Ex-Navy SEAL Sniper: Inside Carlos the Jackal and the Mindset of Modern Terror

Summary

Planet Tyrus Podcast Summary

Episode: Ex-Navy SEAL Sniper: Inside Carlos the Jackal and the Mindset of Modern Terror

Date: August 6, 2026
Host: Tyrus (with Outkick)
Guest: Jack Carr (Ex-Navy SEAL Sniper, #1 NYT Bestselling Author, Docuseries Host)

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Episode Overview

This episode brings together Tyrus and Jack Carr for a lively, rich conversation spanning topics from reading and social media in the digital age to the psychology of modern terrorism. The discussion dives deep into Carr’s life—as a Navy SEAL sniper, novelist, and family man. Central to the episode is Carr’s new Fox Nation docuseries on Carlos the Jackal, one of the world’s first “celebrity terrorists,” with conversations about terrorism’s evolution, myth-making through media, and lessons for a new generation. The episode blends sharp humor, raw life stories, and incisive analysis.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Importance of Reading, Social Media, and Family

• Phones vs. Books

  • Both Tyrus and Carr stress swapping screen time for books, emphasizing the empathy and depth that reading cultivates.
  • Carr notes, “Your Life will be 99% better if you put that phone down and stop scrolling and pick up a book.” (00:01)

• Parental Influence & Social Media Withdrawal

  • Tyrus describes the positive, bonding experience of making reading a family activity.
  • He shares his frustration with AI impersonations and scams on social media and the decision to limit household screen time:
    • “When my daughter is explaining to me how To Kill a Mockingbird goes through the idea, the spectrum of a 12 year old. It is awesome. And you cannot get that scrolling on a phone together.” (04:18)
  • Both discuss the initial "withdrawal" of leaving social media, and how quickly the benefits become apparent.

2. Discipline, Purpose, and Transitioning from High-Pressure Careers

• From SEAL to Author

  • Carr’s life path was clear from a young age: “I knew I wanted to be a SEAL from age 7 onward. Then I knew about age 10 that I was going to write afterward, so. So I kind of knew my path.” (08:28)
  • Tyrus compares career shifts in sports to the military: “I call it a haze, because I remember when football was over, I didn't know what to do with myself.” (09:12)

• Purpose Beyond the Uniform

  • Carr details the importance of combining personal mission and passion to find post-military purpose:
    • “If somehow you can figure out how to combine those two and turn that into purpose, then I think that that's what worked for me anyway.” (10:54)

• Life’s Sprints and Marathons

  • The hosts note the impossibility of recreating the intensity of military operations or professional sports in everyday civilian life.
  • Carr: “When you leave that high pressure environment... you just have to accept that going forward, it's going to be different. Life’s going to be different. That was one part of your life. Now it’s time to turn that page, start a new chapter.” (12:19)

3. The Media, Myth-Making, and the Rise of Celebrity Terror

• Carlos the Jackal Docuseries

  • Carr describes the subject and significance:
    • “It was the first celebrity terrorist... He gave terror a face and a personality. And he really learns how to manipulate the media to help build this mythology that still surrounds him today.” (17:01)
  • Discusses Carlos’s background, transformation, and celebrity status—contrasting him against earlier, faceless terror.

• Media’s Role in Creating Myths

  • Tyrus and Carr discuss how media narratives romanticize or oversimplify terrorists, with Carr emphasizing:
    • “He was just a sociopath who enjoyed killing for the fame, for the fortune, for the women.” (25:15)
  • Tyrus sees parallels with how contemporary figures and causes are sometimes falsely “heroized.”

• Historical Lessons Unlearned

  • Carr underlines the danger of not drawing wisdom from the past:
    • “Our enemy is always learning from us. We should be learning from the enemy... What does that teach our enemy? Oh, that terrorism works.” (21:05)

4. Understanding the Mindset of Terrorists

• On Romanticizing Terror
  • Carr notes the enduring psychological traps:
    • “The mistake that we make when we look at either a terrorist or a terrorist organization is we put our values, our traditions on them.” (27:02)
    • “We mirror image them.” (27:34)
  • They discuss the persistence of myth-making (e.g., Robin Hood), clarifying real figures versus their legends.

5. Behind the Scenes: Writing, Motivation, and Legacy

• Carr’s Approach to Writing

  • Driven by story and authenticity, Carr ignores trends, reviews, and external expectations.
  • “If I put my heart and soul into every single word, then I'm doing my job... Because all my heart and soul is to going on into the story.” (46:06)

• Motivation and Resilience

  • Lessons from SEAL training—“the cold is the differentiator”—also apply to writing: enduring boredom, adversity, and discomfort is necessary for meaningful work.
  • “If you want to write a book, just sit down and do it.” (43:46)

6. Advice for Veterans, Aspiring Authors, and SEALs

• Transitioning Identities

  • Carr encourages finding one’s next mission and being honest about the challenge of replacing peak experiences:
    • “At some point you're gonna have to get there and realize that you're not going to replicate that in the outside world.” (47:33)

• Direct Advice to Aspiring SEALs

  • “You have to just sign up and do it otherwise you're going to be looking back just do it wondering.” (55:48)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Why Reading Matters

  • Jack Carr: “Your Life will be 99% better if you put that phone down and stop scrolling and pick up a book.” (00:01)

• On Empathy and Fiction

  • Jack Carr: “When you put yourself into someone else's shoes which you do when you read fiction... you really develop this compassion and empathy that's harder to develop in other ways.” (01:39)

• On Social Media Manipulation

  • Jack Carr: “Comments section of social media develops the opposite attribute [of empathy].” (01:57)

• On Transition and Purpose

  • Jack Carr: “Everybody's gonna have a different mission in life. Everybody's gonna have a different passion. But if somehow you can figure out how to combine those two and turn that into purpose, then I think that that's what worked for me anyway.” (10:54)

• On the “Celebrity Villain”

  • Jack Carr: “He [Carlos the Jackal] was just a sociopath who enjoyed killing for the fame, for the fortune, for the women. And like I said, it ends up leading to his downfall.” (25:15)
  • Tyrus: “He's like evil James Bond.” (36:12)

• On Myth-Making and Media

  • Jack Carr: “He learned how to manipulate the media, no doubt about it. But it served the media's ends as well. Putting Carlos the Jackal on the front of a paper back then.” (36:13)

• On Advice for Writing

  • Jack Carr: “A lot of people come up and say they want to write books, and my advice is, yes, sit down and do it. Just got to do the work.” (43:46)

• On Following Your Calling

  • Jack Carr: “Listen to that calling... it's very similar to that sixth sense. I mean, it's a real thing. We're all here because we have ancestors that were good at hunting, good at fighting. And then a lot of those lessons learned were passed on through story so those lessons wouldn't have to be relearned in blood.” (47:33)

• On Common Misconceptions About SEALs

  • Jack Carr (joking): “No, no, that's how it is. We're pretty badass. No, I'm just kidding.” (51:05)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:01] Jack Carr advocates putting down your phone and reading
• [04:18] Tyrus describes the real impact of family reading
• [08:28] Carr’s childhood ambitions: SEAL and author
• [12:19] Life after intense, high-stakes careers
• [17:01] The rise of Carlos the Jackal and the “face” of terror
• [21:05] Learning from adversaries and terrorism’s evolving lessons
• [25:15] Carr deconstructs the myth of Carlos: “just a sociopath”
• [27:02] Misunderstanding terrorist values
• [31:02] Robin Hood myth: fact vs. fiction
• [36:12] Media and mythologizing villains
• [43:46] Carr’s advice on writing endurance
• [46:06] Writing: passion for the story over trends
• [47:33] Carr on moving past your “peak moment”
• [55:48] Concrete advice for aspiring SEALs

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Flow, Tone, & Style

The episode moves seamlessly between stories, sharp analysis, and playful jabs. Carr’s disciplined, thoughtful insights play off Tyrus’s humor, making for a relatable and energetic listen. Both draw from personal experience—sports, military, writing—and use these as springboards for broader lessons about society, media, legacy, and purpose.

