0:00

We'd get pushed interpreters out to us,

0:02

you know, and we'd run through them. You know, some guys would get

0:04

out there, man. They just weren't a good fit. You know,

0:06

they why they couldn't, you

0:08

know, show up on time for patrol.

0:10

They couldn't wear their gear. They'd forget their

0:13

night vision goggles. And it's like, man, we don't have time

0:15

to hold anybody's hands either. You're, you

0:17

know, about this and you're going to put in the time to

0:19

be ready or you're out of here. And

0:21

sometimes guys would show up and they'd go on that first

0:24

patrol with us and they'd get into a gunfight and they're

0:26

like, I'm out of here. It's never again. Yeah. I

0:28

remember Ron telling me when he got the job

0:30

being an interpreter, you know, he had to take like a basic

0:33

English test, like, can this guy actually speak

0:35

English and translate? And he was saying

0:37

that they, you know, they sent him to the airport to fly down to

0:39

Marjah. Well, he had no idea that

0:42

he was going to be fighting like we're fighting. Yeah.

0:44

You know, so he shows up with us and sees

0:46

like a bunch of dudes with Mohawks

0:48

and Kami Payne and dirty and,

0:50

you know, where there's no showers or toilets or

0:53

chow halls or we're eating out of bags and,

0:55

you know, but, you know, he stayed,

0:57

you know, which says a lot about him. Absolutely.

0:59

Yeah.

1:11

I'm really honored that you guys both are here

1:14

and to start, maybe you guys could

1:16

just introduce yourselves and just say where you're from.

1:19

And yeah, just let's start with that.

1:21

Well, I'm Travis Irvin. I'm from

1:24

East Tennessee, Knoxville. God's

1:27

country, as we like to say. I

1:31

ran off and joined the Marine Corps at 18, and that's

1:33

kind of where my this story kind of

1:35

starts. OK. Yeah. OK.

1:37

And how about you? Yeah. I

1:40

am Mohammed Idris Hamdar.

1:44

Originally, I'm from Afghanistan. I was

1:46

born in Kabul and

1:48

like I joined with the Marines and

1:52

between 2010 and 11. And

1:55

that's what my story just start from

1:57

there. And where did

1:59

you guys where? Where did you guys meet and when did

2:01

you guys meet? We met in Marjah,

2:03

Afghanistan in 2010. So

2:05

my platoon was pushed out to Marjah to

2:08

continue clearing operations there. Marjah

2:10

at that time and down in Helmand Province was like

2:12

the last big Taliban

2:15

stronghold. And we

2:18

don't have interpreters. We've got Marines

2:20

that'll kind of get punched out to go to language schools,

2:22

but it's such a complex

2:25

language that they're speaking. Dari and Pash too,

2:28

there's not a lot known about it. So our guys

2:30

can kind of speak words here and there, but we need

2:34

better linguists with us. And so the

2:36

US government will reach out to

2:39

Afghan locals that are thoroughly,

2:41

thoroughly vetted to come work with us. And

2:44

that's where I ran

2:46

into him. And because so much of what

2:49

you're doing over there is engaging

2:54

and trying to gather information, find out who's

2:56

who and where they're at, right? Like, can you just explain

2:58

the need for interpreters and why that is?

3:01

And it didn't start off like that. And can you just sort of

3:03

talk about like your kind of history with it from what you

3:05

saw? Well, the language

3:07

part is huge because we're out running around with guns

3:10

and looking for bombs,

3:12

but there's more information we need. We

3:14

need to talk to locals and figure out, what are

3:16

you seeing in the morning times? What are you seeing in afternoon

3:19

and evening times and

3:21

who's who around this village? And that's

3:23

where guys like Ram come in and they

3:26

can chat these guys up and gain trust and rapport

3:28

with them. And

3:30

yeah, it's sort of a key piece of our

3:32

operations. Do you remember when you guys first

3:34

met? Was there anything, do you remember your first impressions

3:36

of each other? Absolutely. The

3:39

first time when I just met

3:42

my dear brother, I

3:44

just call him my dear brother. He is more

3:46

than my black brother. It

3:49

was in Marjah, district of Helmand

3:52

province of Afghanistan. It

3:54

was like in the

3:55

midnight.

3:59

I just

4:03

came from another post to

4:06

their post. We

4:08

just walked like 30 or 45 minutes. Then

4:12

we arrived to the post where my

4:15

mission started from that day. So

4:18

in the early morning, I just

4:20

met Travis and also

4:23

my other team, Marines, over there.

4:26

It was the first day I met him

4:29

over there. My mission just started

4:31

with them from there. Was that the first time

4:33

you had worked with the Marines or had you already been working with the Marines? It

4:36

was the first time. The best way you can, can you walk

4:39

me through where that decision comes from? What

4:45

made you want to get to work with them?

4:49

What was going on in your life in those days? Before

4:53

I joined the Marines,

4:56

since

4:59

I just realized and had experience

5:01

about my country story, I

5:04

just planned and decided with myself to

5:07

go outside this country and

5:10

just live in a peaceful area,

5:13

not in darkness. Just

5:16

one year ago, when I joined with

5:18

Marines, I just started like a, I

5:21

have just met one of the, like

5:23

a captain. She was my

5:25

friend as well. She was working

5:29

with the US Army in

5:31

Logar Province and I was on that time

5:33

working for INGEO.

5:35

I'm in Langaparman organization

5:37

on that time.

5:40

So I met her over there and

5:42

it was one of my target

5:45

to start moving and

5:47

put the first steps to go

5:49

to the United States for higher education

5:52

and for like a peaceful

5:54

life, not only for myself, for

5:56

my children's future. So

5:58

it was my, my journey. vision

6:01

and targets how many kids you have I

6:04

Have three three kids. Yes.

6:07

How old are they? My

6:09

oldest just she's eight

6:11

and I have twins. Uh-huh boy and girl.

6:14

Yeah, therefore and half. That's beautiful Yeah

6:17

crazy crazy And

6:20

like for either one of you guys like can you

6:22

just I mean I know it's a big question But

6:25

yeah, I think for all of us that that

6:27

that that haven't served and haven't been over there

6:29

and they're just sort of like All our news is

6:32

is filtered in from from various different

6:34

parties. Can you guys just sort of explain? At

6:37

that time you're talking about

6:39

like 2008 2009. Correct. Like what's the state

6:41

of Afghanistan? Like when was the first time you were

6:43

over there? What do you what did you see in

6:45

Afghanistan? What are the biggest misconceptions?

6:48

I'd love to hear about growing up there I just like

6:50

to hear more about it Common

6:53

miss can I remember the first time that I got there,

6:55

you know, that was 2010. I'm young, you

6:57

know, I'm like 20 years

6:59

old can't even like, you know can't even legally

7:02

drink, you know But I'm over running around with

7:04

a gun and you know, and you're so immature You

7:08

know at that at that age.

7:10

I remember before we even got sent to Afghanistan

7:13

I knew we were going to Afghanistan and I knew

7:15

we were gonna end up going to a place called Mars. Yeah, and But

7:19

I'm so young I didn't even like look into what Mars

7:21

you even was right, you know Right, like

7:23

how easy that would have been for me to get on

7:25

the old Google and look up what this place

7:27

is And what it looks like but we didn't even It's

7:30

like send us wherever we don't care wherever

7:32

the fuck you want to send this. Yeah, you know and

7:35

we show up over there And you know Mars

7:38

it's down South. It's like the you know, agri agricultural

7:41

hub in the country And I

7:43

mean, it's just farmland and poor people.

7:46

That's it, you know You're expecting

7:48

to see you know, I Guess

7:51

it was hard for you know, somebody

7:53

at my age over there What are we doing over here fighting in this

7:55

farmland that were surrounded by all these poor people over

7:58

here? Why are there Marines dying? You

8:00

know an army guy's dying every day like what are we fighting

8:03

over right now? You

8:04

know?

8:05

And then you know as the deployment goes on

8:07

you know you start to build Relationships in these little

8:09

cities and villages and you see these little kids run

8:12

around and you know they have nothing

8:15

you know just absolutely nothing so That

8:19

was a wild thing for us to see at that age

8:21

you know

8:23

And when you engage with the

8:25

Taliban like when you when you when you engage

8:27

with? You know the enemy

8:29

what why you're there is it because

8:32

you hear about it all the time was it easy for

8:34

you to sort Of like decipher

8:36

who was who or were you were you

8:38

able to get like garner some sort of understanding? What

8:41

the people of Marjah felt about the

8:43

Taliban and what that relationship was? you

8:46

know I think from the The

8:48

people of Marjah you know from their mindset

8:52

from what I've gathered and witnessed

8:54

you know They're just trying to survive you know

8:56

they know that Americans aren't going to be there forever

8:59

We know we're not going to be there forever The

9:02

Taliban knows we're not going to be there forever So you know

9:04

the Taliban really they really pick

9:07

and choose on when they're going to show their face And

9:09

when they're going to do an attack and yeah, I

9:12

don't know it's it's just a wild It's

9:14

a wild place you know and it's not like you know

9:16

the Taliban's running around in uniforms that say

9:18

Taliban right You know they're blending in with these

9:20

villagers, and you don't know who's who you

9:23

know it's One day

9:25

there you know you think this guy's your friend and then later

9:27

on you know You find out that they're giving

9:29

up information to the time and they're spotting

9:31

us You know they're they're watching us come out of our

9:33

little patrol bases, which I think a lot of people

9:36

You know they they think military bases, and it's

9:39

these giant bases with jets launching

9:41

off of them That's not where we were at I

9:43

mean we were in somebody's house

9:45

that we took over in the middle of the night and filled

9:48

sandbags up and made posts in The middle of the night you know

9:50

that's how we're living you know we Show up

9:52

into a farmer's compound throw them some money and say you got

9:54

to get out of here and There's

9:57

really no Separation

10:00

from where we're living in the city. I mean, we are

10:02

in the city. There's no, you hear that term, oh,

10:04

you leave the wire. Like there's

10:06

no wire. But

10:10

as we would come out of our patrol bases, we'd

10:12

usually run three operations a day, morning, afternoon,

10:15

and night, and we'd

10:17

have these little devices that could pick up

10:19

on their radio traffic. And

10:22

guys like Rom would be listening to

10:24

these devices and

10:27

relaying to us, okay, this is what they're saying, this

10:29

is where they're at, oh, they're planning an attack here. But

10:32

you can hear them counting us and calling

10:34

out where our weapons systems are. Oh, here's a long

10:36

rifle over here. Here's a machine gunner

10:38

over here. And it's crazy to hear that.

10:40

You're like, holy fuck, like they're watching us.

10:43

You can't see them, and you don't know who's giving up

10:45

that information, but a lot of times

10:47

it's villagers that they'll pay off. But

10:50

so it sounds like an environment where trust

10:52

is so impossible to kind

10:54

of, how people sort of feel about

10:56

you and how trust seems enormously difficult.

10:59

And you guys refer to each other as brothers.

11:02

I'm really interested in

11:04

how trust is earned. And then what's that

11:06

environment like? Is it the same for you? Is

11:08

it the same for folks who grew up in

11:10

Mars or for

11:13

the farmers or the villagers that work there? I

11:15

mean, can you just talk about trust

11:17

in that environment and how it works? Yeah,

11:21

actually it was so difficult to make

11:23

them

11:24

trust as, so

11:26

difficult for those kinds of pupils

11:29

because the pupils over there, they don't have knowledge.

11:32

They were not like literate

11:34

pupils. The schools were schools over

11:36

there and their entire life,

11:39

not only for women,

11:42

for the male generation as well.

11:45

So all of them just grew up with the shovel,

11:48

with the farming, nothing else

11:50

like that. I mean, the villagers in that

11:53

area. But it was just ANA,

11:56

I mean Afghan National Army and

11:58

the beside of them, it was just, was the

12:00

Marines, you know. We just

12:02

make trust for them. We just had

12:05

like make sure, you know, I mean like

12:07

big meetings every week over

12:09

the year. Like all the key leaders would come from the village

12:11

and sit and talk with us and we'd develop rapport

12:14

with them like that. Yeah. We just like motivate

12:17

them for democracy. We just

12:19

motivate them for having peaceful

12:22

life and deal. We want to make

12:24

them happy every day than the previous

12:26

and the past. So it was their

12:30

life and it was that they trust us.

12:32

Not 100% but a little more than before.

12:37

And every day we just gave them their trust

12:39

as much as we can. And meanwhile you're

12:42

trying to earn the trust of did

12:44

you feel like you had the trust of the Marines

12:46

that you were with right off the bat? Of course.

12:49

You did feel that. Yes. You

12:51

did feel that. Exactly. And just tell

12:53

me a little bit more like kind of just whether

12:56

it's philosophically or like I

12:58

understand. I guess what you were saying is that you

13:00

had this urge. You knew you were dedicated.

13:02

You're an educated man. You're

13:04

a dedicated man to your family. You knew

13:06

that eventually you wanted to what you wanted to leave Afghanistan.

13:09

Right. When did that feeling start? You

13:12

know, was that was that before the war? Like what

13:14

did something change in your life to

13:17

make you feel that way? Did you always know

13:19

that you wanted to get out of Afghanistan? Yeah,

13:21

exactly. Since I was just

13:24

like seeing my

13:26

father's life. What was your father's

13:28

life like? I mean, just

13:31

he grew it as a human over

13:33

there, you know, he didn't

13:35

like had higher education, you know,

13:37

he didn't have like own

13:39

independence for himself, for

13:42

his family, you know, for my grandfather,

13:44

for my uncles, for my aunts, for all

13:46

of his family. So

13:49

when I was just looking at them every

13:51

time, it was just like making me sad.

13:54

So I just decided on that time

13:56

with myself to find a way to

13:58

go out from here.

13:59

and make good life.

