434.5: FACTS and CLARIFICATIONS: War Crimes, Murder, and Leadership.

This episode addresses allegations of misconduct by Task Unit Bruiser in Ramadi, including war crimes and poor relationships with other military units.

1. Jocko Willink strongly refutes allegations of misconduct and war crimes by Task Unit Bruiser.
2. Willink details the rigorous approval and oversight processes his unit underwent for all operations.
3. Misinformation can have damaging effects on reputations and morale, emphasizing the need for careful fact-checking.
4. The losses among Marines in Ramadi were primarily before Task Unit Bruiser’s arrival, challenging the narrative of their negative impact.
5. The unity and professionalism among U.S. military branches in combat are highlighted, contradicting claims of discord and misconduct.

1: Background and Accusations

Jocko Willink addresses and refutes serious allegations against his task unit, explaining the factual errors and possible motivations behind them. Jocko Willink: "These vile accusations... are just flat-out not true."

2: Operational Integrity

Willink discusses the stringent operational protocols and the close coordination required with various military commands. Jocko Willink: "Everything we did had to be approved... not just by one chain of command."

3: Impact of Misinformation

The harmful effects of misinformation on individuals and military morale are examined, with a call for responsible information sharing. Jocko Willink: "Accusations like these... they're not just harmful; they're dangerous."

1. Verify information before sharing it, especially if it involves accusations.
2. Understand the importance of operational approvals in military contexts.
3. Recognize the impact of misinformation and take steps to correct false narratives.
4. Appreciate the unity and collaboration among military units.
5. Respect the sacrifices of military personnel by upholding the truth.

Actions, operations, and conduct of SEAL Team Three, Task Unit Bruiser, in the Battle of Ramadi.

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Jocko Willink

Content Warnings:

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Jocko Willink

This is an addendum to Jocko podcast 434, which was called War Crimes, murder and leadership with Echo, Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. So after that podcast came out, number 434, if you haven't listened to it, please go listen to that first and come back to this. But after it came out, I had some people point out some things to me that they'd seen or heard on the interwebs. Some of them I'd glanced at, but I checked them out a little more in depth.

And normally I don't worry too much about stuff like this, or I don't talk very much about these kind of sort of thoughtless and flippant comments and, you know, bits of information out there on the interwebs. But there was actually some really revolting and outrageous things being said about me, being said about my task unit, tasking a bruiser, accusations of war crimes and reckless behavior, and getting Americans killed. And it was disgusting to listen to, to read through, and a wretched insult to all my guys who served and sacrificed, and especially to those guys who aren't here to defend themselves. And there were some very specific things that were said. And if you know anything about the military or war, they might have seemed a little bit unlikely.

But if someone is not familiar with the military, not familiar with war or rules of engagement or chain of command and the myriad of other things that you learn over career in the military, then people might believe some of these things. And even people that were in the military sort of spent time in the military. And so some of the vocabulary seemed familiar. Some of the things they said seemed like, oh, it seemed like could be possible, and some. So that could lead people to believe some of these things.

Well, one of these things was a supposed letter that was allegedly written by a marine officer from three eight marines. Now, like I said, for a normal person, this letter might seem credible. It uses some jargon, military jargon. It discusses places and, and events that took place in Ramadi. But for anyone with just a little bit of knowledge or a little bit of curiosity, it doesn't make any sense, and it's obviously just fabricated.

So according to this letter, then I'm not going to go through every detail of this letter, but this letter tells the story of how the marines arrived in Ramadi. And once they got to Ramadi, and this is in March of 2006, they got to Ramadi, and they established good working relationships with the local civilian leaders, and that's the sheikhs, and they were working to gain their trust and cooperation. And so. And it sounded like, oh, so everything got off to a great start. And, look, everyone was interacting with the local populace.

I've talked about that a bunch of. But the idea that things were going really well in early 2006 is just not true. The al Anbar People's council was a little tribal assembly that had been put together in late 2005 and 2006, early 2006, and it failed. And one of the reasons, in fact, I'll say the reason that it failed was because I think eight of the tribal leaders, maybe it was six, maybe it was eight of the tribal leaders, were assassinated, murdered, and it destroyed that idea and sent fear through the populace. So this is all happening in early 2006.

