I lost my innocence there.
You're 18, 19, 20 years old.
You don't know life yet, and
here you are experiencing w*r.
And I call my dad, and I say,
"Dad, you guys are gonna
see some things on the news.
It's gonna say that a
car b*mb hit this camp.
Just tell mom that. It
had nothing to do with me.
It had nothing to do with
here, different unit.
But dad, like I was there, it sucked.
Like, I don't wanna be here anymore."
And I could hear his voice crack.
And I'm like, "just don't tell
mom like it was here, man.
Like, f*ck."
And then I kind of like caught myself
like kinda shedding a tear and
kind of trying to wipe it off
so nobody else could see me in there.
You know, trying to play tough guy.
And then just back at it again, right,
back at it for another round.
Oh man, I've seen too much.
I've seen too much. I gotta
get help when I get back.
What does this mean, right?
Am I gonna be screwed up?
Like, what does this mean?
And I remember that shocked me,
Like this is a Sergeant First
Class, like saying that like.
I'm asleep.
They wake me up, "Hey
wake up, get dressed.
Get your sh*t on, we just got incoming."
I found that to be weird
'cause I didn't even hear the incoming,
not even one round or anything like that.
So we started getting dressed,
putting on our Kevlar flak jacket and,
we were gonna go to the
point of origin, the POO.
To the chow hall, sir.
I wanna go to the chow hall, sir!
Let's go, let's go!
We were out on patrol. MSR Tampa.
MSR Tampa is a main route
that goes from Kuwait all
the way up to northern Iraq.
Main supply route.
Just over here, left.
Left, stop. Stop.
Keep going.
This was January, so as I
pull up, of course I'm scared.
they would do secondary IEDs,
secondary VBIEDs, secondary ambushes.
Like, these insurgents had caught on.
Like, hey, let's hit 'em with something.
Then when they're out
there snooping around,
let's hit 'em again.
I didn't want to get out of the Humvee
'cause all I could see was pieces of meat,
pieces of charred meat all over the floor.
It was like gravel.
It was like, for like a 50 meter radius
there was just pieces, chunks everywhere.
Chunks, chunks, chunks of people.
And I didn't want to get out.
To me that felt like a nightmare.
It felt like an actual
nightmare that was true,
that was in real life and
I couldn't wake up from it.
And I didn't want to
get out of the Humvee.
I just figured I don't
wanna get my boots dirty,
I don't want to get involved
in this, but I'm a grunt.
It's like, I gotta do this sh*t, like.
And then Sergeant Dean's
like, "Hey, get the f*ck out
and start picking pieces up."
But like I said, we were
18, 19, I turned 20 there.
That's a kid, man. That's a
frickin' kid faced with w*r.
Most people's concept or grasp of w*r
is from a movie, a film, Hollywood, right?
When you're there, you smell the smells,
you hear the sounds, you
see the blood, the brains,
the guts, the chunks of
pieces of meat, you know,
the sh*t becomes f*cking real.
You could see the crater
where the SUV blew itself up.
There was a charred
upper torso, like this.
Sticking outta the ground.
There was no face.
It was a hole where the
face is supposed to be.
The whole thing's charred.
And the other Iraqis,
there was another bus load
full of their friends,
the Iraqi national guards
that had just pulled up
and they were already
starting to pick up the pieces.
They pick up this torso
and they move it like this
and I just saw all kinds
of red slush come out
into the ground and I'm like, "Oh sh*t."
And since it was cold outside,
everything is just steaming.
All the pieces are just steaming.
There we are picking up pieces of meat,
Kevlars, helmets that
were exploded this way.
You had boots with feet still in it.
You had gloves, you had
parts, pieces, body, brain,
guts, blood everywhere.
You had Iraqis crying, screaming,
sh**ting their AKs in the
sky, it was pure chaos.
Iraqi national guard pulling cars over,
pulling civilians out
and beating the out
sh*t of 'em just 'cause,
they were taking out their anger.
And it just began just getting pieces
and putting 'em in the back
of a truck, getting pieces.
There was not one complete person.
There was not one full body.
There was not that.
It was just carnage.
There I am at my house in
Brawley with all my friends, man,
I got a frickin' lump in my throat, dude.
Like, I don't want to cry,
and I just leave walking,
my sister's bawling, my mom is bawling,
my friends are looking at me
like, ah, look at this kid.
Right?
So being that I was 17,
I had to have my parents'
permission slip, right?
I had 'em sign the waiver
'cause I was underage
and my parents kept trying
to talk me out of it.
My dad kept telling me,
"Hector, go to college.
Well, I'll pay for your college."
It was almost pleading,
"I'll pay for your college."
I'm like, "Hey dad, why
would I go to college
when I frickin' hate high school?"
Like?
And he is like, you know,
maybe they saw how much I wanted
it or how much I needed it.
And yeah, ultimately
they signed the waiver.
My sister who's three
years younger than me
and has been my biggest
cheerleader from the start
was all, all on board.
The recruiter takes me away.
Boom. San Diego.
Padre Trail Inn.
That was this little hotel in Old Town
that they would take you there
the night before you ship out.
And I remember, dude, like I used that.
There was a payphone at a
Mexican restaurant outside
and I called my girlfriend at the time
and that's when I felt it.
I had hickeys on my neck,
I had a shaved head.
I go and I have somebody
buy me some cigarettes
'cause I'm not old enough
but I did smoke at that time
and it's like, that was
your boy right there.
Like f*ck',
young and dumb, dude.
Just f*ck' ready to take
on the world, so I thought.
I am the Infantry.
I am my country's strength in
w*r, her deterrent in peace.
I am the heart of the
fight, wherever, whenever.
I carry America's faith and
honor against her enemies.
I am the Queen of Battle.
I am what my country expects me to be,
the best trained Soldier in the world.
In the race for victory,
I am swift, determined, and courageous,
armed with a fierce will to win.
Never will I fail my country's trust.
Always I fight on, through the foe,
to the objective, to triumph overall.
If necessary, I will fight to my death.
By my steadfast courage,
I have won more than 200 years of freedom.
I yield not to weakness, to hunger,
to cowardice, to fatigue,
to superior odds,
for I am mentally tough,
physically strong,
and morally straight.
I forsake not, my country, my mission,
my comrades, my sacred duty.
I am relentless.
I am always there, now and forever.
I am the infantry! Follow me!
The bayonet is a 25-mile road march,
that was the last test.
So you're out in the field for a week
doing these little tasks and trainings
and challenges and obstacles
and then you finish it off
with a 25-mile road
march in like 24 hours,
with your rucksack, your weapon.
Yeah, your feet are hurting
afterward, your back's hurting,
and this is what I recall.
It was nighttime.
There was torches on the
side, there was signs,
it said World w*r II, Korean w*r.
Vietnam, Gulf w*r, at each torch.
And then there was a blank
sign at the last torch.
And our drill sergeant said, you see that?
That's your guys' w*r. You guys
are gonna be there shortly.
I f*ck' made it.
Like, damn, all this training,
all this like hard work,
dedication that I put into this sh*t.
Like, I'm a f*ck' foot soldier.
I'm a f*ck' grunt.
Tip of the f*ck spear.
Like, when America goes to w*r, we're it,
we're gonna keep the f*ck'
wolf away from the door.
It was one thing for me to go
from San Diego to Fort Benning.
That was sad, right? Homesick.
