
[UNKNOWN]: There was some other options that we could have landed at a little bit sooner, but the goal was to get to a place that had a doctor right there.

01:56:46.457 --> 01:56:49.178
[UNKNOWN]: And so, all the air force bases have the flight surgeons that are there.

01:56:49.699 --> 01:56:53.280
[UNKNOWN]: And so, yeah, that's why we ended up going to Albuquerque because there was a flight surgeon.

01:56:53.500 --> 01:56:53.680
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:56:54.581 --> 01:57:08.881
[UNKNOWN]: From a coordination standpoint, is that handled the same way, say a commercial jet with a medical emergency would be handled where it's like they're racetracking and diverting to get you guys to be able to land quickly because it's an emergency kind of thing.

01:57:09.402 --> 01:57:10.242
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think so.

01:57:10.462 --> 01:57:12.123
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's you just get priority.

01:57:12.223 --> 01:57:29.308
[UNKNOWN]: As soon as you say the word emergency and there's clear in the path for you and then in that case, you know, we were we were talking to a center and air traffic control center and we the my wingman passed them the information about what had happened and so then it was getting pushed to the actual landing location so they could get the doctor ready.

01:57:29.648 --> 01:57:33.589
[UNKNOWN]: So that's why when we showed up in landed, you know, the fire department was there, the flight surgeon was already there.

01:57:34.409 --> 01:57:39.614
[UNKNOWN]: That coordination happened through civilian air traffic control agencies coordinating all the way to the military base.

01:57:39.734 --> 01:57:39.954
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

01:57:41.135 --> 01:57:48.601
[UNKNOWN]: I assume that you've got your own like flight crew mechanics-wise that travel and maintain the aircraft for the shows and all that.

01:57:48.842 --> 01:57:51.604
[UNKNOWN]: Are they like their own, they're the Thunderbird mechanics?

01:57:51.804 --> 01:57:52.625
[UNKNOWN]: Yes.

01:57:52.645 --> 01:57:53.485
[UNKNOWN]: They're a top of the line.

01:57:53.505 --> 01:57:57.729
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, if you see these guys and gals like the things they do, I mean, first of all, they're all jacked.

01:57:58.069 --> 01:57:59.811
[UNKNOWN]: Part of their job is workout two hours a day.

01:58:00.111 --> 01:58:02.113
[UNKNOWN]: No, that's good advertising for the Air Force, right?

01:58:02.993 --> 01:58:08.416
[UNKNOWN]: So they're super sharp, they're at the top of their game in their combat squadron, and that's how they get selected.

01:58:08.616 --> 01:58:12.998
[UNKNOWN]: It's the same selection process as it is for pilots, as it is for them.

01:58:13.038 --> 01:58:15.880
[UNKNOWN]: As far as the tip of the spear wants that.

01:58:15.980 --> 01:58:18.281
[UNKNOWN]: So it's literally the sharpest people you could ever want.

01:58:18.741 --> 01:58:26.083
[UNKNOWN]: And I mean, those jets, those things we do to those jets, and then the way that they get them ready to go, the next day, that night, and sometimes they're working all the way through the night.

01:58:26.443 --> 01:58:30.824
[UNKNOWN]: We're talking sheet metal specialists, engine specialists, I mean, everything you can think of.

01:58:30.884 --> 01:58:41.686
[UNKNOWN]: You know, they're crafting new parts, like if a panel is broken, they'll, in a remote location, something that flew in on a C130, you know, they'll do metal sheet work to get it ready that night.

01:58:41.706 --> 01:58:43.267
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it's super impressive.

01:58:43.447 --> 01:58:44.307
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's amazing.

01:58:44.487 --> 01:58:45.407
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:58:49.168 --> 01:59:01.297
[UNKNOWN]: If you were to go from that back into a combat flying environment, I mean, I would assume that you would be a phenomenal air to air dog fight kind of pilot coming from that like you'd be best in the world, right?

01:59:01.818 --> 01:59:05.060
[UNKNOWN]: 100% yeah, the stick and rudder skills that translate from that.

01:59:05.080 --> 01:59:14.667
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I've never felt sharper than getting done with the team and so at the end of my time, I was an instructor on the team and I could just tell like how much I could

01:59:15.107 --> 01:59:28.967
[UNKNOWN]: how much airmanship you had because all the flying stuff the dog fighting skills were so second nature that you could do some advanced stuff yeah yeah super cool um is there a coolest thunderbird experience that you had venue wise

01:59:30.028 --> 01:59:35.410
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, I really love flying around the Chicago air and water show because the skyscrapers are right there.

01:59:35.550 --> 01:59:35.750
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

01:59:35.870 --> 01:59:38.231
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I remember flying over top of like the skyscrapers.

01:59:38.251 --> 01:59:40.492
[UNKNOWN]: There's a pool right there and I feel like it was like a freeze frame.

01:59:40.872 --> 01:59:43.013
[UNKNOWN]: Whereas this dude, you know, with a drink.

01:59:43.413 --> 01:59:44.933
[UNKNOWN]: And he was like, like, what are you doing here?

01:59:44.953 --> 01:59:46.154
[UNKNOWN]: And I'm like, what are you doing here?

01:59:47.054 --> 01:59:56.518
[UNKNOWN]: It was just this cool moment of like man, America is incredible, like the things that we have, the things that we, you know, America is like, hey, here's the keys to six jets.

01:59:56.638 --> 01:59:59.379
[UNKNOWN]: Each of them are $100 million a piece, here's a $30 million budget.

01:59:59.759 --> 02:00:02.800
[UNKNOWN]: Go entertain us and inspire us and show us what's possible.

02:00:03.040 --> 02:00:12.744
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, but yeah, that Chicago show was just so cool because you're weaving in and out of buildings, you know, you're treating buildings as pylons, like it's just such amazing thing as an aviator.

02:00:12.784 --> 02:00:15.525
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, did you ever have any close calls?

02:00:16.536 --> 02:00:27.719
[UNKNOWN]: Yes, yeah, so there is a couple, the probably the the biggest close call was another two of them that I can remember one of them we were doing a loop on takeoff

02:00:28.632 --> 02:00:42.587
[UNKNOWN]: And the loop on takeoff to me, it's, that's like, I don't know if there's something that you guys did, or like when you first got to the range, or you first got into a training evolution, but you're kind of cold, right, when you first step into that environment at the beginning of your day.

02:00:42.988 --> 02:00:48.534
[UNKNOWN]: And so the loop on takeoff is one of the most complex maneuvers and you do it right away.

02:00:48.834 --> 02:00:50.036
[UNKNOWN]: So you're all on the runway together.

02:00:50.716 --> 02:00:59.780
[UNKNOWN]: You know, you just got into the jet a couple minutes ago and then you take off and then you go into burner And then you do a full loop and you haven't warmed up at all yet.

02:01:00.000 --> 02:01:09.584
[UNKNOWN]: You know, it's just right off the take off So to me that one was kind of you would get in your head about it a little bit You know, it was a little bit of a okay, how's this going to go today and everybody's learning right?

02:01:09.604 --> 02:01:20.089
[UNKNOWN]: So I'm not throwing spears at anybody, you know, everybody's doing their best to figure this out The boss is doing his best to assess the altitude we need to get up over the top safely They clear the airspace to a certain altitude

02:01:21.411 --> 02:01:24.814
[UNKNOWN]: But again, sometimes things don't translate.

02:01:24.854 --> 02:01:31.020
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe someone in the tower a couple of months before who now has a different job knew that we needed 12,000 feet to do this.

02:01:32.060 --> 02:01:36.865
[UNKNOWN]: But in this case today, we got like a 9,000 foot ceiling of what we were supposed to go to on the loop.

02:01:37.425 --> 02:01:41.609
[UNKNOWN]: And so we take off, we do the loop, and we start going through the 9,000 feet.

02:01:42.970 --> 02:01:43.991
[UNKNOWN]: which isn't odd.

02:01:44.011 --> 02:01:48.233
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it's sometimes there's different things that happen in the boss is trying to correct and come back down.

02:01:48.733 --> 02:01:52.936
[UNKNOWN]: And I just see out of the left corner, a Navy, I think it was a P-8 or P-3.

02:01:52.956 --> 02:02:02.782
[UNKNOWN]: It was a Navy submarine hunting jet, literally like a hundred feet off my wing and I'm like, oh, and so we kind of all like break apart because

02:02:03.382 --> 02:02:07.505
[UNKNOWN]: We went to high on the loop, this jet's coming over, they shouldn't be bringing jets over.

02:02:07.685 --> 02:02:11.968
[UNKNOWN]: But again, someone forgets that that's a protocol, things happen.

02:02:12.528 --> 02:02:16.391
[UNKNOWN]: And so really close call, probably 100 feet from that jet, going up and over the top.

02:02:17.031 --> 02:02:29.099
[UNKNOWN]: And then I got into, I pulled so hard to get kind of away from the formation that the jet stalled, the F-16 stalled, which isn't, you know, you'd stall all the time in dog fights as far as like getting down to really, really low air speed.

02:02:29.620 --> 02:02:31.101
[UNKNOWN]: But we are probably like, you know,

02:02:33.142 --> 02:02:46.602
[UNKNOWN]: the base and i'm in a full like zero air speed situation just floating down like this so then i push forward like this and then recover you know a couple thousand feet above the the floor of the base and i'm it's kind of like oh i just did that in front of everybody you

02:02:48.144 --> 02:03:01.102
[UNKNOWN]: And the tower's like, you guys okay, you know, but it's weird flying, you know, people maybe don't understand, but there's certain times, you know, when those jet engines, the winds a little bit different, something shifts, and it's just a dynamic situation.

02:03:01.122 --> 02:03:04.687
[UNKNOWN]: So I get, I don't blame anybody for that, but that can happen any given day.

02:03:05.228 --> 02:03:14.598
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so the rest of the last, the other one, as an instructor, so I'm in the back seat of the F-16, and this happens in all the different evolutions.

02:03:14.859 --> 02:03:18.963
[UNKNOWN]: As you leave the Thunderbirds, you become an instructor, and then you teach the next group.

02:03:19.944 --> 02:03:22.367
[UNKNOWN]: And so I'm in the back seat of the jet this time.

02:03:23.328 --> 02:03:27.252
[UNKNOWN]: teaching the new number two, and super good dude, really good at flying.

02:03:27.372 --> 02:03:29.774
[UNKNOWN]: Again, you get put in weird situations, right?

02:03:29.794 --> 02:03:43.125
[UNKNOWN]: So there's things that happen that the reason I'm there is because it's flying is so different from everything else that we're going to put this pilot in a very uncomfortable position, and it's just, you know, the evolutions of having the reps to understand, this is a new way of flying.

02:03:43.366 --> 02:03:44.627
[UNKNOWN]: It's like learning how to do a backflip.

02:03:44.947 --> 02:04:00.951
[UNKNOWN]: You know, if you've ever done a black back flip before, you know that there's this thing in your brain where it's like this isn't natural, this isn't normal, and then you do it a couple times and you're like, okay, I know, bring the legs up high, do it, you know, pull them in, don't delay, like be really precise about how I pull my legs in, so I can actually flip backwards.

02:04:01.631 --> 02:04:04.172
[UNKNOWN]: Little nuances like that is what I'm training this guy on.

02:04:04.967 --> 02:04:18.209
[UNKNOWN]: And so we're in a role and we get into a position where as the left side of the formation is kind of the formation side where it's said to be the most challenging because you're pushing and going into a negative G state.

02:04:18.590 --> 02:04:22.390
[UNKNOWN]: So you're kind of light in the seat a little bit as you push here to stay in position.

02:04:22.830 --> 02:04:29.592
[UNKNOWN]: And so the number two and then number five or six, whose ever on the left wing here, typically has the hardest job in formation.

02:04:30.412 --> 02:04:31.532
[UNKNOWN]: And so as we're pushing through,

02:04:33.114 --> 02:04:37.418
[UNKNOWN]: This pilot who hasn't done this that many times forgets to push because it's very unnatural.

02:04:37.438 --> 02:04:40.501
[UNKNOWN]: Like as a fighter pilot, you don't want to go in a negative G. And so he's pushing.

02:04:41.161 --> 02:04:45.305
[UNKNOWN]: And then we get to a point where we're literally like top gun Maverick or top maybe as original top gun.

02:04:45.365 --> 02:04:47.067
[UNKNOWN]: Where it's like keeping up foreign relations.

02:04:47.507 --> 02:04:49.890
[UNKNOWN]: There's the other cockpit right above us, right?

02:04:49.910 --> 02:04:50.670
[UNKNOWN]: Because we're like this.

02:04:51.531 --> 02:04:54.212
[UNKNOWN]: you know, and so this is a very bad position because there's no really out.

02:04:54.372 --> 02:04:56.933
[UNKNOWN]: This is the boss, the lead, he's just rolling like this.

02:04:57.253 --> 02:04:58.494
[UNKNOWN]: So we're kind of stuck right here.

02:04:59.354 --> 02:05:03.076
[UNKNOWN]: So I just took command of the jet and went full nose down.

02:05:03.116 --> 02:05:06.137
[UNKNOWN]: So again, negative G's as we try to escape this thing.

02:05:06.197 --> 02:05:08.078
[UNKNOWN]: And then this, the formation keeps going that way.

02:05:08.698 --> 02:05:15.241
[UNKNOWN]: We push down and then I look, you know, and I say, I have the jet, you know, right away, I'm telling the guy in the front, I have the jet.

02:05:15.641 --> 02:05:17.962
[UNKNOWN]: And as I, my whole focus is the formation, right?

02:05:18.002 --> 02:05:19.403
[UNKNOWN]: Not necessarily the ground yet.

02:05:20.323 --> 02:05:26.765
[UNKNOWN]: because the first thing that was going to kill me was going to be smashing canopy to canopy and kill the other guys and the other jets.

02:05:27.165 --> 02:05:28.205
[UNKNOWN]: That's the first threat, right?

02:05:28.225 --> 02:05:36.588
[UNKNOWN]: So I get us away from that jet and then we roll out and I look up and it's just a cockpit full of earth rushing up at us rapidly.

02:05:36.628 --> 02:05:40.449
[UNKNOWN]: So then pulled nine G's, got us out of it and we recovered.

02:05:40.849 --> 02:05:44.250
[UNKNOWN]: I would guess probably 75, 50 feet above the desert.

02:05:44.370 --> 02:05:44.550
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:05:45.290 --> 02:05:45.991
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, man.

02:05:46.011 --> 02:05:47.072
[UNKNOWN]: That's a super close call.

02:05:47.092 --> 02:05:52.477
[UNKNOWN]: So at that point, I mean, are you, is there any part of you that's jumping his ass in the cockpit?

02:05:52.497 --> 02:05:57.122
[UNKNOWN]: Or is it more of a, you kind of expect things like that to happen and it's a learning experience?

02:05:57.303 --> 02:05:59.265
[UNKNOWN]: I think that's always your first reaction, right?

02:05:59.285 --> 02:06:03.328
[UNKNOWN]: Because we all have this desire for self-protection, right?

02:06:03.368 --> 02:06:08.312
[UNKNOWN]: So the first thing that comes into your mind is you try to kill me, but I didn't say that out loud.

02:06:08.932 --> 02:06:10.413
[UNKNOWN]: Because I know we didn't try to kill me.

02:06:10.774 --> 02:06:14.276
[UNKNOWN]: But your first reaction is, my adrenaline's high.

02:06:14.296 --> 02:06:15.517
[UNKNOWN]: I literally just almost hit the ground.

02:06:16.278 --> 02:06:17.199
[UNKNOWN]: Who can I blame this on?

02:06:17.219 --> 02:06:18.680
[UNKNOWN]: That's just human nature sometimes.

02:06:18.700 --> 02:06:20.381
[UNKNOWN]: And that's one of my faults as well.

02:06:20.601 --> 02:06:21.782
[UNKNOWN]: It's jumping to that conclusion.

02:06:22.803 --> 02:06:31.552
[UNKNOWN]: But I think what happens over time is you realize like, oh, what was this person's intention and slow things down kind of like when you have road rage when someone has road rage like that person's trying to kill me.

02:06:31.692 --> 02:06:38.539
[UNKNOWN]: No, they just cut you off because maybe they're thinking about their kid who's sick today and they're not paying attention or whatever, right?

02:06:38.559 --> 02:06:41.121
[UNKNOWN]: There's different reasons someone's not always trying to kill you.

02:06:42.162 --> 02:06:46.567
[UNKNOWN]: And so it's like calming down the nervous system and I think that that happened over time as an instructor.

02:06:47.228 --> 02:06:54.341
[UNKNOWN]: But once we got in the debriefram I was like, hey man, you know how serious that was right and I needed to make sure that he got it

02:06:55.529 --> 02:06:59.270
[UNKNOWN]: And when he reiterated, like, yeah, I know that we almost hit the ground today.

02:06:59.510 --> 02:07:00.851
[UNKNOWN]: Like when he said that, I was like, okay, cool.

02:07:00.871 --> 02:07:11.515
[UNKNOWN]: Now we can learn, but I needed to make sure he got that point across, but I think the key thing when it comes to any high stakes, high performance instruction is you don't want to lose them.

02:07:11.755 --> 02:07:13.595
[UNKNOWN]: You don't want to, you know, make them not really.

02:07:14.055 --> 02:07:16.776
[UNKNOWN]: Not want to listen to the next thing that comes out of your mouth because you're being a dick.

02:07:17.016 --> 02:07:18.057
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, for sure.

02:07:18.917 --> 02:07:20.138
[UNKNOWN]: man, that's dicey.

02:07:21.298 --> 02:07:24.259
[UNKNOWN]: You got promoted to major mid-flight, is that right?

02:07:24.579 --> 02:07:24.859
[UNKNOWN]: I did.

02:07:25.179 --> 02:07:26.480
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, how did that work?

02:07:27.240 --> 02:07:29.180
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, your surprise that I got promoted, I am too.

02:07:31.321 --> 02:07:32.301
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, no, it was awesome.

02:07:32.361 --> 02:07:38.183
[UNKNOWN]: So the the Thunderbird lead at the time, Shifty heard his name, amazing leader, great pilot.

02:07:38.783 --> 02:07:40.144
[UNKNOWN]: It was just a surprise.

02:07:40.184 --> 02:07:42.785
[UNKNOWN]: So I made major against all odds, apparently.

02:07:44.125 --> 02:08:07.461
[UNKNOWN]: He was probably as shocked as I was and he's like, man, we got to do something big for this much to the shigran of the one star That's in top gone three the one stars just sitting there shaking his head while the guys getting promoted They got to work that scene in somewhere So he's like, hey man, we're gonna do something different today You're gonna get promoted in the jet, so yeah, we went up did a full practice show and then I read the oath of office You know back to MS.

02:08:07.481 --> 02:08:09.222
[UNKNOWN]: He's reading it to me over the radio beautiful.

02:08:09.242 --> 02:08:10.203
[UNKNOWN]: I mean amazing moment man.

02:08:10.223 --> 02:08:10.363
[UNKNOWN]: Just

02:08:11.063 --> 02:08:12.344
[UNKNOWN]: chills and goose bumps again.

02:08:12.465 --> 02:08:14.907
[UNKNOWN]: These things that have happened that I'm like, how did this happen to me?

02:08:14.967 --> 02:08:18.591
[UNKNOWN]: Like, I'm just, the luckiest dead dude on earth, the most blessed dude on earth.

02:08:18.671 --> 02:08:19.732
[UNKNOWN]: And I was one of those moments.

02:08:20.092 --> 02:08:21.794
[UNKNOWN]: And then at the end of it, we did a bon tawn roll.

02:08:22.154 --> 02:08:24.556
[UNKNOWN]: So we all kind of did an aileron roll information.

02:08:24.596 --> 02:08:27.880
[UNKNOWN]: And, uh, dude, I just, one of the top moments for sure.

02:08:28.020 --> 02:08:28.260
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:08:28.440 --> 02:08:31.183
[UNKNOWN]: And that was, uh, the Super Bowl fly over to, right?

02:08:31.743 --> 02:08:48.586
[UNKNOWN]: No, we did the I think we did the Super Bowl fly over a little bit after the after that promotion Our super bowls and like any state image that kind of all the same thing when you're flying above it I mean Are you able to really discern one thing over the next I think one of the things that I really

02:08:50.140 --> 02:08:51.762
[UNKNOWN]: could discern was a Daytona 500.

02:08:52.302 --> 02:08:57.988
[UNKNOWN]: So when you're flying over the Daytona, you have a second to kind of look down at the crowd and everybody's right there and it's just America, baby.

02:08:58.228 --> 02:09:00.110
[UNKNOWN]: That was probably the coolest flyover ever.

02:09:01.071 --> 02:09:02.612
[UNKNOWN]: But we did a flyover in Houston.

02:09:03.373 --> 02:09:03.994
[UNKNOWN]: This was in 2017.

02:09:06.095 --> 02:09:12.317
[UNKNOWN]: And they didn't open up the stadium for us, so we did it and everybody could hear us.

02:09:12.477 --> 02:09:16.339
[UNKNOWN]: But they just piped it into the stadium via the big screens and I'm like, what?

02:09:16.479 --> 02:09:17.999
[UNKNOWN]: And at first, I'm like, okay, you know what?

02:09:18.079 --> 02:09:21.140
[UNKNOWN]: It's probably humidity, like, you know, something to do with the players.

02:09:21.180 --> 02:09:22.581
[UNKNOWN]: Got to make sure that the game goes well.

02:09:23.001 --> 02:09:24.622
[UNKNOWN]: And then what happens at halftime?

02:09:25.402 --> 02:09:27.723
[UNKNOWN]: Lady Gaga, they open the stadium for and I'm like,

02:09:28.543 --> 02:09:39.214
[UNKNOWN]: Lady Gaga gets a stadium open, but we don't like the sound and you don't even need to do it, you know, you gotta just make the digital Thunderbirds just take over all the flyovers.

02:09:40.256 --> 02:09:48.124
[UNKNOWN]: Man, all right, so burn in question, F-15 or F-16 if you had to go back into flying one of the two of them which were under your pick.

02:09:48.514 --> 02:09:51.618
[UNKNOWN]: Man, I do that's a really tough one.

02:09:52.759 --> 02:09:55.062
[UNKNOWN]: I think, I mean, can I pick F-35?

02:09:55.322 --> 02:09:56.123
[UNKNOWN]: Sure, okay.

02:09:56.203 --> 02:09:58.386
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think I would, that was my next assignment.

02:09:58.406 --> 02:10:02.812
[UNKNOWN]: So when I chose to get out, I had an F-35 coming down the pike, that's where what I was gonna do.

02:10:03.633 --> 02:10:06.116
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, I think that's just the most advanced jet as you have 35.

02:10:06.136 --> 02:10:06.796
[UNKNOWN]: So it's kind of like,

02:10:07.938 --> 02:10:21.094
[UNKNOWN]: great photo of done the F-15E amazing incredible having a whiz on the back I love that dynamic and then F-16 just a pilot jet built to be a pilot jet sports car super maneuverable F-15E to me is way more

02:10:22.390 --> 02:10:30.653
[UNKNOWN]: combat oriented for my liking, because it carries so many bombs, so much gas, two engines, so if you have an engine issue, so get home.

