435: Get Up and Aggressively Attack Until You Win. Lessons from A Marine Named Mitch.

Jocko Willink

This is Jocko, podcast number 435 with Echo, Charles and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Echo. Good evening. The night we moved off the beach inland, somewhere around Henderson Field, we were to beef up the small perimeter which had been held by the other two regiments. Our friends at the beach told us to expect to see some activity after dark, as they had just told us about the way the enemy harassed them at night.

Just as we were starting across an open clearing near Henderson Field, washing machine charlie, the japanese observation and spotter plane we had been told about, dropped his greenish white but very illuminating parachute flares right over us, lighting up the entire area like daylight. Naturally, we hit the deck immediately, and not a soul moved. A moment later, the booming from sea Lark channel came, the horrifying red hot naval gunfire, ripping up trees and causing the earth to move under you as each big round came crashing ashore. This was our baptism.

And that right there is an excerpt from a book called A Marine named Mitch, written by Mitchell Page, who served as an enlisted marine, was eventually commissioned, and he was born in Charlie Roy, Pennsylvania, August 31, 1918. His parents were Serbian. They had immigrated to America from overseas, and he was the youngest of three. Older sister, older brother. Spent his teenage years in the Great Depression.

Doesn't talk about that too much in the book. Gives some kind of basic background. But as he's growing up, he sees some. It's interesting, he sees some, some violence and whatnot. But it turns out that the military looks like a pretty good option.

And we're gonna get into it, get into his life, and you're gonna hear some stories that you won't forget. Here we go. One day, after high school was over, I kissed my mother goodbye. My very close friend Johnny Haller was two years younger than I wanted to go with me. Mother packed a bag of food for us, and Johnny and I set out for Baltimore.

We started walking, and the next day, we arrived in Baltimore. After being given several rides by people on the road. The recruiters told me they could not accept me until the end of August cause I was just 17, and besides, I needed to put on more weight. So on that hot summer day in 1936, Johnny and I started back to Camden Hill. This was the greatest distance either of us had ever been from home.

We walked many miles as we were embarrassed to put our hands, to put up our hands to flag a car or a truck. Once we came to a stream where we stopped for a restaurant. I washed out my socks and put them on a rock to dry. Then I bathed myself. Johnny laughed at me when I told him you had to check your socks, shoes, and feet if you're going to walk long distances.

On my 18th birthday, I was back in Baltimore alone. This time I passed the physical examination, but I had to eat about a dozen bananas and drink several glasses of water, as I still wasn't quite heavy enough. When the doctor started the examination, I had my left hand on a Bible, and my right hand was raised facing the american flag. My spine tingled as I repeated the oath administered to me by the Marine Corps officer that day in the recruiting office in Baltimore. Quote, I will uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies, whomsoever, foreign or domestic.

I was given a train ticket to Parris Island, South Carolina, for my boot camp training. There were other new men on the train also, and we quickly got acquainted. We talked about our new adventure and all the fun we were going to have. But that all changed when we were met at the train station in a little town by some marines known as drill instructors, or Di's. I never realized anybody or anything could be so rough.

Our drill instructors were truly tough men. I can recall corporal Ambrose D. Webb. He would put his nose against a recruit's nose and say, if you don't shape up, I'll kill you. And we all knew he meant it.

One night about 0200, he made us get under our bunks, roll a heavy marching order, then carry them outside, put them on our backs, and then we had to double time into the swamps. He marched us right into ribbon creek while standing on the bank screaming, down, you dumb bast. Drown, you dumb bastards, drown. We had outstanding men and knew what march discipline meant. By that time, the first man in the water marched straight through.

The rest followed, and as a consequence, no one was hurt. We were dead tired when we finally got to bed in our barracks that morning and reveille sounded a very short time later.

A favorite practice of corporal webs while we were at the rifle range was to march us out to a very sandy area, where he ordered us to stand at attention for an hour at a time. By the way, that's the worst. When I had to go to, like, you're going through basic seal training, you. You know, you gotta, like, do push ups and burpee. Well, we didn't do burpees.

They do them now. We did a count. Bodybuilders, whatever. They're doing. Calisthenics.

That's how you're getting crushed. When I went to officer candidate school, a lot of it was stand there at attention. Don't move. And I would much rather take the burpees and eight count bodybuilders or whatever. What is the position of standing?

Hands at your side. Oh, at your side. Your feet are together. You're looking straight ahead. It's like that.

Echo Charles

Yeah. Normal military position of attention. You can't, like, loosen up. Nothing. You gotta stay still.

Jocko Willink

Stay still. It's not fun. Back to the book. With our shirt, with our arms and necks exposed. Since we could only wear an undershirt, the thousands of sand fleas were all over us.

In our nostrils, eyes, ears and hair web paced back and forth around us, pounding the palm of his hand with a stick, screaming, if you move a muscle, I'll kill you.

Check and look. Obviously, I'm not gonna read the whole book. Fast forward a little bit. Graduation from boot camp was the highlight in my life to that point. Hell, yeah.

Fast forward a little bit. When I enlisted, when I had enlisted in Baltimore, the commandant of the Marine Corps was Major General John H. Russell. On December 1, 1936, when General Russell retired, Major General Thomas Holcomb became the 17th commandant of the Marine Corps. As years went by, the old salts used to say.

And how many commandants have you served under? It was wonderful to know that I was no longer a recruit. I was now out serving with other regulars from boy to man.

So again, this is 1936. So this is the Great Depression is going on, and there's no war going on. And he gets assigned to a ship. He gets assigned to the USS Wyoming in Norfolk, Virginia. And they set sail out into the Atlantic.

And he goes through San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Guantanamo. And through the Panama Canal, out into the Pacific Ocean, goes up the coast of Mexico, ends up in California.

Go to the book here. Pick it up. The next day, February 18, 1937, was a cool, overcast day. And we were off San Clemente island, which is 65 nautical miles off the coast of San Diego. Where you and I live.

And it's also where seals get trained. Not only in basic seal training. But also in some advanced training. You go out to San Clemente. So San Clemente island has a special place in our hearts.

So here he is. Overcast day. We were off San Clemente island when, at 1042. A powder charge of a five inch shell exploded in a breach which had not been properly closed. At that precise moment, on gun number 13, starboard side, Marine Captain Edward J.

Trumbull and five enlisted men were killed. Ten others were seriously injured, and one died. A few hours later, I helped a man to the sick bay whose arm had been blown off the shoulder. It was a horrible sight. That was the first of many terrible sights I would be experiencing in the next few years.

So that's one thing they do at San Clemente island, is you can, you can bomb it. So they do naval gunfire out there. And that's what they were doing, I'm sure, at that time. So then from there he gets onto another ship, the USS Showmont. Goes to Hawaii, goes to Guam.

So he's on this USS Shomont Chaumont. And he says this on the 19th. Sorry. On the 19 June 1937, we steamed into Manila Bay, past Corregidor and into Manila, philippine islands, some 1500 miles from Guam. As the tug eased us into the dock, a loud cheer and laughter came from the Greeters as the stern of the ship moved in closer.

A marine private had lowered himself over the phantail of the ship, and under the letters of the ship's name, he had painted the following. So you know, the name of the ship is the showmont, and that's written across the stern of the ship. And so this marine in the middle of the night had gone over the side and he had added letters underneath to make a sentence. And the sentence that he wrote was, christ help all us marines on Navy transports. And then he says this, only a troop passenger would understand his reasons for doing this.

And I was a troop passenger on three navy ships, two amphibious ships, one aircraft carrier, he says, and here's what they were dealing with. One canteen of fresh water a day to brush your teeth and wash your face. Saltwater showers and sleeping quarters that were stacked so high, so deep and so close together, you never knew whose foot or hand would be in your face. Anyone with claustrophobia would never have survived. The chow lines were unbelievable.

It was one continuous line that snaked all around the top side of the ship from about 0500 for breakfast. I was just laughing as I read this because that's exactly what it was like for me. Ownership in the nineties. This was interesting. Fast forward a little bit.

The total strength of the United States Marine Corps at that time was 17,000. The total strength of the whole Marine Corps was 17,000, which included all the officers and men stationed all over the world. Our pay then as a private was dollar 21 a month. $0.20 was deducted for the Navy each month for our hospitalization. So actually I was receiving $20.80 a month.

So a little bit more.

Our commanding officer was known as Miles R. Thatcher. He was better known to all enlisted men as court martial Thatcher. It was said that Colonel Thatcher held the Marine Corps record for the greatest number of brig days awarded for accidental discharges and for failure to salute. And what's interesting about that is even though they had this super strict commander, they were still out.

Just like being young marines and getting after it. Pick up a little fast forward in the book. I can recall one big brawl in the dreamland cabaret when about 200 sailors, marines, and civilians turned on one another while blowing my whistle and pulling sailors and marines apart. I felt someone pummeling my back and the back of my head. I swung around and quickly I could see a ballerina flopping to the floor as I had accidentally clobbered her with my elbow.

I picked up her. I picked her up and deposited her behind the bar and told the bartender to put some ice on her head. I was glad that the night was to over. I was worried about the ballerina, but she was all right the next day. Nothing but a sore head.

So these guys are just out brawling. He ends up going from Manila and heading for China. On October 25, 1938, I went aboard ship in Manila, and we sailed up to Hong Kong for a few days and then to Shanghai. After we hit the Yangtze river, we then steamed along the muddy Wang Pu river to Shanghai, which was about 16 miles from the sea. We passed numerous japanese warships, and all looked as though they were itching for a scrap.

That's 1938.

This was interesting. Fast forward. One day, I was browsing around in the Oriental bookstore, which was located at 164 Victoria Road in Tian Sin. I saw Lieutenant Chidester perusing a book. As I walked over to say hello to him, I noticed he was looking at a book entitled Opium.

He asked me what I was reading, and I told him I just purchased a book about Genghis Khan. Previously, I'd purchased a book about Marco Polo, the venetian traveler. Lieutenant Chidester said he was reading all the books about dope he could lay his hands on. The next day, when I came off watch and walked into the guardhouse, the sergeant of the guard told me that Lieutenant Chisel wished to see me. When I went into the small officer of the day's room, Lieutenant was reading the book about opium.

He told me to sit down and then started to tell me why he was so interested in books about dope. He said, someday dope will be the ruination of the world. Dope will do the people's dope. Dope will do to the peoples of the world what bombs, bullets, and bayonets won't do it. Will kill millions without wounds, cuts, dismemberment, mutilation, or bloodletting, but rather it will kill by destroying the mind.

He told me about the horrors and the tragedy he believed would beset the world, all mankind, through the use of narcotics. He told me how the Japanese had introduced their red pills into China. He said the Chinese had recently instituted a law that chinese manufacturers of dope and the chinese peddlers of dope would be shot. He gave me a real education on opium, heroin, and morphine.

He moves again. I went to Chin Wang Tau on the coast, where I went aboard the USS Henderson, or more familiarly known as Hendy Maru, to any sailor or Marine who's ever traveled to or from the far east in the thirties and forties. So he's on another ship, back across the Pacific, back to Honolulu, fast forward San Francisco, through. Back through the Panama Canal, back to Brooklyn.

Granted leave, goes home. For the first time, Mother read several letters to me she had received from the old country, wherein it was feared that Serbia, in Serbia, that they, too, would be in another war. Prince Paul of Yugoslavia was reported visiting with Hitler, and many of the high yugoslav air force officers were mingling with german officials and military personnel. Mother said she was certain that the country was being sold out to the Germans. When my leave was over, I was ordered to Philadelphia Navy yard for duty.

So he shows up there. I've been promoted to corporal. September 10, 1940. And again, just trying to give you some sense of what's going on in his world as being a peacetime marine during the Great Depression.

Fast forward a little bit more. Captain Mahoney called me into his office, handed me a sheet of paper. As he reached out his hand and said, congratulations, sergeant, I've been promoted. My date of rank was May 14, 1941.

Goes over. He's now tracking. You know, they're all watching these world events. He sees the Yugoslav get bombed by Hitler, and now we kind of get into it. Sunday, December 7, 1941.

I was sitting in my tent in New River, North Carolina, when the news on the radio was interrupted with a special bulletin. The Japanese were bombing Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The news went around camp in a flash, as it did around the country and the entire world that day in December. All men on liberty and those on leave were recalled immediately. There were very heavy casualties in Hawaii, we learned, as everyone seemed to have his ears glued to all the radios in camp that day.

