{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/iiif/z31ng4jx7m/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["Forest Cooper Interviewed by Andrew Gordon"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/038/original/university-libraries-logo-2x.png?1711560609","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Source"]},"value":{"en":["Arizona Veterans Project, MS 835"]}},{"label":{"en":["Relation"]},"value":{"en":["Arizona Veterans Project (is part of)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Agent"]},"value":{"en":["Cooper, Forest (Interviewee)","Gordon, Andrew (Interviewer)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2025-04-29"]}},{"label":{"en":["Coverage"]},"value":{"en":["Arizona--Tucson (spatial)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Language"]},"value":{"en":["English"]}},{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eGWOT with Army Ranger.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},{"label":{"en":["Format"]},"value":{"en":[".MP4"]}},{"label":{"en":["Publisher"]},"value":{"en":["University of Arizona Libraries"]}},{"label":{"en":["Identifier"]},"value":{"en":["MS835.042 (uid)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Keyword"]},"value":{"en":["Branch of Service - Army","Highest Rank - SSGT","Period of Service - GWOT","Company - C","Battalion - 3","Division - RANGER BATTALION"]}},{"label":{"en":["Type"]},"value":{"en":["Oral Histories"]}}],"summary":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eGWOT with Army Ranger.\u003c/p\u003e"]},"provider":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["University of Arizona Libraries"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["University of Arizona Libraries"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/038/original/university-libraries-logo-2x.png?1711560609","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/282/736/small/azu_ms835-042_a.mp4_1752515050.jpg?1752515051","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 1 - azu_ms835-042_a.mp4"]},"duration":2170.752,"width":640,"height":360,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/282/736/small/azu_ms835-042_a.mp4_1752515050.jpg?1752515051","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-arizona.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/282/736/original/azu_ms835-042_a.mp4?1752515049","type":"Video","format":"video/mp4","duration":2170.752,"width":640,"height":360},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["transcript [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: Um, awesome. Gotcha All right? Um, so if you want to introduce yourself, and then, like, name, rank, and then where you are from, and then where you're at now, and then, can you get going?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=18.0,28.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/2","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: Yeah, all right. So real, real brief. Forest Cooper. I have a complicated first name, so it comes across as forest Ryan Cooper, but that being the case, my time in service was spent with the 75th Ranger Regiment in Third Battalion at Fort Benning, Georgia. I joined the Army in oh eight with an option 40 contract, and then went straight into basic training. Everyone school. RIP graduated rip in April of oh nine, and then was sent to Third Battalion at 400 Fort Benning, Georgia. I got out of the Army in 2013 as a corporal. The I had served four deployments with third Ranger Battalion. Accomplished Ranger School, became a team leader, held multiple roles, whether it's designated marksman, SAW gunner, Breacher, and so on and so forth, even though those are very battalion internal. That being the case, I got out of the Army in 2013 and continued to work in kind of the military adjacent arena, particularly with contracting in 2015 I went to school. I got my degrees at the University of Northwestern St Paul, and my degrees were in philosophy, theology, history and Greek. After which, I continued to work in some of the contracting space, some of the writing. I started getting published in world or international magazines and journals, and then went on to work as an editor for recoil magazine, and then continued in the contracting space, and then work as a weapons and tactics instructor for Air Force Special Warfare so","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=29.0,133.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/3","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: well, and that's where our paths crossed, the last combat leader qualification course. So I guess first question, where did you grow up, and kind of, did that lead you to join the army? Or, kind of, what was like, the very start of like, how you joined the army initially?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=134.0,155.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/4","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: Yep. So I grew up patently middle class rural Minnesota, outside of the city by about 40 miles in a small town of about 8000 people the the my when I joined the Army, my parents were, in no way, shape or form, surprised. I have some military history in our family, but it's really just my grandfather, and there's a lot of lost history because of people leaving home at young ages. My grandfather was in World War Two and Korea, as well as a POW in Korea. So I grew up with the stories I had always had a an interest in, we'll talk about like the military side of the world. In other words, I always saw it, not only or I oftentimes had seen it as some sort of rite of passage. But also, as I got older, in my teenage years, I didn't really see a place that I really wanted to be outside of the military. Now, in the small town, it wasn't exactly expected. I was a smaller body, 150 pounds, joining basic training. But the, but the there was always something about it that was interesting, particularly the idea of being a part of something efficacious, or doing something as opposed to just making money and having a career, right? But, yeah, so that's that answer.