Speaker 1: Ah Beat Force. If it doesn't work, you're just not
Speaker 1: using enough. You're listening to Software a Gradio Special Operations,
Speaker 1: Military news and straight Talk with the guys and the
Speaker 1: community Software Radio on Time on Target. I am Ian
Speaker 1: Scotto here with Jack Burphy as usual. Uh. This show
Speaker 1: is brought to you by air Drop. Air Drop is
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Speaker 1: there on an air drop. We have Thomas Pecora coming
Speaker 1: on this show. Excellent response to the show's last week
Speaker 1: they're getting a lot of plays. Actually, for the first
Speaker 1: time checked out our stats on Spotify because it was
Speaker 1: kind of like a slow build up on Spotify, and it's, uh,
Speaker 1: it's really building, uh like a lot of followers if
Speaker 1: you listen on Spotify. And the cool thing about Spotify
Speaker 1: that other channels don't have is it gives you a
Speaker 1: pretty like uh complete rundown of who your listeners are,
Speaker 1: and it's like percent mail. But like, I was sort
Speaker 1: of surprised because we have a lot of female listeners
Speaker 1: who are like hardcore fans that tweet us about every
Speaker 1: show and stuff like that, but it's still a like
Speaker 1: predominantly predominantly male fan base. And then it was like
Speaker 1: zero percent non binary, non gender specific. So it's just
Speaker 1: how does Spotify even like measure that I wonder? I
Speaker 1: think when you sign up you have to enter your gender,
Speaker 1: I guess, you know, because it also has the demographics
Speaker 1: of age, you know, and our listeners are mainly it's
Speaker 1: like to probably forty. That's like the bulk of the demographic.
Speaker 1: It's cool to see all that. Uh So it was
Speaker 1: my first time looking at that in a while. But
Speaker 1: it's just the players are are tremendous this past week.
Speaker 1: I mean it's I believe, like a hundred thousand plays
Speaker 1: the past week. It's doing awesome. Yeah, I'm very excited
Speaker 1: for how big this thing has gotten. Um. The big
Speaker 1: news today that I heard that you heard last night,
Speaker 1: actually they sent over to me, is that Michael Behannah
Speaker 1: has been pardoned by President Trump. We had first Lieutenant
Speaker 1: Michael Behenna on way back. I was looking five years
Speaker 1: ago on episode eighty eight, a very long time ago,
Speaker 1: which was when he was first released and he served
Speaker 1: five years of a fifteen year since in Fort Leavenworth
Speaker 1: for murdering are allegedly murdering you know, the known terrorist
Speaker 1: Ali Mansor Mohammed, which he said was in self defense.
Speaker 1: I reached out to Vicky Behennah, who is the contact
Speaker 1: I had his mother. Uh, they're doing, of course, some
Speaker 1: big things that they're doing, Hannity, but I might be
Speaker 1: able to get her on or him on um the
Speaker 1: next episode. No, I'd love to follow up on that because,
Speaker 1: like you said, it was five years ago. Yeah, we
Speaker 1: interviewed him. It was like right after he got paroled out. Yes, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it was pretty much immediately I was looking at the
Speaker 1: story we I think we were one of the first
Speaker 1: who had him on. Yeah, So I mean that's like
Speaker 1: one of those stories that's good for us to follow
Speaker 1: up on. I think, yeah, And I think they were
Speaker 1: kind of loyal to UH. I would say me because
Speaker 1: of the fact that I heard about Behnna's case actually
Speaker 1: on Michael Savage is the radio show. And you know,
Speaker 1: it's funny, like people kind of criticized talk radio for
Speaker 1: being incendiary and stuff, but sometimes these type of cases
Speaker 1: are only covered on like conservative talk radio. Mainstream media
Speaker 1: wasn't talking about Michael Behannah UH when he was when
Speaker 1: he was in Fort leaven Worth, Michael Savage was one
Speaker 1: of the only guys I know of who was talking
Speaker 1: about this. So I heard about it from there. I
Speaker 1: was producing David Webb show. I wanted to get Vicky
Speaker 1: Behanna on to talk about it, and I stayed in
Speaker 1: contact with her. So when he was released, I was
Speaker 1: able the text Vicky his mother and ask if we
Speaker 1: can get him on, and she uh pulled through and yeah,
Speaker 1: I just texted her and congratulations and she's like, I'll
Speaker 1: actually read the text of what she said. UM. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean in the meantime, listeners can go back and
Speaker 1: listen to what is an episode eight. Yeah, she just said,
Speaker 1: thank you, Ian, We're so very happy. So yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I bet you know. Um, it's symbolic in some ways
Speaker 1: because he's already out of prison sort of the sentence,
Speaker 1: but now he doesn't have a criminal record anymore because
Speaker 1: he's been pardoned. So I'm sure it means a lot
Speaker 1: to him and his family. I wonder how this has
Speaker 1: brought to Trump's attention. And the thing is, I would
Speaker 1: not be surprised if it was that talk radio has
Speaker 1: a ear, you know, of President Trump. The fact that
Speaker 1: guys that we know have been to the White House
Speaker 1: and have gotten a chance to talk to President Trump
Speaker 1: about issues that are of concern, and like I said,
Speaker 1: he's going to be on Hannity today, I would not
Speaker 1: be shocked if someone like Sean Hannity said, hey, this
Speaker 1: is an important thing. People who um are pro military
Speaker 1: are behind this guy. It would it would be a
Speaker 1: great symbolic gesture to pardon him, and it wouldn't surprise me.
Speaker 1: I think it speaks to Trump's bass um, so I
Speaker 1: would expect to see him do more of that. I honestly,
Speaker 1: I think the play that President Trump is gonna make
Speaker 1: is to pardon Eddie Gallagher during the reelection campaign. Um,
Speaker 1: whatever you think about um chief Gallagher. And I don't
Speaker 1: uh know if the guy is innocent or guilty, which
Speaker 1: is why I've avoided playing Barracks lawyer on this podcast.
Speaker 1: Um to some people's chagrin. But um, you know I
Speaker 1: was saying yesterday, you know, people get mad at me
Speaker 1: because I haven't like had a passionate stance on this thing.
Speaker 1: And it's like they want me to wear the free
Speaker 1: Eddie shirt and it's like, hey, man, like I'm a journalist,
Speaker 1: I have to be a little bit more impartial and
Speaker 1: unbiased about it. But um, you know that's gonna play
Speaker 1: out in court. His trial comes up in July. I
Speaker 1: believe I would not be surprised is the fact think
Speaker 1: gets dragged out and appeals and things like that. If
Speaker 1: Trump plays that up um as much as he can
Speaker 1: and then pardons him during his reelection campaign, A lot
Speaker 1: of people are behind him. And I think people who
Speaker 1: don't even know the full story, they do have an
Speaker 1: emotional response to it. It's a n A B C
Speaker 1: O um who they feel as being treated unfairly, and
Speaker 1: people who are pro military are oftentimes, you know, I
Speaker 1: get it to some extent, but like I had somebody
Speaker 1: come at me like, oh, it seems like the prosecutors
Speaker 1: are just trying to get a conviction. It's like, buddy,
Speaker 1: do you know how our legal system works. Prosecutors try
Speaker 1: to get convictions, the defense tries to get a not
Speaker 1: guilty verdict. Like that is that is due process. That
Speaker 1: is part of our legal system. And like, if you're
Speaker 1: getting mad about this stuff, I mean, I mean, I
Speaker 1: understand that there's frustration, there's anger, and I understand that
Speaker 1: Eddie Gallagher's family is going through a lot of ship
Speaker 1: and I don't judge them for defending their family member.
Speaker 1: I mean, they're they're right to do that, right, But
Speaker 1: there are some folks out there just like ranting, and
Speaker 1: it's like, man, you need to go back to like
Speaker 1: take a Civics one oh one course and learn about
Speaker 1: how your government and how your justice system works before
Speaker 1: you start getting like you're getting mad that prosecutors are
Speaker 1: looking to prosecute that. I don't know what to tell
Speaker 1: you about that. By the way, I just received the
Speaker 1: text from Vicky behenna Um it's about coming on for
Speaker 1: our next episode. She said, I could try give me
Speaker 1: the time I may have to be in court, So
Speaker 1: I'll text her back after this show, Uh, figure out
Speaker 1: a time. I just said it would be interesting if
Speaker 1: he if he or Vicky comes on on Thursday, uh
Speaker 1: for the Friday show, because we also have Fred Galvin
Speaker 1: coming on. And Fred Galvin and Michael Vehenna are kind
Speaker 1: of in the same category of guys who accused of
Speaker 1: war crimes. Yeah, accused of war crimes. Benna actually served
Speaker 1: time in Fort Leavenworth and and Galvin was exonerated his
Speaker 1: memory exonerate. Yeah, but it deeply affected both of them.
Speaker 1: As we know Galvin for a while, when you googled him,
Speaker 1: people thought war criminal. So I mean I told I
Speaker 1: told Fred when we had him on the first time.
Speaker 1: I was like, that's what I had always heard about
Speaker 1: the first Marsoc deployment, is that you guys were just
Speaker 1: cowboys just running and gunning, you know, gunning down villagers,
Speaker 1: and all of that turned out to be false. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: all right, I have some great emails to get to,
Speaker 1: so let's get to that. But I'm actually gonna open
Speaker 1: these windows because it is yeah, sure fucking stuff in here.
Speaker 1: Language Please languaging. There's kids listening to this. Okay, we're
Speaker 1: we're family show Family Showy. Leave that in here and
Speaker 1: been editing it out. I don't even do what you want.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think people are used to just putting
Speaker 1: up with our bullshit on the show. You know, I
Speaker 1: feel the windows. I'm like, if you do, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: spend a big story, you know, like I don't even
Speaker 1: look directly down like well as a It was all
Speaker 1: too much for Ian. He threw himself out the window.
Speaker 1: It was because we didn't get enough five star ratings
Speaker 1: on our podcast reviews on on iTunes, and Ian just jumped.
Speaker 1: He said, fuck it, I'm officially keeping this all in
Speaker 1: and I was gonna edit it out, but it's been
Speaker 1: been amusing, so you guys could hear what I usually
Speaker 1: would edit out. I'm gonna have remember Ian t shirts
Speaker 1: on start selling them. No profits to my family, no
Speaker 1: profits to to the Ian Charitable Fund. Um, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: take that and I'm gonna go spend it at gentleman's clubs. Nice,
Speaker 1: you have my approval now, uh like uh oral consent
Speaker 1: or something on the podcast. So all right, um, let's
Speaker 1: get into this email sent to soft Rep dot Radio
Speaker 1: at soft rep dot com. Uh, this one is from Josh.
Speaker 1: Hello Jack and I and I have a couple of
Speaker 1: questions for Jack, what stance do you take on foreign
Speaker 1: intervention when it comes to counter terrorism? Now that the
Speaker 1: g WATT is tech think we over Is there a
Speaker 1: better method of using spectral forces to train FIDE I
Speaker 1: think you've said this before. What is for those foreign
Speaker 1: internal defense okay and host nation military units than what
Speaker 1: we have been doing? Uh? What steps can the US
Speaker 1: take in foreign affairs to improve results and effectiveness encountering
Speaker 1: terror groups? I know it's a lot for Q and
Speaker 1: A on the podcast. Thank you for your time. Keep
Speaker 1: up the great work. Josh. Yeah, that's a huge, huge question.
