← The Shawn Ryan Show
The Shawn Ryan Show
#162 Leif Babin - What Leadership Looks Like in the World’s Deadliest Warzones
05:31:51
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- [00:01]
Leif Babin
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- [00:28]
Sean Ryan
Leif Babin, welcome to the show, man.
- [00:30]
Leif Babin
Thanks for having me, Sean.
- [00:31]
Sean Ryan
It's an honor to have you here.
- [00:33]
Leif Babin
It's all really.
- [00:34]
Sean Ryan
And man, we've got history together. We went through BUDS together. I'm sure we'll get into some of that. But man, I just, I've been following you for a long time, man, and what you're doing and you're just putting out amazing stuff, and I think you're a great example for, for veterans and SEALs coming out of the teams and anybody coming out of the military. You know, we both know it's a big struggle for a lot of people and to have, you know, good examples to follow and good leaders like yourself, it's just, it's really cool, man, what you've accomplished and what you've done after the teams, and I just, I want to commend you for that.
- [01:22]
Leif Babin
Thank you, Sean. That means a ton to me. That means so much coming from you, and I'm so proud of you and your success and the powerful voice that you have been for so many great stories and how you've represented as a teammate, how you represent the SEAL teams, how you represent the veteran community. And it's great to reconnect with you. It's been way too long. And man, I was thinking about all the history that we had through our time together in buds, and what a great time that was. Like, what an incredible time and our class and what people went on to do and the combat that you saw and so many others saw and were a part of. But just can't tell you how excited I am to be here with you. And I'm proud of you and all that you're doing and honored to call you a friend.
- [02:10]
Sean Ryan
Thank you, brother. Feelings are definitely mutual. And like I said, I've been looking forward to this for a long time, so. But everybody starts off with an introduction here, so let me get to yours. Leif Babin, former U.S. navy SEAL officer. Served 13 years in the Navy, nine of which were in the SEAL teams. Several deployments to Iraq with the infamous Task Unit Bruiser. You are the co author of the New York Times bestseller Extreme ownership. The number one New York Times bestseller, Extreme Ownership, How U.S. navy Seals Led and Win, and the number one national bestseller bestseller, the Dichotomy of Leadership with Jocko. You are the co founder of Echelon Front and currently serving as president. You're the recipient of the Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and a Purple Heart. You are a husband, a father to three kids, and a Christian man. Am I missing anything? I'm sure I'm missing quite a bit.
- [03:14]
Leif Babin
But no, that's it, man. I think being a husband, father, and a Christian, I think are the most important aspects of that entire bio there. I think those are the most important jobs I've had. And I was lucky enough to serve with some incredible people like yourself going through training and then on the battlefield. And I'm just honored to be able to share some of those lessons learned with, with others around the world and to see people that can take and apply some of the leadership lessons that we learn on the battlefield in their lives. I'm humbling and mystified about just how far and wide that has spread and the impact it's had, and it's incredible to me to see that. And that's kind of what keeps us going. That's our mission of why. And I get to honor the teammates that I lost and talk about their legacies and. And all that they did and how they lived.
- [04:06]
Sean Ryan
We have a lot to dive into. We have a lot to dive into. And so in the interview, I want to. That's what I want to do. I want to cover your life story, your time in the teams. I mean, I've heard. I wasn't there, but I've heard a lot, a lot of amazing things about Task Unit Bruiser. I had several friends that we went through buds with that wound up serving with you and under you and, you know, you know, once again, I just. You hear a lot of shit about a lot of people, you know, on the teams and especially officers, and man, I've just. You always come, like, highly recommended and your guys just. You guys fucking love you, man. And it's. It's really cool to see that. You don't see that in a lot of platoons, I don't think. Not like what I hear about yours. And so I can't wait to dive into that.
- [05:06]
Leif Babin
But that's the highest compliment you could ever pay me, man. And I love those guys. I'd do anything for them. And it's just the honor of my lifetime was to serve with some awesome, awesome teammates.
- [05:22]
Sean Ryan
So we have a Patreon. And Patreon is our. They are. It's our subscription network, and they are our top supporters. A lot of them have been with us since the beginning, and one of the things.
- [05:33]
Leif Babin
I'm proud to be a member.
- [05:35]
Sean Ryan
Yeah. Thank you for being a member, though. They will be ecstatic to know that you're in there. But so, you know, we. I offer them the opportunity to ask each guest a question, and usually I only pick one, but for you, there were a lot of good questions. And so I think we're gonna. We might do three here. First question is from Charlton Clark. What are three words that encapsulate a powerful leader and why?
- [06:09]
Leif Babin
Three words that encapsulate a powerful leader and why? I think the three most powerful words are it's my fault. It's my fault. And I think, as a leader, recognizing that you are responsible for everything that your team does or doesn't do, just as a dad or a spouse, you're responsible for everything that your family does. And I think that understanding this concept that we call extreme ownership, man, our ego is such a powerful driver in the world, and it wants us to point fingers or cast blame or make excuses or say, hey, look at that guy over there. He's more successful than me. Well, he got lucky, or he got this break, or he started with some advantage that I didn't have instead of actually. And when you do that, what you do is you don't actually take action to correct the problem, to actually implement solutions to fix that going forward. And so I think when you accept ownership for every single thing that happens in your world, every single thing that impacts your mission, then you could actually take action to solve problems, constantly learn, constantly grow, constantly improve. And I think that makes all the difference, man.
- [07:27]
Sean Ryan
That's great advice. Thank you, Stephen. Casey, what is the most significant leadership principle you have seen that is essential but has problems transitioning or translating from the military to civilian situations?
- [07:43]
Leif Babin
That's a great question. I think initially I thought that this concept that we call cover and move, which is teamwork, we're working together as a team, you and I are trying to move across the street under fire. You're laying down suppressive fire so I can move, and then when I get across the street, I lay down suppressive fire so that, you know, so that you can move. Like, we're covering and moving. We're leapfrogging. We're mutually supporting one another. When Jocko and I first launched Echelon Front, our leadership consulting company, we went in to talk to corporate business. And we thought, man, should we even talk about this concept? How does that even apply? And we're talking, this is a gun fighting tactic from the battlefield. And the moment that the senior executive team is telling us how the sales team and the production team are like, they're not on the same page and they're blaming each other and they're pointing fingers at each other. The marketing team is saying, well, the sales isn't selling that. And the sales team is saying, well, marketing is not actually setting us up for success. You got a bunch of finger pointing, a bunch of blame casting. And we said, okay, let's talk about this concept of COVID move. And they said, hey, that's exactly what I need you to teach to my team. And so it's really just the recognition that it's not about you, it's about the overall team and the overall mission. And that applies to your family. I mean, when you see your wife or your spouse, it's like struggling or frustrated with the kids or something that's going on on the home front. And you can say, hey, okay, those school applications are taking a long time and you got a bunch of stuff on your plate. Why don't you let me just take that off your plate? I'll take that, I'll run with it. That's cover move in action. You can actually, you're working together as a team, mutually supporting one another in order to accomplish a mission and win. And I think initially we weren't sure how that would apply in the civilian world, and it absolutely does. I think one that's harder to apply is what we call our fourth law of combat. And that's decentral command. Decentralized command is a, you know, obviously something you're familiar with being in the military. It just simply means that everybody leads. And I think a lot of times when you talk to, you know, a leader that wants to control everything, they want to do everything, obviously that doesn't work on the battlefield. And that's one of the strength of the SEAL teams and special operations units. You've got thinking shooters. I mean, Even going through buds together when you were 18 years old, you're a smart, capable, talented individual that just because I'm the officer and I'm in charge, I need you to be able to step up and make calls. I need you to be able to solve problems. I need you to be able to move the team forward in a positive direction. I can't make all the calls. I can't. If you're just sitting and Waiting for me to tell you what to do. That doesn't work. So that's a concept that's hard to get across in the civilian world. People say, well, I don't trust my team, or they don't have a strong relationship. So we help them work to build those relationships. It's all based on the strength of relationships. It's built on trust when people understand not just what to do, but why they're doing it. What we call commander's intent, the military, the purpose and the goal and the end state. But oftentimes now we start to see leaders when in the civilian world, they release the authority, they give people ownership, and they kind of let people run with stuff. The problem is they get too detached, they get too far away. And so it's always a balance, right? It's a dichotomy. And you're getting pulled in different directions. So you want to be detached as a leader. You want to step back. You want to let your people step up and lead and run with a plan and execute the plan, give them ownership of the plan. But you can't be so detached. You can't be so detached that you don't know what's going on. You're too attached from the challenges of problems. And then you can't actually support your team. You can't guide your team. You can't actually step in and help them if you're not even familiar with the challenges or you can't see when they're getting off track and you maybe need to hope or redirect them when you're talking.
- [11:37]
Sean Ryan
I'm just curious when this is a personal question, when you're talking about, when you're relating stuff back to, you know, to Ramadi or gun fighting scenarios, because it sounds like you guys kind of do that. How, how quick, I mean, how fast do civilian types wrap their head around what you're teaching them when you're using those analogies?
- [12:01]
Leif Babin
Pretty fast. Pretty fast. Usually. I think initially some people will think, I guess I can put it this way. The biggest excuse is that. I think the biggest excuse that any of us give ourselves, me included, is that it's harder for me than it is for other people. And so, yeah, Sean's maybe experienced some things on the battlefield. Well, how does that really apply to me? Or, hey, you've done some things in your life and you have some good lessons learned, but that doesn't really apply to me. I have a different situation. Instead of keeping an open mind, instead of saying, oh, what can I learn? From Sean, what does he experience? How can that apply to my world? What lesson can I take and apply to that? And before Jocko and I wrote the book Extreme Ownership, I'd have a lot of that. Businesses would say things like, well, how are you going to translate this to the business world? They would say that over and over again. Tell me how you're going to translate these combat leadership lessons to the business world. And I think once they read Extreme Ownership, they realized that the hardest part about combat leadership is it's not about planning, executing missions under fire. It's not about maneuvering troops with bullets flying over your head. The hardest part about a combat. The hardest part about combat leadership is getting a diverse group of people with different skill sets and different agendas and different perspectives to work together as a team to accomplish a mission. And obviously that applies to any team in any situation. It's people. It's actually getting people actually work together as a team, put their own egos, their own agendas aside and put the mission first. And I think that's what makes the SEAL teams great. Certainly the best units in the SEAL teams have that right. They put the team and the mission before anything else. And it's not about them as an individual. It's about the team they're going to sacrifice for the team, they're going to sacrifice for their brothers on that team. And so I think that when people realize that that's how these concepts translate, it's just about getting people to work together as a team to mutually support one another to accomplish a strategic goal that applies to everything everywhere.
- [14:03]
Sean Ryan
Makes a whole lot of sense. That's good to hear. That they can comprehend it that fast. That's really cool.
- [14:12]
Leif Babin
We do have people that push back. We'll come into a company. I was with a company a few weeks ago where there was half the room of several hundred leaders were female executives. And these lady executives, some of them were pretty skeptical. They told me afterward, hey, I was pretty skeptical about how this applies to me, how we were going to take these leadership concepts and apply them in our world. And they came up and said, this absolutely applies. We need more of this. And so I think once people are just willing to open their mind, they realize that every problem that you face in life is a leadership problem. Your frustrations with your spouse, your frustrations with your kids, your friction points in the community, the frustration you have with your boss or the people on your team for not doing what you want them to do, or the people outside of your immediate team that you depend on for support. These are all leadership problems. And I think once we think about those problems as leadership problems, then we can start to apply leadership to the point of fruition, as the Marine Corps would say, to get those problems solved. But you see that what might seem like a hopeless problem actually is a solvable problem.
- [15:24]
Sean Ryan
Interesting.
- [15:24]
Leif Babin
If you're my boss and you're micromanaging me and I'm feeling like Sean just need to get off my back, I'm being micromanaged and I feel like I'm in a hopeless situation. Sean doesn't trust me. What can I do about that? He just needs to back off and trust me, let me do my job. But if I realize that actually I control that situation, if I take extreme ownership of that situation and realize if what I'm feeling is micromanaging, you're asking me questions about what's going on, well, that's because you care about the situation and you don't have enough information. You need some more information. So I start to take action to push more information your way to build a better relationship with you, to talk to you about what I'm doing and why I'm doing it, to get some guidance on you, to get some guidance from you so I understand the strategic goal and that we can be aligned. And if we do that, then I can get that problem solved. All of a sudden you're like, hey Leif, you got it. Good to go. Let me know how you want to do this. And so those check ins become less frequent. And so what seems like an impossible situation actually is easily solvable. The moment I put my ego in check and the moment I actually take ownership and I start to lead up the chain of command and apply leadership to get problem solved.
- [16:34]
Sean Ryan
Wow, that's great advice. Thank you. Thank you. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. What do you want your 2025 story to be? Every January brings you 365 blank pages waiting to be filled in 2025. Maybe you're ready for a plot twist. Or maybe there's part of your story you've been wanting to revise. Life isn't about resolutions that fade by February. It's about becoming the author of your own life. Think of therapy as a partner, helping you write new chapters and create the meaningful story you deserve to live. Therapy is helpful for learning positive coping skills and how to set boundaries. It empowers you to be the best version of yourself. And it isn't just for those who've experienced major trauma. It's helpful for everyone. BetterHelp is fully online, making therapy more affordable and convenient, serving over 5 million people worldwide. Access a diverse network of more than 30,000 credentialed therapists with a wide range of specialties. Easily switch therapists at any time at no extra cost. Write your story with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com SRS to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp. H-E-L-P.com SRS did you know that studies show that 80% of resolutions fail by February? You can beat the odds with Lumen and improve your wellness. Lumen is the world's first handheld metabolic coach that helps measure your metabolism through your breath. And on the app, it will tell you if it sees your burning fat or carbs and gives you tailored guidance to help improve your nutrition, workout, sleep, and even stress management. Just breathe into your Lumen when you wake up and Lumen can tell you what's going on with your metabolism. Then Lumen gives you a personalized nutrition plan for the day based on your measurements. You can also breathe into it before and after workouts and meals so Lumen can tell you exactly what's going on in your body real time and give you tips to keep you on top of your wellness game. Take the next step to helping improve your health. Go to Lumen Me SRS to get 20% off your Lumen. That's L U M E N Me SRS for 20% off your purchase. These statements and products have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease or condition. All right, Leif, one last thing. I got one gift for you. Last one. I promise we're getting to your story, but just a little something for the ride home. Those are Vigilance League Gummy bears.
- [19:20]
Leif Babin
That's awesome. I've. I've been looking forward to sampling this.
- [19:24]
Sean Ryan
Right on. Well, now you got some.
- [19:26]
Leif Babin
Outstanding, man. I appreciate it. Thanks, brother.
- [19:28]
Sean Ryan
You're welcome. But. All right, Leif, we're going to. Like I said, we're going to go into your life story and I have a feeling this is going to get really heavy and I think people are going to get a. A lot out of this episode. And so once again, I just want to say that I've really been looking forward to this. And so let's start. Let's start at the beginning. Where did you grow up?
- [19:54]
Leif Babin
I grew up in a small town in Southeast Texas in the piney woods called Woodville, Texas. And it was an awes community to grow up. And it was a small town, about 3,000 people. We had two stoplights, we had two Dairy Queens, which made us, I guess, big time at the time. But it was just a great place to grow up. If you wanted to go to a fancy restaurant or a movie theater, you had to drive more than an hour away. But I loved it. I spent all my childhood playing in the woods, playing some kind of combat in the woods, throwing spears at each other, building forts. People sometimes ask me if we played cowboys and Indians. We actually were in. We were all Indians all the time. Everyone. No one wanted to be a cowboy. Everyone was an Indian. And so we were the Native American warriors out there, patrolling the woods, setting booby traps for my mom to like fall in in our backyard. And we lived in a great neighborhood with just kind of woods behind the neighborhood. And we were just constantly in the woods playing. And out from like sun up to the sundown. My mom had a whistle that she would blow and we had to be within hearing distance of the whistle, which was. I pushed that pretty regularly, but you could hear that whistle. We'd come back and I grew up in a great household. My mom and dad were loving, wonderful parents. They really took their job seriously. My dad was the town dentist and he had a busy job. My mom's a stay at home mom and then a part time school teacher and school librarian. But they really just poured into me and my brother and three sisters. We had a big family and they took that as their primary job is raising us upright. The proverbs train up a child and the way he will go and when he's older and not depart from that. I think they took that very seriously and really set an amazing example for me as a mother and dad and just were constantly there to support me. And I was always. My dad's like fishing, hunting buddy really. He had friends that he, he'd hunt with. But we spent so much time together on the lake, on the ocean, you know, fishing and hunting out in the woods. And it was an amazing place to grow up. And I didn't fully appreciate the town of Woodville and the community until after I, I left school. I went off to the Naval Academy and. And when I was really deployed overseas, because the amount of care packages that would come in from not only my family, but friends and just members of the community, I mean, it was stuff that we would share with the rest of the task in it because it was so much stuff that was coming in and it just you know, there were some great communities across the United States, but it was just a quantitative measure of just how awesome that community was to grow up in and just how supportive and patriotic and amazing. The church was a big part of our life growing up. We started going to First Baptist Church of Woodville when I was in third grade. My dad became a deacon there, and church was mandatory every Sunday. When I started being a little wild man in my high school days and partied a little too hard, my dad would come in and drag me out of bed and say, you're going to church, boy. Here we go. Then we get home from church, and it was, put on your working gloves and working clothes. And I remember trying to push back and saying, hey, dad, aren't we supposed to not work on the Sabbath? And he said, this isn't work, son. This is fun.
- [23:18]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [23:19]
Leif Babin
So we'd be out chainsawing brush and clearing land we grew up on. When I was about 12, we moved to some acreage kind of out in the woods. We lived in a neighborhood before that with woods behind it, like I mentioned. But then it was constantly just working to clear that place and keep it nice, build fence and repair fence and Claire brush. And it was just an awesome way to grow up. It was an amazing community.
- [23:42]
Sean Ryan
Five kids.
- [23:44]
Leif Babin
Five kids in my family.
- [23:45]
Sean Ryan
Where'd you fall in the birth order?
- [23:46]
Leif Babin
I was the second. My sister and I are very close. We're 16 months apart, so she'll never let me live down that she was in those 16 months. I guess she lived a lifetime of experience that she's only then. I have a twin brother and sister. My parents wanted to have three. They had me and my sister. Then the third child was twins. My brother and sister, fraternal twins. And then they had a surprise about eight years after that, my baby sister.
- [24:14]
Sean Ryan
Nice.
- [24:15]
Leif Babin
Nice. I was the only one that served the military. I always wanted to do that. My dad had been in the army and then in the Air Force. And so I spent my first couple of years at Ramstein Air Base. He was stationed there as an Air Force dentist. And I was the only one that went in the military. My five siblings. But for me, that's all I ever wanted to do, was be in the military.
- [24:37]
Sean Ryan
What'd your dad do in the military?
- [24:40]
Leif Babin
He was in the National Guard in the Army. And then they paid for his dental school. And he served, I think, four years after dental school. So he was stationed at Ramstein for, I think, four or three of that. Right on my first kind of six months To. We came back when I was three years old.
- [25:00]
Sean Ryan
Wow. I lived there too, when I was a kid.
- [25:02]
Leif Babin
Okay.
- [25:03]
Sean Ryan
My dad was in the army too, as a pharmacist. Wow. Our upbringing is very similar.
- [25:08]
Leif Babin
I never knew that. That's awesome.
- [25:09]
Sean Ryan
Yeah. Yeah. But are you tight with all your siblings or.
- [25:14]
Leif Babin
I am, I am. They're, they're, they're, they're a great family and we all keep each other in check and. But yeah, they're, it's, they're a wonderful family. Everybody's got kids. We have a huge. I think My parents have 17 grandkids.
- [25:29]
Sean Ryan
Holy cow. That's awesome.
- [25:31]
Leif Babin
18 to, you know, two or three.
- [25:33]
Sean Ryan
I think that is awesome.
- [25:35]
Leif Babin
So it's, it's a, it's a pile of cousins. Every time my kids, you know, go, it's, it's magical. And they scream, why can't we live in Woodville? Every time we go there, just run around the woods.
- [25:44]
Sean Ryan
That's awesome, man. Does everybody in Texas.
- [25:47]
Leif Babin
Everybody's in Texas now.
- [25:48]
Sean Ryan
Nice, nice, nice. What were, what kind of. Were you a star athlete or anything like that? And growing up, I played, you know.
- [25:57]
Leif Babin
I played probably like a lot of people, you know, I played soccer and baseball and, and basketball. I was horrible at basketball. I realized that wasn't my sport when I, I, I got a rebound, I think that was in fourth grade or fifth grade. And I immediately shot, I shot the, the basket, scored a goal for the other team. I was like, basketball is not for me. So when I started playing football in seventh grade and tackle football, football was like everything. And in small town Texas, it's, you know, we'd have 3,000 people in the town and we'd have like, you know, probably nearly that many people at the game, you know, on Friday nights. It was just a, it was an awesome thing. I loved it, man. It was the closest thing to suiting up, you know, and gearing up for combat, you know, that you could do, I think, in the civilian world. And it was a super, it was a fun time we had in our high school, the head coach, our head football coach, coach Melvin Houston. He'd been there for years. Awesome guy. And he was a real mentor to so many people on the team, particularly for some of the star athletes who were raised in homes that maybe didn't have a father there. He was an incredible guy. And his wife was also the choir director. So all of us, like the entire starting lineup in football was, like, in choir as well, was mandatory. He was in track, so we all ran track also to Keep in shape. You know, we had, we had some of the star football players that are like, marching the band at halftime. Everyone kind of did everything.
- [27:25]
Sean Ryan
Wow.
- [27:26]
Leif Babin
And it was just, it was just a fantastic place to grow up.
- [27:29]
Sean Ryan
Awesome community, Very cool. What, what got your interest in the military?
- [27:37]
Leif Babin
I can't ever remember wanting to do anything else. I mean, from the time that I can remember wanting to do anything, I, I wanted to be in the military. I was painting my face and crawling through the, you know, the, the, the backyard jungle and, and it was, I just, I wanted to be some kind of combat leader. I had a little stint where we had these F4 Phantoms that would come fly over from some of the bases in Louisiana. I remember a couple of like B52, like tree top level flights that were pretty awesome. So there, there was like a small stint where I was like, oh, man, maybe being a pilot would be cool. But then I quickly went back to like, no, I want to be a, some kind of a ground combat leader in some, some capacity. And then when I was like in probably. I was probably in junior high school and I started hearing about the SEAL teams and the, the Mareno books came out. Read Rogue Warrior. You probably read it probably about the same time I did. And that was, that was one that really. I started reading about the seals in Vietnam and learning about the Rungsat Special Zone and, you know, Kamaran Bay and NA Bay and all these places that our SEAL forefathers were operating out of. And I was just smitten with that. And then the movie Navy seals with Charlie Sheen came out.
- [28:50]
Sean Ryan
Oh, yeah.
- [28:51]
Leif Babin
And while I was in high school and it just, that kind of cemented it for me that I wanted to be in the SEAL teams. And so I wanted to go to the Naval Academy to pursue that, that dream. And so I put in a package for the Naval Academy, I put in a package for West Point as well. And we had a super strong West Point alumni association in Southeast Texas. And one of the head guys, he was a Silver Star recipient from the Korean War. Amazing guy. He was really close friends with my grandfather and he was a big advocate of West Point, his West Point grad. And he was pretty heartbroken when I chose. I chose Navy, but I chose that because I wanted to be in the SEAL teams. And my dad and I did a lot of fishing growing up on the Texas coast. There's fantastic inshore fishing, offshore fishing on the Texas coast. And we were going out on the Galveston jetties. And I remember just watching all these. I'd accepted my appointment to West Point because I got picked up in, like, it was like, January of my senior year. And so I accepted my appointment, and I still hadn't heard back from Navy. It was like. And finally in, like, late April, when I was graduating in May, I finally. I got accepted to West Point, or I'm sorry, I got accepted to Navy. So I'd already accepted my appointment to West Point. I finally got an appointment to the Naval Academy. And so then I was like, man, what do I do now? Like, I don't know what I want to do. The alumni network told me. They said. The West Point alumni network said. They said, all right, you got a decision to make here. Dwight D. Eisenhower went to West Point. Jimmy Carter went to Navy. I was like, man, that's a tough one. You're putting it on me here.
- [30:34]
Sean Ryan
That was a stunt.
- [30:36]
Leif Babin
But I was out fishing. My dad had a little center console fishing boat. We were out trying to catch some speckled trout and redfish on the Galveston jetties. And I remember looking at these oil tankers. The Houston Ship Channel comes into the Galveston there. It's one of the busiest ports in North America. And just watching these different tankers come in and all the different flags sail from around the world, and I just remember turning to my dad and saying, I'm gonna go to Naval Academy. I wanted to be in the Navy, and I wanted to be in the SEAL teams. That was the purpose. And after four long years at Navy, I did not get selected for the SEAL program.
- [31:12]
Sean Ryan
Damn. You know, it's. Why did you. I know you said all throughout your childhood you wanted to be a leader in a ground unit, but why? I'm just curious. Why didn't you go the enlisted route? Why did you? Why were you hell bent on the Academy, man?
- [31:29]
Leif Babin
That's a great question, Sean. There are many times as an officer when I was sitting in a tactical operations center and when I was, you know, when we were passing out the PowerPoint ranger patch, you know, 3,000 hours, you. You just where I was like, maybe I should have enlisted in the SEAL teams. I definitely questioned it when I graduated from Navy, because when I didn't get service selected, and, man, they made the right call. To be honest, they only took 16 guys out of the Naval Academy. And there was a prior enlisted SEAL in my class, so they took 15 guys. And, you know, there was 200 people that went out for the screener. It was probably 80 guys graduated from the screener, and probably 40 or 50 of those guys could have gone and done really well any of them. And so they only took 15 and I was not one of those 15. And that was based on my grade point average, which was atrocious. I was part of that half of the class that made the top half possible. And I had a terrible conduct record because when you get, you know, a midshipman that was two years older than me who was kind of barking orders at me and telling me what to do, I let them know that I was not too pleased about that. I was pretty strong willed and hard headed, as you know me to be. And I think that that didn't serve me well there. So I had a conduct record, I got in a bunch of trouble and so I wasn't selected. But actually was the, it was the best thing that ever happened to me because my time in the surface fleet was awesome. I was instantly thrown into a position of responsibility and leadership and I served three different deployments on two different ships, got to sail all over the world and see some amazing things, worked with some incredible people.
- [33:21]
Sean Ryan
So what was. Sorry, go ahead.
- [33:26]
Leif Babin
Well, I was just going to say, to answer your question, I think what my parents were pushing me to like go to college first. And that was probably a bigger factor, but it was a, I don't know, like there were, when I, when I got service elected out of, for the, for the service lead out of the academy, I was like, man, I probably should have listened to the Navy. So. But it was, it was, I think my parents just kind of encouraged me to go to college. I was interested in the Naval Academy, you know, I was interested in having a degree under my belt. If I hadn't gotten one of the academies, I would have gone to Texas A and M and been on the core cadets there in the ROTC program. So I think that was probably more their encouragement than anything else. But there's certainly times that I regretted that. And what I loved about the SEAL teams was man, while the college degree might have separated officers from enlisted at some point, I mean the post 911 world, that was the case, you know, for a lot of guys, Brian Bill in our Bud's class that have electrical engineering degree, probably a way better GPA than I ever had, you know, and so many guys that I served with, like you, you know, just super smart guys, you know, and, and we're way smarter than I would ever be. So it was, there wasn't a lot of differentiation. It was just simply like, like a different role.