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=156.0,241.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/5","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: Awesome. And then while you're in basic training, did you hear about the Ranger regimen? Or what was your gateway from the conventional side, I guess, for starting out in basic training, then going to rip","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=242.0,255.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/6","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: before in like the 2000 let's just say, the combination of being before the explosion of the internet and social media and all these explanations and movies and seals and this, I grew up in a rural area, so we didn't really have much for internet connection, and then we just it was very small, so I didn't have a lot of access to research all the time. But at the same time, it wasn't as public. And so I initially I wanted to be special forces, but I didn't know the difference between Green Berets, Army Rangers, Navy SEALs, Delta Force and so on and so forth. I didn't really even read much about it, which is, in retrospect, maybe something that would have been worth learning. But at the same time, I knew I wanted to. I originally wanted to go Special Forces at that time, whether this is true or false, I wasn't supposed to be able to allow to get an x ray contract because I was 18. I think I even signed the papers when I was no I was 18. So like and then, so the next, the next best option that was presented to me was Ranger Battalion. I ended up joining the army with an option 40 contract, which meant basic training everyone school rip onto battalion.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=256.0,329.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/7","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: So you went through rip, now referred to as rasp. What was that like? Mentally, physically, think you got in kind of right as the first surge was going on, correct? This is true,","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=330.0,341.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/8","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: yep. And so a kind of an anecdotal story, is rip is I understood rip was supposed to be kind of this rite of passage, again. That was something that I was looking for as a young man, this sort of passage from boyhood to adulthood. And I expected rip to be this extremely difficult course right now, this was influenced by the surge. And so what I understood, and I've gathered both before and after, a normal rip class starts with about 100 125 and graduates 25 with a really high attrition rate of like 70 to 80% our class, if I'm not mistaken, started with about 315 and graduated about 285 so the RIP class itself wasn't, say difficult, but it was the after effects that actually had the most weaning or weeding weeding out process that took place. So rip was hard, but it was achievably hard, and at the same time, when we stayed on the stood in the graduation field, you could kind of look to your right and see this guy you knew he passed. He's physically a stud, he's mentally sharp, he's tactically proficient. And then you look to your other side and there's a guy who's like, I have no idea how you made it through. And so you start to ask yourself, like, where do I fit in? And I and like, conversations with peers that seem to be a somewhat common experience, and then that was man like manifold, made more complicated by your team leader than you get sent to your unit. And now they've got to try to figure out whether or not you were allowed to pass right because of numbers, or whether you actually met the standards and achieved what was desired, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=342.0,444.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/9","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: So did those first kind of like, those, those first you know, you walk through the doors on your first day. I'm sure a lot of those guys who you know, you look to your right, and I think that's probably army broad across a lot of selections too, you're always gonna look to your left and right, and you're gonna know the studs versus the guys who kind of like hung at the bottom and got through. But, you know, they talk about showing up on your, you know, Team day, you know, first new guy, what was your first day like? And then also your first deployment, because they talk that's kind of like, where you make your money and set the impression. So your first day at uh battalion, and then your first deployment with them as well.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=445.0,483.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/10","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: Yeah. So I had, for whatever reason, I kind of assumed that I was going to end up in Second Battalion over in Washington, and it was somewhere where I just kind of thought I was going to be, there's, there's no reason for me to believe that, and I ended up in Third Battalion, not by my choice.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=484.0,497.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/11","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: Okay, so you know, right? Say what you don't get to pick, right? You don't get to put like, preferences, like yes or no.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=498.0,504.