In addition, we learned that the Japanese had also struck at all of our other bases in the Pacific and in the Orient. All 16 officers and 178 enlisted men at Tianzen and Pei, Peking were interned that day by the Japanese. A short time after that, the first announcement, Captain Mahoney and Sergeant Bill AG, who had just returned from Charleston, South Carolina, came charging into the tent. The captain's first words were, well, this is it this time. And we all knew it was, too.

We fast forward when we learned that we would be the first to be going overseas, I thought how nice it would be if we would only be able to continue to listen to what was my favorite radio program, as it was also for practically all the marines in New River, North Carolina. So they found out that they're leaving. This was a little side note as well. Well, it's not a side note. In October 1941, Chesty arrived in New River, North Carolina, and took over as the commanding officer of the first battalion, 7th Marines.

So you got Chesty Poehler. Get to hear about him. Our battalion executive officer was Major Odell M. Connally, an outstanding officer in every respect. We all had absolute confidence in major Connally, and I personally was very happy to have such capable leaders as he and Colonel Hanneken.

On the fourth of Octof April 1942, I was promoted to platoon sergeant in the Marine Corps. My machine gun platoon went aboard the USS Fomohault, which was a cargo ship. Also aboard was a naval construction unit of Seabees. At 0400 on the 10 April 1942, we sailed out of Norfolk and out into the Atlantic. What's a seabee again?

So, Seabees, it stands for construction battalion. So in the navy, they have. They need to build things. And so they formed this group called the Construction Battalion. Their nickname is Seabees CB.

And they're, you know, their symbol is like a little b. And they still exist to this day. And they're really, in a way, kind of the. The group inside the navy that is likely to spend time on the ground in combat because they build things in an extremist situation. So in for us, in tasking a bruiser, I had CB's with me, and they.

So their job in our camp and camp Mark Lee in Ramadi. So if we needed something to be built, they built it. So if we needed a bunker built or we needed a tables built or we needed a building built, they would build it like they would build a building. You know what I mean? Now, it doesn't.

It's not up to code or whatever, but structurally sound. You know, it's two by fours and there's no sheet rock, but it's got plywood on the inside and and then these guys, actually, our CB's would go out and just build out whatever we needed to. So they. When we would set up in a combat outpost, if we needed a little extra, who knows, maybe a little planning space, like they'd go out into town and go down there and build it. Yeah.

Echo Charles

Yeah. They. When Stoner was over in camp Corregidor, they were in this building called full metal jacket using the boom. So this building was called full metal jacket. It was all blown up.

Jocko Willink

This is over at Camp Gregory door, the first, the 506. And these soldiers and marines and seals are living in this building called full metal jacket. And I remember one of the first things. So when we got to Ramadi, pretty early, we went over, they needed help over in that district of Ramadi, eastern Ramadi. Wait, who needed help?

Well, there was a lot of enemy activity, all right? And so everyone knows there. So when we showed up, we killed some IED emplacers, like almost out of the gate. And Colonel Gronsky, who's been on the podcast, we were. I'm literally in the.

In his tactical operation Brigade tactical operations center. And we'd been there for a little while, but a very short period of time. And when we got there, marines had just had a massive IED in this place called firecracker. And four marines got killed. It was terrible.

And the marines kind of liaised with us and said, hey, we've got this area where there's a lot of IED emplacements. Can you help us? And we're like, sure. And so bTF Tony took some guys. They would have set up a sniper position and killed IED emplacers in that vicinity where they had just lost those marines.

And I was in talking to Colonel Gronsky as these reports are coming in, hey, there's been multiple engagements of IED emplacers. And, you know, Colonel Kronsky's, are those your guys? Yeah, sir, those are my guys. And he said, we could use your guys out in eastern Ramadi in this place called the Molab district. So I said, roger that.

And so we put together a package of guys to go out to eastern Ramadi. And at first, we took a big group, like, probably. We probably took 20 guys for the first series of missions that we did out of there. But when we got there, we needed a place to stay. So where we stayed was this place called full metal jacket.

And at that time, it was dirt floors, just mosquitoes, just hotter than hell. It just sucked. It was nasty. Mosquitoes, like sand fleas or something, and it had moon dust. You know what moon dust is?

Echo Charles

Yeah. Have you ever been to a place that has real world, like, real world moon dust? No. So this had moon dust everywhere in camp Corregidor, and the moon dust was just all over the place. So this place really sucked to live.

Jocko Willink

So we ended up conducting operations for a period of time out there, and that's actually when we had the blue on blue. So all that stuff. So we conducted a bunch of operations. We ended up having that blue on blue. Now we go back to.

We take. I take all those guys, and we go back to western Ramadi. When we get back to western Modi, which is. Which was called Shark base, which we changed the name to Camp Markley after Mark got killed. So now we're back there, and we, you know, we debrief the.

The blue on blue. We set up standard operating procedures to make sure it doesn't happen again. All that investigation gets complete. So now it's. We're back.

We got to get back in the field and go do our job. And now it was, okay, we need to send an element of guys back over to Corregidor. And this ended up being detachment corregidor debt core. So debt core, which Seth took six guys, seven guys out to debt corps, and Mikey Monsoor was one of them. JP Danelle was one of them.

So those. That group of guys. I think all the other guys are still in. Some of them are out. But anyways, it was that group of guys.

They go back out there. So now it's just them, but now they're gonna permanently live there, and they're in this freaking barracks. That is sucks. So we explain that to the Seabees, and this whole story that I just told you is my love story for the Seabees. Yeah.

Echo Charles

Yeah. Hell, yeah. Because then the Seabees go back, go out there. They load up a truck and go out there with all kinds of plywood and air conditioning and rewire the thing and get it all set up. And.

Jocko Willink

And they. Everyone built in these big kind of empty rooms. Everyone built their own little bedrooms. Yeah, so. So Mikey monster wore his.

I forget, like, Mikey's mansion or something like that. Like red velvet hanging up. And everyone had these little. Basically built these little, you know, built a nice. A lot more comfortable.

They put flooring in because it was dirt. So they put plywood down the. So the Seabees did that. The Seabees also. So one of the CB chief.

Great guy. And so we got mortared and the mortar round hit by our tents and. But luckily, thankfully, I don't know how it didn't hurt anybody, but it blew up our, put holes into our big. We had a big water tank, you know, like a 10,000 gallon water tank, a big giant water tank. And so it put big holes in.

It was ruined. And somehow my CB chief went out and found somehow he went out and found another tank and brought it in a camp and got it all hooked up. And, you know, I was talking to him and I said, hey, man, thank you. Like, he got it up in a day or whatever, two days. And I just want to say, hey.

And again, this is my like, love story for the Seabees. And so I said, hey, chief, I was like, hey, man, I really appreciate you getting that done. That that way guys can fill up their canteens and. And he's like, hey, it's no problem. I'll do whatever I got to do to take care of you guys so you can go out there and kill these bad guys.

He said, cuz I don't want no more boom boom in the camp. And I said, I hear you. Then I don't want any more boom boom in the camp either. We didn't like that boom boom in the camp. Yeah.

And so, yes, so that's what CB's do. And their motto is, we build, we fight. Yeah. And we certainly gave them the opportunity to build and fight. Ramadi, great job.

Echo Charles

So legit freaking like that even. That even kind of. And I'm kind of slowly, not slowly, but over time, painting this picture of like, how it all works, you know, and it's like buildings are massive, massive operations, obviously, where like, you have a whole. Their whole job is just to go. And just build shit.

Jocko Willink

Yeah, yeah. And so this was. And we had whatever, we probably had 30 vehicles, so we probably had ten Humvees, a big two, big six buys. Little like SUV's. Those guys maintained all those vehicles.

Yeah, so. And it's a big deal when you're maintaining a Humvee that guys are gonna be driving in that their lives are dependent on. It's a big deal. You can't gun deck the freaking maintenance on it. So they're doing all that.

We. I think we had 17 diesel generators and they're big. Not like a camping generator, but, you know, a generator that's the size of a small truck, you know what I mean? So we had like 17 of those. All the air conditioning units.

These guys just, they were working around the clock. They worked around the clock, I think we had six CB's. That's crazy. And then their boss, technically, was this master chief. So when you're a master chief, CB, you're kind of just.

You got a lot of power, you know? So if we needed something and my chief could go to that master chief, that master chief would just take care of us. Yeah. Yeah. He was just a great guy.

They were just great guys. Yeah, that seems like you'd be a. I mean, obviously there's a lot to it, but that seems like that'd be such a legit job where you could just, hey, let's just build that thing right there. And it's very cool if anyone's listening to this and you're, let's say you're 16 years old and you like carpentry or you like working on cars or you like heavy machinery, you can go in the army for sure. And there's, you know, you can be an engineer, but the Seabees is a definite option.

And their job, your job will be like diesel mechanic or a heavy equipment operator. So when you. If you want to get a skill, you can go in the Seabees and you can get that. And it is. It's.

I don't know what it's like now. It used to be a little bit hard to make rank because it was such a good. Like, you're even recognizing that it's a cool job. Yes. And so since it's a cool job, guys stay in it.

And since it stays in, it gets kind of. The ranks get filled up. So sometimes it can be a little bit hard to make rank. But RCB's were great. And the young enlisted guys, like the e four s, e five s, those guys were working 24 hours a day.

Like, it would just never stop because we had so much work for them to do. So those are the Seabees construction of the time. And there's another thing about the Seabees that they have to kind of improvise, adapt and overcome. So they're gonna, like, where do you get a 10,000 gallon water tank in Ramadi, Iraq, in the summer of 2006? How do you do that?

You gotta figure out, you got a wheel and deal. You gotta have relationships with people. You gotta be able to trade stuff. Yeah. You know, he probably.

I don't know what he may. He might have given away a truck. I don't know. You know, he did something. He did something.

He did what he had to do. Yeah. He was also strong, bro. Yeah. His nickname was Biggie.

He would. He would. He would just rep. Warm up, rep 315. Honest, honestly, like, I do 135 in a warmup.

He would be doing that with 315. Oh, damn. Was it huge? Huge. Huge.

Like, and, like, what's the style where they're not lean, but they're definitely not fat? They're just huge. Yeah, yeah. He wasn't fat. He was just, like, a large human almost.

You know, maybe he's not quite the same species as we are. You know what I mean? Like, he's that much different where you're like, this is not. It's not normal to bench 315. Just repping it out.

By the way, this isn't. The food's not great. You're on weird hours, and he's just in there just jacking. That's how his body is just jacked. So, yeah, there's my CB's.

Echo Charles

Yeah, that always seemed legit. Like, the idea of these guys. And there's a lot of guys like. And there's actually tv shows like this, too, with the guys with the cars where, like, hey, let's just put a roll cage on here or whatever. They'll just.

Jocko Willink

Oh, yeah. Cause they just know everything about. They just know how, you know, that's their. Their skill, you know? Where.

Echo Charles

Yeah, just like how you said where. It's like, hey, let's make a. Let's make a tower right here. And we're like, wait, we don't have that much wood. All right, well, I'll go find some shit to build this actual, legitimate tower.

Jocko Willink

Yeah. You know, it's like, man, that's kind of impressive. And that's. That was. That was a cool thing, is, like, just having that skill set.

Echo Charles

Yeah. And me having access to it. Oh, we. For instance. Oh, we want to put an observation tower here.

Jocko Willink

Cool. Give me a few days. Yeah, I don't have any wood. I don't have any this on, but I'm gonna get it, and you're gonna have your freaking tower, sir. Cool.

I like it. So check out the Seabees all day. Good thing, man. All right, so these guys are now setting sail out there across the Atlantic. On May 8, 1942, we arrived and arrived in Pago Pago.

Pago. Pago. Pago. Pago. Pago pago.

Thank you. In American Samoa. Yeah. Actually, it would be pronounced Pongo. Pongo, if I'm not mistaken, because you add the n sound and.

Okay. The g. Okay, we'll check with Tulsi. Yeah, check with Tulsi to confirm, though. Dude, she tightened me up on that podcast.

Remember that? Tight me. Oh, she tightened me up. Yes, I said Samoa. She's like, Samoa.

Echo Charles

Samoa. But remember, and I don't know if I said this online or offline, but sometimes you can be kind of seen as a poser, because that's, like, the authentic way to say it. So if you're samoan, you're gonna say samoan. Right. But then usually people just say samoan, you know?

Jocko Willink

You know, you don't. How they didn't want to, like, start china, you know what I'm saying? I wasn't over there trying to. You want to stay in your lane on that. Yeah.