14:01

Change this. Did your father want that

14:04

for you? Did your father want you to have a different

14:06

life? Yeah, exactly. But my grandfather,

14:08

I mean,

14:10

they didn't want this for my father,

14:12

you know? So that's why because my

14:14

father was, my father was like educated

14:17

person. He was working with defense ministry

14:19

from since he just born and

14:22

joined with the army with

14:24

the military. So he didn't like,

14:28

has any stuff for me to don't

14:31

go deer or air just he wants

14:33

me to grow up in

14:35

a very peaceful area

14:37

like this. So on that time I just

14:40

decided to start working with

14:43

the like

14:45

private companies because

14:48

it was that time the private companies

14:50

was the way to go to America or

14:52

go to the Western countries

14:55

for better life. You know,

14:57

that's why I just stepped on on

14:59

this way. Yeah.

15:02

Can you sort of remember your

15:04

your just sort of like your own

15:06

personal history? Well,

15:09

with the Taliban and how

15:11

you sort of felt that

15:14

that what is sort of the relationship

15:16

with kind of like the common person

15:19

in your country with the Taliban and what

15:21

are the pressures to join and how

15:23

do most folks feel about them there? And as

15:26

they came into power, did

15:28

something change drastically in the country? And if

15:30

so, do you remember, is there any memories of that? Yeah,

15:34

actually, in the first time when they just got

15:36

our country,

15:38

I mean, it was like 1990 or 1992, I think.

15:42

So these years when they just got

15:45

and handed over our country, I

15:47

was a kid, but still I remember some

15:50

memories from that time, you know,

15:53

that they were just the stoning the pupil

15:55

stoning the woman's, you know, stoning, stoning.

15:58

Yeah. And also they just killed

15:59

You know, they just killed the pupils

16:02

like in front of the eyes of the

16:04

pupils, you know, they just gathered the pupils

16:07

They just announced it in the radio There

16:09

was no other television on that time. They

16:12

just announced and rode you that we have like hanging,

16:14

you know How old were you when that happened?

16:17

I was like maybe 14 I

16:21

Can say or maybe 13, but still I

16:23

remember that, you know, it was biggest

16:26

idiom in Kabul Just close

16:28

by the presidential palace close

16:31

by so It

16:34

was like crazy time on on

16:36

that time, you know, and you ask it What

16:39

what why they just killed this pupil, you

16:41

know for nothing? They

16:43

just killed innocent pupil in

16:47

I mean I hear me so it was I'm so please

16:50

please it was all that that changed

16:52

my mind To just evacuate

16:54

from this country as soon as you

16:57

can Even just

16:59

recently. I mean wrist in the recent

17:01

years. I had Special

17:03

life over there. I had my own business

17:06

my own company everything but I left behind

17:08

everything Because

17:11

I didn't see any bright future for

17:13

my children for my family

17:16

This this brutality

17:18

and Like You

17:22

say this sort of like meaningless brutality

17:24

Do you remember the first time you either

17:27

witnessed that or something

17:29

that kind of defined them to you or? The

17:32

first thing that you heard or that you saw over

17:34

there that that showed you

17:36

Kind of that that defined the

17:38

ethos of those people

17:43

You know, I think the my first

17:45

like experience like holy shit We're at war

17:47

now, you know is when you see a guy that

17:50

you know, she drank beer with and

17:52

hang out with Blown up,

17:54

you know and his body's ripped in half You

17:58

know, and this is a good guy,

17:59

you know

17:59

Or another guy that's been shot,

18:02

you know and killed, you know, you see in your buddies dead,

18:05

you know running them to helicopters You know, that's

18:07

that's like the this is real

18:09

moment, you know, and then just the brutality

18:11

that you know these the the Taliban

18:14

would do, you know, they would go out

18:16

to these farmland never in and and just

18:18

plant IEDs everywhere all over the fields

18:20

and You know kids would

18:22

step on them all the time, you know

18:24

innocent people would just walk along, you know

18:27

and step and step on

18:29

these devices Taliban doesn't

18:31

care. Yeah, they're after us at the end of the day, but If

18:34

they're putting them in this family's backyard,

18:36

you know eventually one of these kids is gonna step on this

18:39

or some guy on a tractor plowing his field is gonna

18:41

you know Hit this IED and

18:43

that's when it's like for real,

18:45

you know, it's like

18:49

Seeing little kids suffering, you know,

18:51

I did a little stint after my my time

18:53

with the Marine Corps I

18:55

got a job with National Geographic and I went

18:58

back to Afghanistan and kind

19:00

of got to see the war from From

19:03

a non, you know infantryman grunt View,

19:06

you know because in the in the grunts, it's this this is what you

19:08

see, you know You're you got your mission is

19:10

you don't understand where these helicopters are coming from

19:12

or where you're sending your wounded off to you Don't you don't

19:14

see it at all? But with that

19:17

job, you know, I got to take a step back and kind of be

19:19

a spectator and war and kind of see Okay, here's

19:21

where the fighter pilots are taken off from here's

19:24

the Logistics side

19:26

of the house. Here's the helicopters and then I

19:29

did a little time in a frontline hospital It

19:31

was called a shock trauma platoon and

19:34

we just sat in this tent for you know, a month

19:36

two months It periodically in and out

19:38

for a month two months and man the casualties

19:40

just keep coming in, you know And it's just

19:42

like holy shit. I

19:45

remember I had never like cried, you know

19:47

the unit that we were with we lost 15 guys You

19:51

know 15 guys killed which is fucking

19:53

crazy and So

19:55

I remember the Purple Heart ceremony after we came

19:58

back. I mean there was a hundred people up

20:00

in a formation. There were so many purple

20:02

hearts handed out that they didn't do it like individually,

20:05

you know, like, okay, this person got shot

20:07

this and that. Okay, next guy,

20:09

we're going to read off. There were so many people that they

20:12

just did it all at once. Wow. You

20:14

know, but anyway, so to be in this, and

20:16

I'd never shed a tear over it really

20:19

hadn't, you know, lost some really close friends. And

20:22

when I, you know, a year later, I went

20:24

back with that net geo job and I'm sitting in this, this

20:27

tent and the, you know,

20:30

income the casualties and here my dumb ass is

20:32

with a camera running around filming

20:34

it because I want people to understand what's going

20:36

on over there, you know, but you really feel

20:40

like a piece of shit running around

20:42

filming this dude with a gunshot wound in his forehead.

20:45

You know,

20:46

you're just, it's just unreal. But I remember

20:49

this, there was a Marine that came in and he

20:51

was on an early morning patrol and

20:53

he was the radio man and he had a radio antenna

20:55

sticking out of his backpack. And

20:58

there's a lot of ungrounded wires over there. And this

21:00

guy's patrolling around and his radio

21:03

wire hit one of these ungrounded wires and

21:06

it electrocuted him. And,

21:10

you know, they, his unit, they call

21:12

in the medevac birds. They're called dust

21:15

off, great guys, black hawks come in, snatch

21:17

this guy up, bring him back to the little tent that I'm

21:20

at, you know, filming these casualties

21:22

and interviewing surgeons and stuff like

21:24

that. And in comes this

21:26

guy and he's back

21:28

in the day, we put the radio mic like in between

21:30

our Kevlar, you know, we got our helmet and you got the strap.

21:33

Well, the radio guys would run these, run

21:36

the hand mic up in here. Anyway,

21:38

they bring this guy in and this hand mic is

21:41

melted into his face.

21:44

And I remember watching this dude like,

21:48

nobody knows what's going on over here.

21:50

You know, I remember when we were there, no one, no one really

21:53

asked questions. You know, it's like, oh,

21:55

you were in Afghanistan, you know, everybody's so desensitized

21:58

because we've been over there for 20 years. You

22:00

know, they were like, oh, yeah, it's just war.

22:03

You know, this isn't normal being somewhere for 20 years

22:07

You know, but yeah That was with that that incident

22:09

when I I saw that dude and

22:11

all my buddies that I was with the wrinkle though They'll make fun

22:13

of me for telling the story and saying that I cried but it's

22:16

it's the truth I mean, I filmed this dude. They tried

22:18

to resuscitate this guy for 15 20 minutes

22:21

And then finally everybody in the room agreed they're

22:23

calling it

22:24

and I remember I you know

22:26

Turn the record button off went outside and cried

22:29

like a bitch Yeah, cried like a

22:31

bitch in this old crusty surgeon came

22:33

out He used to be an 80 8404 corpsman

22:36

that used to run with the grunts But now he's kind of leveled

22:38

up and he's doing bigger and better things But

22:40

he came out and he little tiny guy came

22:43

out and put his arm around me and just I'd

22:45

never met that dude My life, but he knew you know

22:47

where you were at. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, cuz

22:49

when you see, you know journalists I was technically a journalist

22:52

over there at that time. They're like, oh who's this journalist?

22:54

They have no idea what's going on. But and

22:56

some people ask about my background and stuff

22:58

like that But you know not

23:00

a lot of people knew that I was a part of that

23:03

as well the year prior, you know My

23:06

unit lost 15 dudes in that same ao

23:08

that they're in but yeah,

23:10

that was like a just a unreal

23:13

like I'll never

23:16

forget that

23:16

so it's like you you both and

23:19

I hate to I

23:20

Hate to stay on it too much But

23:23

but but I mean you both are sort of describing this kind

23:25

of chaotic wild environment

23:27

It doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. This is like

23:29

this is your home. You grew up in it I mean for

23:32

for you Do you remember that when you first

23:34

sort of had that thought like what the hell is

23:36

going on here? And I'm just really interested

23:38

in like why maybe your reasons

23:40

for wanting to sign up like a reason for

23:43

wanting to enlist and and and

23:45

then you know Just

23:49

kind of your journey through through then

23:51

being there and and and and what you saw

23:53

what your feelings are and and and you're

23:55

sort Understanding that either grew

23:58

or your lack of understanding I

24:02

think my story with wanting to go over there kind

24:04

of sort of wanting to go the military route

24:06

started young with me I was a part of this

24:08

program called the breakaway program where

24:11

they'd send like court-ordered kids out

24:13

to the woods to you know get

24:15

their asses kicked and you got in trouble no

24:17

I didn't I was like a student staff and my

24:19

parents ran with the staff that got

24:21

it all outdoorsy mountain men type

24:23

people really shaped who I am and

24:25

yep in my values and I really saw

24:28

the benefit of going

24:30

out to a shitty place and living with

24:32

nothing and having you know only having the guys around

24:35

you I really saw the benefit of that at a young age

24:37

and pushing yourself to that at a young

24:39

age and and also you know September

24:42

11th you know I I

24:44

was never allowed to miss school ever like my parents

24:46

are like you're going to school we don't care if you've got

24:48

COVID right you're going yeah

24:51

I come from a big family there's five kids in my family all

24:53

together but on September 11th

24:55

my older sibling

24:58

or no one of my younger brothers had to go to the doctor so

25:01

any mini minimo I'm staying home to watch

25:03

the youngest so I'm sitting at home on

25:05

the couch I was in seventh

25:07

grade so I think 12 13 years

25:09

old and I'm sitting on the couch

25:12

and then watching Sports Center

25:15

you know big baseball guy sure catching up

25:17

on I'm like this is nice I'm hanging out yeah no school

25:19

today holiday yeah and

25:21

the phone rings and it's my dad and he's like turn

25:23

on the TV right now and I flipped you

25:25

know flip on the news and you know

25:28

five six seven minutes later we see the the

25:30

second plane hit the tower

25:33

and that was a pivotal moment for me at such a young

25:36

age it was like how dare these motherfuckers

25:39

you know and I had a connection with you

25:41

know I grew up in Tennessee but you know during the summers

25:44

I'd go you know up to New Jersey my grandparents

25:46

had a beach house there and like on

25:48

the ocean on Long

25:50

Beach Island and a lot of these people

25:52

running around there were you know firefighters

25:56

from New York City and NYPD

25:58

and so it was like how dare

26:00

these people do this? But you know, and it sounds corny

26:03

and this and that, but I knew at that age,

26:05

like this is what I'm doing. And I remember

26:07

being so fucking pissed

26:11

that I was not young enough to

26:14

sign up right then. Like I remember being

26:16

livid and like counting down the clock

26:18

like when I turn 18 years old or when I can sign

26:20

this contract, I'm going. Yeah,

26:22

and I remember being afraid I was gonna miss the war. A lot of

26:24

guys say that too. It's like,

26:27

I need to get in the pipeline right away with

26:29

a rifle in my hand to go see these dudes on the front

26:31

lines as soon as possible.

26:34

Do you remember where you were? Do you

26:36

remember where you were, 9-11, or do

26:38

you remember your first sort of like understanding

26:40

of it or did it affect your

26:42

life?

26:43

Yeah, on that time I was

26:45

like

26:46

very

26:47

young boy, you know? And also

26:50

we didn't have any access on internet,

26:53

on television, no television, nothing

26:55

else. We even didn't have like

26:58

electricity, you know? So,

27:01

but the older pupil,

27:03

I mean my dad, uncle and other

27:06

pupils, they were just

27:08

hearing the news from BBC, you

27:10

know, and the radio. And they

27:12

were talking on that time that like

27:15

an incident happened to the trade center

27:17

in the New York, in America,

27:20

that the tourist groups headed that

27:22

by the Al-Qaeda like this on that

27:24

time. I was hearing all of these, but

27:27

I was so

27:28

kid, I didn't care about this so much

27:30

and I didn't have knowledge about that. So

27:33

yeah, I remember just short

27:36

things like that. But

27:38

in Afghanistan at the

27:40

time, you know, was

27:43

there a general feeling, I mean, when

27:46

you know at these big soccer stadiums, there are

27:48

these huge executions and there's

27:50

this group that has taken over and they're

27:53

ruling with brutality. And now

27:55

you know that, you know, somebody

27:58

came and poked the bat.