When I went to Germany, oh
my goodness, man, my dad,
the look on my dad's face,
it was like he was devastated, bro.
And it's like, the
little son, man, is gone.
Gone, right, overseas.
I was 18 and Iraq was
brewing, to say the least.
That made me feel like, oh
my God, what have I done?
As a matter of fact, when
I touched down in Germany,
December 8th, 2002, you find
out what unit you're going to
and then you go, they
bused us into a classroom
on Ledward Barracks in
Schweinfurt, Germany.
And the soldier up there said,
"If you guys are going to 1/18
infantry or 1/26 infantry,
you're going to Iraq."
And everybody just put their head down.
Like, this is real.
Like yeah, this is what
we were begging for.
But to actually hear him
say, "Hey, it's go time,
like, you're gonna be going,"
was like, f*ck, right.
Again, the human
emotions, you're gonna be,
it's the fear of the unknown.
How am I gonna react?
Am I gonna perform as expected?
I hope I don't let my
brothers down, right?
'cause to let your
brothers down would mean
lives are gonna get lost.
And I saw you again
and again and again
My friend Jeffrey
King from Philadelphia.
Hill's side of the room, Texas flag.
Nonsense.
Al Pacino.
California, of course.
This is my roommate Hill,
Richard, from Texas.
Oh yeah, captured S*ddam
Hussein today.
Pretty cool.
We got Big G, Michael Garcia from Arizona.
Brandon Winkel from Chicago.
Chi Town.
Maldanado,
Alex, from Puerto Rico.
- What up?
- Corporal Luga.
Specialist Garcia over here.
Hey, Cruz.
From Cali.
Before you get on the plane.
Josh Soto from Cali.
Clayton Weeks.
From Texas.
Make sure I got everything ready for Iraq.
Already started but here's all my DCUs
and it is snowing outside.
Or started to snow.
Hey! Agh! Ferrel,
I'm gonna kick your a*s, man.
I'm gonna kick your a*s.
Classic.
Good sh*t.
Richard. Yeah.
Maldo, what are we doing right now?
I guess we are pulling guard.
I'm not really sure.
- On top of a roof.
- On top of a roof.
Here's a view of
where we're pulling guard.
Pretty weak.
And right beside us,
we have a Haji neighborhood.
Neighborhood in the middle of
f*ck' FOB, we don't know.
But this is what we do for
four hours, for 24 hours.
Four hours on, four hours off.
Sit and pull guard.
Fun, fun time.
Yep, all the fun.
Roger, tell
'em to get no gas today.
So when we get to FOB Paliwoda,
4th Infantry Division, the
guys from 4th ID were there.
These guys were salty,
uniforms looking like sh*t,
tattered, f*ck' sunburned.
These guys had been in country
for like 15 months, right?
They did the invasion
and then they hung around a little longer
than they anticipated.
They were ready to go home, right.
We showed up all fresh, 1st
Infantry Division, Big Red One.
So we had to do those left
seat, right seat rides
where we would go out on patrol with 'em,
they would show us the surrounding area.
And the first patrol
that I went out with him,
I remember there was a, he was
like a E-6, Staff Sergeant.
He looked like the lead
singer from Newfound Glory.
And he's like, "Hey, just be aware
that when you sh**t these
guys with your M-16,
the b*ll*ts are gonna go
right through 'em," right?
The velocity's so fast, when
you're inside the house.
And I'm like, "The hell?"
And yeah, these guys had
been f*cking k*lling people.
And I remember like looking at this guy
like he was a god, right,
like a f*ck' all thing grunt God.
Because I'm like, damn, this
m*therf*cker's doing it.
And he's telling us like, "Hey,
you're gonna have to sh**t these dudes
four or five f*ck'
times to put 'em down."
And I was like, all right.
So that was kind of the introduction
to like what we're getting ourselves into.
I mean I shot a dude one
time, like I mentioned,
he was like at 250, 300 meters
and he still kept running.
He still kept running.
And you want to talk about
not being like the movies,
in the movies you sh**t somebody
and they f*ck' fall over dead, right?
Unless you hit a dude in the head,
which we're taught to sh**t center mass,
it's very discouraging to
sh**t at people or sh**t people
and have them continuously fight
because some of them are
hyped up on adrenaline,
actual adrenaline and or meth.
We were finding vials,
we were finding syringes
where these dudes were getting
hyped up on f*ck' dope.
And then in 2004 you had
a lot of foreign fighters.
You had Jordanians coming
to Iraq to f*ck' fight.
You had Syrians, you had like
people from Africa coming.
No doubt people from Afghan,
like that was like a holy w*r to them.
Like hey, you want to come
f*ck up some Americans?
Come here.
So yeah, we were finding Chechnyans,
different sh*t, different
documents, different passports.
Living on a FOB, we were on FOB Paliwoda,
Forward Operating Base Paliwoda.
The reason it got named that
was a month prior to us arriving,
it was called FOB Eagle.
But there was a captain
by the name of Paliwoda,
I believe he was in the
4th Infantry Division,
he was k*lled by indirect
fire, I think it was rockets.
So therefore they named it after him.
So I want you to think
of like a small area
where you can pretty much,
you know everybody that's on the FOB,
not too far of a walking distance
and you have your living quarters.
This happened to be a former Iraqi base
that the Americans had taken over.
This is our friend Zimmerman and
he can sleep through anything.
Watch this alarm go off,
he won't even wake up.
Watch this.
- Oh!
- Oh!
So in 2004, Operation Iraqi Freedom II,
that was the beginning of the insurgency.
Up-armored anything was very
slim to none, irrelevant.
You know, I remember in
Kuwait being on a detail
of filling up 7,000 sandbags in 24 hours.
And that sucked, bro.
And they were gonna use the
sandbags for the floorboards
of the Humvees as as armor.
And what a routine patrol would look like
would be four vehicles
going out every time.
One would be an up-armored Humvee,
the other one was a frickin' supply Humvee
that I drove, Bravo 2-4,
and that was an IED magnet.
I think that thing ended
up getting hit directly
probably by like 12, 13 IEDs.
Where we built, or my
sergeant built stencils
and we were putting stencils.
I even got a picture of it.
After every time it got hit,
like we would just bring it back and.
Yeah, the windows would be blown out,
the tires would be f*ck' flat.
M-113, an armored personnel
carrier like Vietnam era.
A tracked vehicle.
And then I think the other one
was another up-armored Humvee.
Our biggest weapon system
was a 240 Bravo 7.62.
So we would go out into sector, patrol.
I was in Balad, very agricultural.
It was like living out
in the country, villages.
Dirt roads, canal roads.
Grape vines, orchards.
I took a picture of you already, man.
When I deployed to
Iraq, they pulled our platoon,
2nd Platoon, and attached
us to a unit of tankers.
So they kind of did some
Mickey Mouse Frankenstein unit
with one platoon of
infantry, which was us,
one platoon of combat engineers,
one platoon of tankers,
and a National Guard
platoon from New York.
It's safe to say that
they used and abused us,
us and the engineers, to do
all the grunt work basically.
Patrol, convoys, raids, guarding PoWs.
Guarding on the FOB, the
towers, the front gate.
Man, route clearance,
QRF, Quick Reaction Force,
we were busy 24/7, 365.
We have just discovered an IED,
improvised expl*sive device,
ahead of Checkpoint 10.
We are here with Jared
Hinks, take it away.