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Conclusion

This episode provides an engaging, multi-layered look at the forces shaping modern terror, military transitions, and the real value of storytelling in society. Carr’s expertise is complemented by candid talk from Tyrus and his team, making this essential listening for anyone interested in culture, history, or personal growth. Whether discussing the dangers of myth-making around celebrity villains, the power of books over screens, or the complicated journey from the battlefield to the writer’s desk, the episode delivers with both humor and depth.

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Recommended Action:

• Check out Jack Carr’s new Fox Nation docuseries on Carlos the Jackal
• Read his fiction and nonfiction for deeper context on modern warfare and terror
• Embrace “deep work”—pick up a book, put down the phone, and talk about the stories with your friends and family!

Transcript

[Jack Carr]

Your Life will be 99% better if you put that phone down and stop scrolling and pick up a book.

[Tyrus]

If dad's reading a book and they got to pick a book and then you talk about the book, you cannot get that scrolling on a phone.

[Jack Carr]

My mission in life is to going forward is to take care of my family.

[Tyrus]

I remember when football was over, I didn't know what to do with myself. From 8am to 2pm Every day life's

[Jack Carr]

going to be different. That was one part of your life. Now it's time to turn that page, start a new chapter.

[Tyrus]

I really don't.

[Jack Carr]

We just kind of just go, yeah, perfect.

[Tyrus]

But just because of. I feel like people already know who you are anyways. But it's an honor to have you here. First of all, thank you for your service. Oh and former Navy SEAL sniper. I want to get into how that even number one New York Times bestseller. We got a couple of those in this room today.

[Jack Carr]

There we go.

[Tyrus]

Right. Did you ever see yourself being a New York Times bestselling author?

[Jack Carr]

I did. I did because I grew up reading all these books and at the top of all of them it said number one New York Times best selling author. Author of and so I grew up reading Tom Clancy and Nelson DeMille and A.J. cornell and J.C. pollock, Mark Golden, Tom Clancy, Louis Lamore, all these guys.

[Tyrus]

So you're a scholars.

[Jack Carr]

I don't know if someone would say those books are scholarly but it's certainly more like pop culture type.

[Tyrus]

Well, I think contemporary fiction knowledge is power and the fact that you're. You were edited from a young age. I still read books. It's something that I feel is like lost. Not everyone wants to watch the movie. I'd rather read the book.

[Jack Carr]

There you go.

[Tyrus]

I think there's more you. You're a deeper person when you the nuances of a book. You can't really. Yeah, I love movies. Don't get me wrong.

[Jack Carr]

Me too.

[Tyrus]

I don't watch movies for information.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, yeah. I mean it's influence of popular culture. But it's interesting that you say that as far as reading goes because when you put yourself into someone else's shoes which you do when you read fiction.

[Tyrus]

Yes.

[Jack Carr]

You really develop this compassion and empathy that's harder to develop in other ways. But when you spend 500 pages seeing the world through someone else's eyes, it does that. And what's interesting, when I think about my kids and I think about them scrolling on social media or looking at comments. Comments section of social media develops the opposite Attribute.

[Tyrus]

It's like an opposite.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, it's opposite of, of empathy and compassion. Because you're not seeing the world through another person's eyes. You're being programmed to get outraged or to do it well. You're being programmed to stay on the device. That's what.

[Tyrus]

You're being influenced.

[Jack Carr]

You're being influenced. Manipulation device. It's a manipulation device. So. But fiction, like that's interesting that you said that, because I really think that that reading fiction and if we could, if I could give people any advice, which I don't usually do, but in this case it makes sense in this terms of this conversation. Your Life will be 99% better if you put that phone down and stop scrolling and pick up a book, any book, and you won't have to go too far to find one that you like. Just do that.

[Tyrus]

You know, it's. It's amazing you said that. So part of my career, I've. I had this massive social media, all these numbers, millions of followers, all this fun stuff. And when AI came in, I really had a problem with, especially Facebook and Instagrams and using the AI versions of me and a lot of other. Not just me, but anyone who was so called celeb or fame or whatever with a fan base and it was always asking for money or was catfishing people over and over again. And I would go to my wife, would contact Facebook and be like, hey, that's not true. Some of the wildest things, I think I adopted a child with autism. But in the picture, the kid on the shirt said, his shirt said autism. Who would. It's just ridiculous, right? But then I need funds to take care of it or I'm getting a divorce and my wife has all my money and I'm seeing all this stuff and I was like, if I'm not present on social media, maybe they won't have the opportunity to do it. And at the same time, my concern is I can't watch my kids all the time. It's everywhere. But if we have it as parents, as we have it, it's a little hard to dictate to them not to use it. So we just got rid of it. Just stopped making any posts other than I have. Like they put up the podcast and billboard for my concert events, but that's it. And at first a lot of people were saying, well, you're going to lose a lot of business. And this I didn't. And I also found that in doing that, the first week was a little rough with my kids. But once it settled in. And like if dad's reading a book and they gotta pick a book and then you talk about the book, you've just created a whole new dialogue. And I gotta be awesome. When my daughter is explaining to me how To Kill a Mockingbird goes through the idea, the spectrum of a 12 year old. It is awesome. And you cannot get that scrolling on a phone together. And I think a lot of parents. But it has to start from the, from.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, I think we missed our, our window. The kids are getting a little, little older now, so it's. But I wish we, if I could go back, I certainly would have kept the phones out of their hands for, for a lot longer. And for me it's, it's, it's a. Yes, it's a, it's a tool. It's for business. But it still affects me.

[Tyrus]

Yeah.

[Jack Carr]

I go on there to thank somebody for reading the book or watching the TV show or whatever it is, but I see all the craziness also. And it knows exactly what to feed me. Obviously for me it's watches and Land Cruisers and motorcycles. Like it knows exactly what to do. And I'll get on there. I'm just gonna do a quick post. Okay. I know exactly what I'm going to do. It's copied, it's pasted, it's ready. Oh, look at that watch. Oh, look at that sweet Land Cruiser. And then 20 minutes go by, I'm like, what was I on here for? Oh, they got me.

[Tyrus]

Exactly. Yeah. Six wheels, six wheel trucks.

[Jack Carr]

Oh, you, they got you fish.

[Tyrus]

Because I collect cichlids and stuff and like any old wrestler. Oh, I remember this match. And the next thing you know, and putting a stop to that, you just have to put it down. Like on my phone we have the. I think all on iPhones have it where you. I'll tell you how much social media you have. And I'm down to two hours a week. And it's literally just post for work. And actually a lot of these guys do it for me. They collaborate. So I don't have to really. All I gotta do is hit review.

[Jack Carr]

I need to do it.

[Tyrus]

But I. You go, you go through a little bit of withdrawal. Yeah, it's a weird little addiction.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, I know. Yeah, I know. It's got me too. Just like everybody else, you know, I'm not immune to it. Certainly not immune to it. And obviously it knows my preferences. It knows what's going to keep me scrolling and keep me from actually doing that post that we talked about. But for Me also, it's. I mean, it was an opportunity. Like, I looked at publishing as the same way I looked at the battlefield, meaning I looked for gaps in the enemy's defenses. And really on the battlefield, it's who adapts faster. That's the person who, because you're a

[Tyrus]

man, you could not become a Navy seal, let alone a Navy SEAL sniper without an extremely high level of discipline.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, you need the discipline for sure. But. Well, thinking about social media certainly erodes at that discipline, because it knows.

[Tyrus]

But.