27:59

bear of America, now America

28:02

is getting involved in some way. Was there a feeling in

28:05

Afghanistan that this could potentially come

28:07

to us or touch us? Would people have

28:09

any idea of that or no? Yeah,

28:12

definitely. Like I said, pupils

28:14

were just talking about

28:16

that and had like feeling

28:20

for the pupils, why

28:22

this like happened, what's wrong

28:24

with that. But since

28:27

most of the pupils like you don't, you

28:29

know,

28:30

they were not like

28:33

have the

28:35

outside or I can say for you

28:37

like a knowledge of external

28:39

countries to know what's

28:41

happening over there, you know, or what's

28:43

going on over there. That's why

28:45

they were not like

28:48

have like deep feeling what's happening

28:51

or they didn't see anything by television,

28:53

you know, by the TV to

28:56

see what happened with these pupils,

28:58

you know, but of course, yeah, they had like

29:00

feeling and talking about that on that time.

29:04

You know, I think seeing over there, these

29:06

people on the day to day, they don't have time

29:09

for like conversational like gossip

29:11

of what's going on. They're trying to like feed their kids

29:14

in a country where there's no jobs and

29:17

trying to scrape, beg, borrow, steal

29:19

to get their kids fed.

29:21

You know, like they don't have time to like

29:24

sit around and, you know, scroll

29:26

the internet and what's going on. Yeah,

29:28

like they're like, dude, I got to feed my kids,

29:31

you know, and they're just scraping by all means necessary

29:33

by any means. Yes. And you know,

29:35

I don't fault them from that. That's right. Because

29:37

what would I do to feed my family and his kids and

29:40

my loved ones and people around my circle,

29:42

I would do anything,

29:44

you know, to do it.

29:45

When you first get there, will you be able to make

29:48

any sense of anything? Or like you said, it's just this

29:50

mentality, just like follow orders one

29:53

foot in front of the other. I remember we flew in, we were at

29:55

a big base called Leatherneck and they're like, you know, we

29:57

get our briefs from the Medevac units.

30:00

supporting us. Hey guys, this is how you load your

30:02

casualties in. This

30:04

is what we're seeing in the area. These are the tactics

30:06

that they're using. Watch out for IEDs here.

30:09

Watch out from there. They're just they put them in

30:11

everything from roadkill to

30:13

the curb, to trees, to above you.

30:15

So we're getting

30:17

schooled up on that and then

30:19

they load us on helicopters and we're like, all right,

30:21

we're going to go get some right now and we're

30:23

going to go replace a unit that's there. There was a unit

30:25

called the 3rd Battalion 6 Marines that was there. They

30:28

did the initial push in there and gain the foothold

30:31

and then here we come in to replace him and then

30:33

they punch out and go home. But

30:35

we landed on this. It

30:38

was a bigger base in Marjah. It was called

30:40

like Hanson, I think, right? Yeah,

30:43

yeah.

30:44

Cop Hanson. It was called and then

30:46

we land and then, you know, it's so loud and chaotic

30:48

and dust is flying everywhere and

30:51

we run off the bird and then the bird takes off and then

30:53

it's like quiet. You don't hear anything and

30:55

I remember you could hear gunfights going on outside,

30:58

you know, because that base we're on was like the

31:00

big battalion level. That's where our battalion commanders

31:02

are at. There's like nice little chow halls. They're living

31:05

it up, you know, in cots

31:07

and, you know, they got nice stuff and then we

31:10

hear these gunfights going on where we're going because we're

31:12

going to go take over one of these houses.

31:15

And I remember there was a... And

31:18

it's villages? Like the gunfights are coming from? Yeah,

31:20

it's not mountainous, right? No, no, it's straight

31:22

farmland, swampy cotton fields,

31:25

weed, opium, corn,

31:27

watermelon, you know, agricultural

31:29

stuff.

31:31

Difficult to operate in.

31:35

But yeah, I remember we were hearing all this going on. They're like,

31:38

what's going on out there? Because that's my first... You know, I've been

31:40

to Iraq before. I went to Ramadi, Iraq

31:42

back in 2008 and we

31:45

spent seven months there just waiting for something

31:47

to happen and never did. You

31:50

know, as a crone, if you're not getting after it, you're

31:52

like, this sucks. And you know, and your chain of command's

31:54

fucking with you, you know, trying to keep

31:56

you busy and keep you mad, you know. And

32:00

I remember wishing for that, God, I just want

32:02

this gunfight. Well, fast forward to Afghanistan in 2010, we

32:04

land on that base and then, what's this gunfight

32:07

going on? And it's like, oh, you guys are going there. The

32:09

unit you're replacing, the platoon you're replacing, that's

32:11

them right there. And if I remember

32:13

correctly, that was the day that a helo

32:15

was shot down. I wanna say it was like a

32:19

cobra, I wanna say, but don't quote me on

32:21

it, but there was a helo that was shot down out there

32:23

in our battle space. And

32:25

in 2010 in the time, you don't hear of helicopter,

32:28

US American helicopters being shot

32:30

down. So we're like, what the fuck is this

32:32

place we're going to? So they load us up

32:34

and we get a little brief, and

32:37

then they load us up in like a seven ton it's

32:39

called. It's a big transport truck for people.

32:42

And they drive us out there and we get

32:44

off and

32:45

we get to this patrol base, right as that squad

32:48

is coming back in from that gunfight. And I remember

32:51

looking at these dudes and they look

32:53

like something straight out of Vietnam. Here we are, fresh

32:55

camis, all of our gears, good,

32:59

we've got the civilian weight we're carrying from the States,

33:02

we're not patrol ready. But

33:06

yeah, I remember them coming back in and they look

33:08

like they were just in a

33:10

gunfight and they were sweaty, were

33:12

rocking bandanas, not blousing

33:14

their boots, cuffing their sleeves. We

33:17

don't care about military regulation haircuts

33:19

dudes with mohawks. And you're like, dude, this

33:21

is awesome. Like this is where I wanna

33:24

be right now. We finally like reached this place.

33:27

And so they took the, for the next like two

33:30

or three days, they took the key leaders from

33:32

our platoon that's replacing this platoon. They

33:34

took like the platoon sergeants, Lieutenant,

33:37

squad leaders and team leaders. And I was a team leader at the

33:39

time. And they took us out on patrol with

33:42

those guys, kind of like a left seat, right

33:44

seat with them. And there's no vehicles. We're

33:46

all, everything's on foot. Wow. And

33:49

so we start, they start integrating us into their patrols

33:52

and how what's going on and they're giving tips and

33:55

don't cross here, little

33:58

things to look for. And we're just. trying

34:00

to like soak it all in. Cause we

34:02

know- Is it possible to soak it all

34:04

in? I mean, you feel like, like how much are you retaining

34:07

on that first? You know, I think you're in a survival

34:10

situation. So your brain is on like max overload

34:12

to try and retain everything. But I remember just

34:15

being like a, we call it a fucking gear bomb.

34:17

You know, there's like a way to patrol in Mars.

34:20

And there's, you know, there's what the states,

34:22

you know, patrol around in North Carolina teaches you,

34:24

I got to have all this gear. I got to have all this. I need

34:26

this. I need water, you know, but when you're

34:28

patrolling on foot miles and miles, it comes down

34:30

to weight. You're stripping all sorts of weight, learning

34:33

how to wear your night vision correctly. You learn how

34:35

to, you know, use your thermal scopes

34:38

and pec-15s with your lasers

34:40

on them. And there's a massive

34:43

learning curve that you're- Sure. That

34:45

you're battling. Sure. And you don't

34:47

want to look like a piece of shit either. You know, it's like you

34:49

got junior guys looking at you. You can't seem

34:52

like you're iffy

34:54

about something. It's

34:56

probably pretty impossible to not be iffy, especially

34:59

in the beginning. Absolutely. Yeah.

35:01

Like you're making it up as you go. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you're

35:03

drinking out of a fire hose. Right. You

35:06

know. Right. Dudes are getting shot. and

35:09

shot and main from IEDs. And,

35:12

you know, your biggest fear is just letting

35:14

somebody down behind you, you know, not

35:16

seeing an IED, the dude behind you steps on it or-

35:19

And so it's really that night. I mean, it's like first night in, it's like,

35:21

you're like, okay, this is, this is going to be different. This

35:23

is, this is wild. And

35:25

do you remember your first sort of exposure to

35:28

the villagers and like, is there any,

35:31

is there any kind of feeling or to

35:33

just the nationals in general, is there any feeling

35:35

like, what do they think of me? Or like, could,

35:37

because I guess what you guys both describe

35:40

is there's, and so many of the folks

35:42

that I've had the honor to talk to have just talked about

35:45

this. One, your every step

35:47

you take, there could be an IED. Plus any

35:49

person you see could be friend or foe.

35:51

And there's really no way. It's very,

35:53

very hard to figure that out. So I imagine

35:56

that's just an environment of just complete

35:59

and utter chaos. And again, such

36:01

a where we're eventually going to get to such

36:03

a difficult environment to achieve You

36:06

know real trust and real camaraderie

36:09

with with people that were born in different places. Yeah

36:12

You know, I'd never had any exposure to really

36:15

the outside of the US before I don't

36:17

think I'd ever talk to somebody from another country

36:19

other than a Woman that my mom

36:21

would go get her nails done at the Seoul Vietnamese shop

36:23

and my mom helped this lady study for you

36:25

know Her citizenship test

36:28

and I think that was my only Wow if

36:30

I remember correctly that was like the only exposure

36:32

I'd had Trying to communicate

36:34

with somebody who didn't speak English right out

36:36

of the gate. Wow but yeah,

36:38

so we we roll in there and I think my first exposure

36:41

to an Afghan is the Afghan

36:44

army that we're kind of paired up with they got they sent

36:46

a couple Afghan army squads to patrol

36:48

around with our squads Cuz we're trying to teach them

36:51

what's going on here. And this is how you you

36:53

know, take care of your country This is how you gain security

36:56

in your country do what we do. So communicating

36:58

with them and teaching them

37:00

our tactics and which was man was difficult

37:03

and It was a hell of a thing

37:05

to ask looking back at it for a bunch of 19 20 21 year

37:07

old kids to do You

37:10

know, that's kind of a Green Beret special forces thing,

37:12

you know, those Green Berets get in and they Create

37:15

networks and they know how to talk to people and befriend

37:18

people and then you know, that's the whole Green

37:20

Beret mission, you know other than going out

37:23

smoke-checking dudes, right? Their mission

37:25

is to go in there make friends somewhere, right? Well

37:28

asking a grunt unit to go do that It's like

37:30

with no training whatsoever. Plus

37:32

you're not I mean like making friends is not

37:35

right Yeah, that's like the time for

37:37

talking is over. Yeah. Yeah, you know, yeah,

37:39

but yeah, we would like teaching these guys Okay, this is

37:41

how you wear your gear. This is how you make a little

37:44

brief a little pre-mission brief when we go

37:46

on patrol You're gonna go left. We're gonna go right We're

37:49

gonna when we hit this, you know building up here We'll

37:52

button hook right and we'll link up with you guys over, you know There's

37:54

a lot of complex stuff and you're

37:56

worried about you always should know where

37:58

your people are out on patrol because everybody's running with guns.

38:00

I don't want to end up shooting my guys over here,

38:03

getting spooked because everybody's trigger happy.

38:05

You know, everybody's ready to pull

38:07

the trigger, you know, because you know, in war there's

38:10

a clear hold and build phase. Can

38:12

you explain that? I

38:14

mean, I think, don't quote me

38:17

on this, but I don't remember what, you

38:19

know, army or military genius

38:21

figured this out. There's a clear hold and build phase.

38:24

Well, a clear phase is the enemy's still

38:26

here and operating freely. We need

38:28

to clear this whole place out

38:31

and then we're going to hold it, make sure everything's good

38:33

to go, and then we're going to start to rebuild. We're going to start

38:35

to rebuild schools, hospitals,

38:38

roads, all of this. Well, we're still in the clear phase,

38:41

you know, so. But

38:43

yeah, I remember, you know, linking up with these Afghan

38:45

army guys and we'd create these little terrain models

38:47

as best as we could, like, okay, you guys are going

38:50

to go this way. We're going to go this way. And I remember, I don't

38:52

know, it was probably our 10th patrol with them. We

38:55

punched out and we've got nicknames

38:57

for all these Afghan army guys. I remember this Afghan

38:59

army guy we called Loveseep, like you would sit on,

39:02

you know, for whatever reason, we called him Loveseep.

39:04

And he had an M249 saw, which is

39:07

like a squad automatic weapon. And

39:09

we punch out and man, we're not 10 minutes

39:12

outside of the gate. And this dude is just unloading

39:15

on us. Yeah, just, and

39:17

we hit the dirt like, what the fuck?

39:19

You knew it was him? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Because I

39:21

know where they're at. You know, I'm watching them, you

39:24

know, but yeah, you're just trying to

39:26

get these guys on the same page as you.

39:28

Yeah. Yeah. But that would happen like all the

39:30

time. Oh my gosh. Yeah. And, and,

39:33

and from your perspective, how

39:36

did everybody take sort of your decision to work

39:38

with the Americans? Was there any resistance

39:40

to that? Were people supportive

39:42

of it

39:42

in your life?

39:44

Actually, my

39:46

family, especially my dad and my

39:48

mom was with me. And the first,

39:51

but after just, I just

39:53

was

39:54

six months in the mission. They

39:56

just here, you

39:59

know. on TV as

40:01

well at the same time in the newspaper,

40:03

everything's in the media, the

40:06

interpreters were killing every

40:08

day in the mission. Every

40:10

single day like this, you know. So

40:12

my dad, my mom was so

40:15

worried and has concern on

40:17

this, you know. So when I just,

40:19

actually the interpreters over

40:22

there in the post on the mission

40:24

didn't have access on the phone

40:27

to talk with their family because we didn't have

40:29

access on this, you know. There

40:31

was no antenna, I mean signal to talk with

40:33

your family. But I have access by

40:36

the helps of my Marines, you know, with the satellite.