The glass factory, which we had Braxton on here talking about his book about the glass factory, that attack happened January 6, 2006. Most of the sheikhs at this time had actually gone into hiding or they'd fled Ramadi. So relations were not good. Early in 2006, the city's complete war zone. And this, again, this letter sort of paints this picture that then the seals from task unit bruiser showed up totally unprofessional, consistently breaking roes and standard operating procedures.

It talks about seals killing an elderly man doing yard work, and that the marines were then told to be ready for a local retaliation. And then the direct fire and indirect fire. And this is a, quote, direct fire and indirect fire saw a surge. And the intel reporting on our wounded in action, killed in action confirm this. A third marine and third platoon was shot in the head.

So you get the idea. So everything's kind of okay. This is the picture that's getting painted. Everything's kind of okay. And then the seals show up totally out of control, and now there's retaliation.

And the letter goes on to say that, quote, the local sheikhs refused to meet with us. They confirmed this was a response. Retaliation for the killing of an innocent elderly man. Tasking a bruiser with their signature punisher patches was causing the mayhem. Gut shooting women from their firing position of the hospital, killing unarmed Iraqis, and not cooperating with us forces on the ground to deconflict the battlespace.

Again. Go listen to podcasts. 434 go listen to podcast. 385 I explain in great detail, I would say three, four, 5 hours worth of detail why these claims are just. They're.

They're unbelievable. They're. They're not believable. Again, deacon not deconflicting with friendly units meant death. And believe me, we knew that very well because we had a significant blue on blue very early in deployment.

Not so if you're not going to cooperate with the battle space owners. It's suicide. You're going to die.

And if you kill unarmed civilians, that's going to be the last operation you do, and you're going to get detained and you're going to be put on trial. That's what's happening. So listen to podcast 385 and 434. I've explained the roe, the conditions on the ground, the scrutiny we were under, and you can hear that there. This letter then goes on to say, and here's, here's a quote.

It was obvious that they were not only directed to act in the manner which they did, but were also protected by their leadership because the combined leadership of three eight, that's the three eight marines and other local units were reporting bruisers wild and wanton acts of violence to their own chain of command as they were resulting in marines getting killed in retribution attacks. But our reports fell on deaf ears, end quote.

Again, this is just patently wrong. Any, any reports like this of us behaving in this manner, we would have been stopped immediately. We wouldn't done any more operations, investigations would have been launched. I would have been arrested.

Just, and this is what the claim is here. Just imagine this, that all the marine leadership is being told that war crimes are being committed and marines, their marines are getting killed as a result of it, but no one's going to listen to that. And the army, same thing. That's the claim here.

It's an absurd claim. And especially in the wake of Abu Ghraib, in the wake of Haditha, which again, these are things I've talked about. And now you're gonna say no one's listening, no one's paying attention when marines and soldiers are getting killed because of this behavior. It's just, it's just absolutely false. That's all it is.

So this letter, that's what this letter does. It tells this whole narrative of task unit bruiser, my task unit, being out of control, unprofessional, killing civilians, which then riles up the local populace, who then attacks. And this directly results in 36 marines being killed. And to sum up this narrative from this supposed officer and three eight marines, it says this, quote, we lost 36 marines. The vast majority of those losses were only in the middle months of deployment when task unit Bruiser was present, end quote.

That's just horrific to hear here, and it's just completely and utterly untrue. And anyone that was there or anyone that does five minutes of research knows that it's a lie. Here's the truth. Three eight marines, an outstanding unit assigned to one of the worst sectors in Ramadi, who fought a determined enemy valiantly and suffered greatly and took significant casualties. But they did not lose 36 marines tragically during their deployment.

They lost 17 marines, and that includes one of their navy corpsmen. One of their docks. Six of those marines, including their dock, one of their docks, six of them were killed between March 31 and April 6 during what the three eight marines call their hell week in Ramadi.

And that was before task unit Bruiser even arrived in Ramadi.

So the highest concentration of marines killed in Ramadi took place before task unit Bruiser even arrived in Ramadi.

One more marine, Lance Corporal Justin Sims, was killed April 15, just after we arrived.

The other ten marines that were killed from three eight were killed between May and August during the heaviest fighting of the battle, as the entire brigade combat team, including the three eight, of course, fought aggressively to seize ground inside the city.