[Jack Carr]

But I saw that as kind of a little bit of an opportunity, meaning I could. An author in 1975. 85, 95. Well, they had readers back then. We have a lot less readers today. Okay, so that's something I'm stepping into a, Into a private sector industry where a lot less people are doing the thing, and that's reading. Same thing with Hollywood and same thing with TV shows. And I have a whiskey less people drinking today. That's beside the point. I'm stepping into these different industries where less people are doing those things. So I thought, well, what can I do today that authors couldn't have done in 1975, 85, 95, even the early 2000s. And okay, social media is one of those things. Podcasts like this is. Is. Is one of those things. Having my own is one of those things. Having a merch line is one of those things. Having a television show, okay, you could have done that in the 70s, 80s, but now you can also engage with an audience that you couldn't have. You can say thank you to that person who reached out to. It's also more personalized. Exactly. It's much more personal. Exactly. Back then you had to find out, hey, when is this author coming to town? If you were going to figure that out, how are you going to do that? Okay, maybe you maybe saw it in the magazine. A bookstore would have it, like taped up or something like that. You could see, oh, John Grisham is coming on this day. Okay, great. How do I need a ticket? Do I just show up? So you'd have to do that and put in the, in the work. And then you could go down there, you could shake that author's hand and say, hey, thank you, I love the book. And they can look you in the eye and say, thank you. And I love doing that on book tour. But now I can do it throughout the year, too. During a time.

[Tyrus]

Because you have the outreach. Exactly. A lot of times when I've talked to a lot of men who serve, they talk about the importance of purpose from the time you leave. Because, know, a lot of our. A lot of the veterans that come out, they have. Going through a tremendous. We have homelessness, we have depression, suicides. And they said one of the biggest things is you have to find purpose.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

Now, when I'd like to get in your origin story, how you ended up joining the Navy and all that stuff, but when you were getting ready to transition to civilian life, had you already had your stuff laid out or was there a period where you kind of where like a fish out of water and kind of found your way?

[Jack Carr]

I was very lucky that I knew exactly what I wanted to do. And I knew I wanted to be a SEAL from age 7 onward. Then I knew about age 10 that I was going to write afterward, so. So I kind of knew my path.

[Tyrus]

So you had to blueprint it out.

[Jack Carr]

I had to blueprint it out. And. But. But when I. As I got closer to leaving the military, I saw a lot of people who had a hard time leaving. And I've noticed that with professional sports. We live in Park City now, so I see it with Olympic athletes out there, really, anything that's. That's where the team is of greater importance than the self. Or if it's an individual sport. And obviously you have other people as part of that team that are helping you in that individual sport. But when it comes time to do something else, after you've devoted so much of your life and your formative years to that thing, whatever it might be, there's hard to move on.

[Tyrus]

I call it a haze, because I remember when football was over, I didn't know what to do with myself from any 8am to 2pm every day. I was just kind of lost.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

And ended up watching a lot of soap operas. Oh, wow. You know what I'm saying? Not. Not great. You know, One Life to Live. I was all about Victor and stuff. But you were like. It was. Luckily for me, it was a soap opera and it wasn't like a nightclub, you know, But. But I'm just. That wasn't a good period. But there was that time of just. Okay, we gotta figure. All right. All right. We gotta figure something out here.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, no, absolutely. And so I got. Well, I had time to think about it. So I was taking guys downrange for majority of my time in uniform. But then my last couple years, I was the operations officer at Bud so. Our SEAL training facility. And there. You're not taking guys to Iraq and Afghanistan anymore. I knew I was getting out, so it Was just a different type of responsibility and type of responsibility that allowed me to do some other things and think about getting out. I knew I wanted to write. Okay, I can start writing. Because each and every second of every single day doesn't have to be focused on now being the most, the best leader and operator I possibly can be. Because I'm going to take guys downrange and the decisions I make under fire are going to affect them and their families for the rest of their lives, or it's going to have multi generational effects if something goes sideways here and it's going to affect their children, even grandchildren. So I took a lot. So everything that I did when I was taking guys downrange was focused on the job and being the best leader and operator that I could. But as I got near the end, I thought, okay, here we go. I'm about a year and a half left and I'll start writing. You know, I'm seeing all these guys have a very hard time leaving this job behind. They built a foundation, and for almost everybody, it's a very solid foundation. But they're having a hard time building upon it as they leave. They're staying stuck in. It's like wet cement. And their feet are staying stuck in this thing and they can't build on it. So I recognized that and I thought, okay, what is my mission in life? My mission in life is to going forward, is to take care of my family. We have a middle child with severe special needs who needs 247 full time care for life. So taking care of him and making sure he's all set, that's my mission. Okay? My passion. My passion is writing. How do I combine those two things and to give me purpose going forward. So when you say purpose, I think it's that combination of that mission. And everybody's gonna have a different mission in life. Everybody's gonna have a different passion. But if somehow you can figure out how to combine those two and turn that into purpose, then I think that that's what worked for me anyway. It's gonna be gonna have a different, different.

[Tyrus]

Because your pressure was life and death. There's a level of just one wrong move, one flinch can change. Like you said, a family's entire life, that's a lot of pressure all the time, you know, and then all of a sudden it's gone and it's life pressure. It's different, but it's not the same.

[Jack Carr]

Not the same.

[Tyrus]

You're not you. It's not this.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

And sometimes it's the slow, the slow blade. Which is the worst because it's that the. I need to make something happen now. Yeah. If I'm not having it happen now, then it's never going to happen. Opposed. Like you're going from sprinting to a marathon. Well, that'd be an accurate depiction.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, that would definitely be an accurate depiction. But. But also at the, at the same time it's when, when you leave that high pressure environment. A lot of guys I saw were trying to recreate those feelings that they had when they were going in, let's say, hit a target in Baghdad.

[Tyrus]

Right.

[Jack Carr]

And you're not going to have, you're not going to have that same feeling on the outside. You just have to accept that going forward that it's going to be different. Life's going to be different. That was one part of your life. Now it's time to turn that page, start a new chapter. But it's not going to be the same. And that's okay. I mean that happens. Doesn't mean just happen to people in the military. It can be any life transition. Anything. Could be a divorce, could be the death of a loved one from being

[Tyrus]

job change, TV show host and then shows canceled, anything. And now life starts over.

[Interviewer]

Yep.

[Tyrus]

And you have to figure out that not everywhere you go, everyone, oh hey, that's the guy.

[Jack Carr]

Life changes.

[Tyrus]

You got to figure it out.

[Jack Carr]

You have to adapt. You have to adapt to it. And that's what happens downrange. It's whoever adapts faster usually is going to be the one that ends up on top. But then you have to anticipate what, what is the enemy going to think you're going to do in adaptation to them and take one step beyond that. So it's that three dimensional chest that we talk about.

[Tyrus]

All right, so let's get into. Now I have the terminal list. Do you have a copy of that here?

[Jack Carr]

I do not have that one. But that terminal list is the first book and this is the. But this is the latest book. Fourth option right here came out.

[Harry]

You were awesome.

[Tyrus]

Thank you.

[Jack Carr]

There he is.

[Tyrus]

That's got to be.

[Jack Carr]

Look at that guy. Come on, call her up. Come on, call her up. Hey, call her.

[Tyrus]

You're not mess. That's business right there. I love that.

[Jack Carr]

That's it, right there. That is my first non fiction right here. Targeted Beirut. So 1983 takes you from the embassy bombing in April all the way through the barracks and headquarters bombing in October of 1983. So that's my first non fiction.

[Tyrus]

This is a Behind the scenes account of a mission and a fight that changed America. I thought I knew what happened in Beirut. But at this granular, visceral and human level, in a trademark style, Carr and Scott sharpen our understanding of the forces driving much of this drama, in effect is engrossing, making this book very hard to put down. This is. That was by Doug Standing. Number another number one New York Times bestseller, Soldiers in Harm's Way.

[Harry]

Yeah.

[Jack Carr]

So that's the nonfiction side. Another, another targeted book should come out in 2027 on Pan Am 103, which went down over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988.

[Tyrus]

And then.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, the fourth option. That's my tenth book right there. The fourth option. 1010 Crazy.

[Tyrus]

Crazy.

[Jack Carr]

That's the start of a new series, but the one most people know is the Terminal List that stars Chris Crowe's, adapted to a television show starring Chris Pratt that came out on Prime Video a couple years ago. We have Dark Wolf that came out in August. And then the second season of the Terminal List, based on my second novel, True Believer, comes out in October.