02:10:30.713 --> 02:10:36.815
[UNKNOWN]: So a single seat jet in combat situation, you know, very reliable, but there's just something nice about having to.

02:10:37.255 --> 02:10:40.776
[UNKNOWN]: But the reason why I would pick F-35 now is just how advanced it is.

02:10:40.796 --> 02:10:48.439
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I know a little bit about it, just from some of the things I've learned through friends and I'm prior to getting out, and I think it's just the best combat jet we have.

02:10:48.599 --> 02:10:49.359
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah.

02:10:50.460 --> 02:10:51.541
[UNKNOWN]: UAP encounters.

02:10:51.961 --> 02:10:53.022
[UNKNOWN]: Yes.

02:10:53.203 --> 02:10:55.645
[UNKNOWN]: If you came across the radar, no pun intended.

02:10:56.426 --> 02:11:02.853
[UNKNOWN]: I'd love to hear about your experience with it, and also kind of where it went after seeing it reporting, etc.

02:11:03.358 --> 02:11:04.019
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah.

02:11:04.719 --> 02:11:17.310
[UNKNOWN]: So I got to talk to Jeremy Corbyl about this and I just think it's first lot of things that's really cool that we're having this conversation as a society that were able to have it and pilots aren't made to be crazy for having this, these encounters.

02:11:17.370 --> 02:11:17.730
[UNKNOWN]: It's cool.

02:11:18.691 --> 02:11:21.513
[UNKNOWN]: So the first one I had was on the Thunderbirds,

02:11:22.614 --> 02:11:29.960
[UNKNOWN]: Well, I guess the first one's even before that, but it was similar to what we've seen some of the videos of where these little orbs have been seen out over the Atlantic.

02:11:30.621 --> 02:11:35.865
[UNKNOWN]: So we would be out in the F-15E doing practice, bomb drops, airdair engagements and things like that.

02:11:36.205 --> 02:11:41.910
[UNKNOWN]: And we would see these little orbs that we thought were like balloons or something, but then they'd be going against the wind, which was weird.

02:11:41.990 --> 02:11:43.752
[UNKNOWN]: So then we just started thinking drones.

02:11:44.572 --> 02:11:45.313
[UNKNOWN]: So we report it.

02:11:45.473 --> 02:11:50.755
[UNKNOWN]: We file a report with our Intel agency and I don't really know where that went.

02:11:50.935 --> 02:11:53.337
[UNKNOWN]: I have no idea, but it's typically it was from a distance away.

02:11:53.617 --> 02:12:00.440
[UNKNOWN]: Just kind of ominous like weird like there's some little things up in this airspace because remember a bird going down the engine, you're done, right?

02:12:00.640 --> 02:12:01.081
[UNKNOWN]: Sometimes.

02:12:01.141 --> 02:12:03.142
[UNKNOWN]: So I see these orbs.

02:12:04.062 --> 02:12:07.887
[UNKNOWN]: And that was just a weird situation, but at that time we didn't really know what to do that information.

02:12:08.368 --> 02:12:15.637
[UNKNOWN]: Ryan Graves have come out with some videos where he talks, he shows kind of the way that these things are going against the wind stream and things like that.

02:12:15.818 --> 02:12:18.982
[UNKNOWN]: But I remember seeing them when I was out there in the F-15E and the Atlantic.

02:12:19.502 --> 02:12:21.444
[UNKNOWN]: And then the next one happened on the Thunderbirds.

02:12:21.964 --> 02:12:26.207
[UNKNOWN]: So I was coming in, we were coming in to do a recovery.

02:12:26.287 --> 02:12:27.548
[UNKNOWN]: So it's called a Thunderbird pitch.

02:12:27.968 --> 02:12:31.991
[UNKNOWN]: We all come into the airfield, and then we pitch sequentially.

02:12:32.412 --> 02:12:34.353
[UNKNOWN]: But as we're driving in there, we're information.

02:12:34.393 --> 02:12:38.636
[UNKNOWN]: We're working our way around some of those mountains right there by Nellis Air Force Base.

02:12:39.917 --> 02:12:43.119
[UNKNOWN]: And as we're coming in, and we're setting up, we're kind of in a right hand turn.

02:12:44.260 --> 02:13:07.601
[UNKNOWN]: and then we roll back to correct a little bit and as we roll back to correct a little bit as a formation something catches my eye and it's just breakneck speed what goes right past me and I was able to kind of freeze frame it you know you kind of develop that skill when you're seeing fast objects seeing other fighter jets and things like that so I remember kind of freeze framing in my mind and it looked like a metallic triangle that had some sort of a like

02:13:09.042 --> 02:13:35.917
[UNKNOWN]: cyber truck looking stainless steel look to it like it wasn't finished you had some welding marks or something like that but it was a really aggressive shape like shaped with a very aerodynamic type look to it so I don't know exactly what that was I mean we are close to area 51 out there but it it doesn't make any sense to me for the US military to test advanced technology against the Thunderbirds I mean if something went wrong and it hits one of us I mean and that's a huge PR loss for everything the team gets

02:13:38.038 --> 02:13:44.921
[UNKNOWN]: So that's what made me think like okay is it a hobbyist, but our hobbyist flying like advanced fighter-shaped drones going really fast.

02:13:45.122 --> 02:13:46.402
[UNKNOWN]: Well then what altitude was that?

02:13:46.762 --> 02:13:48.803
[UNKNOWN]: We were probably at 2,000 feet Agile.

02:13:49.023 --> 02:13:49.203
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:13:50.064 --> 02:13:53.786
[UNKNOWN]: I mean in foreign involvement doesn't make sense either because of where it's at.

02:13:54.166 --> 02:13:54.646
[UNKNOWN]: Right.

02:13:54.686 --> 02:13:56.267
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe on a coastline or something.

02:13:57.167 --> 02:13:59.789
[UNKNOWN]: middle America, like that doesn't really check out either.

02:14:00.069 --> 02:14:08.875
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, like you mentioned go pro footage and Do you guys have on board cameras things all the time that was there any recording of it?

02:14:09.056 --> 02:14:12.238
[UNKNOWN]: No, we don't have them We have the HUD HUD recording

02:14:13.058 --> 02:14:16.819
[UNKNOWN]: And I don't remember being able to see it on the HUD on mine.

02:14:17.699 --> 02:14:24.702
[UNKNOWN]: I don't even know if I looked because when we got back, I asked my friend who was on the other end of the formation.

02:14:24.722 --> 02:14:26.602
[UNKNOWN]: I said, hey, did you see that?

02:14:26.882 --> 02:14:27.862
[UNKNOWN]: And he was like, no.

02:14:28.002 --> 02:14:28.983
[UNKNOWN]: And he was kind of like this like,

02:14:29.845 --> 02:14:30.505
[UNKNOWN]: Are you okay?

02:14:30.726 --> 02:14:31.246
[UNKNOWN]: Kind of thing.

02:14:31.286 --> 02:14:34.168
[UNKNOWN]: It wasn't like a, let's investigate and figure out what this is.

02:14:34.989 --> 02:14:42.334
[UNKNOWN]: And I feel like at the time that was more of the culture is like, hey, let's, like, people might think you're crazy if you say that to someone else.

02:14:42.394 --> 02:14:44.455
[UNKNOWN]: That was the vibe I got when I talked to them.

02:14:44.655 --> 02:14:44.836
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:14:44.996 --> 02:14:45.196
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

02:14:45.216 --> 02:14:46.277
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:14:46.757 --> 02:14:48.278
[UNKNOWN]: Was there another thing?

02:14:48.318 --> 02:14:50.640
[UNKNOWN]: Was there something that was actually recovered?

02:14:51.580 --> 02:14:57.464
[UNKNOWN]: There was one that happened, it was up in Southern Wyoming area, and we were up at altitude.

02:14:58.705 --> 02:15:12.934
[UNKNOWN]: And this object that looked to me, kind of like a square, a translucent square, caught my eye, and there was another pilot with me, and so I'm like, hey, look at that, and he's like, oh, what is that?

02:15:13.975 --> 02:15:15.918
[UNKNOWN]: we both are like, is it a balloon?

02:15:16.318 --> 02:15:19.963
[UNKNOWN]: That was our first comment, and then we look, there's no tether, nothing's holding this thing up.

02:15:21.024 --> 02:15:24.289
[UNKNOWN]: And it's kind of towards sunset, but it's not quite sunset yet.

02:15:24.389 --> 02:15:27.092
[UNKNOWN]: It's probably like, you know, 5, 6pm or something like that.

02:15:27.112 --> 02:15:28.574
[UNKNOWN]: It sounds a little bit lower in the horizon.

02:15:29.515 --> 02:15:34.577
[UNKNOWN]: And as this thing's getting closer, I start to make out what looks like kind of a window in the middle.

02:15:34.637 --> 02:15:40.279
[UNKNOWN]: It's got translucent space where it's almost like there's could be airflow going through this little central part.

02:15:40.720 --> 02:15:45.001
[UNKNOWN]: But it's a big rectangle that I would estimate was probably like 50 to 75 feet tall.

02:15:46.742 --> 02:15:57.086
[UNKNOWN]: Not flying your old onion, I make me like just flat cleaning with a hole in the middle and bright white edges on the outside and that translucent part in the center that look like airflow could kind of make its way through.

02:15:58.127 --> 02:16:10.132
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and it's just coming towards us and I'm like, okay, so I might have to take go over to sing on a collision course because at first it kind of did look like it because it wasn't moving on the canopy at all and I'm ready to click the autopilot off and then it just kind of shifts.

02:16:10.292 --> 02:16:12.233
[UNKNOWN]: So I don't know if it had

02:16:13.328 --> 02:16:20.851
[UNKNOWN]: Always not been on a collision course, but it looked like it was on a collision course, because as soon as something's static on your canopy, that means it's coming directly at you.

02:16:20.871 --> 02:16:22.892
[UNKNOWN]: You're looking for a line of sight, any type of movement.

02:16:23.372 --> 02:16:27.833
[UNKNOWN]: So it's coming right at us, and I'm thinking we've got to turn this autopilot off in maneuver.

02:16:28.014 --> 02:16:28.734
[UNKNOWN]: The things that hit us.

02:16:29.174 --> 02:16:36.297
[UNKNOWN]: And then last second, it just shifted and started going down the wing line, probably passed 100 feet off of our wing.

02:16:36.757 --> 02:16:39.238
[UNKNOWN]: We were missing that close.

02:16:39.738 --> 02:16:41.779
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and but it was coming toward you.

02:16:41.819 --> 02:16:42.219
[UNKNOWN]: So you.

02:16:43.620 --> 02:16:44.941
[UNKNOWN]: going past it basically.

02:16:44.981 --> 02:16:45.662
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:16:45.722 --> 02:16:47.524
[UNKNOWN]: Do you remember about how fast you were going?

02:16:48.164 --> 02:16:52.188
[UNKNOWN]: We're probably going ground speed probably 400 knots, ground speed.

02:16:52.408 --> 02:16:52.648
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

02:16:53.889 --> 02:16:55.971
[UNKNOWN]: So that now at least somebody else saw it.

02:16:56.092 --> 02:16:57.673
[UNKNOWN]: Did you guys talk about it afterwards?

02:16:58.133 --> 02:17:06.941
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so we filed something with the FAA like an anonymous or anomalous report that tells him I described it exactly.

02:17:07.762 --> 02:17:33.199
[UNKNOWN]: and then actually I made the radio call to air traffic control after that as well because we're thinking like hey there's something up here there's airliners up here there's people flying other jets up here you know what if someone hits it so my call to air traffic control I'll never forget I was like air traffic control I got a wild report for you and they're like okay and so I described it I was like hey we just passed by an object that was a rectangle had a translucent

02:17:37.521 --> 02:17:45.487
[UNKNOWN]: And it looked like it was on a collision course with us for a second and then shifted last second and they're like, Okay, we'll pass that on.

02:17:45.607 --> 02:17:45.987
[UNKNOWN]: Thank you.

02:17:46.188 --> 02:17:47.509
[UNKNOWN]: You know, what are they going to say?

02:17:47.529 --> 02:17:50.851
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and so then we filed the report with the FAA gets submitted.

02:17:52.252 --> 02:17:57.916
[UNKNOWN]: And that pilot and I, you know, I was, because you know, I have the social media presence too of asked him.

02:17:57.936 --> 02:17:59.617
[UNKNOWN]: I like, hey, do you want to talk about that sometime?

02:17:59.637 --> 02:18:02.279
[UNKNOWN]: And he says, no, doesn't want to talk about it.

02:18:02.679 --> 02:18:02.940
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:18:03.869 --> 02:18:10.572
[UNKNOWN]: I would, I would want to talk about it, I know, but, man, I would be so cool if you had GoPro footage or some sort of...

02:18:11.152 --> 02:18:11.453
[UNKNOWN]: I know.

02:18:11.673 --> 02:18:21.977
[UNKNOWN]: I would have to, I mean, honestly, if it was less of that collision course fuel, who knows, maybe I would have whipped out the phone and filmed it, but it literally felt to me, like, this might be a situation I got to dodge this thing.

02:18:22.478 --> 02:18:27.560
[UNKNOWN]: How many seconds, like from the time you saw it until you couldn't see it, like how long will I know it?

02:18:27.620 --> 02:18:29.141
[UNKNOWN]: I'd say a solid 15 seconds.

02:18:29.341 --> 02:18:29.541
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

02:18:29.881 --> 02:18:47.264
[UNKNOWN]: yeah like just really like clear coming right down the wing line and I was super grateful there was another pilot too yeah so it's like man it's happened to be twice if i'm the only one saying this people are gonna start talking do you know any other pilots that you've talked to or heard from that have had even remotely similar experiences

02:18:48.085 --> 02:19:15.477
[UNKNOWN]: I have, yeah, a good friend of mine, and so I won't share his name or anything, but he's done a lot of international trips, and he's saying that every time he goes through the certain part of the Pacific Ocean, he sees a formation, like a constellation of drones that are going in and out of the water, like going in and out and going up, or they'll just turn, sometimes it's at night, so he doesn't know if they're going into the water, the lights are just turning

02:19:17.198 --> 02:19:27.828
[UNKNOWN]: But he says it's been pretty consistent like pretty much every time he does this trip He sees this in the Pacific you said Pacific yeah in the same place every time It's roughly in the same place.

02:19:27.888 --> 02:19:29.890
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, where can you say we're about?

02:19:31.131 --> 02:19:36.976
[UNKNOWN]: Well, I know that he's he's flying from the west coast to like Japan Korea

02:19:37.857 --> 02:19:39.778
[UNKNOWN]: And he hasn't told me exactly like where on that trip.

02:19:39.998 --> 02:19:40.178
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:19:40.338 --> 02:19:43.779
[UNKNOWN]: But somewhere on that route from like West Coast to Japan.

02:19:44.039 --> 02:19:45.640
[UNKNOWN]: Has he ever tried to get footage of it?

02:19:46.220 --> 02:19:47.280
[UNKNOWN]: He does have footage of it, yeah.

02:19:47.300 --> 02:19:47.480
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:19:47.780 --> 02:19:47.900
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:19:47.920 --> 02:19:48.600
[UNKNOWN]: Has he sent it to you?

02:19:48.861 --> 02:19:49.001
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:19:49.021 --> 02:19:50.401
[UNKNOWN]: He hasn't sent it to me, but he's shown it to me.

02:19:50.681 --> 02:19:50.881
[UNKNOWN]: No doubt.

02:19:50.901 --> 02:19:52.262
[UNKNOWN]: He's seen it on his phone.

02:19:52.322 --> 02:19:53.242
[UNKNOWN]: What does it look like to you?

02:19:53.963 --> 02:20:13.815
[UNKNOWN]: uh... it looks like some sort of advanced drones to me and it looks like some sort of propulsion that doesn't exist to us yes humans and it's wild so and what what is your take on ua p's generally speaking from kind of the the huge shift in the last five years really of

02:20:14.795 --> 02:20:34.549
[UNKNOWN]: much more kind of mainstream acceptance of the fact that there's at least sightings by credible individuals, you know, not the toothless method and trailer parts, it's like, I was a doctor, you know, like, okay, yeah, because that's kind of the only people that ever talked about, or people that want particularly credible in the first place.

02:20:34.589 --> 02:20:37.511
[UNKNOWN]: And they always show something up their butt, yeah, that's a weird one.

02:20:38.071 --> 02:20:39.452
[UNKNOWN]: That wasn't the alien sweetheart.

02:20:40.813 --> 02:20:46.555
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so I guess, you know, what's your take on UAP's generally speaking at this point?

02:20:46.695 --> 02:20:49.096
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think my perception of it has shifted a lot.

02:20:49.616 --> 02:20:54.837
[UNKNOWN]: And I think I always wanted UAPs to be true, that just makes mathematical sense to me.

02:20:54.857 --> 02:20:59.479
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's cool to think that there's other things out there that we can learn from.

02:21:00.679 --> 02:21:09.586
[UNKNOWN]: But it's shifted a little bit now where, you know, I've heard the statements from David Grush, you know, there's no a pinnacle on office, that's looking into this kind of stuff.

02:21:10.527 --> 02:21:14.850
[UNKNOWN]: And I'm like playing this out, right, for my my fighter pilot brain.

02:21:15.911 --> 02:21:16.791
[UNKNOWN]: Okay, like,

02:21:17.772 --> 02:21:20.733
[UNKNOWN]: what's another, because I always feel like these things aren't exactly what they seem.

02:21:20.953 --> 02:21:25.395
[UNKNOWN]: So extra-tressual ET, okay, I mean that's cool, Hollywood stuff, probably not.

02:21:25.675 --> 02:21:30.317
[UNKNOWN]: I'm just trying to think like, you know, counter, like if you're trying to win in the stock market, think different, right?

02:21:30.337 --> 02:21:32.058
[UNKNOWN]: I think alternative options.

02:21:32.798 --> 02:21:37.860
[UNKNOWN]: So, okay, what if this is some sort of thing that's actually been here on Earth?

02:21:38.580 --> 02:21:45.302
[UNKNOWN]: And I think David Grush brought this up in one of his letters or one of the statements he made is that these things are actually from here.

02:21:45.482 --> 02:21:56.444
[UNKNOWN]: And there's a portal here where whether it's space, time, whatever, some different dimension where these things can actually now come to us in this phase, this realm, this time.

02:21:57.344 --> 02:22:01.885
[UNKNOWN]: And I first thought that was crazy to be honest, I was like, duh, dude, this is fantasy stuff.

02:22:02.286 --> 02:22:03.506
[UNKNOWN]: But then I started playing it out.

02:22:04.793 --> 02:22:08.678
[UNKNOWN]: me, like to say myself, I've fast-forwarded myself a couple thousand years in the future.

02:22:09.159 --> 02:22:11.462
[UNKNOWN]: I'm a fighter pilot, type mindset.

02:22:11.562 --> 02:22:20.875
[UNKNOWN]: It's going to be doing something different, drone oriented or whatever at the time, but I love America, I love our country, maybe we're the last bastion of hope for what we've built here.

02:22:21.696 --> 02:22:23.077
[UNKNOWN]: How do we keep this?

02:22:24.078 --> 02:22:26.500
[UNKNOWN]: And we've seen a lot of it trying to be attacked recently, right?

02:22:26.580 --> 02:22:28.361
[UNKNOWN]: Even our constitution being attacked.

02:22:30.102 --> 02:22:32.724
[UNKNOWN]: Socialists trying to attack what America stands for.

02:22:34.105 --> 02:22:37.608
[UNKNOWN]: China, Russia, all these threats outside of us, Iran, nuclear weapons.

02:22:38.288 --> 02:22:49.350
[UNKNOWN]: So, what if there's some sort of deterrence that I could get to this time now that some future version of me, some ancestor in the future would think like I think, and finds a way to get that portal here.

02:22:49.450 --> 02:22:54.911
[UNKNOWN]: So, we get it and Russia doesn't get it, or we get it a slightly better version of it and Russia doesn't get quite that version of it.

02:22:55.351 --> 02:23:02.512
[UNKNOWN]: And so, to me, that makes a lot more sense, and then I was thinking that way, and then I saw an interview with Palmer Lucky, and he's like, he kind of said something similar.

02:23:02.832 --> 02:23:05.213
[UNKNOWN]: I don't think it was on Joe Rogan, where he was like, what if...

02:23:06.353 --> 02:23:15.784
[UNKNOWN]: There's this UFO that they're going to show to some high ranking military official and they open up the gates and it's this incredible looking craft and then you walk around the side of it and it says property of US Navy.

02:23:17.141 --> 02:23:20.962
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I think that's a way more plausible situation than E.T.

02:23:20.982 --> 02:23:21.463
[UNKNOWN]: at this point.

02:23:21.663 --> 02:23:22.383
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah.

02:23:23.563 --> 02:23:27.705
[UNKNOWN]: Um, it's a, I mean, it's a fascinating realm and perspective for sure.

02:23:27.725 --> 02:23:34.207
[UNKNOWN]: Um, she kind of segues into the, the war planning phase of your career before we talk about it.

02:23:34.227 --> 02:23:43.490
[UNKNOWN]: I know it's jumping around a little bit, but just for the flow of the, uh, the interview generally speaking, I wanted to cover that last because I think it's most applicable to to kind of what you're doing now.

02:23:43.551 --> 02:23:44.631
[UNKNOWN]: But sure, um,

02:23:46.096 --> 02:24:00.220
[UNKNOWN]: I guess one, I assume the UAP or just foreign intelligence from a totally unknown, and these are things that are inexplicable, maybe doesn't play a big role in that, maybe it does.

02:24:00.240 --> 02:24:06.481
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know if it's something that's even discussed in kind of the war planning phase, but tell us about for what you can.

02:24:07.201 --> 02:24:09.422
[UNKNOWN]: The section of your career where you really spent

02:24:10.940 --> 02:24:19.386
[UNKNOWN]: all day every day kind of dirt diving, you know, potential conflicts from an air superiority standpoint with a lot of different potential foes.

02:24:19.706 --> 02:24:20.367
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, for sure.

02:24:21.087 --> 02:24:29.753
[UNKNOWN]: To hit quickly on what you said about like our adversaries with that technology, I mean, I think that's also a plausible scenario too, especially with those orbs that are being seen in the Pacific.

02:24:30.153 --> 02:24:39.920
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, perfect testing ground for advanced orbs, you know, and they know that there's airliners doing this route constantly, they can, you know, use those as, you know, tests, they could maybe,

02:24:40.520 --> 02:24:59.615
[UNKNOWN]: use their whatever on board type radar systems they have they could be seeing actual metal aircraft that they could test these things on So I think it's actually a great testing ground for our adversaries for sure and the thing that I would say to is this is why I'm so big on technology in our military is Russia and China It's basically China.