Speaker 1: I mean that's like the quandary of our time since
Speaker 1: nine eleven. UM. I think that there's a number of
Speaker 1: things that you can do to try to reduce terrorism. UM.
Speaker 1: That's why we've been active in North Africa and we've
Speaker 1: had soldiers deployed to a Niger, Brikina FASO. UM. What
Speaker 1: are some of the other adjoining countries where we have
Speaker 1: guys Molly. UM, the Europeans have been active in Central
Speaker 1: African Republic because these are at risk populations, um because
Speaker 1: of the encroaching Islamic fundamentalism combined with the inherent poverty
Speaker 1: of the region that makes people susceptible. So we've been
Speaker 1: trying to head start on it, you know, try to
Speaker 1: intervene before one of these countries turns into you know,
Speaker 1: the next Afghanistan and you have like terrorist training camps
Speaker 1: and all sorts of crazy ship So we're trying to
Speaker 1: get ahead of the ball there. UM To counter terrorism
Speaker 1: it requires, um, you know, a holistic approach that addresses
Speaker 1: the social, political, economic, and UM security aspects of these countries.
Speaker 1: And we some of sometimes we don't do a very
Speaker 1: good job with that. UM. Our efforts UM are discombobulated,
Speaker 1: they are not unified. UM. But other times it's also
Speaker 1: you know, the host nation has a say in all
Speaker 1: of this too, and if that host nation is just
Speaker 1: completely corrupt, then uh, it may be very difficult for
Speaker 1: us to operate effectively there and to help them help themselves.
Speaker 1: I mean it might not if you're giving them money
Speaker 1: for counter terrorism endeavors, but some ministers putting it all
Speaker 1: in his pocket and then going to live in exile
Speaker 1: in Paris, Like Okay, it doesn't matter, you know, how
Speaker 1: good a job we do at that point. UM. From
Speaker 1: a military or a special operations aspect, I would just
Speaker 1: say that I think there's a real value in an
Speaker 1: importance in persistent long term engagement, meaning that we have specialists. UM.
Speaker 1: You could say, we have let's say we have O. D.
Speaker 1: A's that specialized in a country, and they go back
Speaker 1: to that country time and time and time again, and
Speaker 1: they build relationships. UM. You know, so the the young
Speaker 1: would say, uh, soldier they trained in that country twenty
Speaker 1: years later is the general in charge of their armed forces,
Speaker 1: and we have that long term relationship with that person
Speaker 1: and with those people, with those troops that we built.
Speaker 1: I'm a big advocate of replicating the UM the Special
Speaker 1: Forces detachment career model that we have these UM Special
Speaker 1: Forces soldiers and ones and twos even that are peeled
Speaker 1: off and they are embedded inside South Korean battalions and brigades,
Speaker 1: and those personnel rotate in and out, but we have
Speaker 1: that persist long term engagement. And I think we should
Speaker 1: set up resident teams like that in other countries. UM.
Speaker 1: We have guys in the Philippines, for example, UM Special
Speaker 1: Forces mar socks seals going back and forth, and they
Speaker 1: do great work over there. But I think we should
Speaker 1: have a resident team there, I think, and there's all
Speaker 1: many other countries around the world where we should have
Speaker 1: resident teams that operate in that same manner to keep
Speaker 1: that kind of persistent engagement rather than like a stop start,
Speaker 1: you know, stutter stepping kind of approach. Alright, great, great
Speaker 1: answer there, Uh and pretty in depth. So another another
Speaker 1: question here and you'll laugh at some of this. Uh.
Speaker 1: This is from Joseph Parish. I wanted to add my
Speaker 1: compliments and respect to the pile that you've accumulated in
Speaker 1: regards to Murphy's Law. I've been a fan and listened
Speaker 1: faithfully for what I think is six or seven years estimation.
Speaker 1: I assumed things about you. For instance, I used to
Speaker 1: call you a liberal. Now after reading your book, I
Speaker 1: realized have stupid. That assumption was My apologies for that.
Speaker 1: There's so many stories hidden within you. It's impressive how
Speaker 1: this book is the first I've ever read or heard
Speaker 1: about these exploits. You seem to be an old man
Speaker 1: trapped in a young man's body, archaic soul. The audio
Speaker 1: book with your narration really brings this to life. Uh
Speaker 1: for first I read, then I listened. Jack, Please do
Speaker 1: all you can to keep the podcast alive and moving.
Speaker 1: I still don't want to accept Ian Leathan, sorry, but
Speaker 1: I have to. I'll miss in and follow his next project,
Speaker 1: but I don't want software completely remodeled. Much respect to
Speaker 1: Joseph Parish, Yeah, man, thank you so much. Like that
Speaker 1: means a lot to me. And I've heard a lot
Speaker 1: of feedback about the book, and um, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of real talk in the book and people have responded
Speaker 1: to it. And you never really know how that's gonna
Speaker 1: go down or people gonna be like, oh, I wanted
Speaker 1: more you know, blood splatter, and you know I could
Speaker 1: it should be about you face shooting terrorists and nothing else.
Speaker 1: But there's a lot of real talk in the book
Speaker 1: and people responded to it and it really connected with
Speaker 1: people and I think in a meaningful way. And I've
Speaker 1: I've gotten a lot of messages and stuff like that. Um,
Speaker 1: if you guys read the book, I mean I appreciate
Speaker 1: if you can drop a review on Amazon that like
Speaker 1: really helps the book get some traction. And um, just
Speaker 1: like reading the reviews and the private messages and d
Speaker 1: M s and stuff I've gotten it's all been like
Speaker 1: super positive. Um, and it's just funny. And I get
Speaker 1: it's not really funny, but I just say this too. Um,
Speaker 1: all the other guys out there who are kind of
Speaker 1: like holding these stories and I mean they're like Vietnam
Speaker 1: veterans who like held it in for fifty years before
Speaker 1: they talk to anybody about the war. Um. Like you said,
Speaker 1: I never really talked about a lot of this stuff,
Speaker 1: and I finally wrote it in the book, and it
Speaker 1: was like, man, like, it's all this stuff that you're
Speaker 1: kind of like holding onto. Um. And then when you
Speaker 1: got even even in your personal life, stuff you don't
Speaker 1: talk about. Yeah. Yeah. And then when like I published
Speaker 1: it put it out into the world, it's in every
Speaker 1: bookstore in the country, I guess right now. And you know,
Speaker 1: everyone can go and listen to the audio book or
Speaker 1: buy the e book or whatever. It's out there now.
Speaker 1: And it's like at the end, it's like really not
Speaker 1: that big a deal, you know, Like I was kind
Speaker 1: of building things up into my head and I should have.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's not that I was ever like just
Speaker 1: like like I said in the first chapter of the book,
Speaker 1: the in the in the prologue. It's just like I
Speaker 1: avoided it, like I didn't want to like confront some
Speaker 1: of those things. So I'm glad that I did, and
Speaker 1: I'm glad that other people are reading it, and I'm
Speaker 1: glad that they're, you know, taking something away from the book. So, um,
Speaker 1: thanks for reaching out man. It's awesome. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: how does it feel to kind of fulfill this dream?
Speaker 1: I'm sure you know people do dream of having a
Speaker 1: book that's out on a major publisher, getting a lot
Speaker 1: of press, and you're living it right now. This is
Speaker 1: like a chapter of your life book right now that
Speaker 1: you accomplished this goal. Yeah for sure. I mean it
Speaker 1: was never like like a specific goal like I want
Speaker 1: to be published through a big, big publishing house. But
Speaker 1: I mean it's to walk into a bookstore like your
Speaker 1: books like gray Matter, Splatter, if you walk into a
Speaker 1: Barnes and Noble, you're not gonna be able to you know,
Speaker 1: You're not. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a big deal. And
Speaker 1: I mean maybe it hasn't like totally struckholm how big
Speaker 1: a deal it is quite yet. Um, but uh, it's incredible.
Speaker 1: It's surreal. I mean, I sent um, I mailed I've
Speaker 1: mailed out a lot of books to my friends as well,
Speaker 1: like former teammates and stuff like that. And uh, I
Speaker 1: actually was able to sign a book and mail it
Speaker 1: out to a retired operator, um the other day. And uh.
Speaker 1: It was a guy who is mentioned in the book,
Speaker 1: but he's not mentioned by name, um because I'm not gonna,
Speaker 1: you know, drop down on this guy. Um. He's a
Speaker 1: really good guy, really low key, down to earth dude. Um.
Speaker 1: But some of the stuff this guy did, like if
Speaker 1: it was in a novel or in a movie, like
Speaker 1: you wouldn't believe it. Like there's a vision people have,
Speaker 1: like the public has in their mind of like what
Speaker 1: Special Operations is like. And the reality I feel is
Speaker 1: more like my book where yeah there's some moments out
Speaker 1: of a recruitment commercial, but it's also a lot of
Speaker 1: other ship. Right. Well, this guy, his career is kind
Speaker 1: of what people think it is, like he did some wild,
Speaker 1: wild stuff. Um. So I was really happy that I
Speaker 1: was able to mail him a book uh the other day.
Speaker 1: And uh, and he'll get to read some parts uh
Speaker 1: that will sound very familiar to him. Um. This is
Speaker 1: my favorite email that that I think he already sent
Speaker 1: to you because I loved it. Uh from Ryan Vance Jack,
Speaker 1: don't tell me. You appeared on multiple news outlets regarding
Speaker 1: your book, including Fox and Fringe, which which the President
Speaker 1: watches and did not take the opportunity to talk about
Speaker 1: the Big Bang in yong Yang Sat Prep has been
Speaker 1: trying to spread the word for years now. Man, you
Speaker 1: really blew a big opportunity. Love the show, looking forward
Speaker 1: to reading your book. I was so tempted to just
Speaker 1: like look into the camera when I was on Fox
Speaker 1: and Friends and be like President of Trump, only you
Speaker 1: can save us from the deep state. Nancy Pelosi hates
Speaker 1: my book because it tells the truth, and anybody tweeted
Speaker 1: about it. The question is, I know we were discussing
Speaker 1: an off air like does he watch Fox and Friends
Speaker 1: on weekends? Because don't know. We know he does on
Speaker 1: the weekdays, but weekends are like golf time, Like that's
Speaker 1: moral lago going golfing time. Who knows? Man, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know. It would be interesting to just know if
Speaker 1: he want, if he woke up in the morning watching
Speaker 1: you could be It's possible, It's possible it didn't happen.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I got to say I should probably
Speaker 1: like refine my message and make it more like you know,
Speaker 1: sound bites for television. But like we talked about some
Speaker 1: I got to talk about like getting smuggled into Syria
Speaker 1: by the p k K and how they're like designated
Speaker 1: a foreign terrorist organization by our government. And I got
Speaker 1: to say stuff like that on Fox, which you don't
Speaker 1: here on Yeah, like TV, you know, broadcast news too often. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're they're probably like, who the hell is what's this
Speaker 1: dude talking about? Yeah, it's interesting, interesting man. All Right, Well,
Speaker 1: I mean a lot of press for Murphy's Law there,
Speaker 1: so pick it up. I guess we're gonna get right
Speaker 1: over to Thomas Pakora, who's back on for his second appearance.