And we supported several of those operations with three eight, and killed enemy fighters as they maneuvered to kill Marines from three eight. So this narrative, that task unit Bruiser, caused Marines to die, is a sickening lie.

One marine, Corporal Joseph Tomsey, who was a badass marine, Lima company, working out a snake pit. He's from Stowe, Ohio. He's a guy that, as a matter of fact, we loaned him a couple of suppressed mp5 s. So silenced mp5 s cause when they were out on patrol, he had to deal with dogs, and so he needed a way to deal with dogs that were making noise, biting, attacking, causing problems. So we loaned him a couple suppressed mp5 s because we were working together as a team.

And he was killed on August 2, same day as Mark Lee, and they left together on the same angel flight as we, seals and marines together, stood side by side on the tarmac, just as we did on the battlefield, and salute them with a final farewell. That's the reality.

And yet this, this just fabricated letter, which is. Could easily be researched and proven wrong, was just presented as a fact and even made into a clickbait title for one of the pieces of media.

The title being one shot from Tu Bruiser resulted in 36 marines dead.

That's disgusting.

And it's an insult. It's an insult to the Marines who were killed, who fought, obviously, an insult to task unit bruiser. It's an insult to everyone that was there working together and risking our lives for each other and to accomplish the mission.

And it's an insult to those men who are not here calling them murderers and calling them war criminals. It's despicable.

And people propagating this lie without researching it all, without doing the simplest fact check and just putting on your platform, it's shameful.

We were a team. We risked our lives for the army. We risked our lives for the Marine Corps. They risked their lives for us as well.

And we'll never forget that. And we won't forget the bond that we formed on the battlefield. Now, does this mean that every person from every unit in normati had great relationships, that there wasn't some friction between some people and between some units? Of course not. There were marines that don't like the army.

There are army soldiers that don't like marines. There's marines that don't like spec ops or seals. There's army guys that don't like spec ops or seals. There's no doubt about it. There's feathers that got ruffled.

There was some friction, but that friction was definitely a minority, a little tiny minority.

It was completely a minority that was so small, such a fraction that it was just overwhelmed by the unity that existed and the common cause.

But that wasn't all the wild claims and accusations. There are just vile accusations of tasking a bruiser, snipers, killing women and children.

Disgusting. And again, go listen to the roes when we talk about them and what the conditions on the ground were. In podcast 385 with Leif Babin, who is there on the ground in task unit Bruiser, or with, or in podcast 434 with Dave Burke, who is there on the ground with the Marine Corps. If you listen to those, you realize again that killing women and children could not have happened.

We had relationships with the interim government there, the tribal leaders that were remaining, that were engaged with their people, that were reporting grievances to the coalition leadership, which is, by the way, the battalion and brigade commanders right there in Ramadi, who we were working for.

And we had iraqi soldiers with us on every operation and iraqi soldiers out patrolling the streets and interpreters. It can't happen. It could not have happened.

I read an article on podcast 434. It's about one civilian that was killed in Ramadi and the repercussions that it caused, including manslaughter charges on american, on an american soldier.

And yet this just this claim that rolling off the tongue, oh, everyone knows they were killing civilians. It's disgusting.

And as I heard this, this is the thing with rumors. People like to be in the know. They like to, they like to be in the know. So they claim or they comment that they heard that, too, or they had an uncle in the army that said the same thing, or had an older brother in the marine who was there and he said the same thing, or my best friend was a seal, and he said, they want to prove that they're in the know. But what's interesting here is that anyone who is actually in the know knows that, that this was impossible.

It was impossible.

But that's what this despicable video claims. And just to continue on, these videos also present this bizarre idea that task unit bruiser and I were a bunch of cowboys out there doing absolutely whatever we wanted to do. Now, just, just cowboys on the loose. Jocko turned them loose.

This doesn't make any sense. As I mentioned in podcast 434, absolutely everything we did had to be approved through the entire chain of command. And not just one chain of command, but the special operations chain of command, the conventional forces chain of command. They're on the ground and the iraqi forces.

So again, if you don't understand this, I can see how maybe you think, oh, Jocko, just be out there doing whatever he wants. We could not conduct a single operation in conventional battle space without their approval. And they own the entire battle space. We did not own one iota of ground in Ramadi. We didn't own anything.