Echo Charles

So. Staying in my lane. But, you know, it's weird. It is funny, though, that I think America might be the only one that does this. The only country that does this, where if you say, like, a non english word or whatever, and you say it with the accent, like, people, like, look at you or whatever, like, it's funny.

You know what I'm saying? But I think all other countries, they say it with accent. Like, they try to say it the. Proper way, but we don't. Or we don't.

Jocko Willink

We just say samoa. Wait, what? Yeah, exactly. Right? Or, like, even, like, you know, you.

Echo Charles

You. Or order, like, you go to mexican place, you say taco, right? Or burrito, right? But it should be burrito, really. Right?

But if Jaco's over here. Hey. Oh, man. Let me get a water and a burrito. Like, people would be like, chocolate.

What the hell? You know? Like, they'd be, like, kind of looking at you funny. So we. We don't do that.

We don't do that. My kids took Spanish. Yeah. In high school, and I think they didn't like to be. Do you know, they didn't want to be the gringo.

Jocko Willink

That's. So they would speak, like, full Spanish, but full gringo, right? Yeah, yeah, it is. Because you learn a lot of Spanish, you know, growing up in San Diego, and now you're taking Spanish 12345 and six, because they start taking in six weeks, so you actually know a lot of Spanish. But not even attempting to pretend as if you're gonna say burrito, you know, they're not doing that.

They're just like, burrito. So I always got a kick out of that. It's the. Well, my mom is from Canada. Right?

Echo Charles

So in. So, Canada. But, you know, there's French. They speak French in Canada, right? A lot of the time, too.

So when she would say the french words, she would say it with the french accent, and for whatever reason, I would be like, but you don't have to try to impress me with your bilingual french words, you know? But after a while, I realized seven. Years old put your mom in check. For real. But after a while, I realized, wait a second.

That's, like, my bias, I think, you know, because, you know, when people, like. It's almost like you can sense when people try to do that. It's almost like they're trying to impress you with their. Like, I'm so worried, you know? That's what it feels like.

Jocko Willink

I don't know. I'm not saying that's what happens. Yeah. There's some people that are probably straight up trying to be respectful to the native language, right? Yeah.

Echo Charles

Oh, yeah. Yeah, you'd think. Yeah, you'd think so. I'm sure there's a bunch of reasons. And there's some people that would think it's disrespectful to try and use that accent when you're a howly.

Yeah. Like, who you think you are kind of a thing. Yeah. And then. But here's the reality of it.

When you really kind of detach, you're like, Brian, you better start using that accent because that's how you learn the language way better. Because, you know how they say when you're a little kid, it's easy to learn languages way easier because you don't build, like, lingual, like, habits or whatever. So. But then after the age of, like, 18 or so, you. You can't get rid of the accent, apparently, you know?

So it's like, Brad, you better try harder. Otherwise, Brad, you're not gonna learn that language. Good. You know? So it's, like, a better thing to try to use the accent, bro.

Why are we hating on that? I don't know. It's weird. I'm sure there's, like, this big web. Of reason, I guess.

Jocko Willink

Here's what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna kind of stick to my howly ways, my gringo ways. So here we go back to the book. On May 8, 1942, we arrived in Pongo. Pongo, American Samoa.

There was very little news that we could get aboard the Fulmanhall, which was their ship. However, I did learn at Pangopongo that Corregidor had surrendered on May 6. And with that, approximately 17 officers and 1474 enlisted men of the fourth marines were captured from Pongo. Pongo. We sailed around the beautiful islands.

And on May 10, we disembarked from the ship and went ashore in Higgins boats through beautiful harbor to the little town of Appiah. So imagine this. You're, you know, you're part of America, the badass, best fighting force in the world. You get on board your ship, and when you get off your ship, people had surrendered in Corregidor, by the way, that's a place. What's, what's interesting about this is he knew those, but he'd been to those places because, remember, he'd gone all throughout the Southeast Asia when he was in the marines prior to the war kicking off.

So he knows what that means. That's got to be a little bit horrifying.

Now they're there on Appia, and he's got so many cool details. I mean, they're out there. This is sort of, you get into the, they're out there living with the natives, hanging out with the natives there. Very cool stories that he talks about. And of course, on top of that, back to the book.

Each day we held machine gun drill, and I would scout the area. All the men were so enthusiastic, and everyone seemed to be learning the samoan language. This was very relaxing time in our service, and it was hard to believe that we were at war again. These are dudes. Like, where's he?

He's from freaking Pennsylvania, and now he's in american circle, Samoa. Or now he's an Appian. He's just beautiful. About the 15 July, we received information that Admiral Gormley had directed that the 7th Marines be ready to embark on four days notice with 90 days supply and ten units of fire per weapon. That particular message naturally created quite a bit of interest among the officers and the non commissioned officers as to where we would be going.

I was very disturbed that we were unable to get any worldwide news. I missed the news so much as Simon Scott and several other members of my platoon were always after me to give them my prediction of what was happening next. I didn't go into this, but he's a very well read guy you can kind of use. You know, he's in the bookstore. He talks a lot about history, and he studies history.

When he goes to places, he's learning about their culture. He's a very interested guy. He's a very curious guy. And clearly you tell from the book that he's someone that everyone kind of respected his opinion. So as world events are happening, plus he's an older marine, lived in Asia.

He knows these things. You know, you know how much when you've been to a place, your knowledge of that place is exponentially more than when you've heard about it. Yeah. So when someone says oh, when you meet someone and they say, where do you live? And I say, san Diego.

And they say, where in San Diego? I always say, have you been there? Because if they haven't been to San Diego, it doesn't matter what I'm about to say. Yeah, yeah, you know, but if they've. Been to San Diego, you're like, oh, we can narrow it down and we can talk, but if they haven't been there.

So here, this guy's been all over to all these different countries and he's well read, so he's got knowledge, but there's no news coming in. Back to the book. My men were very ardent listeners and occasionally in training lectures I would cite certain references and quotes. One of my favorites, for instance, I reminded them of what the old french general told his troops before they engaged the Germans in battle in World War one. Quote, there is no studying on the battlefield.

It is then simply a case of making use of what one knows. And in order to make a little possible, one must know much. Trying to get these guys to study and be ready. When discussing possible carelessness in combat, such as neglecting to move from COVID to cover or failing to keep down low, I reminded them of the great german soldier statement, Bismarck, who once said, some say they learn from experience, but I prefer to learn from the experience of others. Our marine amphibious warfare doctrine had proven itself over and over in previous wars and campaigns.

So again, this guy's not a combat veteran at this point, but he is a senior guy and he's trying to get his individuals trained up, trying to get him to move from COVID to cover. I used to have that when I came back and I was running training and I'd see guys walking in our urban training. I'd see guys not standing by cover. I would feel sick. I'd feel sick.

Guadalcanal. So now we're gonna get into it.

We arrived in Espiritu Santu under escort on September 12. The next day, Admiral Gormley ordered the 7th Marines to proceed to Guadalcanal. So at dawn on the 14 September, we left Espirito Santu escorted by three cruisers plus several destroyers and minesweepers. There appeared to be some disagreement between Rear Admiral Kelly Turnell and Major General Alexander A. Vandergrift, the commanding general of the first Marine division on Guadalcanal, as to where exactly we were to land.

According to a Navy chief in the Radio shack, Turner wanted us to land about 20 miles east of the perimeter, but General Vandergrift wanted us closer to the perimeter. In any event, the weather was quite heavy, and at dawn, about 545, we went to shore. So it's even these guys, like the troops, they hear about these little disagreements, and the chief in the radio shack who's listening to them talk, he's spreading the gossip about what's happening. Two of our destroyers were lobbing shells into nearby. I'm fast forwarding.

Two of our shells were lobbing shells into the nearby jungles, harassing the enemy while we were carrying the crates off the beach. So they went ashore up into cover under the trees. Then suddenly we heard anti aircraft firing all over the place. Someone yelled that enemy japanese zeros were coming in to strafe us. I jumped behind some big crates.

I was getting ready to move as a plane went zooming over us. It was one of our own, and it was a great misfortune that we had crippled one of our own aircraft. I'm sure that was an unusual incident with all the new people around. Nonetheless, I knew then why all our friends were constantly scanning the skies and why our ships wanted to pull out of the area as soon as possible. This was Guadalcanal, British Solomon Islands, America's first offensive since the day the Japanese launched their infamous attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941, some nine months earlier.

Now I read about their baptism. Right a moment later, the booming from sea lark channel came, the horrifying red hot naval gunfire, ripping up trees and causing the earth to move under you as each big round came crashing ashore. This was our baptism. As I lay there on the ground at Guadalcanal, I wondered how many of those ships pounding us at night I had seen previously in Shanghai and other ports in China. I wonder, too, how much of that flying steel that came at us from hundreds of shiploads of scrap iron the Japanese hauled out of our country before the war.

I also thought about all those steel mills back home in Pennsylvania that had produced practically all that scrap iron originally. Just as the first rays of dawn were creeping into the sky, I felt it was safe to sit up. As I looked around me to ascertain that weird noise and thud was, I saw it just a few inches from where my outstretched feet had been. A bluish looking chunk of steel about eleven or twelve inches long and about four or five inches thick was lying on the ground. As I said to some of the men near me, hey, look at the.

Look at the gift tojo just sent me. I reached over to pick it up, and I quickly released it as if I was bleeding from the tips of all of my fingers, there wasn't a splash spot on that chunk of japanese naval shell fragment that I could touch without snagging my skin on its razor sharp surface. If it had dropped on any part of me, it would have undoubtedly severed the part completely from my body. It was a miracle that not a single man in my platoon was hurt during the bombardment of hundreds of five inch, six inch, and eight inch shells crashing into the ground all around us.

That's just, I told you about this before. This. When people think of shrapnel, they think of little tiny pieces of shrapnel. And when you have a small. If you have a little 60 millimeter mortar or a 40 millimeter grenade that gets shot out of a 203, like what you see in the movies, you know, what's underneath their m 16, they'll have a grenade launcher that's a 40 millimeter grenade.

The tiny little fragments from that 60 millimeter, tiny little fragments, you start getting into these five inch, six inch, eight inch guns, and we got hit with some 120 millimeter mortars and the freaking jagged twelve inch long piece of metal that are a half an inch thick. They're heavy. They're heavy. And just like he's describing, they're all just sharp. It's way different than what you think.

And look, any frag can kill you, right? I mean, you get hit with a tiny piece of frag, but it goes into your a order, or it cuts one of your veins and you bleed out. Sure, it can be bad, or obviously it hits you in the brain or hits you in the head, but, man, you see those big, giant piece of fragile, and I think Laif had one. Lafe's guys had one that landed, like, next to them. I had one.

The first. The first time I saw that, we got mortared and killed an army guy, and. But I was behind a wall, and. But it killed an army guy, but we found frag. And that was the first time that I realized the complete horror of indirect fire and of what those artillery shells and mortar shells do and why they're so devastating.

Echo Charles

Yeah, the. And I told you this before, like shrapnel. When you think shrapnel, you're thinking, oh, you know, like maybe like an empty aluminum can, kind of, comparatively speaking, like aluminum can twisted and kind of ripped up and, like, kind of thrown at you really, really, really hard. Then you're like, got some, you know, flak jacket on, you know, or something like this. You'd be like, okay, you be, you know, you might get scratched up for sure.

But, yeah, you don't. I never did anyway, obviously, you know, but, yeah, the, the reality, especially when you said, um. Yeah, sometimes they're like the size of a hammer or something. I'm like, dang. And you get.

And you consider how powerful those explosions are. It's like, probably, it's like someone's literally shooting a hammer at you. Yeah. And it's going wildly, and it's super hot. Yeah.

Yeah. And hot. It's, it's, it's, it's a nightmare. Yeah. And not, you know, I've gotten mortar, too, with little mortars, and they seem real.

Jocko Willink

Real kind of, they sound kind of weak. Yeah. You know, like, you can tell, like, I'm 60. Even an 80 millimeter mortar. 80 millimeter mortars, legit 60 millimeter mortars.

It's like a cracking sound. More, but 120 millimeter mortar when it hits, it's, it's a massive explosion. It's a shocking explosion. Way more than a, than a 60 millimeter. All I would have to remember what the explosive weight of the.

But it's probably ten times bigger. Oh, damn. So it rocks your world. Yeah, it's crazy. And just imagine these guys, like, I'm sitting here talking about 3120 millimeter mortars hitting outside the wall.