02:24:59.915 --> 02:25:04.039
[UNKNOWN]: They have no guardrails on technology especially with these drones.

02:25:04.399 --> 02:25:06.961
[UNKNOWN]: They'll do anything like they'll build anything there's no like

02:25:07.421 --> 02:25:08.262
[UNKNOWN]: Hey, let's not do this.

02:25:08.322 --> 02:25:09.563
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe this isn't moral.

02:25:09.743 --> 02:25:11.884
[UNKNOWN]: No, that doesn't exist in the in the plaf.

02:25:12.305 --> 02:25:13.466
[UNKNOWN]: They don't, they do not care.

02:25:14.266 --> 02:25:28.237
[UNKNOWN]: So I would say advanced technology in the US, the more that we can invest in that, the more that we can get that to our warfighters and get the guard rails off to some extent related to how it could fight against China or Russia or deter them.

02:25:28.877 --> 02:25:29.478
[UNKNOWN]: the better.

02:25:29.518 --> 02:25:36.264
[UNKNOWN]: If we try to dumb down in nerf our systems for whatever the reason, Russian and China aren't doing that, just for that to be out there.

02:25:37.505 --> 02:25:43.811
[UNKNOWN]: So when it comes to where the war planning went and how it kind of shifted,

02:25:44.732 --> 02:25:55.276
[UNKNOWN]: I was super grateful because I got put in charge of plans and that's a position that every fighter squadron has where your whole job is to teach the operational plans to your squadron.

02:25:55.896 --> 02:26:08.440
[UNKNOWN]: And so it's kind of funny, like a little side story, I actually give a briefing in my squadron when I first got there and the weapons officer tasks these briefings and you brief like a

02:26:12.732 --> 02:26:15.974
[UNKNOWN]: his minion, the guy that worked for him, gave me the instructions.

02:26:15.994 --> 02:26:18.095
[UNKNOWN]: And it was like, hey man, we all just got back from Afghanistan.

02:26:19.075 --> 02:26:20.156
[UNKNOWN]: We have all dropped GPU 12.

02:26:20.216 --> 02:26:22.357
[UNKNOWN]: So you're going to brief the GPU 12 to the squadron.

02:26:22.377 --> 02:26:23.538
[UNKNOWN]: Just give us like 10 minutes to do.

02:26:23.558 --> 02:26:24.578
[UNKNOWN]: We've all dropped this thing.

02:26:24.658 --> 02:26:26.239
[UNKNOWN]: Like, please, just make it quick.

02:26:26.820 --> 02:26:27.560
[UNKNOWN]: And so I'm like, sweet.

02:26:27.680 --> 02:26:29.261
[UNKNOWN]: So I get up as a new guy in the squadron.

02:26:29.821 --> 02:26:31.722
[UNKNOWN]: And I'm like, well, everybody, this is the GPU 12.

02:26:31.742 --> 02:26:32.663
[UNKNOWN]: This is the secret.

02:26:32.883 --> 02:26:35.484
[UNKNOWN]: It goes boom, you know, basically to summarize it.

02:26:36.905 --> 02:26:38.226
[UNKNOWN]: And the weapons officer stands up.

02:26:38.246 --> 02:26:38.626
[UNKNOWN]: And he's like,

02:26:41.793 --> 02:26:45.077
[UNKNOWN]: That was an example of what never to do in this squadron.

02:26:45.518 --> 02:26:47.440
[UNKNOWN]: I was like, oh, here we go.

02:26:47.641 --> 02:26:49.563
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, boy, like this is not going to end well for me.

02:26:50.044 --> 02:26:54.229
[UNKNOWN]: And he spent the next 10 minutes saying how I had not studied for that brief.

02:26:54.289 --> 02:26:56.852
[UNKNOWN]: And, you know, which again, it wasn't his vision.

02:26:56.952 --> 02:26:57.693
[UNKNOWN]: But, uh,

02:26:58.638 --> 02:27:00.359
[UNKNOWN]: his minion had told me to do it a certain way.

02:27:01.139 --> 02:27:03.160
[UNKNOWN]: He was stressed, the weapon's officer's stressed out.

02:27:03.200 --> 02:27:18.008
[UNKNOWN]: He was at the end of his rope probably, and it was funny, though, because then I had to make up that briefing, and so I had to overcompensate, and so I did like a 45-minute brief where I was like, okay, this is the beeps and squeaks, this is how the wires are connected, how the lasers talk to each other.

02:27:18.388 --> 02:27:23.411
[UNKNOWN]: If you drop a laser, if you drop a bomb with the wrong laser code, here's what the bomb does, all everything, right?

02:27:23.811 --> 02:27:25.392
[UNKNOWN]: And so after I did that second brief,

02:27:25.912 --> 02:27:27.832
[UNKNOWN]: They were like, oh, you really like this stuff.

02:27:27.852 --> 02:27:31.993
[UNKNOWN]: You're going to be like, that helped me get the job to be in charge of briefing the whole squadron on plans.

02:27:32.013 --> 02:27:34.854
[UNKNOWN]: But it started with a massive failure and potentially a call sign.

02:27:34.894 --> 02:27:37.315
[UNKNOWN]: But luckily, that didn't happen.

02:27:37.695 --> 02:27:39.495
[UNKNOWN]: So I get the job with plans.

02:27:39.695 --> 02:27:41.696
[UNKNOWN]: And then I just dove deep, man.

02:27:41.736 --> 02:27:44.016
[UNKNOWN]: I went, because that was always kind of interested in geopolitics.

02:27:44.036 --> 02:27:44.496
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know why.

02:27:44.516 --> 02:27:46.317
[UNKNOWN]: I just always wanted to know why.

02:27:46.557 --> 02:27:47.517
[UNKNOWN]: Again, the Neo call sign.

02:27:47.537 --> 02:27:48.817
[UNKNOWN]: I was trying to break free the matrix.

02:27:48.857 --> 02:27:50.718
[UNKNOWN]: I guess it's just curiosity.

02:27:51.558 --> 02:27:59.586
[UNKNOWN]: And so I started going deep into the war plans and the U.S. has on the shelf, you know, plans you know this where it's like, okay, we're going to fight North Korea.

02:28:00.087 --> 02:28:00.727
[UNKNOWN]: Here's the book.

02:28:00.847 --> 02:28:04.791
[UNKNOWN]: Here's what happens on day one, two, three, four, five all the way through like three four months.

02:28:05.592 --> 02:28:13.500
[UNKNOWN]: And so I just became an expert specifically on North Korea and Iran to start and then tangentially did some Russia China Taiwan straight stuff.

02:28:14.180 --> 02:28:30.612
[UNKNOWN]: And so it started showing me how many layers there are to warfare and warfare isn't just Okay, Air Superiority means I'm gonna go up today in a 15E fighting against a J20 like those plans break it down all the way to like How the conflict could start who could start it?

02:28:30.852 --> 02:28:32.794
[UNKNOWN]: How a false flag could start it?

02:28:32.894 --> 02:28:35.576
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it's really amazing like the intel that we have is incredible

02:28:36.296 --> 02:28:50.665
[UNKNOWN]: And so I wanted to get that into, you know, the minds of my squadron mates to know that hey, there's 40 chess going on out here every single day and, you know, you take off in a North Korea scenario and you accidentally shoot down a Su-30 MKK from China, we got a real problem on our hands.

02:28:51.165 --> 02:28:54.687
[UNKNOWN]: So how do we avoid shooting down the Su-30 MKK because they're going to take off?

02:28:55.067 --> 02:28:57.849
[UNKNOWN]: They're going to be patrolling their border, make sure that we don't cross into there.

02:28:58.289 --> 02:29:02.632
[UNKNOWN]: Here's how we don't shoot down that Su-30 MKK and then start a broader world with China, you know.

02:29:03.692 --> 02:29:11.338
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, I agreed the layers to it is fascinating and kind of never ending, you know, because I mean, you can what if every scenario to death.

02:29:11.658 --> 02:29:12.298
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:29:13.659 --> 02:29:30.631
[UNKNOWN]: From a kind of a ranking, I guess, of all the different countries that you did out plans for, which one, I think everybody probably knows the answer, but I'll ask anyway, which one scares you the most from a air superiority challenge standpoint?

02:29:31.111 --> 02:29:31.452
[UNKNOWN]: China?

02:29:31.572 --> 02:29:31.772
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:29:32.092 --> 02:29:34.233
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, hands down.

02:29:34.293 --> 02:29:34.553
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:29:34.873 --> 02:29:36.174
[UNKNOWN]: Like Russia's not even close.

02:29:36.594 --> 02:29:37.435
[UNKNOWN]: No, no.

02:29:37.495 --> 02:29:45.979
[UNKNOWN]: I mean Russia's not nothing, you know, but you think of an F-22 going up against anything that Russia has, it's going to be a bad day for that Russian pilot.

02:29:48.420 --> 02:29:50.861
[UNKNOWN]: So with that I guess kind of diving into

02:29:53.721 --> 02:30:16.096
[UNKNOWN]: a lot of the content that I've, you know, consumed of yours over the last six plus months, you know, you spent years in a vault planning for war in Iran, having such kind of intimate knowledge and experience with that procedure, now watching it unfold firsthand, how well does that line up and what has surprised you and not surprised you?

02:30:16.456 --> 02:30:16.676
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:30:17.597 --> 02:30:20.919
[UNKNOWN]: Well, I think there was a big part of me that has the FOMO, right?

02:30:20.999 --> 02:30:22.900
[UNKNOWN]: Like, I studied this, I wish I was there.

02:30:23.400 --> 02:30:27.843
[UNKNOWN]: But then I step outside of my own ego and my own desires of like, what is Ryan want?

02:30:27.963 --> 02:30:38.009
[UNKNOWN]: And I'm like, oh, maybe my place was to kind of share with the American people, what this adversary is that we're actually going up against and how hard of a challenge this is for our workfighters.

02:30:38.109 --> 02:30:40.850
[UNKNOWN]: They're totally capable and able to do it, but this is a real problem.

02:30:41.291 --> 02:30:42.972
[UNKNOWN]: Like, they've gotten to the point where they're really strong.

02:30:43.712 --> 02:30:53.316
[UNKNOWN]: And I started to see that when I was teaching it, was how much of their shadow fleet and shadow orientation for their economy propped up the IRGC.

02:30:53.856 --> 02:30:59.058
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, why is there so much of a shadow infrastructure to pump money into the IRGC?

02:30:59.358 --> 02:31:05.501
[UNKNOWN]: And why are they getting 60-70% of the revenue going right to this like, top guys, I don't get it.

02:31:06.241 --> 02:31:18.607
[UNKNOWN]: And so I think that it just was kind of like it's the mind of the eye at the whole of being represented in the military, the military hardware they have is all built for proxy warfare if you really think about it.

02:31:19.007 --> 02:31:25.450
[UNKNOWN]: I mean we took out their massive military systems, Bluewater Navy, surface air missile systems for the most part.

02:31:26.370 --> 02:31:31.613
[UNKNOWN]: Some of their headquarters buildings command control notes pretty much in the first couple weeks, right?

02:31:32.513 --> 02:31:35.115
[UNKNOWN]: But their whole system was built for proxy warfare.

02:31:35.395 --> 02:31:44.103
[UNKNOWN]: And so what I was most kind of taken a back by was how resilient their systems are to once the war starts.

02:31:44.423 --> 02:31:50.348
[UNKNOWN]: Like it's like they kind of know, they see the writing on the wall that their main military force is going to be crushed.

02:31:51.189 --> 02:31:54.752
[UNKNOWN]: And so then they immediately have second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth.

02:31:56.713 --> 02:31:58.734
[UNKNOWN]: ways of fighting back, right?

02:31:58.754 --> 02:32:00.875
[UNKNOWN]: And a lot of it's dispersed, ballistic missile bunkers.

02:32:00.915 --> 02:32:15.583
[UNKNOWN]: You know, if people come into my live streams, you can see that like, we'll go on a live stream and we'll just look across one little chunk of the country and they'll be five different areas where there's 50 plus ballistic missile bunkers where they just pull out a missile launch it and go back in.

02:32:16.303 --> 02:32:24.046
[UNKNOWN]: And I started to see, too, how North Korea and Iran, the tactics Iran was taking from North Korea.

02:32:24.486 --> 02:32:30.908
[UNKNOWN]: North Korea seemed to have perfected it with AAA, and so it was really cool to be able to take the different war plans, a war game, and against each other.

02:32:31.308 --> 02:32:34.049
[UNKNOWN]: Like, okay, how are these people going to learn from each other?

02:32:34.069 --> 02:32:36.510
[UNKNOWN]: Because birds of a feather flock together, right?

02:32:36.930 --> 02:32:37.310
[UNKNOWN]: And so,

02:32:37.930 --> 02:32:41.852
[UNKNOWN]: In North Korea, they have AAA pieces that pull out of a hill and they can launch at Seoul.

02:32:42.032 --> 02:32:49.776
[UNKNOWN]: Estimates are 500,000 people would be dead when the first 72 hours in that conflict, because they're going to launch so much artillery at Seoul.

02:32:50.017 --> 02:32:50.677
[UNKNOWN]: And it's right there.

02:32:51.617 --> 02:33:04.504
[UNKNOWN]: So Iran's version of that is the ballistic missiles where they have done the same exact technique, but not as many pieces, not as many AAA pieces as North Korea, but their ballistic missiles are doing the same thing, at least in their minds.

02:33:04.524 --> 02:33:05.465
[UNKNOWN]: That's what they hope for.

02:33:06.165 --> 02:33:14.429
[UNKNOWN]: It's to hit their neighbors hard enough, hit our base is hard enough that everybody just backs off and this was light This was a light and it wasn't nothing right.

02:33:14.449 --> 02:33:22.634
[UNKNOWN]: We still see them launching ballistic missiles But their goal their stated goal is 10,000 plus ballistic missiles people can back me up on the exact numbers.

02:33:22.894 --> 02:33:28.076
[UNKNOWN]: I want to say they started the conflict with like 2000 something like that, but their goal is 10,000

02:33:29.617 --> 02:33:31.538
[UNKNOWN]: and 100,000 plus drones.

02:33:31.898 --> 02:33:37.662
[UNKNOWN]: But the numbers I saw was they started with 2,000 blizzic missiles and maybe close to 50,000 drones.

02:33:37.902 --> 02:33:38.082
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:33:39.063 --> 02:33:46.007
[UNKNOWN]: From what you planned and kind of what was anticipated versus what's actually happening, does that line up pretty well?

02:33:46.107 --> 02:33:47.308
[UNKNOWN]: Or are there some things?

02:33:47.328 --> 02:33:53.511
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I know you mentioned their resiliency surprised you, but it was that not anticipated in the planning.

02:33:53.531 --> 02:33:53.932
[UNKNOWN]: Like did

02:33:55.112 --> 02:34:13.069
[UNKNOWN]: I guess from somebody in your position or the higher up who's going to be putting that package on the president or joint chiefs desk and saying here's what day one two five six months looks like Do you think that that it was predicted accurately or are we pretty surprised where things are at right now?

02:34:13.749 --> 02:34:17.513
[UNKNOWN]: I think it was predicted pretty accurately, but I think there was surprises in certain places.

02:34:18.093 --> 02:34:23.158
[UNKNOWN]: So the section two or whatever of that O plan is the proxy warfare phase.

02:34:23.178 --> 02:34:28.302
[UNKNOWN]: So section one, you know, here's the force on force, section two is like way thicker and it's this.

02:34:28.342 --> 02:34:31.125
[UNKNOWN]: So I think the plan that was put on the president's desk was like,

02:34:31.885 --> 02:34:55.246
[UNKNOWN]: Potis this is gonna wind down in like three to four weeks for the main military force But then this is gonna kick up and hockey stick when it comes to the proxy warfare But maybe Potis at that point was like what we're gonna make a deal with them anyways, so you know But then it turns out the IRGC is fully embedded like a mafia Yeah, right and so maybe that was a little more surprising where a lot of their front facing

02:34:56.167 --> 02:35:01.970
[UNKNOWN]: and I even kind of felt this with seeing a lot of their front facing leaders, they're convincing.

02:35:02.130 --> 02:35:03.891
[UNKNOWN]: They're relatively good at gaslighting, right?

02:35:03.911 --> 02:35:10.193
[UNKNOWN]: Where they seem like normal politicians, but they're all IRGC guys that are all skilled in IOS information operations.

02:35:10.794 --> 02:35:12.975
[UNKNOWN]: So maybe that the politicians.

02:35:13.295 --> 02:35:14.515
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I guess you're right.

02:35:14.555 --> 02:35:15.496
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I guess we know that.

02:35:16.016 --> 02:35:17.457
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, I think that might have been

02:35:18.572 --> 02:35:22.756
[UNKNOWN]: maybe the inability to negotiate with them, maybe didn't get communicated as well?

02:35:23.236 --> 02:35:24.157
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe it did, I don't know.

02:35:24.537 --> 02:35:27.259
[UNKNOWN]: But I think the proxy warfare was definitely communicated.

02:35:27.399 --> 02:35:32.764
[UNKNOWN]: But the one thing I would say is what's changed for me when I was in to now was the drones.

02:35:33.164 --> 02:35:34.665
[UNKNOWN]: Because there were drones, right?

02:35:34.805 --> 02:35:39.910
[UNKNOWN]: As we studied their plans, but a lot of it was more fast attack boats that would be remote control.

02:35:40.750 --> 02:35:57.545
[UNKNOWN]: They would be more of a fast attack boat drone focus where they would launch 500 or whatever of these fast attack boats with explosives and try to take out the carrier So that was kind of the main thing that I saw with some drone stuff Definitely ballistic missiles was a part of it, but also at the time

02:35:58.506 --> 02:36:02.530
[UNKNOWN]: the ballistic missiles that that we studied weren't as accurate because they weren't.

02:36:03.070 --> 02:36:11.418
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know if we were understanding at the time that they were going to get some advanced technology from Russia and China with electro optical seekers and different things like that.

02:36:11.559 --> 02:36:13.801
[UNKNOWN]: And so I think just like the enemy always does, right?

02:36:13.821 --> 02:36:15.803
[UNKNOWN]: The enemy has vote, they're going to adapt.

02:36:16.063 --> 02:36:23.090
[UNKNOWN]: And so that's what I think they've done over the last five, 10 years is get more accurate with their ballistic missiles and their drones.

02:36:24.030 --> 02:36:30.332
[UNKNOWN]: And they've taken money, that's been given to them for decades, and they've just consistently increased our military capability.

02:36:30.372 --> 02:36:41.034
[UNKNOWN]: So this can has been kicked down the road so long that now you're fighting a much more resilient Iran-proxy warfare wise than I think we would have if this would have been done 10, 15 years ago.

02:36:41.234 --> 02:36:41.434
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:36:42.034 --> 02:36:43.155
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I don't doubt that.

02:36:43.795 --> 02:36:49.336
[UNKNOWN]: I'm curious if there's anything that you learned about the IRGC in the planning phase

02:36:54.197 --> 02:37:05.925
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I've talked about it quite a bit on the channel, but I think the big thing is they are using an information operation that is straight out of the book called Rules for Radicals.

02:37:06.545 --> 02:37:18.573
[UNKNOWN]: And so there's a book out there called Rules for Radicals written by Alinsky and the whole focus of that was actually the left, the political left in the United States used that in the 70s and it's basically a way to

02:37:19.934 --> 02:37:47.946
[UNKNOWN]: triangulate a group of people against a specific threat for your own gain and so you can see it especially being used by people like AOC or Gavin Newsome or a lot of people on the left who will say we're all against Trump, we're anti-Trump, we hate Trump right because that's all they have to say they don't talk about any achievements that's being done by the Democratic Party because they're using that book which is specifically meant to triangulate people against

02:37:48.606 --> 02:37:49.347
[UNKNOWN]: a certain person.

02:37:49.427 --> 02:37:57.515
[UNKNOWN]: And the book specifically says, don't triangulate against a large group of people, triangulate against one or two, and don't triangulate against a whole system.

02:37:58.296 --> 02:38:01.980
[UNKNOWN]: So you basically find something that people are interested in.

02:38:02.480 --> 02:38:07.045
[UNKNOWN]: You create an enemy, and then you tell them why that enemy is keeping them down.

02:38:07.645 --> 02:38:09.486
[UNKNOWN]: And you just do that over and over and over again.

02:38:09.887 --> 02:38:13.169
[UNKNOWN]: And so that's what the left in the United States had done for a long time.

02:38:13.229 --> 02:38:14.710
[UNKNOWN]: The right uses it now two by the way.

02:38:15.090 --> 02:38:21.135
[UNKNOWN]: So it's a bipartisan thing in certain ways, because the only way to fight against that is using the same tactic against itself.

02:38:21.195 --> 02:38:21.975
[UNKNOWN]: It's so powerful.

02:38:22.355 --> 02:38:23.376
[UNKNOWN]: It's such a powerful thing.

02:38:23.516 --> 02:38:27.299
[UNKNOWN]: It's like this weird cheat code of the human mind, which is unfortunate.

02:38:27.919 --> 02:38:36.742
[UNKNOWN]: But it's been used by both political parties started with the left, now the right, having to use it as well, and then the IRGC uses it against the West as well.

02:38:36.802 --> 02:38:38.662
[UNKNOWN]: That's why they call America the Great Satan.

02:38:38.922 --> 02:38:46.844
[UNKNOWN]: They call Israel the Little Satan because they're using the same playbook to try to triangulate the world against a specific thing.

02:38:47.245 --> 02:38:52.366
[UNKNOWN]: You know, and then when you see the IRGC being interviewed, they've even come out and said, this is right out of the book as well.

02:38:52.446 --> 02:38:55.247
[UNKNOWN]: They'll say, we're not against the American people, we're just the leaders.

02:38:56.497 --> 02:38:57.778
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, okay great.

02:38:57.798 --> 02:39:01.819
[UNKNOWN]: I'm sure if we were walking through the streets of Toronto and you just be like, Oh, yeah, yeah, Americans great.

02:39:02.520 --> 02:39:14.024
[UNKNOWN]: So again, it's an information operation and so I see the left kind of being a little bit Swooned by the IRGC and that whole tactic because it's the same tactic and playbook that they've actually been using themselves.

02:39:14.604 --> 02:39:15.425
[UNKNOWN]: So it works.

02:39:16.366 --> 02:39:16.566
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:39:16.846 --> 02:39:22.875
[UNKNOWN]: Do you have any idea how much of the planning you did would have actually been used or implemented or how does that work?

02:39:23.155 --> 02:39:26.119
[UNKNOWN]: Because obviously the plans are already made.

02:39:26.800 --> 02:39:30.104
[UNKNOWN]: How much are you augmenting or adding to them in that planning phase?

02:39:30.713 --> 02:39:38.979
[UNKNOWN]: I think the way that my planning would have been done would have been more on the tactical level, because at that time I was just very focused on that tactical application of the F-15E.