- [34:42]
Sean Ryan
Interesting. Interesting. So, so I didn't. So they're recruiting right out of the academy.
- [34:49]
Leif Babin
I didn't.
- [34:49]
Sean Ryan
I didn't realize there was that much. The 200 people tried. Roughly 200 people trying out. That's. Well, that's pretty stiff competition. So when you found out that you didn't. How did they tell you you didn't make the cut? Do you find out?
- [35:05]
Leif Babin
Immediately they announced. It's like service selection night. And so they announce you. And so I had put. My first choice was naval special Warfare. My second choice was Marine Ground. I was like, if I can't be in a seal, I'll go be a marine infantry officer. Maybe I can try to go, you know, force recon, and, you know, that. That route. And. And then my third choice was service. Service warfare, the ship drivers. And so when they, they. They basically like, just, you know, you. You distribute a piece of paper that gives you the service selection with all the, you know, the seniors, the first there. And you're sitting there in, like, the wardroom on. On, you know, and it's. It's. I saw my best friend and roommate. Just his head just, you know, he was really disappointed to not get. So we were both going out for the, you know, the SEAL program. That's what we wanted. And so when he didn't get it, I didn't get it. And we were right there in the room together, sitting next to each other. You know, it was an encouragement, you know, to keep going. But again, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I loved my time in the surface fleet, and I wanted to be a SEAL the whole time. But. But I instantly. I flew out to. I went to about six months of school in Rhode island, and then I flew out and met a ship, and we were enforcing sanctions against Iraq back before the war kicked off. So these were the UN sanctions that had been in place since the Persian Gulf War. And so I got to work alongside. SEALs would go take down these ships. Our boarding team would go alongside and take over the ship and then just vector them over to a holding area. It was super cool, man. You were.
- [36:43]
Sean Ryan
I forgot you were on a boarding team. Correct.
- [36:45]
Leif Babin
I remember. Right. Yeah. We did dozens of boarding sim. How did.
- [36:49]
Sean Ryan
How did you get involved in that?
- [36:51]
Leif Babin
They just. The ship just selected me to be a part of it. I was lucky enough to be a part of that. And it was a neat thing to be able to see and do. And I think just being able to navigate a ship across the world was. It required a lot of responsibility. I mean, when you're the officer of the deck, you're in charge of the ship when the captain's asleep in his stateroom at nighttime or if he's elsewhere, you were responsible for the entire well being of that ship. I mean, there's massive responsibility on your shoulders.
- [37:19]
Sean Ryan
What kind of ship were you on?
- [37:21]
Leif Babin
I was on a destroyer, DD972, USS Oldendorf. I did two years on that. We had an awesome wardrobe of great officers in the listed sailors were outstanding that were on that thing. And it was just a great leadership opportunity for me. I learned a ton of lessons learned in a ton of things wrong. Came in kind of this strong willed ensign and got shut down, realized, look, I need to rely on my experienced chiefs and sailors to actually lead this team and learn from them. And so I got to see what good leadership looks like. It's not the person that's barking orders at people. It's actually being the silent leader that listens to the team and lets them run with things. And then I went to a different ship, FFG 38, USS Kurtz, did about a year on that there as a training officer. So I did the first ship. I did two deployments to the Persian Gulf. I kind of transit that Indian Ocean, Pacific transits. And then I did a western Pacific deployment with the Kurds, the frigate. Both of those were great experiences and awesome group. And I got selected probably halfway through my time at being on that second ship, the USS Kurds, I got selected. This was September 2001 and I got selected finally on my second package that I put in for the SEAL program. And so right as September 11th happened. Wow. And so we knew this was real. We knew we were going to war. I knew after buds, we were going straight to a SEAL platoon and deploying overseas. And so probably by the time that you were going through your boot camp and just starting your Navy journey, I was. For me, it was interesting because some of the sailors, there's so many sailors in the fleet with 70, 80% attrition rate that didn't make it through buds. I remember one of the sailors is a great, great guy asking me, like, you know, you got selected, you know, for, for buds. How far do you think you'll make it to the program? You know, and I thought, I thought that was a crazy question. I was like, all the way through the program, like, like, why, why would I be even going if I didn't think I could? I was going to make it all the way through, you know, I think, you know, in his mind, having gone there and not made it through, it just was like Impossible make it through the program. And I think I was so appreciative of the experience. When I got to Buzz and you and I going through Buzz together, it enabled me to think about what it took to actually get there, all the effort that it took. And I had some amazing people that pulled so many strings for me to write letters of recommendation to train me and prepare me and get me ready physically, and stuck their neck out to get me selected out of, you know, dozens of people that applied. And so I was never going to, you know, let them down anyway. And it gave me. It gave me some great perspective.
- [40:21]
Sean Ryan
Man, I didn't realize you got picked up in September of 2001. Where were you when the towers went down?
- [40:28]
Leif Babin
I was on duty the pier side in San Diego at 32nd Street Naval Station aboard the USS Kurt. So I was the duty officer, and we were just, you know, everybody was just waking up in the morning and, you know, obviously that's, you know, six. Six in the morning, you know, on the West coast when. 9:00, you know, when it went down, and on the East Coast. And I got a call from the. The incoming duty officer who was listening to the news on his way into work, and he said, hey, a plane's just hit the World Trade Center Center. And I thought. I'm thinking it's like a little Cessna sightseeing plane or something, you know, that got too close. I'm like, what are you talking about? So I went in and we turned on the news in the wardrobe, and I turn on the news and I'm sitting there watching, like, man, just smoke billowing out. And we just watched on live TV as the second plane hit. And we knew instantly this is an attack. Like, this is real. We're at war. And it just was change everything. Wow.
- [41:28]
Sean Ryan
Wow. And so you were selected right after that or right before that?
- [41:33]
Leif Babin
I don't remember the exact date that I found out that it was right around then. And I can't remember if it was just before or just after, but I know I got the news, like, in September 2001. And so it was. I knew this was real. And I was lucky enough I had a great commanding officer on board the USS Kurtz. And he was kind enough to send me, TAD over to SEAL Team 5. And so I was TAD to SEAL Team 5. I went over there, I helped out wherever I could on the administrative side, but they assigned us to a senior chief. And he was all he did with me. He just trained us all the time. And so for, like, six straight months before I went to Buds, I was spending most of my time over at Seal Team 5 just training and, and preparing and some of my friends were there who had helped pull some, some strings, you know, for me to be there. In fact, that very same SEAL who'd got service selected and no kidding, yeah, he got, he had got picked up just the year before. So they went through the year before that. You and I went through buzz together and he was just there as a new guy, assistant Platoon Commander. And so man, he take me out for, for runs. I would. The runs that he took me on were harder than anything we did in butts. Like I, I would puke my guts up and as a result of that, I, I never, I was a, I was a horrible runner. That was the thing I probably struggled with most and, and I didn't, I didn't fall back into the runs in buds just because, you know, thankfully I hadn't had that opportunity.
- [43:07]
Sean Ryan
How long was it, how long was it after you got the word that you showed up at Buds?
- [43:13]
Leif Babin
We classed up 241. Classed up in April of 2002. So that was, yeah, it was pushing six months of kind of prep and training and I knew that when I got picked up like that was the last time I was already a Lieutenant jg and I knew I was going to make Lieutenant at the four year mark which if you remember, I put that on at first fade days. I got quite the promotion party, the beat down. But yeah, I knew that was like the last shot. So I was already training for it, I was already preparing for it, but I had about six months of people that really. And it's so hard to train when you're underway on a ship. You know, as far as running and swimming and doing the thing, you just can't do it so well. So it was, it was just awesome to have my commanding officer and the senior leadership on that ship support me and be excited for me. And on my previous ship, I mean they wrote super powerful letters of recommendation as well that enable that to happen. And if I didn't have the seals that were pulling for me that wrote me a letter of recommendation and more than anything, probably was Admiral Smith who was retired SEAL Admiral. His son Adam and I are friends and our close friend who's still serving, I won't name him, was probably my biggest advocate. Amazing guy and pulled so many strings for me, trained with me, got me ready, connected me with Adam and then Apple Smith and Apple Smith wrote me just an incredibly powerful letter of recommendation that if people hadn't pulled those strings for me, man, I would have never even had the opportunity to serve.
- [45:01]
Sean Ryan
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- [47:33]
Leif Babin
I think the bill is, I think there's 24 bullets at the academy today and I think there's something like that. It's a, for all of like ROTC and then there's like a hand.
- [47:44]
Sean Ryan
So they take 48 a year, something like that.
- [47:47]
Leif Babin
I don't know what the numbers are. I have to double check that. I think that was it for a while. But it's highly competitive. Right, Interesting.
- [47:54]
Sean Ryan
So they only take 48 men.
- [47:58]
Leif Babin
It's something like that, yeah.
- [47:59]
Sean Ryan
Program.
- [48:00]
Leif Babin
Yeah. Don't quote me on the numbers of that because it'd be a high vary. But it's very highly competitive. And then there's a handful of. Of officers that come in, like our mutual friend Travis that will come in with a Officer Candidate School billboard and who went through Buzz with us. And there's just. It's very competitive as an officer. So you're training with people like. I mean, I was competing at the Naval Academy with the captain of the water polo team. I was never a competitive swimmer. That guy's going to destroy me. Like somebody who's on the cross country team, somebody who's on the triathlon, you know, on the triathlon team.
- [48:43]
Sean Ryan
They got to be looking for more than that, though. I mean, they can. They can find physical fitness anywhere. What are they looking for specifically in an officer? I mean, you. Because it sounds like you weren't even. No, no offense, but it doesn't sound like you were a superstar athlete at the Naval Academy.
- [49:01]
Leif Babin
I definitely was not.
- [49:02]
Sean Ryan
Problems running? You weren't a swimmer. You know, and then you have all these guys that were. Maybe that's not why you got picked up. I don't know. But I mean, they have to be looking for more than athleticism.
- [49:12]
Leif Babin
That was a part of it. I think it was a major factor. I think they're also looking for grade point average. They're looking for, you know, student leadership opportunities. I was never a student leadership because I was always in trouble for something. So I think, you know, there's just. I mean, I wouldn't trade. My time at the Naval Academy was awesome. I really enjoyed my experience there. There was some negative examples, right. That showed me, like, the leader that I didn't want to be as well. I think that's always the case. Right. I think good leadership is rare no matter where you are. But there also were some amazing leaders there who poured into me and set a great example. And frankly, Sean, I'm. I am. I wouldn't trade that for anything. I mean, the fact that I didn't get service elected for the SEAL program, I had to work as. I had to work my ass off. I had to. I had to train. I had to go out and build relationships. I had to stop feeling sorry for myself. And making excuses, because that would have been easy to do, right? Well, this person knew that person or this person got picked up, or that person happened to, you know, made better grades than me, or this person's a better athlete, you know, and that shouldn't be what it's based on. I can make all those excuses. What I had to do was before I even understood this concept we now call extreme ownership, I actually, I didn't take extreme ownership to say, if this is what I want to do with my life, I'm going to have to actually do the work to make this possible, you know, to open the door. And when I put in my very first lateral transfer package, so I had to get fully qualified as a service warfare officer. And so that took me about a year and a half on my first ship. You know, man, that's a huge qualification to get right. You have to study, you have to prepare. It takes a long time and effort. And when you. I finally got that qualification, I put together, I met every requirement possible, and I put in a package that I thought was a strong package. Didn't get service elected.
- [51:01]
Sean Ryan
Wow.
- [51:02]
Leif Babin
I got turned out again. And that was crushing to me. I thought, damn, what this, you know, this is. And the senior officer, he was a captain at the time, and he was the chief of staff over at warcom, the Naval Special Warfare Command, So very senior officer. And I reached out, just tracked down his content info, scheduled a meeting with him, and went over and sat down to talk to him. And I said, hey, sir, I'm Lieutenant JG Babin. I want to be in the. I want to be in the SEAL team. This is what I want to do. I think I can contribute to this community. What do I need to do to make this happen? And he told me, he was like. He said, he was like, no one has ever scheduled a meeting like this with me. I think that shows a lot of initiative on your part, you know, keep trying, you know, get your scores better, get some better, you know, get. Go get some strong letters of recommendation, put in a package again, and I think you'll do better next time. So I think just. We call this concept default aggressive, that problems aren't going to solve themselves. Like, you actually got to go solve problems. You actually have to make things happen. Things aren't going to just fall in your lap. Like, you got to go make it happen. And that applies on the battlefield. It also applies anywhere in life. And the opportunities. I think it's real easy for us to look at people and be like, well, you know, that person got lucky or this person just stumbled upon that, or this person had that door open for them. And more often than not, man, people make their luck through hard work, you know, discipline, preparation, effort, all the years and years of effort behind the scenes that people don't see. And so I think that to me was a tremendous life lesson of like, hey, this isn't going to happen unless you go and do the work to make it happen. And that required training, you know, being the best service warfare officer I could be. I knew that instead of complaining about not being in the SEAL teams, if I wanted to be in the SEAL teams, the best path for that for me was to be the best service warfare officer I could be. And, and there was, I mean, people would say things like, well, you don't want to be. They won't want to let you go. You know, if, if you're too critical for a member of the team, that's total bullshit, right? You gotta, the better that you are on your team, the higher you perform, the more that your leadership's gonna want to write you a strong letter of recommendation, right? The more that people are actually going to want to take care of you and help you out. So the more I could contribute to my team that happened to be a ship that I was assigned to, the better it would be for me going and building relationships with people, reaching out to folks that could write powerful letters of recommendation, you know, and, and it was, I, I think for anything in life, like, it's, the opportunities are not going to come your way. You got to go make things happen. You've got to be default aggressive. And, and, and it's, you know, again, if you wait for problems to go away on their own, they just, they just don't get worse, you know, so I'm, I'm thankful that happened. It was the best thing that ever happened to me. And I could tell you, Sean, years later, after I was serving as a, a senior, you know, executive for, and the business world would call it, right at the operations officer and executive officer position. And I was frustrated with the employment of seals or lack of employment with seals in combat at the time. And I would get super frustrated about things that were way above me in the chain of command there. I can remember at least three different occasions where I jumped in my truck, I drove across the Coronado Bay Bridge, I went over 32nd Naval, I went over to 32nd Street Naval Station, which is where all the ships in San Diego are, and I walked out on one of those piers And I lived across at Coronado at Naval Amphibious Base where the SEAL teams are. And I remembered what it was like and it just put that whole in perspective for me.
- [54:32]
Sean Ryan
Wow.
- [54:33]
Leif Babin
I can't ever forget what it was like to be over here, wanting to be there and wanting to do anything I could to get over there. So no matter how frustrated I am, I'm in the SEAL teams and I gotta do the best I can and impact the people around me, you know, and try to try to make whatever unit I happen to be assigned, try to make life as good as I can for those people that I'm with.
- [54:54]
Sean Ryan
Wow, that's interesting. So you would go back to what you couldn't wait to leave, to reset.
- [55:01]
Leif Babin
Just to give me perspective on what it was like to remember what it was like to want to be in the SEAL teams and not be there.
- [55:07]
Sean Ryan
Man, that's cool. That's cool, Leif. So correct me if I'm wrong, but at breakfast I think we had a discussion. Where are you mentoring junior officers in the SEAL teams or junior officers that are wanting to go to the SEAL teams?
- [55:24]
Leif Babin
When I got back from my second combat deployment to Ramadi, I took over the Junior Officer Training Course. It's over two years. I ran that training program for every single SEAL officer they graduated from buds. So before they go to buds, before they go on to the advanced training, the SEAL Qualification Training, they would go through a four week, classroom week, long field training exercise. And so I'd been through that program. That's where you and I broke off together right after we graduated buds, and then you went on to SEAL Qualification Training. And so the officers from our class went to Sears School and some other schools, and then we went to the Junior Officer Training Course together. And so I got a chance to run that four years later. And it was a great program and I went through it, but I think it was focused on trying to help you understand how it was organized. And what I got to do was really, I think, try to revamp it to just try to set those leaders up for success and to help those leaders be ready for the most difficult combat situations that they might come up against.
- [56:30]
Sean Ryan
We'll get into more details with that at a more appropriate time in the interview. But what I'm. The reason I'm bringing it up is what, what are you looking for in Junior SEAL leadership? What are some of the. What are some of the top attributes that you've identified that the great leaders inside of Naval Special Warfare all seem to have?
- [56:56]
Leif Babin
Number one, humility. Humility is the most important quality in a leader. And the reason I say that is because, look, if you don't have an ego, you don't care about winning, right? You just mail it in. You don't care about outperforming the other, you know, other people or doing well. Like, ego drives us to be successful. So you gotta have an ego. But so often ego is the. It just, it just absolutely destroys people, it destroys careers, it destroys teams, it destroys relationships, it destroys lives. And when people can't put their ego in check, you can never get better. You can never improve. And I think the biggest lesson that I've learned in life through some extremely humbling combat operations and then beyond is that it's be humble or get humbled. And anytime that I'm feeling like, oh, I got things figured out, oh, I've got to, you know, oh, I'm ready for the worst case scenario life might throw me, man, you get humbled and you get put in check. So I think that humility is number one, the most important quality. Because without humility, you can't learn from anybody else. You can't get better, right? You can't evolve, you can't adapt or innovate, you can't listen to other people's ideas or learn from them. And in any capacity. And worst of all, you can't look yourself in the mirror and conduct an honest self assessment, a brutally honest self assessment, because that's what's key. If you can't do that, there's no way you're ever going to improve. What's required is an honest self assessment of like, okay, I need to do these things to improve. I need to do these things to actually fix myself going forward. Okay, these might be my strengths, but these are my weaknesses. I need to work on those to get better. Hey, we might have gotten lucky on that Comet operation, but we better be prepared for that worst case scenario next time in case we don't get so lucky. And so I think, number one, humility, number two, ownership. And that goes right along with each other, right? If you're going to point fingers and cast blame and make excuses, it's right there with humility. The driver of that is ego. But oftentimes the reason I say ownership is because if I'm going to wait for you to solve my problem, like that problem's not going to get solved. So let's say you and I have a conflict and we don't see eye to eye on something. I can say, well, Sean, just, I don't like the way Sean talked to me or Sean needs to come apologize to me or Sean, that's Sean's fault for not seeing the world from my perspective. Or I can actually take ownership of saying, you know what, Sean, there's some reason that Sean disagrees with me on this. Let me actually learn from his perspective. Let me actually take ownership, ownership of fixing this problem by taking some action to actually get his perspective and see his perspective on things and see what I could have done better to better communicate what my perspective was and ask more questions so I could see the world through his eyes. And so I think those things are super critical. Teamwork is a great example of that, right? If you're just about yourself and you can't actually put the team at the overall team, the mission first, I think that's not someone that's going to do well. And particularly in high performing organizations, whether you're talking to a SEAL unit or a special operations unit or a SWAT team, or frankly, a super high performing sales team in the corporate world, a lot of times you'll talk to them about the concept of COVID move and teamwork and they'll say, oh, we're doing awesome, we're doing awesome. But our admin department sucks and supply sucks and they're not getting us what we need. You know, the senior leaders up in their corporate high chair, they don't know what's going on down here. And so what you realize is like, they think about teamwork within just their immediate team, not about the other teams that they actually depend on to be successful. So when you start realizing, like, hey, I need a better relationship with the admin department so that we can get paid, so that we can actually get the paperwork taken care of, so that we can actually do what we need to do and focus on our job. You know, I need a better relationship with supply so they can give me the tools that they, that they, that I need to be successful. I need a good relationship with my chain of command. Probably one of the biggest lessons I learned from Jocko is not having a good relationship with your chain of command doesn't help you and it certainly doesn't help your team. So you got to build a good relationship with your chain of command just to make sure you're aligned with them, make sure they understand, you know, what you're trying to do and how you're trying to do it and why you. And they have the information they need to better support you and make better decisions. So I think when you're looking at Humility, ownership, teamwork, I think those are crucial things. Discipline, I think is something else. If you have people that are not disciplined. I think about somebody in our bloods class like Brian Bill, for instance, who probably wasn't born great at everything. That guy was so he was the only guy in our entire BUDS class that was first time every time in die face through the pool competency test, which is if you don't know what pool comp is, it is miserable. Right. Where they're tying your hoses and knots. And that's a terrifying test for so many people that even people that are comfortable in the water. And we had so many rollbacks from the previous class, as you know.
- [62:10]
Sean Ryan
You know, I was one of them.
- [62:11]
Leif Babin
Yeah, you were one of those. It was. And, and the stories you guys told us, it was like terrifying, you know. And so I think that Brian was the only dude on that wall this first time, every time. Why is that? Well, he was, he. He was methodical in his preparation and, and it was. He was disciplined and that enabled him to. To be successful in everything he's trying to do. So I think somebody, you know, it's great to have some innate qualities and natural abilities and those things are great. When you can combine natural ability and discipline, that's unstoppable. But hard work is going to beat natural ability over time. If you've got somebody who's disciplined is going to put in the work. So I think those are the qualities that I think apply not just to a SEAL leader, but I think to any leader in any situation. Somebody who's humble, somebody will take ownership, somebody who's a team player. It puts the team first. As somebody who.
- [63:00]
Sean Ryan
Discipline, man, that's great. That's great to hear. Thank you. I got a ton of questions, but I'm going to save them for the leadership section. But so let's get back to Bud. So you show up to Buds. We're classing up in April of. Was it 2001? 2000. 2002. Correct. And so what. I mean, what was it like for you walking in the compound as a. Is a. Is a. As a BUDS candidate, BUD student, man.
- [63:30]
Leif Babin
I might have been different from a lot of us. I loved it. I thought it was awesome. I mean, to me, just having the. Not that you weren't certainly we were walking on eggshells all the time. Right. Any. And I remember afterward, particularly as the class officer in charge. Right. As the senior person in the class, it didn't matter what happened. Right. I don't think I Failed a single room inspection the entire time. Actually, I did. We had one spot inspection in dye for phase that I failed, and me and my roommate failed. It was like one. But every other inspection I passed. Every other personnel inspection, I passed, which was unheard of. And, yeah, I got beaten. I was the first guy to get beaten every time. Right. Because you're just. Anybody in the class feels you as the leader, are responsible, and so you're going to pay the man for it. That was just part of the game. I embraced that with a sense of humor. So there was. There was. It took a couple of years to be able to walk on the grinder before you were kind of like, who's looking at me? You feel like you need to be running and calling cadence. But by the way, they don't call cadence across the grinder anymore, man. It's. I mean, that was so freaking cool. Like, just to my left, to my. You know, just yelling at our class as we came across the grinder. For me, just knowing the history of that place, you know, knowing not only through the SEAL teams, but for the underwater demolition teams, our frogman forefathers before them, and knowing all of that took place right there. Right? I mean, it's Coronado Naval Amphibious Base. I mean, this is where the, you know, the guys that were going out and swimming up on beaches like Iwo Jima, you know, and Guam and Saipan. I mean, just amazing, amazing history. And I thought it was awesome. And checking in, I mean, for guys like you that were class ahead of me initially, it was like, you might as well have been there for 30 years of experience, right? Because I'm just showing up and you don't know what to do. I quickly just tried to just have a sense of humor. I remember I walked into the Indoc office those first few weeks that they used to call indoctrination. The indoctrination before you started first phase. And one of the instructors was like, babbing. Just walked up to me was like, hey, they had their coffee mess there, and they had this fancy coffee. And I came from the fleet. There's no fancy coffee. Everybody's these chiefs, the fleet are drinking black tar coffee that was reheated coffee from five days ago. So they had this fancy coffee mess in there, and they had a pile of like. Like sugar cubes. I mean, and it was probably like, I don't know, 50 of them. He's like, how many of those sugar cubes, you know, can you eat it once, Bab? And I'm like, all of Them, I just like shove them all in my mouth, you know, and yeah, just, I, I think from that on I just, I just try to, you know, just have a good sense of humor about it. And it was, yeah, to me, I thought it was. I mean, it was the quality of people that we got to serve with. There was, you know, I think in that post 911 era of people that, you know, like you, that are like enlisted in the Navy, this is what they want to do. I'm going to go serve my country in a time of war, you know, it was just incredible, man. And I just, I wouldn't trade that for anything. It was awesome.
- [66:52]
Sean Ryan
What about the intimidation factor? Were you intimidated coming in, checking in there?
- [66:57]
Leif Babin
Totally, man. Of course. You know, I mean, you're kind of like, do I make eye contact with people? Do you not? You know, you're trying to just figure that out, you know, and we talk a lot, you know, the dichotomy of leadership, right? You've got to try to find that balance. You got to be confident but not cocky, right? And I said humility is the most important quality leader. So you've got to have some confidence, but you also, you can't be cocky. And I think just trying to find that balance was like, you know, knowing that like the instructor staff that some of the guys that would, you know, say I hate officers and give us the hard time, you know, more than anything else, they ended up being my favorite instructors and they just, you know, even though they dished out the worst physical punishments in pain, they were just, they were awesome. And, and you know, some of those guys who, who you know, were like looking to give the officers a hard time. You know. One of the things I loved about Indoctrinated. Do you remember the, the officer belly flop contest off the high dive?
- [67:56]
Sean Ryan
Oh yeah, oh yeah.
- [67:58]
Leif Babin
Off like the 15 foot board.
- [67:59]
Sean Ryan
That was so awesome.
- [68:00]
Leif Babin
It just, you're like, okay, if I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna win. Like, I'm going all into this thing. I want to make it so painful. I'm like knock the wind out of myself and someone's gonna have to like haul me to the side. But that to me was like, it was, it was fun. I think you just try to, you know, try to make the best of what was the.
- [68:18]
Sean Ryan
Usually everybody I know has some type of, you know, they're worried about a hang up in buds, whether it's the pool comp or the 50 meter underwater swim or the 2 mile swims or whatever it may be. Mine was the 50 meter under underwater swim was the first one I was really nervous about. Whoop.
- [68:36]
Leif Babin
How'd you do on that?
- [68:38]
Sean Ryan
Crushed it, I think.
- [68:40]
Leif Babin
That was hard. You know what was crazy? So we, I'm sure you watched the Discovery Channel like oh yeah, 50 times. So I did too. And, and they what I realized later, some things like hell week, like they really can't show you just how hard hell week's gonna be. Right? So like it's. I thought hell was way harder than, you know, that I'd even envisioned it could be just kind of based on watching that show. But some of the other things, like the ocean swims, the cold water, like the underwater, they were, I realized they were focusing on people that were struggling and so it made it look like it was impossible. So. Yeah, I mean they, I thought the 50 meter underwater swim was like no factor, you know.
- [69:18]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [69:19]
Leif Babin
But some of the things that, that, that kicked my ass, man, were before.
- [69:23]
Sean Ryan
Though, before we did them. What were you worried about? What was your biggest fear?
- [69:27]
Leif Babin
I worried about it. I sweated every single evolution. No kid, every single one. And, and I had a friend to tell me that. Sweat every evolution. Like just, just you, you, you better be worried about preparing. We're going to spend our weekends prepping, planning. We were doing stupid stuff too, like, like pool comping each other in like the, you know, in the, in the, in the like local, like apartment complex pools, you know, into like civilian dive rigs that we rented from the local. Like stupid stuff, like dangerous stuff. If you're listening to this, don't. Or watching this, don't do that. That's stupid. You know, you're going to age yourself. You definitely need a dive master in there to make sure stuff like that's not going on. But we just tried to sweat every evolution. I was worried about the runs because I had struggled with runs and I found the runs were like, the runs were hard. I mean they definitely were, you know, all out spread for. But I don't think I got in the goon squad even one time. That was also because our good friend and classmate Seth Stone had made the egregious error of marrying one of the BUDS instructors sisters.