[Tyrus]

Now I'm trying to think how many I'm at. I'm at 5, but one's a children's book, another one's a graphic novel. So I'm pretty good. Yeah. But I'm working on them.

[Jack Carr]

That's awesome.

[Tyrus]

And I'm just started a new one, but.

[Harry]

Oh, nice.

[Tyrus]

When your first book was coming out, how was there a moment? Because when my first book came out, about two weeks before it was going to come out, I called the publisher and said, I changed my mind.

[Jack Carr]

Stop it.

[Tyrus]

I've given up too much. I didn't realize because you write, it's very. It can be very like. It's almost like therapy when you write. Yeah.

[Jack Carr]

Very therapeutic.

[Tyrus]

And then you, you kind of finish this work and then you have that moment. You're like, I think I put too much myself out there.

[Harry]

Oh, really?

[Tyrus]

Especially memoirs are a little, you know, and as just kind of as a man. Because you think like, oh, man, I wrote about this time I cried. I wrote this time I lost my job. You know, and you're like, oh, man. And they're like, it's too late. It's already in print. Was there? Or you just couldn't wait to get it out?

[Jack Carr]

No, I was ready. But at the same time, I just did a forward for someone else's book. It's really the story behind a friend of mine, Adam Brown, who was a seal who was. Was killed. And there's a book called Fearless about His, his life. But there's another book coming out soon, I think comes out in August about the guys that the author, Eric Blem interviewed about my friend Eric Brown, Adam Brown. And so that one was very tough to write. The forward. So I know what you're talking about because I talked about my relationship with Adam Brown and, and I'm like, oh, did I give a little too much? Was I a little too open? Because in here you can always, even though a lot of the characters have portions of you in them or life experiences, you weave in and fictionalize all that stuff, in the end you can still say it's fiction. And then a book like Targeted Beirut, like, hey, that's someone else's story right there and still emotional. But, but, but it's someone else's story. And that this one, this, it's just a forward. But in talking about Adam Brown, it is, I thought, oh, did I give too much of myself up? So I know what you're talking about. That was a long way of me

[Tyrus]

saying it's kind of like walking around naked. Yeah, yeah. In a windstorm.

[Jack Carr]

And then people can, well, people can judge fiction and nonfiction, but then a memoir, I think is a little different because, yeah, people are going to judge these things. Just like any artwork, you put it up there, especially today, everybody can comment

[Tyrus]

like it, and the 21's going to

[Jack Carr]

be like, I hate it. Exactly. No matter what.

[Tyrus]

That part didn't bother me too much because I don't really worry about it. Yeah, but you've. You've 10 books and then now you're working on a Fox Nation series.

[Jack Carr]

Yep. Came out today.

[Tyrus]

This is kind of. Congratulations.

[Jack Carr]

Thank you.

[Tyrus]

This is kind of very interesting. And I have, I have explicit instructions on here. Do not read aloud. I have intel that I cannot share. Okay, I won't share.

[Jack Carr]

All right, but so Carlos the Jackal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that came out today, three part docu series, Fox Nation. And it's really interesting because it was the first celebrity terrorist. This guy, Carlos the Jackal. Ily Ramirez Sanchez is a real name. He had two brothers, actually, and the dad was a communist lawyer in Venezuela. And they're each named for Lenin. So it is Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. Those are the names of the three brothers and Carlos the Jackal Ilyich. So it takes him really from those early days in Venezuela to London where he starts to assimilate to Western culture. And then his dad gets a little worried about that because his dad is a Marxist socialist and communist and sends him to Moscow So he goes to Moscow, where he gets a touch point with the kgb, ends up in Beirut terrorist training camps, and then back to London to put together a hiss list of prominent Jewish businessmen to assassinate. So. And then it just rolls on from there. So. But really, he's. He gave terror a face up until that point. There were. There was terrorism up until that point. Munich was 1972. Dawson Field hijackings were 1970. But this is the first time that terror has a face and a personality. And he really learns how to manipulate the media to help build this mythology that still surrounds him today.

[Tyrus]

You know, it's. It's. I always call it like. It's like the Robin Hood syndrome with media and a lot of people where a really bad character, they try to attach some sort of meaning behind what he does. And you'll see kids with a shirt of a face of a guy that they couldn't even be in the same room with him because he would have no. No use for them breathing. But there's this, and we see it often today. You know, you'll see, you know, certain groups for Palestine. And I'm just like. You realize that they would throw you off. You wouldn't even make it to the building, you know, and it's. There's this. This romanticism with these violent serial monsters. And they try to humanize them and some. And it's a weird. It's a weird. I don't know what to say. It's a psychosis of a certain. Where they try to like, romanticize these bad individuals.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, well, in that case, it was a celebrity. And he attracted. He had fame, fortune. He essentially goes from a revolutionary to a capitalist mercenary at some point, becomes very wealthy from some of the attacks that he perpetrates. And back then in the 70s into the 80s and even the early 90s, a lot of European governments didn't want to deal with terrorism. So when it came time to negotiate. And I think a lot of this goes back to Munich, 1972, and we see the outcome of that on the airfield where German authorities try to retake these helicopters that were taking the. The Israeli athletes out of there with the terrorists, and it just ends in disaster. So from then those European countries say, okay, whatever we need to do to get these terrorists to just go to another country, make it someone else's problem. So Carlos recognizes that, and through that he becomes quite wealthy. Attracts a lot of women and lives the lives the high life, but had this celebrity status around really a Persona that was sociopathic in nature and that

[Tyrus]

you're just kind of discovering him. He was kind of a shape sister, a shape shifter, and a chameleon. You said he changed identities. Yeah, he used media nicknames to his advantage. He made his own myth, bigger than the man.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah. And he could do that back then. You'd have a harder time doing it today. Yeah, I think. But back then, there was essentially a safe area, meaning he could go behind the Iron Curtain because of his time in Moscow, certain places, he could go pretty much anywhere. And he had multiple passports. Some were real, some were forged. And he could still move back and forth with ease, but then follow the Soviet Union. The whole Eastern Europe shifts. And now what does he do? Well, he has to go on the run. Essentially ends up in Sudan with Osama bin Laden at the same time. And we have a CIA operative named Billy Waugh who tracks him down in Sudan. And the story is that in the final episode of the docu series about how he is repatriated to France to stand trial, and he's still there in prison today.

[Tyrus]

Now, you. You targeted terrorists in. In the SEAL teams, and now you're investigating one of the most infamous terrorists in history. What made Carlos the Jackal the right target, so to speak, for you?

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, it was because of what we learned from him. So he's always learning. Our enemy is always learning from us. We should be learning from the enemy. We should be taking those lessons of the past and applying them forward, going forward as wisdom. We're not very good at doing that in this country. But certainly the enemy is learning from us. And Carlos Learned from Munich, 1972. He learned from the Dawson Field hijackings that I talked about. He learned from some of his failures in the lead up to this operation that he runs in 1975 in Vienna, Austria, where he's tasked by Gaddafi to assassinate, really, the OPEC minister from Iran and Saudi Arabia. And that's really where he comes to into his own on the world stage. But other people are watching Carlos at the same time, and they're watching how he manipulates the media, and they're watching his celebrity, and they're seeing how you can use the media in conjunction with a terrorist attack to create this spectacular event to get the end result that you want. So let's take it Back to Beirut, 1983. So 241 U.S. servicemen are killed in that attack in October of 1983. There's a lot of tough talk out of the administration at the time, but we leave pretty quietly in 1984. So what does that teach our enemy. Oh, that terrorism works. And then we have Achille Laurel, we have TWA 847, we have Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. And December of 1988, we have a series of terrorist attacks from that point all the way up to September 11th. Where really that, what is, I hate using this term, but it's, it's, it's kind of how I, I, I think of it. There was an acceptable level of violence where you didn't have much of a reaction from the United States.

[Tyrus]

That's accurate. It's almost like this, there was this line.

[Jack Carr]

Well exactly.