We had to get their approvals. The brigade commander, the battalion commanders, the company commanders, the platoon commanders, that means the three eight marines. Everything that we did with the three eight marines was absolutely approved by the three eight marines. We couldn't do anything without them. And by the way, they gave us guidance.

Don't go over here on this road. Stay over here on this area. Watch out for this building.

We had to get approved from them, from the 137, from the 136, from the first, the 506, from the 135, from the 160. They were our quick reaction forces. They were our fire support.

We couldn't conduct operations without them, and we were under extreme scrutiny, as I've explained, we were killing a lot of enemy. We had guys getting wounded. We had the blue on blue take place. Everyone was watching our every move.

And it's because we were in combat like no one in the SEAL teams had been in a long time, this kind of sustained urban combat. So the chain of command watched and checked and investigated and approved. So this idea that I was a cowboy, just out there doing whatever I wanted, and that task unit bruiser was let loose by me to go and do whatever they wanted is just, it's just an ignorant thought. It's not possible.

And not only did we have to get every operation approved through multiple chain chains of command, we got visited. We got visited by the special operations community. We got visit. My commanding officer, who was over in Fallujah, would come out and listen to brief and go out on operation. So he understood the ground truth of what was happening.

The siege of commander in charge of all the special operations in Iraq came and met with me and got briefed by me and then went and met with the conventional commanders and got a brief on what we were doing and how we were doing it and why we were doing it.

And the commodore in charge of all west coast SeAls who'd been in a JSOC command, who was my boss's boss, he came out to see exactly what we were doing and how we were doing it and why we were doing it.

And he approved. And the Cjisotiv commander approved. And my commanding officer approved. And even the commander, the commander of the entire special Operations command, commander of all special operations in the United States, General Brown, the four star general in charge of all United States special operations forces. He came to Ramadi to meet with my task unit to get a situation brief from me to then go and talk to the conventional commanders that we were working alongside to get their perspective on what we were doing and why we were doing it.

And he understood exactly what we were doing in great detail, and he understood how we were doing it and why we were doing it. The overwatches, the daytime patrols, the conventional iraqi troops we were working alongside the large scale clearance operations through the city.

He understood exactly what we were doing and why we were doing it.

And it just so happened that he was there in Ramadi the day Mark Lee was killed, and he stood at attention and saluted alongside the soldiers and marines and SEals as we loaded Mark Lee and Joe Thompsey on their last flight home.

So he absolutely knew the risk and he absolutely knew the cost.

And from all that, he understood exactly what we were doing, and he approved it because he knew we were doing the right thing. They all did. I did my task unit, did, anyone that understood the dynamics on the ground, the losses american forces were taking, the impact we were having, the Americans we were keeping alive, the gratefulness and gratitude of the army and Marine corps, anyone that understood that supported us and what we are doing implicitly.

We're frog men, we're seals, and our fellow Americans are out there fighting and dying on the battlefield. We stood up and fought with them.

And as I explained on podcast 434, we achieved victory on that battlefield.

And the battle of Ramadi became the model of counterinsurgency for the war in Iraq.

And after we came home, I took over the training for the west coast SEAL teams so I could pass on the lessons learned. And that's what I did.

I carried on with my career. And it's interesting, these videos, there's some of them saying that my career was a big disaster and I had a bad reputation, and I got kicked out of the teams or pushed out of the teams. Again, this is just ridiculous.

I had a great career in the navy and in the teams. I was blessed with what I got to do and my reputation and my performance in the teams is all in my record and the trajectory of my career. It's. It's all reflected there. And there's this.

There's this also, this mentioned in one of these videos about my involvement in an investigation of a contracting issue. And this happened. There was an investigation, not just to me, but of a whole slew of people. And I can tell you what happened. There was a.

There was a system of martial arts that was part of our training pipeline for a few years, and it wasn't that effective for what we actually needed, especially once the war started. And I didn't think so, and the vast majority of seals didn't think so, either. And that's the feedback that we got. And I was in charge of the west coast training, so we took the consolidated input from all the teams. And, look, we did this with all of our training all the time.

Oh, what. What's good? What's working? What's not working? And in the midst of all these training assessments that we did, we decided that this block of training was ineffective, and we should replace it with something more like the modern army combatives or the Marine Corps mic, Mac.