- [70:37]
Sean Ryan
I forgot about that.
- [70:38]
Leif Babin
So the officers would get regularly pulled out and just beat on for that. And then the entire class would get beat on. And then wherever Stoner was, we call him Sesto, we call him Stoner. But wherever Stoner was in the lineup of the runs, if you remember, they would just find him and be like, goon squad here. I'm back. And he. He would just embrace it, you know, and. And just start bear crawling. The goon squad. Everyone's just getting beat on and. And everyone else is like circling up. But you were a good runner, right? You weren't. I don't think you were in a goon squad.
- [71:07]
Sean Ryan
I was a good. That was the one thing I was really good at, was running.
- [71:10]
Leif Babin
Yeah, I remember you being a good runner. The swims for me, I was like one bad swim. Our mutual friend, who, I won't say his name, but we got put together, it was another officer, and he was not a great swimmer, and I was not a great swimmer. So we were like one bad conditions away from failing the swim. I think the only swim I feel was the. The ones where they forced us to wear like the new fins. Remember that one?
- [71:33]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [71:34]
Leif Babin
Oh, yeah. And half the class failed because we had to wear these. These new fans that were supposed to be so much better. And. And we all went back to the old school. Like World War II, like duck feet.
- [71:46]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [71:47]
Leif Babin
But it was. That was one where I was. I wasn't a fast swimmer. I'm not gonna go for a while, but. But I knew I was kind of one bats one way, but I think one of those. The hardest things for me that I didn't anticipate was drown proofing. People thought drown proofing was easy. Did you. Did you have no problem with drown proof?
- [72:05]
Sean Ryan
I thought drown. I thought drown proofing was easy.
- [72:09]
Leif Babin
So many people did. Drown proofing was horrible.
- [72:12]
Sean Ryan
No shit, that was hard for you.
- [72:14]
Leif Babin
When I. After we did like, you know, bouncing off the bottom was fine, but once we had to do like the traverse, you know, with your hands and feet tied, and my heart rate got up and then I started doing the flips.
- [72:25]
Sean Ryan
So just for the audience that doesn't know what drown proofing is, basically what they do is they tie your feet. They tie your feet together. They tie your hands together behind your back. And you start off just in the deep end, right? Bouncing up and down, kind of getting a rhythm into breathing. Then you have to float. Then you have to swim. Was it 100 meters? You have to swim 100 meters with your hands tied behind your back and your feet tied together. And it is challenging. The swim is definitely challenging.
- [72:56]
Leif Babin
Well, I've struggled with it and I was really struggling with it. And one of those buzz instructors who was the. The meanest instructor, you know, when it came to officers and just hammering them, he. He just pulled me aside and put me in. Like, he put me in like the forefoot section. It was like, he's like hands and feet tied. You just, you're gonna do your bounty in the forefoot section. And he just like left me there and then he moved me over to the, to the, you know, nine foot section. And it was, it was like a, it was just like a progression and that really helped me. And then actually one of the other instructors, remember, we had to like, you were supposed to. So after you do the, that, you know, you do that traverse, then you were supposed to like, you do like a flip and then go down and grab the mask. And then you were supposed to, you were supposed to do like three flips and then like five bounds. And then that was the end of the test. And one of the instructors on the side was like, I think I was probably 30 flips in. He was like, again, Again, Again? Yeah. And finally, finally that same instruction to help me out came over, was like, bavin, you're good, get out of the pool. And so it was. He kind of helped me out. But I mean, you knew you were going to get the full benefit on it, like no factor.
- [74:05]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [74:06]
Leif Babin
And that was. So that, that to me was harder than I thought it was going to be for whatever reason. And then life saving was.
- [74:14]
Sean Ryan
Life saving was a kick in the ass, man.
- [74:18]
Leif Babin
The smallest instructor we had. So if you remember, we had our. You had your unconscious victim for the. I don't think life saving is like that anymore. What do you mean?
- [74:30]
Sean Ryan
It's not like, I don't think it's.
- [74:31]
Leif Babin
Like a pass fail, evolution. Like, it was like, I don't think you can get kicked out of the program. Remember for us, like, if you didn't pass it.
- [74:38]
Sean Ryan
Oh yeah, I remember you got kicked out.
- [74:40]
Leif Babin
And so the unconscious victim. I got the smallest buds instructor we had. He was like probably 150 pounds. He was the unconscious victim. Which means he's laying there, I just grab and home across the pool. And then the very next one was, if you remember this instructor who had started at. He had played starting linebacker at Arizona State University.
- [75:02]
Sean Ryan
Oh yeah, I remember how.
- [75:03]
Leif Babin
And man, he was an awesome instructor. I loved it. But he kicked my ass. Like, I swam over to him and realized, like, he's like, save me. And I grabbed him. I think it took me.
- [75:15]
Sean Ryan
Was this Scotty Wilson Walker?
- [75:16]
Leif Babin
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [75:17]
Sean Ryan
I mean, we could say his name. He's in the buds thing. Yeah, he's in the 234 thing.
- [75:21]
Leif Babin
So I don't know if you can say, yeah, Scotty was Scotty was hilarious, but he, he just like, attacked to be underwater. And it was, it was a giant wrestling match with like, what, he probably weighed 250.
- [75:34]
Sean Ryan
I was like, I remember watching that guy when we were doing log pt, pick up the log by himself and just start running up the berm with it. And I was like, holy shit.
- [75:45]
Leif Babin
I remember that too. And we were all like, dude, that guy's an animal. And I got, I remember it was probably, it felt like a 20 minute evolution for me to get him to the side. I don't. It probably wasn't near that long, right? But I finally get him to the side and I crawled out the combat training tank just outside and I just puked my guts. And then I just. And I crawl back in there and it was like, the next one, the next one, the next one. So that was a tough evolution, but it was awesome. I mean, you also knew that, like, what was cool about that is there's nobody that I can't save. If I could save, if I could save Scotty attacking me under those conditions and this monstrous human and I could get him to the side and fight him the whole way. Like I could save anybody, you know? It was. And just the training program, program itself was just awesome.
- [76:34]
Sean Ryan
Do you remember, do you remember when Ben. Do you remember the armpit hair tactic that Ben created?
- [76:43]
Leif Babin
I do remember that. I had forgotten about that. Yeah.
- [76:47]
Sean Ryan
Genius move.
- [76:48]
Leif Babin
That was a genius move. I, I don't think that I, I don't think that I. I can't remember if instructors shaved their armpits for that or if they, if they stopped, but it was he.
- [76:59]
Sean Ryan
I remember he had. What did they call that victim you had? Like the, the passive victim. You had the unconscious victim. You had the one that's gonna fight everything you do, basically beat the shit out of you as you're trying to save him. And I think it was, I think it was Pranger. Was it Pranger? Ben went out to save Pranger and he just reached all the way around his chest, grabbed a big handful of armpit hair and just yanked it. Instructor was like, I'm good, I'm good. And what a genius move, dude.
- [77:33]
Leif Babin
I remember Instructor nave had me and I didn't even know what a triangle choke was. He had me in a triangle choke on the bottom of like the 15 foot section of the combat training tank. I'm like trying to go underwater to get away from him and he just like locks me up in this triangle. I'm like down on the bottom.
- [77:51]
Sean Ryan
Man. Man, that Was crazy. When did you find out you were going to be the class oic?
- [77:57]
Leif Babin
So in indoc, I was the senior guy. I was the only officer for a little while. We had a few officers that end up getting rolled back. So I think I was the. There were 18 of us in buzz class 241 that, like, started with 241 and made it through in one shot. I think I was the only officer from that. That group. And. And. And the. The rest of our, like, 44 guys that graduate, you know, were rollbacks. And, man, thank God for you guys, because when you got rolled back in the class, y'all brought in this, like, okay, we've been here before. We understand how to prep for these things, because at the time, we didn't. Other than the Discovery Channel show, you don't even know what's coming, right? The schedule's secret. You can't. It's not like you can walk in and ask the instructors that, you know, so that was massive. But we had several O's that were, like, rolled in. And so I think when you got rolled back into the class, that was. I got. There was. There was a senior officer who took that role through Hell week, and then shortly after Hell week, he got. He got rolled out. And so then I became the senior officer again. So most of the class, I was a senior officer.
- [79:02]
Sean Ryan
What did that. I mean, what did that feel like for you to be the OIC of? I mean, that's a lot of induced pressure, I would imagine.
- [79:12]
Leif Babin
Yeah, it definitely is. I mean, I think it instantly. Luckily, I'd learned the lesson of, like, hey, I can't do everything. I'm here to rely on my teammates to make this happen. Right? I need to use my senior enlisted leadership. You know, if I'm running around trying to count everyone, right, that doesn't work. Right? You have to have a. And if the lpo, the leading petty officer is doing that, that doesn't work. We need squarely BOKU leaders. You need people in those boat crews that are helping those boku leaders out. This is how decentralized command actually works. And so I think it was. That, to me, was like the. The. The thing that I was. You know, I would get. Sometimes people would come up with ideas and say, hey, let's go ask the instructors if we can do this or we can do that. You know, people wanted to kind of try to cut corners. I. I was. You know, I think. I know I frustrated some of the class sometimes when I was like, yeah, we're not Gonna, we're not gonna, we're not gonna expend the leadership capital on something like that. We're gonna just show up when they told us to do it. You know, we're not gonna ask if we can come 15 minutes later. Right. We're gonna like, like it's not, it's not worth it. And I think for people that at that time, I know some, sometimes, particularly some of the O's and BO crew leaders got frustrated with me, you know, with some of that stuff. But you have to just, I think, really prioritize like what you're going to put push back on what you're not. And we had a phenomenal class. I mean it was awesome. And it was. I mean, you joining our classes was one of my favorite stories of the whole thing. Man. With the Hell Week kickoff.
- [80:39]
Sean Ryan
Yeah. Yeah, that was, that was outstanding. Yeah, I got rolled because I failed the first phase exam. Genius move, Sean. But it all worked out.
- [80:49]
Leif Babin
Everything happens for a reason.
- [80:50]
Sean Ryan
It was an awesome class. And I do think my most memorable experience in BUDS with Leif Babin was the O course wrestling match. When I got a little too far out in front of my skis and challenged you to a wrestling match. Didn't come out on top, but dude.
- [81:12]
Leif Babin
That was so awesome. So we show up to the O course and we show up to the obstacle course. And if you don't know anything about the Buzz obstacle course, it's a notorious obstacle course. These things have been around for a long time. All these obstacles are named and before even CrossFit bit or these kind of high intensity, you know, interval training was even a thing. The O course was that, right? You're going to do seven or eight minutes of like max put out effort, you know, when you're done with that thing. And then you add the soft sand runs and you know, to the, to the demo pits and back, you know, that's a mile and a half down, mile and a half back, and then, and then, and then add a ruck, you know, ruck run, you know, in that soft sand on top of that for dirt phase. So we were out there for that evolution. And I can't remember what happened. Like our. Something got screwed up, the schedule got screwed up. I know I cleared the proctor, we were supposed to be there, but the instructors never showed up. And of course there's nothing worse than like bored bud students standing around. So somehow it started with these wrestling matches that were going on and we had some wrestlers in the class and people were calling each other out Like WWE Smackdown style. And I remember, like, I was just kind of, like, trying to stay above the fray, making sure, you know, because it's in the sand, we didn't want people's head hitting rocks or, you know, obviously at this point, you get injured, right? You're going to be rolled from the program and potentially don't even graduate. So I wanted to try to prevent that. I was trying to stay above the fray, and all of a sudden, you know, I got Sean out there. You, like, walked out in the middle. It looked like Apollo Creed from the Rocky movie. I want you. You. You were like, babbitt, I want you. And, like, just challenging me. I was like, okay, I guess I got. I got no choice here. So. Man, they, like, drew a ring in the sand like Kumite. We had a big rest of that, so that was awesome. I think it was probably more of a stalemate than anything, but. Yeah, yeah, I. I stuffed the tape. Yeah.
- [83:04]
Sean Ryan
I'm pretty sure you choked me out.
- [83:07]
Leif Babin
I think I just held you in place until it was like, okay, let's move on to the next. Everybody got bored. But, dude, you're. My favorite story from you was that Hell Week experience. Because, you know, we were. No one knows. It's kind of like combat, right? No one knows. Hell Week was. I think it was the fifth week for us going through first phase. So we've been in five weeks of indoc. We've already been at four weeks, you know, of first phase at that point. And I think we started our class. We started with 193 guys. And then I think we started with. I think we started hell week with 101 guys. So our automatically was just get. Already a bunch of people had quit, right? It's getting whittled down. And I remember those numbers well, because it was. So you're already losing a bunch of people in those first few weeks.
- [84:00]
Sean Ryan
Now, hold on. Let me just. I just. 193 guys at one one day or 193 guys in Indoc.
- [84:07]
Leif Babin
193 guys in Indochin, okay. Is what started with Bud's class. 241. That's what classed up, okay, the original class. Now, some of those guys left, others got rolled back in. You know, the numbers are kind of switched around. And by the time we were in, we were about to start Hell week. We had 101, so we'd already lost, you know, guys. A lot of guys had quit a bunch of, you know, injuries, things people enrolled, things like that. But you. You were a Brown Shirt rollback, which is like that, that coveted brown shirt was, was had to be awesome, right? You'd made it through Hell Week.
- [84:40]
Sean Ryan
And so if you don't remember right, they actually took our brown shirts and gave us the white shirt back.
- [84:45]
Leif Babin
Well, and I think that's what's. So I know people who, I know people who in the previous years have been given a chance, they screwed up something in Buzz, you know, in dive phase or third phase and were given a chance to go back and start day one and they're like, no thank you, I won't do it. They turned down a career in the SEAL teams because they were not willing to go back. And so once you've made it through hell, I mean Hell Week is close to combat as you're going to get. I mean it was designed by Draper Kaufman and his staff at Fort Pierce back in World War II for the naval combat demolition units that were hitting the beaches at Normandy and, and blowing up all the, these were the first waves at Omaha and Utah. And they were trying to create as much mayhem as possible for them. And so they tried to combine all this training down, weeks of training into just five continuous 24 hour days. These guys up all night, no sleep, explosions going off everywhere, chaos and mayhem. And just like combat, nobody knows how they're going to do until they get in that situation. And I remember just reading the Bible, having Bible study.
- [85:59]
Sean Ryan
You were having Bible study?
- [86:00]
Leif Babin
Totally, man and buds. Totally. Yeah.
- [86:03]
Sean Ryan
Wow.
- [86:03]
Leif Babin
Andrew, Paul and I on our team and several others, you know, we got issued those Bibles, those little buds Bibles that were, you know, niv translation and in the camo I still have that one man. And we were reading from Judges about the story of Gideon and the story of Gideon, who's this reluctant warrior. Like the angel of the Lord appears to Gideon and says, hey, you're going to go fight the Midianites. And Gideon's like, what are you talking about? I'm the least of my family. I'm not even the biggest and strongest guy in my whole family. You know, Midian is so much stronger, more powerful than Israel. Like what are you talking about? I can't do that. And the angel continually assures Gideon that and he says some translations it's, you know, was you are a mighty warrior and God is with you. And those are just such powerful words. You know, in some translations it's God is with you, mighty warrior. And it's, you know, Gideon is this reluctant warrior and of course he is empowered to. He calls out to Israel thousands of people come to the call. You know, he has thousands of Israelite warriors that have answered the call. And God says that's too many people aren't going to believe in the miracle of this. So he like whittles it down to just a few hundred and Gideon goes and destroys the Midianites with just a few hundred warriors, you know, through the power of God. And so it was. We were reading that verse and in fact, Andrew, Paul and I like during hell week, you know, when in the darkest hour, you know, like the second day, like Tuesday night, you know, and probably the largest number of quitters. I remember quoting that verse to Andrew, you know, him quoting to me like.
- [87:45]
Sean Ryan
It was in the middle of it.
- [87:47]
Leif Babin
In the middle of it, yeah, of like I said, I told him, you're a mighty warrior. God is with you now go get back under your boat. You know. So like those things are. Those verses were super powerful to make it through. But even then, like I'm nervous. Like I didn't sleep at all, man, prior to hell week. Like most people probably didn't. You probably didn't before your first hell week. And what's crazy is you guys at 2:40 had like the worst hell week of all. I remember it was like I was going into Seal Team 5 because I was tad there before we classed up. Actually, maybe I was already in indoc, I can't remember, but I was scraping the ice. I scraped the ice off of my windshield.
- [88:28]
Sean Ryan
That was 239.
- [88:29]
Leif Babin
The 239.
- [88:30]
Sean Ryan
I would love to take credit for that, but I can't. But that was class 230. Because I remember watching that and I was like, it's fucking snowing in San Diego right now and these guys are in the water. And I was like, holy shit. And I remember watching like all these badass guys just like quitting, quitting.
- [88:49]
Leif Babin
Okay. I guess that was just going well 240. You guys had a huge amount of guys that got pneumonia. I think it was a particularly miserable one. It certainly wasn't the June hell week that we had, which the water wasn't as cold, the weather was cold. That just meant we ran more, you know, but you'd. You definitely went through a tough hell week for sure in 240. And so when you got assigned to come back and that brown shirt. So you get a white shirt, you know, you got a white shirt, you make it through hell week, you get that brown shirt. I mean, this is a super coveted thing we're all looking at, you know, you and you know, the guys that have made it through of like, oh, man, man, those guys made it through Hell Week. And we're talking the vast majority of the 70 to 80% of the people that don't make it through training quit during Hell Week. And so when they took away your brown shirt and sent you back as a white shirt, and I just remember I was in awe, man, of the attitude that you had. You were like, all right, this is what it is. We're going to do it. And I'm going to go through this thing. I'm going to. To be a team player for 241. I'm going to tell them what I know. I'm going to support the team. And, you know, we're all nervous, man. We've been up, you know, for nights on end. Everyone's kind of freaking out. We're reading these Bible verses. They're trying to, like, strengthen each other. And right as they kick off, you know, they come into the tents and they have an amazing way. I think I hadn't slept for easy 24 hours prior to that. Just as I was able to kind of relax enough to, like, fall asleep, sleep for, you know, 10 minutes, right? They come in, all of a sudden, the blank fire is going off. They'll fit. Machine guns and grenade sims are being thrown. And. And I remember running out there and we had. We had instantly had quitters from the team that had been thinking about it. It got to their head, and they're. They're already ringing the bell within minutes, and we're running out to the grinder. We're running around, and I remember them calling you out by name and getting. And pulling you out of the class and then giving you your brown shirt back. And now you got the support. And it was one of the coolest things I ever saw, man, because there were so many people who would have been like, no way am I doing that. I just did. This is supposed to be the toughest military training in the world. You're going to make me go through it again. And that's what you were willing to do. And you were a team player the entire time. And then even as a brown shirt rollback, man, you were checking on us. You were looking at us, you're like, hey, guys. You know, you were just strengthening us, giving us some encouragement. It was freaking cool, man. And I remember later, you gave me some photos of all of us, just like, we look like just, you know, just disaster, like wet, sandy, all like, contorted on these swollen, you know, Three days in, when we get like our first chance to sleep for 45 minutes or an hour or whatever. And you know, but you're like taking photos for us, like just helping us out, looking out for us. And it was awesome, man. It was like the consummate team player and the person that's gonna put the mission first. And you were like, hey, they're telling me to do this. Cool. I'm gonna do it. And even you were willing to go into that with such a great attitude. And you could tell the instructor staff was like fired up by that and you know the respect and admiration that they had for you to be willing to do that. And you were like. Cause I don't how much you were. It wasn't immediate. Like, it was. I mean, you were running around the grinder.
- [92:03]
Sean Ryan
Yeah, we did the, I think we did the whole, we did the whole breakout. And then they, they, they called me and the other two gents out first. First serve Torture. Fabric by Gerber Life is term life insurance that you can get done right from your couch. And it can be done all online and on your schedule. You could be covered in under 10 minutes with no health exam required. Just go to meatfabric.com Sean that's meatfabric.com Sean. The New Year's here. And this is when I reevaluate all of my family's needs. My kids are another year older, so planning for my family's financial security is my top priority. Fabric provides me help with protecting my family. And fabric can help you too. Fabric has flexible policies that will fit your budget, like a million dollars in coverage for less than a dollar a day. There's absolutely no risk. They offer a 30 day money back guarantee and you can cancel at any time. Join me and the thousands of parents who trust fabric to protect their family. Apply today in just minutes@meatfabric.com Sean that's meatfabric.com Sean. Policies issued by Western Southern Life Assurance Company not available in certain states. Prices subject to underwriting and health questions. Even though I'm excited for the new administration, there's a lot of tension in the world. Russia, Ukraine, the border, inflation. Who knows what could happen next? Me, I'm not waiting around to find out. And I don't think you should either. Look, it's simple. I want you to go to seanlikesgold.com, you'll learn about my partners over at Gold co. They're a great precious metals company that I trust. They're one of the Top rated gold companies in the industry with impeccable customer service, and they support the show. And for my listeners, they're going to give you a free gold and silver kit where you can learn about how precious metals could help you protect your money. You could also get up to a 10% instant match in bonus silver on qualified orders. That extra 10% is a great way to get started. Plus it helps support the show. All you need to do is go to SeanLikesGold.com that's SeanLikesGold.com make sure you do everything in your power to help protect what's yours. Performance may vary. Consult with your tax attorney or financial professional before making an investment decision.
- [94:36]
Leif Babin
Yeah, so it was. We were probably 45 minutes or an hour of, like, solid, physical beat down at this point. You probably are 100% convinced that I was the entire next five days of.
- [94:47]
Sean Ryan
No sleep because Holcomb had actually told us, like, they're probably gonna pull you guys out. We're like. Like right before, and we're like, all right, whatever. And then I remember seeing him and break out, and I was like, they're not fucking pulling us out.
- [95:02]
Leif Babin
And like, he was just playing mind games with money. Yeah, yeah.
- [95:06]
Sean Ryan
But. Well, thank you for saying that, man. I will say, I think the thing that sticks out the most, and you were a great fucking leader, by the way. I really. I really looked up to you, you know, going through buds, and that means a lot, man. And I had a terrible mistake in third phase. Right before. Right before we were done on the island, I had an ad with a blank round and talk about a. One of the most humiliating experiences of my entire fucking life. And, yeah, I had an ad is an. Is an accidental discharge. And I just remember getting called out immediately. And I was like, man, we're like a week away from getting out of here and we're done, and I'm probably gonna get kicked out. And I don't know what the conversations were, you know, behind the scenes. I never asked, but I just. I always respected you for not making. For not making more of a thing out of it and. Cause it could, man. That's. That's, you know, when you make a mistake like that, it's. You feel like the entire world's crashing down, you know, And. And I've never even talked about it before, but I haven't thought about that.
- [96:34]
Leif Babin
In a long time.
- [96:34]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [96:35]
Leif Babin
And you know what, though, Sean? Like, to me, like, it was. Failure is the best teacher. And I think that those are the things that I can't imagine that that helped you as a shooter and as an operator, you know, as teaching tactics, you know, down the road, you know, those kind of lessons learned and the weight and pressure after all that you've been through, you know, weighing on you. But for, you know, you were always like exactly the kind of person that we wanted in the SEAL teams, right? Like exactly the kind of person I wanted. I remember at one point the instructor staff going through hell week saying like who's not performing in your boat crew? Like who's, you know, always, they're always trying to solicit like info and I'd always be like me, I'm not performing, you know, I wasn't going to throw guys on the bus or things like that. And then you. But you start to realize like, hey there, they, they want good people to serve in the SEAL teams. And if you don't want somebody, if you wouldn't want somebody on your platoon, you know, if you wouldn't want to, want to go to war with somebody, then that's like you owe it to the SEAL teams that like these guys should be weeding out the program, right? That's what the program is actually for. And so I think that was somebody like you were always an absolute standout performer. Always somebody put the team first. And I mean to me I don't think that was ever a question in any of the instructors minds and everything I could say positive about you was always said man, because you were a go getter, you got things done, you're smart, you're capable, you're talented, you're innovative, you're a hard worker, you're a physical put out guy all the time. And you absolutely the kind of guy that I wanted to serve the SEAL team with, that other seals you would want to serve with as well. And frankly my hat's off to you brother, because I was 26 years old, man, I was an old man. There were a couple guys, our leading petty officer and a couple of our non commissioned officers but man, I had 26 years of maturity experience. For you to do that as an 18 year old, to have the maturity to train and the discipline to actually train and to put out and to be able to make it to Turning Brook. I don't think I could have done that at 18 man. So I mean that's to me that's what I loved about the SEAL teams. It was always about the guys and the quality of the people that I got to serve with and guys like you, man. And that's what I Love most about buds is like, hey, we might be getting beat on this, might be physically punishing, but we could look at each other and just laugh about how ridiculous it is to just hit your situation was and, and, or how funny it was or how much we were actually suffering. And you know that, that, that's the best of the SEAL teams, man.
- [99:13]
Sean Ryan
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm with you, man. And, and you know, like I said, your reputation preceded you and, and went with you everywhere you went. And so moving out of buds, I mean, where did you, we all get a dream sheet? Where, where did you want to go? What team?
- [99:33]
Leif Babin
I wanted to be on the west coast, you know, just because I'd been stationed in San Diego. My friends were out there. Just, you know, I, I had spent some time on a ship during a midshipman cruise in Virginia beach and I just, I like San Diego. You know, I'd gotten to know it better and my closest friends were there. So I think I'd put West Coast SEAL teams and I got service elected or I say service selected. I got selected for, I was going to be sent to SEAL Team one and. Excuse me, so I got sent to SEAL Team one and I had orders to SEAL Team one and that was a problem for me because in their rotation, as you know, I put on lieutenant in buds and so I was already a senior guy. What that was going to do was I was going to start as a one, a one time platoon commander so I would have had, I wouldn't have been an assistant platoon commander under my belt. And that was a problem I was going to like instead of, you know, having a full workup cycle and deployment as an assistant platoon commander which would give me some experience in the SEAL teams and give me some perspective. I just didn't think that was good for me. It wasn't good for the SEAL teams. And so luckily I had some good friends. It was my same, my same friend that was at SEALs SEAL Team 5 and several other friends that were there. They went in and talked to the executive officer and commanding officer at Seal Team 5 and they pulled some strengths from me and got the D theater to cut me some new orders. So I went to seal Team 5 as an assistant Platoon commander. So even though I was a lieutenant.
- [101:05]
Sean Ryan
Man, I never thought of that.
- [101:06]
Leif Babin
I got a chance to be a platoon commander. It was the best thing that ever happened to me and I'm so thankful for my friends that were there, for the senior leaders that were there that pulled strings for me and made that happen. And and really opened some doors for me. So we got a, got a chance to go through and got a chance to serve with some of our, our mutual friends. Ellie Elliot, you know from our BUDS class who maybe Elliot may be the most senior, the most significantly wounded living SEAL like through the, the gwad era.
- [101:38]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [101:39]
Leif Babin
You know who got wounded Ramadi and tbi, you know and lost his leg wheelchair bound. Like significant injuries. But just an amazing guy, man and such an awesome dude and always love stories from buds. I pull strings to get him over to Seal Team 5 and try to stack that platoon he was coming out of, you know the 18 Delta Combat Medic course, Special Forces combat medic course and all our corps and went to. But it was, it was great to be there with Elliot some of the guys that were in, you know, classes just before us and behind us.