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/12","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: And I don't know, I can't really speak to that, because my situation might have been somewhat special, or, you know, maybe one of multiple options. But something that we had kind of understood was they're going to say, you know, I need 30 bodies to go to Second Battalion. And when they called that, I ended up being person 32 and you're like, ah, you know, I should have ran a little harder. Now, whatever right it is, we don't get to choose everything. And if it was all up to choice, we wouldn't be joining the army. So I went to Third Battalion. I remember going in, getting placed in Biko, and starting to kind of put the pieces together rather quickly through sort of the chatter that Biko and 375 had a history. It was in Mogadishu. I'd seen Black Hawk Down. I kind of knew enough of it. And so now I'm suddenly proud, but also a little like I'm still in Georgia, and so I remember our I remember sort of our group of individuals that were brought over to Bucha were set before what I'm going to only assume were platoon sergeants and maybe some squad leaders, and they kind of picked their way through who they wanted. And the first question we got asked was, What was your PT score in basic training? And I had a good one. And so I ended up going over to be CO and then the next, the very first question I was asked by my team leader that I remember, is, do you hate rednecks? And so now there's this cultural shock of, I'm from rural Minnesota, a redneck means something there that's kind of like a. Or it's not exactly a derogatory term, but it's not a compliment by any chance. And I'm like, I don't And of course, the story would be something like, why I give an answer where I don't know what a redneck means to you, but it means some it might mean something different to me, and then I get told to do push ups. And you're like, okay, cool. Yeah. So the first introduction into battalion was very quick, but it was also there were some things that didn't make sense, like, we had to go get our haircut, but it was nine o'clock at night on a and we had to have our haircut by the next day. And you're like, What do you mean how I don't have a car? I don't there's, I don't know where the barber shop is. I don't know how, of course, you're going to get in trouble, but you figure it out anyway, right? And then that, though, I find out, and I kind of understand, I'm starting to understand, that we're getting ready for a deployment. In fact, the guys that I'm introduced to within a couple of weeks deploy to Iraq, and we get held back because we just got there, right? And then we get a decent number of us in that period of time. Let's say, Let's see April, beginning mid of May to the beginning or the end of June. We lose a number of people. People start quitting battalion entirely, which was not necessarily a surprise, but you kind of got to see that after effect of the large rip class. And then we get, we kind of were treated as lawn mowers, and you had to run a lot and all this other kind of stuff, because they wanted us to be in shape. But then there was also some questions on who was left and rear, rear D or whatever. But we end up going to, I end up deploying, and I remember it because, like, because I remember, I think it was the fourth of July, or is right around that time, because I remember being like, July 1, and my first experiences where we ended up in Balad because we got grounded by a dust storm, and just this other worldly experience of like, wow, this is Very different than rural, humid, Midwest or cold, and then we end up going to our we, after the dust storm leaves, we get finally integrated in our our platoon. And there's, it's, it was very odd at that time, personally, because we had spent a number of months with our other privates in our arena, and we don't know what information had gone forward, or who was the good guy and who was bad, or who was the private that was liked. And I remember getting put under my team leader, who had been on deployment for a couple months now, and being able I was very encouraged at the beginning, because I got to look up to him and say, okay, teach me how to do this, and he was firm, but instructing. And then that deployment didn't end up being a very, let's say, busy one as far as missions. And so there was a lot of downtime, which meant a lot of time getting smoked, a lot of time doing push ups, a lot of time im team through freshly smashed gravel. A lot of time working, learning how to use flash bangs. A lot of time learning how to clear a house for by battalion standards, whether it's a glass house or we had a shoot house, or we had a structure that we could use. And so there was a lot of lessons learned. How to drive a striker, how to even how to prep demo, how to how to carry saw pouches on a machine, for how to carry ammunition for a saw, because I was in an assault team, and while we didn't really do anything as far as mission said, there was a lot of development, and there was a lot of kind of introduction to the the zeitgeist, to the mentality of the battalion at That time, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=505.0,819.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/13","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: So first deployment was kind of quiet as it kind of as it kind of picked up over there, and you went on, like your second and third deployment is that where you started to see more of, kind of, you know, everyone talks about rangers and kicking in doors and raves, and I'm not all at night coming in on the little birds. Is that when you kind of started to pick that up kind of pretty fast, and kind of learn all that on the job there. So if you want to talk us through, kind of like maybe that, like your second and kind of those more memorable deployments where you had a lot going on,","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=820.0,851.