[Tyrus]

You know, in a lot of one life is too many and then it seems to be there's a number.

[Jack Carr]

Yep. And September 11th crosses that line. And then of course we go into Iraq and Afghanistan and then mismanage that for, for 20 years. But when Carlos's case here, he's learning also. So he's learning, he's taking these lessons, applying them to, to the, his current problem set makes him very wealthy, like I mentioned. And then of course the, the women and the money end up being his downfall. In, in Sudan, when he's asking usually bodyguards. Yeah, you know what? And not just when it comes to terrorism.

[Tyrus]

No, no, across the board.

[Jack Carr]

Across the board.

[Tyrus]

That's usually, it is now the OPEC hostage crisis. Yeah, yeah, that feels like, like that was probably, I always think of like 24 hour news. The O.J. simpson chase kind of changed news forever. The OPEC. I feel like it was the first example of terrorism on a, on global television.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, I mean we had it, we had some things that happened earlier to that, but, but this one was a successful attempt. So we had Munich 1972. I mean a horrible success for the terrorists for Black September, but there hadn't been really a negotiated outcome. They've done smaller ones, but nothing on this global scale. And then now we see, okay, OPEC Vienna, Austria, we have all these, the oil is big, huge in the news, oil embargoes, prices, all of these things. Gaddafi wants to keep those prices artificially high. And some of the OPEC states are, are negotiating to lower those prices essentially. And so now Carlos goes in very short notice, has a group of terrorists, they go in, they take this building, they kill people, they keep people hostage. And now the building is cordoned off by the authorities. And the authorities really just want Carlos out of there. They want to make this somebody else's problem. So he negotiates. One of his guys gets shot in an ill fated attempt to retake the building, it doesn't really work out. So now Carlos has one guy who's shot in the stomach. His life is saved in a hospital in Austria. They negotiate their way to a plane and he negotiates the return of his guy. So the authorities show up, shake Carlos's hand. There's a very famous picture of the authorities shaking his hand, turning over his guy. They get on this plane and off they go to the Middle East. So it was a negotiated outcome that ended up being very profitable for Carlos.

[Harry]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

And it's like you think about like, why wouldn't you just follow him with a rocket?

[Jack Carr]

But it's a different time. It's a different time.

[Tyrus]

Different time. Yeah. You know, and in the series, Carlos talks about killing with almost no emotion.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

And as some, as someone who studied war and violence from the inside and out, what does that tell you about his mindset?

[Jack Carr]

Tells me that really all the myth, all the romance that surrounds him, when I say that there are books, there are television shows that lean into that mythology, that revolutionary mythology type of a thing that put him on this, that puts him on this, this pedestal is a revolutionary when in reality he was just a sociopath who enjoyed killing for the fame, for the fortune, for the women. And like I said, it ends up leading to his downfall. But he was on the go for a long, long time, for decades before he was finally brought to justice.

[Tyrus]

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[Jack Carr]

So it, I think what we, the mistake that we make when we look at either a terrorist or a terrorist organization is we put our values, our traditions on them. Like we mirror image them. If this is important to me, say, life, the life of my children, that sort of thing. We think that other people across the globe would have those same kind of traditions, values, when in reality that might not be the case. Specifically when it comes to negotiating with Iran. Right here I see that we're in negotiations again as we record this podcast.

[Tyrus]

Yeah. Every time we do something, then they.

[Jack Carr]

Another negotiation, another stall tactic. But I think what we keep doing is putting our values on them. And we're trying to get through this leadership, these tiers of leadership, to get to someone who will negotiate with us that allows us to get what we wanted in the negotiations prior to hostilities, let's say in January, February, timeframe. And we haven't found that person quite yet or those people quite yet. And that's because I think we mirror image them.

[Tyrus]

I think it's a little off topic, but are there actually any real leaders in Iran at this point? Or is it just kind of like, I don't want to use certain warlords, but like there's just certain groups, generals, who have just kind of taken up a spot and they're just basically pirates now. And, you know, there's still one guy is trying to negotiate, but he has absolutely no control over anything because they can't even step outside their little wherever they're hiding without getting their heads blown off. Rightfully so. But I'm just like, you're negotiating with white gloves on, thinking a handshake still means something. And your word means something to a group of people for almost 50 years, that means nothing to them. The only thing they respect is, is the sound of a bullet.

[Jack Carr]

This is true. And I think you hit it exactly right here. Meaning there's not just gonna be, you're not just gonna get to that one person who is the quote, unquote leader, and everyone else under that person is gonna fall into line. I mean, there's opportunity for people now and there are gaps for people to fill. Not everyone under that said leader is gonna fall right in line. So you have different factions in there. You mentioned generals, military, internal security service, other politicians, terrorists now. Exactly. So. So there's, there's definitely something to that. And how do you know, and of course, that's where intelligence services come in, but really, we don't have the greatest track record of predictions in the Middle East.

[Tyrus]

Well, again, they've been doing it centuries. And although I do think this is. Has been monumental in terms of. We've actually gotten other Middle east countries to come to the table. You know, because before, it just seems like whenever America got into something, it was always America. And then when we left, it was just pure chaos.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

You know, at least now they're seeing vested interest from other countries, which you would think across the board, peace is kind of a cool thing, you know, and especially when it's one bad actor. But we see all the. All the shift. Everyone's blaming everything on Israel, which I find absolutely hilarious. Like, it's. This is happening to them in their yard. And their reactions, I think, are just. If you're, you know, October 7th, I did not see any pushback on that, but there was so much pushback. But again, it goes back into this romanticism of these individuals. And there really isn't a Carlos for Iran. There really isn't a guy that everyone's like, you know, because we. Every other. We've always made villains and, you know, the media. We had Gaddafi, we had bin Laden, we had these villains that you put. And no one can stay alive long enough in Iran to become that guy. But yet somehow their mission or their ideals have become. Have become the star.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, no, that's true. We had Zawahiri, Zarqawi. So there are all these names that do give terror a face. And that seemed to come and go. But going back to what you said about Robin Hood, there's this myth of Robin Hood that we talk about in terms of, let's say, revolutionaries or. Or terrorism or insurgents or whatever it might be. But the myth of Robin Hood that's been subverted, really, is that Robin Hood stole from the rich to give to the poor.

[Tyrus]

Right.

[Jack Carr]

That's not correct.

[Tyrus]

Not at all. There's a new movie that's basically telling the real.

[Jack Carr]

I haven't seen it.

[Tyrus]

It's dark.

[Jack Carr]

Okay.

[Tyrus]

He's dark.

[Jack Carr]

He stole not really back from the government, that. So essentially, the tax dollars that were taken by the government, he took those back to redistribute to the people. So that's how the myth has been changed. Took steel from the rich to give it to the poor. That is not it. But that's the one that most people will say talk about. Yes, when you mentioned Robin Hood, but. But Robin was basically coming back to the government, took back those that the money that was stolen by the government in the form of taxes, and then gave that back to the people who had given it. So he went back and took back what had been taken from them.

[Tyrus]

So he was like a mercenary more than he was like, you know, just robbing the guy with all the gold watches.

[Jack Carr]

Exactly. It was not that. It was not that.

[Tyrus]

So do you mind if we break down these episodes? Because I. I know I got something to watch for me in the hotel tonight. I fire this up. So nice. Episode one, the Birth of a Terrorist. You know what? You. All of your books and you have great titles. Is that something that's just. Is it something that just comes quick or do you work hard on it?

[Jack Carr]

I work hard on them. I work hard on all of them. Because it's a title's important.

[Tyrus]

Yeah, it brings you in terrace. I'm like, oh, really?