- [102:14]
Sean Ryan
We'll get into, we'll get into deployment cycles and everything that happened. But just real quick, I mean when you, when you pinned your trident on, you'd been passed up, you didn't get selected two different times. One in the academy, one a couple years after the academy, then you make it through straight with no hangups. I mean who was your first phone call when you passed BUDS when you got through?
- [102:42]
Leif Babin
My first phone call was to my dad. My dad mom who praying for me the whole time and knew that's what I wanted to do and just wanted to thank them for their love and support and all the prayers and that was, I think my dad since got, you know, disappeared but he had a voicemail for me after hell week that I called and left for him, you know too as well. But that was, it was a proud moment man. And getting that, getting that trident and you and I, you know, we didn't get pinned together because that was at SQT during the time. But I remember well, Ty woods who was you know our instructor at SEAL qualification training that it probably probably pinned your trident on the chest just like he did for me as well man that we later lost in begasse. He was an awesome guy. And yeah that, that, that blood penning ceremony was, was something that we, we had a full on Navy investigation on. I had to answer all these questions.
- [103:45]
Sean Ryan
And oh man, really?
- [103:46]
Leif Babin
Yeah. And they're like, you know this can't happen. This is hazing. And, and that's what they officer was like like doing an investigation and I was like, I was like, I was like I wasn't hazing. Like this is completely voluntary. This wasn't hazy in any way shape or form like I saw that, that, I saw that as a ritual that was like, this is what I wanted to be a part of. And so I asked him. The investigating officer was like, hey, did you, did you get your trident pin on? He was like, oh, it was a seal. Yeah. I was like, that was a different time. I was like, there was no hazing whatsoever took place. Yeah.
- [104:17]
Sean Ryan
Ah, that's awesome, man. That's awesome. Well, you know, I do have one other question. I had no idea you guys were studying the Bible on buds. And, you know, I think, I think, at least for me, faith in general kind of dissipated into nothing for, for a very long time until recently. And I'm just curious, did you, did that stick with you throughout your entire career?
- [104:44]
Leif Babin
Man, I've fallen so far, Sean. I've stumbled, you know, as much as anyone out there. And I'm glad I had the foundation, you know, built in me, I think. And by the way, man, you, you're, it's, I love that you share your faith with people. I think that's an incredible thing. I don't know how people who have been through dark times in their life make it through without faith, man. I, I, People ask me, how is it that you're doing okay? And I think knowing that there is a creator that's in charge of the universe, that has all things planned out and has a plan for each one of us, right? That to me is everything. And knowing that you can screw everything up and all you have to do is simply just ask for forgiveness and strive to follow the righteous path as best you can, knowing that we're all going to fall short of the mark. But that's all it takes. And I think that to me is everything. And I think, thank God, that was instilled in me at an early age. I didn't realize or fully appreciate that I went to the public school. I went to a private school at a small three room log cabin schoolhouse until I was in fifth grade. And then I went to public school in a small east Texas public school. And then before my junior, I transferred to a public school, or, I'm sorry, a private Catholic school in the bigger town of Beaumont that was about an hour away in southeast Texas. And so, you know, it was, the level of education there, I think was going to open some more opportunities for me. It was probably easier to get accepted into the Naval Academy as a result of that or one of the servers academies, but it wasn't until I started going to school and, you know, I was going to school in the Catholic school was outstanding school. We had a religious class every semester. And I was going to school with kids that had been in a religious class every from kindergarten on, you know, And I remember. So this is my junior year, and it's my first ever, like, religious class, because in public school, we didn't have that. But I went to, you know, Sunday school every Sunday with the First Baptist Church at Woodville. I was involved in the youth group, and we were constantly. My dad would study the Bible and talk about it at home. It was constantly something that we referenced and talked about. And so I remember the teacher in high school in this Monsignor Kelly high school asking, like, in the spiritual class there, like, what is. How did the Israelites get to Egypt? And I was like, you know, I just, I was kind of looking around the room. I was ready for somebody to jump in. And I was like, I was like. I just raised my hand and I thought. I talked about Joseph, the coat of many colors. And, you know, his brother sold him into slavery. And then, you know, he's. Which is an amazing story from the Bible, right? Joseph is sold into slavery by his brothers that are jealous of him. He, his brothers think he's dead. He goes to Egypt. Years later, there's a famine in the land of Canaan. His brothers bow down before him and are asking for food supplies. And what he says to him is that what you use for good, what you meant for evil, God chose to use for good. And so all the Israelites come and they start to become, you know, populace. In Egypt, they eventually slayed 400 years of slavery that results from that in Egypt until Moses leads them out. And I was kind of looking around the room, like, everyone knows the answer to that question. And afterward, people were like, dude, like, how did you know that? And I was like, I was, like, halfway paying attention in, like, Baptist Sunday school, you know, like, getting kicked out because I was bad and, you know, cutting up and punching people back in the head. But I realized, like, like studying the Bible was that there. That had been grained in me, that that's something my, my, my family did. That's something that we did in church and in my youth group, like, opening the word, studying the word. And I'm so thankful for that, that foundation that that was built in me. And there's times when I strayed very, very far, you know, from that. But I, I, I thank God that that always has brought me back to, like, the truth, right? Always understanding that there's forgiveness for anything and that all it takes is to recognize your own failures and flaws, that none of us are actually good enough to achieve righteousness on our own. And only through the blood of Jesus can we do that. And that's all it takes. So that to me is. I've shared that with many people when I talk about it. We don't need an openly secular organization, actually. But I think there's so many foundations that are biblically rooted, right? When it talks to being humble, I mean, you know, you can't study scripture and not realize like abject humility is like continually the theme. You know, the proud will be humbled and the humble will be exalted. And that's throughout the scripture, particularly in the New Testament. But I think the idea that if we got to take ownership of our problems, we're never going to actually be good enough. And that's what prevents us from achieving salvation. So I think to me, faith is everything. And I think having that foundation that's built in and study of the Word, I try to be like the Paul talks about the noble Bereans who after he would preach to them in the synagogue, would study the Word to see if these things were so. So right. You hear something in a sermon, you hear something from a pastor, you hear something from somebody in the world, we would actually search the Word, open up the Bible, study scripture, make sure that that actually is the truth and that it's open for any of us to study and know. But I just, you know, it's been really cool to hear about your spiritual journey and I thank you for sharing that because I think for so many people out there, they're trying to find some answer in the secular world. They're trying to find whether it's fame or fortune or money, power, followers on social media, whatever it may be. And they're never going to find that. We all know that that doesn't lead to happiness. And I think being grounded in that. By the way, have you ever been to the palace at Versailles? I don't think so. So the palace of Versailles. I got a chance to go to France this summer just before the 80th anniversary of the Normandy invasions.
- [111:21]
Sean Ryan
Oh man.
- [111:22]
Leif Babin
And I did a goruck event there. We did the 80 kilometer ruck, you know, about 50 miles. It was brutal, man, 19 hour, get some evolution. But awesome to do that with a goruck team. But we went to the palace of Versailles and my wife and I took our kids there and we had a nanny there that came and helped us with the kids and she did some great Reporting there. And the palace of Versailles is probably the greatest monument to the idea that money and power and fame and fortune cannot buy you happiness. It is the most magnificent place you could ever go. Like golden gates. And I mean, this was the seat of power, right, for the, you know, for the French kingdom from Louis xiv, who was the sun king at the height of France's power, one of the most powerful people in the entire world, all the way through Louis xvi, who eventually he and his wife, Marie Antoinette were led to the guillotine. And I think one of the reasons that happened is because I don't think they had a clue what was going on outside the palace, man. I think they're surrounded by people who. You can walk around these amazing gardens and this incredible, just ornate palace that would have just eclipsed its mindset. Blowing to think about the power and fame and fortune and influence and, you know, that was going on. This is the reality show, right? TV time that everybody wants to be a part of, and you just sense that it's probably the most miserable place you could be, right? You can't trust anybody. Everybody's got their agenda. Everyone's trying to, you know, to undermine the other. And it's, It's. I think it's just a living monument to that. I think it's worth going and worth seeing. Very interesting for that. But it's, again, just leading us back to the faith of, like, what buys you happiness, right? It's the proud will be humbled and the humble will be exalted. And only through recognizing my own failures, abject failures and flaws and weaknesses, can I actually find salvation through Jesus. And I hope that's something that others can turn to and, and, and see, because that is, that is how you. You find peace in this world.
- [113:30]
Sean Ryan
I'm not like extremely wealthy or anything, but it does, but, you know, I'm working towards it. And so doesn't the Bible say something like a rich man has like a.
- [113:43]
Leif Babin
It's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.
- [113:46]
Sean Ryan
Yeah. What do you think about that?
- [113:49]
Leif Babin
Yeah, these are. Those are great questions, man. I think Abraham was very wealthy. I had massive herds. So did Isaac, so did Jacob. Joseph became second only to Pharaoh in Egypt, you know, the most powerful empire of the time. You know, and the day. I think God, I mean, Job was, you know, was given tremendous wealth, right? That's one of the things that was taken away from him, that when Satan was trying to get him to curse God. So I think there's. I think God, I Think God gives us? I think as long as you remember that it belongs to God. It belongs to God. And so you can choose that to do good with it, you know, or you can choose it to be selfish with it. I think God has given you the means to, to help people. And, and I think I kind of like Dave Ramsey's take on it. You know that when you have like the, the. You can't help your. You can't help anybody else out, right? If you came to me and you're like, hey, Leif, I'm having trouble paying my bills and, you know, I might lose my house here if I can't pay my mortgage, and if I don't have my own finances in order, like, I can't help you. I can't do anything for you. So, like, I need to. If, if I have my finances in order, then I have the ability to actually have the means to help you. It enables me to help other people. So I think when it becomes the object of worship as like, no, no, I want more money. It's money for the sake of money. I think that's where it becomes a problem. And when you know that it's all man, it's all like, it's just all dust, right? You can't take any of it with you. I think when people kind of hold that up, it's like, this is what success looks like. I think you do have to be careful that it's. There is. You know, I think that Jesus talks about the Jewish culture of the day was like, hey, if. If someone was poor, well, that means that God, like, you know, they did something bad. If someone was rich, then God had blessed them, they did something good. And Jesus threw that on its head like that. Thinking is not true at all. In fact, when his disciples had asked him, you know, when he encountered a blind man, you know, who sinned, this man or his parents, and Jesus said, neither, this man is blind, so that God could be glorified. And then he healed him, you know. So, I mean, I think it's. It just throws out the idea that like, you know, bad things can happen to us at any time, right? All of this can be, you know, can be given and taken away. And I think as long as you use the means that are given to you for good, you know, to help those in need, to help others in need. And that's. I love what you're doing that man, with like the veterans advocacy groups and bringing people into the foot, like not working yourself, right? So you can actually help People and get them into the fold so they can get taken care of and get the benefits they deserve, you know, through the va. I just think. I think those things. Using the platform that you've been given for good, man, like, that's, That's. That's. You've been given this platform for a reason, man. God has placed you in that position for a reason. Yeah. And you. You can choose to use it for good or ill. Right. And. And when you share your faith with people, when you try to help those in need and try to actually reach out to those that are struggling you in hard times, like, you're using it for good, man. And that's what I think has been so awesome about seeing your success, man.
- [117:21]
Sean Ryan
Thank you. Yeah, it's just something. I don't know, man. I think about it all the time. Because. Because, you know, I want to set future generations of my family up to. That's how you don't get pushed around. You know what I mean? In my opinion is you create enough wealth to where you can't be fucking pushed around anymore. And that's like something that's really important to me. I just don't want to see you look. You see all these fucking families, and everybody's getting pushed around, man. Pushed around in their beliefs. You know, you see it and you see it everywhere. And. And it just, like, from the. I mean, it just looks like the people that don't get pushed around are the ones that work themselves up to be. To be wealthy so that they, you know, they. They can afford to, you know what I mean, pull their fucking kids out of school and put them over here and.
- [118:25]
Leif Babin
And I think there's definitely something to that, man. Right. I mean, if you. If you become un. Cancellable, you know.
- [118:31]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [118:32]
Leif Babin
Like, where somebody. Somebody. They're trying to put the pressure on you, you know, and you could say, like, well, I'm not gonna do that, you know, or, hey, I'm gonna. Oh, I. You. Yeah, that might be a big paycheck, but I'm not actually gonna take that sponsorship because I don't want you dictating what I get to say.
- [118:48]
Sean Ryan
I'm never. I'm never. I'm never fucking like that.
- [118:52]
Leif Babin
Well, I think that's what's been awesome, and that's what's driven the success of your show, man. I mean, there's no question in my mind about that. Like, you get to. You get to talk to people you want to talk to. You don't pull punches. You don't like, you Know, you say what you want to say. And I think. And not that you're not smart about it or professional about it, you know, but I think there's. I think the self censorship, man, that you were talking about with Joe, you know, on the Rogan, Joe Rogan experience was like, that's. That's the worst of all. Right. We're like, oh, I shouldn't say that because someone doesn't want to say that. I mean, I just think it's. I think that's the kind of thing where I think there's enough people pushing back on things now where that pendulum is starting to swing back, where people are like, yeah, we've had. We've had enough of that.
- [119:36]
Sean Ryan
Yeah, I think so too. I mean, is that something you think about, though, build. When you're building your business, the. The wealth stuff and what the Bible says about.
- [119:45]
Leif Babin
Totally, man.
- [119:47]
Sean Ryan
What was the passage again? The camel.
- [119:51]
Leif Babin
It's easier for a rich man to pass through the eye of a needle is the passage that Jesus talks about. Now there's some controversy about whether or not he's talking about an actual geographic place or an actual needle himself. And then he was asked about it. His disciples are asked about it, he says. He's saying it's not impossible. And there clearly are many, many, you know, many examples of wealthy people, including Joseph of Arimathea, who was a wealthy man, that Jesus was laid in his tomb. Nicodemus, who was one of the Pharisees. And Jesus called him the teacher in Israel in John, where he comes to Jesus by night and asked, like, you know, how do you get to heaven? You know, how do you be born again? And, and so those are things that these, these were, these were believers that were wealthy in positions of power and, and use their, their power for good, you know.
- [120:48]
Sean Ryan
Interesting. Yeah, it's just, you know, it's something I always think about. And I know Jesus is, you know, all about family. And so if the goal is to, you know, protect your family with it and everybody around you, then I just don't see how it could be bad. But, you know, I don't know. I get wrapped up in these little.
- [121:11]
Leif Babin
I struggle with it too, you know, as we started to gain some success as well. But I mean, the cool thing is, like, you as you're. You. I mean, you've got a growing business, right? You're. You're. You're employing people. Like, you're, you're creating livelihood for people. You're. I think that's. That's huge, man. That Builds our economy. And you're promoting the sponsors in those companies that employ people. I mean, those things all have huge impact. So you can't lose track of that. I think we live in a society where you kind of get demonized of success and you shouldn't be apologetic for it. I think you should be, again, confident, not cocky. Right? Confident knowing, like, hey, this is what I'm supposed to do. This is. God's given me the opportunity to do this. I'm gonna use this platform for good, and then I'm gonna help people in need. If I see someone in need, I can help them. Cool. I'm gonna absolutely help them, and I'm gonna use that, the means that I've been given for good. And I think also again, knowing that, like, ultimately our faith is not in money or savings or even our firearm stash. As much as I hate to admit that in our house, right. Our faith is in the almighty creator of the universe who's in charge of all things man. And even if he lost everything, right, like Job did, you know, he's still on the throne. He still has a plan. And that's where your faith lies, you.
- [122:29]
Sean Ryan
Know, So a lot of people looking for that right now. A lot of people looking for that. It's really, it's cool to see, you know, how many people are coming to the word, but. Well, Leif, let's take a break and when we come back, we'll pick up at Seal Team 5. A lot of us are trying to get our finances in order and to start the new year off right. There's some great news for homeowners. Interest rates have dropped. If you've been buried in high interest credit card debt, now's the time to break free. American Financing can help you access the cash in your home to pay off your high interest debt. Last year, their salary based mortgage consultants helped customers save an average of $800 a month. That's like giving yourself a $10,000 raise. What a way to start the new year. And if you start today, you may be able to delay two mortgage payments. Call American Financing today at 866-781-8900. That's 866-781-8900. Or go to americanfinancing.net SRS NMLS 182334 NMLSC O N S U M E 866-781-8900 for details about credit costs and terms. I know everybody out there has to be just as frustrated as I am when it comes to The BS and the rhetoric that the mainstream media continuously tries to force feed us. And I also know how frustrating it can be to try to find some type of a reliable news source. It's getting really hard to find the truth and what's going on in the country and in the world. And so one thing we've done here at Shawn Ryan show is we are developing our newsletter. And the first contributor to the newsletter that we have is a woman, former CIA targeter. Some of you may know her as Sarah Adams, call sign Superbad. She's made two different appearances here on the Sean Ryan show. And some of the stuff that she has uncovered and broke on this show is just absolutely mind blowing. And so I've asked her if she would contribute to the newsletter and give us a weekly intelligence brief. So it's gonna be all things terrorists. How terrorists are coming up through the southern border, how they're entering the country, how they're traveling, what these different terrorist organizations throughout the world are up to. And here's the best part. The newsletter is actually free. We're not gonna spam you. It's about one newsletter a week, maybe two, if we release two shows. The only other thing that's gonna be in there besides the intel brief is if we have a new product or something like that. But like I said, it's a free CIA intelligence brief. Sign up links in the description or in the comments. We'll see you in the newsletter. All right, Leif, we're back from the break you're getting into. You're getting ready to check into SEAL Team 5 as brand new guy, but in 03. And so let's just talk about, you know, what that experience was like checking in. Let's go to day one.
- [125:49]
Leif Babin
Yeah, it was awesome. Walk across the quarter deck there at Seal Team 5. And we were in the old kind of Quonset huts, you know, then. And we ended up building, like, a new building that was all kind of fancy. And some of those old Quonset hunts have been out there since The World War II, you know, underwater demolition team days. But it was awesome. I knew a bunch of people at Seal Team 5. It was great to be a new guy there. There was a bunch of pipe hitters there. There were people that were just. They had just come back. I checked in. In. We came back from Alaska, our winter warfare training trip, which I did in August of 2003, which was actually miserable. It was like 40 degrees and raining on us, you know, for a lot of the time. But we had a Great time up there. You know, on, on the, we, we awesome fishing. And we came back, excuse me, we came back from, from that and I immediately went on like an elk hunting trip with my dad and, and my brother. We went up to the mountain, Colorado and, and went and pursued some, some elk with our bows. Uh, and then I came in, I checked in as sealty five and the guys, a couple of people had just come back, but the team was deployed. So Iraq war had just kicked off and so Seal Team 5 had taken over from Team 3 that had done kind of the initial takedowns of the oil platforms off the coast. And then Seal Team 5 had really gotten in the mix with the DAS, the Direct Action missions, the capture kill raids. And they started using vehicles and jumping in, using those vehicles as like their mobility element. I think they initially had to borrow vehicles from the National Guard unit because we didn't have the capability in the SEAL teams at the time. And so that became like, I came back and the guys that were coming back from that deployment started trickling back in the fall were highly experienced. I mean they had more experience than any SEAL unit since Vietnam at that point. So it was really cool to learn from them and talk, talk about the real world experiences that they were, you know, that they were, they were getting. And, and it was just, just a lot of great mentors, a lot of open up notebooks and ask a lot of questions.
- [127:58]
Sean Ryan
So what, I mean, what was. It's just such a different experience than, you know, from what I experienced. I mean, you're, you're going especially going to Team five. I didn't know that they were the kind of the first ones out the door doing it and in Iraq. And so, you know, is a, as a lieutenant in 03, I mean, we've already discussed the fact that you were going to have to do a platoon commander, which means you're in charge of everyone in the platoon for those that are listening. And you were able to, you know, finagle your way into kind of an AOI or not kind of an AOIC slot is what it sounds like. So second in charge and your, you know, from your words, you're getting ready to lead men who have the most experience out of the entire SEAL team organization, all of Naval Special Warfare since Vietnam. I mean, what is that like for. To walk into that, you know, with, with, with. I mean a junior guy right out of sqt. I mean we basically, yeah, we're seals, buddy. We really don't know shit, you know, and we haven't really experienced anything other than training. And you got these guys coming back who you just mentioned capture, kill missions. They're getting after it.
- [129:20]
Leif Babin
It was very intimidating, man. When I graduated buds, you know, when you and I, you and I graduated BUDS together, you know, we felt like, hey, we just graduated buds. Like, you know, we're ready to go take on the world, right? Then you start going into sqt, so qualification training. You start getting some of the fundamentals of close quarters combat and land warfare and, you know, maritime operations. You realize, man, there's a lot I don't know. And then you start getting that first World Cup. You're like, I don't know anything. I know absolutely nothing. And then I deployed to combat. You know, I deployed to, to Iraq, and when I was leading my first combat missions, like, I know absolutely nothing at all. Like, it's even less than nothing. So it definitely was very humbling. It was cool though, because there was, you know, I think, just realizing that, like, hey, I can learn from these guys. Let me talk to them. Let me understand what they know. And I think everyone was trying to like, get in, you know, into the war effort. Everyone got a chance to, you know, everyone wanted a chance to go forward and be in the fight. And for me, like, right off the bat, our very first training block was, was the, our very first training block was the assaults block. And so we started going through and learning that and doing our close quarters combat. And then we did our visit board search in Caesar block shortly thereafter. That was. I had had a bunch of experience boarding ships as we talked about in the Persian Gulf. So I'd climb down these ships onto, you know, I'll climb down the, the Jacobs ladder, right, the rope ladder and the plastic rungs that you lower, you know, from the side of the ship. I've climbed up and down those things a thousand times. And in my very first VBSS training block, we're doing some hooking climbs from the 11 meter ribs, you know, from the, from the special boat team detachment that took us out. We're 13 miles off the coast of San Diego and we're boarding in the duty oiler, right? It's like 800 foot long US Navy service ship. This is the ship that, like the other that's refueling the, you know, the Navy warships and the carriers. And so we're 13 miles off the coast of San Diego and we're doing the hook and climbs, you know, climbing up that little caving ladder just as you've done. And I remember I was about to Walk off the the deck. I was like the first down on the ladder to climb back down onto the rib. And we had a guy that was driving the boat. They clearly had a new coxswain at the helm. Like he was. Somebody was having a tough time, you know. And you remember what it's like when you're climbing up that little, you know, paving ladder, right? You're getting your boat's going, you know, left and right, like, you know, are moving out, hauling out from the ship. Like it's treacherous as you're trying to climb up the 25 foot freeboard and you're bouncing up and down the waves. And so we kind of complained about it. You know, this guy can't drive the boat. And people were kind of complaining about it, but no one said anything. I didn't say anything. And so I'm about to climb down. So now the caving ladder. We climbed up, we cleared the ship, we took down the bridge. And so now we're gonna do another run. And they threw the Jacob's ladder over the side. This big, heavy, you know, rope ladder with the plastic rollers. This is now admin, right? We're just climbing down back onto the rib. So I'm climbing down this thing and right before I go, one of the trading detachment instructors that's running the train says, don't be scared, Bab. And he made some comment like that. I'm like, whatever, you know, I just like, I was like, man, I've done this a thousand times, dude. I walked out. So I get down to the bottom rung of the ladder, right? The water line. The waves are going up and down. The RIB comes in. As the rib's about to haul out from the side of the ship, I go to step on or as the RIB comes in, I'm about to go step onto the ship. And the RIB hauls out probably 10 or 12ft from the side of the ship. And I went right down in between the RIB of the ship. And it would have been fine if I had a positive flotation on. We went and did our dip test, the combat training tank. You know, just like we're supposed to be a positive flotation on, man. If not, I'd have been 2,000ft on the bottom, you know, off the coast of San Diego out there. But it was, I go, I got my leg wrapped up in the painter line.
- [133:28]
Sean Ryan
Oh.
- [133:29]
Leif Babin
So now I'm getting dragged upside down underwater by this 800 foot long vessel. And. And I mean, I didn't know what to do. I mean this was. They're going like 12 knots, which is a lot of pressure. You know, if you're underwater. The, the. And my leg is like suspended, but my body's like underwater. I got my helmet, body armor, you know, radio, all that stuff on me. Luckily we had a weapon shield shape, not a real weapon because I ditched that, you know, as soon as I could. I was trying to get to my, you know, my little scuba bottle, the he's bottle that got just ripped away by the force of the water. So I couldn't get to that. The RIB comes in and just. And, and they're trying to rescue me and they just smash me between the, the rib and the ship. And luckily I had, if I had. If I'd had a protech on a plastic helmet, I'd have been killed. Almost certainly would have smashed my head. Man. It. I had my Kevlar on and so the boat smashed my nose. It just kind of like filleted my nose open. But the rib realized they can't help me so they just kind of hauled off and they were sitting probably 200 yards off the, you know, off the Quarter. Just kind of just no one knew what to do. The guys on the ladder didn't know what to do. And I'm, you know, I'm trying to reach the water. Every time I tried to get my hand, I would just get ripped right back down by the force of the wave. So, so within probably, you know, it felt like an hour, right? It probably was two or three minutes. But I very quickly realized, like, I'm not going to survive this, man. This is over. Holy shit. And it just happened like that. And it was. I just remember thinking what a stupid way to go, man. This is so dumb. I've done this a thousand times. And luckily some, some heads up guys on the ladder, my teammates above me on the ladder, they realized, you know, climb back, they climbed back up the Jacob's ladder and everyone was kind of just wondering what to do. And they started. One guy was like, hey, let's haul this thing. And they started hauling it in by hand and they lifted me. I mean that was a massive feat of strength and very heads up, you know, for them to do because it was a contingency that they hadn't really even thought about. And so they started holding the ladder in and as it lifted me up out of the water, the painter rope popped free off my leg and I floated down the side of the ship. Damn. And I mean I could see just blood pouring down my Face the rib. So the rib driver let me to rib comes over to pick me up. I just float right down the side of the ship. I'm kind of in the stern wash, you know, as they come pick me up. And their faces were white. I mean, they were like eyes this big. I must have just looked.
- [136:03]
Sean Ryan
Probably thought you were dead.
- [136:04]
Leif Babin
Blood just pouring everywhere. And I. I probably looked especially crazy, Sean, because I had a gigantic smile on my face. I was laughing because I was so. I was so happy to be alive, man. And I did not think I was going to live through that. And I was. I was stoked. And actually, Elliot Miller was the corpsman on that. Man. Elliot treated me and. And was keeping pressure on my face. Took me to Balboa, you know, they got me stitched up. I sat out for another couple weeks till the stitches healed, you know, and.
- [136:32]
Sean Ryan
Damn.
- [136:33]
Leif Babin
Got her. Got our go platts on. Holy.
- [136:36]
Sean Ryan
Yes, dude. So how did you. How did you. How did you gain the respect of the. Of the guys, of the seasoned guys coming back from combat?