That's right, Ferrel,
here in Balad, Iraq
on route Linda where two Hajis,
excuse me, indigenous personnel.
- Iraqi members.
- Iraqis,
came to the front gate
while we were leaving
and told us they knew where a b*mb was.
Back from a raid, caught
us some f*cking prisoners.
- Huh?
- Going against you?
No, I got myself.
That's little Nathan Maez after a raid.
We'll start off with a cousin, Doc.
- I saw some action today.
- Edgar.
- No shots fired.
- Our medic.
It's a g*dd*mn shame.
The newest member
of the f*ck' family.
- Who here?
- Straight out of basic.
Scrolly as f*ck, brand new BDUs.
Cherry, he got his cherry popped today.
- Here we got Apa.
- Look at this.
So the movie "Platoon"
where Charlie Sheen is writing a letter
to I believe it's his grandma.
He's talking about his platoon
mates and where they're from
and little small cities.
And to me it was exactly like that, man.
You got Garcia from Miami, Arizona, right?
You got Hinks from Duluth, Minnesota,
you got Hill from Amarillo, Texas,
you know, Winkel from Chicago,
you just got everywhere
from all these places, bro.
And it's just like f*ck'
put us all together,
become brothers.
Look who's recording us right now.
Yeah.
It's a camera, it's recording.
Oh, it's video, you're recording.
- Yeah.
- Well. Let me see.
I am Sergeant Saragosa,
Jedi Knight and protector
of the Iraqi people.
Anyone who defies me, the sons
of b*tches, will f*ck' pay.
That's good sh*t.
- He's good.
- Like f*ck' dogs.
Another now.
Man, the guy
in yellow's losing it.
What are you throwin', man?
- Airheads.
- Dude, gimme an Airhead!
I'm right here, your f*ck' sergeant.
b*stard.
You're a b*stard.
I wanted a f*ck' airhead,
you know what, I'll go over
there and beat the sh*t
outta those kids for it.
I'm here in Balad Iraq
on top of what we would call a mansion.
Probably the only one in Balad right now.
As you can see behind me,
this man has a beautiful
view of the landscape around,
lots of green because it
is nearing winter time.
Around this area, the insurgents,
AKA (speaking in foreign
language), like to plant IEDs,
improvised expl*sive devices.
Where at one point in
time, this young man here,
Nathan Maez, 19 years old,
straight outta high school,
got blown up right over
there by a roadside b*mb.
Kind of where near that white car is.
Hold on folks, lemme take care of this.
And that's pretty much it.
This is Dan Withers saying.
Dan Withers saying, tschuss.
If it was during the day it would be,
kind of like a presence.
Like you go, you go to a
village, you go to a house,
and then they tell you to
come in, offer you chai,
which is like hot tea.
Meanwhile we're pulling
security up on the rooftop.
We're taking a look around.
You know, you ask them,
"you got a silah, silah?"
Silah is Weapon in Arabic, "Silah?"
"No silah, no silah, mister."
That's what they would say, right?
So we're still looking around,
we f*ck' find an AK-47
and we're like, "Silah!"
They're like, "One silah, one silah."
It's like, hey, these
m*therf*ckers, right?
It just agitates you, like, hey.
So the rule was they were allowed to have
one AK-47 per household
for thieves or whatever.
Alibaba is what they call them.
"Alibaba, Alibaba. mister."
So there's a lot of interacting
with the the Iraqi nationals.
You got the kids, right?
So you learn things like jenta is trunk,
you know, you're doing
traffic control checkpoints
where you're stopping
vehicles and searching 'em
for insurgents, contraband,
weapons and stuff like that,
and, "Jenta, open jenta."
Jenta.
- Jenta!
- Okay. Okay.
Open the jenta.
Jenta.
- Jenta.
- Yes, yes.
I want to marry the women Americans
and live in America
because I'm stuck in Iraq.
I want to go on America
because there isn't the
freaky freak in Iraq, in
America there is the freak.
Okay?
And half the platoon
would go out on patrol,
the other half of the
platoon would stay back
doing weapons maintenance,
vehicle maintenance.
Like I said, guard duty.
If you had time to go
to the internet cafe,
back then in 2004 the internet
cafe was a little office
or a little building a little room.
And there was probably
about four computers
hooked up to like old school internet.
And then you were able to
send old school emails out,
use the telephones, made
sure you had a calling card.
It was never a dull moment considering
that we would get indirect fire daily.
Daily, for sure daily.
Some of it accurate,
some of it not, you know,
the rounds would hit
outside, inside the wire.
We also had our outgoing,
which was our 120 millimeters,
11 Charlie Mortarmen, they
had their mortar pit set up
right outside of our building, barracks.
So it was freaking loud
like, boom, constant.
So we got to distinguish between incoming
and outgoing fires,
like there's certain
distinctive sounds to it.
And right after we would
receive incoming from the enemy,
the insurgents, our outgoing would run out
to the mortar pits and
start f*ck' firing back.
So there would be like battles sometimes
of just ingoing and outgoing,
just extremely f*ck' loud.
But you get used to it after a while.
Yo!
Zimmerman.
Zimmerman.
- Yell loud, yeah.
- Real loud? Real loud?
Zimmerman!
- Bro.
- What?
Quit it.
This is what a really
good friend of mine
shot off in here accidentally,
almost got me k*lled, almost
got the whole platoon k*lled.
- Zimmerman!
- What?
Hey, you alarm enough?
Thanks.
You feel the concussion.
For sure you feel the concussion,
the wave through your like chest, like.
Depending on how close you are
to it, especially incoming,
and, dude, I remember we got caught.
Me, Maez, Garcia, and Deano, our sergeant,
were walking to the internet cafe
and in between us and there,
there was a Bradley from 1/26 Infantry
that the grunts there were working on.
And as we're walking, we hear
like,
so right away we look,
and it's like, f*ck.
My best man, Garcia, he's like,
"Hey, don't worry, that's outgoing."
And we look, there was
nothing outgoing about that.
There was no Paladin there,
which we had Paladins, 155 a*tillery,
and definitely no our mortar
guys there, so it was incoming.
It's like, "Oh sh*t,
run, m*therf*cker, run!"
That's what the 1/26 guys yell to us.
They get up, they scatter.
And I kid you not, dude, we're running
and it just started dropping
on us like rain, dude.
All right, PC
Maez is about to describe
a rocket attack we went
through a while back,
About the rockets, I don't
like to talk about 'em much
because it's just
traumatizing, but anyway.
We were walking towards the internet,
towards the TOC at battalion.
And once we got to that Charlie Rock area,
their maintenance bay, we
heard an expl*si*n to our right
And Garcia said, "Outgoing."
I said, "No. Rockets."
Yeah, Garcia says "Paladin".
I was like, "There's no paladin."
Yeah, I was like, wait,
there's not a Paladin there.
Then I hear Charlie Rock maintenance crew,
- "Go, m*therf*cker, run, run!"
- "f*ck' run!"
So what did we do?
- We ran.
- We f*ck' ran.
- Was there a bunker? No.
- No there wasn't.
So we had to run for about 100, 150 meters
before we found a little overhead cover.
Boofy a*s Haji concrete barriers.
Wouldn't have stopped anything.
But we survived it, luckily,
even though they were coming
in on us like f*ck' rain.
The rounds would never stop.
And then on the run back we left Deano.
We sorta left our
team leader in the dust
because he's not up to par where PT's set.