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/14","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: yeah, because each of the deployments was memorable, but for a very different reason. And so the first deployment was very quiet, a lot of training, a lot of being a private, getting team leaders preying on you whenever you're not paying attention, or whatever. Then we got back from that, and I got sent to a language school, so I missed out on my first training cycle with battalion, and I kind of got reintegrated late into the training cycle where everyone had all this time to bond with each other. So I went from being a junior private, coming back for my first appointment, being a senior private, then going into language school, and then kind of being set back to being, not necessarily a junior private, but while, why don't you know these things, and having to deal with that sort of relationship, because at by that time, my team leader had moved on to being or my first. Team Leader. Moved on being a squad leader. I had a new team leader. We were like oil and water when it comes to personalities, but that doesn't mean we couldn't be professional, even though that was a lesson learned. And so my second deployment was a big fighting deployment. We went to Kandahar in 2010 and we extended, and there was all at anybody's beef with one another didn't necessarily come to the forefront, as in, we would fight it out in the team room, or whatever it became. It became very stressful because we started having we started losing numbers by sending people home to go to Ranger School, or sending people home due to injuries, and sending people and making decisions like that. And so the second deployment, I remember being in gunfights and kind of going through the, oh, this is what, this is like mental game, and recognizing that I wasn't gonna freeze, I wasn't gonna lock up, I wasn't gonna become, not necessarily become afraid. But it was, it was just I didn't do the things that I had stereotypically expected or been warned of, and that was encouraging. But at the same time, the social aspect of our platoon, the fabric was pulled completely to its limits, and so that after the second deployment and we came home, some of those limits, some of those strands started to break, especially because we had lost a few guys that were close to others and I wasn't. And there was, there was a is like a former team leader of mine ended up getting killed and another private In My Squad, and it was this sort of survivor's guilt complication, and the leadership was dealt a very difficult hand. And one of the solutions that they did is they kind of spread some of us out, and so I was not having gone through all of this. Now I'm, I'm after my second deployment, and not being, let's say, in the best of Graces with certain certain parts of leadership, ended up moving over to a more administrative role in a headquarters company getting ready to deploy almost immediately. So I come home, I've got a couple months, I deploy again, and now I'm working a much more administrative role in a jock where I get to learn, not at this time thinking it's the great thing, and it's like, well, I got to survive this deployment, not survive in a combat sense, but professional sense, and learn that I get to see a lot of the background of how these things work, and how do mission sets get developed, and how does leadership make decisions on the company level, instead of just on the squad and platoon level. And so it was, in retrospect, very beneficial, but at that time, felt like it was a not an attack, but a setback, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=852.0,1070.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/15","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: So, as you kind of went through your deployments, a lot of people talk about range of bat being kind of almost like a cult, if you had to, kind of, like, streamline a sentence or two as to how, like, how you view kind of the Brotherhood, how would you describe it, kind of as a community, as a culture, as a brotherhood.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1071.0,1093.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/16","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: If you were to read a book on the subject without actually reading about Ranger Battalion, I would recommend reading why honor matters by Sommers. Now he's a philosopher and he is an academic, but he's he addresses the idea of a dignity society versus an honor culture. And Ranger Battalion is very much so an honor culture. One example of that is, I can pick on my private. I can punish him, but you can't, even if you're a team leader. And so where there's elements where we all come together with camaraderie and esprit de corps, but there's also elements where it's like where you have to deal with a very foreign social and not necessarily moral code, but social code that differs from big America, and that is, we like to talk about honor. We like to talk about honor as something we pursue, but honor as an honor culture is very different. And so you you just you have to build honor and dignity, or honor and respect amongst your peers. And that's not something that's given, but it's talked about, and we know that it's talked about, that it's not given. And so the cultish aspect of Ranger Battalion primarily comes from two things. One of them is historically. And I'm not saying this is universal. I got out 10 or 12 years ago, so there's plenty of things that have changed, but it liked it tried very hard to keep everything in house, and we wouldn't go to say the Green Berets or the seals to ask for advice or even suggestions on certain things, as much as I thought we would have. Now I was a private or a team leader. I never got to get to the company or platoon, platoon or company level, so there's a certain amount of knowledge that I didn't have. But even after getting out of the military, I recognized how much Ranger Battalion at that time. Time was isolated. It kept things in house. It solved problems internally, which does attribute to that honor culture, but it illustrates that more by saying the respect of your peers is, is quite, quite Can, can almost be more important than just something as simple as how good you are as a marksman, right? You can't, you can't just be good at the PT score, or just be good at shooting or just be good at one thing. You have to do that and also have the honor of your peers.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1094.0,1230.