Speaker 1: So back on the podcast for a second appearance. CIA
Speaker 1: officer Thomas Pakora, author of Guardian Life in the Crosshairs
Speaker 1: of the CIA's War on Terror. It's out today as
Speaker 1: we're recording on Postale Press. Uh. Thomas was last on
Speaker 1: episode four ten with us discussing the early years of
Speaker 1: Protective Operations. Cadre Uh, friend of Dale com Stock so
Speaker 1: hooked us up and we're glad to have you back on.
Speaker 1: This is a big deal because it was a few
Speaker 1: months ago when we heard about the book, and we
Speaker 1: figured we'd have you back on as the book got released,
Speaker 1: And it's got so many interesting stories, and I think
Speaker 1: people really responded to the first interview. Yeah, oh, thank
Speaker 1: you for having me back. And I'm glad that people
Speaker 1: like the interview. Yeah. Now that I have a copy
Speaker 1: of the book in my hands, I've been flipping through
Speaker 1: it and reading parts of it. And this is a
Speaker 1: really unique book because we have a lot of memoirs
Speaker 1: out there, and a lot of books written by former
Speaker 1: CIA case officers. UM. Very few who worked on you know,
Speaker 1: the paramilitary side at all, um, and certainly none from
Speaker 1: the guys who worked UM protective details. Yeah, and there's
Speaker 1: looking at the at the previous books that have been written.
Speaker 1: I basically, in preparation for writing the book, I read
Speaker 1: as many books written by agency personnel as I could
Speaker 1: to get a feel for what they talked about and
Speaker 1: what they're able to talk about. And this, my story,
Speaker 1: is a lot different. It comes from a different point
Speaker 1: of view because I was protecting those case officers as
Speaker 1: they were the majority of people who actually wrote books.
Speaker 1: I got the sense that you were, Um, I mean,
Speaker 1: correct me if I'm wrong. That you were able to
Speaker 1: tell some of these stories as long as you were
Speaker 1: kind of vague and non specific, like we were in
Speaker 1: a North African country. One yes. Um, the publication, the
Speaker 1: CIA Publication Review Board, UM kind of went through a
Speaker 1: policy uh switch. And the reason why I can say
Speaker 1: this is I spoke to Jose Rodriguez, who was the
Speaker 1: head of the counter Terrorism Center. His book came out
Speaker 1: just before I got my first manuscript into the publication
Speaker 1: review board. The CIA is reviewing entity, and his not.
Speaker 1: He was a very senior guy. His his process was
Speaker 1: much different than mine. His was only a couple of
Speaker 1: months long. Um. When I first submitted my book, my manuscript,
Speaker 1: they sat on it for a year and then had
Speaker 1: to kind of come back to him and say hello.
Speaker 1: And then they sent me an email saying, well, this
Speaker 1: is just just as overwhelming. Said okay, well let's start
Speaker 1: with step one. And uh it was a struggle. It
Speaker 1: was a struggle, uh uh to try to explain to them,
Speaker 1: you know, here's here's all the different books that have
Speaker 1: written similar things. Here's all the open source stuff. Here's
Speaker 1: the stuff that is an open source you know directly
Speaker 1: but indirectly is open source. So it was a struggle.
Speaker 1: Don't you find it weird when when you have to
Speaker 1: like correct them and be like, oh wait, you previously
Speaker 1: declassified this, Like this isn't a secret anymore. Yeah, those
Speaker 1: those are some tense moments because I'm I'm a bit
Speaker 1: of a pack rat and I've had a lot of
Speaker 1: time to work on this. I used to show up
Speaker 1: in the meetings because you can't bring any electronic into
Speaker 1: the meetings with them with uh, you know, a foot
Speaker 1: to two ft of paper, uh, basically photocopied sections of
Speaker 1: books where other agency uh entire agency officers had written about,
Speaker 1: you know, these certain subjects in their books. And sometimes
Speaker 1: I was able to win the day, and other times
Speaker 1: I just get this look across the table like Okay,
Speaker 1: you're not gonna be able to say that. So how
Speaker 1: long did it take all together to get it through
Speaker 1: the pr B? Three years? Wow? That's crazy. Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: It was a struggle, and there were times when I
Speaker 1: was like, really, is this going to be worth it?
Speaker 1: And you know, is it going to be I kept
Speaker 1: thinking about the Hemingweight story of the old man in
Speaker 1: the sea and where he catches this big fish and
Speaker 1: by the time he gets the shorts of skeleton, and
Speaker 1: I was thinking, you know, if that death level thousand redactions, um,
Speaker 1: and there were just a boatload of redactions. But but
Speaker 1: I worked really hard to try to get around that.
Speaker 1: I wasn't going to put black marks in the book
Speaker 1: because that's just tough to read and it's it's no
Speaker 1: fun for a reader to to to try to have
Speaker 1: kind of guess what we're talking about now. So that's
Speaker 1: why I ended up with undisclosed locations and things like that.
Speaker 1: Now you can a lot of times you can figure
Speaker 1: out what's going on, but well, for relso have to
Speaker 1: protected protected sources and methods. And that was you know,
Speaker 1: as a requirement as a security officer. Um. You know
Speaker 1: that would be really uh uh hypocritical of me if
Speaker 1: I didn't. Yeah, no, that's understandable. Uh for the people
Speaker 1: who are not familiar or maybe haven't listened to the
Speaker 1: last podcast we did. You want to tell us you
Speaker 1: know what's your book about? Um? My book is is
Speaker 1: a historical memoir of my twenty four year career in security.
Speaker 1: But I was not a traditional security officer. I branched
Speaker 1: and mainly stayed into the protective side. I was heavily
Speaker 1: involved in providing protection to agency personnel, facilities and information
Speaker 1: in hostile areas, and I did in a variety of
Speaker 1: ways and stories. The main story is about the this
Speaker 1: protective unit called the Protected Protective Operations Cadre, which was
Speaker 1: formed back in officially and that that entity remained UM clandestine,
Speaker 1: out of the public eye up until an event in
Speaker 1: UM in Pakistan and then later on with the Benghazi
Speaker 1: right and UM. The other parts of the book are
Speaker 1: my other roles doing protective work. When I was in
Speaker 1: the counter terrorism I was protecting our case officers another
Speaker 1: personnel by looking for and going after terrorists who are
Speaker 1: targeting our people. Yeah, it's like I said, it's a
Speaker 1: very unique view that I think you're the first person
Speaker 1: to ever write a book like this, UM from the
Speaker 1: standpoint of you know, running the protection detail for for
Speaker 1: agency case officers. And the book really, as you said,
Speaker 1: it's a historical memoir. It really takes you through the history, UM.
Speaker 1: And I actually reading the beginning of the book, it
Speaker 1: starts off with a pretty thorough account of the assassination
Speaker 1: of Colonel Nick Roe. I mean, I don't think I've
Speaker 1: ever seen it detailed, UM, quite so thoroughly before UM.
Speaker 1: And that is you kind of point out really the
Speaker 1: catalyst of how the park came about. Yes, that's that's
Speaker 1: exactly what happened. Um, it was it was a watershed
Speaker 1: moment for UM for us. We we we ended up
Speaker 1: in a situation where we're like, wow, are our people
Speaker 1: in an area you can't really operate. We need them
Speaker 1: to operate, you know, in the traditional clandestine UM case
Speaker 1: officer role collecting in intelligence. So they had to scramble
Speaker 1: and UM, so we sent people out to the Philippines
Speaker 1: and UM. You know, as a lot of a lot
Speaker 1: of events occur, you're you're caught up in the middle
Speaker 1: of it, and you and later on you get a
Speaker 1: chance to look at and go, we can do this better.
Speaker 1: So that's when they created this Protective Operations Cadre and
Speaker 1: started a training program and and made this UM a
Speaker 1: part of the security apparatus within the agency. And do
Speaker 1: you talk a little bit about how you came into
Speaker 1: work for the agency. And it was really just responding
Speaker 1: to a newspaper ad right, Yes, yes, as crazy as
Speaker 1: that sounds, The Milwaukee Journal had an they had for
Speaker 1: the CIA in there and I was coaching wrestling and
Speaker 1: working at the J. C. Penny's Catalog warehouse, trying something
Speaker 1: to do, and I applied and then um, they slatted
Speaker 1: me into security, which is a good fit. And and
Speaker 1: then things kind of picked up. And I was lucky
Speaker 1: because of my personality, I'm more action oriented and UM,
Speaker 1: I was struggling with the with the basics of the
Speaker 1: security profession because back then it was mainly personnel security,
Speaker 1: which is background investigations, clearance division clearance p sessing you
Speaker 1: know for people's uh top secret and secret clearances and
Speaker 1: a lot of that type of work. And I that
Speaker 1: wasn't really what I was suited for. So UM, luckily
Speaker 1: things really picked up. I was I came in at
Speaker 1: the right time to get onto the first training class
Speaker 1: for the for the Protective Operations Cadre and we called
Speaker 1: the park and um and then things just picked up.
Speaker 1: I mean my second job, I was at this in
Speaker 1: the Security Duty Office, which is like security watch center
Speaker 1: for all of our our agency for facilities in the
Speaker 1: DC area. And that's when um uh mera mal Kanzi
Speaker 1: Pakistani terrorist attacked the front gate and several of our
Speaker 1: employees and so that I got right into the terrorism
Speaker 1: aspect and that I got my uh my baptism and
Speaker 1: fire there and then I, uh, then I deployed to
Speaker 1: Somalia um as a Protective Operations Cadre member and from
Speaker 1: that moment on, I was hooked. When you deployed to
Speaker 1: Manga Dishue, I mean it was before Task Force Ranger
Speaker 1: showed up, which was interesting. So you guys were kind
Speaker 1: of out there. I don't want to stay out there flapping,
Speaker 1: but before there was any real visible American presence. Yes,
Speaker 1: so we were, we were out on the roads and
Speaker 1: um and uh. In fact, when Task Sports Ranger came
Speaker 1: in their first element, which is their administrative side, um uh,
Speaker 1: they didn't have any logistical uh components, so we ended
Speaker 1: up driving around Colonel H. McKnight, who was the head
Speaker 1: of Task Force Ranger, and his his staff. We ended
Speaker 1: up having to drive them back and forth between the airport,
Speaker 1: through the dangerous parts of the city into into the
Speaker 1: university compound. And uh our unit actually got a thank
Speaker 1: you memo from him, which I thought was really impressive
Speaker 1: considering that he uh, he ended up having his hands
Speaker 1: full after we left, and he's still able to remember
Speaker 1: to thank us and send us this um um the
Speaker 1: certificate uh class act. What was it like operating a
Speaker 1: mangad issue at that time? I mean you had to
Speaker 1: presumably drive a case officer around him, meet with his assets.
Speaker 1: And I mean I can just from the stories I've
Speaker 1: heard about Manga Disue, I mean it must have been
Speaker 1: a colorful experience. To say the least. It was surreal.
Speaker 1: It was mad max and technical between between the Somali's
Speaker 1: running around and all the U N troops. And and
Speaker 1: let me give you a a flavor on the U N
Speaker 1: troop thing. Um U N troops a lot of are
Speaker 1: developing countries like we had well Pakistani's, we had Malaysians,
Speaker 1: we even had some New Zealanders, not that they're developing,
Speaker 1: but there's there was this widespread of different nationalities and
Speaker 1: personalities and capabilities running around in this all in this area.