If you're not ready to run,
you shouldn't be allowed to
have fun and go to the internet.
Simple facts.
That's all I gotta say about that.
Thanks. Thanks.
Specialist Ferrel, You all right, man?
No comment.
It was scary.
All right,
I'll let you be, man.
- Huh?
- I said I'll let you be.
Please. Let me gather my thoughts.
I know it hurts.
Lemme contemplate
what could have happened.
Because you could hear
the rockets, it's like,
especially how close they are.
And the only thing we found
was those concrete walls
that you'll see around
the green zone in Baghdad
they put around perimeters of bases.
Those concrete walls,
but they were stacked
on top of each other.
They were in a laying down position
and like four of us managed to
just cram into a little hole.
And, dude, it was like.
So you can smell the black
smoke, the gunpowder, the dust.
Could hear the whizzing of the rounds.
Definitely the explosions.
And we just started laughing, dude.
We just started laughing because
there's nothing you can do.
You get to a point man,
you get to a point where
you know there's nothing you can do,
you might as well have a good time with it
because, honestly, what
difference is it gonna make?
Would you rather scare yourself
to death or just go out?
Kind of like go out happy with it?
It stopped after a while.
We all picked up when it
seemed like a good time,
like a lull in the fire, to go back.
And we went back and my boy
Hinks from Minnesota was like,
"Damn, bro, did you guys
get caught in that?"
We're like, "Yeah, dude,
right in the middle."
"Was it scary?"
"100%, absolutely."
But my dad had given me some
type of religious medallion
prior to deploying, which was random.
And I remember just clutching that thing
when the rounds were
landing all around us.
We're here in Balad, Iraq again,
where I guess the driveby
happened on this f*ck' car here.
k*lled the driver definitely,
'cause his brains are
hanging on his shoulder.
And I guess some other
people were in the back
that got shot up, taken to the hospital.
I guess this is these
people's relatives or whatever
and they're not too happy right now.
I guess it was a tribal
w*r between two tribes
or some sh*t like that.
Anyways, just another day here in Balad,
we're almost outta here.
More brains for you.
- Oh, I gotta go down there.
- Go down there with a camera.
I don't see him.
All right.
I don't see him.
This here is
high speed Second Squad
In the middle of what we
would call a battle I guess.
Get out of
here! Get out of here!
- Clear?
- Yeah.
House clear.
Let's go, bro, that easy.
Look at Hill on the g*n.
What's going on?
We are in downtown Balad
on a regular patrol.
On the g*n as usual.
Moo.
Look at that dirty f*ck'
kid, and his brother.
All right, there's mother.
Don't mind the b*llet hole in the glass.
Yep.
Hard at work.
Oh, look at the helicopter,
Hey did it record?
That's f*cked up, dude. That
was my best one too, man.
There goes another one.
Say something, d*ck.
We're in Balad right now, downtown.
We're not in downtown Balad right now.
- Dude, you're f*ck' stupid.
- Huh?
On dangerous mission today?
Not dangerous at all.
- Very dangerous.
- Dangerous mission today.
That's scroll on the g*n.
Always talkin' that sh*t.
My foot hurts really bad.
We're gonna escort these
f*gs to the hospital.
- Go go, show the f*gs.
- Show the f*gs, dude.
Show the
non-combatant m*therf*ckers.
Zoom in, zoom in.
I dunno how.
- I'm Luga.
- Shut the f*ck up, as*h*le.
- Hey.
- I'll f*ck' k*ll you.
This is how we do it in the Humvees.
Smokin' Newports and
sh*t, not giving a f*ck.
I ain't dismounting for nothing,
'cause my foot's all f*cked up.
I'm here for the hell of it,
for shits and f*ck' giggles.
You gonna put that on a f*ck'
documentary when I make it.
This is how we lived in Iraq.
I guess, damn.
I never really, really thought of this,
but I guess the first time that
I fired my weapon in combat
was April 15th, 2004.
I was taking a sh*t in the latrines.
It was like a trailer, like
the ones you see at a concert.
And we started getting incoming
like rockets or mortars.
I remember thinking like,
I'm gonna die on the shitter.
Right, you never want
to die on the shitter.
And I remember thinking like, damn,
shrapnel's about to come through
like this aluminum fricking tin thingy.
So I like throw on my vest
real quick, my helmet.
I don't even think I wiped my
a*s, and I take off running.
Outside of the door
and you got the maintenance
bay right there.
This is on our FOB, FOB Paliwoda.
And we were QRF, Quick Reaction Force.
So it was our job to go to
the point of origin, the POO,
that was tracked by a satellite
that would give us the exact coordinates
of where it came from,
it would track the
trajectory of the round.
So we load up, we get in the Humvees.
We stop and set up a
traffic control checkpoint
to try to find the mortarmen.
Well, we see a white truck
coming in our direction,
they see us and they f*ck'
haul a*s and do a U-turn.
So it's like, "Hey, jump in,
jump in, get in the vehicle.
There they are."
Man, we're chasing this
fricking truck vehicle.
We go about 30 miles away from
where we're supposed to be.
It's like we damn near
ended up in Fallujah
from what I gather.
I was an E-3, E-4, so
I really didn't like,
you know, I wasn't making
any f*ck' decisions.
Just driving a Humvee at this time.
So we chase them.
Again, to some village
right in front of a house.
They parked the truck,
it was a white truck,
three males, military-age males jump out,
they run through a house.
Even though I was the
driver of the Humvee,
something told me just get
out and f*ck' chase 'em.
Right, so I jump out
and instead of us going through the house,
we went around the side.
And as I'm looking, Sergeant
Hendrickson is over there
and he's handling one of the dudes,
one of the older guys, right?
It is him and he's handling
him, we'll just say that.
So now you see two guys
running, me, Hinks and Deano.
These dudes are f*ck' gaining on us.
Right, we didn't know if
they had weapons on them,
they just f*ck' like, it was all bad.
Bad area, bad people.
That was the crazy thing
about f*ck' Iraq is that,
you know, they didn't
really wear uniforms.
So I asked my sergeant,
"Can we sh**t warning shots?
Can we sh**t warning shots?"
So he's like, "Yeah." So
it's like boom, boom, right?
Warning shots get f*ck'
fired, dudes are still running.
I was like, man, these guys
are really up to no good.
So I see one kind of turning,
kind of like turning to the left.
And then that's when I draw
on him and just, boom, boom.
The dude was like 250 meters away, 300.
And when I seen he was running,
he skipped the ground with his hand.
I'm like, holy f*ck. I shot him.
So he kept running.
I mean, they were a distance.
And when we come up to the guy,
there's a canal that's empty
of water, but there's mud.
It's a very muddy canal.
And the dude is on his
knees like this, soaked,
soaked in blood.
And I remember thinking in my head,
God, please let that be mud.
Please let that be mud, right?
I was hoping it would be mud
from what he had just crossed.
And the dude was wearing sandals,
which caught me off guard.
Like, how the hell did
he keep his sandals on
through that mud?
Right, you would think
it would've got stuck.
So we end up coming up, coming behind him.
And my sergeant yells, "Hey,
you shot him, you search him."
So I just kicked him. Boom.
I kicked him in the back and
he f*ck' falls forward.
And now he's in the prone position.
And I'm standing over him,
'cause they did teach us
how to do EPW searches,
enemy prisoner of w*r searches,
in case they have grenades,
which is one of the last stands
or one last-ditch efforts that they'll do
is they'll lay on top of a grenade
or just f*ck' pull the pin
and just take everybody out.