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/17","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And I think a lot of like that, the culture stuff too. I think people view it super negatively. Because, I mean, even to this day, we've had a couple guys come over from from Ranger bat, and they all just don't vibe with kind of, like the culture of it. So I think it's definitely on perspective, on how you look at it. And I think you described it really well. So yeah, so I mean, if you were to look back right young private self, say you're like, maybe a team leader or even a platoon sergeant, what? What's some advice you give to someone who's young and in the range of bat, whether that's a lieutenant coming in or even also a private? I mean, those two things are going to look completely different. But just as a general statement, right? How would you kind of address being young, and then the regimen","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1231.0,1281.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/18","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: there's, there's three very short phrases of advice that I'd give. One is, don't take everything personally. If someone's talking just, just, don't take everything personally. Whether it's it's jokes, it's jeering, it's relationships within the unit. If, if you get so focused on looking internally that you have that you think everything's an attack on you, you're going to miss the mission Second. Second one is, at all costs. Avoid nihilism, and that would be, do not come. Do not become so cynical that you think it's all for naught. Do not be tempted to think and sort of define yourself by, what's the point? Anyway, I'm just going to have to do push ups and and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, or I'm just whether, whether you're trying to become, trying to get to ranger school and become a team leader, whether you're a leader, and you're faced with all these setbacks, because you're going to be, and some of them will be short term. Some of them are long term, like do not give in to nihilism and let it crush you. And I think the final thing within Ranger Battalion, or even the military as a whole, is be careful how much you expect it to define your identity. And that is perhaps the most. That is something that you could we could go into in detail, but the short answer of it is the Ranger Battalion can be a part of your identity, and it certainly is something that you can accomplish, but it is not the sum of who you are. And I'm not talking about esthetic choices that you like or books that you read or music you listen to. I'm saying that expecting something like the military or a specific unit just to become the entire sum of your identity is asking something that it cannot fulfill, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1282.0,1393.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/19","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: Well, good advice. So while we're kind of on the topic, was there a specific leader you know, talked about your team leaders and all that is there a specific leader. And when you think, man, like that was a really great leader. Really helped my time out in the regiment, were there a couple names, or even just one name that kind of comes to mind, help, kind of guide you, and almost like you're, you're, you know, they call them like Team brothers, right? Like you have your big brother and your uncle and stuff like that.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1394.0,1422.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/20","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: So my first team leader was Sergeant Smith. They called him Smitty. He was he even in the first deployment, or as I continued on, was particularly instrumental in teaching me that you can be right but still lose the battle. And it's not about losing the battle in the gunfight. It's about your place in battalion. You can be right in the argument, but still lose because you not necessarily, because you, like, socially, put everybody off. And he was also good at balancing that with being good at your job. And he was, he would, he would imply the importance of, say, making sure your math is correct and building demo, or how your footwork needs to be improved, or deadlifting, or being able to certain physical accomplish certain physical feats. He was very good at translating that, and this is as a team leader. I'm going to go back to that. He was very good at instructing me where you can be right but still lose and you can you have to recognize that it's not beneficial to try to knight in shining armor this whole thing. It's not that it's you should lie and cheat and steal. It's that. Don't put yourself out for attack just because you have the righteousness on your side, right, not advising me to act immorally. The second one would be my squad leader when I was a team leader, and that's Mueller, who I think that something that he did really well is he looked when he saw people, he looked for where he should put them, instead of trying to fake make them fit a mold, right? And he saw say, someone who was a little bit more analytical, and he would be, yeah, you're still going to be a team leader. But he was, he was very good at taking the aggression of Team Leader A and the and that analytic mentality of Team Leader B, and putting them together for a common mission, which was as a leader, he was very good at defining the mission. This is what we're doing. This is where we're going. This is what winning looks like. Now follow me. I","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1423.0,1551.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/21","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: think that's super important too, and especially when you're running in small teams, right? Whether that's platoon or just even the squad, I think for leaders, too, whoever, whoever's watching this is take, you know, you take the strengths of your your guys, and you can use them where they're good. So, so with that, right? Was there ever kind of, like a, a moment that stands out in any of your deployments, or any kind of regiment where you kind of almost got lost in the sauce, like you were, you know, it was super intense. How did you handle that situation, whether it be in Garrison or in London?