40:38

I just talk with my family via that and

40:42

my dad just told me, please, please

40:45

come back, please come back, stop

40:47

this like this. But I didn't give up,

40:49

you know, myself. So even

40:51

my first unit, I mean Travis

40:54

and with other people just

40:56

left over there, I was over there. I

40:58

just continue my mission just

41:00

for more than three more months.

41:03

Then I just received my paperwork and came

41:05

back home for a holiday to

41:07

process all this paperwork to

41:10

get to the US like this, you know. When

41:12

I just get back to home, so my

41:14

dad, my mom just stopped me and

41:17

just cried, please, if you're

41:19

like my son, please

41:21

don't go back to the mission. You

41:23

would be killed.

41:24

Interpreters were being sought out. It was

41:26

especially dangerous to be an interpreter. On

41:28

patrol interpreters are getting killed because they're out walking

41:31

around in the same minefields we are. They're in the same gunfights

41:33

we are, so they're definitely a part

41:35

of those casualty counts. But also when they would go

41:37

back to visit their family or go back on vacation,

41:40

you know, there's an entire Al-Qaeda

41:43

and Taliban intelligence cells

41:45

out looking for these people. You

41:48

know, I think a common misconception about the Taliban

41:50

and Al-Qaeda, they're just a bunch of dudes living in

41:52

caves. They're not really up to date

41:54

on technology. Man,

41:57

they evolved. They evolved

41:59

over the past. 20 years and

42:02

they know what they're doing, they know how to find these people.

42:05

And you never know who's secure with information

42:07

because his information is sitting

42:10

at an embassy or office somewhere

42:13

that's supporting government operations. Well,

42:16

who's to say that a Taliban dude isn't working

42:18

in there that can now give up that information

42:21

for the right price and now they know

42:24

where his home of record is? Right. That's

42:27

real. That's real. Yeah.

42:29

And did that make you worry that

42:32

you were potentially putting your mom and dad's

42:34

life in danger? Absolutely. Absolutely.

42:38

That's why I didn't go back to mission

42:40

but I

42:41

just started searching

42:43

another job. I just started working

42:46

after that with the US Army Corps

42:48

of Engineers, you know, in the Kabul,

42:51

in the city with a private construction

42:53

company who was just working on behalf

42:56

of that US Army Corps of Engineers.

42:58

We were just building, make the

43:00

HQ headquarters for the Afghan

43:03

National Police, A&P and also

43:05

Afghan National Army like this. But

43:08

I just continue to keep going

43:11

my working and my task

43:13

only just alongside with the US,

43:15

you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. All

43:17

my life. Yeah. I remember

43:19

we'd get pushed interpreters out to us, you

43:21

know, and we'd run through them. Some guys would get out

43:24

there, man, they just weren't a good fit. Why?

43:27

They couldn't, you know, show up on

43:29

time for patrol. They couldn't wear their gear. They'd

43:32

forget their night vision goggles and it's like, man, we don't

43:34

have time to hold anybody's hands either. You're

43:36

about this and you're going to put in the time to be ready

43:39

or you're out of here. And sometimes guys

43:42

would show up and they'd go on that first patrol with us

43:44

and they'd get into a gunfight and they're like, I'm out

43:46

of here. Never again. Yeah. I

43:48

remember Ron telling me when he got the job being an interpreter, you

43:50

know, he had to take like a basic English

43:53

test. Like can this guy actually speak English and

43:55

translate? And he was saying that they,

43:57

you know, they sent him to the airport to fly down to Mars. had

44:00

no idea that he was gonna be fighting

44:03

like we're fighting you know so he shows up

44:06

with us and sees like a bunch

44:08

of dudes with mohawks and kami-pain and

44:10

dirty and you know where there's no showers or

44:12

toilets or chow halls or we're eating out of

44:14

bag and you know but you

44:17

know he stayed you know which says a lot

44:19

about him absolutely yeah it was

44:21

really difficult for me you know like for us

44:24

middle-city boy

44:26

just move out for us from

44:28

his home you know we can

44:30

say for this like milk boy you know milk

44:32

boy yeah so just move from

44:35

his home yeah leave it

44:37

left behind his family yeah just

44:39

go to war you know war yeah

44:41

we're we're gear

44:43

seed rifle just to

44:45

see himself in the middle of the gunfight

44:48

fields you know gunfight it

44:51

was difficult for me but but as

44:53

Travis said I

44:54

just stayed yeah

44:56

yeah

44:58

he made a name for himself did you

45:00

recognize how special he was

45:03

and did that brotherhood begin because you saw

45:05

how difficult it was for him in the beginning

45:07

and that he didn't and then was it the choice

45:09

to stay and come back and not run

45:11

you know I don't think that you know at that

45:14

age and with all of that going on your brain doesn't really

45:16

process what's going on you

45:18

don't get to pick who you're with you don't get to pick

45:21

who your machine gunner is and Marine Corps decides everything

45:23

that's right everything you know you just you're just

45:25

so used to saying all right Roger we're gonna roll with

45:27

it yeah but

45:29

you know once I you know started to get this you know like as

45:32

I said I got the job with National Geographic and

45:34

really got to step back and see this war

45:36

from a you know

45:39

different perspective you know you really start

45:41

to reflect on the relationships that you made and

45:43

like yeah I mean

45:45

this guy stuck it out with it he was one of us

45:48

you know he was in all the gunfights we were in

45:51

he was promised by the government to hey man you

45:53

stick your time out with us we're gonna get you out of this country

45:56

this is the deal and and

45:59

once I realized that you know, that wasn't happening

46:01

for him that really weighed on me for a long

46:03

time. And I realized that was happening in like 2012 timeframe.

46:08

And I remember a time with him where I felt

46:10

like I turned my back on him. Uh, when I

46:12

got that job with National Geographic, I went down

46:14

my contact list,

46:16

uh, you know, on Facebook and, and, and, uh,

46:19

and I remember scrolling across the name, we'd been in communication

46:22

and I deleted him off Facebook.

46:24

You know,

46:25

cause it was like, what, if I get rolled up here by

46:27

the Taliban out here, cause I'm now I'm a civilian over

46:30

there. Right. I don't have the protection of a squad

46:32

of dudes around me. Right. So if I get rolled up on,

46:34

they take my phone and then they start looking

46:36

through my content, okay, who's he friends with? I'm

46:38

friends with this dude. Now they can come after

46:41

him, but you know, I did it for his own protection,

46:43

but still, you know, it's something that I never, you

46:46

know,

46:47

forgive myself for. You know, and

46:50

I, and I always waited over the years, man,

46:52

and just would stay up at night thinking about it since 2010 to 2021.

46:56

And when he, when he finally made it over here, like waiting

46:59

for an opportunity

47:01

to make it happen for him. And,

47:03

and, and were you guys, how did you guys

47:05

communicate during that time? Uh,

47:08

once I wrapped that job with Nat Geo, I, you know, added

47:10

them back on Facebook and we talked and strategized

47:12

and he would send me paperwork and ask questions.

47:15

And you know, we would, we're just two idiots

47:17

trying to figure out how to navigate this immigration system

47:19

as a part of America right now. Sure. You know,

47:22

we don't have the word grunts. Like,

47:24

I don't know, I'm not a lawyer, right? You know, it's

47:26

extremely difficult and backed up. And,

47:28

you know, also I was working with the

47:30

government, doing private security work with the

47:33

government. I can't be friends

47:35

with, you know, people

47:38

that aren't Americans, you know, you can, but it, man, it'll,

47:40

it'll give you some trouble when it comes to get like, you

47:42

know, time for security clearances and stuff and like that.

47:45

Um, but yeah, that

47:47

always weighed heavily on me that, man, there's something

47:49

that I could be doing more. I'm ignoring this guy,

47:52

like, um, but in my

47:54

brain, like I swear in my head, like I always knew

47:56

that we would get something. It's

47:58

going to happen. It's going to get done. We

48:01

just need that, just

48:03

a little sliver of opportunity and we're going to take

48:05

it. Did you develop

48:08

a hatred for Al-Qaeda?

48:10

Did you develop a hatred for the Taliban?

48:14

How common is that in your country? Do most

48:16

people feel that way?

48:17

Most of them, yes. Majority

48:20

of people have the same feeling, the hate from

48:22

them. I

48:24

can tell for you, since

48:27

I was born, I was born over there

48:29

and I just grew up and I just knew

48:32

my right and my left hands. I just

48:34

had a difficult

48:37

life over there. I was so

48:40

interested to have higher education,

48:42

but I couldn't because of the economic situation

48:45

over there. At the same time, because of this

48:48

politician system which is running

48:50

on that country since the

48:53

beginning until now. But

48:56

I was trying myself to be an

48:58

educated person. I'm

49:00

still not an educated person, but I just

49:02

tried my best. At that time,

49:05

my dad was very poor.

49:07

We went to

49:08

the house at that time. There

49:18

was no computer actually commonly

49:20

in the homes. I mean private computers.

49:23

No people had that much. All

49:25

of the people were just going to these

49:27

special courses, private courses,

49:29

private schools to learn computers like

49:31

this. I even

49:35

didn't have many to go to learn

49:37

computer and private schools.

49:40

My dad just borrowed

49:43

money for me to just go and

49:46

learn this since you like this. When

49:50

I just came back home, I didn't have

49:52

any computer at home. So I just draw

49:56

with the charcoal, the keyboard.

50:00

computer just like

50:03

close by the mirror of the

50:06

I mean to close by window you know

50:09

just I draw draw up by the charcoal

50:11

and I just learn the typing from

50:13

that I just I just

50:16

like imagine that the

50:18

mirror the window in front of me

50:21

is like a screen of computer and

50:23

the keyboard just under my hand

50:25

which I draw it by the charcoal is the

50:27

real computer

50:29

you can tell it better than me now

50:32

so I learned the computer by

50:34

this way you know so that's

50:36

why that's why this made me this made

50:39

me to make decision to

50:41

take out your children to other country

50:44

or take out yourself to other country

50:47

to be have not like this

50:49

yeah you know I think when the West came

50:53

into Afghanistan and you know there's a common misconception

50:55

that it was just Americans there I

50:57

mean all of them like NATO

50:59

is there you know they don't they're not

51:01

involved fully like we are but they're there you

51:04

know so with the West coming technologies

51:06

coming and it's advancing

51:08

and you know computers they're starting to be more computers

51:11

internet service cell phones smart phones

51:13

and I think the Afghan people they start

51:15

to see what's going on outside these

51:18

borders and they're seeing the rest of the the

51:20

world and I think for a lot of them guys

51:22

like Ron like oh it doesn't have to be like we're

51:25

living here we're like the only you know there's very

51:27

few countries living like we are right now yeah

51:29

yeah and you know and if you look at

51:32

you know what the Taliban the Taliban doesn't want internet

51:34

and they don't want their people to see outside

51:36

world they don't want them to have a taste of it you

51:38

know because then that'll start you know

51:41

causing that little flame in somebody do

51:43

you guys have any insight or opinions on what's

51:45

driving them I mean besides I mean I think the

51:47

misconception for a layman like me is it's just

51:49

it's all this yeah like fanatical

51:51

yeah I think it's just their interpretation

51:54

of the Quran Ram you could probably speak on

51:56

better on it than me just like the just like the

51:58

Bible that Christians look There are so many

52:01

different interpretations of it. It's

52:03

just that their interpretation of the Quran

52:05

happens to be some pretty

52:08

wild extremist views. They

52:10

are against Quran.

52:12

They are against that because

52:14

in Quran it's not saying like that's

52:17

what they are doing right now. They

52:19

put all the pupils in the cage. They

52:22

just want their own power running

52:24

the country and doing everything

52:26

for themselves and also they

52:29

do some activities

52:31

that not a human being

52:33

do that. I mean not

52:36

only Quran, not a human wants to

52:38

do that. They are not human. They

52:40

don't deserve to say they are human. They

52:43

are wild animals.

52:45

Anybody that will weaponize a child

52:48

and load a child up with explosives

52:51

and tell them to go into this building and blow themselves

52:53

up. I mean what kind of psychopath

52:55

do you have to be? I

52:58

think that convincing

53:00

people to do that comes from

53:02

not being educated and being able

53:04

to manipulate these people in the name of God.

53:08

They just use this

53:11

like a business for their own

53:13

targets. Can we ultimately

53:17

withdraw and how

53:19

did you feel about it? How did that sit with you and

53:21

what's your take on that?

53:27

We knew we were not going

53:29

to stay there forever. We can't

53:32

just take over this country. We

53:34

know we are going to leave. But

53:36

after you spend 20 years in a

53:38

country, thousands of our dudes

53:41

die. Men and women are dying. You

53:44

would think that the

53:48

result would have been better than what it was.

53:53

For instance when we were in Marjah and we

53:55

were in another place called Sangin, just hundreds

53:59

of Marines.

53:59

and army dudes died there.

54:02

But I remember going back, here I am again, referencing this

54:04

Nat Geo job, but went back with Nat Geo and

54:06

I got to see these same battle spaces that

54:09

we were in, we were patrolling. Well, now I'm back as

54:11

a civilian and we get to see

54:13

these places and

54:15

it's in Taliban control, like

54:18

a year later, two years later. What

54:21

was all that worth if we're just willing to leave?