So he's like, "You shot
him, you search him."
So I go to search him and
I put my hands on his back
and my f*ck' hands slipped.
He's wearing a man-dress,
and my hand slipped on the red,
slick blood, dark a*s blood.
And I fell on top of
him and I'm like, "Ah!"
Right, I looked at my hands
and I just remember thinking,
like, damn, I have blood
on my hands, right,
like the figure of speech,
I have blood on my hands.
So by then another sergeant came,
who he claimed to be a medic,
but he gets here and he starts panicking
'cause the dude's exit wound
is here in his neck, right?
Again, I'd never seen a g*nsh*t wound.
I had never shot anybody
up until that point.
You know, this is like really happening.
So Sergeant Deano tells
him, "Hey, patch him up.
You're supposed to be a f*ck' medic."
And he says, "Hey, let's go.
We still have to go
and get the other guy."
Right, so it was me and
then we were all regrouped.
Hendo, Deano, Hinks and me and I
and we're running, the
other guy disappeared, man.
Holy sh*t, he ran into a f*ck' village.
It was a bad village, dude.
It was a really bad village.
I mean, you would think
because you're in Iraq,
it's a hostile area of combat operations
like 24/7 everywhere.
Some f*ck' places are
more sketchier than others
and just different things that give away.
Like the way people look
at you in their eyes,
it's like the hate is radiating
from people's like body, souls.
And we were seeing a lot of that.
Pictures of S*ddam Hussein
up on people's walls.
That wasn't something we
had necessarily encountered
in our area of operations.
I told you we had driven frickin'
30 minutes out of our AO.
And I remember clearing
a house clearing it,
and there was an old lady in a wheelchair.
And as I come across the
room, she just stares at me.
She's just in the wheelchair, like.
Doesn't say nothing to me,
I don't say nothing to her.
It is almost like she's used to
people coming in her house with g*ns
and it's like just keep pushing, right?
Like, she's not a threat, keep pushing.
We start getting like the heebie-jeebies.
Like, Hey, we gotta get outta here.
We gotta get outta here,
we've been here for too long.
We've been here for too
long, we're in a bad area.
It's just a matter of time
before they come down on us.
And so we start making our
way back to the vehicle.
And you had the family
members of that individual
that I shot were crying.
I mean, I assume they
were their family members.
And then you had the dad,
which this is what I found extremely odd.
The dad walks up to me
and I shake the dad's hand
and the dad shakes my hand.
So if there was a major
event, which there were,
they would send the chaplain over to us
in our little makeshift barracks.
You know, initially it
was just a big open bay,
then we somehow got some
plywood and made cubicles,
two-man cubicles.
But we're learning this as it's happening.
The big army will send
a chaplain over to us
and talk to us about what's going on.
Of course, we're not
gonna openly, you know,
pour our heart and soul into this guy.
We don't even know him and
we're not trying to look weak.
So at that time, right, I
don't have that same mindset.
'Cause you gotta understand, bro,
weakness will get you k*lled.
You gotta be f*ck hard, stern.
I mean, you gotta be a k*ller
to survive and adapt in that environment.
You can get got at any time.
Like about five minutes ago,
the Humvee that I drive
just got hit by an IED.
But the other squad was driving it.
Pretty f*ck' scary.
Joe, why you
ain't got no f*ck' grease
on his face, Specialist?
Dad's mad.
It's PFC Roberts Zimmerman
reporting from Balad, Iraq.
As you can see, the weather
out there is f*cking shitty.
f*cking electric lines and transformers
are blowing all over the place.
Oh f*ck.
What is it,
from the f*ck' sand?
It's probably from the sand.
A big a*s piece of metal.
Oh man, that's what this
is, a piece of a shrapnel
from the b*mb that went off
right next to my vehicle today.
- A b*mb?
- Yeah man,
a roadside b*mb f*ck'
almost blew me up today.
A piece of the metal. Check it out.
Check out this little piece.
Good sh*t, huh?
That's a big piece of f*ck' metal.
Yep.
12th of May.
So how do you feel?
How do you feel about that
flying past your head?
Nah. can't really do much about it.
We k*lled somebody though,
that's what counts.
Hopefully it was the guy.
If it want, oh well. Really don't know.
- That's about it.
- All right.
Six in the barrel.
First time I met Doc
Daclan was in Hohenfels.
We actually had a medic prior to him
that refused to fire his weapon
on one of the live fire ranges
and our platoon sergeant,
Sergeant First Class
Goehlich, kicked him out.
He's like, "Hey, get outta
here. I don't need you.
I need somebody that's gonna
f*ck' fire their weapon."
And asked for a replacement,
which was Doc Daclan, Edgar.
I ended up going to the PX at Hohenfels
and buying this big giant
Rambo knife, like a gimmick.
And it came with a compass
and I was so excited, man,
probably like a bargain,
probably like 10 bucks.
And I was so anxious to open it up
that I actually sliced my
hand open with that knife.
And we were in the billets,
you know, the little barracks area.
And I go up to the medic, Doc,
and I'm like, Hey Doc,
can you help me out here?
And he starts bandaging me up.
This is the first time I meet him.
And he has that like high-pitched voice
and he is like, "Hey,
man, you gotta be careful
when you're messing with these knives."
And I'm like, "I know, man, I know."
And he starts like bandaging my hand.
And even then I just
remember thinking like,
this dude's so caring,
like this dude's so
passionate about his job.
Get in the Humvees, we start
driving out the FOB front gate,
Specialist Maldanado, my boy
from Puerto Rico's there,
and he's just like looking at us, right?
And I'm looking at him, which was weird
because like the whole mood was somber.
It was just weird right out the the gate.
Normally he would've been like,
"Hey, what's up, f*ck."
But it was just like nothing.
We drive to the location
where the point of origin is,
along the Tigris River.
Right before we get to the POO,
there's a T-intersection
on a hard ball street.
And I was the third vehicle
out of four vehicles in the patrol.
And we hear over the radio
that the last vehicle had
broken down about a mile back.
Like, what?
So the lieutenant in the first
vehicle made the decision
to send my vehicle back
and link up with them.
So we're like, "All right."
So I drive back and I link
up with that other vehicle.
Now I didn't give it any thought
whether they were gonna stay
put or continue mission.
I mean, I guess I figured
they were just gonna stay put
till we got back and linked up.
What ended up happening is that
patrol went and carried on.
And Doc, Edgar Daclan
was like a grunt to us.
Even though he was a medic, combat medic,
he was a grunt to us, 'cause
he was always leading,
he was always kicking in doors,
he was always sh**ting his weapon with us.
So as we're there,
I'm with the last vehicle that broke down.
We hear.
Like the loudest rumbling forever.
Like, I never heard
anything like this before.
Followed by g*nf*re.
- Wow.
- Don't get up, guys.
That rocket tracked.
It took like a f*ck' half a second.
"Hey, let's go, they're
getting hit. Let's go."
So then my wheel starts spinning like,
oh, they went forward, right?
They continued mission, they
pushed on and they got hit.
Here we go, here's part of it.
The Humvee parked right next to the IED.
It was a surface leveled IED,
meaning it was surface leveled
and it was in a mound of dirt.
So there was only dirt covering
those a*tillery rounds.
And as soon as Doc stepped
in front of the Humvee
and the insurgent saw
him, he detonated the IED,
which blew Doc across the road.