Imagine sitting there, no protection, no overhead cover for hours, and they're shooting hundreds of these things at you. Yeah. That's what these guys are enduring. And by the way, they just showed up. The battle's just kicking off back to the book.

For the next several days, it was foxhole digging and manning the line. Nearly every day, at least one japanese sniper would shot out of a tree. They would tie themselves in a tree at night and try and pick off marines during the day, which they did occasionally. Their camouflage was superb, as they were. They were extremely difficult to locate.

The enemy planes overhead were overhead almost daily trying to knock out Henderson Field. At night, enemy warships would slip into sealark channel and try to do the same thing and lob a few shells into the front lines for good measure each night. The other battle was the ever present malaria carrying mosquito. Then, too, at night, every tree seemed to take the shape of an enemy soldier, and the men were quick to challenge. The password was always a word with L's, like Honolulu, which was difficult for the enemy to pronounce distinctly.

Even with that, it was dangerous to move around at night. One night, one of my gun crew got up quietly and went back, went to the back of the line to relieve himself. And as he returned another man quickly turned around and at point blank range fired in the dark, killing the Marine instantly. His best buddy.

He went into shock and had to be taken into the battalion sick bay. I knew there would be an investigation as soon as the report reached headquarters. I was afraid that unfortunate, incidentally, might disturb the emotions of the men, thereby jeopardizing our effectiveness as fighters. However, they all accepted it as a twist of fate that this is what happens. Guys get freaking scared, they get jumpy, you know, you talking about every tree turns into an enemy soldier.

I've told you about this. In Ramadi, Humvees shooting at other Humvees. Think of how crazy that is. The Humvee has the most distinct vehicle profile of any vehicle. And there would be times where Humvees would shoot at other Humvees because they were just freaking scared and see movement.

It's like, oh, and take a couple seconds and what are you supposed to do? How? What are you supposed to do? Now I see. I'm getting shot at by Humvee.

I know. Wait. Wait a second. Is that an enemy? Did an enemy get a hold of our Humvee?

I don't think so, but they're shooting at us. They're keeping. You see what I'm saying? It's a freaking nightmare.

Fast forward a little bit. We had air raids practically every day during the rest of the month. Each night, the japanese observation plane washing machine Charlie was overhead, buzzing around the perimeter and dropping flares periodically. On the 27 September, we counted 53 enemy aircraft in the sky over us. The next day, we counted 28 bombers in formation.

These raids continued for the rest of the month and for the better part of October. On the 7 October, instead of a move along the perimeter, we were moving west out toward the man, the Matanikau river.

My machine gun. So now they're on. Move. My machine gun platoon was assigned the mission of setting up on high commanding ground to lend overhead fire across the Maticau river.

On the 12 October, again, I'm fast forward. Get this book. Get. Just get this book. I haven't said that yet.

Get this book. I'm renamed Mitch. First person account. On the 12 October, we were also making our way back to the perimeter. During the movement, we had an air raid, which held us up for some time.

I was proud of my men. They may have been young in age, but they were all loyal fighting men. I knew I had the best platoon in the corps when the situation was critical and our nerves were pretty well taxed. Someone would always come up with something to ease the tension. Such as wonder what all the monkeys in the trees do during a naval bombardment.

You guys are still having a good time. Get that gallows humor. We were getting some news from the airstrips, and all of it was very disheartening. There were a lot of casualties, and our precious fighters and bombers were strewn all over the fields. Later that day, we learned that actually 49 of our planes had been destroyed on the ground.

This was the biggest loss we had suffered since the campaign started on the 7 August. The Japanese were determined to knock us out as quickly as they could. It was really disheartening the next day as japanese ships brought their transports into the channel in bright daylight and calmly unloaded their troops and supplies.

What a freaking nightmare. More bad news arrived. Word had been received that Vice Admiral Gormley, commander of the South Pacific area, had proclaimed that due to the extensive damage suffered on our airstrips and the fact that our ships could not come in with additional men and supplies, that the first Marine division would have to fight it out alone, as there was no other way. Like, how much ammo do you have? You know what I mean?

How much ammo do you. How much water do you have? Okay, we got some rivers. Okay. How much food do you have?

What about overhead protection? What about when the Japanese just come in there, start shutting? Imagine what a freaking nightmare this is when the word that you get is that your entire support structure is leaving malaria. By the way, malaria was starting to hit my men, as it was practically everyone on Guadalcanal. But there was some encouraging and welcoming news that came along the lines.

Admiral Gormley had been relieved. The aggressive Vice Admiral William F. Bull Halsey had taken his place. A cheer went up along the lines when it was reported that Halsey's message was, was, by God, if the marines can stay, the navy will stay. That was enough to lift the spirits of our fighting men.

That's what I'm talking about. A coward, by the way. A coward that's going to just abandon the troops, and a man that steps up and says, okay, we're staying. If we're going to leave the marines here, we're going to stay and support them.

During one attack, while lying flat on the jungle floor supinely and we were having heavy air attacks, that one of my men, William B. Faust, would sit alongside me as the bombs were released by the enemy japanese bombers flying overhead. I ordered Faust to get in his foxhole during the raids, but he always refused as he wanted to stick by me, as he would tell me. He would sit alongside me and pray for us. This one particular time, I heard a string of bombs coming down, and as my head was flat to the ground, I could feel that with each burst, we were right in the drop pattern.

As the explosions came closer, one bomb dropped just to our right, and the next one, I was sure, would be a direct hit on Faust and me. He continued his praying out loud, and the next bomb dropped into a soggy part of the jungle a few yards away from us, throwing mud all over us, making a huge crater in the ground. I told Faust that I attributed our being alive to his fervent prayers, and then he joined me in reciting my favorite psalm, the 121st, to achieve a level of experience of getting bombed to where you're making these calculations of, oh, yep, we're in the bomb pattern. Oh, there's one that's, you know, 80 yards that way. Oh, the next one was 60 yards that way.

The next one's gonna be, you know, it. It's crazy to think that these guys had that much experience of getting bombed that he's knowing where the next one's gonna land.

Very lucky, too, that it's hitting mud. Had some guys in Ramadi get ambushed in the middle of a field. Now only one of the group, like one squad, or actually one element, one fireteam was out in the middle. Cause they had to cross this big open area, left the other element back in the dike to freaking cover for them in case something happened. And sure enough, something happened.

But the mortars that they got hit with, they basically all went into the mud and detonated. So it doesn't put out a big. Doesn't put out a frag pattern. You lay down and it's like, boom, it's happening six inches down in the mud. So everyone was okay.

That reminds me of this right here.

On the afternoon of October 24, a large body of japanese troops were observed making their way east towards our perimeter. Third battalion had gone into position several days earlier. It was in that position that our battalion had been given orders to fill in and tie in with the left flank of third battalion. Colonel Hanneken had given each of the company commanders their final orders, and we were to stop the enemy at all costs to prevent him from taking our precious airfields, without which there would be little hope for all Americans on Guadalcanal.

Stop the enemy at all costs.

And when you. When you can, when you understand that tactical picture of, oh, wait a second, if they take us off this flank, they're going to run through us and they're going to have the airfield. Everyone here is going to die.

Our job as a heavy machine gun platoon would be to find the best terrain for a final protective line with interlocking bands of grazing fire.

We came up to our new position in darkness the evening of October 24, going slowly and carefully along the winding trail, carrying all of our heavy water cooled machine guns, ammunition and personal weapons and packs, while stumbling on tangled roots. The footing underneath it was difficult in the boggy turf, under the umbrella of tall rainforest, lush tropical trees that incessantly dripped rain. The ridge on top was kunai grass, but hard as cement underneath. Nobody had the strength left enough to dig himself a foxhole. Before we were able to set up our guns, the drizzle turned into a heavy downpour.

Fast forward. I told my men to drop their loads while I made a survey of our new position. I was crossing my fingers, hoping that I didn't wander into an ambush or set off a booby trap. I dropped my gear with the first squad and started out with only my pistol in my hand. I crawled along the ground, groping my way forward by hand.

When I reached out and felt the ridge dropping away on all sides, I returned to my men and said we would set up along that knoll. We immediately set up the guns and after the 30 caliber water cooled guns had been in place in their designated positions, I arranged a security watch for the night. We crawled around on that wet ground and I distributed a meager ration of spam by scooping the meat out of the can with my fingers and dropping each man's portion into his outstretched wet hand.

In that black fast forward in that black cave of night, the only reality was the rain drenching us and knowledge that somewhere in the jungles around us, other men were waiting to kill us.

I felt a very deep sense of responsibility for my men and officers.

Yeah, that. There's a picture of that a Kombat cameraman took of guys in tasking a bruiser. And they're going down a street. You can see they're in a staggered file. So there's guys on one side of the street, guys on the other side of the street.

And being out there, you're watching that and you're. You're literally waiting for the gun fire to start. It's the. This idea of waiting, that there's someone waiting. And when you're in a city, imagine how many places can you get shots?

This is the same as a jungle. Like we're in a jungle where can you get shot at from, you can get shot at from so many different directions. A jungle is actually a little bit more compressed, right? You can't get. You're not gonna get shot.

You can't be seen that far away. The seals in Vietnam, they'd get enemy contacts would be like 20ft away. And then when they'd move 20 yards, they couldn't see the enemy anymore. They wouldn't even get shot anymore. In some cases, you're in the city, like, you could get shot from a window that's ten yards away or a doorway that's 600 yards away.

And everything in between those two is a legitimate threat. Yeah, yeah. It's great because you pointed that out a while ago where you were like, hey, you know, I work downtown, right? Standing at the front door outside, and it's like, think of all, every single single doorway or window that you can see. Every single one that you can see.

Echo Charles

You don't care if it's 100 meters away. Don't care if it's like 10 meters. Like, every single one. That's a potential story for, like, an enemy person. Yeah.

Crazy, man. And where was I talking about this the other day? The, the timing, you know, there was a captain from the army from the first of 506, and great guy, so focused, so professional. He had, he would, he would video. He had, like, a camera set up in his Humvee.

Jocko Willink

It was just a video. The street. He would just watch the video. So he would get to know, like, where the trash was, where the doorway was, what looked out a place. But the first time I went with him into the city, he's like, oh, we're gonna get contacted in 30 minutes.

Start your stopwatch. And I was like, okay, cool, you know, and sure enough, 27 minutes in and it's on. So, you know, you're gonna get contacted. You know it. Stoners element over in Craig door got contact, got contacted by the enemy.

24 straight missions in a row.

24 straight missions in a row. You know, I talked to guys from Vietnam. They've gotten, again, this is some of the guys in Vietnam. Some of the seals in Vietnam, they'd be like, yo, yeah, we got in six contacts on all of deployment. Look, some guys were more than that, but some of them were like, that was.

That's legit. And here's Stoners and JP's crew out there freaking 24 straight missions, getting enemy contact. So that feeling that these guys had of like, oh, they're out there waiting to kill us. Yeah, I would absolutely have that feeling. The streets absolutely have that feeling.

Echo Charles

Makes sense. Yeah.

Jocko Willink

Especially watching my guys. For some reason, I never really felt like, much like I would get wounded or killed. And this is you go back to Dean Ladd. Dean Ladd who? Marine going into Tarwa.

And he was on the podcast, and unfortunately, he passed away, God bless him. But we were talking to him, and I'm reading from his book about he's getting ready to go into Tarawa. And I said, you know, were you. Were you nervous? Were you scared of getting dying?

And he's, oh, no, that was gonna happen to the other guy. I thought to myself, man, that is such a good young man feeling that I absolutely had. But the feeling, the sickness that you get is watching you see your guys. You don't want your guys to get hurt. I don't want you guys to get shot.

So as you're watching the 450,000 threats that are ahead of you as the platoon's walking down the street, and that's what he's feeling, I felt a very deep sense of responsibility for my men and my officers. As I lay there thinking about them, it was so dark that nothing existed save what could be heard or felt. The predominant emotion was probably loneliness and an overwhelming sense of isolation. Even though I knew I had the best officers and men in the world here with me, I thought about some of the lessons from Sergeant Nagy and corporal corporal Webb had taught me in boot camp. I thought of all my confrontations with the Japanese in the Philippines and in China.

As much as I dreaded killing, respected the enemy in uniform on the battlefield, as I knew I would be doing the job he was assigned to do, and that was to seek out and destroy his enemy. I knew that what we would be facing at any moment was a case of kill or be killed. At about 0200, fast forward. At about 0200, I was startled into a charged wakefulness by what were unmistakably low mumbling sounds. I woke up PFC Schmitty Smith, and together we strained our ears.