[Jack Carr]

You gotta have good titles for everything. The books, television shows, docu series, whatever it might be. Because that's a, that's a person's gateway right there. So a cover is important. A title. It is important. And I like my titles to have multiple meanings, but in this case right here. Yeah. They kick this thing off with a reenactment of that OPEC terrorist attack that we just talked about to draw you, draw you in. And then go back to the beginning, which is interesting in and of itself, just to find out what was going on in Venezuela in the 50s and the 60s, and then how this guy became the most wanted man in the world and the world's first celebrity terrorist. How did this kid from Caracas end up in that position? And, and it's interesting, during COVID the French government, so he's in prison in France and the French government gave their prisoners cell phones. So humanitarian type reasons. And so an Israeli journalist calls Carlos and records all these conversations with him. So this document, you have the one. We have these conversations and so that's woven into this special right here. So it's Carlos in his own words, but then also fact check against the record because he has a very over inflated view of himself.

[Tyrus]

I would say not like a villain lies.

[Jack Carr]

It's. Yeah, exactly. He still thinks he's a good person. The way, I mean, he talks about killing people and saying they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. And I had to kill these people. Wish I could have. And I could have. I should have killed more. It was very interesting.

[Tyrus]

That's a, that's. And then you go right into the prime Time, terror, I mean.

[Jack Carr]

Oh, yeah. So he's really learning in those first years. Learning in Moscow, learning in Lebanon, learning in Jordan, and then learn learnings from his first assassination attempts in London. A couple of them don't go quite the way he wanted them to. He tries to shoot down an airliner outside of France with an rpg. It misses, but that plane was full of people. And he goes back a few days later because security was a little different back then, and walks in with some other terrorists and they have great. They have AKs and they take hostages. And so. So he's learning and he gets away with it. He gets away. He gets his plane out of there.

[Tyrus]

Insanity.

[Jack Carr]

So he starts. It was. Yeah, security was a lot different back in the. In the 70s and 80s. So he's learning through all those. Then OPEC, of course, is his. Is his. Is his big, big attack. That really puts him. Cements him on the world stage. And as the French authorities are looking for him, he'd gotten a nickname in. In the Middle east, and that was Carlos. And they say, okay, Carlos, he's from Venezuela. You're now Carlos. And so they find a copy of Frederick Forsyth's the Day of the Jackal, which is a very popular thriller of the day and movie of the day. And so they find this in the apartment, one of the safe houses of one of the women that he's shacking up with where they're looking for him. And they find weapons and they find documents, and they find the Day of the Jackal. So the media dubs him Carlos the Jackal, and that's on the COVID of every magazine and newspaper around the world.

[Tyrus]

You know, sometimes I feel like the media needs to take more responsibility and giving a guy a clever nickname, it's also inspirational.

[Jack Carr]

Fed right in. Yep. Fed right into the myth. Fed right into them.

[Tyrus]

And also fills in for a lot of young bad doers who are like, I, they. I always. I always hate. Whenever we catch a serial killer or someone who's killed somebody and we put their name on the picture on tv, it's like you're making them a martyr. But you're also inspiring the wrong kind of people.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

And I don't know why that. I guess at some point you have to. When it comes to news, I think ratings should be secondary to truth and responsibility. But again, I'm in the minority in that one.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Tyrus]

Because that does create. To the point where it, like, makes him. If you just stuck to what the facts was. I don't think anyone really get behind Him?

[Jack Carr]

Yeah. He throws a. Drops a grenade in a crowded department store because it's owned by a Jewish guy, and this is in the 70s in London, drops a grenade and it blows off a kid's arm. Kills two people in that one. I believe so. But once again, he has no remorse for doing that. Specifically targeting civilians. And now he's getting put on this pedestal. That's his action. Yet now he's Carlos the Jackal. No one can find him. The intelligence services are stumped.

[Tyrus]

He's like evil James Bond.

[Jack Carr]

Sounds like a Bond villain. Exactly. Like a Bond villain of. Of the day. So. So yeah, the media def. He learned how to manipulate the media, no doubt about it. But it served the media's ends as well. Putting Carlos the Jackal on the front of a paper back then.

[Tyrus]

Oh, everyone's buying it. Everyone's reading it.

[Jack Carr]

Exactly.

[Tyrus]

You know, and then you. And then you. Episode three, Terror, Inc. Oh, yeah, that's

[Jack Carr]

what he really comes into his own and. And becomes more of a mercenary, a capitalist mercenary rather than some Marxist socialist revolutionary, because now he's making money and now he has all the women, he has all the drinks, and he's just living. Living large. But he also falls in love and. And his. How does a second fall in love? That's amazing. So, yeah, Magdalena Cope becomes they. They get married and then she gets arrested and he goes on the war path, bombing trains, saying that he's going to blow up a nuclear reactor in France if she's not released. And he goes on this wave of terror and lo and behold, gets her released.

[Tyrus]

Yeah, a giant temper tantrum.

[Jack Carr]

So he was. Yeah, he was very, I mean, successful for the most part when it comes to serving himself, serving his own fame, his own fortune, and unfortunately, a lot of innocent people were killed because of it.

[Tyrus]

How much did you enjoy this project?

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, this one was. I. I'd grown up seeing some of those headlines and I remember when. When Carlos was captured and there's a Special Forces legend named Billy Waugh who read his book, it's called Hunting the Jackal. And so there was all this mythology about it and about him, about Billy Waugh being in Khartoum, Sudan, and tracking both Osama bin Laden and Carlos the Jackal. So I got to talk to people who knew him. Rick Prado is one of them. Fred Burton is another guy who had touch points with this investigation. And so being able to talk to these experts, I'm always learning. I approach everything from the position of a student. So as a student of warfare in the SEAL teams. I am a student of what I'm doing now as a writer publishing Hollywood. I approach everything from that. That aspect. So same thing with this. This is my first time doing a docu series or a documentary of any sort, so I got to learn about that process, but then also learn a little bit more about this person who I had grown up reading those same headlines and knowing a little bit of the backstory. But now I got to go deep and. And learn a little bit more about him and put it out in a way that is very approachable for people and really engaging.

[Tyrus]

Is. Is this something that we can look forward to seeing more docuseries series from you?

[Jack Carr]

Because this we shall see. We shall see. I don't know.

[Tyrus]

I don't know.

[Jack Carr]

Maybe. It depends on how it does.

[Tyrus]

There's a lot of bad guys out there.

[Jack Carr]

There are a lot of bad guys out there.

[Tyrus]

And historic, historically wise, I think it would be.

[Jack Carr]

Learning from the past is something I try to be thoughtful in. All I do that's not try to bring to social media or any blog post or interview or my podcast, whatever it is, I at least try to be thoughtful. That's what I think that I owe the. What whatever audience I may have is that I can. That's what I at least aspire to, is to be. To be thoughtful. That's what I owe. That people are spending time with me that they're never going to get back. I want to be thoughtful and I want to improve with everything that I do. So the next docu series, if there is one, will have to be better than this one.

[Tyrus]

Robin Hood.

[Jack Carr]

There we go. Hey, B. Maybe I have to explain the myth. I have to actually break it down, explain the myth.

[Tyrus]

And I would definitely check that out again. Jack Carr investigates Carlos the Jackal. Streaming now on Fox Nation. Finish this episode first, then hop over and check it out. I will just. I will 1000% be checking this out. And of course, get your books wherever books are sold.

[Jack Carr]

Thank you.

[Tyrus]

And you got your podcast. And are you cool with Harry, who for some reason bears a striking resemblance to this.

[Jack Carr]

I think maybe this is he dressed like that today. Look at that beard.

[Tyrus]

Yeah, he's kind of.

[Jack Carr]

I know. He's going for it.

[Tyrus]

I think you have a fan.

[Jack Carr]

He's going for it. I like it. I like it.

[Tyrus]

He's part of my B team, usually let him come in and ask a couple questions.

[Jack Carr]

Oh, yeah, let's do it. Absolutely.

[Interviewer]

Thank you for doing this. I appreciate it.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, fantastic.

[Interviewer]

Sometimes Tyrus will have me Come in, you know, ask the guest a few questions.

[Jack Carr]

I like it.

[Interviewer]

He always wants, you know, like the younger generation to come in and try and try and spread the. Spread the word. All right, so he might have Ryan come down.

[Jack Carr]

All right.

[Tyrus]

I have a beard.