So I convinced the sergeant
like, "Hey, let's go, let's go."
So we had jumped in the Humvee,
and I know a shortcut to the location,
it was through like a dirt road.
And I see the Humvee
that got hit and it was,
we would come to it like a T.
I jump out and as soon as I jump out,
Sergeant Edgar comes around
and said, "They k*lled Doc."
I'm like, "What do you
mean they k*lled Doc?"
And he's like, "He's
right over there, look."
And like I look past him
and I see a body on the road
and my vision just goes,
and my whole world just went dark.
And like at that moment,
my innocence left me.
Like a shift in my, like my innocence,
anything I was ever taught,
that good things happen to good people,
bad things happen to
bad people, shattered,
f*cking shattered on the spot.
So I run over there, I don't know why.
And I look down and there's a
body, and I look at his face
and there's droplets of blood on his face.
But he doesn't look like Doc, right?
His face is in one piece,
his face isn't injured,
it just doesn't look like Doc.
And then I started going
down, look, scanning his body.
And then I get to his right leg, his shin,
and his shin bone is exposed
so he took like shrapnel to the shin.
Lieutenant Torres took shrapnel
on the bottom of his foot.
Because when I arrived,
Lieutenant Torres was sitting
on the passenger side of the Humvee,
holding his foot up like this, cussing.
And the bottom of his boot was chewed up
and his foot looked like ground beef.
Then you had Oneal who was the gunner
at the time of that Humvee.
He had his back of his
head facing that IED.
So when that IED blew, boom,
it blew some shrapnel into his Kevlar.
We had the old school Kevlars,
the ones that came down,
not like the new ones.
And that saved his life.
It punctured his skull
and it wounded him, took
him out of the fight.
And Hinks was bandaging up Oneal
and Hinks was bandaging
up Lieutenant Torres,
which was a f*cked up feeling
because we never in our wildest dreams
anticipated that our
medic would get k*lled.
And I'm just like, holy f*ck.
But then I realized like, hey,
this is an unsecured like scene still,
we still have to pull security.
Like the insurgents, the bad guys
can still be out in the bushes.
So we look down and
they're like, "Hey, Ferrel,
there's a f*cking vehicle
coming down the road."
So you have the dead
body, you have my Humvee,
that Humvee that got hit, the 113,
and we're set up in this little position.
But it's on a hard ball so you
got traffic trying to come,
Iraqi civilians trying
to come from both sides.
So I start sh**ting
warning shots at this car.
Probably had to be an Opal.
Everybody drove Opals.
The the car turns around and leaves.
Well then I see a white truck coming
and I do the same thing,
but the truck keeps coming.
So then I sh**t in front of the street
right where that truck is at with my M-16.
The truck is still f*ck' coming.
So then I sh**t at the engine block.
And now this is only .556, but I mean,
I don't know what else to do so I'm like,
and the f*ck' truck is still coming.
I'm like, I'm gonna
have to k*ll this dude.
I'm gonna have to f*ck'
k*ll this dude, right?
'Cause at that time they had
already started implementing
car bombs, VBIEDs, vehicle borne IEDs.
I see that there's a
driver, but no passenger.
So I aim at the passenger
side window, windshield,
and just put a couple rounds in there
and the f*cking truck kept coming.
And I'm like, I'm gonna
have to k*ll this dude.
I'm gonna have to f*ck'
k*ll this dude, right?
And it's one of those things,
like, I don't know if this is a bad guy.
I don't know if he's a car
b*mber. Is this a risk?
By then, the dude is up on us, right?
So much time, like
everything's happening so fast,
we see that it's a old man,
dude had to have been 80 or 90 years old.
Blind, deaf, dumb.
So we just break the, the
window, we drag 'em out,
we rough 'em up a little bit
'cause we're highly upset and young
and our friend just got k*lled
and we him back in the truck
and he turns around and I hear Hinks say,
"Hey, did you sh**t him?"
And I'm like, "No," like pissed.
He f*ck' goes off.
And now Weeks shows up.
So it's like, hey, let's
go follow the wire, right?
Because back then they would
have two types of IEDs,
command detonated and remote detonated.
So command, they would have
a copper wire strung out
to two 155 a*tillery
rounds, or one or three,
however many they wanted,
with a blasting cap
and then they would string it out
and they would be there watching you
with a nine volt battery.
So we follow the wire and we
look and we look right down.
It was right on the edge of the Tigris.
The dude had a clear line of sight
to the Humvee down the canal.
So they would use different
markings to hit you.
And then when he donated,
he ran into the village,
which we would later drop
f*ck' two 500-pound
bombs on that village.
After we've traced the wire,
the dude was nowhere to be
found, the insurgent, we go back.
And it's time to load the
bodies on the medevac, right?
So they tell me to pop smoke,
I had red smoke canister.
I popped it and I threw
it into the street,
but it didn't go where
I wanted it to land.
So I go to pick it up and I
burned the sh*t outta my hand.
Like, I didn't realize it
was gonna be burning so hot.
So I just dropped it.
By then pretty much
all the reinforcements,
all the big wigs, everybody
came from the FOB.
We weren't that far from our FOB.
As a matter of fact, my friends on the FOB
that heard the expl*si*n,
which was like two miles away
or three miles away, it was so loud
that they thought it
was incoming on the FOB.
I'm telling you, that IED was
just f*ck' weird, different.
I'm standing in the middle
of this empty field in shock.
Sergeant First Class Joselito
gets me and pushes me down.
He's like, "Hey, you're
doing good, Ferrel,
you're doing good, take a knee."
At the same time the medevac was landing.
You know, I didn't realize
that I was standing straight up
and he's like, "Hey, you're doing good."
Like, I don't know if he
noticed I was in shock.
And we get up afterwards
and then we start loading the
bodies onto the stokes litters
and onto the helicopter.
And I remember the helicopter
pilot looking at me
and just me looking at him
kind of like, you know,
like thank you and like take care of them.
But we had one KIA, two wounded in action.
Yeah, those guys left and never came back.
Doc's death hit the
platoon f*ck' hard, man.
It hit the platoon hard
because of who he was, right?
I'm not saying had it been anybody else
who wouldn't have been
dealt the same emotions,
but because it was him, it
f*ck' sucked that much more.
On top of that,
September 10th happens
to be my mom's birthday,
which makes it the worst day of my life.
'cause I had to come back
to the FOB, call my mom,
and tell her happy birthday
and keep all those feelings inside
because I didn't want
to ruin her birthday.
It was usually like this,
two guys in a cubicle, quiet.
You know, when Doc got k*lled,
it was me and my best
man sitting right across
exactly like we are right now.
He's crying, I'm crying.
And he wanted to know what happened.
And I told him exactly how it happened.
And he's just like, "f*ck, man."
It's almost like the facial
expressions couldn't hide it.
It's moments of just sad, extreme sorrow.
Reflecting back, what could we have done?
Why couldn't we get k*lled?
Survivor's guilt, bouncing
stories off of each other.
And then, hey, guess what?
Suit up. Put your sh*t on.
We're going out again.
You know, looking around the room
and seeing everybody's face,
it's like that little kid
trying to hold their lip in,
right, from crying.
I was crying. Other dudes were crying.
But it's the group mentality
as a whole, it's like,
A, we don't wanna show weakness.
B, we can't afford to show weakness.
C, we gotta continue mission.