Speaker 1: And those who are working for the u N, those
Speaker 1: foreign troops, they get paid an extra amount of money.
Speaker 1: So this is a this is a real money making venture.
Speaker 1: Yet yeah, and um so they're in a whole different
Speaker 1: mindset that our troops. U S troops don't get any
Speaker 1: extra U N money. So, um so we've got all
Speaker 1: these characters running around it with different capabilities and some
Speaker 1: of them are out in the field, like the Italians
Speaker 1: were out in different checkpoints. Checkpoint Checkpoint Pasta a very
Speaker 1: famous one, and the Italians were involved in some really
Speaker 1: nefarious stuff. They were they were they were kind of
Speaker 1: colluding with the a Deed because it was an Italian
Speaker 1: county previously and they wanted back in. And so we'd
Speaker 1: be driving on these roads and we were relying on stealth.
Speaker 1: We didn't have armor with a few exceptions, and so
Speaker 1: we had to rely on speed, um and unpredictability and stealth.
Speaker 1: So we'd be running around on these roads, dodging buses
Speaker 1: filled to the brim with with some when we're talking
Speaker 1: about no windows, and they're they're all over the top
Speaker 1: of the bus also, and they're careening across the streets.
Speaker 1: And then you have wildlife. I mean you have donkeys
Speaker 1: and camels and sheep and chickens. You know, they're just
Speaker 1: running around, So you're dodging animals at the same time.
Speaker 1: And then uh, and then of course you've got technicals,
Speaker 1: the warlord troops running around with with their trucks with
Speaker 1: heavy machine guns on them. And then we're trying to
Speaker 1: make it through checkpoints. So it was it was challenging
Speaker 1: to say the least. No, never a dull moment. And
Speaker 1: what was the story. I know you mentioned it in
Speaker 1: the book a little bit that there is a source
Speaker 1: who allegedly and it's mentioned in Black Hawk Down I
Speaker 1: think also the source who allegedly killed himself playing Russian Roulette.
Speaker 1: Yes he did. He um, it was one of our
Speaker 1: main assets. He was. He was one of the warlords,
Speaker 1: kind of on the mine side, but he was a
Speaker 1: main asset um and uh he was. He had he
Speaker 1: had a wife who was a little suspect. And what
Speaker 1: happened was we got word that he had shot himself
Speaker 1: playing Russian Roulette with his cronies. When and what he
Speaker 1: wasn't dead, and we got him into a hospital on
Speaker 1: the un compound, and they didn't find what they normally
Speaker 1: would find with a with a head, a close contact
Speaker 1: head one powder burns. Powder burns. Now we found out
Speaker 1: later when they did uh the autopsy, that that because
Speaker 1: of the type of hair he had, it dissipated them
Speaker 1: the powder burns, but we didn't know that at the time.
Speaker 1: And his wife wasn't exactly the grieving type. She was
Speaker 1: taking over all the money that he had collected from
Speaker 1: the U S and other people, and so we ended
Speaker 1: up having to go to his compound um and collect
Speaker 1: some equipment. And that was a t scary moment because
Speaker 1: we don't know whether somebody within his group killed him,
Speaker 1: and we were, you know, we're inside the compound completely
Speaker 1: at their mercy. So it was Parker factor completely And
Speaker 1: there were also um a few there. There was another
Speaker 1: vehicle with agency personnel that went over what it went
Speaker 1: over a landline and it killed a few, killed one guy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was that was during the first deployment of the
Speaker 1: Park to Somalia. Um. There's an interesting story that goes
Speaker 1: with that. These were para military guys um one of
Speaker 1: one of which uh his name is Larry Friedman. He
Speaker 1: was on that movement, and they were they were doing
Speaker 1: road reconnaissance for the military. They were they were an
Speaker 1: advanced element and they ran over a landmine and detonated
Speaker 1: and killed him instantly pretty much, and then wounded another guy.
Speaker 1: The POC responded, provided security at the site and then
Speaker 1: um uh uh a famous journalists showed up and there
Speaker 1: was an altercation. Yes and she uh Christian, I'm poor
Speaker 1: and she she basically ran off with the ambulance that
Speaker 1: we're supposed to the converted um uh, the station wagon
Speaker 1: was supposed to um Paul are wounded back to a hospital.
Speaker 1: So so she actually tried to have a physical altercation
Speaker 1: with these things. She she basically stole them. She she
Speaker 1: wanted to follow the story, so she she accommandeered the
Speaker 1: station wagon. YEA, yeah, Okay, then so that was that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was That's a pretty pretty ugly moment. So we
Speaker 1: we we were not really big big on the journalists
Speaker 1: from from that bomb went on. And in terms of
Speaker 1: Somalia coverage. The other the other guy who was hurt,
Speaker 1: I believe he was an army dude. Actually, yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: It was probably a combined unit. I know Larry was
Speaker 1: was the main paramilitary officer and his it was only
Speaker 1: later that he was acknowledged for that. Yeah, and Larry
Speaker 1: was a plant owner of Delta Force. That should be mentioned.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's he's a he's a living legend in
Speaker 1: a lot of ways. Yep. He was on Desert one.
Speaker 1: So yeah, and he was. He was definitely a character.
Speaker 1: And you also write in the book, Um, I'm sorry
Speaker 1: if I missed it, did you have your your case
Speaker 1: officer get shot or was it one of the other
Speaker 1: POC members that was actually the deput chief ship And yeah,
Speaker 1: it was. This is one of the the dangers and
Speaker 1: part of the book I wanted to focus on on
Speaker 1: the difficulties are real life difficulties are running protection details
Speaker 1: your clients, UM, in the private sectors clients and in
Speaker 1: the government it's your bosses. UM. Sometimes they don't want
Speaker 1: to listen to you. They have their own agenda, and
Speaker 1: it gets to be a dangerous moment when when you
Speaker 1: were telling them that this is really not a good
Speaker 1: idea and they decided they're going to have to go.
Speaker 1: You know, they're gonna They're gonna push through anyways, and
Speaker 1: you're kind of stuck in a situation where you in
Speaker 1: some cases you can't say no. And in this case,
Speaker 1: we tried desperately to talk him out of going on
Speaker 1: that route because, Um, what happened was a deed was
Speaker 1: targeting us very heavily. He was a former asset and
Speaker 1: he knew our operations, He knew our our t tps
Speaker 1: or tactics, techniques and procedures, and so he was hunting us.
Speaker 1: He had guys looking out for us, and they uh
Speaker 1: like he was looking to kill you, is what you're saying.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah. They Later on we found out they had
Speaker 1: a a reward out for each of our heads. They
Speaker 1: had physical descriptions three of our team. They had the
Speaker 1: vehicles all picked out except for one of them, um
Speaker 1: that we pulled in at the last minute. And uh
Speaker 1: so he was tracking us and we were we were
Speaker 1: changing routes and times um just for frantically to keep
Speaker 1: out of his range, and it was working very well.
Speaker 1: But then at one point we got where that that
Speaker 1: they had mined one of our main routes up the
Speaker 1: north Mue. So we were stuck with one route at
Speaker 1: the time. And normally what happens is then we'll developed
Speaker 1: new routes, but we didn't have time to do that,
Speaker 1: and so we were stuck with one route. And we
Speaker 1: told the deputy that this is not a good idea
Speaker 1: because if you go up and down up that route
Speaker 1: to north mug and then back down the same way,
Speaker 1: you're really putting yourself in danger. And he insisted. So
Speaker 1: we ended up taking a route we had never taken before,
Speaker 1: not at least for six months, and we ended up
Speaker 1: doing a black Hawk overheight overflight of the route to
Speaker 1: check it out. It was still really dicey because um uh,
Speaker 1: if you get off that main road, it's a rabbit warrant.
Speaker 1: There's there are no maps and this is something that
Speaker 1: the Rangers and Delta Force found out in in the
Speaker 1: Battle for Mogad issue it. Once you get off the
Speaker 1: main pass, um there are no street signs and uh.
Speaker 1: And at that time the GPS wasn't really a big thing,
Speaker 1: So you're stuck and so um we ended up taking
Speaker 1: that route. But what we ended up running into was
Speaker 1: and the remnant of an attack that had happened earlier
Speaker 1: in the morning on Nigerian outpost, and so we we
Speaker 1: kind of walked drove right into the remnants of that.
Speaker 1: And if we wouldn't have the driver in the car,
Speaker 1: one of my commage Bill Stone, if he hadn't worked
Speaker 1: at Uey and got us turned into other direction quick enough,
Speaker 1: we would have Um I wouldn't be here to tell
Speaker 1: you the story because we took quite a few rounds
Speaker 1: and unfortunately the deputy was in the back, so he
Speaker 1: hit um and nearly severed his subclauvial um rtery. It's
Speaker 1: near his neck. We're able to get him back to
Speaker 1: a hospital and they did emergency surgery and they saved
Speaker 1: his life. And so it was a pretty pretty scary moment,
Speaker 1: super sketchy. Yeah. Um. And then in the book you
Speaker 1: also talked about the point to Bosnia, and I wanted
Speaker 1: to ask you a little bit about that because I
Speaker 1: don't think we got into that at all last time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the other part of the you know, the other part
Speaker 1: of the book that you know why it's it's a
Speaker 1: historical memoirs. Upon retrospect, I realized that my career kind
Speaker 1: of um, well, it was on the same road that
Speaker 1: the US was on in terms of so many different conflicts.
Speaker 1: I was in pretty much every major conflict from ninety
Speaker 1: three on until two thousand thirteen. I hit him all
Speaker 1: all the ones at the military were in mean some
Speaker 1: of them they weren't, but there were major events for
Speaker 1: the for the U S and um Somalia is one example.
Speaker 1: In in two areas one UH Somalia was the first
Speaker 1: time we end up really in combat, you could say,
Speaker 1: with some of Osama bin Laden's troops. But the other
Speaker 1: side of that was which had an impact on Bosnia.
Speaker 1: It was this was um, this was a real learning moment.
Speaker 1: Somali was a real learning moment for the U. S.
Speaker 1: Military when it came to humanitarian aid and the policing
Speaker 1: action and it what happened in black Hawk Down really
Speaker 1: colored what we did in Bosnia changed the way we operated.
Speaker 1: And General Nash, who was in charge of the troops,
Speaker 1: um it was based out of Two Salem, UH, he
Speaker 1: really wasn't going to take any other chances that he
Speaker 1: saw we took in Somalia. They didn't want to repeat
Speaker 1: that experience from the you know, the Battle of the
Speaker 1: Black Sea. That's it. He basically said, if if two
Speaker 1: is good, I'm sending ten and um I think my
Speaker 1: personal opinion, having spent about fifty days in Twosla at
Speaker 1: the beginning of this of this kind of conflict, UM,
Speaker 1: I think he really forced the bad guys to take
Speaker 1: a second look at whether they wanted to tangle with us.