54:25

Because it goes back to that clear hold

54:27

build phase. Well, we did the clear phase,

54:30

where was the hold and build? Where

54:34

was that? If that was your great idea, where was that? And

54:36

why was that worth sacrificing a

54:38

bunch of 19, 20 year old kids? Because that's who's

54:40

dying, make no mistake. It

54:43

is a bunch of kids over there

54:45

dying.

54:46

Why wasn't that held?

54:47

I think that we set

54:50

up the Afghan army. Now

54:53

they could have done a thousand things better, no doubt.

54:55

But we kept the war going

54:58

on the American side through massive air bases

55:00

that are over there. You got Camp Leatherneck,

55:03

Bastion, Kandahar

55:05

Airfield, J-Bad, up

55:08

in Kabul. There's bases everywhere that

55:10

are running aircraft out to places like

55:12

margin saying, and to resupply us, with

55:15

beans, bullets, band-aids.

55:18

When we left, the

55:20

Afghan army didn't have that ability to resupply

55:23

themselves. And the whole

55:25

time, we're over there telling the Afghans, look, this is how

55:27

you do it. This is how you patrol, this is how

55:30

you, and it's like, okay, but how do you resupply?

55:32

And that's something, in my opinion, was never really

55:34

focused on with the Afghans.

55:36

They can't resupply themselves. They're out here

55:38

in these remote patrol bases.

55:41

The closest person's 50 miles away. They're

55:44

getting overrun, and they did all the

55:46

time. Those patrol bases that we handed over to those

55:48

Afghans were overrun all the time.

55:51

They'd either run out of rounds or

55:54

take five rounds with them and take their uniforms off and

55:56

leave. But we set them

55:59

up.

56:01

I'm not going to say we set them

56:03

up for failure, but they

56:06

can't resupply themselves. So how are they going to survive?

56:09

Once they left or once you went to

56:11

the Corps of Engineers, are you worried

56:13

for your safety every day? Exactly.

56:16

And what's that like? I mean, like, how

56:18

many people in your life know? I mean, how

56:22

common was it that ex-interpreters

56:24

were being hunted down? Yeah,

56:27

I can tell you, they are right now,

56:29

you know, you can search in Google. There are

56:31

a lot of interpreters killed since

56:33

Americans left over there. I mean, not

56:36

in these last two years.

56:38

Even on that time, you know, in the previous

56:40

government, you know, they just have

56:42

access, especially outside.

56:45

When you just walked outside of the Kabul,

56:47

you know, from the capital, the

56:49

Taliban were present on that time, you

56:51

know, when they just captured the pupils.

56:54

They have especially, I mean, the biometric

56:56

system with yourself. They just put your

56:58

fingers on that, and all

57:01

of your data will just appear

57:03

for them. And they just know, recognize

57:06

you that this guy worked for the Americans

57:08

as interpreters. Not only

57:10

interpreters, also, they just killed

57:13

many – I can tell you thousands

57:15

of NA, I mean Afghan National Army at the

57:17

same time. Yeah, would just line them up

57:19

and execute. Yeah, because interpreters

57:22

and Afghan National Army had biometric, you

57:24

know. Can you explain that? What's

57:27

the biometric? It's a kind of like

57:30

ice

57:31

cleaning and

57:33

also the fingers, you know.

57:35

So when they just put your fingers

57:37

on their machines, small machines,

57:40

and also your eyes, it just appeared

57:43

that this guy is working with the government or alongside

57:45

with the US Army. So in this reason,

57:48

I had concern. Every day I

57:50

would suffer for this.

57:52

So if this happened for

57:54

me, what should my children do? Yeah, there's

57:56

a vetting process that takes place when guys

57:58

like Rahm come to work with us. us an Afghan army,

58:01

you know, I'm gonna make you look at me and I'm gonna take a

58:03

picture you're this crazy science fiction

58:05

machine that takes pictures of your retina and

58:07

your fingerprints. Well, eventually,

58:09

where's that information gonna end up? You

58:12

know, for instance, like when the country collapse, where did all

58:14

that go? Yeah, well, it goes into the hands of the new

58:16

regime. They have everything from helicopters

58:19

to guns to night vision to all

58:21

of our allies information. Wow.

58:24

And that's how it's being that's how these guys are being hunted.

58:26

Did that hit you immediately? Like

58:29

that that that he was in danger? Yeah,

58:32

I mean, I knew it since we left there in 2010 and

58:34

or 2011. When we left,

58:37

you know, like I am we, we all kind of anticipated

58:39

that eventually would end badly,

58:42

but never to the extent

58:45

that it did never did I think that we would leave

58:48

guys like ROM over there. You

58:50

know, I would at least think we would like expedite

58:53

their immigration process to get them out. You

58:55

know, I mean, shit, they were on the front lines with us.

58:58

Right. You know, so never

59:00

did I ever expect that it would go down like

59:02

it did. And I don't know how familiar you are. Yeah,

59:05

well, I mean, I'd love for you to walk me through

59:07

it. But just, you

59:09

know, there was a basically a meeting between the US

59:12

and I'm paraphrasing here, but there's a meeting that takes

59:14

place between the US government and

59:16

the Taliban saying, okay, we're out of here. Yeah.

59:19

We want you to give us a little bit of time. But we're

59:22

going to get out of here. And the Taliban is very firm on

59:24

you guys are going to be out by

59:26

this date, you know, and now it's public.

59:28

Okay, Americans are out, it's hitting the news, everybody,

59:31

you know, news channels are pouring into the country

59:33

to try and because the Taliban is coming, you

59:35

know, and before they took over Kabul,

59:37

I mean, you know, Taliban,

59:39

you know, Afghanistan looks like this, they're taking

59:42

over cities and provinces, and they're coming in. And

59:44

they're going to close on the capital Kabul. And then, you

59:46

know, Afghanistan is going to be the Taliban again. But

59:49

you know, from a strategic standpoint, and I'm

59:51

no general, right? But

59:53

why would you take away the giant air bases

59:56

that were the spine of the war for America,

59:58

you know, JBAC? Kandahar,

1:00:01

Leatherneck, Bastion, go down the line of these giant

1:00:03

air bases that kept us afloat for 20 years.

1:00:06

Why would you take those away

1:00:08

in the middle of an evacuation? You know,

1:00:11

you know, I think a lot of times with the clusterfuck

1:00:14

that the evacuation was, you

1:00:16

know, you hear the politicians say, oh well we

1:00:18

evacuated a hundred thousand people. You know,

1:00:20

a hundred thousand, that's the largest air evacuation in the

1:00:23

history of probably the world. And it's

1:00:25

like, well if you were willing to

1:00:28

evacuate a hundred thousand people like that without

1:00:30

vetting these people really and figuring out who they

1:00:32

are,

1:00:33

you know,

1:00:34

why didn't you do that for the past 20 years? Right,

1:00:36

right. Why did you have to bring it down to like

1:00:39

it was? Like the why.

1:00:41

Yeah, I mean the amount of people,

1:00:43

specifically kids, that were killed

1:00:46

outside that airport in Kabul was

1:00:49

unfathomable, you know. And US

1:00:52

military, you know, 13 US service members got

1:00:54

killed by a suicide attack. In

1:00:56

my opinion, keep these

1:00:58

bases around and then okay,

1:01:00

you're gonna evac people, okay, cool, Roger

1:01:03

that. You guys, you know, drug your feet

1:01:05

on it, but alright, maybe start flying them

1:01:07

to these other bases where we've got a great standoff,

1:01:10

where we're not gonna get hit with rockets and gunfire,

1:01:13

where you look at the airport in Kabul, the Taliban are literally

1:01:15

holding hands with Marines basically. Not

1:01:17

actually holding hands, but I mean they're from here to you. We've

1:01:20

been fighting these guys for 20 years and I'm watching

1:01:22

on TV, there's a 19 year old kid with an M4

1:01:24

standing right next to a Taliban dude and

1:01:27

you're like, what is going on

1:01:29

here right now? What is happening?

1:01:31

Yeah, so it was a cluster fuck.

1:01:34

And what was that time like from your

1:01:36

perspective? I mean, is it you just do whatever

1:01:38

you can to get out?

1:01:40

Actually, I wasn't in Kabul

1:01:42

on that time when the country fell back

1:01:44

into the hands of them. I mean, Taliban.

1:01:47

I was in Istanbul for a business

1:01:49

trip. At the same time, I was trying

1:01:52

to gain a visa for my family. I mean

1:01:54

before clubs, the country, I

1:01:56

was tried four times for

1:01:59

my family to get the visa, turkey visa,

1:02:01

to move them to that country to

1:02:04

live over there. And where was your family? In

1:02:06

Kabul. Yeah, in Kabul. So

1:02:09

I was in Istanbul when the country

1:02:11

just collapsed and my family just

1:02:14

stopped. I was overwhelmed on that time.

1:02:16

It was like heartbreaking for me.

1:02:18

So yeah, imagine your family

1:02:21

being in a country that was just taken over by the Taliban.

1:02:23

You're in another country.

1:02:25

It was like killing me, you know. Eight

1:02:28

seconds was like passing

1:02:30

for me like two,

1:02:31

one year. What's communication like?

1:02:34

I mean, are you talking to them on the phone?

1:02:36

Like how? Yeah, exactly. But are you worried about

1:02:38

WhatsApp? Yeah, WhatsApp on that time. Okay. In

1:02:40

the first days when they just came

1:02:43

and had take over the country, the

1:02:45

internet was working. But just after

1:02:48

five or four days later, they

1:02:50

just stopped and just decrease the

1:02:53

internet access for the pupils because

1:02:56

the pupils just like broadcast in

1:02:58

the media what they do with the pupils,

1:03:00

you know, and the first

1:03:01

days when they arrived over there,

1:03:04

they just killed thousands of people,

1:03:06

thousands, you know, all the A&E

1:03:09

pupils, all the interpreters, all the pupils

1:03:11

who just like against

1:03:13

them in these past 20 years.

1:03:16

So I was in Istanbul and this

1:03:19

this incident happened.

1:03:22

I didn't know what should I do in this time.

1:03:24

I have no idea except just

1:03:26

I texted to Travis on that time.

1:03:29

Yeah, I just texted him like,

1:03:31

Hey, dear brother, please

1:03:33

help me. It

1:03:43

was a wild time. Yeah,

1:03:55

so I just told him to please

1:03:58

help my family. Get

1:04:01

out of that hell.

1:04:18

So I've received that message from him

1:04:20

on Facebook. I

1:04:23

get a message from him because we're friends again on Facebook.

1:04:27

I'm in San Francisco at the time. I'm in the Bay Area

1:04:29

for work. I'm sitting around and, of

1:04:33

course, I'm watching all of this on the news. I

1:04:35

know he's going to reach out to me and boom,

1:04:38

the message comes across. I'm watching

1:04:40

the news and everybody that I work

1:04:42

with is former military guys in the protection field.

1:04:45

We're all just sitting around drinking beer like,

1:04:47

man, can you believe what's going on

1:04:49

here right now? I

1:04:53

remember watching the news and watching them at the airport, recognizing

1:04:56

places there in Kabul and seeing

1:04:58

the Taliban and kind of doing our own little intel

1:05:00

gathering through sources on the internet,

1:05:03

people we have on the ground. I

1:05:05

use Snapchat a lot. I know that sounds like something

1:05:08

a 12-year-old would use, but on

1:05:10

Snapchat you can get on these heat

1:05:13

maps where people can post live to where they're at. It's

1:05:15

a great source of information. I

1:05:18

remember for five, ten

1:05:21

years I'm on Snapchat popping

1:05:23

over into Kabul and looking, okay, I don't see any Taliban

1:05:25

anywhere. Then when that happened,

1:05:27

I remember popping on Snapchat to kind of get a live

1:05:30

view of what's outside the airport. The

1:05:32

Taliban's been hiding for 20 years. They don't want to be

1:05:34

known and seen. But once

1:05:36

they took over and they're taken over these provinces

1:05:39

and they make their way into Kabul, now they're

1:05:41

not scared anymore. They don't have to hide anymore.

1:05:45

I remember hopping on those heat maps and seeing them everywhere,

1:05:47

and it was like, holy fuck.

1:05:51

Yeah. And

1:05:54

what are the conversations with

1:05:56

you and your wife? What

1:05:59

do you think? saying to her and

1:06:02

what are those conversations like? Yeah, I'm

1:06:04

gonna just explain you after I just received

1:06:06

a

1:06:07

positive response from Travis. He

1:06:09

wasn't his job, you

1:06:11

know? Travis

1:06:13

was not at home. He just told me that

1:06:16

right now I just fly and

1:06:19

just like he quit, you know? He

1:06:21

just quit his job, not for one

1:06:23

day, one week, one month, just for more than

1:06:25

one year, just for my

1:06:27

family. So

1:06:31

I just transferred the same thing what

1:06:33

Travis told me for my wife. So

1:06:36

for a woman, for a young woman,

1:06:39

it was difficult to trust, especially on

1:06:41

that situation, you know? She

1:06:43

just told me, you're

1:06:45

crazy and your brother that

1:06:48

you're calling his brother,

1:06:50

you're crazy. You both are

1:06:52

outside this country and you don't know the

1:06:54

situation, what's happening. And my

1:06:57

kids, my wife was so

1:06:59

scary. They were so worried. They

1:07:01

were just waiting for killing, you know? Every

1:07:04

second that somebody can knock the door

1:07:06

and kill that. And what were they doing? What

1:07:09

is her day to day then? I mean, is she in

1:07:11

hiding? What did she do? Yeah,

1:07:14

I tell you right now.

1:07:15

And the first day just came here, they

1:07:18

were in my father's home, which

1:07:20

was at the east part of Kabul.