A few minutes later, we heard the same sounds again. I was certain I heard a few japanese words. I knew that exposing our position by opening fire would not be wise, but then neither would be sitting back and letting the Japanese infiltrate the perimeter. They might, at any moment, at that moment, already be preparing to charge our lines. I was so relieved that my men were not trigger happy, as was a common thing with so many men.

Japanese could be seen everywhere at night. Every limb in a tree took the form of an enemy sniper. Kunai Grass took the shape of an enemy moving towards you. Marines fired thousands of rounds at shadows. My men were truly hard and professional fighting marines.

I trusted my men and I knew they, they trusted me. As we had worked together for nearly were two years as a team, I resolved this matter when I quickly decided to get this over with. Right now, I still wasn't entirely sure if I was doing the right thing. I pulled the pin from a hand grenade and pitched it over the slope where we had heard the noise. As soon as my men heard that click, they too followed suit with a cascade of grenades.

There were a number of muffled explosions. There were also screams of pain. Bob, Smitty and I were pulling pins and letting and quickly letting them over the side, just like the old baseball days. Then silence descended on the knoll and the jungle, and that was the end of it. So what's interesting about grenades is you, especially at night, you don't know where they came from, so you don't have to give away your position.

You can just toss grenades, just huck a grenade out there.

Fast forward. Throughout the daylight hours of October 25, we tended to our weapons and we waited with some apprehension for night to fall. All that day, the Imperial Japanese Navy sent warships down to shell our installations. There were also numerous dogfights over, all over the skies, between zeroes and our Marine Grumman wildcats. Let's go.

Dave Burke. Good deal, Dave. Reports at Colonel Hannekin's command post indicated a strong japanese force had engaged the first battalion, 7th Marine, some 2000 yards south of Henderson field the night before. That apparently was the main thrust of the japanese assault mounted by General Masao Maruyama's second Sendai division, minus the shattered fourth regiment, a total of perhaps 16,000 men. The division's motto, and he's talking about, so he's talking about this japanese division.

The division's motto was, quote, remember that death is lighter than a feather, but that duty is heavier than a mountain.

For the Sendai division, feathers flew in great numbers. The mountain proved too heavy. They were pulled off. They were held off by a determined battalion of marines under Chin, Chesty puller, with the help of an army battalion under Lieutenant Colonel Robert hall.

Fast forward. While Major Connolly and I had been walking around our front and I casually remarked that I questioned the reason for our present position, he pointed down through the jungles and slopes and said, really, mitch, there is hardly anything between here and a straight shot right into Henderson Field. As a matter of fact, even chesty and the army wouldn't be aware of it as they are south of the airport. I then realized the real significance of the piece of real estate that we now commanded. I had the greatest respect and admiration for both, both Colonel Hannekin and Major Connally, as both were my idea of a real marine officer.

Tall, athletic, powerful, lean, tough marines. I would have gone anywhere with either one, as I knew they were leaders and fighters.

When darkness fell on October 25, I knew the Japanese were definitely coming, and I knew my orders were that we had to defend our ridge at any cost.

I talked with each man, instructing him that we would have 100% watch tonight and to withhold their machine gun fire until they actually saw enemy in front of them.

Fast forward, and here we go. The bushes rustled, and the maddening voices continued their soft mutterings, but still nothing could be seen. Then I dimly sensed a dark figure lurking near Gaston's position. I grabbed a grenade, pulled the pin, and held down the lever, ready to throw it around me. I could hear the others also pulling pins as we did the night before.

We heard the ration cans rattle. They'd set a little indicator, a little early warning system of ration cans on strings, so they hear the little. We heard the ration cans rattle. And then somebody let out a shriek, and instantaneously the battle erupted. Grenades were exploding all over the ridge nose.

Japanese rifles and machine guns fired blindly into the night, and the first wave of enemy troops swarmed into our position from the jungle flanking Gaston's gun. Stansberry was pulling the pins out of his grenades with his teeth and lobbing them down into the slope of the jungle. Liepart was skying them overhead like a baseball pitcher. The tension burst like a balloon, and many men found themselves cursing, growling, screaming like banshees. The Japanese were yelling, banzai.

Blood for the emperor. Stansberry, in spontaneous tribute to President Roosevelt's wife, shouted back, blood for Eleanor. The battleground was lit by flashes of machine gun fire, pierced by the arching red patterns of tracing tracer bullets, shaken by the blast of shells laid down no more than 30 yards in front of the ridge by Captain Louis dittas 60 millimeter mortars. It was a confusing maelstrom, with dark shapes crawling across the ground or swirling in clumped knots, struggling men falling on each other with bayonet swords and other violent oaths. After the first volley of american grenades exploded, the wave of Japanese crowding onto the knoll thickened.

Pfc. Charles H. Locke was killed from a burst of enemy machine gun fire. I screamed, fire. Machine guns, fire.

And with that, the machine guns opened up and with them all the rifles and Tommy guns. In the flickering light, I saw a fierce struggle taking place for the number two gun. Several japanese soldiers were racing towards Liebert, who was kneeling, apparently already hit. I managed to shoot two of them while the third lowered his bayonet and lunged. Liepart was the smallest man in the platoon, weighing barely 125 pounds.

The japanese soldier ran him through the force of the thrust, lifting him high in the air. I took careful aim and shot Liepart's killer. Gaston was flat on his back, scrambling away from a japanese officer who was hacking at him with a two handed samurai sword and grunting. Hunting with exertion, Gaston tried desperately to block the samurai sword with the Springfield he had picked up off the ground, apparently lieparts. One of his legs was badly cut from the blows.

The rifle soon splintered. The japanese officer raised his sword for the killing thrust, and Gaston, with maniac strength, snaked his good leg up and caught the man under the chin with his boondocker, a violent blow that broke the japanese neck. The attackers ran past Gaston's gun and spread out, concentrating their fire on the left flank gun manned by Corporal John Grant, Pfc. Sam H. Scott, and Willis A.

Hinson. Within minutes, Scott was killed, and Hinson was wounded in the head. Then Joseph A. Polowski was killed. Stansberry, who had been near me, was hit in the shoulder, but the last time I saw him, he was still fighting with his Tommy gun, ferociously shouting, charge.

Charge. Blood for Eleanor. Corporal Pettyjohn on the right, cried out in anguish, my guns jammed. I was too busy to answer his call for help. At the center, we were being.

We were beating back the seemingly endless wall of Japanese coming up the gentle slope at the front of the position. There were at that point approximately 75 enemy soldiers crashing through the platoon, most of them on the left, left flank. But the main force of the attack had already begun to ebb. The ridge was crowded with fighting men, it seemed somehow I vividly recalled putting up my left hand just as the enemy soldier lunged at me with a fixed bayonet. He must have been off balance, as the point of the bayonet hit between my little finger and ring finger enough to let me parry it off.

And as he went by me, he dropped dead on the ground. The enemy started to melt back down the slope, and almost before they were out of sight, Navy corpsman began snaking forward to treat the wounded at Petty John's gun. James Nobby McNabb and Michael F. Pat Swanek were badly wounded and had to be moved off the line. Stansberry was still around and didn't want to leave.

He I crawled over to Petty John's gun. What's wrong with it? Petty John said. A ruptured cartridge, which refused to budge. I said move over, and fumbled with the with stiff fingers, broke off a nail completely, but somehow pried the slug out with a combination tool, which I felt in the spare parts kit under the tripod.

I also changed the belt, fed the belt feed. Paul, which had been damaged in the rough slamming, trying to get the round out. Pettyjohn and faust covered me. Though the first assault had flopped, a number of enemy soldiers had shinnied to the top of a tall hardwood trees growing up from the jungle between the platoon and Fox company's position. From this vantage point they could direct a punishing, plunging fire down in two directions.

The men in foxholes along the crest were especially vulnerable. Bob G. John Jock and John W. Price were wounded and helped the back of the line by Corman I was getting ready to feed a new belt of ammunition into pettyjohns gun. My left hand felt very slippery, so I rubbed it in the dirt under the tripod of the gun.

Then, as I reached up to hold the belt again, I felt a sharp vibration and jab of hot pain in my hand. I fell back momentarily and flapped my arm and stared angrily at the gun, which might have been wrecked by a burst of fire from a japanese Nambu light machine gun. Almost immediately, a second assault wave came washing over our positions. This attack was more successful than the first. Oliver Hinckley and William R.

Dudley were wounded. Hinson, over on the left gun, already wounded, continued to fire until all his supporting rifles were silenced. He then withdrew down around the hill in the rear of George Company, putting the gun out of action before he left. As I instructed, the section had been hit hard with mortars and grenades, causing severe shock to all the men, one of them being August P. Marquez.

All the men on the spur had been literally blasted off, including Lieutenant Phillips, Bill Payne, and John Grant in the Fox company area. Back toward my left rear, I saw Fox company men pulling out and disappearing over the crest. I picked up a Springfield and fired a shot at them, yelling for them to hold the line. The Japanese swarmed up that 70 foot cliff in great numbers, armed with three heavy and six light machine guns, a number of Tommy guns, and several knee mortars. I thought, dear God, Major Connally and his small command post are just over that crest.

But here was the only grazing fire I had with my machine gun. So I quickly found Gaston's gun and swung it around towards our own lines. As there was nothing between my gun and the crest but the enemy japanese soldiers, I fired a full belt of ammunition into the backs of those crouching enemy, praying that they could not get over the crest to the command post. I learned later from Captain Farrell, who is with Colonel Hannekins command post, that the word was that the enemy had one of Page's fast firing machine guns, and the rounds were ricocheting over the line into Major Connolly's position. He had also heard reports that all my men had been killed, and in some.

And in fact, some had been. Some had seen me sprawled out dead on the ground before they left the ridge. I learned later, too, that this information had gotten back to division command post. By 0500, the enemy was all over the spur, and it appeared they were going to roll up the entire battalion front. A second prong of the attack aimed at our front had not fared as well.

But my platoon was being decimated. A hail of shrapnel killed Daniel R. Cashman Stansberry had been pulled back over the hill after being hit again. So just to kind of break that down a little bit, he's in a forward position and back over a little crest, over a little ridge line is the command post. And so the Japanese actually push through, and they're heading towards the command post.

And so he turns his gun around and has to shoot back towards the command post to kill those Japanese. And there's ricochets going into the command post, the command post. He finds out later, thought that his gun had been captured by the Japanese.

This is. We would do jungle training, especially in the. And so in the nineties, I did jungle training, and this is pre nods, pre night vision, and, well, you know what it's like when you're in the dark and all of a sudden there's a flash of light and you lose all your night vision. That's what this is. This is just a scene of total confusion.

So now there's enough light. When there's this much fire going on, sometimes you can kind of see a little bit more what's happening. And I think that's the mode that. Well, that's definitely the mode that they're getting into, where it's almost like there's a strobe light going, but, you know, a strobe light is a consistent timing. This would be like a random strobe light, but very close together, because even the muzzle flash gives ba ba ba there's a flash of light with each one of those, so you're gonna be able to see something even when it's 10ft away.

It's gonna light up your area. But the confusion and chaos in this situation is it's gonna be total mayhem. I continued to trigger bursts until the barrel began to steam. In front of me was a large pile of dead bodies. I ran around the ridge from gun to gun, trying to keep them firing, but at each emplacement, I found only dead bodies.

I knew I must be all alone. As I ran back and forth, I bumped into enemy soldiers who were seemingly dashing about aimlessly in the dark. Apparently, they weren't aware. They weren't yet aware that they had almost completely. They had almost complete possession of the knoll.

As I scampered around the knoll, I fired someone, Springfield that I happened to pick up. Then somehow, I stumbled over into the right flank of George company. There, I found a couple of men I knew named Kelly and Topman. They had a water cooled machine gun. I told them I needed their gun.

At the same time. I grabbed it, and they took off with me. I said, follow me, and ordered several riflemen to fix bayonets and to form a skirmish line back across the ridge. I told the rifleman not to be afraid to use the bayonet. We still had the 19 oh, 516 inch bayonets with the front end sharpened throughout its length and the back edge five inches from the point.

It was by then not quite as dark as it has been. Soon dawn would break. I knew that once the Japanese realized how much progress they had made, still a third wave of attackers would come up the slope to solidify their whole on the knoll. On the way back, I noticed a movement of Japanese on the ridge just above Major Connally's position, and which I had raked with grazing fire earlier. I fired Kelly's and Topman's full belt of 250 rounds into that area, and once again, the rounds were ricocheting over Connally's head.