Speaker 1: The other part he was worried about was the terrorists,
Speaker 1: you know, the non the traditional noncombatant types. He was
Speaker 1: really worried about the terrorists groups that were hiding among
Speaker 1: the NGOs and non government organizations. So he he asked
Speaker 1: for UM some help with the terrorists. Right party in
Speaker 1: the UH. He was advised that there was a unit
Speaker 1: in the CIA that specifically would go and look for
Speaker 1: terrororst signature and provide um basically become a force protection
Speaker 1: m in the military that term, but at the time
Speaker 1: that wasn't really a term in the military, and we
Speaker 1: were doing so. We were sending to basically look for
Speaker 1: terrorist signature, terrorist threat, terror surveillance on his troops and
Speaker 1: his base in too. Did you find anything, Oh yes, yes,
Speaker 1: we saw lots of very suspicious activity because the military
Speaker 1: had you know, they operated especially back then, you know,
Speaker 1: we're uh, we were extremely well crypted military and we
Speaker 1: went in in force. But their their outlook was strictly
Speaker 1: looking for um, traditional combatants, not non traditional. So when
Speaker 1: they would go out on patrols, they weren't looking for
Speaker 1: the type of signature that we were looking for. Um,
Speaker 1: they weren't looking for the passive surveillance. They weren't looking
Speaker 1: at their routes from the point of view of how
Speaker 1: can we said, you know, a bad guy set up
Speaker 1: a car bomb, um like for I'll give you one example.
Speaker 1: They had an end freeway into their base that and
Speaker 1: they allowed locals to park, so it was like a
Speaker 1: funnel and every time their troops would come driving or
Speaker 1: walking through that area, they were surrounded with cars that
Speaker 1: were not checked. So we we advised them that that
Speaker 1: that that configuration was dangerous to their health, and they
Speaker 1: immediately made changes. And then some of their routes. They
Speaker 1: were very doing some very predictable routes through the mountains
Speaker 1: between Tusla Base and the city of Tuzla. So we
Speaker 1: started to watch certain choke points and we started to
Speaker 1: notice that there were unusual activities by certain entities that
Speaker 1: that coincided with the movements of U S troops. Can
Speaker 1: you say who some of the more non traditional threats
Speaker 1: were that maybe the average Joe isn't aware of. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think we're all aware there's conflicts with the Serbs,
Speaker 1: Albanians and so forth. But you're saying there's more unconventional
Speaker 1: or terrorist threats as well. Yes, among some of the
Speaker 1: Angio em It's like Red Crescent Um. They had a
Speaker 1: history of being infiltrated by Hezbollah and Hamas, So you
Speaker 1: had these these elements running around under the cover of
Speaker 1: of of aid workers. But yeah, they're collecting and um,
Speaker 1: they're providing logistical support to other elements that we're doing
Speaker 1: nefarious things. So we would see these these kind of behaviors.
Speaker 1: UH did at the time when I was there. We
Speaker 1: never never actually picked up anybody. We were in a
Speaker 1: very defensive mode. In other words, that we saw something,
Speaker 1: we told them, we waved him off, and then they
Speaker 1: would come in and harden that site. So we were
Speaker 1: basically pushing them off the bullboard, making it very difficult
Speaker 1: for them to operate. Interesting, Uh, and where is there
Speaker 1: what else? Uh? What's going on in Bossing? I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: I haven't gotten to this part of the book. Well,
Speaker 1: in boss we were we went in in in true
Speaker 1: color fashion. Were we were. The team was nicknamed the
Speaker 1: the Ethnic Team. I was working with a Moldavian Russian
Speaker 1: and a check and baseboak cerble crow ad in Russian,
Speaker 1: and I was the mute. I didn't speak any of
Speaker 1: those languages. So I basically when we were out and about,
Speaker 1: I didn't say anything, but we U. I had a
Speaker 1: full beard and we Well before we went into uh Bosnia,
Speaker 1: we got breeched on the mission and it was like, oh,
Speaker 1: we're this ari I equipment is not gonna work. Not
Speaker 1: that we're gonna go run around as as locals or
Speaker 1: at least um people from the region. So we ended
Speaker 1: up before we went in and split Croatia, and we
Speaker 1: went to a local used clothing market and we bought
Speaker 1: all used clothing, which was a painful, um thing to
Speaker 1: do because we went into a really harsh winter in Tusela,
Speaker 1: and Tusla had been under siege for for two years.
Speaker 1: So the people and tools that did not have winter boots,
Speaker 1: they didn't have clubs, they didn't have hats. Um. So
Speaker 1: there we were. I was running around and kind of
Speaker 1: beat up old dress shoes were in the slush. It
Speaker 1: was layered like a like a less commo and uh so,
Speaker 1: and we ended up staying in some pretty rough locations.
Speaker 1: I mean no, I didn't get close washed for almost
Speaker 1: almost two and a half weeks. I didn't get a
Speaker 1: shower for about the same Um. Contrary to popularly, if
Speaker 1: you can smell yourself, it's not so. And uh you know,
Speaker 1: we we basically operated like logos and it was interesting.
Speaker 1: Was a very depressing place to be. Uh. The Twoslins
Speaker 1: were really in rough psychological shape of people in the
Speaker 1: hospitals were there for um uh stress related mental health
Speaker 1: ca Asians. Wow, you never saw a smile, You never
Speaker 1: heard a laugh or if you did, it was a foreigner,
Speaker 1: it was it was a press or some other unit.
Speaker 1: Was never the locals because had just been traumatized by
Speaker 1: the war. Yeah, and they fully believed that the war
Speaker 1: was going to continue when it was just going to
Speaker 1: get worse. Jeez. Uh. You also talked in the book
Speaker 1: about deploying to Khartoum and working with Cooper Black and
Speaker 1: Billy wall a little bit. Yes. Yeah. The the unit
Speaker 1: that I that I was doing this um counter tourism
Speaker 1: activity that we called the connetarism unit. Um. It's it's
Speaker 1: never been mentioned in the press, with the exception of
Speaker 1: Billy Wah's book, which was not passed through the Complication
Speaker 1: review board, called Hunting the jack and I arrived in
Speaker 1: Khartoum after Billy had identified and photographed Um Carlos the
Speaker 1: Jackal basically unen masked him. He had been living in
Speaker 1: and hanging out in in cartoon for for several years
Speaker 1: and masquerading as a Greek merchant and with a bodyguard.
Speaker 1: And um, so I got a chance to work with
Speaker 1: the living legend Billy Billy Wants several occasions. Uh. Um.
Speaker 1: It was like you know Obi wan Kenobi the guy
Speaker 1: had been everywhere, done everything and fascinating environmental work. Uh
Speaker 1: austere to say the least, UM full of all kinds
Speaker 1: of bad things that could happen to you, both both
Speaker 1: in terms of your health, UH, from disease and bad
Speaker 1: water to UM to every terrorist group you can imagine
Speaker 1: running around this was their terrorists are in our location,
Speaker 1: and sometimes they got bored and decided that they would
Speaker 1: want to they want to play with the Americans. UM.
Speaker 1: And the only thing that was keeping them really from
Speaker 1: from full on on us was the was the threat
Speaker 1: of the US government was UM putting UH to the
Speaker 1: Sudanese leadership basic saint, don't don't allow these guys to
Speaker 1: mess with our people. But there were there were quite
Speaker 1: a few occasions where they pushed the envelope we did.
Speaker 1: We thought at one point that they were going full on.
Speaker 1: They were targeting us. They were starting to do dry
Speaker 1: runs of attacks and we were not in a position
Speaker 1: there was no protection detail out there. We were running
Speaker 1: around without armor, were we had pistols. It was it
Speaker 1: was it was some praty, scary moments. Yeah, I imagine
Speaker 1: UM and reading Billy's book to you get the impression
Speaker 1: that everyone knew something really bad was going to happen. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was just a matter of time, and everybody was there.
Speaker 1: Who amas Albuni dal Uh Osama bin Lan, But he
Speaker 1: wasn't a big player at the time. These other UH
Speaker 1: units were much bigger players. Budae was kind of fading
Speaker 1: into the woodwork. But um, but we were definitely facing
Speaker 1: hostile environment and trying to track these guys and watch
Speaker 1: the movings and see who they see and um, you know,
Speaker 1: trying to determine, you know, what what they were going
Speaker 1: to possibly do once they come off their vacation. So
Speaker 1: it was fascinating work. And there's also a picture in
Speaker 1: the book that I was funny to see, Uh You're
Speaker 1: in Zamblanca, which I was there what two years ago now,
Speaker 1: and I got to meet with General Saban Uh and
Speaker 1: some of the other guys who had worked with the agency.
Speaker 1: Is He told me pretty openly about, you know, sitting
Speaker 1: in his kitchen planning, um, you know, rescue missions for
Speaker 1: the Burnham's the missionaries were captured and uh and also
Speaker 1: to assassin hate well maybe I shouldn't use that word,
Speaker 1: but the sure kill um. What was the name of
Speaker 1: the big terrorist at the time, he was the spokesperson
Speaker 1: for Yes Sabaya and they got him. We got him. Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was a fascinating time. After after I finished, um
Speaker 1: my senior uh the senior team that the park up
Speaker 1: until two thousand and one, when I changed, I found
Speaker 1: this position out in Asia as a as the security
Speaker 1: officer basically the security chief of that region, and so
Speaker 1: I went out to Asian. I came in just in
Speaker 1: time to to work extensively on the Burnham kidnapping kids.
Speaker 1: But this is a case of of a bunch of
Speaker 1: Americans that at a dive resort in Palawan, Philippines, and
Speaker 1: these terrorists a boot uh a Botsabaya and his group,
Speaker 1: the boot uh a f G, a s G. Pardon
Speaker 1: me uh. They they came out of the Southern area,
Speaker 1: took their boats up, kidnapped these people, and took them
Speaker 1: down into their jungle layer. And it was this was
Speaker 1: a major big deal for the US to try to
Speaker 1: get these guys back and to to go after the
Speaker 1: s G. And so I was down and exambling a
Speaker 1: lot help build the base that we had down there,
Speaker 1: supporting all the military elements to be Special Forces seals,
Speaker 1: you name it. Okay, can I just interject that this
Speaker 1: picture in particular really caught my eye because I have
Speaker 1: been too many Campgrounds of America. When I was on
Speaker 1: this team tour back in the day, we went to
Speaker 1: You meet so many characters there. And I never knew
Speaker 1: that there were Campgrounds of America in the southern philip
Speaker 1: because obviously there that was a joke. We had that
Speaker 1: sign made up because we had a large um a
Speaker 1: number of trailers for our air element and our and
Speaker 1: so somebody said, boy, it is just like camp Grounds
Speaker 1: of America. So we had the sign made up. You met, like,
Speaker 1: I don't know if you've had the same experience, because
Speaker 1: like I was on this team tour, like I was
Speaker 1: probably I don't know, like seventeen or something, and you know,
Speaker 1: so we went to camp Grounds of America all throughout
Speaker 1: the US, because we basically were on a bus from
Speaker 1: like New York all the way to Florida. One year
Speaker 1: in New York all the way to California. So we
Speaker 1: were at camp Grounds of America in like South Dakota,
Speaker 1: in Utah, and you meet some weird characters because like
Speaker 1: they're just like, you know, there were great people there,
Speaker 1: and then there are people in trailer parks who kind
Speaker 1: of fit that stereotype, and you met some really odd
Speaker 1: characters just from what I remember my experience. Well, we
Speaker 1: had the same odd characters in our yeah ground to
Speaker 1: you name it. We had a we had a lot
Speaker 1: of different types. I will always remember this one. I
Speaker 1: know I'm going way off topic, but just the camp
Speaker 1: grounds of America mind, I will always remember this weird
Speaker 1: story of us trying to make small talk with this
Speaker 1: guy in Utah and um, we were like, oh, were
Speaker 1: you a fan of the Utah Jazz and the and
Speaker 1: there is a guy we literally just met, and like,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to repeat it, but the guy was
Speaker 1: literally like I'm not I'm not interested in watching a
Speaker 1: bunch of N words like throw around a ball. And
Speaker 1: we were like wow, Like it was just the most
Speaker 1: blatant racism I ever saw in my life. And then
Speaker 1: I remember hearing I've told people this story, and I
Speaker 1: remember hearing just recently about these players in the Utah
Speaker 1: Jazz being harassed by fans in the stands of them
Speaker 1: like channing N word and all this stuff. And a
Speaker 1: friend of mine was like, I'm sure you're not surprised
Speaker 1: by the story and like the owner came out it
Speaker 1: was like, we're not a racist organization, and I suck.