But like I said, those glimpses, right?
Those glimpses of complete sheer terror,
bewilderment, excitement, joy, right?
Blowing up a fricking
house, blowing up a car,
and it's like a little
kid with some fireworks
and a little GI Joe doll.
Boom, right?
It's like during those
glimpses you can catch like,
hey, you know, we're still kids,
but I'll tell you what thing,
man, 13 months of that,
18 months of that, 15 months
of that, multiple deployments,
you do lose your innocence, f*ck' fast
February, 2005.
The lieutenant colonel pulled us
into an airplane hangar in Germany.
He said, these three things,
don't drink and drive.
don't beat your wife,
and if you hear loud
sounds, you may flinch.
Have a good day. Boom.
Coming back home, bro, to San Diego,
to El Centro, to Brawley.
I felt like a f*ck' alien, dude.
Like an absolute f*cking alien.
My parents didn't understand
what was happening to me.
My sister didn't understand
what I had just went through.
My friends knew that I was turned up
and that I was drinking
the most and doing the most
and acting bizarre, wild, and unusual.
But they enjoyed that sh*t.
I was a life of the f*ck' party.
And that's where it was
a double-edged sword.
Hit him.
Daclan. Daclan.
Help.
What?
Back up. Back up. Get away.
Get away!
So in April of 2004,
yeah, I shot a dude, right?
The dude was bleeding out. We
f*ck' ran up to the scene.
The dude was bleeding out, man.
The exit wound was coming out of his neck.
And while he didn't die
then and there, you know,
my sergeant would later on tell me like,
yeah, that dude f*ck' didn't make it.
That happened in April.
I got R and R, rest in
relaxation, in August.
I was already kind of
fighting that in my mind.
Like, am I gonna go to hell?
I grew up with a religious
background, Catholic.
So I'm like, I know the 10 Commandments.
Well, I surprised my parents
when I came back in August
for R and R and they threw
me on the whim block party
with all the neighbors.
Well, I remember getting drunk and crying
and saying, I'm a m*rder*r,
I've k*lled somebody.
And like, f*ck, man.
You could just imagine the
neighbors looking at me.
This was in 2004.
I didn't plan that.
You know, once the
alcohol started flowing,
that's kind of just what came out
and everything always
been inside of me, right?
In my thoughts, in my
gut, and in my heart.
But when I drank, sh*t came out.
In a very unhealthy, very ugly way.
I wrestled with that, tackled with that
thought, memory, idea, action,
for a long, long time, man.
And that just goes hand in
hand with every other trauma
that I experienced throughout
the duration of the w*r.
My w*r.
You guys are f*ck' crazy.
You need your little AK-47 now, dude.
The whole year of 2005,
I was definitely drunk
and the majority of
times under the influence
of a controlled substance.
Marijuana, cocaine, meth,
and those were the three.
And to be honest with you,
this is what it looked like.
Wake up at nighttime,
start drinking, okay?
Start dabbling in some coke.
That's the word I was
looking for, dabbling,
'cause I wanted to get up.
It didn't put me up where I wanted to,
so I would smoke some
meth or snort some meth
and it would put me too up.
So then I would kind of panic
and smoke some weed to bring me down.
And then I would just continue
that rollercoaster from hell
for the whole 2005.
September 10th, the anniversary
of my friend getting k*lled,
still came around all those years,
and that's a trigger for me.
And I had to learn about triggers.
I had post-traumatic stress disorder.
I mean, I still have post
traumatic stress disorder,
but I didn't know what the hell that was.
I literally thought I was
losing my f*ck' mind, bro.
The word anxiety, if I
tell you the word anxiety,
people know the symptoms.
Oh, anxiety, rapid heart
increase, nervousness.
Not only did I not know
the f*ck' word anxiety,
I didn't know the symptoms.
I thought I was f*ck' losing my mind
and having a heart attack simultaneously.
Adding dope and everything else,
oh bro, you could just imagine.
And then when you go
through prolonged periods
of fight or flight scenarios,
your brain gets rewired.
And this is something I
learned after the fact
in therapy and treatment.
So sending those neurons
and everything else,
and your brain remembering
survival things.
The problem is you get in an
argument with your girlfriend,
you go straight to full
combat mode, right?
She's thinking you're a a*usive
son of a b*tch from hell.
Right, verbally a*usive,
physically a*usive, and a drunk.
You look like a f*ck'
piece of sh*t as*h*le,
is what you look like.
But what's really happening
is you're suffering, right?
It's not an excuse at all, right?
You gotta be held accountable.
I gotta be accountable for my actions.
However, that it was an ugly mess.
I was the king of self-sabotage,
the absolute king of self-sabotage.
I was a manipulator, right?
And that comes with being an alcoholic.
The traits of alcoholism.
I knew something wasn't
right, bro. I wasn't happy.
I wasn't happy.
You know, you hear people
say, they look in the mirror,
they don't like the person that they see.
Well, I mean, I would look in the mirror,
I didn't think I was f*ck',
you know, bad looking.
But I didn't like the person
that was inside of me.
And that person inside of
me came out when I drank.
There was no forethought though.
There was no knowledge
of what scientifically
was happening to me or
what I was enduring,
if that makes sense.
Like medical terminologies,
mental health terminology, symptoms.
It looked f*ck, you know?
And I remember telling
my parents one time like,
"Hey, this looks ugly to you guys.
Just imagine what the f*ck
it looks like inside of me."
Because yeah, dude, the
thoughts, oh my God, bro.
And I haven't reflected back to that,
how it was that bad in ages.
But it was bad, dude.
In 2010, I would hit my
bottom, bro. I'd hit my bottom.
I'd had a fiance at a time.
I totaled my truck, I
totaled my Toyota Tundra.
I bought that Toyota Tundra
in 2005 as a gift to myself
coming back from Iraq as a trophy.
f*ck' totaled it.
And I was upset that I
didn't die in the accident.
That's how bad I was.
My dad said, "I'm gonna
drop your f*ck' a*s off
at the VA in La Jolla.
You're not gonna call us anymore.
You're not gonna talk to us
anymore. You're not my son.
You're their problem. You're
not our problem anymore." Boom.
Thank God he didn't just
drop me off and leave.
He actually waited right there
as I checked myself into
the emergency room of the VA
and I told him, "Hey, I need help".
There was a female
working behind the counter
at the emergency room.
I said, "I need help."
She's like, "Well, what's wrong?"
I said, "I don't know.
Every time I drink,
something bad happens."
She's like, "Well, what do you mean?"
I'm like, "I don't know. I
have these thoughts. I can't."
She's like, "All right, have
a seat." She was really nice.
We're gonna get you
processed through the room.
And then that's when my
journey began, bro, in 2010,
of inpatient rehab.
Started off with a trip to the psych ward
to south in La Jolla voluntarily.
They kind of duped me into going up there.
They said I was gonna get some help.
There was no help up there, bro.
It was a f*ck' locked psych ward.
I did go to my first AA meeting up there,
which it's been on and
cracking ever since, you know,
and I just hit 13 years of sobriety.
So that's what that looked like, man.
It got worse before it got better.
Their death like hung over me
like a f*cking black
cloud from hell, dude.
And I blamed all my
drinking, my drug usage,
and all this and all of that, man.
And the bottom line is I
refused to accept their death.
That's the bottom line.
I was at the VA hospital, like I said,
all this f*ck' treatment
came from the VA hospital.