- [136:46]
Leif Babin
Man, I don't know if I did a great job. I'll tell you. I learned. I made a lot of mistakes. And, and as I said earlier, like, mistakes are the. The best teacher. And I think so many of the, you know, when you ask me, like, what are you looking for in a leader, humility is number one. Because I think so many of the mistakes that I made, particularly early on, were when I was really trying to prove myself, you know, when I was like, I need to show people that I'm a competent leader, and I need to show people that I know what I'm doing and I'm in charge of this or, you know, that. And I made all kinds of mistakes like that, you know, instead of. Actually, what you need to do is show people that you're humble. What you need to do is show people that you can listen. What you need to do is show people that you can lean on the most experienced people. We were lucky. We had a super squared away crew in. In our. In my first platoon, SEAL Team 5 Bravo Platoon, and, And they were awesome, man. Like, it was a great crew of guys. We had a stellar crew of new guys, and we had some. Some experienced guys that just come back from. From combat, and it was. And we had a. We had. We. We had a. Our platoon was. Was tough as nails, man, because our. Our. Our physical training coordinator was Dave Goggins, who was he all our training. And Dave is exactly who, who, who you see Dave today, man. It was, you could always tell our platoon because no one had any skin on their shins because we're constantly climbing ropes doing, you know, hundreds of pull ups and running like crazy. And he organized all the pts and it was good, man. It was a good time.
- [138:13]
Sean Ryan
I'll bet it was good with that guy wrote in it. Holy, man. Well, when did you find out? So you check into team five? We talked about that. When did you find out where you're deploying to?
- [138:28]
Leif Babin
We were all fighting to go to Chance, you know, to get a chance to go to Iraq. And we, we, we learned that we were going to get surged, you know, forward with. They were going to combine. We were going to be part of SEAL Team 3's deployment. So they took, they took some of the platoons from team five and split them up. And so the plan was to go half of that to Iraq and then half to the Pacific theater to run JSATs with our partners. So we knew we were going to go Iraq first of all. And then all of a sudden seals got handed the personal security detail mission for the top five interim Iraqi officials. I don't know. Did you get tied up in that for your first of all?
- [139:08]
Sean Ryan
We did. Well, not for my first one with, you know, we talked about my first one at breakfast when I went to Baghdad. We did, we were t. The whole team was tasked with it and we had a very, just a really cool OIC and I don't want to say his name because I don't know what he's doing nowadays. He might still be in, but he started farming us out to, he started farming us out to conventional units and who were having problems with the ID stuff going on. And so they sent us, he got us into all these different locations helping training and going on operations with conventional units, primarily army units. And we would do like a mini work up training course on sniper operations, take the guys out and then get rid of the problem, you know, kill the bad guys. And so I never had to do any PTs or PTs, PSD, personal security details in Iraq. Cause he had farmed us out.
- [140:23]
Leif Babin
That's awesome. Yeah, well, I can't tell you that. I mean having done a bunch of that on that first deployment for a few weeks and then on our second deployment to Ramadi, just seeing so much of that war was a defensive war. Right. For those guys that were. When the enemy's 70 to 80% of attacks are IEDs, roadside bombs, and when there's nothing to shoot back at and you don't even know who placed it there and you're losing guys and you're hauling your dead and wounded comrades out of the street. There was nothing, I think, more powerful for a morale booster than for those conventional units that know the soldiers and marines that were out there in the streets running those convoys, knowing that they had frog men on the high ground, snipers that were, had their backs and were covering for them so they could move. I think it was phenomenal to be able to do that and support those guys. And I think it was just game changer. Now if you think about every bad guy, you eliminated more soldiers and Marines are coming home to their families as a result. And I don't think we did near enough of it. And some of the people that criticized us later of like, that's not a special operations mission. I was like, man, you don't know what you're talking about, man. These are Americans that are getting killed. Whatever we can do to try to help win this thing and help more of them come home with their families is what we're going to do.
- [141:47]
Sean Ryan
It was awesome, man. I mean, you know, not only the operations that we did, but we ran into and several of these. I've talked about this before and a lot of the guys that, a lot of the conventional guys that we worked with emailed in saying, hey, I was the 18 year old that got that kill that day or thanking us. And we ran into, I think it was, I think it was the 10th Mountain guys that we worked with. They were the first ones we got CO located with and we ran and they were the last ones that we saw. We ran into them at the chow hall at the end of the deployment and one of the sniper teams that we had trained and taken out came up and they were like, hey, we've killed X amount of, you know, more bad guys. We have not had any casualties since you guys put us through that. And we just want to, like, all of our equipment's different. They've changed everything. They took all the recommendations that we had and implemented just about everything. And it was just cool to see, man, like the impact after you're gone, you know, like we went there, these guys were getting blown up like every day. We killed the guys in the first 12 hours, I think, and then moved on to the next unit and ended like to run into those guys three or four months later, whatever it was, and to see them still doing the job effectively, probably even more effectively, and taking zero casualties when they were every other day, I was like, it's just fucking cool, man. You know, I mean, dude, I mean, how many, how many guys are still walking around today that would have been killed had we not gone there and trained with them? And then they have kids and their kids will have kids. I mean, you're, when you, when that kind of shit happens, like, you're not just saving a life, it's an entire fucking line of lineage, you know, that is going to be roaming the earth because 16 guys from a SEAL platoon went and trained with that unit and brought them on a real world operation. And it's cool to think about, you know.
- [144:19]
Leif Babin
That's awesome, man. That's outstanding. And I think you sometimes, you know, when you, when you think what it's all about and like, you know, all this loss of life and, and friends that we lost and families have been destroyed in the wake of it, and even those guys that are seriously wounded as well, right? Lives are changed and altered forever. It's really good to remember that, man. It's good to remember the impact of that. I think it's a little bit like that. It's kind of like It's a Wonderful Life with George Bailey there and getting a chance to see what it would have been like if you didn't do that stuff. And I think it's a good reminder, man, of the impact that it has and it's so much bigger than us. For me, I was going to do everything in my power always to help try to bring as many Americans home as we could, do everything we could to do as much damage to the enemy as we could. And I think that's just an obligation that we all have. And so for me, like, it was, I was, I was lucky enough, we got assigned that, that security detail mission and the team right before us had been given it. And man, that was, that was not what we wanted, as you remember. But I think Blackwater came in with like a, a bid. It was like $100 million per, you know, per guy. And the Bush administration said, negative, that's too expensive. Seals, you got it. But I think the seeing that like, you know, two of those guys have been assassinated, you know, in the months prior to the SEAL teams taking over it. And so when this is like a no fail mission, we have to keep these five interim Iraqi government officials alive. I love one of the guys that passed down to me, you know, for the previous SEAL team said, you know, we know there's bad guys looking at us. We know they're going to try to, you know, they're going to try to take us out at some Point our whole goal is just to make them say, not today, not today. They look at us, not today, and we're going to be, you know, we're going to be a hard target. They're going to look at us, not today. We'll try somewhere else. We'll go hit some softer target somewhere. And I thought that was something that always stuck with me. And the SEALs did that amazingly well. I kept all those guys alive. It was frustrating for me. I got to go out with a detail every once in a while, but most of the time I was assigned to the tactical operations Center. So I'm in there as the liaison officer, you know, just tracking their movements and kind of setting up their logistics. Not what I wanted to do, but it was a job that needed to be done. And I felt like I was probably the best guy, you know, to be able to do it for my platoon and help them and support them. Learned a ton about passing information back to the talk and how they can best support you. And luckily I had a great executive officer who sent me out. He tasked 12 of us, bunch of us from, you know, from Seal Team 5, Seal Team 8. Got a chance to go, go and be a part of some sniper operations up at Samara, supporting the Big Red one. 1st Infantry Division up there, you know, didn't see a lot of com. Got shot at a few times. Kind of small little teams kind of, you know, going through the city, little four, six man teams and climbing up on rooftops and trying to do the sneaky drop. Messed up. It was pretty fun. You know, we engaged a few guys. I think we had one confirmed kill from that and, you know, a few problems, but we definitely disrupted the IDs that were being laid and the mines were being put in the street. And it also gave me an appreciation. You know, obviously I love the SEAL teams, man, and I'm so proud of the training that we went through and the guys that we served with. But when I flew up to Samarra and it was funny because we left Baghdad, we had 12 guys with us. It was like 82 degrees on the tarmac in Baghdad. We land in Samarra after a couple other stops, it's nighttime. It was 39 degrees. I had five guys with no warmies. Yeah, bad. And it was like, so we're trying to piece together this stuff. We're living in this burned out building and I didn't realize our guys are complaining about Baghdad and they're eating at the Al Rashid, you know, hotel with ice sculptures and stuff and I remember jumping in a, you know, we're rolling around these up armored vehicles and, you know, and it was a lot of times in and out of the Green Zone, obviously there was dangers. I mean, people were trying to attack the guys. I'm not saying the risks were limited, but I remember sitting in the cab of a big, like five ton truck. There's like, you know, quarter inch steel plates welded on the back. They didn't have doors. Wars on the cab. It was an Arkansas National Guard unit. And they're giving us a ride from the airfield over to like in, in the, in the, the downtown city center where there's an ODA team. We were gonna stay with them. And I'm talking to this, this, you know, Arkansas National Guard soldier. I was like, man, he's kind of hanging it out up here. I know. He's like, oh, man, this baby, I've been. He's like, this baby's eating about 14 RPGs at this point. Yeah, she's my good luck charm. And I was just like, man. And here we are, these dudes are out here roughing it, right? They're in the fight, they're getting attacked all the time. They don't have near the equipment that we have, they don't have near the training that we have. And that to me was like, I'm gonna do everything I can to help every American that's on the ground here in every way that I possibly can.
- [149:36]
Sean Ryan
Yeah, I thought you were gonna say, he looked at you and said, I'm not the one hanging it out. That's your vehicle. But yeah, it was pretty bare bones there at the beginning. But when did Elliot get hurt? Was it this platoon?
- [149:55]
Leif Babin
It was the next platoon, so he stayed in that same platoon. I rotated to a different platoon in Seal Team 3. We ended up getting rotated out of Iraq. So we went up to Samarra for three weeks, then we came back, did our turnover, and then we did the relief in place between the squadrons. And so we got sent to the Pacific theater. So we went around doing the J sets with the Royal Thai seals and the Republic of Korea seals, and. Excuse me, we spent a little time in Okinawa. I got to see a different theater, got to train a little bit, spent most time in Guam surfing and partying and basically we just trained like mad men the whole time and got in really good shape and were itching for a chance to go back. So I came back with Seal Team 5. And luckily my commanding officer at Seal Team 5 at the time, he said, you're going to Seal Team 3. And I was so pissed about that, Sean. Like, I was like, really? These are my guys. I want to take over this platoon. I want to be their platoon commander. And he was detached from this, and he said, look, you're already senior. It's important that you'll be six months ahead in the workup cycle that you deploy so that you'll be eligible for promotion down the road and that this is best for your career path. And I was like. I pitched a fit about it, man. I was like, are you kidding me? I was the kind of the argumented pushback type. And he was like, nope, it's happening. You're going to Seal Team 3. And thank God he did that, man, because I love those guys at Seal Team 5. They were awesome and still some of my closest friends in the world. And they relieved us in Ramadi. But thank God I got a chance to go serve in Tascina Bruiser in Seal Team 3. And so I showed up at the end of that deployment. I came back, did a little, you know, got a little bit of a leave, and then went straight to Seal Team 3. Checked in as the platoon commander. Got assigned as Charlie Platoon. We heard about this guy, Jocko Willink, who was our. Our task unit commander. He was in charge. And I had heard about Jocko. I'd never seen Jocko. I didn't know anything about Jocko.
- [152:02]
Sean Ryan
What did you hear about him?
- [152:03]
Leif Babin
I heard he was pretty intense. I heard he was a. My platoon chief. Tony Efrati was phenomenal, phenomenal seal, and I think probably one of the best SEAL chiefs that. One of the best platoon chiefs that the SEAL teams has ever produced.
- [152:22]
Sean Ryan
No kidding.
- [152:23]
Leif Babin
Like, phenomenal battlefield leader.
- [152:25]
Sean Ryan
Wow.
- [152:25]
Leif Babin
I'm talking like, hey, we're taking massive fire from that building across the street. Give me two guys on. On me. Let's go.
- [152:31]
Sean Ryan
Wow.
- [152:32]
Leif Babin
And he is absolutely the guy that you want in a gunfight, you know, And. And so he was like. He was like, you know, he had a reputation. Tony. Everyone loved Tony. Been around for a long time, and. And he'd been busted down, like, you know, multiple times or, you know, shenanigans, and, you know, just old school, you know, teams. Teams. And so here he is at the platoon chief. He's like. He's like, trust me, Jocko is the one guy that we want as our task to commander. I was like, all right. And then when. So when Jocko had been the admiral's aide, so he got assigned as the admiral's aide, and he gets he comes over, and when I met him for the first time, you know, Seth Stone, our brother from. You know, from buds, he was the Delt platoon commander. So we. We were platoon commanders together. We had a bunch of guys from our BUDS class in there, you know, as well. I knew a ton of these guys. I've been deployed with Seal Team 3 just before this. So I. I got to meet Chris Kyle and. And some of the other guys. You know, just. Just prior to that, they'd been in Baghdad doing a bunch of sniper ops on, you know, Haifa street and supporting the Fallujah offensive, you know, that went down while we were. While we were deployed, you know, in. In the fall of 2004. And so now we're here in the spring of 2005, standing this the up the Task unit. And so Jocko shows up, and I was like, man, this dude looks like an axe murderer. He doesn't smile at us. He just walks up, like, just mean mugs like, hi, I'm Jocko. Like, no smile whatsoever. And, like, just walks away. And, dude, you remember Stoner? Like, you know, who's. Who's emotional. God, man, I love Stoner so much. And he was like, that dude hates me, man. I can see it. You know, he's like. And. And. And. And I. I was like, hey, man, listen, I hear he's the guy that we want. I was like, let's. We knew he trained jiu jitsu. You know, we knew he just got his black belt. You know, he's a big jiu jitsu guy. Like, we knew he had a ton of operations. You know, he'd come from Seal Team 7 as a platoon commander. He had a bunch of operations that. That he'd done. And so he probably had as much experience as anybody in the teams at that point. And so I was like, hey, man, come on, let's just. Let's work hard. Let's train jiu jitsu, you know, and after a couple months, like, Steph and Jocko ended up being, like, super close friends. In fact, I think, you know, it was. Seth was probably the little brother that Jocko never had, you know, to Jocko, But Jocko was like. He set the tone for our entire casket. We had an awesome crew of pipe hitters, in there, man. They were excellent. They were just coming back from a rap. A lot of experience, you know, Chris Kyle was our lead cyber appointment, man, and. And he had a ton of experience coming from Fallujah, coming from Haifa street, some of the other places in. In Baghdad, and then the New guys that we got in were, were studs too, man. You know, we sent them to schools. It was an awesome team. And. But Jocko really set the tone for our entire team. And, and of like, hey, right away he was like, right away he was like, we're not tasking a Bravo, we're tasking a Bruiser. Interesting. So, you know, we had three task units. A, B, C, right. Alpha, Bravo, Charlie in the phonetic Alphabet. And I was like, I thought that was weird for like 24 hours, like tasking a bruiser. And then like 24 hours later we're like, bru, Task Unit Bruiser. So like, it was actually, I learned later this is something that he got from a book called by a US Army a retired colonel named David Hackworth called the Bout Face. And if you haven't read this book, it is a phenomenal, phenomenal book. Hackworth joined the army when he was a private. He lied on his paperwork, enlisted when he was 17 to try to make it into World War II. Just missed World War II, but was brought up through the ranks, as I'd learned from all his mentors who, who had just defeated the Germans and Japanese in World War II. And then he served in Korea and was eventually commissioned as an officer. Made it up to Colonel. Multiple deployments to Korea, multiple deployments to Vietnam. I think he was the. When he died, he died in the early 2000s, I think it might have been while we were deployed to Iraq that first time. And I think he was the highest, the most decorated living soldier at the time. Wow. I'm in like crazy, crazy awards, but like, they call him like Mr. Infantry. And so much of. He changed the names of his units. Interesting to give them like a personality.
- [157:04]
Sean Ryan
So, you know, I'm gonna, I'm just gonna. Task Unit Bruiser is like a legendary unit. And you just, you don't hear, look, there's no other task unit that has a call sign that I'm aware of. You hear people talk about tasking a Bruiser all over the place. I don't know a whole lot about it other than the reputation. But I mean, it seems like you guys have really created or did create like some type of very strong culture in that platoon.
- [157:48]
Leif Babin
The culture was massively strong, you know, in our platoon, Charlie Platoon and Delta Platoon, Seth's Platoon, you know, and the entire task unit. And, you know, there's two 60 man SEAL platoons and a five man headquarters helmet that Jocko was in charge of that we started out with. And he set the tone right from the beginning, like we're tasking a bruiser. We're harder than everybody else. We're going to train harder than everybody else. We're going to be ready for the worst case scenarios on the battlefield. And that was the culture of our team. And what's interesting about Jocko is you look at him and he's got this super stern kind of look to him. But he actually. And even though he didn't smile at us for the first couple months that we weren't together, in fact, the first time we were all training Jiu Jitsu, we'd come in at 5 o'clock in the morning train Jiu Jitsu, he'd lay mats out in the high bay. At Seal Team 3, it was mandatory for all the officers and we had a bunch of enlisted guys that would come in to train too. And you could tell us at officers call, you know, the morning meeting, because you'd say, you know, if you said like, hey, Leif, Ray, Seth, like, everyone would kind of turn their head, like their whole body because their necks are all like jacked up. Because we're like cranking on each other and hurting each other and everyone's going just full bore, level 19 Berserker mode. But the first time that I realized that Jocko was like, actually, you know, not super serious all the time, like, I'm demo. He's like demoing a Jiu jitsu move at 5 o'clock in the morning. We're in the high bay. He's like, he's like, Batman, get over here. You know, he's like, grab my hand. Yeah, my other hand, my other hand. And he's like, bow to your sensei. Bow to your sensei. And I'm like, wait, that's Napoleon Dynam. He's quoting Rex Kwondo from Napoleon Dynamo. But he's doing it with a straight face and he's not like, he doesn't even smile. And I'm like, okay, this dude's joking around. So, like, that was the first time I got to see, you know, Jocko, who's totally, like, totally jokes around, you know, like, and is obviously professional when he needs to. But what I think what Jocko did for us was I think channel like aggression and guys that wanted to go get after it into like, he, he, he really taught me to be what we call, and I call the silent leader. That that's what good leadership looks like. Like, you would look at someone like Jocko and think, Jocko's in charge. Jocko's a Prior enlisted SEAL. Jocko's got more common experience than, you know, anybody else here. So he's going to dictate everything and run everything and tell you what to do. And he did the complete opposite. It was, he said, hey, here's the goal. Why don't you come up with a plan and tell me how you want to do it.
- [160:10]
Sean Ryan
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- [161:05]
Leif Babin
Was the first time that I saw like we'd roll out on operations. Well, he doesn't, he doesn't say anything. He's letting the team run it. So I realized that's what I need to do as a leader, is let my team step up and lead. And so when my team is leading now, I can look up and out, right? Every leader should be trying to look up and out down the road. So instead of me solving the immediate tactical problem, I'm thinking about the next step or the next step or the next step. Beyond that, you're thinking about the long term strategic problems down the road. And that's what every leader should be trying to do. And Jocko also, he used what we call the indirect approach, which is, you know, instead of saying, hey, listen, you know, I had one platoon under my belt, didn't really have, I had a handful of combat operations. I had zero DA missions, right. Capture kill raids. At that point. Zero. Seth had done a couple of them. You know, I'd done a handful of sniper operations. Well, I didn't have any, I didn't really have any experience. And you know, but instead of, instead of saying, you know, for us, when the training detachment instructors who obviously drive a very high standard A performance when they would say things like, hey, you guys are good to go. You met the standard. You know, we're out here at land warfare. Okay, your patrol is good to go. Hey, your, your immediate action drills when react to contract and you know those, those are good to go. Hey, you guys can take it back to the camp instead of Jocko saying like, you knuckleheads aren't as good as you think you are. Combat's harder than you think it is. You know, we're going to keep pushing the standard even higher. We're going to do this again. He actually, he actually just called us over over and he said, hey, Leif Stoner, do you think we're ready for the worst case scenario on the battlefield? And we like looked at each other and we're like, no, man, no, let's do another run. Let's do another run. After that, let's do three more runs. And it was us doing it. If we'd have said yes, he would have been cool. Sounds good. Let's go back to the camp. But he just, he would ask us an earnest question, right? A question that he wanted the answer to and let us reveal the truth of ourselves. And I think it's such a powerful leadership concept. Instead of, this works on your kids, this works with your spouse, with members of your community, with your team at work, anywhere in life when you can ask someone a question and allow them to reveal the truth to themselves instead of trying to just bash them over the head with the truth. Because what good is telling people the truth if they don't listen? But when you can ask someone a question like that, now it's not Jocko saying do two more runs and everyone's complaining about it. It's actually me saying we needed two more runs so that we were ready for that worst case scenario. Talking that over with my platoon so they understand it as well. And I think that was the kind of culture that became part of the team of like, hey, we have to be ready for the absolute worst case scenario that we might come up against. And so I think that was, it was a culture of always striving to do better. And immediately I think what set our task unit apart was in my previous task, it was kind of like most SEAL task units where we had some really talented people, we had some experienced people, we did some things well, we did some things not so well. But the things that we didn't do well when training detachment would say, hey, you should improve on this. There was pushback. We were kind of Like, I'd like to see them do better. We're good to go. We'll play the game and just get through this and get overseas. And in tasking a bruiser wasn't like that. We were our own harshest critic. It was really critiquing ourselves. And when these training instructors said, hey, look, your headcounts are taking too long. You need to figure out a way to be more efficient, we're like, absolutely, let's figure this out. Let's work on that. And we were our own harshest critic. We were always trying to get better and improve all the time. And that became the culture of the team, whether you're a brand new guy that was trying to contribute in some way to managing your fire team, all the way up to me as the platoon commander, to Jocko as the Cascade commander, and figuring out ways to be more efficient and effective all the time. And I think that's the strength of the SEAL teams is always that innovation, always trying to get better in what we're trying to do, always trying to improve and seeking inputs from everybody, no matter if they're in a leadership position or if they're simply just a shooter who's in charge of just themselves and their piece of the mission. I think when that becomes the culture of the team, that makes all the difference. You've got a team that's constantly improving, constantly learning, constantly growing. We made all kinds of mistakes in tasking a bruiser. We screwed all kinds of stuff up, but we learned from those mistakes and we would implement solutions to try to fix them and prevent them from happening going forward.
- [165:37]
Sean Ryan
I mean, are we ready for the worst case scenario? That is a. That's a tough question. Was there ever a yes?
- [165:49]
Leif Babin
I don't think so. I think we were honest enough with ourselves, right? To know, like, hey, man, I've never been in the worst case scenario. So are you ready for it? Like, are you going to be ready for it? And I think, you know, when you show up to something and you're overtrained, like, hey, we didn't need to train that hard. Cool. It's easy, you know, it's easy. Like, that's no fact. Like, that's what you want it to be, you know, if you can make training harder than actual combat, like, that's. That's the way. That's awesome. That's ideal, you know, and that's one of the lessons that we brought back to Ramadi, you know, with us, you know, after we deployed. If you'd asked me if you'd asked me as young lieutenant Leif Babin, Charlie platoon commander and tasking and bruiser, hey Leif, are you going to be in, you know, do you think you'll get in a blue on blue like friendly fire situation? Man, I told you, like that happens to losers who don't know how to plan, execute missions. And you know the book Extreme Ownership, like that's chapter one. That's chapter one. The very first major combat operation that I was a part of, massive blue on blue, massive blue on blue issue. And you know we talked about before like the idea that like we had to, if we didn't take extreme measures to mitigate the risk of that happening, like it was absolutely going to happen, particularly in the urban environment where there's, it's confusing with so many different units that are out there, particularly with our SEAL snipers that were going out under cover of darkness beyond the forward line of advance and you've got, you know, US tanks and Humvees and units that are coming into an enemy held area area and they're getting shot at by enemy fighters. Just the idea that that is absolutely going to happen unless you take massive steps to mitigate the risk of it happening. And it was just one of those things where I just realized combat is so much harder than I thought it was ever going to be. And those things can happen so much easier than you ever thought it could be. And once you're in it, you can't just peek your head if you're taking effective fireman. You can't just peek your head up over the wall and say, hey, who's shooting at us? You know, like your head's going to be gone. That's going to be the end of you. So if you're getting suppressed, man, that's all you can do, you know, and I think it's, you know, we had such a close call in that first situation where we had about that whole squad of my guys on that operation.
- [168:13]
Sean Ryan
Let's rewind real quick. So this is your first operation. That was the first operation, first kinetic operation of the deployment. Let's just walk. What were you guys doing? What was the op?
- [168:26]
Leif Babin
Yeah, if you will, maybe it's better to back up to talk about what it was like to arrive in Ramadi and start there. When we thought we were going to go work with the ICTF in Baghdad and do this high speed Iraqi commando unit that probably had the most training of any Iraqi unit out there. And that's what we thought we were going to do. We're going to go do these kinetic operations. It was going to be super fun. We were excited about it. Everyone left to go on pre deployment leave. And while we were on pre deployment leave, we got a change of orders. They decided to consolidate the two different squadrons that were deploying. And we found out we're going to Ramadi. So at the time, Ramadi was just a violent hellhole. I mean, it was a city of 400,000 people. It's the capital of Anbar province, and it's a fraction of the size of bag. I think the whole greater area of Baghdad had something like two and a half or three million people. In Baghdad, there would be more significant attacks or enemy attacks that happened in and around the city of Ramadi, this small city of 400,000 people just a few miles across the city center. There would be as many or more attacks in Ramadi on a daily basis.
- [169:46]
Sean Ryan
If there were, why was Ramadi such a strategic location?