02:39:39.459 --> 02:39:44.963
[UNKNOWN]: So we got really good at strafing boats, and I found a lot of different tactics to straf both.

02:39:45.444 --> 02:39:51.248
[UNKNOWN]: And I did a lot of research with people from three letter agencies to determine, you know, what exactly are these boats going to do?

02:39:51.748 --> 02:39:52.869
[UNKNOWN]: Tell me exactly the maneuver.

02:39:52.909 --> 02:39:53.290
[UNKNOWN]: I want to see

02:39:54.050 --> 02:39:58.651
[UNKNOWN]: And how far does a diesel bass boat turn if he goes full right wheel?

02:39:59.031 --> 02:40:00.331
[UNKNOWN]: Like, I want to know all those things.

02:40:00.511 --> 02:40:04.092
[UNKNOWN]: So I basically went to like the Nat's asked details of that.

02:40:04.992 --> 02:40:09.633
[UNKNOWN]: And the different styles of boats they have, like all different classes.

02:40:09.653 --> 02:40:11.493
[UNKNOWN]: You know, 15 different classes of boats.

02:40:11.813 --> 02:40:13.353
[UNKNOWN]: I want to know exactly how fast they are.

02:40:14.614 --> 02:40:16.694
[UNKNOWN]: Are they going to see me up above them?

02:40:16.894 --> 02:40:18.034
[UNKNOWN]: Are they going to try to stop?

02:40:18.114 --> 02:40:18.994
[UNKNOWN]: What are they going to try to do?

02:40:19.495 --> 02:40:21.635
[UNKNOWN]: And so that's the kind of stuff that I'm more put into the plan.

02:40:23.743 --> 02:40:44.869
[UNKNOWN]: Is there been a, I guess, an understanding, or was there an understanding, then maybe anticipations a better word for the assistance that China, specifically China and or maybe even Russia, has given Iran as far as intelligence, drones, technology, etc., that was that anticipated, or is that kind of a surprise?

02:40:46.103 --> 02:40:52.570
[UNKNOWN]: Hmm, I think it was always kind of an option, you know, I think we always have seen, you know, Iran.

02:40:53.771 --> 02:40:58.116
[UNKNOWN]: I actually thought that they would have more Russian systems than they do to be honest with you.

02:40:58.456 --> 02:41:05.805
[UNKNOWN]: So they've, I don't know if it's a pride thing, but they have if they do have the ability to indigenously build surface-to-air missiles, rockets, and things like that.

02:41:06.405 --> 02:41:09.126
[UNKNOWN]: So, I'm actually surprised there's not more Russian equipment.

02:41:09.146 --> 02:41:11.908
[UNKNOWN]: I suspect that Ukraine thing probably has a lot to do with that.

02:41:12.108 --> 02:41:12.888
[UNKNOWN]: There you go.

02:41:12.988 --> 02:41:18.811
[UNKNOWN]: I mean Russia's so strapped with that is that they have far less to contribute maybe.

02:41:19.171 --> 02:41:19.431
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:41:19.651 --> 02:41:26.314
[UNKNOWN]: And they have a little operation going through the Caspian right both ways where, you know, actually Iran will send small arms.

02:41:26.374 --> 02:41:26.694
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know.

02:41:27.314 --> 02:41:32.097
[UNKNOWN]: Iran sending small arms to Russia, Russia's sending explosive packs for drones to Iran.

02:41:32.117 --> 02:41:34.418
[UNKNOWN]: So they have a little shadow network there in the Caspian as well.

02:41:36.819 --> 02:41:56.256
[UNKNOWN]: Are you aware of how much help China has given, I've seen a lot of reports that aren't maybe particularly definitive, but certain aerial imagery satellite imagery and stuff of what was anticipated that Iran would have versus what China has given them in disparity of how much better the Chinese intelligence is.

02:41:57.057 --> 02:41:59.619
[UNKNOWN]: Does any of that ring true or strike a

02:42:02.075 --> 02:42:10.600
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think the thing that we saw with China is, again, China is really good at building cameras, listening devices, I mean, look what they do to their own population, right?

02:42:10.620 --> 02:42:12.621
[UNKNOWN]: So they've just taken that and magnified it.

02:42:12.661 --> 02:42:16.263
[UNKNOWN]: Again, like I talked about earlier, no limits on the Chinese military, right?

02:42:16.603 --> 02:42:17.504
[UNKNOWN]: They're like, oh, sweet.

02:42:17.524 --> 02:42:25.708
[UNKNOWN]: We can build a thousand mega pixel camera and put it on a fighter jet and test it right now, and it's going to be able to see everybody's home that we fly over, and it's going to absorb all that information.

02:42:25.749 --> 02:42:26.169
[UNKNOWN]: We don't care.

02:42:26.229 --> 02:42:26.409
[UNKNOWN]: Cool.

02:42:26.969 --> 02:42:44.914
[UNKNOWN]: You know the US military might have some things where you know you can't even if you're coming in to land at a base You can't even have your targeting pod on right because of privacy issues and all kinds of things which I love It's good, but again trying is going to just go to the max level when it comes to any type of capability Especially intelligence surveillance or reconnaissance.

02:42:45.354 --> 02:42:45.994
[UNKNOWN]: That's what they're good.

02:42:46.074 --> 02:42:54.937
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, there's a reason why you know They're like the wall wave phones, right that we you know aren't allowed to have in the U.S. or government officials can't have them definitely

02:42:55.637 --> 02:43:10.162
[UNKNOWN]: So, I think the thing that was going on with China, that is hard to counter, is even if Z and Trump have a good relationship, and you know, they're face to face, like, hey, we're not going to share any information, they're shadow companies that are operating all over the place.

02:43:10.242 --> 02:43:16.124
[UNKNOWN]: And again, if they have access to it, they've bought off a general in the plaf, people's liberation army Air Force.

02:43:16.965 --> 02:43:23.252
[UNKNOWN]: And they're able to get some sort of new technology to Iran and that general is going to make $100 million.

02:43:24.213 --> 02:43:25.515
[UNKNOWN]: They're going to do it every time, right?

02:43:25.535 --> 02:43:28.478
[UNKNOWN]: Because corruption is going to rule a lot more when it comes to China.

02:43:28.538 --> 02:43:35.567
[UNKNOWN]: So I think there could be some things going on behind the scenes, but as far as the hard military power being transferred to China.

02:43:36.648 --> 02:43:40.130
[UNKNOWN]: I don't, from trying to to Iran, I don't see that, you know, being a factor.

02:43:41.270 --> 02:43:48.034
[UNKNOWN]: Where do you see it, or I guess before you explain or predict where you see it going, how do you think it's going now?

02:43:49.414 --> 02:43:53.496
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's going longer than everybody would hoped.

02:43:54.077 --> 02:43:55.938
[UNKNOWN]: I'm not surprised that it's taken this long.

02:43:56.538 --> 02:43:59.319
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I could say here an armchair admiral, the thing all day long, right?

02:43:59.339 --> 02:44:04.482
[UNKNOWN]: Because I'm sitting in my nice comfy studio on YouTube and enjoying the freedoms that everybody's out there fighting for.

02:44:05.262 --> 02:44:09.565
[UNKNOWN]: So I think there's there could have been some better messaging perhaps early on.

02:44:09.905 --> 02:44:26.995
[UNKNOWN]: I remember a releasing of video In I think it was March or April and I was like I think we need to get ready for six to ten months of of this and someone Someone that was close to me was like dude you shouldn't say that like people people aren't gonna think you're credible like they're not gonna think you're credible because that's way too long

02:44:27.575 --> 02:44:36.142
[UNKNOWN]: And I was just thinking, no, I think we need a lot of time to see if some sort of a change could happen on the ground.

02:44:36.502 --> 02:44:46.691
[UNKNOWN]: Because if we're not going to do an invasion, which I don't know, I want, I'm curious your thoughts too, maybe an invasion is the way to go, but not the US, not US troops on the ground.

02:44:46.831 --> 02:44:47.651
[UNKNOWN]: Is that even possible?

02:44:47.712 --> 02:44:48.332
[UNKNOWN]: Is that feasible?

02:44:48.832 --> 02:44:53.997
[UNKNOWN]: When you look at what happened with Japan, the reason why they surrendered, people think it's a nuclear bomb.

02:44:54.137 --> 02:44:55.498
[UNKNOWN]: I don't think it's just a nuclear bomb.

02:44:55.578 --> 02:44:56.679
[UNKNOWN]: I think it was a nuclear bombs.

02:44:57.419 --> 02:44:59.941
[UNKNOWN]: and the credible threat of an invasion right off their coast.

02:45:00.582 --> 02:45:07.788
[UNKNOWN]: So they're seeing the nuclear bombs hit and then they're seeing these fleets of naval vessels packed with American infantrymen ready to invade.

02:45:08.408 --> 02:45:18.036
[UNKNOWN]: You know, so I think that to me, I was always curious early on if the regime is going to fall, can the people be armed, who's going to be on the ground?

02:45:18.176 --> 02:45:22.360
[UNKNOWN]: Even when we took out Hitler, we owned the air, but we owned the ground too.

02:45:23.043 --> 02:45:25.544
[UNKNOWN]: and that the Hitler regime had nowhere to go.

02:45:26.604 --> 02:45:28.784
[UNKNOWN]: So this regime right now has a lot of places to go.

02:45:28.884 --> 02:45:31.925
[UNKNOWN]: So I think that's what the president's doing the off-ramps thing.

02:45:32.125 --> 02:45:34.486
[UNKNOWN]: So I did think the off-ramps were gonna be the end of it.

02:45:35.066 --> 02:45:38.247
[UNKNOWN]: That's just my thought I was like, well, IRGC lost a lot here.

02:45:38.707 --> 02:45:39.707
[UNKNOWN]: The off-ramps would be the end of it.

02:45:39.727 --> 02:45:42.928
[UNKNOWN]: And that would have been what a five-month conflict at that point if they took the off-ramps.

02:45:43.888 --> 02:45:48.409
[UNKNOWN]: And so I was even a little bit surprised that the IRGC didn't just try to fully protect themselves.

02:45:49.329 --> 02:45:59.232
[UNKNOWN]: Not the IRGC specifically, but the molas, the people that weren't maybe as radical as some of the top leaders in the IRGC were able to get some sort of a deal brokered and wrapped the thing up in five months.

02:45:59.672 --> 02:46:02.192
[UNKNOWN]: And I think that's what I originally predicted.

02:46:02.532 --> 02:46:08.354
[UNKNOWN]: And now I think we're just seeing that this regime is way more cancerous than we ever thought.

02:46:16.456 --> 02:46:24.117
[UNKNOWN]: I remember watching one of your early videos and just thinking like pass is super entertaining and just was really impressed with the job that you did.

02:46:24.137 --> 02:46:26.918
[UNKNOWN]: I love your content, I've watched a ton of it.

02:46:28.058 --> 02:46:43.341
[UNKNOWN]: It's such a, I think, a useful position and perspective you have between your flying experience, your planning experience and the window of time that you spent doing it being pretty relevant and relative to what's going on now.

02:46:44.081 --> 02:47:03.605
[UNKNOWN]: With the Iran conflict being so overwhelmingly air dominant and almost entirely, you know, air strike or air campaign focused, is there anything that surprised you from that kind of specific aspect of the actual air campaign standpoint?

02:47:03.845 --> 02:47:12.227
[UNKNOWN]: And do you have any kind of ballpark percentage on what airframes have been used in the campaign

02:47:15.089 --> 02:47:22.698
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so I think something that's surprising me now is there's not strikes happening at places like Pickaxe Mountain.

02:47:22.959 --> 02:47:24.641
[UNKNOWN]: And then who knows, maybe they just just happened.

02:47:24.661 --> 02:47:25.982
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it's a fast movement ball game.

02:47:26.683 --> 02:47:30.187
[UNKNOWN]: But I think early on they, they will 20, 25.

02:47:30.207 --> 02:47:31.950
[UNKNOWN]: They targeted a lot of the nuclear infrastructure.

02:47:32.810 --> 02:47:38.872
[UNKNOWN]: And then after that the campaign focus more on other things and now it's shifted to the straight of Formus.

02:47:39.732 --> 02:47:47.774
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, I think while we're the one thing that's surprising to me is if we're in there doing all these operations, tag pickaxe mountain, make sure they can't use it.

02:47:48.554 --> 02:47:53.216
[UNKNOWN]: But I think that so that was a little surprising to me and that who knows that could happen at any moment.

02:47:54.296 --> 02:48:02.342
[UNKNOWN]: I think the sheer number of sorties was surprising to me, the numbers I saw was like 13,000 sorties between the US and Israel.

02:48:02.902 --> 02:48:13.330
[UNKNOWN]: So, I mean, just the repetition of that and the folks that are getting those jets launched, you know, the people blasts and the jets off the carriers, the bases that are right there getting shot out with missiles, like

02:48:13.650 --> 02:48:15.131
[UNKNOWN]: the the off-s tempo is insane.

02:48:15.431 --> 02:48:19.554
[UNKNOWN]: So I think that's something that you just can't understand how amazing that is.

02:48:19.694 --> 02:48:26.819
[UNKNOWN]: And I think everybody out there should know how hard that is to do for the people on the ground getting the Jets airborne.

02:48:26.939 --> 02:48:27.999
[UNKNOWN]: 13,000 flights.

02:48:28.140 --> 02:48:34.944
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, we're talking refueling them, maintaining them, loading weapons, you know, all those things are just hats off to everybody doing that.

02:48:35.084 --> 02:48:38.246
[UNKNOWN]: Do you know how many aircraft would contribute to those 13,000?

02:48:38.286 --> 02:48:40.827
[UNKNOWN]: Like, what is that average per aircraft?

02:48:41.347 --> 02:48:43.028
[UNKNOWN]: Wow, yeah, that's a good question.

02:48:43.868 --> 02:48:49.411
[UNKNOWN]: I think the, so the, the publicly released numbers that I saw was somewhere around 200, 300 fighter aircraft.

02:48:51.532 --> 02:49:05.852
[UNKNOWN]: I'd say it's on the higher end of that, to do that, and then that probably includes drones, but remember, drone operators are sitting in there operating that drone as well, you know, they're operating it from creature or first base or wherever, so I'm asserting, I'm sure it includes drones.

02:49:06.633 --> 02:49:09.954
[UNKNOWN]: But again, the workhorse jets are the ones that are flying most of the missions.

02:49:09.994 --> 02:49:20.919
[UNKNOWN]: So F-15es, F-16s, A-10s, these fourth generation fighters that, you know, maybe they're not the sexiest thing on the block now with the F-22 and the F-35, but they get the job done, right?

02:49:20.959 --> 02:49:21.459
[UNKNOWN]: And if you've got a...

02:49:22.179 --> 02:49:25.402
[UNKNOWN]: If you got a Philips head screw, you need a Philips head screwdriver, and that's what these jets are.

02:49:26.262 --> 02:49:26.743
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:49:26.763 --> 02:49:27.083
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:49:27.223 --> 02:49:32.287
[UNKNOWN]: Is that something that that level of sorties in the hot plan stuff?

02:49:32.327 --> 02:49:43.796
[UNKNOWN]: Is that something that you would get that far in the weeds on where you would anticipate this many sorties per month or in this phase you would anticipate X number of sorties to accomplish phase one or whatever is that detailed?

02:49:44.456 --> 02:49:51.238
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think it is, but it's broken down by squadron, like roughly, like, hey, this is how much your squadron is going to have to be ready to go.

02:49:51.478 --> 02:49:56.020
[UNKNOWN]: And so this many rotations, the jets are going to need to fly this many times a day.

02:49:56.040 --> 02:49:59.361
[UNKNOWN]: And this is the battle rhythm that we're going to consistently get.

02:49:59.381 --> 02:50:01.481
[UNKNOWN]: And then everything else is built from that, right?

02:50:01.521 --> 02:50:03.222
[UNKNOWN]: So they're like, okay, with that battle rhythm,

02:50:03.662 --> 02:50:24.583
[UNKNOWN]: We're going to need this many wizos, this many fighter pilots, this many bombs because we assume we're going to drop this many I mean the planning is just completely dialed in all the way down to like the last 20 millimeter bullet that you're going to bring Yeah, well, you mentioned A10's F-15's F-16's I'm sure F-18's on the navy side as a huge component

02:50:25.944 --> 02:50:31.927
[UNKNOWN]: far more of a percentage of the stories flown by those aircraft than the fifth gen stuff they have 22F 35.

02:50:32.347 --> 02:50:34.608
[UNKNOWN]: I would think so yeah just because there's more of them.

02:50:34.848 --> 02:50:41.812
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah this sheer numbers right and yeah thanks for catching the F-18 my F-18 browser had given me a hard time for that one.

02:50:42.652 --> 02:51:06.188
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, the super hornet's amazing, but yeah, I think the big thing is a lot of these stealth jets are Incredible for what they do, but even to make them stealthy you have to put everything inside of them So it means little less weapons load out Now the F-35 probably not as concerned about being stealth right now, but still maneuverability wise controllability wise I've never really seen bombs hung on the outside of the F-35 Sure it can be done

02:51:06.648 --> 02:51:09.510
[UNKNOWN]: but maybe more of like an air to air missile load out would be on those.

02:51:09.570 --> 02:51:18.535
[UNKNOWN]: So if you want to go in and pummel targets, you've got to find a big truck of a jet, which is F-15E, primarily that's the number one.

02:51:19.016 --> 02:51:23.679
[UNKNOWN]: Number two would be probably the super haunted in the F-16, right around about the same.

02:51:23.979 --> 02:51:26.340
[UNKNOWN]: And then obviously the A10's kind of in a class of its own, right?

02:51:26.801 --> 02:51:28.342
[UNKNOWN]: Built for a little bit different of a purpose.

02:51:28.482 --> 02:51:28.682
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:51:29.422 --> 02:51:34.484
[UNKNOWN]: And they're even, I mean, they've used B-52s and the big, good point, big, huge carpet bomber.

02:51:34.504 --> 02:51:35.065
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:51:35.085 --> 02:51:35.465
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, crap.

02:51:35.485 --> 02:51:37.346
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, not a lot, but they have been used, right?

02:51:37.526 --> 02:51:37.766
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:51:37.946 --> 02:51:38.966
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, they have.

02:51:39.146 --> 02:51:39.947
[UNKNOWN]: Especially early on.

02:51:40.127 --> 02:51:40.327
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:51:40.367 --> 02:51:46.670
[UNKNOWN]: So I think the cost and the, the keeping those things close to the battle space, you don't need to keep them extremely close either.

02:51:46.710 --> 02:51:49.391
[UNKNOWN]: They can fly missions from Coneys, which is nice.

02:51:49.931 --> 02:51:57.357
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, those things, they should have, you know, I don't know, in my opinion, that that lightens the load of the fighter requirement.

02:51:57.457 --> 02:52:02.721
[UNKNOWN]: If you can get a whole bunch of targets hit with a carpet bomb of a B52, a carpet bomb for the viewers.

02:52:02.741 --> 02:52:05.302
[UNKNOWN]: It just means a whole swath of a chunk of space.

02:52:05.342 --> 02:52:05.523
[UNKNOWN]: Like,

02:52:06.183 --> 02:52:22.738
[UNKNOWN]: say it's a mile by a mile, you just want to eliminate whatever is there, could be under ground bunkers, could be sensors, whatever, so the B-52 rolls in and drops, you know, 18, 2,000 pound J-dams and can just kind of take that square out of the whole battle space equation, right?

02:52:22.758 --> 02:52:24.900
[UNKNOWN]: And that limits the demand on the fighters.

02:52:25.241 --> 02:52:28.484
[UNKNOWN]: Is that what the payload capacity is, 18, 2,000 pounders?

02:52:28.884 --> 02:52:29.545
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's more.

02:52:30.185 --> 02:52:45.764
[UNKNOWN]: So I know that they have built these revolver like a just like a revolver casing for 2,000 pound bombs until it releases one and then goes to the next one and it carries that little revolver thing I think it carries like eight and they have a whole bunch of those like in a jet.

02:52:45.864 --> 02:52:47.026
[UNKNOWN]: B1 has that as well.

02:52:48.367 --> 02:52:50.628
[UNKNOWN]: Like a £2,000 Gatling gun.

02:52:50.868 --> 02:52:52.548
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, a damn Gatling.

02:52:52.568 --> 02:52:53.249
[UNKNOWN]: America, baby.

02:52:53.569 --> 02:52:54.369
[UNKNOWN]: God, that's wild.

02:52:55.369 --> 02:52:56.070
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:52:57.230 --> 02:53:14.496
[UNKNOWN]: Could you kind of analogize the difference in its sounds like it's a stealth and technology standpoint or capability, but the F-22, F-35, that the Gen 5 fighter jet versus the Gen 4, like why you're using one over the other, other than there's more of the Gen 4's.

02:53:15.056 --> 02:53:19.158
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so the F-22 is like the king predator of the sky for sure.

02:53:19.198 --> 02:53:26.461
[UNKNOWN]: So that thing is built to completely clear the battle space and just remove any threats that could come in and try to shoot down our other fighters.

02:53:26.501 --> 02:53:27.161
[UNKNOWN]: That's the main thing.

02:53:27.261 --> 02:53:29.102
[UNKNOWN]: Or something coming in to drop a bomb.

02:53:29.682 --> 02:53:31.603
[UNKNOWN]: Something like that would be a big use of that as well.

02:53:32.103 --> 02:53:39.166
[UNKNOWN]: And so you can think of those as like the high end jets that are built for very specific highly, highly skilled tasks.

02:53:39.746 --> 02:53:44.608
[UNKNOWN]: like shooting down a jet that's at 40,000 feet going mock to, right?

02:53:44.628 --> 02:53:56.213
[UNKNOWN]: You got to have something very specific for that, because even me and my striking goal, you know, trying to get up there, let's say it's a 257 or something like that, you know, like I was talking about in combat, right, with all the bombs on my 15-y.

02:53:56.294 --> 02:53:57.414
[UNKNOWN]: I'm in max after burner.

02:53:57.434 --> 02:53:59.355
[UNKNOWN]: I'm trying to get up there, trying to get a shot,

02:53:59.875 --> 02:54:14.599
[UNKNOWN]: But, you know, there's certain systems or a J20 from China that maybe you just need that very, very highly skilled jet that's purpose built to get up to 50, 60,000 feet, launch an AMRAM, they never see them and they're gone.

02:54:14.799 --> 02:54:18.280
[UNKNOWN]: Like that's like, to me, that's like the leading edge of fighter aviation, right?

02:54:18.300 --> 02:54:24.681
[UNKNOWN]: That's like the two nights jousting and you have to have something that's able to have a lot longer of a reach and not be seen.

02:54:25.121 --> 02:54:26.702
[UNKNOWN]: And so that's why you have that high end F-22.

02:54:28.288 --> 02:54:35.691
[UNKNOWN]: And then the F-35's a version of that, so we can do a certain version of that, but it also can sneak in and do a lot of work with surface-tare missiles.