[Interviewer]

Tyrus has a beard. You have a beard. Ryan doesn't have one.

[Jack Carr]

Well, then maybe not.

[Interviewer]

And he can't really grow. Like, I don't think he's ever shaved. Like, I don't think he's ever actually shaved his face.

[Jack Carr]

Then maybe he can't come in.

[Interviewer]

Yeah, I think I asked him.

[Jack Carr]

He was like, just kidding.

[Interviewer]

Every three weeks, I think was hilarious. Which is staggering.

[Harry]

Yeah, yeah.

[Interviewer]

But one thing that I heard you say when you and Tyrus were talking was you said that from a young age you knew that you wanted to be an author.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah.

[Interviewer]

And knew that you wanted to be a seal.

[Jack Carr]

Yep.

[Interviewer]

That's usually like, that's like not the case for most people, would you say? Right. What are some of the differences that you've noticed with people who have maybe later in life wanted to become a SEAL between those who always knew.

[Jack Carr]

Yeah. You know, there's really no difference in the outcome. There's some guys that found out what seals were in boot camp, and I don't know how they didn't know. I'm taking this back to 96, 97, 98 timeframe right now. So there wasn't an Internet the way we know it today. There wasn't social media, obviously, those sorts of things weren't as many movies and books. There were still a lot out there. But for me, I mean, like I said, I've always been a student, so I was very aware of these things. A lot of the books that I was reading had protagonists with backgrounds I wanted in real life one day. So let's say someone who was and typically was a Vietnam era veteran. So like a, let's say someone who's Army, Special Forces In Vietnam, Navy Seal, Marine Sniper, CIA, paramilitary, and now in the 80s, they're in a book and they're a police officer, but they still have that skill set from Vietnam and special operations that they can now bring to this problem, set in whatever book that is or even TV shows and movies. Very, very similar. I mean, Magnum, Vietnam veteran, seal, Crockett, Mamy Vice, Vietnam veteran, Airwolf. You had Simon, and Simon, you had all these different shows, Fall Guy, you had these shows with these protagonists that had these, these backgrounds. So I was very aware of all that stuff growing up. But some people find out about in Boot camp. Some people find out about it when they're a little older, they're in high school or whatever. And now of course, people find out about it through social media, through movies, through books, through, through whatever it is, but the outcome, not really different. And I'm sure we could, there's. And maybe they've studied it, probably have, but there's really no way to prepare for buds. There's no really way. I mean, now you can try and you can be in the best shape, but I think any average high school athlete can make it through the program. But what is really the differentiator is that cold and is being on the verge of hypothermia for a week in hell week, and being there Sunday night and thinking, oh wow, I have to do this till Friday. There's no way I can do another night of this. I'm going to quit now. And we make it very easy to self select out of the program by putting a, a bell in a trailer hitch of a truck that you see the entire time that you're in buds. Sorry, that you're in hell week. And so you just have to go ring that bell and you're out. You have coffee, you have hot chocolate, you have donuts, and. And off you go to do whatever it is. This just wasn't your sport type of, type of a thing. So there really was no difference. When I saw people that found out about it the day before or the person who wanted to do it since they were seven like me, and everything in between. Same thing with how fast somebody is, how strong somebody is, how big someone is, how loud someone is. As far as like motivation and all the rest of it. That cold's the differentiator. And when you have your arms linked in the surf zone, they call it surf conditioning. Now we call it surf torture. But surf conditioning was somehow more politically correct. I think it changed at some point along the way. Then people are getting up and quitting in droves. And I was like always like, hey, this is the program working. 80% of these people are not supposed to be here and they're quitting right now. So it's, it finds out if you want to be there or not really quick.

[Interviewer]

Have you noticed like a similar thread of, you know, becoming an author? Like, is there, you know, have you talked to people who've been like, oh, maybe I want to write a book and, and they kind of just like fell out of love with it or, you know, didn't stick to it?

[Jack Carr]

Yes. And it's hard to A lot of people come up and say they want to write a book now. And so there are a lot of people out there that want to write them, and they ask for advice. And I say, you just got to sit down and do it. So don't think about websites, don't think about social media, don't think about publishers or agents. Like, write the book first. Make it as good as you can possibly make it. Then start thinking about those other things. But it takes so long to write one of these things two books ago. So Cry Havoc is espionage thriller dropped into the heart of Saigon, 1968. It's the dad of my protagonist. His name's Tom Reese. My main protagonist is James Reese. But that took a ton of time to research because every character could only have a life experience up until 1968 to bring to a problem set or bring to a conversation or bring to a thought about something. When you're doing contemporary research for the fourth option that you have there, or a terminalist series that's contemporary, then those ones doing contemporary research just happens a lot faster. You don't have to go back and like, okay, I need a street in Saigon, 1968. Okay, I gotta find that photo. I gotta confirm that it is 1960. Then I have to zoom in and try to describe a black and white photo or whatever it might be. What kind of car is that? Okay, I gotta figure that out. And that just takes a long time. It takes a long time of uninterrupted writing time for me anyway. And now there are so many more distractions out there than there were for an author in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, early 2000s. Now there are constant distractions coming at you all the time. And I'm worried for this next generation of authors or anybody really, because they're scrolling. And that really is. That's a different type of a thing than deep thought spent in the pages of a book. And being able to devote that time to the pages of a book, that's a lot tougher than scrolling. But it is also a lot more beneficial to you as a person and I think, to society at large if you spend time in the pages of the book rather than scrolling. So it was a very long way of me saying that a lot of people come up and say they want to write books, and my advice is, yes, sit down and do it. Just got to do the work.

[Interviewer]

When you, like, think about a concept for a book, are you thinking, like, what's missing out there? Or are you thinking, you know, what's A book that I would want to

[Jack Carr]

read and like more what I would want to read. But don't frame it like that. It's, it's, it's all about the story for me. I never think about is this going to alienate some portion of a readership or audience or is this, is this pulled from the headlines or anything like that, or do people like short chapters or long chapters? I don't think about any of those sorts of things. I don't think about any previous review. Don't think about anything other than the story. Because I know that if I put my heart and soul into every single word, then I'm doing my job and I am doing it for people who are trusting me with time they're never going to get back. And that's something that I take very seriously. So whether someone likes it or not, I can write to the audience. I write to the story. And if I do that, then I'm honoring those people who are spending that time with me. Because all my heart and soul is to going on into the story. Not like, oh, this person said this about the last book or oh, I wonder if I'm going to, going to alienate the Fox audience or this audience. Nope. I never spend, I spend zero bandwidth, zero time thinking about any of that. And all I think about is writing the best story that I can.

[Interviewer]

And you mentioned guys after service kind of trying to compare everyday life to those high adrenaline moments. And that happens a lot with fighters, specifically like, with like MMA fighters. Boxers is like the feeling of walking out there and competing is like they, they can't really find any other area of life to, to match that. What, like, advice would you give to someone who's maybe dealing with that, you know, withdrawal? It's almost like an addiction in some, some ways.