Speaker 1: Former players on ESPN be like yeah when we played
Speaker 1: certain states, like that was just the norm, Like you
Speaker 1: heard this type of stuff and it was. To be honest,
Speaker 1: just as someone who grew up in New York, it
Speaker 1: was really eye opening to me because it's like racism
Speaker 1: exists everywhere, but it's never that blat It's never like
Speaker 1: in the context of hey, how are you doing and
Speaker 1: someone throws out you like a racial slur ian You're right,
Speaker 1: that's pretty off topic. Yeah, extremely off topic. But camp
Speaker 1: Grounds of America it was I don't know, it's like
Speaker 1: a landmark of of how many years ago in my
Speaker 1: life probably a good uh, you know, twenty years, fifteen years.
Speaker 1: At this point, I did not realize that you were
Speaker 1: involved in the in the Burnham incident, and I was wondering,
Speaker 1: if you can talk to us, if you can talk
Speaker 1: to us about that, because having talked to General Saban
Speaker 1: and talking to some of the the l r R
Speaker 1: had just been stood up at the time by the
Speaker 1: Special but US Special Forces had helped with that. Um,
Speaker 1: that's a very very interesting time and this is just
Speaker 1: as the global war on terror is starting to kick
Speaker 1: in the high gear. Absolutely, um, what that's it. The
Speaker 1: other part of this book talks kind of gives a
Speaker 1: view that most Americans and other people even from Europe
Speaker 1: don't understand that how how much terrorism affected the Asia
Speaker 1: and its implications across the globe. So the Abusabaya group
Speaker 1: with the s G that they kidnapped the Burnhams, we're
Speaker 1: also in UM contact with Osama bin Laden's group, and
Speaker 1: they were also working with UM elements from a major
Speaker 1: terrorist group from Indonesia called Jimminia and Slamia j I
Speaker 1: j I And like for example, a little background. UH
Speaker 1: in two thousand, I was coming back from a dive
Speaker 1: trip in the southern in the Philippines and we had
Speaker 1: to UM divert around Manila because five bombs went off
Speaker 1: in the city in one day, and UH they called
Speaker 1: the resolved bombings. It was on the thirty December two
Speaker 1: thou and there was a j I operative who did
Speaker 1: those bombings. He was the guy and later on he
Speaker 1: resurfaces in the in a plot to go after the
Speaker 1: US embassy in Singapore, and the backup plan was to
Speaker 1: bomb the U s Embassy in Manila, and all this
Speaker 1: stuff is swirling and then of course not I love
Speaker 1: it happens when I'm there. So it's we are so
Speaker 1: deep into the terrorists. UM, I mean historical bowels. Because
Speaker 1: the guy who developed the plan to use aircraft, UM
Speaker 1: Ramsey Yusef was was working and hiding out in the Philippines.
Speaker 1: And what happened was he lit his own apartment on
Speaker 1: fire and he had the fleet, and and then when
Speaker 1: they did the investigation, he found his fingerprint and they
Speaker 1: found out, you know, what he's working on. So there
Speaker 1: are a lot of terrorists nexus stuff that happens, and
Speaker 1: it happened in the Philippines that were um one of
Speaker 1: the most dangerous guys outside of the Middle East, for
Speaker 1: um the Osama bin Linge group, you know, was a
Speaker 1: guy named Humbali and he was the architect behind the
Speaker 1: Singapore plot. He was gonna he actually surveiled the US
Speaker 1: embassy in Manila. Um, he was involved in all kinds
Speaker 1: of stuff and he was a major player, uh in
Speaker 1: the terrorist infrastructure. So a lot of things happened in
Speaker 1: the Philippines. But during the Burnham things, UM, these guys
Speaker 1: were We're getting a lot of pressed. They had these
Speaker 1: hostages they were they were holding them for ransom, and
Speaker 1: the US got involved, but the Philippine leadership did not
Speaker 1: want us to have an active role. We had to
Speaker 1: do support training, some guidance, but there were limits to
Speaker 1: what we could do, and including intelligence because if we
Speaker 1: provided certain types of intelligence and people were killed at
Speaker 1: that requires what we call lethal finding. And um quite frankly, uh,
Speaker 1: if we were allowed to throw off the the leash,
Speaker 1: we would have ended that kind much quicker. I talked
Speaker 1: to well. General Saban told me that the case officers,
Speaker 1: the first plan they came up with for Sabaya was
Speaker 1: to deliver have delivered to him, uh, a satellite phone.
Speaker 1: And he said they came to him and it was
Speaker 1: like one of these big satellite like trifold, you know,
Speaker 1: radar dish things and and he was like he's like, man,
Speaker 1: if I if we give this to him, he's going
Speaker 1: to know exactly where it came from. Like to them,
Speaker 1: a satellite phone as a thoria. So they did the
Speaker 1: thoria but that didn't work. And uh, it was interesting.
Speaker 1: I got to talk to some of the napsack guys,
Speaker 1: the Philippine seals, and like two years ago. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when I was over there, good friends with with the
Speaker 1: commander of all Naval Special Warfare for for the Philippines
Speaker 1: was down there during that event. I've known him ever since.
Speaker 1: You're talking about Ben no val Oh No, I don't
Speaker 1: know him there. He's the he's the commander of the
Speaker 1: able Special Warfare for the Filipinos. One of the former
Speaker 1: bull Frogs is Uh. He's here in the city in
Speaker 1: New York. He works for the u n right now. Um.
Speaker 1: Really good guy he was. He was the bull Frog
Speaker 1: when Zamblanca happened, the Zamblanca siege. Yeah, bow was a
Speaker 1: was a young young tadpole at that time. Okay, okay,
Speaker 1: And do you know who's down there with him? And
Speaker 1: I've got a picture of that. Yeah, I'm gonna call
Speaker 1: BS on that one. If if Chris Kyle, if or
Speaker 1: somebody's claiming that Chris Kyle was there. This is the
Speaker 1: first I'm ever hearing about this. Oh, the Seals. I'll
Speaker 1: send you a picture, Okay, okay, you'll see that. He'll
Speaker 1: steal this his profile and uh, the Seals were very
Speaker 1: active down in Zambulanga training the Philippines. Seals during the
Speaker 1: Zamblanca siege, not the zamble on the siege during during
Speaker 1: the Burnhams Oh during the okay, okay, I got you.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, so two thousand one, yes, that period. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know this. The American Seals are still down there.
Speaker 1: I ran into them on the on the Navsog compound
Speaker 1: and that they do really good work. I mean all
Speaker 1: of them do, the Marsak guys, the Green Berets down there,
Speaker 1: they all do really good liaison work, um and training
Speaker 1: and everything else. But anyway, back to the Burnham's. Uh.
Speaker 1: I got to talk to one of the um Navsog
Speaker 1: seals Philippine Seals and uh, and between him and Saban,
Speaker 1: I was able to kind of piece together the whole
Speaker 1: the whole story. It is very interesting. There's some things
Speaker 1: they'll tell you on the record and something's off the record,
Speaker 1: but a very interesting story about how they you know,
Speaker 1: how they bugged the boat and they ended up deciding
Speaker 1: to interdict him at sea because they're like, well, he'll
Speaker 1: finally have nowhere to run to. No comments. Yes, I
Speaker 1: spent a little time on down there in the ocean
Speaker 1: on a boat in the middle of the night. Oh
Speaker 1: you too, Because there were two American I was too
Speaker 1: told to deav group seals on one of the boats
Speaker 1: when they interdicted him, and they were both kind of
Speaker 1: like taken aback by some of that went down. Uh,
Speaker 1: there was an interesting moment. Yeah, I mean he was
Speaker 1: cut in half, boots, was cut in half with a
Speaker 1: fifth with a fifty and he just sunk, which we
Speaker 1: didn't get the body. And then for a while the
Speaker 1: boost tried to push it like like he's still alive,
Speaker 1: but we had we had his signature, sunglasses and his phone,
Speaker 1: and so it's like no, yeah, I know. It was
Speaker 1: all very like it went down by the numbers in
Speaker 1: a lot of ways. But then they also told me like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, he was treading water shooting his A K
Speaker 1: forty seven at us in the middle of the ocean
Speaker 1: in the middle of the night. And I'm like, uh yeah,
Speaker 1: maybe okay, man, okay, all right. And then and then
Speaker 1: one of them, allegedly one of the Philippine officers, has
Speaker 1: Sabaya's nineteen eleven as a trophy. I'm like, huh, so
Speaker 1: you're saying he sunk to the bottom of the ocean, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: but you have his pistol. Yeah, there's there's a the
Speaker 1: stories abound us as things kind of you know, because
Speaker 1: everybody want to be involved. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 1: hear you. I mean everybody, let me tell you, even
Speaker 1: the US, everybody wanted to be involved in that case,
Speaker 1: including the FBI. Yeah. Well, can you tell us about
Speaker 1: how how things went down to the Burnhams though, And
Speaker 1: and I don't know how deeply you can get into it,
Speaker 1: but I can say this, and I am I have
Speaker 1: a lot of friends in the in the Philippine military.
Speaker 1: I have a lot of Filipino friends. I spent a
Speaker 1: lot of time in the Slippines um even now. And
Speaker 1: but um, the truth is that they stumbled on the
Speaker 1: Burnham's there. They just uh the unit that that actually
Speaker 1: got into a battle with the the A s G
Speaker 1: element that had the kind of just stumbled across and
Speaker 1: then they went it went into three fire mode. And um,
Speaker 1: Gracian made it. She got shot, but her husband died
Speaker 1: and that was just a matter of bad luck. Um,
Speaker 1: it really wasn't like a rescue operation. It was just
Speaker 1: they stumbled on him. There was one and I believe
Speaker 1: it was one of the l r RS, the Light
Speaker 1: Reaction Regiment. I believe it was one of their first
Speaker 1: ever operations live operations, was an attempted rescue mission. Um.
Speaker 1: And I think they missed them entirely, that they had
Speaker 1: been moved. Yeah, yeah, there was there was a there
Speaker 1: was a lot of big push to try to get
Speaker 1: the Filipinos the top grade night vision, but that that's
Speaker 1: not allowed, um export issue. Yes. Yeah, and so they
Speaker 1: Philips weren't really keen on rinning at night understandably. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: where our units were very happy to work at night.