02:54:35.751 --> 02:54:45.036
[UNKNOWN]: And so as, you know, warfare evolves, you know, we saw Iraq, Iraq had scud missiles, surface-tare missiles that would go up and try to shoot down aircraft.

02:54:45.096 --> 02:54:45.256
[UNKNOWN]: So,

02:54:45.916 --> 02:54:48.097
[UNKNOWN]: F-16s were one of the big things that worked there.

02:54:48.377 --> 02:54:50.197
[UNKNOWN]: F-16s are still doing work in Iran now.

02:54:50.558 --> 02:54:52.338
[UNKNOWN]: But again, the enemy is going to adapt and evolve.

02:54:52.538 --> 02:54:56.519
[UNKNOWN]: And so again, if you go higher-end, what's going to try to shoot down our high-end assets?

02:54:56.559 --> 02:54:59.840
[UNKNOWN]: Like, trying to shoot down an A-wax or a tanker or something like that.

02:55:00.180 --> 02:55:03.101
[UNKNOWN]: We need a jet that can really do some amazing work and find that.

02:55:03.201 --> 02:55:05.422
[UNKNOWN]: And that's why the F-35 was like a no-brainer.

02:55:05.982 --> 02:55:11.184
[UNKNOWN]: That's the high-end level of like, you could call it like the ground fight, but I would call it more of like the surface-to-air missile fight.

02:55:11.404 --> 02:55:12.484
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that makes sense.

02:55:12.524 --> 02:55:14.185
[UNKNOWN]: Do you know about how many of each there are?

02:55:15.465 --> 02:55:23.431
[UNKNOWN]: Man, I want to say, again, people are going to fact check me on this, I want to say there's just under 200 raptors, maybe even less, maybe like 150.

02:55:24.071 --> 02:55:28.654
[UNKNOWN]: And then when it comes to the F-35, there's over 1,000 of those people around the world.

02:55:28.755 --> 02:55:28.955
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:55:29.215 --> 02:55:29.415
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

02:55:29.655 --> 02:55:30.716
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:55:32.337 --> 02:55:40.523
[UNKNOWN]: Do you have an understanding of China's Gen 5 capacity and potentially even a Gen 6 if that's even, I assume it's in the works on both ends.

02:55:41.232 --> 02:55:42.073
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, a little bit.

02:55:42.173 --> 02:55:43.114
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:55:43.494 --> 02:55:48.158
[UNKNOWN]: So, Gen 5 for China is like a J20, that's what they call their Gen 5.

02:55:48.198 --> 02:55:51.461
[UNKNOWN]: So they think that that can go up and compete against in F22.

02:55:52.321 --> 02:56:05.913
[UNKNOWN]: When I look at just the hype videos of it, I mean, it looks really capable, but there's some clear tells that it's not as stealth as the F22, but it's probably more stealthy than like an F18 or an F16, which are relatively low profile.

02:56:06.293 --> 02:56:08.795
[UNKNOWN]: So I would call their 5th Gen is actually like a 4.5 Gen.

02:56:10.456 --> 02:56:15.361
[UNKNOWN]: And so the J-20 though, that's the one when you asked me before what's the biggest threat going to be.

02:56:16.021 --> 02:56:22.066
[UNKNOWN]: China, and to me it was because of the J-20 numbers, because again, they might not have the best stealth with their J-20.

02:56:22.086 --> 02:56:25.849
[UNKNOWN]: It might not be able to compete with an F-22, but they're building thousands of these things.

02:56:26.310 --> 02:56:26.530
[UNKNOWN]: Right?

02:56:26.610 --> 02:56:32.254
[UNKNOWN]: And so if you have an F-22 that's loaded out with six air-dair missiles, and you've got a squadron of those things.

02:56:32.274 --> 02:56:35.777
[UNKNOWN]: You've got 22 of them, and then the J-20s go up, and you've got

02:56:36.878 --> 02:56:42.102
[UNKNOWN]: 300 that they're able to get airborne, man those numbers don't those numbers aren't exactly comfortable.

02:56:42.303 --> 02:56:43.183
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you know what I mean?

02:56:43.664 --> 02:56:57.315
[UNKNOWN]: So that's their big focus with the fourth point five gen and then when it comes to their six gen model that they've been kind of flashing around and operating, I mean, I look at it like they're waiting for us to really release it like everything else.

02:56:58.135 --> 02:57:00.999
[UNKNOWN]: Like electric cars like iPhones like everything.

02:57:01.680 --> 02:57:04.263
[UNKNOWN]: No China stealing U.S. Have we never imagined that?

02:57:04.283 --> 02:57:05.064
[UNKNOWN]: Okay, you go first.

02:57:05.264 --> 02:57:05.965
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:57:06.566 --> 02:57:07.086
[UNKNOWN]: No you go.

02:57:07.467 --> 02:57:11.752
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think they're good.

02:57:11.772 --> 02:57:15.997
[UNKNOWN]: I've seen some of the propaganda videos and to me the drone stuff is the most terrifying.

02:57:16.586 --> 02:57:35.119
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, especially from a number standpoint, because to that same point, just on a much lower scale, it doesn't need to be anything more than a DJI on steroids if there's 100,000 of them coming your way, you know, like they could have a hand grenade on them, and that's all you'd need.

02:57:35.139 --> 02:57:35.339
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:57:35.399 --> 02:57:36.540
[UNKNOWN]: Good point.

02:57:37.040 --> 02:57:40.363
[UNKNOWN]: And so to me that that's, again, for sure, terrifying.

02:57:41.063 --> 02:57:51.675
[UNKNOWN]: The other thing is the microscopic ones, the B to hummingbird size ones that most people wouldn't even notice because it's bird size or smaller.

02:57:52.216 --> 02:57:55.600
[UNKNOWN]: So it's not even going to register as something that you would pay attention to that

02:57:56.575 --> 02:58:05.199
[UNKNOWN]: is doing God knows what, you know, whether there are many EMPs, many explosives, listening camera, email, whatever, but hundred percent, you know, that stuff to me is terrifying.

02:58:05.660 --> 02:58:18.987
[UNKNOWN]: Do you see a world where the Gen 5 human cockpit fighter jet is obsolete compared to the AI piloted drone version of that same thing?

02:58:21.480 --> 02:58:24.485
[UNKNOWN]: Yes, yeah, unfortunately for Top Gun Maverick 4.

02:58:24.805 --> 02:58:26.928
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think it's how soon do you think?

02:58:27.790 --> 02:58:34.400
[UNKNOWN]: I think we're probably 15, 20 years out from something like that far, even.

02:58:35.108 --> 02:58:35.848
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's that far.

02:58:36.109 --> 02:58:36.289
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:58:36.589 --> 02:58:36.789
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

02:58:37.189 --> 02:58:40.131
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I think there's limitations to autonomy.

02:58:40.671 --> 02:58:51.377
[UNKNOWN]: And I think there's been some desire to kind of not go into autonomy a lot for decades in the US Air Force because, again, the fighter pilots got the helm, right, which I love.

02:58:51.877 --> 02:59:08.525
[UNKNOWN]: I got it, but I think that kind of made the human stay in the loop a little bit longer, which is, again, I think you have to have a human in the loop somewhere, but what I see happening with a lot of these civilian, these private companies, like I've done some work with Jobi, and I see the work they're doing with autonomous aircraft, and it's amazing.

02:59:08.866 --> 02:59:13.488
[UNKNOWN]: It's far enough of the work that the DOW was doing itself on autonomous aircraft,

02:59:13.968 --> 02:59:17.770
[UNKNOWN]: And so the DOW is doing something really amazing now where they've opened up.

02:59:17.790 --> 02:59:21.111
[UNKNOWN]: This is probably just over the last five years or so.

02:59:21.531 --> 02:59:26.354
[UNKNOWN]: They've really opened up the ability, it's maybe it started during Trump's first term.

02:59:26.374 --> 02:59:27.634
[UNKNOWN]: So it's a closer to a 10 year.

02:59:28.114 --> 02:59:36.058
[UNKNOWN]: But basically they've allowed these startups to start building new technology that can actually pilot these aircraft.

02:59:36.658 --> 02:59:47.484
[UNKNOWN]: And so, Jobis got something right now where they've designed something called superpilot, which they plug into cargo, so they've plugged it into a software, so the hardware doesn't really matter.

02:59:47.504 --> 03:00:03.172
[UNKNOWN]: They can plug it into anything, and they're software kind of like integrates with the airframe itself, plugs into the flight controls, and then it can be augmented by a person on the ground, making sure it's doing the right thing or building the mission, but it can fly, it can dodge threats, it can taxi, take off.

03:00:03.612 --> 03:00:24.717
[UNKNOWN]: all on its own and to me that's you know the private sector is being connected to the military it's very important and so now that I see that kind of coming online I think that a part of war is a perfect place to do that right because there's going to be some resistance in commercial air traffic to have fully automated and I agree with that but that a part of war where you could put up

03:00:25.377 --> 03:00:33.400
[UNKNOWN]: These drones these combat collaborative aircraft that can communicate with each other and have a pilot up at an F-47 as the quarterback of the team Just like K guys here.

03:00:33.420 --> 03:00:34.860
[UNKNOWN]: We go, you know like they're dog.

03:00:35.080 --> 03:00:37.441
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's like they're a dog equivalent standing in the dog.

03:00:37.961 --> 03:00:48.365
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, there's a I thought there was a report of an air force Exercise where like the common not went up in the air and there was an AI pilot a

03:00:49.345 --> 03:00:56.269
[UNKNOWN]: You know, with a dogfight or a combat where the human lost every time, do you know much about that?

03:00:56.489 --> 03:01:05.033
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, I saw the report, you know, it was like, they put up a highly skilled fighter pilot, and I think it was like 10-0 AI-1.

03:01:05.313 --> 03:01:07.034
[UNKNOWN]: It's like playing chess against a computer.

03:01:07.434 --> 03:01:07.614
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:01:07.814 --> 03:01:08.835
[UNKNOWN]: Like you're just not gonna win.

03:01:09.015 --> 03:01:34.260
[UNKNOWN]: a hundred percent yeah and there's just certain maneuvers maybe that you know as the fighter pilot needs to ease off a little bit because your pink body is in that jet and got to ease off a little bit so you keep your vision because even even the best fighter pilots as your squeezing under G your vision gets a little tighter right and you're decision-making in that moment like a not one to two seconds as your vision kind of goes down it's not as good as when you can fully see everything right because you're so like tightened down right here just

03:01:36.120 --> 03:02:01.625
[UNKNOWN]: And then you're the jet that you're fighting against might be over here, but you're having to Put the crank down on the G to get your jet in a position and so maybe you're instead of if this jet's on this side And instead of orienting your lift factor exactly where they're at you get it's up slightly because you can't see him Yeah, and then you then you regain vision, but the AI doesn't care they guys gonna be knowing oh like I'm sensing him right there the entire time I'll perfectly put

03:02:02.125 --> 03:02:06.046
[UNKNOWN]: this plain of motion right on them and be right behind them in, you know, a faster time.

03:02:06.246 --> 03:02:13.108
[UNKNOWN]: And it might just be this like little nuance decision-making that the AI is a little bit better at, and in a dog fight literally in half a second.

03:02:13.128 --> 03:02:15.529
[UNKNOWN]: You do something wrong, you make a mistake, and it's over.

03:02:16.109 --> 03:02:16.269
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:02:16.589 --> 03:02:24.351
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it kind of reminds me having never done it, but just hearing about it, the way a Tesla does in self-driving, the way that it breaks in turns.

03:02:24.611 --> 03:02:24.811
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:02:25.371 --> 03:02:28.512
[UNKNOWN]: There's just a weird, weird perfection to it.

03:02:29.292 --> 03:02:31.793
[UNKNOWN]: that seems like you can tell it's not natural.

03:02:32.013 --> 03:02:46.917
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's like this, especially in the breaking, I think I'm fascinated often times being in one where I'll be like, dude, I had a slammed on the brakes by now and it somehow manages to not do it, but also stop in time and it's just a weird

03:02:48.077 --> 03:02:53.098
[UNKNOWN]: It's a weird thing to experience, you know, so I imagine in the air it's, you know, on steroids by comparison.

03:02:53.318 --> 03:03:04.221
[UNKNOWN]: Exactly, I was just yesterday I was driving in my Tesla and this car just changes lanes right into us and I'm on auto drive and I don't see him peripherally with the Tesla goes Yeah, changes lanes and avoided a crash.

03:03:04.421 --> 03:03:05.301
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, that's crazy.

03:03:05.341 --> 03:03:05.881
[UNKNOWN]: That was amazing.

03:03:05.901 --> 03:03:16.784
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's wild I mean, it does for me kind of beg the question though at what point Does it kind of not even make sense though, you know, like if you just basically have robots battling each other

03:03:18.350 --> 03:03:20.203
[UNKNOWN]: There's a certain element of that that seems

03:03:21.345 --> 03:03:30.747
[UNKNOWN]: counterintuitive or counterproductive towards like, well, what are you gaining by, is it purely a numbers game of who can spend more money?

03:03:30.767 --> 03:03:36.148
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I don't know, because it's like, what does your air superiority really mean?

03:03:36.168 --> 03:03:44.510
[UNKNOWN]: If it's just, you know, again, to robots fighting each other in the sky, it's kind of like, well, who gives a shit almost?

03:03:44.570 --> 03:03:44.951
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know.

03:03:45.451 --> 03:03:45.591
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:03:45.631 --> 03:03:50.732
[UNKNOWN]: Obviously, it's very different if you're doing an air bombardment campaign where you're knocking out

03:03:52.113 --> 03:03:56.535
[UNKNOWN]: defense systems and laying the foundation for a ground campaign.

03:03:57.156 --> 03:04:07.522
[UNKNOWN]: That leads into once they're starts being ground drones, which they're already arm and had a guest on not long ago that owns a company that makes humanoid robots that it is in the process of

03:04:08.523 --> 03:04:10.925
[UNKNOWN]: delivering a thousand of them to Ukraine.

03:04:11.126 --> 03:04:11.346
[UNKNOWN]: Wow.

03:04:12.147 --> 03:04:20.995
[UNKNOWN]: You know, so it's like very quickly terminated or two, you know, where there's automated everything, you know, but again, it's just, it's kind of like, well, what's the point then?

03:04:21.135 --> 03:04:26.040
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, you know, I don't know, it's a weird, so weird lines, a weird time to be alive for sure.

03:04:26.320 --> 03:04:34.306
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and then you crane right, we're kind of seeing that hybrid model where there's absolutely meat grinding on the front lines with humans and drones, right?

03:04:34.366 --> 03:04:40.231
[UNKNOWN]: So that's kind of the in between one where it's not drones on drones only, it's, you know, you got the human element in there as well.

03:04:41.051 --> 03:04:46.235
[UNKNOWN]: But yeah, at some point, is it now is it just the robots and just the drones up above?

03:04:46.876 --> 03:04:48.077
[UNKNOWN]: Sky and antinflule effect.

03:04:48.277 --> 03:04:49.698
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:04:50.819 --> 03:04:54.542
[UNKNOWN]: In terms of the current fights that we have going on back in April, there was an F-15 shot

03:04:56.523 --> 03:05:01.905
[UNKNOWN]: How did that resonate with you being an F-15 pilot and what kind of went through your mind when you heard about that?

03:05:03.125 --> 03:05:09.528
[UNKNOWN]: I mean immediately, you know, I'm thinking it's an F-15y because there's no F-15c's that are on active duty right now.

03:05:09.708 --> 03:05:13.469
[UNKNOWN]: So the first thing is like, okay, where's the pilot on the whizzo?

03:05:13.969 --> 03:05:14.770
[UNKNOWN]: You know, where are they?

03:05:15.370 --> 03:05:23.253
[UNKNOWN]: So big drop of the, you know, stomach for a couple of days as we're figuring this all out and a little bit surreal, you know, because again

03:05:24.393 --> 03:05:30.237
[UNKNOWN]: A lot of the technology that a run has isn't going to specifically do get that job done.

03:05:30.257 --> 03:05:35.880
[UNKNOWN]: That's not a normal thing for the technology that they have to shoot down an F-15E.

03:05:35.980 --> 03:05:45.986
[UNKNOWN]: When you go in and you have these strike packages, you specifically build against that, where you have the door kickers that go in, like F-16CJs, F-35s that are shutting down all those systems.

03:05:46.706 --> 03:05:50.129
[UNKNOWN]: And then it was a few, you know, it was into the conflict, you know, it wasn't like day one.

03:05:50.309 --> 03:05:56.774
[UNKNOWN]: So day one, day one or two, I'd be like, okay, you know, there's still some systems online, damn, like, might happen.

03:05:57.595 --> 03:06:00.597
[UNKNOWN]: But that far into the conflict, yeah, I think it was just surprising.

03:06:00.637 --> 03:06:06.862
[UNKNOWN]: And then as detail started to come out and emerge, you know, with potential, like, a drone, some sort of drone swarm that the pilot's going to report.

03:06:07.723 --> 03:06:11.606
[UNKNOWN]: I believe him, you know, I would never sit back here and say, I don't believe him, I think he's right.

03:06:11.686 --> 03:06:13.247
[UNKNOWN]: I think everything he said about what he saw.

03:06:13.980 --> 03:06:14.380
[UNKNOWN]: It's true.

03:06:14.520 --> 03:06:26.185
[UNKNOWN]: Now, when it comes to what those drones were doing, I would think of it more of some advanced intelligence surveillance reconnaissance rather than some sort of drone that actually could hit the aircraft itself or something like that.

03:06:26.865 --> 03:06:31.867
[UNKNOWN]: But if those drones, like let's say their Chinese oriented drones are now pumping information,

03:06:32.647 --> 03:06:36.691
[UNKNOWN]: to some sort of telemetry data that somehow is on a guy's shoulder fired.

03:06:36.731 --> 03:06:41.615
[UNKNOWN]: Missile, he's up on a hillside higher up than normal than, yeah, I could see it happening.

03:06:41.655 --> 03:06:46.178
[UNKNOWN]: So, of course, my brain's going to start playing through all the scenarios of how did this happen.

03:06:46.378 --> 03:06:46.539
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:06:47.159 --> 03:06:51.262
[UNKNOWN]: Is that to say then the jellyfish drone thing is a real thing?

03:06:52.367 --> 03:06:53.488
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think it's a real thing.

03:06:53.908 --> 03:07:02.793
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I would trust with that pilot said, to me, it would make more sense than trying the conventional method because the conventional method has been planned for four decades.

03:07:03.153 --> 03:07:03.993
[UNKNOWN]: Right, you know.

03:07:04.273 --> 03:07:06.675
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, and then again, Iran's focus is proxy, right?

03:07:06.715 --> 03:07:16.040
[UNKNOWN]: So if their conventional sands are going to be hit day one and then they're able to get some sort of a system up that even if it's just like drones that are passing,

03:07:16.980 --> 03:07:17.560
[UNKNOWN]: information.

03:07:17.721 --> 03:07:23.304
[UNKNOWN]: They're just like, okay, we we see a route that this fighter is taking and they're just passing altitude and airspeed and things like that.

03:07:24.005 --> 03:07:26.407
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, that's some advancement in technology.

03:07:26.627 --> 03:07:28.888
[UNKNOWN]: Electrooptical tracking is a new thing too.

03:07:29.529 --> 03:07:34.892
[UNKNOWN]: So Electrooptical tracking back to China's ability to build amazing Electrooptics.

03:07:35.733 --> 03:07:45.806
[UNKNOWN]: It's a new type of tracking, because typically as a fighter pilot, you're used to getting a radar warning in your jet, and then you can react, you can dispense countermeasures, chaff, flares, and things like that.

03:07:46.427 --> 03:07:48.469
[UNKNOWN]: So if it's electro optic, that's a whole different ballgame.

03:07:48.649 --> 03:07:48.850
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:07:49.210 --> 03:07:49.410
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:07:49.911 --> 03:07:54.036
[UNKNOWN]: And totally unprepared for, or generally unprepared for maybe by comparison.

03:07:56.104 --> 03:08:08.871
[UNKNOWN]: Having piloted an F-15 in combat, do you feel that the training is consistent enough to where if that had been you, that the outcome would have been the same, that you would have seared your way into evasion and escape?

03:08:09.751 --> 03:08:13.413
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, I think I'm proud of that pilot.

03:08:13.974 --> 03:08:17.435
[UNKNOWN]: The wizard did great too, but especially the pilot getting rescued as fast as they did.

03:08:17.816 --> 03:08:21.798
[UNKNOWN]: And then the wizard eventually getting rescued just amazing.

03:08:21.938 --> 03:08:25.160
[UNKNOWN]: And I think that was something that we always put in the back of our minds,

03:08:26.040 --> 03:08:30.764
[UNKNOWN]: possibility, but it's such a small chance that, you know, I look back on myself, was I prepared?

03:08:30.984 --> 03:08:31.304
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know.

03:08:31.485 --> 03:08:32.285
[UNKNOWN]: What I've done is good.

03:08:32.826 --> 03:08:33.406
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know, man.

03:08:33.546 --> 03:08:35.288
[UNKNOWN]: I probably not, to be honest.

03:08:38.130 --> 03:08:48.219
[UNKNOWN]: The thing that I find myself being intrigued by just because having been on the rescue or side of that a bunch of times, not in real world, but tons of CSR training.

03:08:50.040 --> 03:08:54.822
[UNKNOWN]: And even our guys will carry a little, you know, any escape in a vision kit of some sort.

03:08:55.002 --> 03:09:02.745
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I'm curious, do you recall and or are you willing to share what was in your escape in a vision kit as a pilot?

03:09:03.605 --> 03:09:09.527
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so I can talk about a couple things that were in there, but the main thing I'll talk about is what's actually in the jet itself.

03:09:09.907 --> 03:09:12.608
[UNKNOWN]: There's some things that we carry with us that we just keep to ourselves.

03:09:13.309 --> 03:09:24.373
[UNKNOWN]: But there's ELT first, electro-locating transmitter beacon that shows where the seat is, and then it should show where the jet's crashed as well.

03:09:24.393 --> 03:09:25.614
[UNKNOWN]: It should give you both of those things.

03:09:25.994 --> 03:09:27.675
[UNKNOWN]: I assume that's not encrypted or is it?

03:09:28.510 --> 03:09:29.431
[UNKNOWN]: I don't I don't know.

03:09:29.991 --> 03:09:32.613
[UNKNOWN]: I don't think it is because I can't be, but yeah, I can't.

03:09:32.773 --> 03:09:50.804
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, because I've heard, well, I've heard the old T's over Unsukure radios before so I guess it could still be encrypted and the sound is still gonna go out over the radio frequency Right, so that's gonna alert that a jet went down and might not tell exactly where it is But who knows they might have been able to pick up on UHF or VHF actual that it happened.

03:09:51.004 --> 03:09:51.184
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah

03:09:52.104 --> 03:10:00.206
[UNKNOWN]: So, and then the radar or the radio itself, the C-cell radio, we would practice with that like once a year, right?