[Jack Carr]

I'd say at some point you're gonna have to get there and realize that you're not going to replicate that in the outside world. Just like that was a period in your life and now it's time to build on that. So that's for anybody. It's not just professional sports or MMA or Olympic athletes or whatever else. Whatever you've done to your life up until that point, successes and failures, that's part of your foundation. So build on it. Don't stay mirrored in it. And so that's what I would say. The sooner that you come to the realization that you're probably not going to feel like you're walking into that octagon to the, to the music and all the other Things, you're probably not going to feel that in the outside world, but find that other passion. Like, what is that other thing? Like, you've done. You've. You've closed the chapter on this book. You can, yeah, you can still teach, you can still do commentary. You can still have a foot in that world if that remains your passion. But find that next thing that's still different than being in the cage. That's still different to be in the octagon, being in the ring, whatever it might be, being on the mat, whatever. But what is that other thing you want to do in life? And. And you just got to. Got to find that thing and listen to the calling. Meaning, I listened to that calling very early to serve and then to write. So I listened to it. I think a lot of times today people don't listen to that calling, or it's military. It's like, oh, maybe parents say something that discourages you because they don't want the kid to go to the military or something like that. But if you listen to that calling, I think you'll be served well later in life because you won't look back and you don't have to succeed at it. Meaning, at least, you know, when you're 80 years old, you're not looking back and saying, man, when I was 16 and I was 18, I felt this calling to do X, Y or Z. And, man, I really should have done it because then I'd know. And now you're 80, 90, whatever it is, and looking back, hey, even if you didn't succeed, at least, you know, like, hey, I gave it a shot, didn't work out for me, so I did these other things. But at least, you know, at least you're not wondering if you could have done it or not. So I'm saying, listen to that calling. It's very similar to that sixth sense. I mean, it's a real thing. We're all here because we have ancestors that were good at hunting, good at fighting. And then a lot of those lessons learned were passed on through story so those lessons wouldn't have to be relearned in blood. But that sixth sense has kept a lot of us alive. And a lot of those hunters, a lot of those fighters that are all of our ancestors, that kept them alive. And so there's that still. We still have that sixth sense today. And it's not just about survival. It's also that calling. It's whatever that's called the service or call to write, call to act, call to do, whatever that Thing is to be a journalist. Whatever it is, they'll listen to it. Listen to it, I would say that'd be my advice.

[Interviewer]

Awesome. Well, Jack, thank you so much. Thank you for your service.

[Jack Carr]

Thanks so much for having me.

[Interviewer]

Yeah. I'm going to bring Ryan in here. I think he just ran out for some Just for Men at cvs. Because you knew that you were going to be here, so. So here he is.

[Jack Carr]

Awesome. Hey, thanks, man. I appreciate it. Yeah, Such a pleasure. Boy, I feel like I should get up. There it is.

[Harry]

You sit.

[Jack Carr]

How are you?

[Harry]

Yeah, I don't need Jess for Men. Rico Suave over here. I wanted to sit with you for a couple minutes and just ask you a couple questions. I know Harry just probably bored you to death with his questions, but appreciate your service. I know that you write a lot of books and you give your side of your service. Do you think that with books and how, even with movies, that there's a misconception of what Navy SEALs are actually like? We see how it's portrayed in movies, and everyone's like, oh, wow, they're so badass. I want to be a Navy seal. Do you think there's a misconception in the general public?

[Jack Carr]

No, no, that's how it is. We're pretty badass. No, I'm just kidding. You definitely are badass. I'm just kidding. You know, I'm sure, yeah, some things will be. But even if something is portrayed as accurately as it can be, whether that's a documentary or that's a feature film, a television show, whatever it. Whatever it might be, popular culture wise, I mean, you never really can portray it as accurately as it's going to be. When you're in the shoes, things can get close. I mean, in popular culture. I remember 13 hours, I was like, oh, wow, great movie. Yeah. Mean, that one for. I don't know why that one rings so true. Maybe it's just. To me or whatever, I knew both of them, the seals that were killed that day, so that one rang true to me. Maybe it's because I know those. Those guys, Glenn Doherty and. And Ty woods and. But. But that one stood out. The other ones, Lone Survivor. Yeah, the.

[Tyrus]

The.

[Jack Carr]

The. The firefight, like the. The sound in that one stood out to me. I only saw it once, saw it in the theater. And I remember when they're in that firefight, they captured the sound of a real firefight. It's very confusing. It's very hard to tell where bullets are coming from, especially in. They weren't in an urban environment there. But in an urban environment in particular, when things. Sounds bouncing off buildings and things like that, it's very difficult to tell exactly where bullets are coming from. So, yeah, there's probably misconceptions out there for sure.

[Harry]

For sure. And you see a lot of these movies like American Sniper, you look at these Navy SEALs when they come home and they try to adjust. This is a pretty deep question, but what was one of the toughest challenges for you going from being in that environment to now having your second life as an author? What was one of the biggest challenges for you?

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, well, first one, American Sniper, I only saw that once also in the theater. And whoever did the costumes and the set design for that, like, that's what Ramadi looked like in 2005, 2006. Like that. They did a really good job. That's how I remember it looking anyway. So they did a really good job. And then when they show Chris Kyle coming home and show that he's looking actually in the blank tv, remember that scene? That one stands out? That one stands out and he's hearing it back. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, that one stood out to me. But for me, I was pretty good at flipping the stuff switch when I came home. I thought that was necessary because if you're at that same level of hyper awareness that you are on a mission, if you bring that home, I recognize that, hey, you're just going to burn yourself out. There's not a need, like a mortar is probably not going to land on the top of my house in Virginia beach or Coronado, California, but in, let's say, Baghdad or wherever else. Like, you could just be sleeping and a mortar could land on your head, on your little hooch where you're sleeping, like. And that's just when you're supposed to be resting. But your mind knows that you're. That this could happen.

[Harry]

Yeah.

[Jack Carr]

So you never truly rest downrange. You're always kind of on this edge, if that makes sense. But I was really good when I got home of being able to flip that switch one time I did in 2006, because we were going so hard first in Ramadi, in Mosul, and then Baghdad. And we were going so hard during that time frame that I came home and I went to be back there like, hey, this is the time. This is the time to be there. And I got home and I think I was just had a hard time for a day or two. And my wife was like, hey, what's wrong with you?

[Tyrus]

Snap out of it.

[Jack Carr]

I was like, oh, yeah, I can't change that. I'm home right now, so I'm going to be home for a little bit. Then I'm going to go on deployment again. And that's just how it. That's just how it goes. But when I got out and moved on, I was ready. I had done 20 years, and I would not be going back to ever lead guys tactically on the battlefield. I'd worked my way out of those jobs, and if I stayed in for another 10 years, yeah, I could come back as an executive officer and a. And a commanding officer at some point with staff jobs in between. But at those levels, you're not going out with the guys kicking indoors doing that tactical level job anymore. You're at the operational level right here. So there's tactical, operational, strategic. And you're now essentially a manager at this point. You're allocating assets, and, yes, you're a leader, but you're not out there, like, leading the charge from the horse in the front with your saber out type of a thing. Thing. Those days are past. So for me, I knew what I was good at, and I am not good at the administrative side of things. So I knew I'm not good at the garrison side of things. I am much better at the tax.

[Harry]

And it's good to see that you're doing well and you're being successful in other ways. My last question to you is, there's a rise of patriotism, I'm hoping, in the country, especially young, young people.

[Jack Carr]

Okay, good.

[Harry]

Do you think, or what kind of advice could you give to someone that are kind of looking to get involved? Want to be a Navy seal? Is there any one piece of concrete advice that you can give to someone that's listening to this right now and says, you know what? Jack Car is on. I want to be like him. I want to be a Navy seal. What advice could you give to that person?

[Jack Carr]

Yeah, you know, it's. It's. Well, you have to sign up and you have to test yourself, and you're just not going to know until you do it. So that is the biggest thing. There's. There's not the one thing like, hey, be really good at running. Be really good at running in sand. Be really good at CrossFit, because you're going to be going through this obstacle course. Hey, get good at swimming. Yes. Be comfortable in the water. Those sorts of things. But those are all obvious. Like, you want to be comfortable in the water. Okay. If you're not, you'll either get there or you won't in second phase of buds and then you're going to find out really quickly in first phase if you have that, that resiliency that, that, that mental physical courage that we're looking for in, in first phase and then third phase we're going to see if you're safe with demo and, and with weapons. So it's all the basics, basic underwater demolition, seal training. So all the basics right there foundation upon which to which to build. So for me, if you have anybody that's that wants to to do that, it's yeah, you have to just sign up and do it otherwise you're going to be looking back just do it wondering.

[Harry]

That's great. Well Jack, appreciate you sitting with me and Harry and Tyrus and thank you for your service and continue to do what you've been doing well.

[Jack Carr]

Hey man, thanks so much.

[Harry]

Appreciate it. Thank you.

[Jack Carr]

Have a good one. Thanks so much.