- [169:51]
Leif Babin
I think it was after the. It was in the heart of the Sunni triangle, right? And it was the largest. It's the capital of Anbar Province, which is the Sunni capital. So this is where the. Saddam's kind of base of support and operations were. So I think there was a lot of support for Saddam and the insurgency that came out of there. I think after the Marines smashed Fallujah in 2004, many of the fighters that were there fled and went to Ramadi. And So from late 2004 into 2005, Ramadi was just really the most violent place in Iraq. Zarqawi, you know, who was the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq at the time, had declared that Ramadi was the capital of his caliphate and he was going to establish the capital there. In Ramadi, there was something like three to five thousand insurgent fighters that controlled most of the city. And when we arrived In April of 2006, it was, man, it was. I think I landed on the ground. It was like April 3, 2006. It was. It was instantly, it was apparent that this was a very different deployment than the one I'd been on previously. And I've been hearing about Ramadi. You'd hear every day in the news. You'd hear three U.S. soldiers killed in Anbar province, or two Marines wounded in Anbar Province. And most of those were coming in and around the city of Ramadi. I think Anbar Province was accounting for something like 70% of US casualties in Iraq at the time throughout most of 2005 and 2006. And most of those were coming in around Ramadi. So it was. It was just a violent terrorist stronghold. And when we got. When we arrived there, right away, I mean, even in Baghdad, like, there's. You're flying around in a helicopter and, you know, like, if you flew over Ramadi in the daytime, like, you're getting shot down out of the sky. Like, no one was doing that. Yeah. So it was like vehicle convoys. And it was. Every single week, there were memorial services going on at the camp. There were U.S. marines and soldiers getting wounded or killed almost every day. Damn. Almost every day. And multiple times, I remember there would be a call of the loudspeaker for a mass blood drive, you know, come give blood, you know, for a mass casualty situation that was happening. I mean, there were people killed on base in the chow hall with mortar, sitting the base, you know, before he even left the base. And when we were driving. So the seals were working out of a place they call Shark Base. It was like an old, like, Republican Guard effort. And after Mark Lee was killed, we renamed it Camp Mark Lee, but it was kind of on the edge of Ramadi, like, right on the Euphrates river. And. And in order to get there, you had to try to drive off the main camp. And it was still kind of behind the walls of the camp. But there was a. You would drive through what they called the vehicle graveyard. And the vehicle graveyard was, you know, these vehicles that would hit, IDs, Humvees, tanks, Bradley Fighting vehicles. They would drag these twisted, burnt hulks and just. They would just leave them out here in this kind of. You know, it was just kind of a. Kind of a junkyard area. And, man, it was a powerful reminder of what was out there waiting for you every time. But you're going. You're going to. You're driving past that every single time you're launching on an operation, driving through that vehicle graveyard and just knowing that those twisted, charred hulks of metal that used to be a vehicle, you know, almost all those had, you know, soldiers or Marines that were killed or wounded in them. And then the gates were like. It was a M88, which is like a. It's basically like a tow truck for tanks. I mean, these things weigh, you know, A tank weighs 70 tons, you know, an M1 Abrams tank. And that's what they had blocking the gate because it was such a threat of like a, you know, massive IED threat coming in, and people would be attacking the camp. And I've been on the ground for probably about a week there. We turned over with a crew from Seal Team 2. Outstanding crew there. And they had built awesome relationships. They trained a bunch of the Iraqi units and they were doing a ton of operations. But it was kind of mostly on the outskirts of the city because there was no US presence inside the city except for the Marine bases that controlled. And the 101st Airborne. First, the 506th Battalion that controlled Task force Red Curry controlled the eastern part of the city. And the Marines from three airborne Marines controlled the main route to the city that was called route Michigan. And about every kilometer the Marines had a base there. And even still, even though we controlled that road, that road throughout our six month deployment there was overwhelmingly the most heavily attacked road in all of Iraq. It had 7 to 10 IEDs on average in any 24 hour period. This is a road that we controlled. So, so like US forces control that road. Every kilometer there's a Marine or army checkpoint. And so I mean it was just, it was non stop, you know, combat that was going on all the time. Nasty. When we showed up, I was just in awe of the soldiers and Marines that were there and the fight. There was a National Guard unit that was on the ground and seeing these National Guard, you know, the National Guard, man, they don't have, they have a fraction of the training and equipment that we have. This was the 228, the 2nd Brigade, 28th Infantry Division, the Iron Soldiers based out of Pennsylvania. And they had National Guard from really all over. They had some Utah National Guard and Vermont National Guard, Pennsylvania National Guard. And these guys had, you know, they're part time soldiers and many of them had been on the ground for over a year at that point. And I mean these guys were hardened combat warriors. And sometimes they'd, I'd show up and, and the SEAL team too, you know, would introduce us and, and they'd, you know, they'd look at us in our high speed little 10 inch barrel M4s and our gear and you know, we had better night vision and lasers and stuff like that. And they're looking back at us like, like oh man, look at, look at that. Look at the seals they've got, you know these guys have all this cool gadgetry and I, I just, you know, for me Sean, I was like man, this National Guard soldiers, you know, who's probably 19 years old has fired more rounds through his weapon in his year here than all of us put together are ever going to fire in our entire careers. And I mean they were just in the thick of the fight the entire time. The Marines that were Manning the checkpoints through that city. In particular the ones at the government center, that was Kilo Company, 3AMarines, awesome Unit of Marines. We worked really closely with, with their Lima company, Kilo Company and India companies. And man, they were, they were freaking awesome. And the government center was taken an OPVA which is named after like the Veterans Administration building. That was, it was like an Iraqi Veterans Administration building, I guess under, in the Saddam era. But those two, they would, they get hit once a week by 50, 100 insurgents attacking from three different directions, hitting them with, you know, a dozen belt fed machine guns at the same time, lobbing mortars in a super accurate mortar fire. And then somebody trying to drive a 5000 pound V bit into their position. I mean, it was, it was every week. Wow. For them. And so we just, you know, when we showed up there, it was like, man, how can we help these guys? What can we do to help in any way that we can? And so we just decided to get to work.
- [177:28]
Sean Ryan
So what was the work?
- [177:31]
Leif Babin
The work was what can we do? What is our part of this mission? And for us, it was number one, SEAL snipers. Just like the work that you were doing. We can take our guys, we can take a pretty small group. And right away we were told there was red areas on the map that were like, don't go there. These are Al Qaeda. This is Al Qaeda in Iraq battle space. And if you go there, you're all going to get killed. Nobody can even come recover your body. And so we realized like, hey, that's the enemy safe haven. Is there a way that we can get into these safe havens and mitigate the risk of being overrun by 100 enemy fighters? And so what we did was we started kind of on the edges of the city, pushing in with some of the Marine and army patrols which sending us sniper overwatch position. We'd go into undercover darkness, set up on the rooftops of buildings, in the windows where they wouldn't be expecting us to be. And if you were in a bad area that had no US presence before, all of a sudden when the first call of the prayer goes down and the sun rises and the city's moving around, you got enemy fighters moving around with RPGs and belfed machine guns and starting to coordinate attacks on nearby friendly patrol and outposts. And it was just a shooting gallery for the snipers.
- [178:48]
Sean Ryan
So you could actually sit in an OP in an area that was black and see the enemy combatants forming up to go outside of that area to engage and ambush US Forces Definitely multiple.
- [179:03]
Leif Babin
Times, yeah, many, many times in the daytime. Well we'd be in there, we'd sneak in at nighttime and try to be hidden as best we could, you know, in a position. And what we did though was we adjusted. You know the, the my idea before of a sniper mission was like a little small, like two man, four man element, six man element man. These elements when you're going in there we had to have, you know, we would go in with a 30 man element and lock down like a four story apartment building. Particularly it didn't start, you know, initially we started working on the outside edges of the city. And then once the US forces start, started establishing these combat outposts, they'd build a forward operating base right in the enemy neighborhood, a permanent form outpost that they could work out of, bring Iraqi soldiers with them. Oftentimes what we do is be the first US troops on the ground for that. So we'd sneak in under cover of darkness and the ID threat was the biggest threat. So how do we mitigate the risk of that? Well, we would foot patrol. So I mean it was throw everything on your back. We're carrying Carl Gustav, you know, shoulder fired rockets, we're carrying 40 millimeter grenades. We're carrying multiple belt fed machine guns. Every squad, multiple belt fed machine guns. Because we had to be ready. You know, we would take the, the minimum force that we would take. We usually was at least a squad of SEALs because that way I at least had two fireteam elements that could bound and if we're going into a super hot area, it would be dust double that. It'd be like a full potatoes or even more.
- [180:31]
Sean Ryan
So you, so you guys are running 30 man teams and would those teams.
- [180:38]
Leif Babin
So, so maybe 18 or 20 of those guys would be SEALs plus EOD. You know our bomb, our EOD bomb technicians were phenomenal and we're absolutely, you know, part of our critical part of our team just like the ones you worked with. And, and we had some awesome shooters too man that could do both. And so we also had, we'd also, sometimes we would plus up with squads from conventional army units or marine units as well just because we wanted to have some more Americans out there with us. And we'd always have Iraqi soldiers. So you know, we might have 12, 15, 20 Iraqis with us. I did not let those guys were out there risking their lives. I did not count on them in the gunfight. So you know, when it was, we saw that too many times that when you know, if you got 100 enemy fighters trying to overrun your position like you are, the only thing that's going to save you is Americans. And the things that saved us was Americans with belt fed machine guns. Those machine gunners carrying the Mark 48762 belt machine gun and the Mark 46, you know, 5.56 Belfast. Those guys saved our lives over and over and over again. Just beat back attacks preventing us from being overrun if we're on, if we were on a patrol with our Iraqis, you know, if we're getting attacked, like enabling us to be able to keep the enemy's head down so we could get off the street laying down cover fire from us. I mean I just, I talked to those Vietnam seals about how much they love their machine gunners, you know, that were carrying the stone or machine machine gunners and the M60s back in Vietnam and how that would enable them to push deep into Viet Cong territory where nobody could come get them. And the only QRF a lot of those Vietnam guys had working in the Rungsat and places like that in the Mekong Delta in Vietnam was like another seven man SEAL squad. And they had some, maybe some they had Seawolf, the helicopters that were subordinate overhead and some aircraft but, but those machine gunners kept them alive. And it was the exact same thing for us in tasking a bruiser. Those machine gunners like Mark Lee and Ryan Jobe and all those guys carrying the heavy belt fed machine gun. Jake, our mutual buds classmate, man, those guys were awesome and carrying so because you're full patrolling in every time and so they're carrying massive heavy weight.
- [182:59]
Sean Ryan
And real quick I want to get into some specific examples, examples of how they, how effective the, the, the aw. The automatic weapons guys were. But from, let's, let's look at a bigger picture real quick. So from, for Ramadi, what was the, what was the overall mission not just of tasking a bruiser, but what was the overall mission? Was it to, was it to infiltrate and occupy and the city and take it from AQ al Qaeda?
- [183:28]
Leif Babin
That's a, it's a fantastic question, man. I think what's interesting about it is never did I see a time where the generals in Baghdad or someone from the Pentagon came and said here's your mission Ramadi. And so the guys in Ramadi figured out what that mission should be. They were close to the problem. And the brigade colonel that was in charge, the colonel and his staff that were in charge of that National Guard unit, they got relieved by about a month into our deployment by the Ready 1st Brigade Combat Team. Of the 1st Armored Division. And those guys brought in tanks and firepower, but they brought in a perspective on that as well about what that mission should be. Colonel Sean McFarland was the guy in charge and his staff were just, they were phenomenal, man, and we love that. National Guardian and two, those guys were outstanding. But the ready first Brigade Combat Team is who I spent the bulk of the that deployment with, helping them many of the marine units and that task force, Red Curry, he that won the first Airborne unit, those guys stuck around as well for much of that our deployment. But what they realized was the mission Ramadi was to stabilize the city, secure the local populace and ultimately lower the level of violence. That was the goal. That was the goal. And I think if you, you know, I think for so long, if you'd asked a seal, if you'd asked me, you know, my first appointment, like, what's your, what's the SEAL mission in, you know, in Iraq? What are you trying to do? I said kill bad guys. And I think something that Jocko really recognizes, like, look, either US forces win in Ramadi and we all win, or US forces lose and we all lose. And it doesn't matter how many bad guys we kill or capture, it doesn't matter how many operations we conducted. If US forces lose here, we all lose. So what we have to do is help US forces win. And we understood that that was the mission, was to stabilize the city, secure the local populace, lower the level of violence. And we realized our part of that was to take a small element that was very heavily armed. I say small, right? It might have been as many as 30 guys if you're locking down a four story apartment building. And many times we tried to put two elements in that were mutually supporting one another because there's nothing stronger than mutually supporting overwatch positions with interlocking fields of fire. I mean, that's how you're going to defeat an enemy that way outnumbers you when they're trying to come and attack your position, when your other, that other position could cover a move, you know, cover for you. And you can cover for them, you know, as well. But we, that's how we mitigated the risk of going into some of those areas. And we knew that we could take a fairly small group of guys with a lot of firepower, carrying the shoulder fired rockets, carrying the belt fed machine guns, you know, carrying the 40 mic mic grenades, you know, JTACs with aircraft supporting us overhead. We had artillery battery, the artillery battery in Ramadi fired, I think they fired over 5,000 rounds. Wow. From their 155 batteries.
- [186:23]
Sean Ryan
So when you're, when you're going out with 30 guys, are you breaking them up into 15 two man teams and putting them in different, different locations? Sometimes seven, four man teams and sometimes all in one location.
- [186:35]
Leif Babin
Sometimes. But what we typically would do, I like to be in multiple locations so we can usually support one another. We also found though that when we teamed up a lot of these operations, we were the very first US troops on the ground. We would even go in and do some reconnaissance in the area. And as frogmen. Right. The river, the Euphrates river river runs right through Ramadi and there's a Habania canal kind of breaks off from there as well. So we had access to much of the city. And there was a badass marine boat unit there called the Dam Support Unit. They had these Cirque boats, these small, small unit riverine craft they could stand for. But it kind of like a rib, kind of like a combination between like a rib and a soccer. And so we teamed up with those guys, man. They would, they would, we'd sneak in there at nighttime, totally blacked out and you know, night vision and they just drop us off in the bank. No one have any idea we were in there. No ship.
- [187:28]
Sean Ryan
You guys would do a water insertion at night, did a ton of them to do a reconnaissance to what? Find your. Find where your sniper hides and nopes are going to be.
- [187:38]
Leif Babin
Find out where they would be, do a reconnaissance of the area, you know, engage IED layers, which we often did. And then, and then we'd use that as an insertion platform. Go in there at nighttime, jump off on the beach, full patrol in. So we could set up a sniper. You know, our sniper hides. And so we would oftentimes take down the buildings or buildings near those buildings. That would eventually be the comet outpost.
- [188:01]
Sean Ryan
So would you insert guys, they would infiltrate the ops and then the rest of the team would come and link up later or would you exfil back out of the, the location that you're at and then get the rest of the team and then go back in?
- [188:20]
Leif Babin
Sometimes we did reconnaissance missions where we'd go in and kind of just probe and do a little recon and they come back and kind of use that as part of planning. Obviously you have to hit multiple buildings. They don't know exactly where you're going. Try to go into different areas and do some misdirection stuff. But usually what we would do, excuse me, Usually what we do is an Insertion method would we would. We would go in there and set up in the sniper hide and try to get in position before the first call to prayer, you know, so we could get in position by, you know, by daylight. Then we would start to like, we would want to try to get some long access looks down, you know, some of the main, the main avenues of approach. And then usually we would be. So we would wait until oftentimes the, you know, the first. Some of those, some of those larger operations. You're talking over a thousand soldiers and marines on the ground, 50 tanks, dozens and dozens of heavy engineering vehicles. I mean they're trucking in 70,000 sandbags, multiple semi truckloads of Jersey barriers and Texas T barrier, those giant concrete barriers to try to concertina wire rolls to reinforce these positions because you know you're gonna get attacked. I mean they're coming and that's usually where we could really help those guys is. So we would set up and cover for them as they infiltrated. And there were multiple tasks.
- [189:39]
Sean Ryan
I remember like, okay, so you would know. I'm just trying to wrap my head around the overall mission. So you would know where the conventional units are setting up. Then you would conduct reconnaissance around that specific area, find the best vantage points and then set up the ops.
- [189:56]
Leif Babin
Well, sometimes we would conduct a reconnaissance, provide it to the conventional units to made a recommendation on where they could set up or take them with us on those reconnaissance missions. And then we would plan that thing out and we became their go to as far as they realized the effectiveness of SEAL snipers and what we could do for them to disrupt attacks. Because they're super vulnerable right when they're trying before there's any, they're just out there in these neighborhoods, they're getting shot at. You've got hundreds of enemy fighters that can muster and start attacking their positions. And so our snipers were able to disrupt those attacks over and over again. But a lot of times we'd be sitting in position. You'd see the mine clearance element and they're big mrap, those V hull vehicles. They were the only guys that had them at that time. We would ask for them and nobody else had them. But you'd see them slowly, like on white lights, like digging IDs out of the road. And there was to one of the first major operations we put in, I mean they cleared dozens of IDs out on that. I mean, just to tell you how bad things were, there was a route that was coming down off Route Michigan, that main road that I Said was statistically the most heavily ID road. A couple months before, before we moved into that area, right before we deployed, the Marines had tried to push down a road into where we ended up putting a combat outpost. It was called Route Sunset. And they'd hit something like 13 IDs in less than 500 meters. So I mean, it was just. It was. It was constant. You couldn't even get into these areas. And so we just. We would watch those guys clear. And so it took like four, five, six hours for them to clear all the way down. And we wanted to make sure that I weren't being in place on top of that. And so then all of a sudden, tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles, those troops are coming in and Humvees. And man, I remember this one time we were sitting in the sniper hide in what was going to be the buildings that would become the combat outpost. And we're on the third story and I'm looking over the side and I got that mine clearance element. I mean, they got this, it was called the dagger was the call sign for the vehicle. And they got this huge arm that's. I think they. They call it the Buffalo was the vehicle. And they're like, digging. It's just this big robotic arm that's like digging in the dirt. And this robotic arm got blown off. Every night they'd replace it. And I'm looking down there and I could see these pro jos. And I mean, I'm looking over the rooftop, I'm like. I was like, this is. All of a sudden it occurs to me that if that thing goes off, I mean, these are like 1, 5, 5 rounds. You know, like, that thing's gonna take my head off. You know, my face is gonna be gone. I was like, if I can see the, you know, explosive, it can see me. I need to get back behind the rooftop. I mean, it's like right there, like at the base of the building. And we found a bunch of them too, like on the. Along, like the creek we were patrolling across as the army went and burned. Burned out the vegetation later and they dug. I mean, they found eight or ten ideas in there.
- [192:52]
Sean Ryan
We were here, like patrol things are just everywhere.
- [192:57]
Leif Babin
And then from the combat outpost, once we had that established, so then we could push out deeper into enemy territory. And so initially the army would say, like, hey, we want you here in this building so that you can cover our guys. And, you know, you're looking 360 for 100 yards in all directions, you know, for blocks. All you can see is us Soldiers and Marines, like, I can't even engage anybody like the. So we talked him into it and luckily Jocko would kind of explain why we needed to do it. And we pushed about 300 meters outside the perimeter and they were worried about us getting attacked, but we pushed 300 meters outside the perimeter, set up in a big four story apartment building. I wanted to go in a different direction. Chris Kyle was like, we need to go there. That's the apartment building. And luckily I was at least humble enough as a leader. I made all kinds of terrible mistakes, but at least humble enough to listen to the guy that knows who he was talking about to say, okay, cool, let's do, do what you know, Chris wants to do. Thank God we did that because, I mean we had, over the next 48 hours we disrupted like all kinds of attacks on that combat outpost. And that was just kind of the model for what we did. Over and over and over again you'd see like a dozen enemy fighters that are trying to like rally to and they know they're going to attack the combat outpost, which you can't see or you get. Right as the sun comes up, mortars are landing dead center of the combat outpost. Kills a soldier, wounds three others, and the soldiers can't even shoot back, right? Indirect fire, it's coming from kilometers away over blocks of the city and you can't even see the launch point. And so our cybers are able to engage guys loading mortar tubes into the back of a vehicle from 600 yards away. That kind of element where like those soldiers when they started hearing like the 300 win mag, you know, it was like three enemy fighters engaged with 300 win. I mean you would just hear like they were, they were so stoked about it. They knew that like we were up there on the high ground, you know, to protect them and help them out. And as a result, I mean every single time we called them, because when we're deep in enemy territory, like we gotta, we got viciously. They always figured out where we were. Sometimes it was like sending like unarmed kids through the neighborhood knocking on gates. I mean, you know, all the standard stuff. And they knew we weren't going to engage that guy, but they wanted to figure out where we're at. So it would. We just adopted the Marine tactic from three Marines of like, it became an overt fighting position. So if you didn't have an urgent surgical casualty, like you weren't calling evac because that's what they wanted you to do, you were going to be in the Streets getting ambushed, having IED clacked off on you, you know, or having, you know, multiple machine guns engaging you while you're patrolling out. So we try to wait till undercover of darkness, if possible.
- [195:39]
Sean Ryan
Damn.
- [195:40]
Leif Babin
Sometimes we didn't do that because if I was, felt like I was in a position that was not very defensible if they attacked us. Like, if they could get, if we were on, we had rooftops, but all the rooftops were kind of equally, you know, high or even higher around us, and they might have the advantage over us. So there were a couple times we had to make the tough call. We just, you know, it's kind of like the, you make the, the, the least bad decision you can, right? Or you're like, hey, man, I know we're going to get attacked, but we can move fast on foot, we can do some misdirection and we can get back to the base. And it's going to be better than allowing them to set up a massive attack, you know, on our position where they have all the advantage, you know.
- [196:19]
Sean Ryan
So I think we've, we've done a fantastic job of painting what Ramadi was like back in 2006. And so let's rewind back to your first kinetic operation with the blue on blue.
- [196:35]
Leif Babin
Yeah, man. Even before that, when the guys hit the ground, the very first, like, I've been advanced, I've been on the ground for like a week. Everyone arrives and so they, they're, they're just offloading in the camp. And we got in, there was like a massive multiple, like multiple unit, like well coordinated enemy attack on the camp. We're talking like, so every single SEAL was on the rooftop of the camp just dumping fire across the river. And that was like the first, the very first one of my guys who was our, probably our most senior machine gunner. It was his third deployment to our Iraq. He'd been a machine gunner, you know, every time. He'd done a bunch of assaults, done a bunch of capture kill raids, you know, those direct action raids. And he, he was like, this is the first time I've ever fired my machine gun. I mean, he'd been on the ground for like three hours, you know.
- [197:30]
Sean Ryan
Are you serious?
- [197:31]
Leif Babin
How many hours? They shot like 500 rounds off the rooftop. So, so we knew like, this is going to be different, you know, and then that first particular, the, the first major operation. First of all, I was so pissed at Jocko for this because he wasn't, I had to be acting task unit commander for that because. And it was the right call, man. It was the right call. But I, like, I obviously wanted to be out there with my guys on the battlefield. And a bunch of guys, the army. This was the 101st Brigade or the 101st Airborne Division. This was the. The first of the 506 Task Force. Red Curry. And this, I mean, they live that the celebrated Band of Brothers tradition from the book that Stephen Ambrose wrote in the HBO miniseries. This was the first of 506 Parachute Infantry Regiment. Awesome, awesome unit. And they just had a phenomenal soldiers, incredible leader of their battalion commander. And they were asking for help. They were doing some operations, pushing in what was called the Malab district. It was a really, really bad area. And so our guys went out there and set up position. We had, you know, our job tasking from the combined Joint Special Operations Task Force. You know, that was the Green Beret colonel in charge of all the special operations operations at theater at the time was everything was going to be by, with and through Iraqi soldiers. So we were tasked to train and fight company and battalion size elements of Iraqi soldiers. Like, that was literally our tasking. So that's what we were there to do. And obviously that was an ODA mission. It was a little bit different for SEALs to kind of adopt that, but we took Iraqi soldiers with us on every mission. And the SEAL team two guys before us had, had done a great job of training those guys up and trying to mitigate some of the risk of their training. But that's what our guys were doing. On that very first mission, we had an element of seals that was going out as combat advisors to the Iraqi soldiers. And we're talking like 100 Iraqi soldiers on the battlefield with like a dozen of our guys and some of the army, the military transition team and some Marines that were with them. And then we had two different SEAL sniper teams that were growing up out there, along with some army sniper teams. And so they went out onto the battlefield, they briefed where everybody was going to be. You know, everything. The plan made a lot of sense. I'm kind of tracking this mission. You know, I'm watching their con ops and I'm listening to it on the radio. And it was pretty clear that, like, all hell kind of broke loose on the operation. And we expected it to, because in the mob district, this was like. And this is our very first major operation as tasking a bruiser. So Jocko felt like he needed to be over there, there located with the battalion leadership so he could kind of be the liaison officer to manage that as the command and control with all his different elements out there, 100% the right call to be able to do that. So Jocko's out on the battlefield, but instead of being, you know, there's all these different multiple SEAL units out there. He's CO located with the, the battalion staff from Task Force Red Curry. He, you know, try to. Try to manage that. And we, we have this, this report of like a, a massive enemy attack that goes on. So our SEAL sniper Elm is reporting the attack. And then all of a sudden we also get a report that, you know, there's a report that the insurgents are attacking the Iraqi unit that's out there. And there were some issues I won't get into on the communication side, you know, as well, that kind of broke down passing communication. Communications. But Jocko's out there on the battlefield. He shows up there, he knows that his guys are in trouble. They're calling for heavy qrf, right? They want tanks. That means they're in a dire situation. They feel like they're about to be overrun. And so Jocko shows up there, the commanding control element. He moves up, sees the Anglico officer, right? The air naval gunfire liaison officer that's there to coordinated an airstrike on a building. There's red smoke marking where the enemy is. He knows that the sniper team is in there somewhere or should be close by. And so he's kind of trying to deconflict what's going on. And he went up and kicked the gate open. And it was Tony, my platoon chief on the other side was like. And realized like, this is a blue and blue situation and no one understood what was going on. This was. Meanwhile, I'm monitoring the radio on the other side of the city. I'm getting traffic passed back to me. There's a huge spin up on this, but all of my guys that were in that cyber position, that was a squad of my guys that were there and they were all convinced, I think, that they were about to die. I mean, they had moved. They moved out to a sniper position under cover of darkness. They realized that where they were was not a good and defendable position. They didn't have visibility on where they needed to see to cover the road that they were supposed to cover for the soldiers and The Iraqi, the U.S. army soldiers, Iraqis that were moving down that road. So they moved position across the road. And they weren't able to pass that information for a series of reasons. A breakdown in. And communication. Then the Iraqi soldiers were out of sector. So they were Supposed to, it was supposed to be like hours before they were clearing. Well, some of the Iraqi soldiers I think decided like, hey, we're going to get killed if we're out here. Let's get this thing over with. They rushed to the furthest point away from the friendly outpost, Camp Corregidor, and then tried to rush back. And so they were out of sector. So all of a sudden, as our sniper team has said, setting up. They zip tied the, the gate to the. And they're setting up and you know, it's, it's just starting to get light. So like first call, the prayer goes down. So night vision doesn't work, you know, but you can't really see. And, and all of a sudden they've got somebody, you know, creeping by the window with an AK47. Like, they see the unmistakable sign of AK47. Like, they engage that guy. And they didn't realize it was a Iraqi soldier that was out of section. So the Iraqi soldier, you know, they, that guy gets killed, several others get wounded, the Iraqis engage back, the Iraqi gets dragged back. They call in for fire support because they're thinking, oh man, there's Al Qaeda insurgents are holed up in this building. And man, we got this on video. There was an embedded, there was an embedded reporter, I think from Stars and Stripes with the unit, anchor unit. They, they pulled up a Humvee and they dumped probably, they probably dumped 300 rounds of.50 cal into the building. And our mutual friend Matt that we were in buzz with is on the rooftop. And, and I mean guy, all he can do is just take cover. Rouse are coming to the rooftop. Like one round. Luckily it went through the concrete wall enough to slow down, like hit him in the face and like embedded up under his cheekbone. Are you. He said it was burning it, but he like grabbed it and pulled it out of his face and threw it down on the roof. And so these guys are like, man, we're about to be overrun, right? They're calling for that QRF and they're thinking, man, these guys, this is, they're bringing it. This is our first major operation. So they're calling in for tanks and fire support outside, they're calling in for tanks and fire support. So a tank pulls up. When Jocko gets up there before we kick the gate open, there's a tank with their gun trained directly on the building where my guys are holed up. And they're just all kind of hunkered down trying to just take cover and not get their head shot. Off. I mean, you can imagine, right, there's 50 cal rounds coming and belt fed, 7, 6, 2 coming right over your head. All you can do is just bury your face and try to take cover and return fire as best you can. And they think they're about to get overrun. And then on top of that, not only were they going to engage with tanks, they're coordinating an airstrip strike. So the Angico, you know, the. The jtac, right, the air controller, he's coordinating an airstrike that's about to just demolish this entire building, so I'm able to wipe out our entire squad. And so this was the lesson from that of, like, just how easily, like, we thought we had taken every step possible to mitigate the risk of that happening. And so meanwhile, I'm back at the Tactical Rock Operations center. You know, we're monitoring radio reports. We're hearing that, you know, we've got wounded SEALs. I know it's one of my guys. I know it's Matt at this point. But then we're hearing that it's friendly fire, right? So, like, okay, what's going on, man? All of a sudden, word spreads like wildfire, right? The Webby, like, instant, you know, chats are going on across the. You know, every talk of, like, friendly fire, friendly fire. Like, what's going on? What's going on? And so, I mean, there's. There's, like, massive scrutiny on this operation, you know, right away. And I remember I jumped in the truck. All I know is that Matt, you know, my brother, our brother, we went through buds with that. I've done, you know, the. This workup cycle that's in my platoon, his platinum. I know he's been shot in the face. I don't know what that means. I don't know if it means his head's gone, you know, I don't mean if he's going to die. So I jump in a truck, drove across the base to Charlie Med, that was a medical facility, and I went to pick him up, and, man, they put him on a morphine drip and patched him up and gave him some antibiotics for infection. And when I was talking to him, obviously he's kind of out of it, right? It's a morphine. But he's like, man, they brought it. Those guys brought it. It's like they were going to overrun our position. He's like, I thought we were all going to die. And he kept saying it over and over again. And I was like, matt. I was like, matt. It was friendly Fire, man. It was friendly fire. It was friendly fire. And I probably said. I probably said it was friendly fire probably six times before it, like, sunk in. And he was like, what? And it was like he couldn't believe it. You know, he couldn't believe it when I said it. And. And so I think that right there as, like, you know, our commanding officer flew out. We had an investigating officer that flew out. We were so fortunate to not lose any of our guys on that. It was horrible that we lost an Iraqi soldier on that. We took up a big collection for his family and tried to do everything we could for him. There were a couple other Iraqi soldiers wounded. Luckily, they recovered from that. But it was so close to being just absolutely catastrophic. We're talking wiping half my platoon out. And then when people were looking like, what heads are gonna roll over this? What heads are gonna roll? Who screwed this up? This is friendly fire. This is the worst. This is the cardinal sin. The cardinal sin that you commit. X ray platoon in Vietnam, right, that had a friendly fire incident, and this is the worst case scenario that can happen. And so we had a big debrief, and our commanding officer, our commanding master chief was sitting in there. The investigating officer, who was our JAG was in there. People are wondering, like, who's responsible? Like, who's. How did this happen? Who's responsible for this thing? And we knew it was probably some heads that were gonna roll over. And Jocko stood up in front of the task, and we're all in there, and he said, whose fault is this? And, man, the radioman stood up, was like, man, I didn't pass the traffic on where. When we moved location, I should have made sure that got passed. That's my fault. You know, The SEAL that engaged Iraqi soldiers said, I didn't get proper pid. I thought that was a, you know, an enemy insurgent. And I engaged him before I had proper pid. That's my fault. I should have made that happen. Go for it. I mean, over and over, the guy with the Iraqi soldiers, you know, who had been combat advising them, said, this is my fault. Those Iraqis were out of sector. And we just went around the room, around the room, and Jocko was like, no, it's not your fault. I'm like, no, it's not your fault. No, it's not your fault. He's like, this is my. My fault. Like, I'm the task unit commander. Everything that happens to this task unit is my fault. I'm responsible, and we're going to do everything in Our power to make sure nothing like this ever happens again. And just to watch that happen, like the power of extreme ownership in front of everybody in the task unit, you know, our respect for him was already high, man. And it went through the roof after that, right. Realizing, like. And our commanding officer, instead of, he actually left there. He had greater trust in Jocko and in tasking abused her because he knew that we were going to take steps to make sure that it didn't happen again. And we did prevent it from happening again. Friendly fire happened. Probably friendly fire would erupt, but it never became catastrophic. We were always able to manage it. We could, you know, we could stop it before, before anybody was killed or wounded. And it was always a constant threat. But we took massive steps to mitigate the risk. And in fact, even I, and even some of the guys, some of your Steel Team eight brethren that plugged into our team, they were awesome crew that came out and joined us and they were kind of jokingly calling me the rocket man there for a little bit because I had these two flares on my back. We had a white flare and a red flare. A white flare was. Our red flare was send qrf. A white flare was like, ceasefire. And so those were signaling device. I was like, man, I want that with me all the time. Just in case that we have that happen. I'm going to carry that thing, those things around on me. That's ultimately my job, is to prevent this from happening. So we implemented lessons learned at every level of the team. We took massive steps to mitigate it from happening. And when it did happen, we had some rounds over our head. We instantly had the radio comms and we had a good comms check with that. The tank that was shooting at us, we could get him to cease fire. We're marking our positions. Ceasefire. Sometimes we'd throw a freaking giant, you know, VS 17 day glow orange signal panel, you know, half the size of this room, over the side of the building and let every insurgent know where we were at. Just because that was better than taking, you know, 120 millimeter main gun rounds, you know, into your position. Because the threat of that was significant every time. Damn. Wow.