03:10:00.246 --> 03:10:10.187
[UNKNOWN]: So, you know, in combat, we would train with it a little bit more, but just knowing how that thing works, that's probably the best data you can have, and I know it sounds simple to everybody listening.

03:10:10.207 --> 03:10:11.208
[UNKNOWN]: They're like, it's a radio.

03:10:11.568 --> 03:10:16.909
[UNKNOWN]: It's a little bit more complicated, and you're thinking about your radar, your Jdans, and all this stuff, and also who's coming to find you.

03:10:17.769 --> 03:10:18.249
[UNKNOWN]: Exactly.

03:10:18.910 --> 03:10:28.144
[UNKNOWN]: That's what I'm thinking about more than anything probably, but yeah, I know you don't don't want to or can't share everything that you carried personally, but for what you can can share.

03:10:28.516 --> 03:10:45.229
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so even just having your iPhone and this might sound super simple to people but having your phone with you like the pilot that got shot down in Libya that GPS on that actually helped them get rescued so that's wild I know something that's helpful there could also work against you.

03:10:45.249 --> 03:10:53.054
[UNKNOWN]: I'm sure and that could have changed since then too, or maybe it's a big no-no to do that now But obviously you have like a side arm with you.

03:10:53.074 --> 03:10:54.496
[UNKNOWN]: I think it was like a burretta.

03:10:54.676 --> 03:10:56.237
[UNKNOWN]: I mean hopefully that thing works

03:10:58.158 --> 03:11:06.443
[UNKNOWN]: Well, if you're at the point where you're pulling the trigger on that thing and like dude save one for yourself Yeah, I know I would either zero chance.

03:11:06.504 --> 03:11:25.976
[UNKNOWN]: I'm letting them drag me off like I would put one in my own dome before I let that happen for sure But yeah, it's like what they've done to pilots put them in cages and burn them and things like that And in terms of any any of the kind of classic bushcraft Survival kit stuff did you carry any of that the fire starter the compass the kind of cheesy Rambo gear

03:11:26.416 --> 03:11:29.137
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I carried it so it was kind of cool.

03:11:29.677 --> 03:11:32.158
[UNKNOWN]: My cousins, they sent me this like really awesome compass.

03:11:32.178 --> 03:11:34.838
[UNKNOWN]: I was like this gold compass that they found and sent it to me.

03:11:34.858 --> 03:11:36.799
[UNKNOWN]: And it was a little bit old school, but it worked really well.

03:11:36.919 --> 03:11:37.939
[UNKNOWN]: So I always flew with that.

03:11:38.119 --> 03:11:39.080
[UNKNOWN]: I always had that on me.

03:11:40.020 --> 03:11:44.501
[UNKNOWN]: And then, you know, just having the things on you that are in good shape.

03:11:44.541 --> 03:11:46.622
[UNKNOWN]: I would always make sure my shoe laces were in good shape.

03:11:46.642 --> 03:11:48.582
[UNKNOWN]: Because, you know, that's something you learn at Sears.

03:11:48.602 --> 03:11:51.203
[UNKNOWN]: Like how to get out of twist ties with shoe laces.

03:11:51.223 --> 03:11:53.024
[UNKNOWN]: Things like just little details, right?

03:11:53.044 --> 03:11:53.824
[UNKNOWN]: Just making sure that.

03:11:55.005 --> 03:12:02.729
[UNKNOWN]: You've got some sort of a whole and an understanding of how to get down out of trees because there are treat areas in Afghanistan, right?

03:12:02.769 --> 03:12:08.413
[UNKNOWN]: So making sure that you have some sort of knowledge of how that little repel thing works.

03:12:08.433 --> 03:12:12.155
[UNKNOWN]: Like literally there's a thing that hooks onto a branch and it allows you to repel down.

03:12:12.475 --> 03:12:16.638
[UNKNOWN]: So I would take that thing out every now and then and we'll get it and understand how it work just in case.

03:12:16.858 --> 03:12:17.038
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:12:17.678 --> 03:12:25.306
[UNKNOWN]: Were there any lucky or personal items that you always flew with that compass for sure right that's for my family So having that on me.

03:12:25.326 --> 03:12:31.452
[UNKNOWN]: I feel like it meant a lot more than just you know if I had to use it and and see her which you know Not the main focus of it.

03:12:31.472 --> 03:12:36.136
[UNKNOWN]: I think it was more symbolic to me of like each much mission I'm flying with what's my true north?

03:12:37.157 --> 03:12:49.083
[UNKNOWN]: And again, I think that played a part in that situation I did and dropped the bomb in a few other times, or maybe we were able to go down a different road instead of maybe a way that would have caused a bigger situation.

03:12:49.383 --> 03:12:49.583
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:12:49.983 --> 03:12:51.504
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:12:52.605 --> 03:12:54.646
[UNKNOWN]: With a ran being kind of where it is now.

03:12:56.927 --> 03:13:03.314
[UNKNOWN]: Two questions, one, where do you see it going, specifically from your kind of area of expertise?

03:13:04.094 --> 03:13:06.477
[UNKNOWN]: And then after that, do you think it's the right thing to do?

03:13:06.797 --> 03:13:09.079
[UNKNOWN]: What we are doing and what we've done this far.

03:13:12.271 --> 03:13:16.854
[UNKNOWN]: So I think the big thing to, when I think about all these things, is start with the target.

03:13:17.114 --> 03:13:20.937
[UNKNOWN]: So that's what we always did in fighter jet operations, is start with the target.

03:13:21.017 --> 03:13:22.698
[UNKNOWN]: What's the best situation?

03:13:22.958 --> 03:13:27.201
[UNKNOWN]: Well, a non-nuclear armed Iran, I think, is the best situation, right?

03:13:27.681 --> 03:13:32.704
[UNKNOWN]: And people have said, well, we took out their nukes in 2025, or they took out their ability to build nuclear weapons in 2025.

03:13:34.065 --> 03:13:35.005
[UNKNOWN]: I don't fully agree with that.

03:13:35.186 --> 03:13:47.370
[UNKNOWN]: I think they have so many different dispersed locations That at this point, you know, there could be a dozen or so places that haven't been released that may be massade knows about CIA It knows about and so I think that's the best situation.

03:13:47.390 --> 03:13:48.250
[UNKNOWN]: So how do we get there?

03:13:48.370 --> 03:13:55.093
[UNKNOWN]: Well There's a couple different ways to get to that fully non-ability of the Iranians have a nuclear weapon that they would use against Israel

03:13:56.333 --> 03:14:00.835
[UNKNOWN]: So the first one, the obvious one, is no IRGC in power anymore, right?

03:14:00.875 --> 03:14:21.726
[UNKNOWN]: So from an air power perspective, what I think of is, okay, how do we support someone who's on the ground that's actually going to make that so painful in the IRGC that a lot of them leave, a lot of them, you know, they go to their island, they're going to their island mansion, that's worth $20 million, and they're like, ah, I'm down here, and you know, a thousand of them do that, and then they just go somewhere else.

03:14:21.766 --> 03:14:22.727
[UNKNOWN]: That would take a massive,

03:14:23.527 --> 03:14:36.653
[UNKNOWN]: air power campaign to support who's ever doing that, because think about Iran's drones capability, their secret police, the besieged or their secret police that are from the IRGC that are keeping their population in check.

03:14:37.273 --> 03:14:38.094
[UNKNOWN]: So is it?

03:14:38.654 --> 03:14:46.139
[UNKNOWN]: police forces, state police, are they able to actually garner some sort of weaponry and get actual foothold in a town somewhere.

03:14:46.700 --> 03:14:48.761
[UNKNOWN]: Somewhere that can be resupplied not from Iran, right?

03:14:48.781 --> 03:14:57.888
[UNKNOWN]: So it would probably be along a border somewhere, along a coast somewhere, and then can that start to filter and infiltrate into the country itself without having a massive amount of US boots in the ground.

03:14:58.168 --> 03:14:58.909
[UNKNOWN]: I'm not stupid though.

03:14:58.929 --> 03:15:03.172
[UNKNOWN]: I realized that special ops played a huge part in Syria.

03:15:03.552 --> 03:15:04.913
[UNKNOWN]: We didn't have an invasion of Syria, right?

03:15:04.933 --> 03:15:05.293
[UNKNOWN]: But I mean,

03:15:06.294 --> 03:15:10.418
[UNKNOWN]: tons of guys like you were there, so what does that look like?

03:15:10.478 --> 03:15:10.958
[UNKNOWN]: Is that worth it?

03:15:10.978 --> 03:15:12.259
[UNKNOWN]: Is that juice worth the squeeze?

03:15:12.659 --> 03:15:13.040
[UNKNOWN]: I don't know.

03:15:13.240 --> 03:15:14.881
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I'm still figuring that out myself.

03:15:15.161 --> 03:15:21.366
[UNKNOWN]: It'd be great if Israel, Mossad, Kurds, all these people could step in and do it.

03:15:21.406 --> 03:15:23.328
[UNKNOWN]: I just, I don't know if that capacity exists.

03:15:23.348 --> 03:15:24.949
[UNKNOWN]: I'm still figuring that out and learning that myself.

03:15:25.470 --> 03:15:32.275
[UNKNOWN]: But I think the best scenario in that case would be whoever there, there's going to be US advisors, make sure they have

03:15:33.196 --> 03:15:34.277
[UNKNOWN]: a massive amount of air support.

03:15:34.417 --> 03:15:34.878
[UNKNOWN]: At all times.

03:15:36.079 --> 03:15:40.423
[UNKNOWN]: That's a no negotiation, not negotiable for me.

03:15:41.263 --> 03:15:44.907
[UNKNOWN]: If we're going to put Americans there, they have to have a 10 to 6.

03:15:44.927 --> 03:15:45.948
[UNKNOWN]: We've got to keep everything there.

03:15:46.528 --> 03:15:52.934
[UNKNOWN]: You can't just pull back, but hey guys, it runs out happening anymore and then behind the scenes, someone needs air support and doesn't have it.

03:15:53.234 --> 03:15:54.434
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:15:54.575 --> 03:16:01.737
[UNKNOWN]: I know it's a kind of a trick question or maybe impossible to answer just from an intelligence standpoint like neither of us.

03:16:02.797 --> 03:16:07.359
[UNKNOWN]: Even with the clearances we've had the experiences we've gone through, etc.

03:16:08.500 --> 03:16:15.162
[UNKNOWN]: Still does not give us the behind-close doors in the oval office pulling the strings and making the decisions.

03:16:15.489 --> 03:16:15.789
[UNKNOWN]: Not yet.

03:16:15.809 --> 03:16:17.110
[UNKNOWN]: You're on your way there though.

03:16:17.290 --> 03:16:19.850
[UNKNOWN]: For sure I'll never be in that position.

03:16:20.431 --> 03:16:30.233
[UNKNOWN]: But the, uh, I guess, you know, put yourself in the president shoes, would you have done what we've done in Iran and would you have done anything different?

03:16:30.273 --> 03:16:32.774
[UNKNOWN]: Would you do anything different moving forward?

03:16:32.814 --> 03:16:41.637
[UNKNOWN]: Would you have that red line of, we need to cut the balls off Iran at whatever cost to the American military is is required?

03:16:42.818 --> 03:16:44.279
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think he's doing the right thing.

03:16:44.479 --> 03:16:54.229
[UNKNOWN]: I think the Department of War, the leadership we have there, the decisions they've made, I think it's the best possible scenario for the world is to have a non-IRGC Iran.

03:16:54.289 --> 03:16:55.530
[UNKNOWN]: I think that would be incredible.

03:16:55.850 --> 03:17:00.515
[UNKNOWN]: Now that might be a bridge too far, maybe it's just a non-nuclear Iran where there's some deal that's made.

03:17:00.875 --> 03:17:01.696
[UNKNOWN]: Off ramp is taken.

03:17:02.236 --> 03:17:02.476
[UNKNOWN]: Cool.

03:17:02.837 --> 03:17:03.918
[UNKNOWN]: And I think they tried to do that.

03:17:04.018 --> 03:17:06.000
[UNKNOWN]: I think they tried to give the off ramp to the IRGC.

03:17:06.680 --> 03:17:11.081
[UNKNOWN]: And the fact that they didn't take it, I think it's a deeper problem.

03:17:11.501 --> 03:17:13.282
[UNKNOWN]: And it shows it highlights a lot of things.

03:17:13.762 --> 03:17:16.943
[UNKNOWN]: I think it highlights that these two ideologies were always meant to headbutt.

03:17:17.283 --> 03:17:17.503
[UNKNOWN]: Right?

03:17:17.783 --> 03:17:25.305
[UNKNOWN]: America, capitalism, religious freedom with radical, Iotola, radical clerics.

03:17:25.625 --> 03:17:27.546
[UNKNOWN]: These two ideologies were always coming to this.

03:17:27.986 --> 03:17:31.226
[UNKNOWN]: And then you bring in his real, obviously, his real has a dog in the fight.

03:17:31.447 --> 03:17:32.887
[UNKNOWN]: You know, they don't want to get it.

03:17:33.708 --> 03:17:39.174
[UNKNOWN]: a backpack size nuclear bomb going off in Tel Aviv at some point because the IRGC wasn't put in check.

03:17:39.214 --> 03:17:45.182
[UNKNOWN]: Of course they want this, but I think the world is going to benefit from what's happening in Iran right now.

03:17:45.602 --> 03:17:52.231
[UNKNOWN]: If nothing else, you're putting these mafia-style boss people in check and you're showing them that hey, you can't operate with impunity anymore.

03:17:52.731 --> 03:17:55.133
[UNKNOWN]: Like, okay, we can't get rid of the hoothies overnight.

03:17:55.153 --> 03:17:57.676
[UNKNOWN]: We can't get rid of Hezbollah overnight and Hamas.

03:17:58.116 --> 03:18:00.818
[UNKNOWN]: But, you know what, we're starting the process.

03:18:00.838 --> 03:18:10.507
[UNKNOWN]: We're starting this hard process of calling you out and not allowing you to operate with impunity and just think that you can do this and then gaslight us all and say you're not.

03:18:10.927 --> 03:18:22.352
[UNKNOWN]: And then, you know, politicians that want to keep the peace in America, they want to keep the gas prices low, they're like, okay, like, we know these guys are evil, but we're just going to kind of let this happen so we get reelected again.

03:18:22.872 --> 03:18:25.653
[UNKNOWN]: So what I see happening right now at this administration is they've got a backbone.

03:18:25.733 --> 03:18:29.615
[UNKNOWN]: They know that the oil prices are affecting people's decisions right now.

03:18:30.215 --> 03:18:38.118
[UNKNOWN]: Hopefully it doesn't affect it enough for them to lose both houses of Congress, but I think the fact that we have leadership that's like, we don't really care.

03:18:38.518 --> 03:18:39.699
[UNKNOWN]: This is something that needs to be done.

03:18:40.459 --> 03:18:40.940
[UNKNOWN]: And it sucks.

03:18:41.020 --> 03:18:41.520
[UNKNOWN]: I get it too.

03:18:41.540 --> 03:18:46.245
[UNKNOWN]: Like I get I see people on my channel complaining that the wars dragging on and never should have been there.

03:18:46.665 --> 03:18:47.326
[UNKNOWN]: And I think that's good.

03:18:47.426 --> 03:18:48.027
[UNKNOWN]: I think that's healthy.

03:18:48.227 --> 03:18:49.368
[UNKNOWN]: People should have that perspective.

03:18:49.388 --> 03:18:50.509
[UNKNOWN]: We shouldn't always be at war.

03:18:51.050 --> 03:18:54.494
[UNKNOWN]: But we shouldn't let evil just propagate and go unchecked either.

03:18:54.974 --> 03:18:59.659
[UNKNOWN]: And so I think it puts you in a moral dilemma where it's like, okay, are you going to do something about it or are we just going to kind of

03:19:00.279 --> 03:19:07.265
[UNKNOWN]: Use diplomacy like Tucker Carlson probably is like, hey, I just want to use diplomacy sanctions things like that anti-war no war I got it.

03:19:07.645 --> 03:19:08.866
[UNKNOWN]: That's a great pipe dream.

03:19:08.986 --> 03:19:25.659
[UNKNOWN]: I think that's amazing But when you see what how the rubber meets the road with the IRGC what they're actually doing around the globe with their shadow networks You know the way that they're they've infiltrated into the ability to put oil on the black market like at some point That's going to affect everybody in a negative way

03:19:26.540 --> 03:19:31.504
[UNKNOWN]: So do we confront the evil and the danger or do we just kind of let it go by the wayside?

03:19:31.584 --> 03:19:39.949
[UNKNOWN]: I'm more on the side of confront it, deal with it, and then try to make the end game as best as possible because you got, you can't forget the end game.

03:19:40.250 --> 03:19:43.932
[UNKNOWN]: And I think right now we're entering a phase where it's not the end game quite yet.

03:19:44.412 --> 03:19:45.873
[UNKNOWN]: But that will happen at some point.

03:19:46.013 --> 03:19:51.617
[UNKNOWN]: The war will more come to an end with some small little proxy scrimmishes, some people launch and drones

03:19:55.720 --> 03:19:56.800
[UNKNOWN]: what's the strategy there?

03:19:56.920 --> 03:19:58.921
[UNKNOWN]: Who do we, who do we help prop up?

03:19:59.081 --> 03:20:07.243
[UNKNOWN]: Is it someone that's actually viable or are we just, are we picking favorites and that's something that's going to fall back into the IRGC's hands again?

03:20:07.683 --> 03:20:08.643
[UNKNOWN]: What's actually going to work?

03:20:09.044 --> 03:20:11.604
[UNKNOWN]: Is it a previous leader from Iran who's not Reza Palavi?

03:20:11.644 --> 03:20:14.065
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, Reza Palavi, I think he's a solid dude.

03:20:14.085 --> 03:20:16.125
[UNKNOWN]: He's inspirational, got a big following.

03:20:16.686 --> 03:20:17.906
[UNKNOWN]: Can he actually hold power there?

03:20:18.606 --> 03:20:23.231
[UNKNOWN]: I think those are the tough questions to ask that I know is being asked at the higher levels right now.

03:20:23.331 --> 03:20:33.661
[UNKNOWN]: I'd love to be a fly on the wall, those conversations, but I think it's does the American public have the will to do something hard and just understand that.

03:20:33.802 --> 03:20:38.586
[UNKNOWN]: Sometimes hard things need to be done, and it's not always popular, but a thing I do like, and

03:20:39.367 --> 03:20:42.669
[UNKNOWN]: Again, I've talked about the ground invasion and things like that before.

03:20:43.069 --> 03:20:49.132
[UNKNOWN]: We're doing things differently now, at least we're not repeating the exact same strategy as Iraq and Afghanistan.

03:20:51.113 --> 03:20:51.833
[UNKNOWN]: And I think that's good.

03:20:51.933 --> 03:20:52.994
[UNKNOWN]: I think we're in a whole new era.

03:20:53.114 --> 03:20:54.775
[UNKNOWN]: We're in a way that we can do it smarter.

03:20:55.475 --> 03:20:58.018
[UNKNOWN]: The question is, can we go through a little short-term pain?

03:20:58.038 --> 03:21:06.368
[UNKNOWN]: I've seen the prices of gas for the average American is about an extra $50 to $100 a month based on what you drive, which is nothing.

03:21:06.568 --> 03:21:06.968
[UNKNOWN]: I get that.

03:21:07.108 --> 03:21:14.517
[UNKNOWN]: Like that $500 a month extra sucks, but it's kind of a crowdfunding campaign to root out the second most evil regime in history in my opinion.

03:21:15.658 --> 03:21:31.139
[UNKNOWN]: So if I were able to do that, I think the first benefit is to the world, my kids, your kids watching this, don't have to send your, don't have to go to Iran and fight against this regime again, and maybe this time it's because of Newquen off somewhere, and maybe it wasn't even Iran launching, and maybe it was

03:21:32.060 --> 03:21:43.911
[UNKNOWN]: Then propping up some terrorists now work and they set off a bomb off the coast of California But now we got to actually go in and then oh by the way, we threw it might be more nukes in there Yeah, that's gonna be a lot more human loss than what we're seeing right now.

03:21:43.951 --> 03:21:46.353
[UNKNOWN]: Which isn't nothing You know the people that we've lost is terrible.

03:21:46.373 --> 03:21:54.240
[UNKNOWN]: It's tragic But if you let a problem like this go on, it's just gonna get worse and worse I do have a perspective on it

03:21:54.765 --> 03:22:10.275
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I do, but I guess before I give my two cents or one and a half cents, I'm not naive to, well, before I even ask that, I guess, push comes to show you're in the president's shoes, do you put boots on the ground for a full American invasion?

03:22:13.718 --> 03:22:21.783
[UNKNOWN]: Yes, but let me caveat that with, I think the best pressure on Iran is a credible threat of an invasion.

03:22:23.996 --> 03:22:24.656
[UNKNOWN]: Does that make sense?

03:22:24.877 --> 03:22:25.057
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:22:25.837 --> 03:22:27.558
[UNKNOWN]: I'm not saying that, that should be tactic number one.

03:22:28.259 --> 03:22:33.802
[UNKNOWN]: And I think there should be the most limited ground for us as possible, absolutely.

03:22:33.842 --> 03:22:43.748
[UNKNOWN]: And the reason why I have been very at an end on my channel about no ground invasion is because of what I saw in Afghanistan.

03:22:44.048 --> 03:22:45.629
[UNKNOWN]: Right, the tactics and the strategy there.

03:22:45.929 --> 03:22:47.330
[UNKNOWN]: It just lost the strategy.

03:22:47.790 --> 03:22:49.171
[UNKNOWN]: And I don't think we should repeat history.

03:22:49.531 --> 03:22:49.952
[UNKNOWN]: But there is

03:22:51.171 --> 03:22:57.933
[UNKNOWN]: a strategy of retrenchment where you go in, you strike the head off the snake, limited strikes, and then you come back and you wait, and then you just keep doing that.

03:22:58.013 --> 03:23:02.915
[UNKNOWN]: But it would be if there were ground forces involved, kind of like what we saw with the F-15E WISO rescue.

03:23:03.755 --> 03:23:07.796
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, dude, your guy is absolutely crushed.

03:23:07.936 --> 03:23:12.078
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I've seen some, I've heard of some of the things that actually went on there and, wow.

03:23:12.838 --> 03:23:15.459
[UNKNOWN]: So maybe it doesn't look like a rack in Afghanistan.

03:23:15.679 --> 03:23:18.080
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe this ground invasion could be different, maybe it's,

03:23:18.900 --> 03:23:20.101
[UNKNOWN]: Cut the head off the snake, come back.

03:23:20.702 --> 03:23:21.222
[UNKNOWN]: Boom.

03:23:21.503 --> 03:23:27.148
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, you know, maybe you just need to check out this house of this IRGC boss.

03:23:27.188 --> 03:23:29.631
[UNKNOWN]: And it's just needed to, you know, check it out real quick.

03:23:29.751 --> 03:23:30.091
[UNKNOWN]: Come back.