But he had no way of knowing that I was doing the firing. He could only surmise that the enemy was now using our machine guns. As we advanced back across the ridge, some of the Japanese began falling back. Several with them, however, began crawling awkwardly across the knoll with their rifles cradled in the crook because of their arms. And then I saw with horror that they were headed toward one of my guns, which was now out in the open and unmanned.

Galvanized by that threat, I ran for the gun from the gully area. Several japanese guns spotted me and swiveled to rake me with fire. The snipers in the trees also tried to bring me down, and grenades and mortars burst all around me. As I ran to that gun, one of the crawling enemy soldiers saw me coming and he jumped up to race me to the prize. I got there first and jumped into the hole behind the gun.

The enemy soldier, less than 25 yards away, dropped to the ground and started to open up on me. I turned the gun on the enemy and immediately realized it was not loaded. I quickly scooped up a partial loaded belt lying on the ground and with fumbling fingers started to load it. Suddenly, a very strange feeling came over me. I tried to desperately reach forward to pull the bolt handle back to load the gun, but I felt as though it was in a vise.

Even so, I was completely relaxed and felt as though I was sitting peacefully in a park. I could feel a warm sensation between my chin and Adam's apple. Then all of a sudden, I fell forward over the gun, loaded the gun and swung it up at the enemy gunner. The precise moment he had fired his full 30 round magazine at me and stopped firing. For days later, I thought about that mystery and somehow knew that the man above also knew what had happened.

I found three more belts of ammunition and quickly fired them into the trees and all along the ridge. I sprayed the terrain with from remaining rounds, clearing everything in sight. All the japanese fire in the area was being aimed at me, apparently, and this was the only automatic weapon firing from a forward position. The barrage concentrated on the ridge nose made me feel as if the whole japanese army was firing at me. I was getting some help from our mortars controlled by battalion, with the George company commander, Captain Lw Martin, observing.

These rounds laid on the spur and prevented the enemy to move up, which would have probably enveloped me from the rear. Other than this, I was still alone, as my George company friends were still behind me some distance. In addition to being in this position, I had an immediate need of more ammunition and I couldn't see any more lying around anywhere. Just at that time, aid came that made me glow with pride. Three of my men from my platoon voluntarily crossed the field of fire to resupply me.

The first one came up and just as he reached me, he fell with a bullet in the stomach. Another one rushed in then and was hit in the groin. Just as he reached me too, he fell against me, knocking me away from the gun. Seconds later, Bob John Jock, who had also been wounded earlier, came from somewhere with more ammunition. Just as he jumped down beside me to help load the gun, I saw a piece of flesh fly off his neck.

He had been hit by an enemy bullet. I told him to get back while I sprayed the area. He refused to lead, to leave. I said, get the hell back, John Jock. And he said again, no, I'm staying with you.

I hated to do it, but I punched him on the chin hard enough to bowl him over and convince him finally, that I wanted my order obeyed. He somehow made his way back as I was afraid he would bleed to death. Meanwhile, Major Connally at the forward command post was rounding up a ragtag force with which to retake the Fox company spur. They were bandsmen serving as stretcher bearers, wiremen, runners, cooks, and even mess boys who had brought some hot food up to the front lines during the night and stayed just in case. Those men, numbering no more than 24, mounted a counterattack up over the crest that I fired some 500 rounds at, that I had fired some 500 rounds at.

They found the japanese machine guns and several of Hawks company's weapons, including three light machine guns, all in good working order. That counter attack, that counterattack, found 98 dead on the spur. By actual count, that was about 530 or so. Dawn was already breaking. I was able to observe the progress of that charge from my position as I directly.

As I was directly out to their front. I also watched quite a few enemy soldiers scrambling back into the jungle, but I couldn't fire in that direction. As I watched that beautiful charge, it gave me inspiration to get up and yell to my George company fighters with their fixed bayonets to stand by to charge. I yelled out in Japanese to stand up.

Tate. Tate. Hurry or isoga. Isoga. Immediately, a large group of japanese soldiers, about 30 in all, popped up into view.

So he yells out in Japanese, hey, stand up. Hurry. Immediately, a large group of japanese soldiers, about 30 and all popped up into view. One of them looked quizzically at me through field glasses. I triggered a long burst, and they just peeled off like grass under a mowing machine.

At that point, I turned around to tell my friends I was going to charge over that knoll, and I said, I want every one of you to be right behind me. And they were.

I threw the two remaining belts of ammunition that I, my men had brought me over my shoulder, unclamped the heavy machine gun from the tripod, and cradled it in my arms. I really didn't notice the weight, which was a total of about 80 pounds, and was no more aware that the water jacket of my gun was red hot. I fed one of the belts into the gun and started forward down the slope, scrambling to keep my foot, spraying a raking fire all about me.

There were still a number of live enemy soldiers on a hillside in the tall grass, pressed against the slope. I must have taken them by surprise as the gun cut them all down. One of them noticed. One of them, I noticed, was a field grade officer who had just expended the rounds in his revolver and was reaching for his two handed sword. He was no more than four or 5ft from me when I ran into him head on.

The skirmishers followed me over the rim of the knoll, and they too were all fired up and were giving the rebel yell, shrieking and catcalling like little boys imitating marines, sounding like there were a thousand rather than a mere handful. They followed me all the way across the draw with fixed bayonets to the end of the jungle, where long hours before the japanese attacks had started.

There we found nothing left to shoot at. The battle was over. The jungle was once again so still that if it wasn't for the evidence of dead bodies, the agony and torment of the previous hours, the bursting terror of the artillery and mortar rounds, and the many thousands of rounds of ammunition fired, it might only have been a bad dream of awful death.

There were hundreds of enemy dead in the grass, on the ridge, in the draw, and in the edge of the jungle. We dragged as many as we could into the jungle out of the sun. We buried many and even blasted some of the ridge over them to prevent the smell that only a dead body can expel in the heat.

The next day, I'm fast forwarding. The next day, Chesty puller came up to see me. He sat down beside me after we shook hands, and he told me about the big attack they had down at the airport on end the night of the 24th. He also told me that he had just seen Colonel Hannekin at the division command post before he came to visit with me. He told me that he read a report that Colonel Hanneken was preparing, recommending me for a medal.

He said when he returned to the command post, he was also going to prepare a report for one of his sergeants, recommending him for a medal. Chesty went on to tell me that this sergeant was also a machine gunner and that our actions were similar. I said, wonderful. Is this sergeant someone I may know? He said, I don't know, but his name is Bazelone.

I said, johnny Bazelone. And he said, yes, I had made platoon sergeant just before we left the states, and I told Chesty that I had recently seen Johnny and we were moving positions. And I had asked him when he expected to make platoon sergeant, and he said soon. He had hoped. I told Chesty that I hoped this would help Johnny get promoted to platoon sergeant.

I had met Johnny originally back in New River, North Carolina, just after he had joined the first battalion, 7th Marines. He told me he was better known as Manila John. And then I said, you must have been in the Philippines, and we had a lot to talk about. As I told him, I had been stationed there for some time. Johnny had been in the army, and I was stationed in Manila, thus the name, Manila John.

We had a friendly greeting when I would call him doggy, Manila John. And he would jokingly call me Kavit Mitch. Chesty was admired by all enlisted men. And while we were sitting there on the ground, Price, who'd been shot through the face, though not very seriously, was very anxious to meet him. Price had bled so profusely, it was difficult to determine how serious his wound had been when he was hit.

In any event, he was patched up now and was most anxious to say hello to that great jungle fighter, Chesty puller.

Chesty shook hands with him and offered him some pipe tobacco, the only thing he had at the time, naturally, a kind gesture, and Price had refused because he didn't have a pipe. However, he had never forgotten that visit with Chesty, the veteran of Nicaragua and other jungle battles. Two years later, Pfc. John W. Price was killed in action.

Fast forward here. Because that's the thing. It's not over. Like, you get through all that. And by the way, like, what part of that do you actually live through?

Almost none. Almost nothing that happened do you get to live through.

But guess what? Doesn't matter. Fight's still on. Back to the book. Now that the enemy's back had been broken, at least temporarily, General Vandergrift believed it would be an opportune time to continue the attack.

So instead of going west, we would leave the Lunga river area, to which we had just returned from our battle ridge to a new front. Everyone said, oh, boy, here we go again. You go through all that, get back into a perimeter, fast forward to pass it, but they're out on that ridgeline. They win that. That fight great cost massive casualties.

And then they pull back into perimeter. Now they get back in perimeter like, oh, yeah, you're moving west. You're moving out. And everyone said, oh, boy, here we go again. The next morning, we started out on a forced march across the rivers and along trails near the beach.

Fox Company, the rifle company I was attached to, was given the extreme right flank, the furthest away from the perimeter. My platoon was a bunch of patched up marines with some replacements.

Fast forward a little bit. I left the extreme right flank open so that a particular gun could fire into the jungle behind it, up the beach or out to sea. I got behind the next gun and placed a bayonet in the sand against the water jacket at the point where it could fire up the beach, just clearing left shoulder of the gunner of the first gun. I did the same thing with each of the other guns so that, in fact, we would be an echelon with each gun being able to fire just to the left of the gun in front of it. Everybody knew the plan and the limitations of traverse for the gun.

This is just interlocking fields of fire. We knew the enemy had moved east about a half mile from us, and in all probability, some might just wander down the beach, as we had suspected. Just after daybreak, we spotted some enemy troops moving out to the water's edge. It appeared that they were going to hike down the beach towards us in formation. We could hardly believe it because this was truly a machine gunner's dream.

Perfect grazing fire at troops in formation. As we were crouched there in anxiety, waiting for a large unit to start down the beach right into our guns, as surely they were preparing to do, as evidenced by their movements. A single crack of Springfield rifle went off some distance down the beach behind us. The round went up the beach over our heads. Some knucklehead riflemen just couldn't wait.

As the enemy started to scatter, all my machine guns opened up, and not a single enemy soldier made it back to the jungle.

Fast forward a little bit. The attack continued across the Metapona river, and we were gradually bottling up the enemy. Chesty had been hit that day with a grenade that landed near him, causing multiple fragmentation wounds in his legs, but he did not leave the lines until the next day. By dusk of the 8th, we had the enemy between us, and it was only a matter of cleaning them up. As we closed the knot tighter, some of the enemy escaped through a gap in the army line, but the rest were cleaned out.

On the 9th and 10th, the final push was made, and the area was secured for all intents and purposes, as the enemy had either been killed and those who managed to escape would find it difficult in the days to come, as we were definitely on the offensive on the 11th, we started back toward the perimeter. Our casualties during the period since we watched the enemy land on the first was 21 killed and 61 wounded.

We had taken considerable enemy supplies, mostly rice and ammunition. That night was a nightmare as the japanese fleet came in and blasted the airports and all the ridges around it, including Edson Ridge, where we were dug in. In my opinion, the most frightening thing in combat is to be on the receiving end of naval gunfire. Artillery is the same when massed. Every time one of those naval shells came crashing into the island, trees were uprooted and the earth shook like an earthquake.

This was particularly evident on Edson's Ridge, which was in line for anything that was fired over Henderson's field. Henderson Field. Our positions felt like we were on jello as the ground literally rolled with each crashing shell. Twice that night, Sergeant Bill Payne and I were completely lifted out of our holes and flopped on the ground. It was just like being lifted into some dirt by a bulldozer blade, a very eerie feeling indeed.

We continued to move periodically from one position to another. This is fast forward. More and more army troops were arriving to take our positions in the lines. The patrols were penetrating deeper, seeking out the enemy. It was getting a little quieter around the perimeter.

As the days went by, however, enemy ships continued to sneak in at night and lob a few shells at Henderson Field and our lines. We still had air attacks, but our valiant cactus air force was shooting the enemy planes out of the skies with great numbers. We had Grumman wildcats, the dauntless dive bombers, the Avenger torpedo bombers, and the air cobras at Henderson Field. Cactus was Guadalcanal's code name. The real heroes of all the gravel crunchers, the infantrymen and the cannon cockers, the artillerymen and the mortar men were those fabulous Marine Corps pilots like Lieutenant Colonel Howard W.

Bower, Major Marion, Carl, Captain Joe Foss, Major Bob Galer, and Major John L. Smith. We would stand on the ground and cheer them, cheer them on as they shot the cream of the crop of the japanese fighter and bomber pilots out of the skies over Guadalcanal each day. At times, we had seen Marion or Joe or John dive into a pack of enemy planes. In almost every instance, they were outnumbered by 15 to ten to 15 to one.