1:07:23

It's called Carte Nao. They were just over

1:07:25

there in my own home, the home that

1:07:27

I built it with my own hands, you know? They

1:07:30

were over there. But I just told them,

1:07:33

please

1:07:34

go away from there. Since I received

1:07:36

the message from Travis, I told

1:07:38

them my father-in-law home,

1:07:41

it was so close with the airport. That's

1:07:44

why I just evacuated, I just told them to

1:07:46

relocate, move from that

1:07:49

location to other location to

1:07:51

your father's home. I told her this.

1:07:54

So she just started moving from my

1:07:56

father's home to her father's home, which

1:07:58

was close by the airport.

1:07:59

airport.

1:08:00

And I was just

1:08:03

telling the same thing what Travis told for

1:08:05

me. I just told him, told

1:08:07

her to get ready just

1:08:11

for moving to the airport. And

1:08:13

the first day just like felt in

1:08:17

their first attempt to get to the airport.

1:08:20

We tried so much and like

1:08:23

you asked about how you conversation,

1:08:25

how was your conversation. The internet was

1:08:28

not working at all inside, I

1:08:30

mean around the airport. There were so

1:08:32

many people crammed into there. Actually

1:08:35

not only because of the people, you

1:08:37

know, the Americans,

1:08:39

you know, I

1:08:41

just forgot that MOA, that's

1:08:44

such kind of machines.

1:08:47

The Americans just turn it on, the signal,

1:08:49

the internet was not working around the airport.

1:08:52

It was a big problem over

1:08:54

there. At the same time, I think that

1:08:57

Taliban also just like limited

1:09:00

the internet access for the

1:09:02

people. So I just, I was like

1:09:05

calling. I just made a connection

1:09:08

with my sister-in-law, which was at

1:09:10

whom and she was just

1:09:13

calling to my wife on direct

1:09:15

line and direct phone. Then

1:09:17

she was calling, she was like

1:09:20

passing all the conversation of me

1:09:22

to my wife, then from my wife to me. Then

1:09:25

I just called, like

1:09:27

transferred all the conversation to

1:09:29

travel at the same time. It was like

1:09:32

unbelievable, you know, difficult

1:09:35

situation.

1:09:37

And

1:09:38

so they just felt in their first attempt

1:09:40

to enter the airport.

1:09:43

It was like a huge chaos,

1:09:45

you know,

1:09:46

around the airport. Like I can tell you

1:09:48

more than 100,000 or 200,000, 300,000 pupils gathered in a very small space.

1:09:57

On concrete too, you know, concrete

1:09:59

bottoms. and then you got concrete walls

1:10:01

or cult tea walls. It's already hot

1:10:03

there, it's August. So you can imagine the

1:10:06

heat that's created. They're like little human

1:10:08

ovens. And the idea is what? Like you gather by

1:10:10

the airport. You wait by the airport and everybody's

1:10:12

got whatever documents they have, however

1:10:15

they're associated with Americans, like get us

1:10:17

out. And who's deciphering who

1:10:19

gets out or not? I mean, how are you? You're just waiting

1:10:21

on paperwork from the State Department. Everybody's

1:10:24

applying for SIVs and P2s,

1:10:26

they're called online. During

1:10:29

this time when he contacts me, I'm

1:10:31

in San Francisco, I'm

1:10:33

fucking pissed off.

1:10:34

It's like I cannot believe that my guy's family

1:10:37

is still there after all of this time. The

1:10:39

sacrifices he's made. We've been trying, I mean, he

1:10:42

won't say it, but he was there with us

1:10:44

through everything. My unit ripped

1:10:46

out and left, he stayed with the other Marine unit, was

1:10:49

blown up with them, was

1:10:51

knocked out with them. This guy has put his time

1:10:53

in. And here I am sitting in a hotel

1:10:56

in San Francisco, safe,

1:10:59

my family's safe, everything's good. It's

1:11:02

just an experience for me. I went to the war,

1:11:04

this is his life. But

1:11:08

yeah, he reached out to me and then I kind of talked

1:11:11

to a couple close people in my circle and most of them

1:11:14

were like, dude, there's nothing you can do. You

1:11:16

just gotta let this go. And from the

1:11:18

outside, now that I've talked to those people

1:11:20

now, they were like, yeah, dude, you looked rough, because

1:11:23

I was up. I was awake,

1:11:25

I'm such a schemer at heart. We're

1:11:28

gonna make something happen. And

1:11:31

yeah, he contacted me and then I

1:11:33

was like, reached out to buddies on my team

1:11:35

and a lot of them were like, dude, there's nothing you can do, let it go.

1:11:37

And then I got one close friend was like,

1:11:40

dude, there's something we can do here. And

1:11:43

I called my boss, I said, I'm out of here. This

1:11:45

is what's going on, fire me. I

1:11:47

quit, whatever happens, I don't care, I'm out of here. Flew

1:11:51

back home to Tennessee and then pulled

1:11:53

out my computer. I had two computers and

1:11:55

my two cell phones running at a time,

1:11:58

just trying to gather intel of what's going on. going on

1:12:00

here, trying to tap into whatever networks.

1:12:02

Okay, who do I know that's there right now? Because

1:12:05

I've seen it from the military side. I've

1:12:07

seen it from the media side. I've

1:12:09

seen it from the private security contracting

1:12:11

side. I've got contacts there.

1:12:14

I just have to go down my Rolodex and find out who's

1:12:16

there and see who can

1:12:18

help us.

1:12:20

And that was the whole goal for the next,

1:12:23

basically two weeks, was

1:12:25

trying to find people there that

1:12:28

were able. We'd find people and they're like, dude, there's

1:12:30

nothing we can do. It's a

1:12:32

mess. It's a fucking mess. Everybody that has a contact

1:12:34

over here is doing exactly what you're doing right

1:12:36

now. Right, right, right.

1:12:37

Yeah.

1:12:39

And so I'm pulling up maps on computers

1:12:42

and during that time, there's underground

1:12:45

groups being created of just

1:12:47

guys like me, former military dudes that have

1:12:49

contacts over there that were trying to

1:12:51

get these people out. And so these groups are

1:12:53

being created and you're slipping into them and

1:12:55

these group threads and you're finding

1:12:57

information on that, solid intel,

1:13:00

some shitty intel, and you're taking whatever

1:13:02

information's there, finding

1:13:05

out where all the Taliban checkpoints are and plotting them

1:13:08

on our maps and then developing a

1:13:10

plan how we're gonna get his

1:13:12

family to the airport. But the hardest part

1:13:14

was finding somebody to be

1:13:16

able to snatch them out of

1:13:19

a gate where there's 100,000 people.

1:13:21

And get them on a plane. And to get them on a plane. Yeah.

1:13:24

And then I started tapping into my network

1:13:26

of,

1:13:28

just who do I know out there? And

1:13:31

I reached out to a guy that I had protected

1:13:33

in the Middle East. And

1:13:36

he's kind of a big wig now. And you

1:13:38

don't reach out to people you protect

1:13:41

and ask for favors. It's just you're crossing

1:13:43

the line.

1:13:45

But at that point I was like, I don't care who it

1:13:47

is. I'm gonna ask. So I

1:13:49

hit this and we were friends on

1:13:52

social media and I hit him up and boom, he got right

1:13:54

back to me. Which

1:13:56

is not, you don't see that in government.

1:14:00

type people you know it's just they're

1:14:03

not as helpful as you would want him to be

1:14:05

man I reached out to this dude he got back

1:14:07

to me and said one of my contact is one of my contacts

1:14:10

is en route there right now this is his name

1:14:13

he'll be on ground in like 10 hours and we're gonna try

1:14:15

and make something happen so it was like that gave us like a

1:14:17

glimmer

1:14:18

of hope

1:14:20

and so I told him what was going on and then that's

1:14:22

when we started to develop the plan and I was showing

1:14:24

him maps you know here's the overhead of the airport

1:14:28

there's like I don't know probably 10

1:14:30

different gates that people are

1:14:32

coming through you know the Brits are helping out the Canadians

1:14:34

are over there the US all

1:14:37

of our allies are you know trying to get their

1:14:39

allies out as well so

1:14:42

we started develop that plan and just

1:14:44

try and be patient and

1:14:47

all while this is happening we know when attacks coming

1:14:50

anybody who's got a brain or any sort

1:14:52

of like tactical sense know that

1:14:54

there's gonna be an attack that happens here so you're

1:14:56

fighting the clock you know look how

1:14:59

close it packed everybody is look how close they

1:15:01

are to the military and they know they know

1:15:04

you've got Americans and other

1:15:06

allied forces there you got ex-interpreters

1:15:08

families of like everyone there is everybody

1:15:11

that's at the airport is trying to leave

1:15:14

Afghanistan so they're all the enemy

1:15:16

to the Taliban and that ticking clock for everybody

1:15:18

at the airport is very much real very much you don't

1:15:20

make it out you are going to be left behind

1:15:23

yeah yeah

1:15:24

yeah exactly

1:15:26

so all we know while that's going on we're

1:15:29

trying to develop plan and at one point I'm watching the news

1:15:31

you know I'm watching the news some reporters

1:15:34

doing a piece to the camera there and I look in the back

1:15:36

I'm like that's my I know this dude

1:15:38

back there and he's on a gig over there with this person

1:15:42

and I reach out to him and he's like

1:15:44

doing a or the lady that he's with is doing

1:15:46

a live piece to the camera and

1:15:49

I'm like holy shit that's the dude that's him you

1:15:51

know I'm not gonna say his name but he so I

1:15:53

like pull up my phone and I send him a message

1:15:55

I'm watching you right now yeah yeah and

1:15:58

it was like a glimmer of hope you know like somebody's

1:16:00

there that I know what's

1:16:02

this look like out here right now you know what's

1:16:05

going on do you see a good avenue what's

1:16:07

what what's the best gate we could send this family

1:16:09

to and but

1:16:11

yeah it was like a glimmer open I'd reach out and text

1:16:13

this guy and then there's like a delay you know there's

1:16:16

like a 10 15 seconds away because they're on the other

1:16:18

side of the world and I sure enough I see him like

1:16:20

take it shut up yeah and he's

1:16:22

texting me back and I'm in my hotel room

1:16:25

probably butt naked you know like jumping

1:16:27

on my bed like here we go you know

1:16:30

and then once once that happened I

1:16:34

that's when I told my boss you know my team was like I'm

1:16:36

out here I'm going back to Tennessee we're gonna make something happen you

1:16:38

know and I hopped on a flight went back to Tennessee and

1:16:41

set up the little I call it the redneck

1:16:43

Jason Bourne operation you know yeah

1:16:46

like we're gonna make something happen right here and so I got

1:16:48

the computers and everything set up and you know by the

1:16:51

time I got home that that contact had

1:16:53

landed on ground from the guy that I protected

1:16:55

his friend it was on ground and

1:16:57

I already had messages like in the chamber for

1:17:00

him to receive as soon as he lands hey I'm a friend

1:17:02

of so-and-so he's pointing me in your direction

1:17:04

what can you do

1:17:06

you know he responded back with you know I just got

1:17:08

here give

1:17:08

me a couple hours we'll assess the situation and

1:17:10

what's going on we'll

1:17:13

go from there so you know be on standby be

1:17:15

ready to move and at this point I mean

1:17:17

like when you're breaking this story down to somebody

1:17:20

new it's like at this point I mean you're you're communicating

1:17:22

mostly through through message right yeah boy

1:17:25

yes everything's yeah you're here I mean you're

1:17:27

you're making these appeals yeah I mean you

1:17:29

know exactly what to write what are you writing

1:17:32

I'm not trying to leave any fat

1:17:34

on what I'm writing right right people that are

1:17:36

there don't have time don't have time for that no

1:17:38

here's what's going on you know this is tremendously important

1:17:40

yeah to know the sacrifice this is this is the

1:17:42

guy here's my connection with him here's his family

1:17:45

this is what they look like they're right now can you help great

1:17:47

if you can't help yeah I don't care if you're the

1:17:49

president of the United States I don't want to fucking talk

1:17:51

oh yeah yeah I don't have time yeah yeah yeah we

1:17:53

are on you know the urgency right now it's

1:17:56

unreal and and when you when when you're getting

1:17:58

this information and then you're communicating

1:18:00

back because you have no line to

1:18:02

his family. I don't speak the language. Right.

1:18:05

Is there a risk every time you're communicating

1:18:07

with your family? Is there a risk? I

1:18:10

mean, just that communication that could be intercepted,

1:18:13

that's putting them in danger? Absolutely.

1:18:16

It was high risk. Every

1:18:18

second I was scared or

1:18:20

worried, maybe they will just like track

1:18:22

my wife. Right. So do you have to decipher

1:18:25

sort of this is a message I want to pass on

1:18:27

or this is a message. I'll wait until I get

1:18:29

a little bit more to give something. I

1:18:32

would like telling to my wife to please

1:18:34

delete every message

1:18:36

you're receiving from me. Just delete

1:18:38

it. Delete it. Yeah. Got it. Got it.

1:18:41

Yeah. Got it. As soon as you get it. Got

1:18:44

it. Got it. Yeah. Got it. She

1:18:46

also needed a lot of people are showing up with paperwork

1:18:49

to plead their case. Like, hey, this is the

1:18:51

paperwork that I have. Please

1:18:53

let us through. Right. Well, they're

1:18:55

crossing through. There's 30 Taliban checkpoints

1:18:58

outside the airport right now. So if

1:19:00

that you know, you're going, oh, come here. Here you let

1:19:02

me search you real quick. Now I got this document.

1:19:05

Let's go over here in this back alley over here real quick.

1:19:08

And that's what was going on. So where

1:19:10

did she end up bringing paperwork with her

1:19:12

that she had? Yeah, yeah. I

1:19:15

just told her

1:19:16

to please keep this like hiding

1:19:19

the paperwork that Travis sent me.

1:19:21

And also I sent her in the email.

1:19:24

Then he she just like put that all

1:19:26

the paperwork inside her brace.