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1552.0,1596.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/22","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: There was a, ooh, how do I how do I phrase that, like, whether it's intensity or in a combat scenario, might be one set of examples. One of them was like, as as antithetical to the that this may come across like standing up for yourself in a way, which was, there was a number of things there after that second deployment, there were a number of things that happened that caused, like I said, those social threads to really pull bear right and certain individuals, some things happened in that environment which would could have very quickly become really Good, could have gotten really worse. And I'm talking after deployment. We're home. People are, there's a lot of drinking going on to kind of assuage the survivor's guilt, or whatever reasons we were giving ourselves, the the social cohesion of the the small element was very broken. We were, we were not only worn out physically, but many of us were injured and so on and so forth. And that led to a conflict where, where I was going again, going down that nihilism Road, where between a leader and myself, that who he had much more authority than me, because I was a private and he was much higher. There was, there was a there was a very distinct conflict. And so it, it kind of escalated. And I think some of it due to misunderstanding, and I think some of it due to just the pressures the moment. And I remember sitting in the office of a man who I respect very greatly, who was held a significant leadership position. And he basically was giving me this idea. He was giving me this rundown of like, well, you know, you're in a bad place right now. We might move you out of battalion. We might send you home, send you off to the big army. You could go here. You could have a good career there. And I remember responding to him saying, because, I guess I remember this moment very clearly, going well, well, I have nothing left to lose, and so I kind of base. I basically stood up for myself and said, Well, no, you know this, but respect rank, words, terms, this happened, this happened, this happened, this happened. And they were all, I'm not the person who's you're you should be as frustrated with. These are the things that have happened that fill it in. And he goes, he basically says, Are you bargaining with me? And and at the end, he ends me, ends up moving me to a different company. And things go really well. However, in the time between standing up for myself and and sort of basically getting my feet underneath me, because everything after that was smooth sailing. It was I had to deal with the nihilism of like, well, what's the point? I'm just going to lose anyway. I'm just going to get treated as lesser and I and that, that was the hardest part, the the combat and the deployments, being able to distract myself from, say, taxes or smaller responsibilities, but saying I'm getting ready to deploy, that's the easy part. The hard part was saying, Well, I've basically made my choice of nihilism, time to move on, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1597.0,1794.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/23","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: So during your deployments, come back time. Regimen is kind of coming to an end. What was the transition like? Right, coming from a super high op tempo place, like the regiment, and then kind of coming out of regiment and kind of into the real world. Were there particular things you kept with you from regiment that you started utilizing, you know, in everyday life to kind of cope with that, or was it a super easy transition?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1795.0,1822.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/24","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: So the immediate transition was easy because I went from Ranger Battalion with its demands to a contracting arena, a military adjacent world where I had familiarity, and then I went to school and I double majored, and I did. I performed well academically, but when I graduated college, that's when it got difficult. That's because I didn't know I no longer had a mission to aim at the things that I learned were and the things that I carried with me was some of them were, recognize who are your people. You're not going to be you're not going to fit into every social group. You're not going to be a part of everybody else's community. So look for your people, and look for ways to support them, to be a part of a group of your you know, whether it's veterans or it's the gun culture, or whether it's, it's that. And then the second thing was, had to go back to that lesson on identity, is being careful, just like when you're you're a 22 year old or 21 year old, probably, possibly team leader in Ranger Battalion. You kind of know the guys who and they never, they peaked in high school, and they're like, Oh, I was a quarterback. You're like, quarterback. You're like, yeah, okay, we're bigger now. The same thing goes as you move on after the military. It's like, that was something that you learned. It's valuable, and you have to hold that value yourself. Don't let other people give it or take it. But at the same time, that can't be your only defining element. That shouldn't be the end of who you are, right?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1823.0,1901.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/25","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: Great answers. Great answers. Do you have any advice for any we'll kind of start to wrap up here. But any advice for any leaders coming in to the regiment or getting out, kind of what they should be on the lookout for from someone who served there? Kind of any inside advice? Yeah, no,","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1902.0,1922.