Yet they could be seen buzzing around like bumblebees, looping and diving and pressing the attack to keep the enemy fighters from hitting us on the ground. We had seen Carl, Foss, Gaylor and Smith get shot down and have to bail out of their burning place. Planes as we watched the air battles. Bauer was shot down over the water and was never recovered. Bauer, Gaylor, Foss, and Smith were all awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, and Carl was awarded the Navy Cross.

Joe Foss became America's ace of aces after he shot down his 26th enemy plane, beating captain captain Eddie Rickenbackers. 1918 record of 25 enemy planes shot down.

Fast forward a little bit.

Things are starting to mellow out a little here. Each day we cleaned our machine guns, had gun drill, and helped Lieutenant Tom Myers get snapped in with us. We went on short patrols around the perimeter. Obviously, the rainy season had set in, and it was raining nearly every day as Christmas had come and gone, and we were not now standing by to leave the island, too.

The first marines had left shortly after the fifth had departed.

On the 5 January 1943, our 7th Marines went aboard the USS Rachel Jackson, and the second battalion was on its way to Melbourne, Australia, where the rest of the division was located.

So that's. You might think that that's kind of the end of the book, and it's what I'm gonna read right now. But, you know, this guy's been through hell, obviously, all of this guy's been through hell, and so it must be over, but it's not over.

Mitchell page ends up getting commissioned. She ends up being awarded the Medal of Honor. So it's him and baszy, him and John Bazelon, machine gunners. So he ends up being awarded the Medal of Honor while he's in Australia, and ends up being in Australia. Training is marines.

Getting them ready, getting them prepared, and eventually the first Marine division, he was with them when they joined the 6th army for the attack on Cape Gloucester, where he saw more combat.

And then finally, in July of 1944, and he. There's so many good details in the book. There's details about Gloucester. Get the book. But he also.

I. There's like, he's got a malaria. Just. You ever known anyone that got malaria? Yes, it's my t shirt.

Like, did you watch them get it? No, no, no. So they just had it. Yeah, he told me, yeah, it's horrible. One of my buddies got it.

He got it in Africa. We were in Africa. I felt bad, too, because he was trying to do the right thing, and he was taking his malaria pills all the time. And he. When we got to Africa, there was.

We were on a ship, and they offered a trip to go climb Mount Kilimanjaro. And that was like, the mature, smart thing to do, right. The other alternative was to go to, I believe it was called the White Sands Hotel. Oh, yeah, the club. No, it's a whole.

It was a whole resort town. Yeah, we were in Kenya. Yeah, we're in Kenya. This is in the nineties. Right.

So we're in Kenya, and we end up, you know, I'm like, oh, yeah, no, we're gonna go party at the White Sands Hotel. So he. So, by the way. So we go out partying. I.

You know, we're drinking and partying. I remember waking up, like, passed out. I was outside. Mosquitoes are just feasting on me. I'm by a swamp, bro.

I'm by, like a. You know, the white Sands hotel had, like, you know, there's white sands, obviously, a nice, beautiful beach. And these are really nice hotels. And the. Had, like, little water features.

Echo Charles

Yeah. But they were kind of more like swamp features. Sure. I wake up and buy one of those things. Just no shirt, pair of shorts, flip flops, and just mosquitoes feasting on me.

Yeah. By the way, I hadn't taken any malaria pills in five days or whatever, right? Meanwhile, my buddy took all his malaria pills, goes and does the right thing, you know, does something a mature human would do, not an idiot. We come back to the ship, he gets malaria, and he was down hard. Yeah.

How long does that take malaria to pass? Or, like, how long do you have it? I don't remember. Well, the thing is, it apparently it stays with you. It's kind of like a Lyme disease, like that kind of thing where it stays with you.

Oh, that's great. And it makes it easier for you to get heat casualties and stuff like that. But, you know, and this guy, like one of my best friends, actually, so I was. I felt really bad. So.

Jocko Willink

So Mitchell Page, he had malaria. He's fighting it. And by the way, you know, when my buddy got malaria, war on the ship, so he got, you know, went into sickbay and he's getting water, and he's in an air conditioned space. And, dude, these guys have malaria in the middle of freaking jungle while people are trying to kill him. So there's that whole thing in there.

But eventually, like I said, he is sent back to America when he spends a little bit of time serving out the Marine Corps, then he gets moved into inactive reserve, then the korean war comes up, he gets recalled. So now he's back on active duty. But what he did during the Korean War, we spent his time training the officers and enlisted guys and ended up writing. He retired from the Marine Corps in 1959, wrote this book in 1975. Or that would.

That's when it was published. He had a GI Joe action figure, which was him carrying that 30 caliber water cold machine gun, which, like he said, is 80 pounds. So, you know, you see an m 60. You see Rambo's m 60? Hell yeah.

Like 25 pounds or something like that. Maybe. I think the modern ones were like 17. So the one he had, the one with the long, but it's probably 25 pounds. But a big water cooled, crew served machine gun.

This thing is huge, 80 pounds. Same thing that Bazzi used. But they. That's what the Gi Joe doll has. Yeah, it's legit.

Yeah. Mitch page. It's not a dollar. And it comes with. Sorry.

Action figure comes a little miniature Medal of Honor. Oh, dang. Okay, so he did that and died in his home, November 15, 2003. He's buried in Riverside National Cemetery in Riverside, California.

And just another to me example of what we as human beings can be capable of, right? What we can be capable of, possibly and importantly, the sacrifices that were made. Just Guadalcanal alone. Just Guadalcanal alone. 29 ships lost, including two carriers, six heavy cruisers.

Two light cruisers, 17 destroyers.

7100 killed, 7700 wounded. That's one battle, by the way. This is an extreme battle, but these are heroes.

Mitchell page.

These troops go out there, sacrifice for each other and sacrifice for us.

And we need to make sure that we live our lives in a way that honors these heroes, the ones that made it home like Mitchell Page, and of course, the ones that didn't.

So there we go. Echo. Charles, fantastic book. Get the book. More just Marine Corps.

Marine Corps history, craziness. Yep. Yep. Again, a lot of these, a lot of these is yet another time where, you know, I watch a lot of movies, you know that. And, you know, you see a movie character does all this, it's not realistic.

Echo Charles

You know, like. But hey, we enjoy the show. You know, we're gonna keep it moving. And yeah, show ends, it's all good. But this, this is like, this is an actual character in real life doing real stuff.

And a lot of times kind of more crazy than most of the movies I'm even thinking of right now. This would seem definitely far fetched. Yeah, far fetched. If you watch this in a movie, if you watch him, like, racing a japanese soldier to his gun that's abandoned to get that thing while there's mortars, grenades, and machine gun and sniper fire trying to take him out, like, what does that scene look like in a movie? You got, come on.

Yeah, fun, fun. Yeah, fun. Love it. But, yeah, that's not really. You're not feeling like this is, you know, we're hyped for it.

Yeah. Action movie or whatever. All day. Yeah, but you don't think it's realistic? Yeah.

Jocko Willink

Here you go. It's realistic. Mitchell Page said what?

So semper fi out there, devil dogs. Hey, let's do our best. Let's live our lives right. Let's be better people. You know, you once informed us that one of the best things we can do to be better people is to get after it.

Get after it physically. Physically, yes. Exercise. And I've narrowed it down even more, by the way, recently to resist resistance training. What about the cardio training?

Echo Charles

We love? We love metcons, we love cardio. We love the whole deal, you know? But if you want to put it this way, and I'm saying this kind of currently, this is how I'm currently feeling. If you're gonna prioritize, I say resistance training priority.

I say all of it. Just like you with the martial arts. Well, do everything you can. Yep. What's interesting is a lot of people that we know are advocating the same thing.

Jocko Willink

Everybody from Gabriel, Doctor Gabriel Lyon. Right. Andrew Huberman, Peter Attia. They're all talking about lifting. Look, they don't call lifting.

What do they call it? Resistance. Right. Right. What do we call it?

Echo Charles

Lifting. All day. All day. Lifting. And just the importance of muscle mass.

Yeah. Being strong, which is weird, because you remember the old days, people would talk about, look, if you wanted to, if you were pure longevity, it would be like, do as little as possible. Be as small as possible. Be as kind of have at least don't eat a lot. Yeah.

Stay out of the sun. Stay out of the sun. Like, there's all these things that you could do for longevity, and it certainly seems like the tide is shifting. And maybe it's. Maybe it's not just what.

Jocko Willink

What Peter T. Calls. Not just long, not just length, but health span. Right. Not just lifespan, but health span.

Like, I want to be healthy. Right? So in order to do that, guess what we're doing. Are we doing resistance training? We are, but we call it lifting.

Echo Charles

Lifting. Oh, yeah, we're lifting. It's true, bro. Whatever. I used to make jokes all the time.

Jocko Willink

You lift, bro. Remember that? Yeah, I used to tell you. Actually, I didn't. It wasn't a joke.

Echo Charles

I was serious. But it sounded like a joke because of how kind of how ridiculous sounds. But when I get reminded about, hey, I'm so glad that I, like lift weights, is like one of the main ones is like, you know, you know, the water coolers, you know, those big jugs, the five gallons. You gotta change out the water cooler. Every time I change one of those out, you gotta lift it in this awkward way or whatever.

And I'm like, this could be really hard for a lot of people. Yeah, but it is. But it's not that hard for me because I lift. See what I'm saying? Cause you do resistance training.

Resistance training all day. What I'm saying is, look, that's one of the many, I would say, millions, millions of scenarios where being trained in resistance training and other stuff is gonna, is gonna yield the benefits seem seen. But to me, it goes for. And that's not to mention mention the psychological, emotional, hormonal, cellular benefits you're gonna get from it as well. Mm hmm.

Okay. Going to a thing. Not gonna discipline. Discipline all day. Here's a, here's the thing, too.

And I think a lot of people were into lifting, feel it's same way, like lifting weights. I never really felt that it took that much discipline. Only because, you know. Okay. Because you like it.

Yes. And here's what it is. This is, especially as a male, I guess I can only speak for male because, not a female. But when I first got into, like, lifting weights, it was like push ups first and then lifting weight. And you know how, like, it gives you, like, this pump, right?

Yeah, yeah. So we are from, so when you're a kid, you think that's your muscles actually growing from the lifting hundred percent. And I'm like, bro, this is freaking awesome. All you do is, I'm gonna be Arnold in freaking three weeks tomorrow. Exactly.

Jocko Willink

Right? So it hooks you like that, and it hooks you. Then you realize, wait a second. This is just like a temporary thing, but it could just keep this thing going. Can you remember that?

You know, when you start lifting, when someone starts lifting and they get stronger, like, fast, do you actually remember that happening to you? Yes, sir, I do. It's called newbie gains. Yeah, gains. I didn't know he had a name for it.

Echo Charles

There's a name for it called Newbie gains. And, and, yeah, it was. But I started, like, lifting on actual, like, lifting program. Not the kind like, oh, there's a dumbbell. Let's do some curls.

Like, actual program was with my family friend, my friend Eric Masters, who became a pilot, by the way, air force all day with his dad. And he was a football coach, and he was a sports coach. And it was like, yeah. We were like, what, 1515 years old. Just testosterone, ready to roll in the game.

Oh, yeah. And I had been doing push ups for a few years. Secretly in the bathroom with no one looking. Did you. Could you tell that you were more jacked than your brother?

Jocko Willink

I wasn't from push ups. Oh, yeah? Yeah. My chest was more developed. Yes.

That's the only exercise you were doing in secret. Yeah. Well, some calf raises. Come on, bro. That's right.

JP's into the calf raises. You know that, right? Oh, for real? Yeah. Watch out, dude.

He'll be. He'll be on those craft. Well, freaking. That makes sense. You ever seen his freaking legs are huge?

Echo Charles

Yeah, so that makes sense to me. Completely. And freaking Caffrey's. Hell, yeah. All day.

Well, now I understand. Like, it does. That part doesn't matter as much as, like, ankle mobility and stuff. Like. So, you know, I do kettlebells and stuff.

And when I did, and it's more than just Caffreys. It's like, you gotta stretch. I mean, you do that. I do that everyone. Maybe once a week or something like that.

Probably. It helps. Yeah. Yeah. I came home from deployment and I roll.