- [211:27]
Sean Ryan
Wow. You know, I heard you talking. I heard you talking once. I think it was with Jocko, about getting shot in the chest, in the plates. Can you run through that?
- [211:42]
Leif Babin
Yeah, man. That was the darkest day of my life.
- [211:45]
Sean Ryan
I'm sorry, I didn't know that.
- [211:46]
Leif Babin
August 2, 2006, man, we lost Mark Lee and Ryan Jobe had been wounded right before that. And yeah, I took a round. I think it was a ricochet, you know, otherwise it probably would have killed me. Split my spine in half, you know.
- [212:01]
Sean Ryan
What were you guys doing?
- [212:02]
Leif Babin
We were. It started as a big. Basically a coordinate search operation into what was called the J Block sector of Ramadi. And so after we'd established those combat outposts, we'd push sniper overwatches out and then we would push. We would push patrols with the Iraqi forces out to try to patrol into the city, engage with the local populace, show them that we were there to actually support them, talk to them about where the insurgents were. These were, the Marine Corps calls them, census operations of just showing the local populace that we were here to support them. That was. That stabilized the city, secured the local populace part, which paid huge dividends down the road to old, ultimately lower level of violence. And the Anmar awakening came out once. But all that started with breaking the back of the insurgency, like really lowering their military capability. But what we would do is push patrols out with the Iraqi soldiers and the military transition teams that were assigned to them. And we put sniper overwatches out there. And we had a bounding overwatch that was in a sniper position covering. And we were out with an awesome unit from the. This was from the Task force Bandit Team Bulldog. So this is Bravo Platoon first. It was Bravo Platoon, 1st Battalion, 37th Armored Regiment of the 1st Armored Division. I mean, this was a unit that had been in the Ardennes for us in the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. Historic unit, incredible group that we built some awesome relationships with. And by the way, we couldn't have done any of these operations without these soldiers and Marines. We push into these areas. The only reason that we could do that, the only reason that we could push so deep in enemy territory is because we knew that the soldiers and Marines were going to mount up in their tanks, mount up in their Humvees and come to our rescue and aid. And they did it over and over and over and over again all the time. And we had just an incredible working relationship with those guys. And I wouldn't be sitting here if it wasn't for them. And so we supported them as well. When they asked us to do things, we helped them. We put in cyber overwatch positions. And so we were pushing our Iraqis deeper into enemy held areas. And as we were clearing through an element of the J Block, we'd done probably, I don't know, six or eight operations like in this area, kind of pushing deeper, deeper in. And Ryan Jobe was one of our machine gunners. Amazing guy, incredible guy and well, the kind of guy that I don't know, I don't know how long it took him to get through buds, but it was a long time. He was one of those guys that was never going to be the best athlete. Was just absolutely tough as nails.
- [214:51]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [214:52]
Leif Babin
And was, it was just a stud, you know, awesome machine gunner, super strong, man of faith as well, and hilarious. But he was the machine gunner basically holding security for Chris and the sniper team that was on the rooftop as we had this kind of bounding overwatch. And I was with the Iraqi element that was moving forward to the streets. And we were about an hour and a half or two hours into that operation. Again, one that we conducted many like that before. And all of a sudden we hear a, a shot ring out. I mean you can hear the impact of it, you know, and, and I, I hear, you know, our most experienced, our most common experience guy was Chris Kyle, but awesome, awesome teammate and tremendous sniper. Saved lots of lives on the battlefield. And, and man, I could just hear in Chris's voice, man, he's like, we, we call. Ryan's nickname was Biggles and he was like, bagels has been hit. I need a Corman to the rooftop now. And man, I could, I could just hear the, in his voice, you know, how horrific that was. And I literally been talking to him, you know, both Those guys like 30 seconds before that, right. Just walked down the stairs, you know, to, to, to try to, you know, we're going to organize our team and kind of push out to the next building before we take the roof out there. And man, we get, you know, so we go rushing back up to the rooftop and Mark Lee who rolls right back up there, another awesome machine gunner, just an incredible, incredible guy. Steps right into the very position that Ryan got shot, like right in the position with his belt fed Mark 48 machine gun and just starts laying down suppressive fire knowing that like we're going to get shot back at any moment. And we got up to Ryan. Ryan had been hit in a hit in the face and just a single, single shot hit him in the face. You know, you could call an enemy sniper around, you could call just a. You know, he obviously was not your average like spray and pray, you know, insurgent, somebody that had some good side picture trigger squeeze engaged him, hit him in the head and man, it just looked horrific. I mean he's, you know, his eyes gone like his. Holy shit. Half his face looked like it's missing. And you know how blood looks, man. It's just. So I, I just, I ran up to him. I just grabbed his hand.
- [217:10]
Sean Ryan
I was like, is he conscious?
- [217:13]
Leif Babin
When I rolled up to him, he's just. He's just laying there. And I grab. I grabbed his hand. I was like, hang in there, brother. We're going to get you out of here. And I, I didn't believe that for a second, man. You know, like, it just looked like it was. There was no chance. And, you know, meanwhile, Mark and. And is standing there laying down some pressing fire right over the rooftop wall where he just. Ryan just got hit. Other guys stepped up there too, are laying down suppressive fire. You know, we're getting. We're calling in the Casa Vac vehicle. The Corman rolls up there and is working on him. That corn was Johnny Kim, our, you know, just a phenomenal guy in there, you know, going to work, you know, on Ryan. And miraculously, Ryan, like, sits up. He, like sits up and says, I'm okay. And, you know, he was. The blood was kind of going down his throat, right? So he has to kind of sit up to kind of clear that. And we get under his armpits. We're getting him down. So the Cazavac vehicle, you know, we had a M113 armed personnel carrier down there, you know, for Kazavak. And so we get Johnny, our corpsman, and we got, you know, guys under each shoulder or Ryan, we're getting a massacre off the roof. And he walks off the roof, really, by his own power, like down the stairs and just incredibly, incredibly tough, you know, human being. And we found out later that Ryan got hit in the. When he was in the hospital, you know, he had all this shrapnel in his face. And they were trying to figure out, like, what exactly happened, because I thought the round just impacted him, you know, but he. What. We realized that, like, there was a round impact on the receiver right at the base of the receiver where it meets the buttstock for his mark for a machine gun. And we were an hour and a half into this operation. Operation. He was, you know, it's 117 degrees. You know, it's miserably hot. We're carrying all our gear and water. I mean, Ryan must have been sweating profusely. And man, just like the awesome teammate that he was, the awesome machine gunner, he was. Ryan was on that machine gun. He was on that machine gun looking down the sides of his weapon, ready to provide cover fire. And if he hadn't done that he would have just taken his hat off, you know, that round would have just taken his hat off. So like that saved his life. And we, unfortunately we didn't figure out till later, it was, it was two weeks later that we realized that, that the, the shrapnel had severed his optic nerve to his good eye and he was gonna be blind as a result of that. And so I didn't know how it was going to go at the time. We evac, we evac Ryan, you know, we sent our corpsman with him. We pulled back to the, we pulled back to the base and August 2nd, we'd done multiple operations in this area. We've gotten tons of gunfights in this area. There were definitely a lot of insurgents. But there was something different about August 2nd. This was probably, I think it was the largest single engagement of any of the engagements that made up this eight or nine month battle of Ramadi. And insurgents were just coming out of the woodwork, attacking the soldiers that were out there clear. So we had one sector, they were clearing another sector. After Ryan got hit, we pulled back and, and went back to the, the. We patrolled back about a kilometer to the, to the base kind of refitted and the soldiers were like under attack, man. They, they, you know, and they asked us if we could, we could help them and, and, and you know, they were getting attacked from these different positions. So we loaded up in Bradley fighting vehicles and we roll back out into the city. And it was, man, there was so much going on that day for guys like Mark Lee, for all the guys that were in charge of the platoon. They knew they were going back at it in the teeth of it. We'd just seen what happened to Ryan and our brothers in the army needed our help from Team Bulldog there and nobody hesitated for a second, man. Jocked up in their gear, reloaded mags, refitted with grenades, loaded up into those Brads and we rolled out.
- [221:16]
Sean Ryan
No shit.
- [221:17]
Leif Babin
To hit those target buildings. No hesitation, no hesitation, man. Those guys did everything I asked them. Unbelievable courage we had. The Firefly was so bad that day, man. We had, I think for. The company commander's name is Mike Baima, is a close friend of mine, he's retired now. Main gun Mike we called him. He fired over 50 main guns from his tank throughout his time there. And I don't know how many people have done that since the World War II era, man. 50 main guns, but he was a phenomenal guy. I think just about every tank and Bradley fighting vehicle out there was. We would use the term Winchester, they're out of ammo. They call it black. When the tanks had ammo, like they. They shot every single main gun round that they had. Damn, in that engagement.
- [222:07]
Sean Ryan
And that is some serious.
- [222:11]
Leif Babin
It was, it was, it was, it was right in the teeth of it, man. And so I think for, for me, you know, I talked quickly over with Tony, my. My platoon chief. I was like, look, if we're going to hit a target where we got bad guys that are shooting at us, you know, the best thing we do is soften it up, you know, first. So we had, we wanted to go in and try to stay off the street. We knew we had at least one sniper out there, so we wanted to try to use armor to get into these areas. And so we had the Bradley fighting vehicles and the tanks just blast these buildings, man, before we went into them, and then smash to the walls and lower their ramps. Before we engaged, we hit one building the insurgents had already pushed out of it. The army told us, hey, we're getting engaged from, from this building. There's a surge in that building. So we loaded back up. We had another building. And in the second engagement, as we went into that building, man, the building was on fire as we went in there. Like a main gun round had already hit the building and just blasted it open. As we started moving into the building and clearing through the building, we took fire from the opposite end of the hallway and Mark was killed. And somewhere I was hitting that gauge, but I heard the gunfire ring out. I stepped out into the hallway, got hit, and I just grabbed one of our guys who was in the hallway. It was clearly a hot hallway with bullets and ricochets flying around to push him across the hallway just to try to get him out of the line of fire. And I heard the man down call. Mark was 20ft away from me when that happened. And guys came as more assaults were poured into the building. They cleared the rooftop and it was the absolute worst day of my life, man. And I think the fact that I got hit just in between the plates and I knew I'd been hit, but then the guy that I pushed into that room was like, hey, Leif, you're bleeding. Just blood always looks like more than it is. My whole inside of my. Inside of my vest was soaked and it was just trickling down. You could just hear like the tap, tap, tap, tap, like blood on the floor and. And. But there just wasn't time to even think about that, man. You know, it was. Mark was down. Like we moved up to him, got the corpsman on him, got him kaza backed. And for whatever reason, like, I thought there might be some hope, you know, Mark was unconscious when we got to him. I thought there might be some hope to him, man. But he'd been. He'd been hit in the head. He was killed instantly. And Mark was just such a. Incredible, incredible warrior, man. And he was doing exactly what I asked him to do, you know, which was engage enemy insurgents. He was moving down a hallway, stepped up right into the doorway to, you know, to engage enemy insurgents that were shooting at us from the building next door, man, and sacrifice himself for me. And the rest of the guys were coming in there, and he was, I mean, just like Ryan, just the most incredible teammate. Just. Just absolutely hilarious. Strong as a. Just, just strong as an awesome, incredible athlete, but just the. The kind of. Just represent the absolute best of the SEAL teams, you know, And. And I would do anything, Sean. I'd do anything to trade places with him, man. I got lucky. You know, for whatever reason, I got, I got lucky and some ricochet hit me, and, you know, they patched me up and, and. And I, I, you know, there'll never be a time when I go up to Fort Rosecrans Cemetery, see Mark's grave there. I don't wish that was me lying on the ground there, man, but not him. And I think that's one of the hardest things that I could have never prepared for, right? When these guys that you love and would do anything for, it's the ultimate dichotomy as a leader. It's the ultimate dichotomy, which is to love your guys and want to do anything for them and be willing to trade your life for them if you could. And yet sending them out on missions where you know that they might get injured or killed. And I think it was something that I tried to pass on to the next generation of SEAL leaders that I, you know, just the reminder of, like, what's at stake. And we would do a memorial, run every junior officer training course that I put through. Like, we'd park our vehicles down at Dog beach and Ocean beach, and we would ride five miles uphill all the way to Fort Roche Grand Cemetery, and we'd go pay our respects to where Mark Lee's buried and Mikey Montserrat, our teammate in Delta Platoon, who was killed about a month later, and pay our respects there and just remind these young leaders about what's at stake, man, and the burden of leadership. And I think for me, they'll never be like It's a burden that never goes away. You know, it's a burden that never goes away. And I think what's. As a man of faith, Mark was a tremendous man of faith. And he had wanted to be a pastor and he had gone to the master's college to study to be a pastor before he decided that he wanted to. He wanted to join the SEAL teams. And I remember quoting scripture and talking about there was. There was a time when we were out when, you know, there was. We were engaging targets and we were talking about like the worst case scenarios, you know, these mangy Iraqi dogs that are like, you know, these kind of junkyard dogs that are running around. Like, the worst case scenario is that these mangy dogs are like chewing on you out in the street, right? And we talked about how this was, you know, that in the Bible there's. And there's numerous examples of that where, like the prophet Elijah, you know, and Jezebel, who's trying to kill him, the prophets of Israel, the dogs are going to chew on Jezebel when David and Goliath. Goliath says that he's going to give David's body after he kills him to the birds of the air and the beasts of the field. And we were talking about this with Mark, right? This idea of like being a warrior on the battlefield. And I remember sharing those scriptures, you know, with Mark and talking about his faith and how powerful that was for him. And I know I'm gonna see him again one day. And I look forward to that day. Man, he was an incredible man. And Ryan Jobe, you know, three years after the surgery on, I think it was the 22nd surgery to repair those wounds that, you know, when he was wounded, we lost him, you know, from complications of that surgery as well. And like him, just like Mark, Brian was an awesome man of faith. You know, he came back from that deployment and being blind to him was like an inconvenience, you know, it was. He climbed 14,000 foot Mount Rainier, totally blind to this awesome organization called Camp Patriot. I know a number of seals that attempted it and were unsuccessful in their summit attempt, you know, with their sight, you know, and all their limbs. And he asked me to go on a hunt. I was the spotter for him. And he shot this world class bull elk using this little camera system. I mean, Ryan was just a phenomenal guy. He married his longtime girlfriend, they were expecting their first child. And when that happened, it was just a tremendous, tremendous loss. But I know that Mark would have wanted us to keep Going to keep operating, to keep doing what we were doing, to try to make a difference there. And I would talk to Ryan on the phone, and Ryan would tell us to keep going in those operations. Keep doing what you're doing, keep going out there, keep getting after it. Do everything you can to try to bring more soldiers and Marines home, to try to win this thing in whatever capacity we can. And, man, I'm just so thankful and fortunate and honored to have been able to serve with guys like that who were willing to lay down their lives. And Ryan one time told me, he's like, it doesn't make me a hero just because I got shot in the face. I'm not a hero. That doesn't make me a hero because I got shot. And I told Ryan that what made him a hero is not that he got shot. It was the fact that he knew that he could get shot at any time, that he could get gravely wounded or killed. And yet he jocked up in his gear and he rolled out all those operations over, over and over and over again. And he did it for me. He did it for his teammates. He did it for the teams. He did it for the soldiers and Marines that we were trying to protect. He did it for the innocent Iraqi people that were out there living under this brutal reign of terror and fear that Zarqawi's henchmen in Al Qaeda in Iraq, later ISIS ruled over them with. And I know Mark was a hero for the same reason, man. Mark was a hero for the exact same reason that he was. He was willing to do that over and over and over again. And I just think it was. It's the honor of my lifetime to be able to. To have served alongside heroes like that and have. And be able to tell their story and share their legacy.
- [231:13]
Sean Ryan
Damn life. That's heavy. That's heavy. I'm sorry I had to go through that, man.
- [231:20]
Leif Babin
We're going to see him again one day, Sean. Yeah, I look forward to that day.
- [231:23]
Sean Ryan
Yeah. Yeah. You know, when I first checked into 240 at Buds, Mark was the. Mark was my. My head mate. I didn't know that, didn't get to know him terribly well, but I am very thankful that I got to meet him and. And he. He gave me the ins and outs of buds. What a great guy.
- [231:53]
Leif Babin
I didn't realize that, you guys. I guess I should have known that because I didn't put it together for several months. Into Charlie Platoon, as he started to come, he joined our platoon and started working with us and that wasn't in our initial workup. That was several months before we deployed. But somehow we put it together. Like he knew Brian Bill, and so I realized that he had been to BUDS previously and those guys, you know, Brian was one of the guys that had trained with him. They lived together in Virginia beach. And, you know, Brian was one of the guys that encouraged him. And I'll tell you what, man, as destroyed as I was, Brian Bill was as close to Mark as you could be. And Brian wasn't close to a lot of people, man. He. He was. But he was very close friends with Mark Lee. And we talked a lot about Brian. And, you know, obviously I was close to Brian and BUDS and was. Was. Was a friend of his through that time. And when we came back, man, I was. I just. Was just. My soul was crushed. My soul was crushed, man, from losing Mark and Ryan, being blind and. And particularly knowing that I had some minor wound, man, it was like, hey, patch me up and I'm going back to work. You know, like, it was like, why couldn't that have been me? Why couldn't I have been killed and not Mark? Why couldn't I have been blind, not Ryan? And, you know, luckily I had a great commander in Jocko who pulled me aside and said, hey, man, we don't have a crystal ball, and we don't know when that stuff's going to happen. And if we did, we wouldn't go in that operation. But we can either choose to do nothing and take no risk, or we could do everything we can to try to make a difference here, to try to save American lives here. That's what Mark would want us to do. That's what Ryan is telling us to do to encourage me to keep going. And that support from Jocko was immense. But I remember sitting in the mission planning space as we're just kind of all reeling from Mark's loss. And at this point, we didn't know Ryan was going to be blind. You know, I knew it was grave. I didn't know how. I knew he was wounded badly. I didn't even know if he was going to, like, out of the woods as far as making at that point. And I got a call from Brian Bill, who was in Baghdad with SEAL Team 8, and he said, hey, man, I heard about what happened, and I just want you to know, like, I'm going to go home. I'm going to take care of the family. I'm going to take care of Maya, Mark's wife. You know, I'm going to Be there for Mark's mom, Debbie, and his family. Like, don't worry about it. You guys are going to continue to operate. Like, I got this. And, man, I can't even tell you how much that meant to me. He never questioned a thing. He never, like, said, what. What happened? What are you guys doing? Like, all the emotions that you might, you know, expect. He just. He just said, hey, man, I'm here. I'm here to help. And gave up what was an awesome deployment, you know, for those guys, you know, in Baghdad, doing a bunch of great operations to go and support Mark, man. And it was. That was the kind of guy that Brian was. And it was. I can't even tell you how much that meant to me, man, just getting that call and like, the darkest hour in real life and like a teammate just putting his arm around you, saying, you know. Cause that was one of the hardest parts is like, hey, we're here, like, what? Deployments continue and operations are going on. I want to go back, you know, I want to be able to talk to Mark's family and support them and be there for them. I want to be with Ryan's family. And yet you can't do that, right? There's still operations going on. So just knowing that teammates like that, you know, we're doing that was. I'll never forget that, man. For Brian, that was just, I think, a real testament to the man that he was.
- [235:37]
Sean Ryan
How long was it after that that you guys were on the next op?
- [235:43]
Leif Babin
We. We had a stand down, and because we just. We needed it, man. We've been going hard. We've been going hard. And Delta Platoon working across the city out of Camp Corregidor was going to be on the. They were going to launch an operation, like, the next day. And Seth Stone called Jocko, said, hey, we're going to roll this 24 hour, 24 hours. And so he. Jocko said, hey, man, you can still go on the opp. And Seth was like, look, I think we need to roll this 24 hours, right? Everybody needs to decompress. Everybody's emotional, you know, and so that was an important thing for us, I think, just to realize, like, we need to allow our guys to decompress. But we had a memorial service for Mark, and, man, it was so. Guys drove down the most dangerous roads in Iraq. You know, our teammates came from Fallujah and Editha and. And from across the, you know, the Ramadi down that, you know, Route Michigan, that deadly road, you know, to come pay their respects. And we had an awesome memorial service where we said goodbye to mark, and then 40 hours later, we jocked up in our gear and we rolled back out.
- [236:55]
Sean Ryan
Do you want to talk about the service with Mark, or do you want to keep that between the platoon?
- [237:02]
Leif Babin
I think we all just said our goodbyes, man. You know, we all just did our best to honor him. And, you know, four guys had gone back with Mark to escort his, you know, earthly remains home and be there with his family and be there for the memorial service, you know, for that. And I think it was, it was an amazing turnout, man. Soldiers, Marines there, Iraqi soldiers. It was just the kind of person he was, man. He was just the best, man. He was. I've never seen anybody who could use humor in the darkest situation, like, to just drop a joke or like a movie quote and get people laughing and get him just to kind of shake things off. Like, he was, he just was. Yeah, man, he was awesome.
- [237:53]
Sean Ryan
You guys took a lot of losses, and, you know, the, the world is very volatile right now, and we're going to get involved in some more stuff. There's not a doubt in my mind. The U.S. and so, you know, for the future generations that are going to go through similar experiences is what you just described. You know, what advice do you have for them?
- [238:20]
Leif Babin
Yeah, I mean, our losses, you know, every time I think I've seen some combat shot, I read about, I read about Marines at Iwo Jima. You know, I, I, I got a chance to visit Normandy this summer, right? And I'm standing on the beaches of Okinawa and, and I'm sorry, the beaches at Utah. And I've been on the beaches in Okinawa as well, you know, when I was deployed there back in the day. But just being there in Normandy kind of opened up my eyes to some stuff, like some of the inland fighting campaigns and things that were happening. And you realize the kind of losses that that military units have sustained over the years. You know, you go to the battlefield like Gettysburg, you know, or so many of the battles around here, you know, in Tennessee that are not far from where we are now. I mean, just massive, massive loss of life that did eclipse anything that I've experienced. And I think what I can just, you know, what I could say is, like, what's helped me is, number one, faith, man, knowing that, like, God has a plan for you, you know, and this survivor's guilt that's so easy for any of us to carry with us is like, God has a plan. And so I think you gotta lean on God for his Plan. We don't know what that plan is. None of us are guaranteed tomorrow. We don't know what he has in store for us, but just trusting in him for that plan, leaning on faith. And knowing, too, that, like, you know, taking extreme ownership of situations, debriefing, learning lessons, even if it's things that, you know, on August 2nd, the enemy fought in a way that we hadn't really expected them to do. Like, they brought it. They attacked in huge numbers. And that was a different. That was a different tactic, right? The enemy's gonna adjust tactics. So you gotta debrief, you gotta learn lessons to apply that stuff going forward, to make sure that you try to prevent those things from happening again. And I think more than anything else, I think it's about taking care of your people, man. Your responsibility as a leader goes way beyond, way beyond just looking out for them in the time that you serve with them. It is about looking out for them and their families for the duration of your life. And I will feel that way about the guys that I serve with. And as long as I'm breathing, man, there's nothing I wouldn't do for them. There's nothing I wouldn't. Wouldn't help them out with. And sometimes, you know, you lose touch with people and you haven't talked to them in a while, and maybe people forget that. And I think it's important to reach out to people and remind them of that. It's important to check in with people. It's important just to be thinking about how you can continue to support them, because it goes way beyond just in the immediate aftermath of some horrible situation like that. And it's not just about showing up and paying your respect to their graveside. It's about checking in with their family, checking in on their kids, you know, reaching out to your teammates, asking them how they're doing, letting them know that you're there for them, man. And that is. You're all in this thing together and no matter what. And I think that's, you know, when you go to a battlefield like Gettysburg, there's memorials all over that battlefield, and that's what it's for, man. People put their hands up just like in Normandy. There's memorials all over there. People, the veterans that survive those battles go there and they put their hands on. On those memorials and they remember their lost teammates and they support each other and they help each other. And I think that's something that goes way beyond just the time and service that you have with people. It's lifelong and even beyond that, thank.