Speaker 1: So we missed some opportunities there, but that's you know,
Speaker 1: that was a political thing with the President of the
Speaker 1: Philippines at the time. Later on she changed your tune
Speaker 1: and we really took the A s G down a
Speaker 1: few notches, just just above obliterated. Now the current president
Speaker 1: there is quite a character. I love talking to our
Speaker 1: web guy and Philippines about the Tara te Oh. Yes
Speaker 1: he is. He's unbelievable. Yes, every few months he makes
Speaker 1: a statement that it's just like I love just seeing
Speaker 1: the things that come out of that guys Canada, It's
Speaker 1: it's what I found interesting over there. Um. So this
Speaker 1: is a couple of years back, and I think things
Speaker 1: were a little bit even more intense than now between
Speaker 1: Dirt and Trump. Um, like two fairly bombastic characters. Um.
Speaker 1: But what I found was interesting is that the military
Speaker 1: to military relationship between US and the Philippines was still
Speaker 1: very strong. Uh. And when you start looking at it,
Speaker 1: you're like, Okay, this relationship goes back like a hundred years.
Speaker 1: You know, I didn't even I didn't even know this
Speaker 1: when I got there. I'm sure you saw it, uh, Tom.
Speaker 1: The American cemetery in Manila gorgeous. It's beautiful. It really is.
Speaker 1: All the American g I s who were killed in
Speaker 1: the Philippines and the Filipinos and the Filipino forces. Yes,
Speaker 1: I mean you you were. That's that's our real bond
Speaker 1: right there, that we fought and died together. And that
Speaker 1: that a cemetery is Um. There's only one that comes
Speaker 1: close to that, and that would be UM Normandy. That's it.
Speaker 1: Those are the two most beautiful UM veteran cemeteries uh
Speaker 1: in the world. And the U S still m maintains that. Yeah.
Speaker 1: By the way, the things you're saying about the tertay
Speaker 1: the interestinct thing is from the discussions I've had with
Speaker 1: Chris and you know who we know in the Philippines,
Speaker 1: the art is almost looked at rightfully or wrongfully by
Speaker 1: the people of the Philippines the way we look at
Speaker 1: Trump and as he's an outsider, he's gonna get things done.
Speaker 1: He's not political royalty, and and that's kind of why
Speaker 1: he's It's well, it's a it's a class issue also
Speaker 1: that the you have an elite in the Philippines, much
Speaker 1: like our our media elite. They don't like Trump very much,
Speaker 1: but in the Philippines is kind of the same, and
Speaker 1: that you have an elite and they live in they
Speaker 1: literally live inside walt compounds and they do not like
Speaker 1: to turth Day. But you have another class of people,
Speaker 1: are working class of people. The woman who has to
Speaker 1: worry about being raped every time she walks from the
Speaker 1: bus stop to home on the way home from work,
Speaker 1: and she is much more liable to support through Dirthday
Speaker 1: because he talks about, you know, killing criminals and stuff
Speaker 1: like that. So it resonates with with a lower class
Speaker 1: of people. And I don't mean that they're lower people,
Speaker 1: but that they have to live states. Yeah, yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: they're they're struggling with with with a severe poverty and
Speaker 1: drugs and by the way, not only does he talk
Speaker 1: about killing drug lords, but he's he's talked about killing
Speaker 1: drug addicts and is and that that kind of talk
Speaker 1: impacts our relationship because Rubio and a Democratic congresswoman also
Speaker 1: maybe it was Feinstein, I can't remember, but they blocked
Speaker 1: armshipments to the Philippines, to the special operations and it's
Speaker 1: and it's not them, it's it's an actual U S
Speaker 1: policy And this was This had an effect when I
Speaker 1: was in the Philippines. UM, because basically extra judicial killing,
Speaker 1: that's what the technical term for for that kind of
Speaker 1: stuff is frowned upon. I'm using that term loosely, um
Speaker 1: by the US government and any elements of a foreign
Speaker 1: government that we are leads on with if they're found
Speaker 1: to have been involved in extra judicial killings. There's a
Speaker 1: there's kind of a whole process on all funding and
Speaker 1: what happened with the Philippine police. UM. I was there
Speaker 1: for uh President Bush's visit to the Philippines. And I'm
Speaker 1: sorry because I know how your career spent. So is
Speaker 1: that President Bush senior or junior? And this is um
Speaker 1: I think it was a two thousand three Uh. This
Speaker 1: this guy that I told you about this j I bomber.
Speaker 1: He got loose, We captured him, he got loose from
Speaker 1: the Philippinos and he was running around and this was
Speaker 1: a major concern to us because we got a president
Speaker 1: coming in. And then just before the president arrives, the
Speaker 1: police chief tells the ambassador that, yeah, you don't have
Speaker 1: to worry about that guy anymore. And just like out
Speaker 1: of a scene like Cassy Blanca, he says, what we're
Speaker 1: doing the paperwork now we don't know whether he uh
Speaker 1: committed suicide or died while trying to escape he mysteriously
Speaker 1: sunk beneath the waves. Oh this was so bad because
Speaker 1: at the time, you know, we can't. It went all
Speaker 1: the way back to the d C where they had
Speaker 1: to look at this and go, can we really hold
Speaker 1: back from our support to the Philiping National Police And
Speaker 1: they realized they couldn't, but they that was a serious
Speaker 1: concern because that was an extra judicial killing. What I
Speaker 1: find disconcerting, and I mean I believe that, you know,
Speaker 1: we we should are some of our foreign support should
Speaker 1: be contingent on human rights. Of course, we don't want
Speaker 1: to arm bad guys. Um. That's why the Lady Amendment exists.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, what happens is you have
Speaker 1: police units committing these e j k s, but the
Speaker 1: special operations guys that we work with, l r R
Speaker 1: navsag um Uh Scout Rangers, they're doing the they're doing
Speaker 1: the right thing. And unfortunately the stuff that some of
Speaker 1: the police do and some of the bombastic statements that
Speaker 1: do dirt Day makes it ends up impacting these special
Speaker 1: operations units that are doing the right thing, and we
Speaker 1: can't get them the weapons and the night vision and
Speaker 1: they need because because of this kind of stuff. And
Speaker 1: you're correct, absolutely right, and that's unfortunate, yes, because they
Speaker 1: need to help. And UM one of the big concerns
Speaker 1: I just wrote an article or in the process of
Speaker 1: writing article for a news agency about the terrorist threat
Speaker 1: in um down in the minute now because there's a
Speaker 1: there's a very large population of Americans in the Philippines
Speaker 1: and quite a few of them are down in Mint
Speaker 1: and now in the southern part and the scary part
Speaker 1: is is Isle. And if just like the j I
Speaker 1: was a major threat coming out of Indonesia, the the
Speaker 1: ISO elements coming up through Indonesia wanting to establish a
Speaker 1: caliphate down there. UM, it has implications, serious implications for
Speaker 1: a lot of American lives. So this is being monitored
Speaker 1: very closely. And I worked, UM. A parallel of this
Speaker 1: is I worked doing training protection details all over the world,
Speaker 1: especially in South America, and I trained a lot of
Speaker 1: the Colombian Presidential Detail. And at one point during the
Speaker 1: nineties UM the FARC had taken over more than half
Speaker 1: of Columbia and at that point the U. S Government
Speaker 1: decided that this was too dangerous too that you know,
Speaker 1: the chances of them taking over more of the country
Speaker 1: and possibly taking it over completely was an untenable situation,
Speaker 1: and so they brought in a lot more special forces
Speaker 1: support and we were able to really squish the FARC.
Speaker 1: So you may see something like that happen in the
Speaker 1: future and other locations, because we can't allow that that
Speaker 1: type of loss of a country to to a terrorist
Speaker 1: element or a narco terrorist element. Yeah. I mean when
Speaker 1: Pablo Escobar brought down that jetline or it was like okay,
Speaker 1: enough is enough, like enough screwing around down their pal
Speaker 1: Oh he was. I worked with so many people, they
Speaker 1: all knew people who were killed by Pablo Escobar. One
Speaker 1: of the one of the protection detail guys. We were
Speaker 1: at a at a picnic kind of thing at the
Speaker 1: end of the course, and he brought his son over
Speaker 1: and sent it a nice nasty scar across his face
Speaker 1: from where Pablo tried to roll a bomb filled bus
Speaker 1: into the dots, which is, um, that's their FBI. But
Speaker 1: the bad part is attached to the FBI building was
Speaker 1: a daycare center in Oklahoma City. Yeah, so it was
Speaker 1: a horrific situation and there were a lot of people
Speaker 1: who wanted that guy taken off the planet. Yeah, he
Speaker 1: he went, he went around the bend, so unreal. Well,
Speaker 1: as you say, Tom, I mean your book, because your
Speaker 1: career kind of follows along, you know, all these contemporary conflicts,
Speaker 1: you know, since the end of the Cold War, America's
Speaker 1: adventures around the world, and then the of a war
Speaker 1: on Terror kicking off. And uh, I could sit here
Speaker 1: and talk to you about like the Philippines and Colombian
Speaker 1: stuff all day and just like ask you probing questions,
Speaker 1: you know, half of which you probably can't answer. But
Speaker 1: I think this stuff is fascinating. I'm hoping that the
Speaker 1: readers will will find that, you know, it's they get
Speaker 1: they get a little bit more of the background on
Speaker 1: why these things are are important, you know, and how
Speaker 1: this has impacted our our policies and our our behavior,
Speaker 1: you know, in terms of the our U S Military,
Speaker 1: in our in our policies, and we haven't really gotten
Speaker 1: into it. I mean, I guess people just have to
Speaker 1: go and read the book. But of course you spent
Speaker 1: a lot of time in Pakistan and Iraq as well.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, uh, Pakistan was a trip that was we
Speaker 1: we pretty much knew Bin Laden was running around there somewhere.
Speaker 1: Pakistani's have not been an ally to us in a
Speaker 1: long long time time. And anybody says different as doesn't
Speaker 1: understand the real the reality of the world. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: the book once again is out now. It's Guardian Life
Speaker 1: in the crosshairs of the CIA's War on Terror out
Speaker 1: on Post Hill Press. And as you heard, a lot
Speaker 1: of great stories in this book, especially as we discussed
Speaker 1: in the last episode, the early years of Protective Operations Cadre,
Speaker 1: which a lot of people mistakenly think is something that
Speaker 1: came about closer to you know, the War on Terror,
Speaker 1: and this goes more into the origins of that and
Speaker 1: you being there in the early years. And it's a
Speaker 1: book that people really have to pick up if they
Speaker 1: want to know their their history and what really has
Speaker 1: gone down in the CIA and intelligence in general. And
Speaker 1: just another segue into that for people who, as Tom
Speaker 1: brought up, the the GRS program had a lot of
Speaker 1: light put on it because of Benghazi and people started
Speaker 1: asking who are these guys? Are these former seals that
Speaker 1: are working protective details? And I think Tom's book is
Speaker 1: going to answer those questions for you. Absolutely, absolutely, Thanks
Speaker 1: again for coming on. Anything else you want to get
Speaker 1: out there besides of course the book obviously. Well, I'm
Speaker 1: doing my first book signing next week at this uh
Speaker 1: the safe House, which is a spy restaurant chain that's
Speaker 1: based in Milwaukee but has a sister one in Chicago.