Just something sort of more modern. I actually thought it should be taught by seals, not by civilians. I didn't think you need to bring someone in. We have plenty of seals that are really good at combatives, and I thought they could teach it. And, you know, look, this wasn't just me.

This was the consolidation of all the input from the guys in training, the guys that were running training. So that's. We briefed up the chain of command, and that contract got removed. No factor. I didn't think.

Didn't even think about it. These things happened. Well, the guy who lost the contract was mad about this. He thought it was some kind of conspiracy against him. It wasn't.

It just the training. We wanted new training. But he filed a complaint to Congressman Duncan Hunter junior, and they launched a congressional investigation now, I owned my gym at the time, and, yeah, one of the investors and partners at the gym was arrested in New York in 1979 for drug dealing. And he went to jail. And when he got out of jail, he never wanted to go back.

So he left that world, literally. And he moved from New York to California, and he was reborn, and he worked, and he turned himself into an entrepreneur, and he became a successful businessman, running health clubs and real estate and a bunch of other ventures. And he was one of the partners at the gym.

But my gym had nothing to do with these military contracts. Nor did I. In fact, no one that got investigated did anything wrong, and the investigators found nothing. No contracting ethics violations by me or anyone else involved. We just wanted better training for the guys that are going on deployment.

And I never had any contracts or I never even applied for anything military or government contracts with the Navy or any other special operations unit. And my gym hasn't either. And up to this day, everything that I do for the army, Navy, Marine Corps, air force special operations, and the SEAL teams, I do for free.

So I was not kicked out or pushed out of the Navy for that or anything else. And if you want to dig around and you want to find some dirt on me, go read my books. Go read my books. The mistakes are in there. I've made them.

They're in there.

And if you want to track that, go track it.

But despite my mistakes, despite my shortfalls, because of extreme ownership, my career was absolutely on track. And I had been deep selected for promotion. And I'd actually screened positive on first look for my next position as executive officer. And that's when I made one of the hardest decisions of my life. I decided to retire.

I decided to retire after 20 years to be with my family and get to know my wife and kids after I'd dedicated 20 years to war and to the teams.

And that's what I did. And when I retired, guess what? I started doing some other things. I started teaching leadership. I wrote books, recorded podcasts wrote books, and recorded podcasts that taught lessons that we learned and shared the stories of our fallen brothers.

Our fallen brothers from tasking a bruiser, our followed brothers from the teams. And not just the teams, but soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines. Throughout history and to the present day, I share their stories.

And I started companies.

I started companies that. Companies that honor the memory of my brothers and teach the lessons of leadership. Companies that. Companies that make people smarter and better and faster and stronger. Companies that provide hundreds of jobs and bring much needed manufacturing capabilities back to America.

Yeah. Yeah, I've been getting after it. And I. I know. I know that Mark and Mikey and Ryan and Chris and Seth, they would want me to get after it.

They would want me to drive on. They would want me to continue to build and grow and live.

And how do I know that? Because I would want them to do the same. And also because their families tell me that.

And those guys, the guys we lost, they would want me to make sure that I did not squander any of this gift that they gave me, the gift that they gave to all of us.

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

So I recommend everyone do that.

Live. Live well. Try to get better. Try to be better.

Be cautious about what you say and what you hear. Be careful who you listen to. Be careful what you repeat.

And if you have a platform, and we all have a platform now with social media, don't put out information, especially information. Accusing people of things that you don't verify. What good are you doing when you do? That doesn't help. It's not going to help you.

It's not going to help anyone else. Don't traffic in rumors and innuendos. They won't help you. They'll hurt you. If you're wrong, admit it.

Take ownership, correct your mistake, and just let's do good.

Do the right thing for the right reason.

Live a good life. Be a good person, and I'll do the same. Or at least I'll try.

I'll try every day to live in a way that would make my fallen brothers proud.

It's the least I can do. It's the least we can do.

And that's all I've got to say about this.

Other than, of course, thank you to all the heroic soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines that fought side by side with us in the bloody battle of Ramadi.

Then I can tell you how I feel. I can tell you how all of task unit bruiser feels.

But I can't say it any better than Shakespeare did in Henry V.

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother.

We will never forget those we served alongside, and we will never forget those that did not come home, and we will live to honor them.