1:19:30

And because if the Taliban search

1:19:33

them,

1:19:34

they will like didn't touch on the woman's.

1:19:37

We know this because they didn't

1:19:39

do this. For the males, they just

1:19:41

search it all around the

1:19:44

body. So that's why she just put that

1:19:46

all the paperwork here. And because

1:19:48

of the checkpoints. So she's putting that all

1:19:51

within her bra or whatever. But what are you telling

1:19:53

her to say when she goes through Taliban?

1:19:56

I mean, because if they're there, they're trying to get out.

1:19:58

Like what is she did she go through? check

1:20:00

points that they did and then

1:20:02

one many and many

1:20:05

and so what is she saying to the Taliban yeah

1:20:07

well actually oh let

1:20:10

me just back up a little bit here

1:20:12

you know we knew that it's his wife

1:20:15

and her three small kids and we're

1:20:17

watching on TV and gathering information the airports

1:20:19

are wreck people are being trampled babies are

1:20:21

dying kids are dying just being thrown

1:20:23

on seawire you know the Constantina barbed

1:20:26

wire they did dead kids everywhere

1:20:28

it is a chaos and it's a fight

1:20:30

to get out of this country and

1:20:33

so I knew that his wife

1:20:35

and those kids aren't gonna make it through you know so

1:20:38

we start kind of exploring okay who can help

1:20:40

them like she had she had two

1:20:43

brothers two younger brothers that I you know

1:20:45

I like enlisted to help you know

1:20:47

he had mentioned them before I was like okay

1:20:49

this could work and so I was giving them like

1:20:51

I need to see how like reliable these people

1:20:54

people are because if I tell you to walk

1:20:57

and I tell you to take 15 seconds

1:20:59

or 15 steps and then stop

1:21:02

right there and then turn in that alley I need you to do exactly

1:21:04

that because I got a contact walking around out

1:21:06

here that's trying to snatch you you need to do exactly

1:21:08

what I'm telling you to do mm-hmm

1:21:11

so I was I started giving them like little side

1:21:14

quests you know like hey go get a stroller

1:21:17

no I told you I said go get go

1:21:21

get a go get a wheelchair yeah go

1:21:23

get a wheelchair you know and I

1:21:25

want to put your wife in a wheelchair so she can hold the

1:21:27

kids in an umbrella so she can

1:21:29

stay in the shade and you know and maybe

1:21:31

they'll take pity on her you know you're

1:21:33

still you're just coming up with whatever you can come up

1:21:35

with so they run down to the bazaar and they

1:21:38

come back with a stroller yeah you

1:21:40

know and so instead of a wheelchair it was a stroller

1:21:42

and at that point I remember we shared like a little bit of humor

1:21:45

you know like hey you learned a new word today yeah

1:21:47

yeah that's called a stroller you know

1:21:50

and I'd send them to go out and get like battery

1:21:52

packs for cell phones you know because who knows I

1:21:55

want you're gonna stay there until that last plane leaves we're

1:21:57

gonna give it 100% everything that we got

1:22:00

So they come back and they proved, you know, okay,

1:22:02

they're listening to me, we can make something happen. And

1:22:04

I told them to tie like a

1:22:06

red scarf around them so they can be

1:22:08

identified. And I told them to go out and take

1:22:11

a picture of everybody so I can send it to

1:22:13

my contact, you know, so we, my

1:22:15

contact knows what these people look like. But

1:22:18

then once they had all the equipment and,

1:22:20

you know, gear to make this push to the airport and

1:22:22

water, I

1:22:25

reached out to my contact, said, they're ready. It's like, all right,

1:22:27

send them. And so we send them to a gate called

1:22:29

Eastgate. First. And

1:22:31

they go to the gate and I mean, it is a fucking

1:22:34

madhouse, you know, just like you can envision.

1:22:36

Just thousands upon thousands

1:22:38

of people, you know, just

1:22:41

nut to butt this close with kids,

1:22:43

you know, just chaos. All the kids

1:22:45

are, you know, sick and tired and heat

1:22:47

stroking and sitting out there all day. And

1:22:50

so his family sat out there and I had a, I

1:22:52

actually had a contact, you

1:22:54

know, the airports like this and Eastgate's

1:22:57

like right here. He left through a gate

1:22:59

over here and, you know, traversed

1:23:01

through Taliban checkpoints. Just a single guy

1:23:04

came out dressed like, you know, Afghan, went

1:23:07

out and, you know, at that time his family

1:23:09

was relaying exactly where they're

1:23:11

at. And I was having them take videos and pictures

1:23:14

so then I can relay to my contact. Okay, this is

1:23:16

what you need to look for. They're around this area. And

1:23:19

I remember they were underneath a little green canopy

1:23:22

like this, you know, umbrella here. And

1:23:25

my contact made it all the way up there to him

1:23:27

and I identified him and

1:23:29

saw him. But there was nothing he could do. You

1:23:32

know, if he would have, he couldn't get through that

1:23:34

gate. He couldn't make it through a hundred, you know, or

1:23:36

through tens of thousands of people that were at Eastgate

1:23:39

at that time. So we had to wave it off,

1:23:41

you know, and that was such a like, dude,

1:23:43

we were so close, you know, and his

1:23:45

family ended up waiting and waiting and waiting out

1:23:47

there. And his kids, you know, had heat stroke and they

1:23:49

ended up leaving. And they couldn't, the kids needed

1:23:52

to get out of the sun. And so

1:23:54

his family ended up leaving and

1:23:56

going back home and

1:23:59

just rehydrated. And then it's like we're gonna do it again

1:24:01

and at that point his wife was just terrified,

1:24:04

you know Like and

1:24:06

again, she's talking to two guys

1:24:08

that are running this operation that aren't even in the country

1:24:11

Right. He's like who the fuck are these guys? Right.

1:24:14

Yeah, I want to like be hundredth person

1:24:16

to be dear, you know,

1:24:18

because my wife was alone Yeah, it

1:24:20

was a long nobody was what it makes

1:24:22

it impossible. It makes it more dangerous. Yeah Yeah,

1:24:25

but at the same time it was more

1:24:27

dangerous if I was I couldn't

1:24:30

go there, you know Yeah, the borders were

1:24:32

closed. Yeah, there's no way no

1:24:34

flight. No flight nothing. Yeah. Yeah,

1:24:37

so it was like

1:24:39

Very difficult for me each seconds.

1:24:42

It was

1:24:43

like putting me on the grave, you

1:24:45

know

1:24:46

second by seconds and we

1:24:49

not only me me and Travis, you know,

1:24:51

we didn't like

1:24:52

Sleep

1:24:53

for more than one week day

1:24:55

and night. We just work on

1:24:58

this To out of that

1:25:00

to out them safely from that situation

1:25:04

So what happens what happens next

1:25:09

So we're gonna go round two at the airport now

1:25:11

Eastgate was an epic failure and

1:25:13

like a punch to the gut You know, I had

1:25:15

confidence going into when the family went to Eastgate.

1:25:17

It was like I got a guy there Like we're gonna

1:25:20

make this happen. I know Marines are there,

1:25:22

you know, which is like those are my boys You know, those are

1:25:24

my people are you in contact with

1:25:27

them? I'm trying real real hard. I'm

1:25:29

up on Instagram I'm looking at you know, they're

1:25:31

all free to frame that I saw on the internet or on

1:25:33

the news and of a name tape with A unit.

1:25:35

Okay, that's this unit that's there. Wow, and then

1:25:37

you just track and then I'm getting online,

1:25:39

you know At night in Kabul,

1:25:41

you know because we're there at different times, you

1:25:44

know So while Afghan, you know while Kabul

1:25:46

sleeping in the airport shut down I'm

1:25:49

back home here trying to collect

1:25:51

Intel. Okay make a plan on what's going on

1:25:53

and then When Kabul wakes

1:25:55

up everybody's back to trying to go to the airport. Well,

1:25:57

I can't sleep because I'm in contact with my

1:26:00

With my contact who's trying to you know, you

1:26:02

got to be like on your toes because once this dude says

1:26:04

go You got to go. Yeah,

1:26:07

so you don't want to bend that because you're a fucking heart easier.

1:26:09

Yeah, click in a nap Yeah, and you

1:26:11

know during that whole time where I'm making Contingency

1:26:14

plan after contingency plan. I'm Zooming

1:26:17

the map out looking at the overhead. Okay, I'm

1:26:20

I'm reaching out to redneck buddies back in

1:26:22

Tennessee that are good at driving dirt bikes It's

1:26:25

like hey, I know you're a crazy fuck Would

1:26:28

you be willing to fly in to say India with me

1:26:30

we cross into Pakistan and then we go in the border

1:26:32

right acquire car We're gonna get this dude's family

1:26:34

out right, right? Of course that dude's like whatever

1:26:37

man. Yeah, whose car we taking? So

1:26:41

we're making all plans, you know just every

1:26:43

plan that you could make yeah

1:26:46

And just scared out of your mind the whole time,

1:26:49

you know, I never had I've never had that kind of pressure on

1:26:51

me before Sure, this isn't just some random

1:26:53

dude who reached out to me. This is my interpreter's family

1:26:56

You know and I'd never met his kids. But once

1:26:58

he starts sending me pictures of his kids, man.

1:27:00

It's like Dude, you

1:27:03

fall in love with them immediately. Yeah, immediately.

1:27:05

You're like, I know these kids I've never met him.

1:27:08

Yeah, but his little son looks just like him. Yeah,

1:27:10

we're gonna get these dudes out Yeah, yeah. Yeah,

1:27:13

and now you're on mission I mean this is but dude

1:27:15

the amount of pressure that was on,

1:27:17

you know I'm sitting at home in Tennessee in front of some

1:27:19

computers and I got a little golf cart. I drive

1:27:21

around I live on the river I got four acres and

1:27:23

I'm riding around in my golf cart with my headphones

1:27:25

in Waiting for calls from contacts

1:27:28

texting him Strategizing

1:27:31

and my brain and my neighbors, you know, they're all like what

1:27:33

the hell is this dude doing in here? Yeah,

1:27:35

and you know my wife she was my girlfriend at the time But

1:27:38

you know from I think from an outsider's perspective

1:27:40

It looked like I was having a PTSD

1:27:43

meltdown and I don't blame him for that. Yeah

1:27:46

But there's no time to walk there's no time to

1:27:48

even have that conversation. Right? Right. There's

1:27:50

no time Right clock is literally

1:27:52

ticking right now, right?

1:27:55

So that you know as the

1:27:59

the days progressed It's like, okay, we're going to make another

1:28:01

run on this gate. And my contact

1:28:03

reached out to me and, and, you know, he's

1:28:05

like, I think Abigay is going to be our best

1:28:08

bet. Let's try and get him through Abigay. And

1:28:10

I agreed with him. You know, I'd seen the overhead maps

1:28:13

and other video that I've obtained from

1:28:15

that gate, it's the best place

1:28:17

to get grabbed from the crowd. You know, the Marines

1:28:19

have an extension out there. There's

1:28:21

like a big road that comes across and

1:28:23

all the Afghans are lined up on this road,

1:28:26

and then here's your entrance into the

1:28:28

airport. That's where everybody's trying to get to. So

1:28:30

there's just thousands of people

1:28:33

packed in here. And then there's

1:28:35

a sewage canal. And

1:28:37

then there's all the Marines that are lined up and other

1:28:39

government entities that are there maintaining security,

1:28:42

make sure nobody jumps over the walls and the right

1:28:44

people are coming through. So

1:28:46

my contact reached out to me and says, Abby

1:28:48

gates it. We're going to do it at this time. Get your family

1:28:50

ready. So reached out to him like, Hey, make sure

1:28:53

your kids are hydrating, eating food.

1:28:55

Convinced your wife to go, you

1:28:57

know, because at this point she's like, no, I'm not doing it,

1:29:00

you know, and I'm like, listen, lady, I've

1:29:03

never met you, but just trust

1:29:05

in, you know, our process

1:29:07

right now. I know your husband. We know what

1:29:09

we're doing here. We're pretty crafty. And

1:29:12

she was like, no, yeah,

1:29:15

because she was, she was like

1:29:17

a witch. Afraid. Yeah.

1:29:19

Especially because of my children, you

1:29:21

know,

1:29:22

each, each seconds, every minutes was

1:29:25

like a possible deal was possibility

1:29:27

or chance of their death. I

1:29:30

mean, in the middle of that crowd, that

1:29:33

chaos, right? Because of that, she

1:29:35

was so afraid and said, no,

1:29:37

I don't want to go back to that airport,

1:29:40

right? That situation. Right. And they're

1:29:42

sending pictures of these just horrid conditions.

1:29:44

You know, there's a, there's a picture that really struck home with

1:29:47

me with his oldest daughter, uh,

1:29:49

that was sent to, you know, Ram

1:29:51

from his wife sent this picture and sent it to me

1:29:53

and it's a picture of his oldest daughter, uh,

1:29:56

just laying, you know, sitting

1:29:58

up and kind of leaning on a suitcase. sitting

1:30:00

on top of human feces. And

1:30:03

it was like no child

1:30:06

deserves to go through this, let alone

1:30:08

my boy's kid. And

1:30:11

it was just like man. And

1:30:13

there was a lot of times where there was no hope in

1:30:16

that. It's like we're gonna

1:30:18

try everything we can but I don't think this

1:30:20

is gonna work. There's a lot of doubt that

1:30:22

you're battling and facing.

1:30:27

But anyway, my

1:30:29

contact reaches out to me and says, hey we're

1:30:31

gonna make another run at this. Get your family ready.

1:30:34

Give me an updated picture of them. So

1:30:36

you know they whatever clothes they changed into.

1:30:38

I had them go out and take another picture of them. Tie

1:30:40

the red bandanas on. Get the kids in

1:30:42

the stroller. Bring water. Bring your battery chargers.