03:23:31.272 --> 03:23:31.913
[UNKNOWN]: Little things like that.

03:23:31.933 --> 03:23:34.816
[UNKNOWN]: It could look a lot different than Afghanistan where we're sitting there like sitting docks.

03:23:35.016 --> 03:23:35.216
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:23:36.030 --> 03:24:00.315
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, I'm not naive to the fact that Iran globally has a pretty significant and nefarious influence, you know, it's not just within the borders of Iran, it's the reach into the Houthis and the Hamas, Hezbollah, the spill over into Europe, you know, it is significant and it's worth being concerned about and it's not just as simple as

03:24:01.475 --> 03:24:02.636
[UNKNOWN]: these people are a problem.

03:24:02.937 --> 03:24:03.898
[UNKNOWN]: It's none of our business.

03:24:03.918 --> 03:24:04.999
[UNKNOWN]: Let's deal with it anyway.

03:24:05.239 --> 03:24:22.296
[UNKNOWN]: I do legitimately understand that what I am curious is from that perspective of kind of laundry listing the overall threat, the existential threat to the Western way of life and specifically to the United States way of life.

03:24:23.237 --> 03:24:38.372
[UNKNOWN]: Do you have a litmus test that you would kind of evaluate any of the other countries all over the world that fall into a similar category as to whether or not we should be doing the same thing to them because there are

03:24:39.113 --> 03:24:54.454
[UNKNOWN]: Certainly, from my perspective, just as evil regimes in places all over the world that we frankly have zero involvement in, you know, there's a handful of countries in Africa that

03:24:55.575 --> 03:25:12.489
[UNKNOWN]: even numbers wise if you if you want to use the whether you call it a litmus or a check mark a checklist of how many of their own people have they slaughtered in the name of fill in the blank there's places in Africa that the dwarf you know what her around has done to itself yeah

03:25:12.769 --> 03:25:14.591
[UNKNOWN]: to where we do almost nothing, you know.

03:25:14.631 --> 03:25:15.151
[UNKNOWN]: Right.

03:25:15.611 --> 03:25:33.947
[UNKNOWN]: So I guess I, you know, before I share my opinion on Iran, just kind of kicking back to you, the, is there a litmus process that you would have to say, if we're willing to do this in Iran, because of X, Y and Z, either are we or Y aren't we willing to do it in all these, these other places?

03:25:34.187 --> 03:25:42.033
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, yeah, I thought about this a lot, and to me it's when the threat also meets with the potential.

03:25:42.393 --> 03:25:44.815
[UNKNOWN]: So it's the ideology, the threat, and the potential.

03:25:44.895 --> 03:25:51.340
[UNKNOWN]: So when you look at these countries in Africa, terrible tragic, the things they're doing to kids, I mean, these guys all should be eliminated, right?

03:25:51.920 --> 03:26:08.965
[UNKNOWN]: But when you look at what's the existential threat to the rest of the world, unfortunately, and this is, you know, unfortunate that we can't extend ourselves this far because it would be, it'd be great if we could just totally take out all these guys that are raping, pillaging, killing kids and all this stuff, right?

03:26:11.704 --> 03:26:16.506
[UNKNOWN]: But I look at it like, what's the actual ability of them to threaten us on a large scale?

03:26:17.147 --> 03:26:22.590
[UNKNOWN]: And so when I look at Iran, yes, I think it's a miracle they don't have a nuclear weapon already.

03:26:22.870 --> 03:26:28.573
[UNKNOWN]: But they weren't even able to just buy one or buy the parts and then put it together and have plausible deniability.

03:26:28.973 --> 03:26:30.674
[UNKNOWN]: So I think they have the threat.

03:26:30.894 --> 03:26:34.076
[UNKNOWN]: They have the ideology and they have the capability.

03:26:34.496 --> 03:26:37.898
[UNKNOWN]: And I think that's one thing we have to look at is like, OK, do they have the capability to do this?

03:26:39.072 --> 03:26:40.433
[UNKNOWN]: You know, can we negotiate with them?

03:26:40.573 --> 03:26:41.934
[UNKNOWN]: Because I think negotiations are great.

03:26:41.954 --> 03:26:43.275
[UNKNOWN]: You should be able to negotiate.

03:26:43.435 --> 03:26:48.919
[UNKNOWN]: And so again, Russia, China, negotiation to me, makes a lot more sense in any military action.

03:26:50.340 --> 03:26:58.286
[UNKNOWN]: And I think with Iran, they have the ability to actually put real power behind that death to America, death is real statement that they've made for years.

03:26:58.927 --> 03:27:10.304
[UNKNOWN]: When I think about a country in Africa, you know, would it be nice if we could just turn loose a whole bunch of contractors and just say hey guys, your job is just mowed down all these dickheads that are doing this to people sure are we able to

03:27:11.611 --> 03:27:29.342
[UNKNOWN]: wrap our arms around that and should we be meddling in that not as much as the people that have the ability to potentially build a nuclear weapon or by the way Iran might be the one funding those people in Africa because they make so much money off their oil so maybe if we focus on what's actually the head of this whole proxy monster.

03:27:30.222 --> 03:27:36.412
[UNKNOWN]: Honestly, I think the around thing is way more justified than a rocker of Ganistan, in my opinion.

03:27:36.512 --> 03:27:44.825
[UNKNOWN]: I think that would be the one if you look at where they're actually getting their proxy funding from cutoff the source, so that's what makes it different to me.

03:27:45.127 --> 03:27:48.749
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, for to me, I would say Iran over Iraq all day long.

03:27:48.949 --> 03:27:51.350
[UNKNOWN]: What makes way more sense than is more justified?

03:27:51.710 --> 03:28:04.056
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, for that matter, even while we were in Iraq, what Iran did to our troops is justifies what we're doing there now, more than anything we ever did in Iraq, in my opinion.

03:28:04.396 --> 03:28:04.596
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:28:04.956 --> 03:28:23.589
[UNKNOWN]: Afghanistan, to me, is different in that I think involvement needed to be had, but after three maybe six months, I mean less than a year at very most, should have been about it, you know, but well said, I don't know many people that

03:28:24.169 --> 03:28:25.510
[UNKNOWN]: disagree with that, honestly.

03:28:25.610 --> 03:28:28.012
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, which is frustrating, but it is.

03:28:28.633 --> 03:28:40.241
[UNKNOWN]: I am curious, the separation between Iran from a purely a capability standpoint or kind of the three things that you factor into your decision-making process on involvement.

03:28:40.722 --> 03:28:51.530
[UNKNOWN]: If you compare them to China and Russia being nuclear powers, or even North Korea who's arguably closer, you know, and being probably

03:28:54.275 --> 03:29:11.137
[UNKNOWN]: Similarly, haven't done the same kinds of things in any of those places that we're doing in Iran, do you think that that's justified or do you think we should be doing similar offensive maneuvers to combat the potential for an existing nuclear power?

03:29:12.577 --> 03:29:20.347
[UNKNOWN]: Well, I like, I'll hit on North Korea first, so North Korea obviously, you know, would be great if they didn't have nuclear weapons.

03:29:20.767 --> 03:29:31.020
[UNKNOWN]: The difference that I see with them in Iran is the religious ideology isn't there, so North Korea isn't coming out every day saying they want to wipe America off the face of the earth.

03:29:31.561 --> 03:29:32.622
[UNKNOWN]: that's not happening.

03:29:33.142 --> 03:29:37.944
[UNKNOWN]: They say choice words about soul all the time, but they've kind of normalized their relationship there.

03:29:38.365 --> 03:29:40.826
[UNKNOWN]: And China's like the big brother that keeps them in check.

03:29:40.946 --> 03:29:44.988
[UNKNOWN]: China's like, hey, North Korea, call some trouble over there, oh, like, fire some ballistic missiles.

03:29:45.028 --> 03:29:45.829
[UNKNOWN]: But oh, not too much.

03:29:46.069 --> 03:29:48.070
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, yeah, okay, just get out of here.

03:29:48.090 --> 03:29:51.572
[UNKNOWN]: You know, they're just like basically like treating them like a little brother so they're in check.

03:29:52.272 --> 03:29:53.973
[UNKNOWN]: And to me, that's a lot different than Iran.

03:29:54.013 --> 03:30:01.197
[UNKNOWN]: Iran, when you look at their ideology, they have a global takeover perspective where they want to create caliphates around the globe.

03:30:01.777 --> 03:30:09.426
[UNKNOWN]: And so, you could even argue that that's more existential or more intensive than what Russia and China want.

03:30:09.446 --> 03:30:13.190
[UNKNOWN]: Russia and China, you know, what China want to bet, Russia wants Ukraine.

03:30:13.210 --> 03:30:14.712
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, we'll Russia keep going, maybe.

03:30:15.353 --> 03:30:21.680
[UNKNOWN]: But what I hear the rhetoric from Persia, from Iran, is that they think that the U.S.

03:30:22.921 --> 03:30:25.285
[UNKNOWN]: taking away their ability to be the leader of the world.

03:30:25.845 --> 03:30:27.768
[UNKNOWN]: They want to lead the entire world with Sharia law.

03:30:28.229 --> 03:30:31.353
[UNKNOWN]: And so they see us as being that main thing that could stop that.

03:30:32.355 --> 03:30:34.918
[UNKNOWN]: So that's a different problem, I think, than what you see in North Korea.

03:30:35.499 --> 03:30:39.204
[UNKNOWN]: And whereas China and Russia seem like you can negotiate somewhat with them.

03:30:40.406 --> 03:30:44.849
[UNKNOWN]: Right now, we can clearly see that who runs Iran is a big shadow network.

03:30:45.130 --> 03:30:47.391
[UNKNOWN]: That there's no real head of state.

03:30:47.411 --> 03:30:49.773
[UNKNOWN]: And that's why we always talked about them as a non-state actor.

03:30:50.174 --> 03:30:57.060
[UNKNOWN]: Iran was never really talked about as a state actor, because when we were learning about it in all of our military schools, they were like, yeah, this one's kind of in the middle.

03:30:57.300 --> 03:30:58.681
[UNKNOWN]: This one's not a non-state actor.

03:30:59.121 --> 03:31:01.884
[UNKNOWN]: It's not a state actor, but it's kind of the aspects of both.

03:31:02.704 --> 03:31:03.785
[UNKNOWN]: So I think that's what makes it different.

03:31:05.166 --> 03:31:24.166
[UNKNOWN]: In a purely hypothetical, do you see, and I'm curious, even from an hot plan standpoint, if it was ever dirt dove in some of the strategy sessions, the hypothetical of the United States, and we'll just say the West as a singular entity.

03:31:24.987 --> 03:31:27.389
[UNKNOWN]: completely pulling out of the Middle East, right?

03:31:27.429 --> 03:31:29.491
[UNKNOWN]: Like absolutely zero involvement.

03:31:30.031 --> 03:31:44.804
[UNKNOWN]: Is there any any part of you that could see or would predict countries like Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Jordan, maybe even some of the northern African countries, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, etc.

03:31:45.664 --> 03:31:46.425
[UNKNOWN]: Because they're

03:31:48.429 --> 03:32:10.093
[UNKNOWN]: within the kind of Islamic realm of both region and influence that now with us playing zero role that it would force them to have to step up and actually do something about not allowing Iran to completely take over because I don't pretend to be a geopolitics expert

03:32:16.954 --> 03:32:32.407
[UNKNOWN]: that it's hard for me to imagine that Saudi, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan, that they're all just going to be like, yeah, you guys got it, we'll just sit here like what's going to keep them from saying, okay, well, if America doesn't have this, I guess we're going to have to do something.

03:32:32.447 --> 03:32:34.108
[UNKNOWN]: Is that ever even discussed?

03:32:34.969 --> 03:32:36.089
[UNKNOWN]: It is a really good question.

03:32:36.210 --> 03:32:37.030
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it'd be great.

03:32:37.350 --> 03:32:38.872
[UNKNOWN]: I've kind of like that ship has sailed.

03:32:39.332 --> 03:32:41.173
[UNKNOWN]: I think if maybe there was a time

03:32:41.894 --> 03:32:46.076
[UNKNOWN]: back with that was the strategy of the United States if we didn't care about the oil over there.

03:32:46.097 --> 03:32:49.659
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, let's just say, you know, the oil, we care about that, right?

03:32:49.679 --> 03:32:50.999
[UNKNOWN]: That's important for America.

03:32:51.079 --> 03:32:54.722
[UNKNOWN]: So do we think that the flow of oil would keep coming to the United States?

03:32:55.522 --> 03:32:56.202
[UNKNOWN]: Probably not.

03:32:56.403 --> 03:32:59.865
[UNKNOWN]: Like, there probably be some the strongest person over there.

03:32:59.885 --> 03:33:01.365
[UNKNOWN]: It's like, who has the biggest sword?

03:33:01.405 --> 03:33:02.706
[UNKNOWN]: That's who wins in the Middle East.

03:33:02.886 --> 03:33:08.710
[UNKNOWN]: So if we were willing to accept that, if we're gonna understand, like, if we pull fully out Iran, in my opinion,

03:33:09.190 --> 03:33:25.965
[UNKNOWN]: Iran is going to take over someone right they're going to get a nuclear weapon they're going to maybe that's going to force Saudi into a nuclear weapon as well so maybe there would be some deterrence between those two but Iran's going to take over pretty much everything else would be my perspective on that at this point you think they would be able to.

03:33:26.966 --> 03:33:38.571
[UNKNOWN]: I think they would have a strong chance of taking over specific key places like Kuwait, Kuwait would probably be first on their list, their proxies, and they might not even need to take over some of these places.

03:33:38.671 --> 03:33:43.854
[UNKNOWN]: If their proxies can have big enough of a presence to disrupt the ball on Mondab straight.

03:33:44.594 --> 03:33:46.275
[UNKNOWN]: and they're disrupting the straight-of-formers.

03:33:47.416 --> 03:33:59.745
[UNKNOWN]: I think you're right though that the UAE, some of these countries do have a strong, stronger deterrence force, but what I see is kind of a lack of will in a lot of these places to stand up and fight for themselves.

03:34:00.225 --> 03:34:02.967
[UNKNOWN]: And it's just a, I don't know if it's a work ethic thing or what it is.

03:34:03.607 --> 03:34:21.505
[UNKNOWN]: But specifically with like Oman, I look at Oman, they have a big chunk of earth right on the other side of the straighted form is they have this many naval bases there and then all the islands that are close to the other countries like Qatar or UAE They're all Iranian, but they're more than halfway towards the other coastline.

03:34:21.905 --> 03:34:22.646
[UNKNOWN]: So what happened?

03:34:23.086 --> 03:34:24.807
[UNKNOWN]: why do we allow them to take over?

03:34:24.927 --> 03:34:32.993
[UNKNOWN]: So I think the UAE has kind of stepped up and I would see them as what one of the leaders over there on their Air Force, especially from an air power perspective.

03:34:33.573 --> 03:34:38.116
[UNKNOWN]: UAE and Saudi Arabia, I think would remain intact, but I think everything else would be on the board.

03:34:39.697 --> 03:34:51.885
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, one thing I've been curious about from a new capability standpoint is with with his in bed as Russia and China are with Iran.

03:34:52.985 --> 03:34:57.808
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe it's the simple answer, it's too much of, they think it's too much of a red line with us, but

03:34:58.989 --> 03:35:11.274
[UNKNOWN]: You know, what's stopping them from providing Iran with just a weapon, not the technology, not the raw material, but just, hey, here's a few tactical nukes, what's keeping them from doing that.

03:35:11.893 --> 03:35:23.255
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I've wondered that as well, and especially what if there was an incentive like once they give them that, now they're getting a whole bunch more money to prop up some sort of an industry for that, right, help them build that.

03:35:23.675 --> 03:35:27.856
[UNKNOWN]: But there must be something that's in their interest to not do that.

03:35:28.416 --> 03:35:34.198
[UNKNOWN]: I personally, I think Putin and Zee's Xi Jinping, they know Iran's crazy.

03:35:34.538 --> 03:35:35.718
[UNKNOWN]: They know that they're unstable.

03:35:36.398 --> 03:35:41.340
[UNKNOWN]: They don't, they like the fact that they bother us, but I think they're smart people.

03:35:41.580 --> 03:35:44.261
[UNKNOWN]: I think to rule China and rule Russia, you got to be a smart person.

03:35:44.961 --> 03:35:57.586
[UNKNOWN]: And so I think they don't want to deal with another nuclear-armed country that might be able to maybe challenge their dominance in a certain region, but they want a country that they still have power over that can then cause disruptions for the United States.

03:35:57.606 --> 03:36:05.289
[UNKNOWN]: That's much more in their interest than having another country that maybe has global domination ambitions that now they don't have as much leverage with.

03:36:05.749 --> 03:36:09.312
[UNKNOWN]: because they have more leverage with Iran, without Iran having a nuclear weapon.

03:36:09.872 --> 03:36:11.853
[UNKNOWN]: Because they're the big swing and you know what?

03:36:11.953 --> 03:36:16.777
[UNKNOWN]: There's like, okay, yeah, great Iran, but like, the end of the day, but I have to listen to anything you say.

03:36:17.692 --> 03:36:23.016
[UNKNOWN]: So I guess the last question is it pertains to Iran as where do you see it going from here realistically?

03:36:23.657 --> 03:36:37.808
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I think it's going to depend a lot on what happens internally, what happens in that country and how long are we able to wait and see if the people will actually have the ability to get armed?

03:36:37.828 --> 03:36:43.593
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, a good friend of mine, Green Baret, has talked about, okay, if we need to arm them,

03:36:44.273 --> 03:36:49.199
[UNKNOWN]: handguns, 38 specials, 100,000, 38 specials dispersed throughout the country.

03:36:49.679 --> 03:36:52.622
[UNKNOWN]: The IRGC is going to get some, obviously, but they already have guns.

03:36:52.863 --> 03:36:53.443
[UNKNOWN]: So who cares?

03:36:53.904 --> 03:37:02.273
[UNKNOWN]: So is that actually a strategy where there could be some sort of a stronghold where they wouldn't just get immediately wiped by the IRGC?

03:37:02.934 --> 03:37:03.875
[UNKNOWN]: You know, what does that look like?

03:37:03.915 --> 03:37:04.556
[UNKNOWN]: So I think that'd be

03:37:06.037 --> 03:37:10.338
[UNKNOWN]: I think that might be where we're headed, at least attempting something like that.

03:37:10.738 --> 03:37:12.558
[UNKNOWN]: If I was in charge, I don't know.

03:37:12.578 --> 03:37:17.699
[UNKNOWN]: I would say, don't trust anything the IRGC puts on paper, don't trust anything they say.

03:37:18.299 --> 03:37:23.700
[UNKNOWN]: Anytime they say they're going to agree to something, just remember, you know, they've got a hand behind their back, just with a dagger.

03:37:24.300 --> 03:37:26.020
[UNKNOWN]: So that's how I would approach them.

03:37:26.541 --> 03:37:31.321
[UNKNOWN]: And then I think try to minimize the energy flow impact.

03:37:31.801 --> 03:37:32.642
[UNKNOWN]: So what does that look like?

03:37:35.567 --> 03:37:39.628
[UNKNOWN]: There's a lot of oil on the market right now, so how do you increase it?

03:37:39.648 --> 03:37:40.448
[UNKNOWN]: How do you make it even more?

03:37:40.688 --> 03:37:42.509
[UNKNOWN]: Does that mean working more with Russia?

03:37:42.729 --> 03:37:46.570
[UNKNOWN]: Like maybe Russia, maybe us working with the super power is a good thing.

03:37:46.610 --> 03:37:52.052
[UNKNOWN]: Maybe Russia is able to kind of help in this situation because that relationship has been built a little bit.

03:37:52.072 --> 03:37:53.692
[UNKNOWN]: You can see Trump kind of doing that as well.

03:37:54.112 --> 03:37:55.253
[UNKNOWN]: That might be one of the reasons.

03:37:55.993 --> 03:38:01.134
[UNKNOWN]: So I think ultimately it's already a win in a lot of ways for energy.

03:38:01.414 --> 03:38:03.175
[UNKNOWN]: And the reason why is because the US has

03:38:04.155 --> 03:38:15.597
[UNKNOWN]: taken control of the energy choke point in a sense in the Persian Gulf by rerouting a lot of it encouraging a lot of neighbors to route a lot of that energy in pipelines.

03:38:16.377 --> 03:38:18.478
[UNKNOWN]: And then the US just struck a major deal with Venezuela.

03:38:19.038 --> 03:38:25.499
[UNKNOWN]: And so the report I saw said 65 billion barrels of oil potentially that could eventually make their way out of the market.

03:38:25.559 --> 03:38:30.040
[UNKNOWN]: Now I know the oil in Venezuela is in his usable rate away, takes some refined mitten things like that.

03:38:30.680 --> 03:38:35.562
[UNKNOWN]: But what I see this going is just, okay, I feel like the president Trump's like, okay, you're not going to make a deal.

03:38:35.802 --> 03:38:43.405
[UNKNOWN]: Okay We're just going to keep opening up oil flow and make the straightive or her moves are relevant and a lot of people out there I want that quick mineral victory.

03:38:43.805 --> 03:38:47.426
[UNKNOWN]: It's just going to look a little different But again, how long did Syria take six years?

03:38:47.767 --> 03:38:52.729
[UNKNOWN]: I think and then one day a side was like, oh, I'm going to Moscow Weird, right?

03:38:52.749 --> 03:38:58.951
[UNKNOWN]: So what was going on beyond the scenes there obviously obviously a lot of of your fellow special operators helping to make that happen

03:38:59.631 --> 03:39:01.193
[UNKNOWN]: So is that what we see there?

03:39:01.213 --> 03:39:02.615
[UNKNOWN]: I think it could be.

03:39:02.955 --> 03:39:03.115
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:39:03.716 --> 03:39:04.457
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:39:05.057 --> 03:39:07.620
[UNKNOWN]: I appreciate all the insight and again for for the listener.

03:39:07.660 --> 03:39:12.926
[UNKNOWN]: I encourage you to check out Max after burner on YouTube because I watch your stuff all the time and I love it.

03:39:13.086 --> 03:39:16.450
[UNKNOWN]: And you know, I think it's really really cool to get your perspective.

03:39:16.690 --> 03:39:19.554
[UNKNOWN]: It's such a unique and well rounded one.

03:39:19.954 --> 03:39:20.575
[UNKNOWN]: I appreciate that.

03:39:20.735 --> 03:39:21.596
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:39:22.337 --> 03:39:32.868
[UNKNOWN]: In terms of when you decided to leave the Air Force, what was the catalyst that made you say, you know, I could go do the F-35 thing, but I'm actually going to pull trucks and get out.

03:39:32.888 --> 03:39:34.550
[UNKNOWN]: What was that decision making process?

03:39:35.298 --> 03:39:39.900
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so I kind of feel like when I was on the Thunderbirds that opened up the world to me.