Jocko Willink

So, you know, JP, this is when I was on the plane with JP, and I think I'm probably ten years older than JP. Something like that. And then his dad is ten years older than me. And you rolled with JP before, right? Yeah, yeah.

You know, JP is strong. Yes, right? Real strong. I rolled with his dad. And his dad, like, doesn't really.

Didn't really know jujitsu, but he knew some, you know, kind of. But as soon as I, like, tied up with him, I was like, oh, this is. This is like, you could see where JP. And JP was. JP was.

He didn't have his. Quite frankly, JP didn't have his full man strength yet. He was 21 or something. You know, he was strong, but he's way stronger now. But his dad, I was like, oh, I could see where JP was gonna go strength wise just by rolling with his dad.

Echo Charles

Yeah. Cause dad felt the DNA. Oh, the DNA. The fast twitch DNA. Like JP sprinting.

Jocko Willink

Yeah, JP sprinting back in the day, he just had fast, fast, like, holding his mark 46 machine gun. Just sprinting.

Fast twitch. And his dad. His dad just. Same thing. Just pure fast, which ends his dad, you know, working construction.

He's just a strong dude. But you can. You can sense those genes. So my question is, you're doing push ups and calf raises. Hell, yeah.

Were your calves and your chest was bigger than Jade truss? I don't know if my calves were not. I don't know how effective the calf raise scenario was, but, yeah, chest was more, more developed. And then when we started lifting, I could bench more, like, out the gate for sure. Actually, let's, let's face.

Echo Charles

I always could. Well, that's good. You were sneaking in those push ups. Yeah, you gotta get the foundation. Did you guys share a room?

Yeah. So you had to sneak him in the bathroom. You were literally sneaking them. So he didn't know that you were getting stronger. Yeah, but there's more to it because he, we would tease each other too.

It's like, ooh, trying to get all buff, you know? So there was like this, I don't know, it was like almost like a, for lack of better term, like, embarrassing to be like, working out until that's what the football team was doing. That's what the team was doing, you know, that's what we were all doing. But, like, on our own, it was, we weren't mature enough, I guess, to start just self developing, you know? Okay, so you start now officially lifting and you get to watch kind of the situation go down.

Yeah. Like, you get to watch the newbie gains. Oh, yeah. Yeah. You get strong.

Cause a lot of it has to do with, well, obviously adapting. Cause that's what muscle and strength and stuff is. There's that big part of it. Cause your body's like, ready. It's ready to take some action, do some stuff, you know, taking nutrients.

You're young, all that stuff. And then, so the adaption happens, like, way quicker. It doesn't get used to it overall. Right. So that's in a nutshell.

But then on top of it too, you have balance as well. So, like, holding weights up. You ever seen someone who's never lifted weights before, especially with, like, dumbbells or something? It's like, ooh, they're all over the place. Or do ring dip.

Jocko Willink

Do dips. Ring dips with on rings instead of on a dip bar. They're all, sometimes people, sometimes someone that could do 25 dips, which is, which is a good amount of dips on a dip bar. Yeah, they can do like five. And they're all.

Echo Charles

So that's a big part of the newbie gains is the balance just being developed. And once you got your balance down, then your strength can start kicking in, even just from the baseline, you know. So even that seems like you're getting way stronger. But more than actual muscle, like contractile strength or whatever, it's balance. So anyway, that's all.

These are all contributing factors. To the new begins. So we're lifting, we're lifting big time. Newbie gains or regular games or whatever. What you got out you.

Jocko Willink

The other end of the spectrum of newbie gains is Plato Plateau, slash decay. Yeah. Cuz let's say you're not real excited anymore cuz you're not getting newbie gains. So you're like, well, kind of won't want, don't want to do this anymore. Then you get loss.

Echo Charles

Yeah. I don't know who is law, I don't know what loss it is, but you get a loss, you're like, oh wow, I'm weak. Don't let that happen. That's really what you gotta watch out for. At the Arnold's and I was interviewing Arnold and I asked him about Plateaus.

Yeah. And he was like, well, we'd shock our system. Remember that? Yes, I do. Have you ever read a book called Way of the Warrior Kid?

I have. And in that book, young mark, he's trying to do more pull ups and he plateaus at like seven and he can't eat seven, seven, seven. He's there. And finally what we know what Uncle Jake makes him do. Yeah, you're gonna do a hundred pull ups today, I don't care how long it takes.

Jocko Willink

And he just like shocks the system. Yeah. Next time he rolls out, does nine. So you want to get through those plateaus, man. Throw a little shock into the system.

How about the muscle confusion? Yeah, that's what that is. Nobody. You down with the muscle confusion? Yeah, fully.

Echo Charles

Um, no, I mean, not, there's such, I think sometimes, and obviously there's a lot to this, but sometimes people will take it kind of too far so they're doing something different every week or something like that, which, you know, that's a thing like you can do that for, you know. But it's not necessary if that's the only issue that you're trying to address. Yeah, you can do, I don't know. Yeah, I mean, depends on who you are, but how long you've been training. But you can do it like four weeks, same stuff, eight weeks, same thing.

And then change up the exercise. And a lot of times you don't have to change up the exercise, change. Up the weight, the reps, the rest. In between the volume. Like there's just little things you can change that.

Your body's like, whoa, okay. And actually I found a lot of the times, a lot of times you just implement some good rest in there and then just one small change. It's like your body can adapt to it because it's kind of close enough to your normal thing that your body's like, oh, this isn't like some fun, foreign thing that we got to spend a lot of resources and time to adapt to. So I can adapt and adapts pretty quick. You know, you get that little jump.

That's what I found. Cool. Now less we need to lift. I'm gonna recommend you also do something that gets your metabolic system moving right. Yes.

Jocko Willink

Some type of metcon, some sprints, some kettlebell swings, some burpees. That's what we're doing. Jujitsu. Yep. All day.

Echo Charles

All day. That's what we're doing. You're gonna need fuel as well. I recommend you try and use some clean fuel. I recommend you try and use some jocko fuel.

Jocko Willink

Go to jacofuel.com. Go to jacofuel.com. You guys know what we're making? We're making energy drinks. We're making protein.

We got hydrate, we got greens. We got the joint supplement, joint warfare, super krill, time war, by the way. Take time. Warning. Take.

Take these things. Take them. You'll be very happy that you did. And your taste buds will be happy that you did. Yep.

They'll be very happy. Yeah. So that's what we're doing. Go to jacofuel.com, go to Wawa and get mulk. Moke is in Wawa.

Go to vitamin shop. You can get all of it. GNC, military and commissaries, Aafes, Hannaford dash stores in Maryland, Wakefurn, Shoprite, Heb Meyer Harris Teeter, lifetime fitness shields. I guess they're putting a lifetime fitness in Brooklyn, I heard. All right.

Yeah. Brooklyn, New York, where my dad's from, by the way. There we go. Maybe he'll go check it out. Leave the island for a little bit, go back home.

Echo Charles

No, no. He's staying on. They're gonna have mulk in there, Shields. And look, you've got a gym. You go to a gym, you go to a gym.

Jocko Willink

Maybe it's jujitsu gym. Maybe it's a powerlifting gym. Maybe it's crossfit gym. If they're not selling Jocko fuel, you want them to tell them to email jf sales.com. Get on the clean fuel.

The good stuff, the tasty stuff. That's what we're doing. Check it out. Also originusa.com. Check that out.

For your hunting gear, for your jeans, your jiu jitsu gear, your rash guards t shirts, training. Just everything that you need. 100% American made. Keep, keep the economy strong. Bring the manufacturing back to America, by the way.

Yeah, we won the wars. We won World War Two by the fighting men that were out there getting after it. But guess who else? All the people back here in America manufacturing all this stuff. Rosie the riveter back here.

So let's make that happen. Originusa.com. Check that out. It's true. Also, jocular store called Jocko Store.

Echo Charles

On this path, sometimes we want to represent same thing, whether it be a shirt, a hat, a hoodie, something like this. Go to Jacob store.com. That's where you can get it. Discipline equals freedom. Good, we all seen the video.

We all seen the video, but yeah, good. Some other stuff on there. Also with, on Jacques Door, there's a thing called the shirt locker subscription scenario. New design every month. People seem to like that one.

Jocko Willink

If you see something, you like something. It'S called the shirt locker. The. Okay, actually, I'm not going to tell you the next design. You're gonna have to wait and see.

Echo Charles

But yeah, it's all on jocastore.com. If you, if you like something, get something you need. Steak. Once you're lifting, working out, doing jujitsu, you're gonna need to fuel the system also with some steak. Yep.

Jocko Willink

Go to primalbeef.com. Go to Colorado, craftbeef.com. The best steak you can get. Tasty. Perfect.

Awesome companies, awesome people. Primalbeef.com, out there in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and Colorado. Kraft beef, obviously, Colorado. So check those out. Get yourself some.

Subscribe to the podcast. Check out jocko underground.com. Check out our YouTube channel. Check out psychological warfare. Check out flipside canvas, Dakota Meyer, hanging stuff on your wall to keep you in the game.

Also, books, clearly. Get this book, a marine named Mitch. Also, I've written a bunch of books. You can check those out if you want. Leadership strategy and tactics, field manual, expanded a dish.

It's out. You know, I've also written a bunch of kids books. Some people like. You've written kids books, right? Yes, I have.

I think I've written six of them. Yeah, I think I've written six of them. Way the Warrior Kids series, Mikey and the Dragons about faced by Hackworth, extreme ownership dichotomy leader. You guys know the deal. Check those out.

Also, echelon front, we have a leadership consultancy. We solve problems through leadership. Go to echelonfront.com. We got an event coming up in Nashville. I think it's sold out, but we also have the muster coming up in Dallas, October 16 through the 18th, we have FTX, we have battlefield, we have the council.

Next council is June 26 to 29th at register now. Women's assembly run by Jamie, our chief operating officer. September 11 through the 13th in San Antonio, Texas. We also have an online training platform to learn about leadership. To learn about life and leadership, go to extremeownership.com.

Check that out. Also, if you want to help service members, active and retired, you want to help their families, you want to help gold Star families, check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got an incredible charity organization. If you want to donate or if you want to get involved, go to America's mightywarriors.org. Help Mama Lee.

Echo Charles

Help. Help our people. Also, heroes and horses.org. Micah Fink up in Montana. And Jimmy May has got an organization beyond the brotherhood.org.

Jocko Willink

Check them all out. And if you want to connect with us, I'm at jocko.com dot. I'm also on social media, anti social media. Cause you sit there and you start looking at that thing and you going through it and getting mad at people and sending tweets, commenting, looking at someone wondered why they got that cool house and you don't. They got a g wagon.

Where's mine? Don't, don't. Don't fall into that trap. If you want to go on there, hang out. You want to go in there, be positive, cool.

Don't let it suck you in. Don't let that algorithm get hold of your brain. It's designed to do that. It's designed to do that. They're making money off of your brain, making money off of your eyeballs.

Don't let them be careful. We're on there, but we're not on there freaking all the time. We're not trying to drag you into it. At Jocko Willink, at echo Charles. Just watch out for the algorithm.

Of course, thanks to all the military personnel out there in the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines out there on the front lines around the world working together. As you saw in this book, support from the there wasn't an air force at the time, but support from Marine Corps pilots overhead, Navy pilots overhead. Army and Marine Corps working together on the ground, Navy giving support. Appreciate all of you. Thank you for fighting for our way of life.

Also thanks to our police, law enforcement, firefighters, paramedics, emts, dispatchers, correctional officers, border patrol, secrets service, as well as all other first responders. Thank you for being on the front lines here at home and keeping us safe.

And I want to close by. Reading a part of Mitch Page's Medal of Honor citation. Quote. Alone against the deadly hail of japanese shells, he manned his gun and when it was destroyed, took over another. Moving from gun to gun, never ceasing his withering fire against the advancing hordes until reinforcements finally arrived.

Then, forming a new line, he dauntlessly and aggressively led a bayonet charge, driving the enemy back and preventing a breakthrough in our lines. End quote.

That's bravery. That's courage. That is how victory is achieved.

And, you know, we all have our own battles.

We're all fighting. We'll just keep that in mind. Get up. Move. Never cease aggressively attack until you win.

And that's all I've got for tonight. Until next time, the Zeko and Jaco out.

435: Get Up and Aggressively Attack Until You Win. Lessons from A Marine Named Mitch.

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1: Early Life and Marine Enlistment

2: Boot Camp and Early Assignments

3: World War II and Combat Experience

4: Reflections on Leadership and Duty

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