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/26","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: no, for sure. And this is so for leadership. Like I remember getting out reading Jocko willing's book and being like, Oh, wow, this is such a valuable lesson. Things like autonomy, trusting your men and you could, I could bring up a couple of books, but if it were to be two of them, it would be leadership and emotional sabotage by Joe Rigney, which is a theological book, and the reason why I recommend that it's 100 pages long, but he as a pastor in a director of a school an academic environment, he very quickly points out the first role of the leader is to define what the mission is, and that means it doesn't matter you're when you're leading men, it doesn't matter how well you communicate the standards, or how much, how well you enforce the standards, how well you try to inspire them to the standards. It quite literally goes back to that kind of often abused Nietzsche quote, a man with a why will endure every how, and so take your men, treat them like adults, show and identify for them the mission, because that is your responsibility. I recommend Joe rigney's book, leadership and emotional sabotage. And then the second one is skin in the game by Nicholas Nassim Taleb, which is you have to recognize as a leader, that the man on the ground who is staring at the insurgent who is making the decision is more capable of making that decision, because, in some sense, because he's closer, so your responsibility is not to make him make the right decision. It's to make him capable of making those decisions, and that he is trusted to do so when he's in the situation. And those are the two key elements of leadership. The inverse of both of them is standards without purpose, and which is a failure, and the other one is micromanaging. If you're micromanaging your troops and your soldiers, or your your whatever, you're going to destroy them. You're going to burn them out. They're going to have they're going to lose sight of the mission, and you're going to find yourself wondering why they haven't figured it out yet, only to realize, hopefully, that you're the one who never defined","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=1923.0,2039.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/27","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: the mission. Hey. Well, a bunch of great information. Really appreciate your time. Super informative. I think we covered a lot, gave a lot of great information, you know, coming into the regiment and then getting out, talk us through, kind of like what you're doing now, really briefly, before we end it, and then we'll go from there.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=2040.0,2061.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/28","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 2: Yeah. Okay, so as short again, many hats. Since getting out of the military, I've worked in some very unsurprising environments, especially coming from a JSOC or a special operations element, which do you know, many people kind of know what we're talking about. There's certain expectations and to be quiet. So there's that I've gone to school, loved academics, realized that I was good at it and and yet, having that mission of accomplishing something, especially even the academic realm, is valuable. So take that drive. When you get out of the military and you go to school, get good grades, you're an adult, you know how to manage your schedule. And then after that, I've gone on to work as an editor for a publication. I've been I've been. Do in an instructing environment, and have held multiple different again, worn multiple different hats. Been in Minneapolis, when you had the conflicts around the George Floyd protests, went to Ukraine, this kind of that and the other. These are all just little bits and pieces. And the thing about it is is, is when it's not always going to be clear, but do not quit. And that's something that we learn. We should have learned, and we probably, many of us, probably did in Ranger Battalion, in Ranger School, is one of the one of the signs of victory, one of the key elements is just not quitting. It doesn't mean shut your brain off and not care, but it's just you're going to face problems, and we know about it. We know that you're going to lose, you're going to fail sometimes, and you have to deal with failure. But that ability or that, it's not even willpower, is that okay? Lick your chops or lick your wounds. Pivot. Make a move. There we go. Yep,","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=2062.0,2157.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/29","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"SPEAKER 1: great. Hey. Well, I really appreciate your time. Think a lot of people are going to get a lot of great stuff out of this. So thank you.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=2158.0,2166.999"},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/30","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"UNKNOWN SPEAKER: I appreciate it. Thanks much. All right, you.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736#t=2167.0,2169.0"}]},{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["English [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://arizona.aviaryplatform.com/collections/2980/collection_resources/153672/file/282736/transcript/81679/annotation/31","type":"Annotation","motivation":"subtitling","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/file_transcripts/associated_files/000/081/679/original/azu_ms835-042_a.vtt?1752610629","format":"text/vtt","language":"en"},"target":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/file_transcripts/associated_files/000/081/679/original/azu_ms835-042_a.vtt?1752610629"}]}]}]}