03:39:39.920 --> 03:39:46.564
[UNKNOWN]: So I was traveling around the country and I was seeing how entrepreneurs have always been interested in entrepreneurship.

03:39:46.904 --> 03:39:51.806
[UNKNOWN]: I was running a few little companies on the side at the time just trying to learn about entrepreneurship really.

03:39:52.466 --> 03:39:57.349
[UNKNOWN]: And traveling around, I just saw how amazing America was, really.

03:39:57.489 --> 03:40:01.371
[UNKNOWN]: I had heard in the media kind of highlighted this sky was falling all the time.

03:40:02.051 --> 03:40:11.646
[UNKNOWN]: And then having gone and seen these little communities in the middle of Michigan or Ohio, wherever outside of these air shows, I was just blown away at how much opportunity was out there.

03:40:12.226 --> 03:40:16.873
[UNKNOWN]: And so I feel like that got me thinking, well, you know, there's all these people building these businesses or they're...

03:40:18.115 --> 03:40:20.858
[UNKNOWN]: pursuing their passion of entrepreneurship and their succeeding.

03:40:21.258 --> 03:40:22.319
[UNKNOWN]: So maybe I could do that as well.

03:40:22.339 --> 03:40:23.960
[UNKNOWN]: So I feel like that was always in the back of my mind.

03:40:24.501 --> 03:40:34.990
[UNKNOWN]: I wanted to make an impact somehow and I went back to my film production days where I felt like the way that I could tell a story on mine was valuable and people would watch it even in college.

03:40:35.010 --> 03:40:36.011
[UNKNOWN]: I was making these videos.

03:40:36.031 --> 03:40:38.753
[UNKNOWN]: I would crack up the whole class or whatever and it was impactful.

03:40:39.293 --> 03:40:40.815
[UNKNOWN]: So I just thought maybe I could try to

03:40:42.916 --> 03:40:53.886
[UNKNOWN]: And when I remember when I decided I was going to get out I wanted to know that I was going to make a difference in whatever I was doing and I knew that I was going to have a meeting with the general as well.

03:40:53.926 --> 03:40:58.970
[UNKNOWN]: So I thought through this long before what I was going to say to her and she was a one-star general.

03:40:59.350 --> 03:41:00.931
[UNKNOWN]: She pulled me into her office and she was like

03:41:01.732 --> 03:41:03.694
[UNKNOWN]: You have an F-35 waiting and you're like, what are you doing?

03:41:04.275 --> 03:41:09.060
[UNKNOWN]: And I was like, well, man, I feel like I've got the ability to, to all the stuff I've learned on the Thunderbirds.

03:41:09.460 --> 03:41:12.203
[UNKNOWN]: I think I can take this and make a really big impact.

03:41:12.704 --> 03:41:14.566
[UNKNOWN]: In other ways, I don't know exactly what that's going to be yet.

03:41:14.686 --> 03:41:19.651
[UNKNOWN]: And as soon as I said that, she was like, I just turned off and she was like,

03:41:20.892 --> 03:41:32.156
[UNKNOWN]: Um, okay, you know, and she just stood up and was like, all right, thanks for letting me know by, and I was like, well, I think that kind of highlighted to me the military too was, there was some weird things started to happen, right?

03:41:32.176 --> 03:41:40.118
[UNKNOWN]: There were some people getting put in positions of leadership that they shouldn't have been put in, and I started to just meet my limit of being able to deal with that.

03:41:40.338 --> 03:41:46.280
[UNKNOWN]: I feel like I played, you know, the chameleon role a little bit because you had to, if someone was a leader that you just knew wasn't a good leader.

03:41:47.020 --> 03:42:03.608
[UNKNOWN]: But I feel like I've reached the point of having the freedom to say you know what I see a little bit of where this is going at the time I felt like it was more of like Okay, who do you know and there was some of that DEI stuff that I was starting to creep in and There was in my line of work.

03:42:03.628 --> 03:42:08.791
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I've flown with amazing women fighter pilots who are who could beat me in a dogfight any day the week and then I've

03:42:09.731 --> 03:42:16.334
[UNKNOWN]: those same women don't belong anywhere in leadership, just like men, they're certain guys that are really good pilots that they don't deserve to be leaders, right?

03:42:16.354 --> 03:42:24.557
[UNKNOWN]: There shouldn't be any reason you become promoted besides merit and being someone that can help encourage mission effectiveness and morale.

03:42:24.918 --> 03:42:28.119
[UNKNOWN]: And as soon as someone's being fake and they shouldn't be their morale creators, right?

03:42:28.479 --> 03:42:34.402
[UNKNOWN]: So I started to see a lot of these people for whatever the reason, whatever it was, get put in leadership positions, because they were the first

03:42:35.282 --> 03:43:01.490
[UNKNOWN]: female fighter pilot or whatever the case was, there was the first female Thunderbird pilot, Fee Fee Malakowski, it was one of the best leaders I've ever come across and she got promoted, she was on her way to be in a general that she had some medical stuff but there was someone that weren't like her that we're getting promoted, you know, and so I think it was a little bit of a helpless feeling for me and some of my fellow aviators where we're like, look, we just want people that are here for merit only.

03:43:02.670 --> 03:43:12.115
[UNKNOWN]: And then that makes your life better, because then maybe someone's a little more socially attuned, they're not scheduling a mandatory fun Friday, barbecue at 6 p.m. when everybody wants to go home.

03:43:12.415 --> 03:43:13.135
[UNKNOWN]: You know what I mean?

03:43:13.155 --> 03:43:15.336
[UNKNOWN]: Just little things like that, mandatory fun.

03:43:15.557 --> 03:43:15.857
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:43:16.117 --> 03:43:20.299
[UNKNOWN]: And so when I saw that train kind of going off the tracks a little bit, that was my exit point.

03:43:20.359 --> 03:43:21.399
[UNKNOWN]: I know it's come back now.

03:43:21.459 --> 03:43:22.840
[UNKNOWN]: Like I've heard really good things.

03:43:22.900 --> 03:43:23.640
[UNKNOWN]: Morales better.

03:43:24.721 --> 03:43:25.581
[UNKNOWN]: I'm still in the reserves.

03:43:25.621 --> 03:43:28.603
[UNKNOWN]: I do some work for the Air Force Academy and recruiting is off the charts.

03:43:29.383 --> 03:43:47.136
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, it's been a wild roller coaster for sure, you know, the upswing in patriotism and standards and kind of getting back to the way things ought to be, at least from what it sounds like, seems to be a pretty good direction change for sure.

03:43:47.156 --> 03:43:47.896
[UNKNOWN]: I agree.

03:43:49.858 --> 03:43:56.103
[UNKNOWN]: How did you go from not really sure what the plan is to have another super successful YouTube channel that kicks ass?

03:43:56.483 --> 03:43:57.064
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, thanks man.

03:43:57.244 --> 03:44:07.693
[UNKNOWN]: So just like all fighter pilots, you know, I feel like you know, you're I'm sure with you guys to his operators your your life is at the squadron your life is with your team

03:44:08.513 --> 03:44:12.277
[UNKNOWN]: And you don't, you can't really take any time to kind of see what else is going on.

03:44:12.317 --> 03:44:15.720
[UNKNOWN]: And so for fighter pilots, what we all do is we just go to the airlines.

03:44:16.000 --> 03:44:19.183
[UNKNOWN]: And you start talking about it a few years prior, which is great.

03:44:19.263 --> 03:44:22.606
[UNKNOWN]: I recommend that, you know, if people want to go fly for the airlines, I think that's awesome.

03:44:22.986 --> 03:44:29.953
[UNKNOWN]: But I do think we lose some fighter aviators that maybe could contribute in other ways and media podcasting and things like that.

03:44:30.753 --> 03:44:49.144
[UNKNOWN]: Because they go to to the airlines because I think it's the only route But I do think it's a nice little buffer right because I have no idea what I want to do At least I'll be able to pay my rent and fly and still is cool Way different, but I feel like that was the buffer zone for me was go do that on trying to build whatever it was that I was gonna build

03:44:49.824 --> 03:44:55.591
[UNKNOWN]: And then I got laid off during COVID from a major airline.

03:44:55.691 --> 03:45:05.043
[UNKNOWN]: I had just bought a house and so I had to put the house on Airbnb and the city I was living in Nashville, luckily there were still some things going on, things were open, they weren't completely bonkers.

03:45:05.483 --> 03:45:07.724
[UNKNOWN]: And so I was able to rent that house out on Airbnb.

03:45:08.185 --> 03:45:13.168
[UNKNOWN]: I moved back right near Mountain Home Air Force Base where my network was by Boise.

03:45:13.888 --> 03:45:18.251
[UNKNOWN]: And I did a lived in a studio apartment and just started figuring out what am I going to do?

03:45:18.911 --> 03:45:21.452
[UNKNOWN]: And I just started doing TikTok and Instagram.

03:45:21.873 --> 03:45:22.833
[UNKNOWN]: A little bit of YouTube.

03:45:22.853 --> 03:45:26.816
[UNKNOWN]: I pulled out my phone one day and did a YouTube reaction to TikTok and Maverick.

03:45:27.516 --> 03:45:30.499
[UNKNOWN]: I had seen a few people do reactions at top in Maverick, and I was like, this is lame.

03:45:31.040 --> 03:45:36.686
[UNKNOWN]: I can do better than this, so I just did a reaction to it, and I was like, oh, that was fun.

03:45:36.846 --> 03:45:40.490
[UNKNOWN]: Cool, and then, you know, next day, 50 views, 100 views, am I?

03:45:40.530 --> 03:45:42.572
[UNKNOWN]: Well, okay, maybe, you know, whatever, no big deal.

03:45:43.392 --> 03:45:44.853
[UNKNOWN]: Two months later I'm sitting on a plane.

03:45:44.873 --> 03:45:45.273
[UNKNOWN]: I pull up.

03:45:45.433 --> 03:45:52.896
[UNKNOWN]: I didn't check to YouTube in in two months I pulled up and it was like you have 30,000 followers And I was like wait, what?

03:45:53.136 --> 03:45:53.916
[UNKNOWN]: This must be a mistake.

03:45:53.936 --> 03:45:54.776
[UNKNOWN]: There's something wrong.

03:45:54.796 --> 03:46:10.922
[UNKNOWN]: You know, I've got a wrong account And yeah, that video was up to like quarter million views And then it just kept going and going and going and that first video hit like 3.5 million views with 10 like six months Just that one video on top of my average and then I'm screwed because I'm like, oh, this is easy And all right

03:46:11.402 --> 03:46:22.448
[UNKNOWN]: And then for the next three to four years, it's just the trial and the process of trying something, failing, a video would get 500 views, a video would get 20,000 views, and just kept going through that.

03:46:22.488 --> 03:46:24.129
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, it still exists today, right?

03:46:24.149 --> 03:46:32.194
[UNKNOWN]: Where who knows, I'm not in control of the algorithm, but I feel like I started to learn, like, okay, I'm good enough at this to where I can get better at this.

03:46:32.834 --> 03:46:37.437
[UNKNOWN]: And so it just became this thing where I was applying my fighter pilot mindset of

03:46:38.397 --> 03:46:45.687
[UNKNOWN]: wake up, breathe, debrief, fly the swordie, and then or fly the swordie, debrief, and then get better next time.

03:46:45.747 --> 03:46:52.215
[UNKNOWN]: And so I just started applying that, and I just became completely set on getting better every time I would do a video.

03:46:52.356 --> 03:46:55.279
[UNKNOWN]: One video a week is what I did for a couple of years, like as a hobby, and

03:46:56.393 --> 03:47:02.358
[UNKNOWN]: And then about a year and a half ago, once the Operation Midnight Hammer kicked off, I started doing a daily video.

03:47:03.199 --> 03:47:04.961
[UNKNOWN]: And then that kind of sputtered a little bit.

03:47:04.981 --> 03:47:07.583
[UNKNOWN]: And then this year, I just decided to do a video a day.

03:47:07.903 --> 03:47:08.544
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:47:08.604 --> 03:47:10.005
[UNKNOWN]: And that's been going for this year.

03:47:10.065 --> 03:47:12.167
[UNKNOWN]: And things are people seem to be getting value out of it.

03:47:12.468 --> 03:47:17.892
[UNKNOWN]: And it's fulfilling to me, I'm doing live streams as well, arguably it's more fun to me to do live streams.

03:47:17.952 --> 03:47:20.375
[UNKNOWN]: So maybe that's something that I know just do in live streams.

03:47:21.095 --> 03:47:22.756
[UNKNOWN]: I started a podcast on the side as well.

03:47:22.776 --> 03:47:23.757
[UNKNOWN]: So we'll see how that goes.

03:47:24.397 --> 03:47:27.059
[UNKNOWN]: But I'm just I see the power of media, right?

03:47:27.079 --> 03:47:31.401
[UNKNOWN]: And I see kind of what we talked about before information operations are happening all around us.

03:47:32.022 --> 03:47:37.945
[UNKNOWN]: And so how do we have maybe a place like a news channel where people who have served or

03:47:39.146 --> 03:47:53.463
[UNKNOWN]: have people in their family that have served or just love our country and want to go somewhere where the goal, I'm not saying I'm perfect, but the goal is to find what is our military truthfully doing what are the capabilities of the warrior and focus on the warrior.

03:47:54.324 --> 03:47:58.347
[UNKNOWN]: and what that sacrifice is, what their skills are, how do we equip them better?

03:47:58.907 --> 03:48:05.232
[UNKNOWN]: So kind of a place where we can go that's focused on tech and how our military is a greatest force for a good on the planet.

03:48:05.952 --> 03:48:07.073
[UNKNOWN]: I like said, I love it.

03:48:07.113 --> 03:48:11.436
[UNKNOWN]: I mean to me, that path of kind of breaking your own trail,

03:48:12.577 --> 03:48:20.640
[UNKNOWN]: and really doing what you want to do with ice, you know, kind of whatever everybody else from your community does, because similarly, I kind of went to totally different route too.

03:48:20.700 --> 03:48:33.065
[UNKNOWN]: So I can both appreciate, relate and respect, I guess it's not both, that's all three, but you also decided to write a book, take command, is that the final title or are you changing the title?

03:48:33.245 --> 03:48:34.165
[UNKNOWN]: That's the final title.

03:48:34.505 --> 03:48:36.186
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, we had a different title before.

03:48:36.246 --> 03:48:37.466
[UNKNOWN]: It's called the Modern Art of War.

03:48:37.946 --> 03:48:44.747
[UNKNOWN]: And then we just shifted that because I realized I just kept saying take command during the book as kind of being the main theme.

03:48:44.787 --> 03:48:47.108
[UNKNOWN]: So we just shifted the title to take command.

03:48:47.728 --> 03:48:50.889
[UNKNOWN]: So depending, DOD approval, that's looking to be released.

03:48:51.449 --> 03:48:53.589
[UNKNOWN]: Is it still a little up in there, depending on that?

03:48:53.609 --> 03:48:54.689
[UNKNOWN]: We want to release it this fall.

03:48:54.810 --> 03:48:59.150
[UNKNOWN]: So the goal would be like a November release, but yeah, depending on what the Department of War says.

03:48:59.170 --> 03:49:00.611
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's in their hands right now.

03:49:00.771 --> 03:49:00.951
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:49:01.151 --> 03:49:01.291
[UNKNOWN]: OK.

03:49:03.091 --> 03:49:12.714
[UNKNOWN]: Take command is kind of the, I guess, basic ideology of it is there another kind of almost elevator pitch that you would attach to it.

03:49:13.414 --> 03:49:14.014
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.

03:49:14.034 --> 03:49:20.376
[UNKNOWN]: So the whole goal is it's 17 lessons from a fighter pilot leading at a thousand miles per hour.

03:49:20.416 --> 03:49:27.478
[UNKNOWN]: So 17 things that I've learned along the way that I think have helped me make split second decisions because in a fighter jet, you can't slow down.

03:49:27.518 --> 03:49:28.298
[UNKNOWN]: You can't pull over.

03:49:28.338 --> 03:49:28.898
[UNKNOWN]: You're moving.

03:49:28.958 --> 03:49:30.859
[UNKNOWN]: And I relate that to everybody's life, right?

03:49:31.699 --> 03:49:34.660
[UNKNOWN]: are doing something that we can't get off, that we just can't stop.

03:49:34.680 --> 03:49:38.361
[UNKNOWN]: You got a family, you can't stop leading your family and being a mom or a dad.

03:49:38.881 --> 03:49:39.781
[UNKNOWN]: Are you running a business?

03:49:39.801 --> 03:49:42.842
[UNKNOWN]: You can't just, you know, not check on your business for two, three days.

03:49:42.862 --> 03:49:43.662
[UNKNOWN]: It's not going to work.

03:49:44.062 --> 03:49:50.483
[UNKNOWN]: So how do we apply this fighter pilot mindset to people that are trying to succeed in personal life, professional life?

03:49:50.944 --> 03:49:55.385
[UNKNOWN]: And just the things that I feel like have made me make those split second decisions better.

03:49:55.645 --> 03:50:01.206
[UNKNOWN]: It hasn't been perfect, but I feel like there's a little system and a recipe that I've used to do that that might help other people.

03:50:02.067 --> 03:50:02.628
[UNKNOWN]: I love it, man.

03:50:02.648 --> 03:50:08.897
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's all a great sage advice and your perspective, like I said, is valuable and appreciate.

03:50:08.917 --> 03:50:12.702
[UNKNOWN]: Plus, you've got a max afterburner energy joint coming out soon, too, right?

03:50:12.990 --> 03:50:15.671
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, Max Afterburner and energy.com, people can check it out.

03:50:15.711 --> 03:50:22.093
[UNKNOWN]: The flavor is right now, our bunker buster berry, lightning liminade, and bomburs, which is a maneuver that the Thunderbirds do.

03:50:22.513 --> 03:50:24.033
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, so, I love it.

03:50:24.273 --> 03:50:29.115
[UNKNOWN]: Do you have any footage of you from your Thunderbird time that we can put into the show?

03:50:29.235 --> 03:50:30.455
[UNKNOWN]: I do, yeah.

03:50:30.515 --> 03:50:33.116
[UNKNOWN]: I've actually got the footage of me that promotion that we did.

03:50:33.136 --> 03:50:33.716
[UNKNOWN]: I've got that.

03:50:34.056 --> 03:50:37.657
[UNKNOWN]: And then I've just got some like doing a high show with a helmet, a helmet cam.

03:50:37.737 --> 03:50:38.097
[UNKNOWN]: Oh, cool.

03:50:38.297 --> 03:50:38.978
[UNKNOWN]: I can share with you guys.

03:50:38.998 --> 03:50:39.738
[UNKNOWN]: That would be great.

03:50:40.718 --> 03:51:04.043
[UNKNOWN]: Last question, and it's a top gun maverick plot hole question, and this is, you know, from the guy on the grounds perspective, so tell me if I'm totally way off base here, but in the maker break mission, if you can use Tomahawk to disable the surface to air missile sites, could you not just send a handful of them down the target hole as well?

03:51:05.563 --> 03:51:12.926
[UNKNOWN]: I don't think so, and the reason why is because the penetration of where you need to get down is a lot deeper than what a Tomahawk can do.

03:51:13.527 --> 03:51:16.748
[UNKNOWN]: So, Tomahawk's not meant for penetration as a penetration weapon.

03:51:17.448 --> 03:51:23.671
[UNKNOWN]: But some of these bombs, even like a 2000 pound bomb, you can put these delayed fuses on them, which is like 20, 30 milliseconds.

03:51:24.332 --> 03:51:35.207
[UNKNOWN]: And that actually can survive going down, you know, whatever it is, 12, 14 feet or so if you need to get down a little bit deeper, because if you blow up just the surface of some of these vents, they're going to be able to repair it in a couple of days.

03:51:35.268 --> 03:51:38.212
[UNKNOWN]: So I think the goal is to get that vent shaft.

03:51:39.113 --> 03:51:43.454
[UNKNOWN]: down probably, you know, whatever it's 100 feet to explode and then cavern in on itself.

03:51:44.014 --> 03:51:47.975
[UNKNOWN]: So then they just got to start from scratch, which is going to take a lot longer to build.

03:51:47.995 --> 03:51:48.655
[UNKNOWN]: So yeah, I don't know.

03:51:48.675 --> 03:51:51.216
[UNKNOWN]: I think that that part of it might actually be true.

03:51:51.536 --> 03:51:59.758
[UNKNOWN]: So let us to say that the United States does not possess a ballistic missile capability that wouldn't mirror what they used on from the aircraft.

03:52:01.098 --> 03:52:04.341
[UNKNOWN]: Like from the capability of what the F-8 teens used.

03:52:04.561 --> 03:52:06.883
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah, I mean, so like let's remove Tomahawk.

03:52:06.903 --> 03:52:16.792
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, some sort of ship or submarine fired ballistic missile that would do the same thing to where you wouldn't even need to put the team of pilots in that position.

03:52:17.192 --> 03:52:17.612
[UNKNOWN]: Gotcha.

03:52:18.113 --> 03:52:20.455
[UNKNOWN]: I think with advanced technology, anything is possible.

03:52:20.935 --> 03:52:25.619
[UNKNOWN]: There's not one that I know of that I can name off the top of my head, but I'd be shocked if we didn't have that capability.

03:52:25.900 --> 03:52:28.502
[UNKNOWN]: You said Tomahawk's don't have a good penetrating ability.

03:52:29.222 --> 03:52:36.350
[UNKNOWN]: As far as I know, they're not built to penetrate into bunkers, but now I know I everybody calls me Tamahawk.

03:52:37.992 --> 03:52:42.017
[UNKNOWN]: Man, it's been amazing sitting down, it's an honor to meet you like I said.

03:52:42.057 --> 03:52:44.760
[UNKNOWN]: I'd love your content, I've been following you for a while now.

03:52:45.798 --> 03:52:51.502
[UNKNOWN]: It's a real treat to get to sit down and appreciate you taking the time and there's anything I haven't asked you earlier that you'd like to bring up.

03:52:51.562 --> 03:52:52.703
[UNKNOWN]: Mike, I really appreciate it, man.

03:52:52.743 --> 03:53:07.714
[UNKNOWN]: I mean, just the support from the SEAL community, I mean, you guys have been very inspiring to me to see how you've reinvented yourself after your service and you've taken successful service and then moved into success and sharing with people, you know, that mindset, that SEAL mindset.

03:53:07.994 --> 03:53:10.916
[UNKNOWN]: I think it's helped inspire me to do the same thing with the fighter pilot side of the house.

03:53:10.936 --> 03:53:12.017
[UNKNOWN]: So I really appreciate it, man.

03:53:12.917 --> 03:53:20.303
[UNKNOWN]: That's awesome to hear and yeah, I mean anything I or we I guess I can't speak for all of us But anything I can do I'm happy to do it.

03:53:20.343 --> 03:53:28.909
[UNKNOWN]: So again, appreciate you coming likewise, man Thank you to the viewer slash let's not hope you enjoyed it if you didn't you can choke yourself until next time This is my job