1:30:45

I don't know if they had an

1:30:47

umbrella. I think I told them to grab an umbrella for shade.

1:30:50

They still have those umbrellas. Yeah. Yeah.

1:30:53

I need that umbrella. But

1:30:56

yeah so they went to the gate

1:30:59

and it was a madhouse. Because again the clock's ticking.

1:31:01

You know all the whole world knows that that last

1:31:04

flight out of there. I wish I had the date in front of

1:31:06

me. I should know it. It was like August 27th. Something

1:31:09

like that was the red line. You know that

1:31:11

the Taliban drew. The Taliban said we've negotiated

1:31:13

with you. How far away are you

1:31:15

from that date at this point? It was the

1:31:18

24th. 24th. Yeah. It's

1:31:20

a matter of days. Yeah. Yeah. Two days. We're

1:31:23

close and we've been at it for two weeks.

1:31:26

You know. I've been telling this dude to be patient

1:31:28

for two weeks. Trust me. Trust in

1:31:30

this process. Convent your wife

1:31:32

to go. That's your only job.

1:31:36

But so my again my contact reaches

1:31:38

out to me says get the family ready and I'm you know just

1:31:41

through the roof. Like here we go. So

1:31:44

instead of texting him you

1:31:46

know because we're usually I called him directly. And

1:31:49

I was like hey my contacts there. This

1:31:52

is what's going on. And

1:31:54

he's like there's like humor in this. He's like

1:31:57

brother this is Taliban trick. No we can't do this.

1:31:59

You know it's a everybody's being told

1:32:01

there's a contact there and to go to the airport right

1:32:03

now this is a Taliban trick we're not doing this

1:32:05

and I was like if you've ever listened to me

1:32:08

in your life like you're gonna do

1:32:10

exactly what I'm telling you to do right now remember

1:32:13

that? Yeah yeah yeah so I convinced

1:32:15

him and thank God he convinced his

1:32:17

wife and they loaded up and

1:32:20

went to the airport and you know the whole time this is

1:32:22

going on I'm in direct contact with my guy at the

1:32:24

airport who's outside of a gate and

1:32:26

he's got his guys his operator

1:32:28

so he's pushing outside the wire to look

1:32:30

for these guys and I'm relaying positions where

1:32:32

they're at at all times

1:32:35

and one thing we're battling that whole time is cell

1:32:38

phone service you know because we finally made

1:32:40

it all the way up there to this gate and now they don't

1:32:42

have cell phone service and now I can't relay exactly

1:32:44

where they're at and

1:32:47

it's like horrifying you know because they

1:32:49

came so close and

1:32:51

now we we you know they're not gonna be able

1:32:53

to find them and we went

1:32:56

through shitty cell phone service

1:32:58

that whole day and finally they they get to the

1:33:00

airport my contact sends

1:33:03

his guys out and

1:33:05

they end up spotting one

1:33:08

of the brothers and

1:33:11

flags him down and it was just like a and

1:33:14

my my contacts in me hey we've got eyes on

1:33:16

and it was just like unbelievable

1:33:19

it was just I mean it's finding the needle in the haystack

1:33:22

with all these people because

1:33:24

you know you got to understand with the amount of people

1:33:26

that's in here I mean just picture going to

1:33:28

a Metallica concert with all these lunatics right

1:33:31

and trying to make your way up to the front row right

1:33:33

something happened right right there's mom

1:33:35

trying to get everybody no one cares it's

1:33:37

not just to see fucking Lars fucking

1:33:39

play the drums like life is like yes

1:33:41

that gate yes yes and people

1:33:44

are willing to do anything because they're in the same situation

1:33:46

because they've got kids right right and you it

1:33:48

ain't happening from the middle like you know like

1:33:51

it's only happening at the front yeah and so

1:33:53

we got them position I'm telling them to

1:33:55

get up in here you know get in get in the crowd and I

1:33:57

think at one point she was attacked yeah back

1:34:00

off and it's like, no, I'm not, she got cold feet.

1:34:02

No, I'm not gonna sit here and watch my kids get trampled

1:34:04

to death. It's not happening. And I

1:34:06

remember being so selfishly fucking mad

1:34:09

at her, you know, looking back at

1:34:11

it. It's like, you know, while it was happening, I was like, well,

1:34:13

she just needs to listen to me. And even

1:34:16

back when I told them to leave the house, okay,

1:34:18

leave the house right now. You,

1:34:21

my contact wants you there. You're gonna leave the house right

1:34:23

now. And I remember them taking a long time

1:34:25

to leave. And I remember messaging him like, I

1:34:28

told you to have your family, you

1:34:31

know, ready to go at a moment's notice and leave.

1:34:33

And it took like 10, 15 minutes. And, you

1:34:35

know, looking back at it, did she

1:34:38

saying goodbye to her entire family that

1:34:40

she'll never probably ever see again?

1:34:42

Nieces, nephews, brothers, sisters,

1:34:44

mothers, fathers, a whole life. And

1:34:47

here I am, some American sitting in a golf cart

1:34:49

in Tennessee, telling her, hurry, you

1:34:52

know, for a good reason, yes. But,

1:34:56

you know, I look back at that and it's like, man, it

1:34:59

kind of like shows you like the different perspectives.

1:35:01

You know, we think the answer is, oh, just do it faster,

1:35:04

do this. And it's like, dude. Especially from a grunt's

1:35:06

perspective, right? Like you're used to being the grunt on

1:35:08

the ground. Now you're the general calling the shots. Yeah.

1:35:11

Yeah. But anyway, so they fast

1:35:13

forward back to Abby, you know, they make it to Abby

1:35:15

gate and

1:35:18

they start to position through the crowd and,

1:35:21

you know, they start to encounter, you know, some

1:35:24

rough stuff getting, you know, she's getting beat up, pushed around.

1:35:26

So she pulls out and,

1:35:28

you know, Ram's like, no, she's done, right?

1:35:30

You remember that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was so scared from

1:35:32

that time when she just attacked by the

1:35:34

crowd pupils on that and she just

1:35:37

laid down on the ground. And

1:35:40

I was like, thinking that she will

1:35:42

be

1:35:43

die like this. How

1:35:45

old are the kids at this point?

1:35:47

My twins was like

1:35:50

a two and a half. Yeah.

1:35:53

And the whole daughter was six. So she's

1:35:55

holding the, the.

1:35:56

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah.

1:36:00

And then the six-year-old is what

1:36:02

just holding on to her show because I think she

1:36:04

pushed him She pushed him in the stroller or

1:36:06

they got him in the stroller as far as they could Strollers

1:36:10

gotta go whatever People

1:36:13

didn't let you go of course or for worse

1:36:15

and the brothers are just doing what they can

1:36:18

everybody wants to leave Of course

1:36:20

course here was no priority I

1:36:24

mean they order yeah, yeah And

1:36:27

so they you know they you know Rom convinces

1:36:30

her hey, you got to try it again, and I remember messaging

1:36:32

him like This

1:36:34

is your shot at freedom right now. This is the chance

1:36:37

for your children to live a life That

1:36:39

you know that you could have never imagined And

1:36:43

Rom convinced her and he's agreed. Okay. We're

1:36:45

gonna try it again And sure

1:36:48

enough they go back in there to try again That's

1:36:50

when the one of the operators comes out sees him

1:36:54

and then calls him over and they kind of got a good go through

1:36:56

the crowd and the crowd kind of

1:36:58

parts the ways a little bit because they see a guy you

1:37:00

know motion them for him to Come here, and they

1:37:03

They cross that you remember because all the Afghans

1:37:05

are here There's a giant sewage canal in the middle

1:37:08

and then that's where all the Marines are on the other side

1:37:11

and so they swim across the sewage canal with

1:37:13

the kids above their heads and Hand

1:37:17

them up to those dudes And

1:37:22

They you know snatch those kids up and then

1:37:25

that my contact reaches out to me hey, we got him

1:37:27

oh Dude when I heard

1:37:29

that you know when I think back on this

1:37:31

whole story. I don't have memories

1:37:34

I mean I've got a I knew I was riding around in my golf

1:37:36

cart pacing around like a lunatic in my yard But

1:37:39

when I think back to that two

1:37:41

weeks We were doing this Like I struggle

1:37:43

with figuring out where I was when I found out that

1:37:45

information because when I flash back to that

1:37:47

time Like I'm there with them my

1:37:50

memories are in at Abbey gate

1:37:52

with them my memories are at their house or in a taxi

1:37:55

Outside the airport you know because I'm familiar

1:37:57

with all of those areas man

1:38:01

when they swam across with the kids above their

1:38:03

heads and handed them up to those dudes and

1:38:06

you know they snatched those kids up and my contact

1:38:08

you know I was like we got him you know dude I

1:38:11

just fucking collapsed on

1:38:13

the ground I mean it

1:38:17

was unreal and

1:38:19

then you know obviously relayed that to him you

1:38:22

know

1:38:24

what'd you think about it when you yeah it

1:38:26

was it was I can see like

1:38:28

the best moment of my life when

1:38:31

I just received a message from Travis

1:38:33

that he told me my contact

1:38:36

got your family no worry at

1:38:38

all they just made to enter to

1:38:40

the airport

1:38:40

right now

1:38:45

it was the best moment I can say yeah

1:38:48

and I was so lucky and just my tears

1:38:50

came I couldn't like stop you

1:38:52

know

1:38:57

you know regardless of paperwork you

1:38:59

know because the immigration is just a nightmare to get

1:39:01

but and they're still not US

1:39:04

citizens but when they cross that sewage canal

1:39:06

and those Americans touch them they are they're

1:39:09

fucking Americans right then and it's

1:39:11

the coolest thing that the Marines have ability to do

1:39:13

you know we can touch somebody and

1:39:16

you're now one of us forever and your kids

1:39:18

are gonna live a great life now you

1:39:20

know I get goosebumps talking about it I mean it

1:39:22

was just the craziest

1:39:26

roller coaster of emotions you

1:39:29

know I don't know what

1:39:32

would have happened if we were unsuccessful

1:39:35

with that because they they

1:39:37

took those kids and

1:39:40

then they you know made them walk and then they threw him an

1:39:42

up armored land cruiser and drove them out to the

1:39:45

flight line and they went into a building and okay

1:39:47

verified who they were and

1:39:49

then I confirmed with my contact hey what

1:39:52

flight are you putting these these guys on because

1:39:54

at that point it's not they're not just sending a hundred

1:39:56

thousand people to the US there's

1:39:58

countries opening up their borders all

1:39:59

over

1:40:01

like not great countries right you

1:40:03

know we're talking third world countries over in Africa

1:40:05

right that are like you're gonna give

1:40:07

us how much money to take these people right okay

1:40:10

yeah bring them and let them sit in the desert we'll get them some water

1:40:12

right and that was also a big fear you

1:40:14

know we don't want to have them end up in a country like that

1:40:16

right right where we kind of you

1:40:18

know we lose contact with them because there's no cell phone

1:40:21

service like this is you you're

1:40:23

realizing this isn't a massive hurdle

1:40:25

you just got over yeah but you're not there yet

1:40:28

we're not there yet no and my

1:40:30

contact is the greatest contact

1:40:32

you could ever have I wish I could reveal who this dude

1:40:35

is but he doesn't want to be named

1:40:37

you know I understand that I don't

1:40:39

I'm not I'm not interested in that I

1:40:41

but that being said I guess the one thing that

1:40:44

I mean it was your contact there because I

1:40:47

hearing this story and trying to put myself in

1:40:50

both of your shoes I

1:40:52

would imagine like the heart the

1:40:54

hardest thing is to keep motivating

1:40:57

this contact like at any right because you

1:40:59

feel like you're gonna burn them out right and like

1:41:01

it's not and like what is the contact doing

1:41:04

there like what is like is the contact doing specifically

1:41:06

yeah he's there on behalf of the government

1:41:09

assigned a certain task from DC to go

1:41:11

in there and do a certain thing understood

1:41:14

but like I

1:41:15

correct me if I'm wrong I imagine

1:41:17

the contacts

1:41:18

job that day or

1:41:20

job being there is not getting certain

1:41:23

people out is that what he's specifically

1:41:25

supposed to be doing there no I don't

1:41:27

I think he was there to assist in that process but

1:41:30

you know you know I made it clear to relay to

1:41:32

these my contact and both my contacts that

1:41:34

set this up like this is a dude

1:41:37

that isn't just some random Afghan

1:41:39

dude this is a dude who's on the front lines with us

1:41:42

has carried my dead dudes around to helicopters

1:41:45

who's carried gear for us and he's done everything we could

1:41:47

ask and I was be sure to you know I was

1:41:49

sending them pictures too like here's a picture with me in this

1:41:51

dude back in margin 2010 like this

1:41:54

is who this dude is right and also

1:41:56

letting those dudes know and kind of putting the heat on hey

1:41:58

if you don't make this happen My ass was going

1:42:00

in there and I know you don't want that. You

1:42:03

know, it doesn't look good on you

1:42:05

guys. Right. But I wanted to, I

1:42:08

didn't, you know, I wasn't talking

1:42:10

to him roughly like that, but I

1:42:12

wanted him to know that. But it is. It's

1:42:15

such a crazy thing to navigate because it's

1:42:17

like everybody has got to, you

1:42:20

know, sort of achieve this impossible

1:42:22

goal. But at any point, you

1:42:25

know, if she, if she said, look, I just can't

1:42:27

do it. Or like, hey, look, man, my hands are like,

1:42:29

we tried. Like there's so many chances

1:42:32

of failure. Absolutely. Absolutely.

1:42:34

And you're just the whole time. You're just,

1:42:36

you're just praying to, to,

1:42:38

for it to work.

1:42:40

Can you talk about getting eyes on

1:42:42