And the doctor's like, "You
need to accept Doc's death."
And I'm like, "Yeah, well
that's not gonna happen.
I don't give a f*ck what you say.
I'm never going to accept Doc's death."
And he said, "Hector, accepting something
doesn't mean that you agree with it.
It simply means that you
accept that it happened.
And I'm like, oh, the light bulb went off.
And that's exactly what did it for me.
That's what it was, dude,
that was a turning moment
in accepting, once I was able
to accept his death, oh dude,
it felt like a million
pounds lifted off of me.
Right? I wasn't holding onto that.
And yeah, you best believe
I don't agree with it,
but now I can accept that it did happen.
They got k*lled doing
what they enjoyed doing.
And I know they enjoyed
it because we were,
you know, shoulder to shoulder,
kicking in doors together,
laughing, joking, eating, smoking.
It's more than just losing a friend.
It's more than just losing a brother.
It's what it is, is actually
the world got a valuable,
valuable asset taken from them.
Everybody went their separate ways.
My buddy Maez ended up going to NTC,
Fort Irwin in California.
The majority of the guys stayed in.
They got stop-lossed.
I got out.
I only did a three year contract.
I got in and I got out, right?
It was kind of a perfect thing.
Train, deploy for 13 months,
and then, well, I went
from Iraq to home, dude,
that's kind of a problem.
And they got stop-lossed
and went back to Baghdad for 18 months.
So not only am I home,
I'm still losing brothers from
my platoon overseas, dude.
So like I'm home and
I'm getting calls that,
Hey, did you hear about so and so?
Did you hear about Allen?
I'm like, "No, don't tell me."
Yeah, he got f*ck' k*lled.
It was with the 10th Mountain,
'cause he ended up PCSing
with the 10th Mountain.
One that hit me hard was Staff
Sergeant Leija, Hector Leija.
Called him Big Hector, he
called me Little Hector.
He got shot in the head by
a sn*per in Haifa Street.
That came out on the news.
That whole scene came out on the news.
This is somebody that was my mentor,
one of my leaders in my platoon
that took me under his wing
when I got into Germany.
So I'm like hurting, bro.
Like extremely hurting
and all this is happening.
So some of my friends
continued w*r and died.
King went back to Philadelphia,
he k*lled himself a couple years ago,
right after Memorial Day or
right before Memorial Day.
I recently got asked to
speak at my high school,
Brawley Union High
School for Veterans Day.
You know, one of my
buddies from my hometown,
he joined the Army Infantry.
He went to Iraq, he
deployed to Afghanistan.
He's a teacher now.
So he tells me I'm gonna be
the guest speaker to speak
and that there's gonna be
other veterans there in attendance.
So I get there and as soon
as I see my buddy Jay, right?
Jay has a sister my age
and it's a small town so
everybody knows each other.
And me and him both came back in 2005.
He was a Marine, he was in Fallujah,
I was in the Army, I was in Balad.
We both came back to that hometown
and we were both suffering
and hurting the exact identical same way.
And we remember, I remember him at his low
and I'm pretty damn sure
he remembers me at my low.
And when I seen him at
that like two weeks ago,
my eyes lit up like, "Oh
sh*t, Jay, what's up?"
It's like, oh.
And I said, "We made it, bro. We made it."
Five or six of 'em ended up relocating
to the Phoenix, Arizona area.
I have made annual trips out to Arizona,
out to the Phoenix area
where we will just chop
it up like brothers, bro,
and reminisce.
And I took my daughter, my
daughter was four or five.
So I introduced her to like,
hey, these are your uncles, right?
So that's, you know, we're growing.
One of my brothers, Hinks,
he just came to San Diego
and brought his daughter.
His daughter's the same age as mine
and we were, you know, we were so happy
that like they can play.
And then you talk about when we were young
and it's like, we both were
thinking the same thing.
Like, damn bro, look at us.
Look at what we went
through together young.
And now look, dude,
we're grown men, fathers,
and look at our daughters together.
You can't put a price on that.
You know, it is unexplainable
Balad, Iraq, where we have
just discovered an IED,
improvised expl*sive device
ahead of checkpoint 10.
We are here with Jared
Hinks, take it away.
That's right, Ferrel,
here in Balad, Iraq
on route Linda where two Hajis,
excuse me, indigenous personnel.
- Iraqi members.
- Iraqis,
came to the front gate
while we were leaving
and told us they knew where a b*mb was.
Sergeant Coleman, being
the man that he is,
said, he didn't care, he
wanted to continue mission.
But being the men we are,
we said, let's be heroes.
Let's go get 'em.
- So here we are now.
- The b*mb is down there.
The wait is undescribable.
Usually pertains to about four
to eight hour wait for EOD.
They have to do certain
things to prepare themselves
to blow up these roadside bombs.
With a chance of ambush.
Like, getting out of bed,
shutting off the PlayStation,
taking a shower, lacing
up their tennis shoes,
putting on b*mb favorite underwear,
and then coming to blow
the b*mb up with a robot.
Strenuous job.
Oh, if you look to the right,
there's cars that we are
diverting traffic off the road
onto the canal road.
Canal road being
that road right there.
If I had it my way, I'd
be able to send those cars
right to the b*mb and blow it myself.
There you got some well hygiened
and groomed Iraqi children.
They're not dirty, dusty,
or stinky whatsoever.
This is a nice home
that you would like to,
you'd most likely see in
Beverly Hills, California.
You see you got the smoke trail.
They got chickens and cows
running through their living room.
Fires burning in the yard.
I did see this kid crap in
the the living room floor once.
Look at Sergeant
Acosta work his magic.
Do it again, Sergeant Acosta,
please, for the camera.
Look at his weapon
Different than ours. Why?
Because that bad boy'll spit
30 rounds out in one second.
Wanna see a thousand-yard stare?
Oh come, come on,
I'm nearly coming, come on.
Don't make me lose that feeling.
42, 43, one more, one more.
46, 47, 48, 49, 50!
That there was a monkey f*ck.
Hear ye, we
are gathered here today
for our little Richard Freddy Hill.
Who's not so little anymore.
It's his 23rd birthday today.
The 30th of June, 2004.
Yay.
- Go on! Cut it.
- Cut that m*therf*cker.
Richard Hill,
do the honors, big guy.
Big nuts.
Hold on, hold on. Not yet.
Hey, Sergeant Stewart,
welcome to Richard Hill's
23rd birthday party
where he cuts the watermelon.
- Cut that b*tch.
- Begin.
Cut it, big guy.
Cut it.
No, don't cut it long-ways man.
You ain't got a birthday cake?
You gonna have a birthday watermelon?
It's a birthday.
Gave all the cakes to the Hajis.
Cut it, Richie like you would a man.
Yeah, like you're starting
right at his sternum.
- Yeah.
- Yeah!
Yeah, big guy!
23 years old, biggest
f*ck' nuts in the platoon.
Nuts so hard
that he ate the boogers out of a dead man
and asked for seconds.
Yeah, there you go. Oh!
This is our new room, my roommate Weeks.
Yeah, this is the friend
I was telling you about
that kind of shot that off in here.
What do you have to say
about that incident, Weeks?
Hold on.
About that day.
- Man.
- Little reenactment.
Where'd you
get that flashlight?
Did you order it offline?
'Cause that's f*ck' high speed
how you got it all hooked up.
Isn't it?
sh*t, should probably put the safety on.
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Grunt (2025)
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