Speaker 1: So that'll be fun and I'll be putting out I
Speaker 1: just put out a video on YouTube. It's a it's
Speaker 1: a video slide show of photos from the book and
Speaker 1: color and um so if people are interested in and
Speaker 1: take a look at that, they get a good idea
Speaker 1: what's in the books. Awesome. Yeah, thanks so much for
Speaker 1: doing this again. I appreciate it you guys having me
Speaker 1: on your show. Yeah, we'll have to do it again sometime, Tom,
Speaker 1: because I know we're just kind of like scratching the surface.
Speaker 1: I'd like to do that. I'd be great. Absolutely, good
Speaker 1: luck with the book, and um, you know, feel free
Speaker 1: to reach out to us anytime. Thanks, I'll do that, yeah, absolutely, okay,
Speaker 1: take care great having Thomas back on. Be sure to
Speaker 1: check out Create Club. It's a club four men buy
Speaker 1: men of gear handpicked by Special Operations veterans. We have
Speaker 1: the Dash one, Create, the Pro Create, and for those
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Speaker 1: These are all available at Create club dot us and
Speaker 1: right now we are running an extremely limited promotion of
Speaker 1: off for all software radio listeners. This is the biggest
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Speaker 1: not in the know, we have our own software Radio
Speaker 1: app that you can download for free on iPhone or Android,
Speaker 1: and our homepage is of course software radio dot com,
Speaker 1: where you can see that full archive of shows. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, shows like the last Thomas Pokora, those are
Speaker 1: up everywhere, but like back way Back episode eighty eight
Speaker 1: with Michael Behannah, that is only available on our archives.
Speaker 1: So that's Software radio dot com and you can see
Speaker 1: all that. Um as always keep up with us at
Speaker 1: Software Radio as well on everything on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook,
Speaker 1: anything else. Man, No, that's it. I mean that was
Speaker 1: a super wide ranging interview because Tom was in the
Speaker 1: agency for so long and he got deployed all the
Speaker 1: hot zones, so we got the covered. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: some really interesting stuff. Got it all all? I'd say, Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I have my own book out too. I know,
Speaker 1: I keep plugging. Please it's a great book. It's okay,
Speaker 1: I'm enjoying it. Um, so go check it out. You know,
Speaker 1: the audio book is out, the e book, I narrate
Speaker 1: the audio book if you're interested in that. UM hardcover
Speaker 1: is out, so whichever format you want, it's there. We're
Speaker 1: not going to cover the met Gala what happened? No,
Speaker 1: it's just that's that's what's been all over Twitter all
Speaker 1: day and all night. It's just what everybody's wearing. You
Speaker 1: haven't seen all this, Katy Perry wearing a fucking chandelier
Speaker 1: and you know, Kim Kardashian and uh no, I don't
Speaker 1: know about this stuff, and I'm a better man for
Speaker 1: not knowing. You know, you're on Twitter. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: it's not it was. It's been non stop. Uh you
Speaker 1: know what's been going on there, and it's just who
Speaker 1: could wear the most outrageous thing? And basically, you know,
Speaker 1: these people who need more attention than than anyone in
Speaker 1: the world. I don't know why we give it to them.
Speaker 1: Well I'm giving to them right now. No, but I
Speaker 1: feel like that's the only thing being covered. So I'm
Speaker 1: actually glad we're not doing a show on that. Um yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll plug myself. Follow me on Twitter at Ian Scotto,
Speaker 1: Facebook dot com, Slushi and scott a Radio. A lot
Speaker 1: of people are asking what I'm up to after I end,
Speaker 1: you know, my run with the shows at the end
Speaker 1: of this month and move on other things. I don't
Speaker 1: know exactly. I mean, I I still do a lot
Speaker 1: of freelance voiceover, and I've been doing a lot of
Speaker 1: that stuff. So I mean, if you own a company
Speaker 1: and you want me to do voice over, I'm always
Speaker 1: open to that. You can always contact me. UM. I
Speaker 1: may do work with Jack in the future. We don't
Speaker 1: really know. But right now I'm doing that UM and
Speaker 1: just some other things, so you know, if there's anything
Speaker 1: in the rise, and I'll be sure to let you
Speaker 1: guys know. I know you're gonna turn around and write
Speaker 1: like a tell all book, like Jack Murphy, the real story.
Speaker 1: I have to write about everybody. I have to write
Speaker 1: about you guys, about like working with David Webb, working
Speaker 1: with Senator Bill Radley. Here's what Jack wrote in his book.
Speaker 1: Here's what you don't know, working with Dee Snyder. There
Speaker 1: re a lot of interesting stories, but I wouldn't do
Speaker 1: there's a lot of there's people who have and then
Speaker 1: they never work in the radio industry again. They right,
Speaker 1: like a self published tell all book that you know
Speaker 1: their family reads. And then because I've seen it happen,
Speaker 1: and then people are like, fuck you man, you wrote
Speaker 1: ship in there that you know we were that it
Speaker 1: was per personal, Like I know a guy who worked
Speaker 1: on I want to say the name of the radio personality,
Speaker 1: but like he was going through a crazy divorce at
Speaker 1: the time. His kids are running around the studio and
Speaker 1: he wrote that and He's like a little tell all
Speaker 1: book that didn't go anywhere, and the guys like, dude,
Speaker 1: I don't need the public to know is like going
Speaker 1: through divorce. My kids are running around that. Yeah, because
Speaker 1: plus why what what's juicy about that anyway? Because it's
Speaker 1: it's it's personal not professional. Yeah, you know, it's like
Speaker 1: one thing to criticize a person on a professional level,
Speaker 1: you know, and another thing to like, you know, take
Speaker 1: a cheap shot at somebody because they're going through a divorce. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's sucking stupid man um. So yeah, I mean the
Speaker 1: main thing I'm gonna be doing, uh, after my running
Speaker 1: the shows, like immediately after, I'm gonna be going hard
Speaker 1: at work with voiceover. So like I said, if you
Speaker 1: own any type of company and you're doing radio, EDGs,
Speaker 1: TV ads, you want me to voice them. Very reasonable
Speaker 1: with that. So yeah at Ian Scotto and uh, I'll
Speaker 1: keep you up to date with if I'm up to
Speaker 1: anything after this. But Jack is still here. I know
Speaker 1: a job for you, let me know after I get stopped.
Speaker 1: But they I went to school with a guy. He
Speaker 1: had a job working as like a personal trainer and
Speaker 1: a gym, which I would like to do as well.
Speaker 1: One of the guys on one of his clients was
Speaker 1: a male Jiggolow. So this is what you're giving to me.
Speaker 1: This is what I'm giving. This is what I'm giving you.
Speaker 1: This is what I think. So this dude serviced Upper
Speaker 1: East Sidewives. That was his whole job here in Manhattan,
Speaker 1: Upper East Sidewives. And the deal was to Viagraa's four
Speaker 1: clients a night. Serious, So this is what I should
Speaker 1: move on. This is what you should do. Bro. It's
Speaker 1: funny that you mentioned personal trainer though, because male gigolo
Speaker 1: something I I told you um Ian Scotto, male prostitute.
Speaker 1: Even though it would probably be like a side thing,
Speaker 1: I do have a love for fitness, as you can
Speaker 1: listen back to the episode East Sidewives episode in Viagra
Speaker 1: with c J Woodrooff and just a little Blue Pill.
Speaker 1: Let me finish this fucking story. C J. Woodruff and
Speaker 1: Doug cachi Jian, who do you know? Have you listened
Speaker 1: back to that episode? We talked a lot of fitness,
Speaker 1: but I early eighteen, I wanted to um get nass
Speaker 1: m um certified as a trainer, and I realized its
Speaker 1: a lot more work than I realized. I just used
Speaker 1: the word realized like twice the sentence. But it's a
Speaker 1: lot more work than I realized. And I actually would
Speaker 1: like to do that on the side. And I just
Speaker 1: I love to like have new knowledge of things, so
Speaker 1: I would love to kind of do that as well.
Speaker 1: But I mean, my main thing has been voiceover for
Speaker 1: a while outside of this, and probably will be voiceover.
Speaker 1: That's what I like doing. I like producing spots for people.
Speaker 1: Isn't that what your buddy who's the NYPD cop we
Speaker 1: had on Oh Ricky He's yeah, he's a trainer and
Speaker 1: NYPD and they're saying voiceover because if you're gonna say
Speaker 1: voiceover people. I know Adam Hamley, I know who worked
Speaker 1: at Serious Sex m was the voice of Wendy's for
Speaker 1: a year and that was a huge pay day. He
Speaker 1: bought his house off that monch. Yeah, so like any
Speaker 1: ad for a year that you heard of him talk of,
Speaker 1: like talking about Wendy's promotions, that was his voice. Man.
Speaker 1: To me, it's just I love doing it. I love
Speaker 1: producing spots for different clients. So um, that's what I'm
Speaker 1: up to right now for any of you, any of
Speaker 1: those wondering, I'm just stepping up my game in that aspect.
Speaker 1: So I want to do the voiceover for like those
Speaker 1: home alarm commercials on television, like by this alarm or
Speaker 1: this scary guy in black masks will break in and
Speaker 1: kill your pets. All Right, I could sell it. I
Speaker 1: could sell it at Software Radio. We'll be back next
Speaker 1: episode with Fred Galvin and possibly Michael Behanna maybe, which
Speaker 1: would be great. Um, But congrats to Michael Behenna because
Speaker 1: that that was the case I've followed for so long,
Speaker 1: and I think I said this on the podcast with him,
Speaker 1: but I remember I regularly wore the free first Michael
Speaker 1: Behanna wristband because it was kind of just a reminder
Speaker 1: to me that like, don't bitch about stuff you're going through.
Speaker 1: This guy's in Fort Leavenworth for you know what he
Speaker 1: thinks was doing the right thing. And so I wore
Speaker 1: that every day. And we had um Colonel Lieutenant Colonel
Speaker 1: Allen West on well Cow and I was wearing that
Speaker 1: wristband and Alan west was like, hey, nice wristband, man,
Speaker 1: and he pulled up his sleeve and he did the
Speaker 1: same thing on and I thought that was really cool.
Speaker 1: They were just like other people keeping this guy's um.
Speaker 1: You know, keeping him in their thoughts and it was
Speaker 1: a real Uh it was just really refreshing when he
Speaker 1: was freed, and then really an honor to have him on.
Speaker 1: And now it ultimately has some great closure hearing that
Speaker 1: he's been fully pardoned by by President Trump. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: one way or the other, he served his debt to society.
Speaker 1: He was sentenced, and he has maintained his innocence throughout.
Speaker 1: Um got paroled out, served his served his his debt
Speaker 1: to society. Uh. And now he's been pardoned by the president,
Speaker 1: so his his criminal record is expunged. And I hope that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that gives him some closure. And now he needs to
Speaker 1: move on and live his life, you know, and I
Speaker 1: hope he's able to do that, you know for sure,
Speaker 1: much like Fred Galvin, who were having on next episode,
Speaker 1: and we're going to have that in depth, in depth
Speaker 1: trying it about. Yeah, yeah, we'n. I'm gonna prep some
Speaker 1: notes for that bad boy because its like that's a
Speaker 1: complicated subject. How you are complicated subject? All right, So
Speaker 1: stay subscribed and you'll get that as soon as it
Speaker 1: goes up. You've been listening to Self rep Radio. New
Speaker 1: episodes up every Wednesday, and Friday. Follow the show on
Speaker 1: Instagram and Twitter at self rep Radio