- [241:44]
Sean Ryan
You for sharing that. Leif, Let's. I know it's been heavy for you, and I just. I appreciate you going through that, man. And let's take a break. All right, Leif, we're back from the break. Once again, I just. I really appreciate you digging deep and. And. And sharing those stories because one, I think it's. It's. It's extremely important to. For those guys to live on, you know, through stories. And two, it's a very, very important piece of history that.
- [242:21]
Leif Babin
That.
- [242:22]
Sean Ryan
That I'm just honored to be able to document here with you today, so.
- [242:27]
Leif Babin
Well, I appreciate it, man. I'm honored to share it. And anytime I get to a chance to talk about, you know, the. The teammates that I lost and honor the legacy of Mark Lee and Ryan Jobe, I mean, I think it's. I'm happy to do it, Sean, and I appreciate you. I appreciate you passing on. I think there's. There's so many lessons, you know, that. That we learn from that. And. And I think for me, I think some Americans, though, need to. Need to understand, like, sometimes people will come up after I speak about leadership and I talk about Romani, and I talk about Mark and Ryan and. And Mikey Monsour, you know, and, you know, Gaby's life and our sister platoon, another phenomenal team guy and awesome machine gunner, you know, just like Mark and Ryan. And people come up and be like, I'm sorry, man. Like, I'm sorry you went through that. And I think it's important to say that, like, we had some dark days in Ramadi, man. I think the. You know, it's kind of cliche, right? The Charles Dickens tale of Two Cities, right? The best of times. It was the best of times. It was the worst of times. But I think it's important to say that, man, like, I would trade those dark days for anything. I would trade the days when we lost Mark and Ryan and when Cowie was wounded and when we lost Mikey Mansoor. I could trade those days for anything. But most of those days were some of the absolute best days of my life. And knowing that we were working with an awesome crew of warriors, that we were out there fighting against an evil enemy, making a difference and have an impact and making sure more soldiers and Marines came home to their families as a result. And I think that's something of that. I think a lot of Americans have a hard time. You know, we kind of live in a. In a day sometimes where it's like, well, you know, is there really good and evil, like. Yeah, there is. There absolutely is. And I think when you see the kind of savagery that the, you know, the precursor to isis, the Al Qaeda in Iraq, what they're doing to innocent people, just the butchery and torture and rape and murder and just horrific, horrific stuff. And I think when you know that you can make a difference in the world and rid the world of some of that evil, then it's a great thing, man, to do everything you can in that regard. And I think America needs to remember that. And so most of the days that I served there were some of the best days of my life. I wouldn't trade for anything.
- [244:52]
Sean Ryan
Is there anything else on this deployment you'd like to cover?
- [244:56]
Leif Babin
No, I mean, I think that's. I think just knowing that we, you know, there were so many lessons learned, like, so many things that. Like that I thought I was ready. You know, I thought, like, hey, we, you know, combat was so much more difficult than we thought it was going to be. And we were just humbled. Like, on every single operation, like, something didn't go right. The enemy does something you hadn't planned. You know, youth thought you deconflicted that so that all the friendlies knew where you were. And next thing you know, you're taking 50 cal, you know, rounds right over the top of your head. You thought everyone knew, you know, what the position was because they could see your marking device and come to find out that they can't see that, you know, when they're looking through their. Their tank sites or. I mean, just so many things like that. It was just over and over again of those lessons that we learned. And I think probably the biggest lesson that I learned is that it's. It's not about you, man. It's not about me. You know, it's not about Charlie Batun or our SEAL unit. And that's one of the lessons I try to pass on as I went to take over that leadership training course. And one example of that is, like, when we first joined the SEAL teams, right, It's. You're training to operate in a SEAL squad or a SEAL platoon, and it's just you, right? And you have assets that are supporting you. And obviously, you know, if you're j. Soccer, you know, there are times when you got a whole bunch of assets that are supporting just a special operations unit like that. But on the battlefield, for us, we would have, you know, there might be. There might be two aircraft, all of Anbar province wide. So if you're going to like declare troops in contact so that the aircraft would be over your head and you could utilize them just in case you might need them. Where you're pulling them off of a, you're pulling them off a Marine squad that's pinned down and maybe have guys are going to bleed out and die. You know, maybe they get overrun or maybe these soldiers that are, you know, in this horrific situation, like you're pulling assets away from them. So I think that really was, you know, that really for me was an eye opener of like, it's not about me or my platoon or like it's, we're part of the overall team and the overall mission. And so we got to share assets, right? We got to share resources. We got to actually contribute to the overall success of the mission. And I think sometimes teams get focused on what they're doing. But I think Jocko really kind of pulled me aside and helping me understand that this is not about us and how many operations we do or how many bad guys we kill or capture. This is about are US Forces winning or losing, Are we going to be successful as, as, you know, as a nation here? Our coalition partners are not. So I think that was one of the biggest lessons to bring back.
- [247:39]
Sean Ryan
That's interesting for us. I've never heard it put that way, to be honest with you. It's always been about the unit.
- [247:47]
Leif Babin
I think that's what.
- [247:48]
Sean Ryan
Pulling assets. Let me, let me. It's always been what assets can we get? Not we're pulling them from these, these, these units and unique perspective.
- [248:00]
Leif Babin
Well, every, everybody. I mean, look, you should be trying to get as many assets as you can, right? Like if you've got an AC130 gunship, use that thing, right? If you got helicopters, use that thing. If you got tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles, whatever assets you can have, that's great. But I think when you start to. One of the things, one of the. This, this is my favorite thing to do with when. So it was when I, when I came back from that deployment from Ramadi. They, they, they sent me to the center and someone decided to put me in charge of the junior officer training course. And so I was happy to pass on whatever lessons I had there. But we spent four weeks in the classroom and a week long field training exercise. And the thing that I love to do was I would play the part of like a army company commander and I used like main gun Mike, the guy I talked about earlier as, as, like this is, you know, he's got tanks, he's got assets. So These seal, you know, these junior officers, they're leading a squad, you know, on the. Onto this training battlefield, they gotta come up with a plan. They gotta come brief me on what they're doing and what support they need from me. And so they'd come up to talk to me about their mission, and I would just be like, hold on. What you got, man? I got some guys. We're actually activating QRF right now, so standby. And I would just have them, like, stand there and just to realize that, like, hey, these army units that you're working alongside, that company commander is in charge of 200 soldiers and a dozen tanks. He's got a lot of stuff going on. You're not the only thing that's going on. So if you're showing up there thinking it's all about you, and, hey, my big op, that's happening, and I got to witness that with a special operations unit. I was standing right there next to a company commander when a special operations unit rolled in the theater, rolled up there, handed him, like, the, you know, the grg and said, hey, here's what's going on. And they actually were blocking the exits to the combat outpost. And the company commander's like, hey, man, I got tank. I got troops out on the field right now. You got to get your vehicles out of here. I got to be able to use these tanks, you know? And it was kind of a rude awakening for that special operations unit to be like, oh, there's other stuff going on around here. I bet it was my big mish. So I think that was what I tried to train those junior officers is just to pass it on to them. It's not that as a leader, you don't try to get every asset that you can for your team, but it's that you realize that it's about the overall team and the overall mission. And so if you are hoarding assets or you are focused on yourself, there may be things that you're doing that could negatively impact others who are also trying to carry out their mission. And we're all in the same together. So I think looking up and out for a leader and thinking about others and those other units that you got to operate in the same battle space with is crucial.
- [250:46]
Sean Ryan
Yeah. Defer we move on to the rest of your career. I want to go back, and I wanted to ask you, what did you receive the Silver Star for?
- [250:55]
Leif Babin
I received the Silver Star for that horrible situation August 2, 2006. And I don't know if I've ever publicly Said that before, but I asked Jocko not to write me up for that, man.
- [251:07]
Sean Ryan
Really?
- [251:07]
Leif Babin
Yeah. I was like, I don't want a reward for that. This is the worst day of my life, man. I traded for anything. Mark got killed, Ryan's wounded. I don't want a word for that, man. We did the best that we could in a horrible situation. I'm proud of my platoon and how they responded in the worst situation imaginable to get the building clear, to call in air support, to. To get casualty evacuation, all the things that they did under the worst situation, you know, imaginable. But I was like, I don't want to work for them. And for whatever reason, he decided to that. That it was deserving an award, and he wrote me up for him. So I accepted that award as a. As a recognition for the My Team Charlie platoon and what they were able to accomplish.
- [251:52]
Sean Ryan
Do you feel that there's anything you could have done to prevent that?
- [251:57]
Leif Babin
I think that when you lose guys on the battlefield like that, like, I will rethink that for every moment of my life.
- [252:05]
Sean Ryan
You know, I. I know you were going to say that. And that's why, as tough of a question as it is, have you found anything he could have been different? Or is it a never. Is it a never ending thing where you will always look for what you could have done different?
- [252:22]
Leif Babin
Yeah, I think that there is. You're constantly thinking, man, what if I'd have done this or would I have done that, or what if I'd have done this? And that's where I think Jocko's guidance is my task at a commander. And saying, like, man, we don't have a crystal ball. If you'd have known that stuff was gonna happen, you wouldn't have gone on that op. You wouldn't have launched on that operation. And I think the tough thing for me is realizing I can't. You know, we've got the army out there that needs our help, and they're in the worst situation of in. They're in the worst single engagement of, like, the entire Battle of Ramadi that lasted for nine months, you know, that killed 94 guys, you know, and I think 94 guys killed in action in the 228, the National Guard unit, and I think 98 total guys killed in the Ready First Brigade Combat Team. And so of all the combat those guys saw, like, this was like the worst, you know, or this was the single, like, hottest day of, you know, gunfire and mayhem and enemy attacks. And so I think for me, it's the recognition. Like I, you know, when somebody needs your help, you know, I think you do everything you can to help them. And I try to mitigate the risk that we can control, you know, by riding in Bradley fighting vehicles so that we were behind armor and not out on the street getting shot at by snipers, by smashing through the walls, by softening up targets with 25 millimeter chain gun rounds from the Bradley fighting vehicles and main guns from the tanks before we actually enter those buildings. But there's just never. It's just a burden that never goes away. I think you have to do the best you can in the. With the information that you have, you know, and I think there's. I would trade that trade that day for anything to do something different to bring Mark back or Ryan back. And it's something that will always be with me. You know, I think sometimes, too, when you're on the, on the battlefield, that the. If you're conducting operations like, there's no. The expectation that you were going to be able to be in significant combat, sustained combat over time, without taking casualties. It doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. And I remember a question our commanding officer asked us, with any operation that you go on, you should ask yourself, is it worth it? Is it worth the loss of one of your guys? And, you know, as we thought about that question, like, I can answer that question right now. No, it's not. I wouldn't trade my guys for. I wouldn't trade my guys for Osama bin Laden. You know, I wouldn't trade my guys for Zarqawi. I wouldn't trade any single one of my guys for any of these, you know, insurgent terrorist, savages that were fighting. But that's not the right question to ask. And I don't think it's any different than. I don't think it's any different than a. If you'd asked a company commander at Omaha beach, like, would he trade one of his soldiers for Adolf Hitler? I think he just said, no. I think he just said, no, of course not. Like, this is my soldier I care about. I'm not going to trade that guy's life. But they were willing to make the sacrifice because they realized that establishing a foothold in Fortress Europe was the key to being able to defeat Nazism so that we could live in freedom around, you know, across the globe and maintain our way of life. And so I think it's the same thing, right? If you're looking at. If you're looking at a mission like that it's never going to be worth. Like you're never going to make that trade. But the trade is that you do the best you can to try to. To try to have the most impact that you can in the time that you have. And you got to mitigate the risk that you can control. And I think that's all you can do as a leader. And I think sometimes the lesson learned is that combat is dangerous, man. It's dangerous business. And if we don't have the will to kill, if we don't have the will to kill the enemy, and if we don't have the will to sacrifice, America allows them that we shouldn't be in combat in the first place.
- [256:50]
Sean Ryan
Leif, I just want you to know I don't take that question that I asked you lightly. I asked it because there's going to be people in your shoes. There have been many people in similar situations. And, you know, just your. Your answer alone might save somebody's life. So thank you.
- [257:11]
Leif Babin
Well, I'm happy to share that, man. I think, you know, for every leader, right, we got to take risks. There's no. There's no combat operation without risk. Right? You can't do anything in life without taking a risk, but you gotta mitigate the risk that you can control, right? You don't wanna run to your death with your hair on fire. And I think trying to balance that dichotomy of being aggressive but not being reckless is crucial for every leader out there. And it definitely made me think deeply about that. In fact, there was a follow on time where we had some aircraft overhead that saw some armed insurgents run into a building. And so after losing Mark and losing Ryan, we were going to look at alternatives to try to hit them in a different way instead of. Even if we smashed that building with tanks and blasted it, we weren't going to run into that building. We were going to make some adjustments. So I think every leader has to make. Has to learn the lessons that they can, lessons that they learned. And I did a poor job, I think, of even letting my guys know of even some of the ops that we turned down. I've talked to some of the guys I served with in Charlotte platoon that were like, blown away that we turned down operations because we looked at it. The risk versus reward wasn't there. We're like, no, we're going to focus elsewhere here. There's too risky. And I think the chance of mission success are limited. So we're not going to take the risk there. And some of them Never even knew that, you know, that we were doing all we could to try to mitigate those risks, you know? Yeah, yeah, but you're not going into combat without taking risks. And if we're not willing to take risks, man, we ought to not even be there in the first place. And I think that's the kind of thing, like the idea that we can go to war without taking casualties, you know, it's just not true, man. It's not true. And I think that's more than anything, I wish that we had leaders who have been to war who understand that so that they can think very deeply about whether or not those risks are worth it.
- [259:14]
Sean Ryan
You know, at breakfast we had a small discussion about, I guess there had been some controversy about the special operations mission that you guys were on. And people were saying wasn't special operations missions because you were operating and gun fighting in the daytime. And so. So I wanted to just give you the floor on that.
- [259:39]
Leif Babin
Yeah, there was all kinds of criticism like that. I've certainly been the victim of the armchair quarterback stuff. I mean, that's going to happen, right when things go wrong and things go bad. And I understand that. I think that's a function of people just, I think, not understanding what we were doing and why we were doing it. And I think I could have done a lot better job of, instead of getting angry or frustrated with people, just kind of explaining that, you know, and talking about why we did what we did and the impact that it actually had. And yeah, I think, you know, Casket and Bruiser killed a lot of bad guys. And a lot of those were. Chris Kyle, our lead cyber appointment at Charter Platoon was, you know, was the ringleader of that, like, who did a tremendous amount of damage to the insurgent fighters there, disrupted dozens and dozens of attacks on soldiers and Marines and our own guys and Iraqi troops. It saved a lot of lives, man, and had some huge impact. And when we were in the squadron after action brief, you know, when everyone's standing in there, all the senior officers and non commissioned officers are in there kind of talking about the lessons learned. Someone stood up and asked Jocko, hey, you guys were out in the daytime for a lot of this stuff. Do you think that's a special outcome operations mission? And Jocko explained that 99% of the enemy fighters that we killed were during the daytime. And he said, killing bad guys is a special operations mission. Next question. And I think it's exactly right. This is. I think sometimes as special operations units, we need to be innovative. And I think you can be conventionally unconventional. Sometimes you're like, oh, we can only go out when it's nighttime. We can only go out when we have the. Well, what happens when you have a target that shows up in a marketplace in the middle of daytime? We have to be able to ask for those targets. We have to be able to figure out ways to do things where people aren't expecting. If they're expecting us to come at nighttime with a. Of. Under cover of darkness every time. So I think our best special operations units are constantly innovating and adapting ways to do things like that. But I looked at what we were doing in Ramadi. We were going out. A lot of what we were doing was undercover of darkness. And that was going in at nighttime, setting up, remaining over day, when the enemy was actually out, when they had freedom of movement, when they were actually running around streets because they knew we would dominate at nighttime and aircraft could take them out, and they knew we owned the night, and then trying to patrol out undercover of darkness at nighttime. But there was, I think, that taking a fairly small group of guys, a lot of firepower, going in deep into enemy territory in a place where people couldn't get. Supporting the conventional units that were then coming in behind us en masse, I think is very closely equivalent to our forefathers from the underwater demolition team. So Naval combat demolition units. Right. These were the first guys on the beach taking the risk, that were hitting the beaches in landing craft like Higgins boats, Naval combat demolition units, or scouts and Raiders. And then in the Pacific Theater, the frogmen, the underwater demolition teams, they were out there doing the reconnaissance, opened up the way, blasting holes in the coral reefs and obstacles so that the Marines and soldiers could land. And I think that's a lot of what we're doing. And there was a shift in World War II where those underwater demolition teams, the UDT, went from daytime or nighttime to daytime on operations. Nighttime. They were trying to do nighttime. They thought it was safer, and they shifted to daytime because they thought, okay, well, initially they thought it was too dangerous. But they realized that when they got these little frogmen swimming around, even with the Japanese pillboxes blasting at them with mortars and artillery and machine guns, most of the time these guys wouldn't be hit. And it was only. I think there was only a handful of UDT men that were wounded or killed throughout the entirety of daytime beach reconnaissance operations. So they were able to do it to mitigate the risk. And they also were far more effective in the daytime. And so I Think that was what we were doing in the daytime was, I think, very similar to just the making that shift. And then it was the opposite of Vietnam. Where in the Vietnam War, when SEALs were going out in the daytime, initially you're chaining the Vietnamese frogmen, and that's kind of how the mission started. And now all of a sudden, we're going to start into some kinetic operations when nobody went in at nighttime because Charlie owned the night. You knew the Viet Cong were out there patrolling, setting booby traps, setting up ambushes. And I've talked to some of those Vietnam seals who made that transition and realized, like, okay, the enemy's out at the nighttime. We've got to shift to being out at night. And the conventional units thought that was crazy. They thought you were going to get a bunch of people killed. But the SEAL teams were able to have massive impact for such a small, small unit on the battlefield because they went out at nighttime, they went into areas that nobody else could get into, and they did a lot of damage to the bad guys. So I felt like what we were doing in Ramadi was very much in the spirit of that, you know, those seals of Vietnam and those same underwater demolition teams in World War II.
- [265:03]
Sean Ryan
Great analogies, great analogies. And so you get home, let's wrap up tasking a bruiser deployment. You get home, you move into this leadership course. What's the time frame here? How fast did you change?
- [265:18]
Leif Babin
I reported in, I think it was like February 07. And so we got back end of October 2006, and I basically spent a couple months at Seal Team 3, turned over and then went to the center. And we. And so I, I just. I took over the course.
- [265:45]
Sean Ryan
Did you want to go over there?
- [265:47]
Leif Babin
I was ready.
- [265:48]
Sean Ryan
Very different role.
- [265:49]
Leif Babin
I was ready for a break. I didn't know what I wanted to do. I wanted to see, you know, do it. I want to get out. I didn't really know what I wanted to do. That was a heavy deployment, man. And it was. So I wasn't seeking that role. Somebody decided that that was a good place to put me. And what was cool about that is, is I loved it, man. I loved every second of it. It was. It was awesome. And the best job in the world is being a SEAL platoon commander. There's no better job in the world than that. The next best job, I think, was teaching that junior officer training course. It was, you know, I had some, you know, the, The. I got to see. It was. It was an amazing leadership laboratory. I got to see different Officers that were coming to that training. We had prior enlisted SEALs coming to the training. We had, you know, we had guys coming out of ocs that had been in the civilian world, and now all of a sudden in the Navy, we had people coming out of ROTC programs. We had people coming from the Naval Academy. We had people doing inner service transfers from the Marines or Air Force or Army that would come through that program. Also put some special operations or some Air Force special operations officers through there and some Norwegian Marine Jaegers that came to that program as well. So I just got to see a bunch of different people, a bunch of different styles of leadership. And it really solidified for me, like, what works and what doesn't work, because I'm putting them all in these challenging situations and seeing how they react to things. And so it really solidified, like, this is what works and this doesn't work. And so it was awesome to see. Just, it was a phenomenal learning experience for me. I think if you really want to know something, well, you need to teach it. I'm sure just like when you started teaching tactics, all of a sudden people are going to ask you questions. You have to be able to know things from different angles. You have to be able to think deeply about things and how you might react to certain situations and with different variables. And so that, I think, really solidified my thought process and thinking about leadership. And of course, the first thing I did was bring Jocko over to give what we call the Jocko brief, you know, kind of his lessons learned and seeing that over and over again. And I got a chance to bring in Vietnam seals, And one of my most favorite things was bringing in the most outstanding senior and junior enlisted SEALs that I worked with and having them talk about the officers that they respected and liked and admired and the ones that they didn't and what the difference was and give their perspective, you know. And so I think that's something as an officer, you don't often get to see that or hear that.
- [268:23]
Sean Ryan
What were the major differences?
- [268:25]
Leif Babin
Many of the ones I talked about. Humility, people that were humble, willing to listen. You know, I think there were. I think the people that wanted to try to act like they have it all figured out or have to show people that, you know, I've got something to prove. I think that, number one, is that's what pisses everybody off, right? When you got somebody that's not humble, that thinks they know everything, nobody likes that. No one likes to know it all. It doesn't matter what experience you have we used to joke we had an acronym for we we, which was when I was in Baghdad, and then it became we. Weird. When I was in Ramadi, you know when people are like dropping these, like when I was there, like, you know, when I was here, when I was this year or that unit. And like, look, man, that's not, you know, that's not the way to lead. Right. I think asking people questions, helping people understand, you know, the truth for themselves, like I mentioned before, is the way to lead. And so I think that's what really rose above is people that were humble, people that were willing to listen, learn, and then the fact that people were gonna, like, look out for the team and the mission first, it's amazing to me. I remember the first time I heard the term servant leadership and I was like, what does that mean? And the idea that a servant leadership means that, yeah, I'm going to. Look, I'm here to serve the team. They don't work for me. I actually work for them. I'm here to help them. I'm here to put the team and the mission first before myself. And I thought that was kind of a crazy terror the first time I heard. I mean, obviously that's what good leaders do. That's great. If you're a servant leader, that's awesome. But I just thought that was weird that it was even a term for that, because it's like the worst leadership ever, right? If you're gonna look out for yourself, if you're gonna be one of these ticket punchers that's gonna be like, hey, I'm all about me. I'm gonna put my needs and my wants before the team or the mission. And I think that's just. That's terrible leadership. No one wants to work for someone like that. So those were things that kind of. And then obviously somebody that just puts out somebody that's going to try hard, somebody's going to have a sense of humor, somebody that's going to hold the line on things when it actually matters and let something slide when it doesn't.
- [270:43]
Sean Ryan
How do you. This is a personal question about leadership. And how do I. I gotta. There has to be a line between you and your guys. And how do you keep. How do you keep. Let me rephrase this. You know, it sounds like your leadership style and you know, the conversations that we had at breakfast and I mean, you were really fucking close with your guys. Like, very, very close relationships. Very personal relationships, it sounds like. And so how do you. How do you maintain that respect As a leader, at the same time as, as, as getting so personal with your guys, because that, you know, as a business owner, I found that that line can be very tricky to navigate.
- [271:56]
Leif Babin
It's extremely tricky. And that's a fantastic question, Sean. I think this is the million dollar question, right? As a leader, you have to be close with your troops, but you can't be so close to them that one becomes more important than the other or more important than the overall team and the overall mission, or that they forget who's in charge. And I think there's. That's a real fine line because it's different for different people, right? I mean, there's the SEAL teams. You know, I came from the fleet where it was. I was gonna, you know, I was Ensign Babin or Lieutenant JG Babin. You know, it wasn't this like, first name basis. We worked with a lot of the soldiers and Marines. They were like that. Whereas we're on a first name basis. You know, charter lieutenant. I was lieutenant. That was my, you know, like, like there, I'm a lieutenant, but I'm late like that. That's, you know, everyone's on a first name basis. I'm sure your, your platoon was like that. You know, your platoons were like that as well. And. But it's. So the line's a little more blurry. But I think it's different for different people when you realize, like, hey, guys, we got to knock this off and like, get focused on what we need to do so we can get this done. And if people aren't paying attention, then, you know, like, okay, I'm a little too close. Okay. I've, you know, I need to, I'm going to have to maybe create some degree of separation, you know, here in some way. So you got to be close with the team, right? I think you got to know your people, you got to understand what motivates them. You got to understand who they are and what they do and what their skills are and what their strengths and weaknesses are and how you can help them, like where they want to go in life, what you can do to, like to set them up for success. And I think that's crucial for any leader to know, but you do have to find that balance. And I think for me, as the ayc, right, the assistant platoon commander, you're one of the boys, and you're not quite the oic. You're not the platoon commander in charge. It's a big step up, I think, to go from AYC to OIC and all of a sudden, you're in charge. And I realized I probably crossed that line, particularly with guys that I go on the buds with. And I was, you know, I've been in sqt with and I had very close relationships with, and, you know, we'd go out drinking and partying and hanging out, and you realize, like, oh, okay, I have to, like, there's. There's. I'm going to have to create some degree of separation here. Maybe it's. Maybe I go out and, you know, spend some time with them. Like, all right, guys, stay out of trouble. I'm. I'm, you know, I'm going to. I'm heading back. But I think. I think it's just trying to create that so that they. You're close with your troops. You're. You're close with the team. You understand them, you know them, they know you. They know you care about them, but you're not so close that that one becomes, you know, more important than the other or the good of the team or that they forget who's in charge. I think that's a. It's a tough balance, but it's. It's different for different people. So you have to just. I think if you're aware of it. You know, one thing that Jocko and I say with dichotomy leadership is even just the awareness that there's this dichotomy that exists and you have to find the balance is one of the most powerful tools you have as a leader, because then you can start to monitor it. Hey, am I too close? Am I not close enough? And then you can start to find balance, and you're never going to be perfectly in equilibrium. It's always going to be constantly trying to make adjustments all the time.
- [275:10]
Sean Ryan
Okay. Makes a lot of sense. Did you ever vent to your. To your guys frustrations?
- [275:22]
Leif Babin
I was probably the chief haterade drinker in tasking a bruiser. Really well. Just if you remember the old Dave Chappelle, the Chappelle show, the Player Haters ball was one of my favorite episodes. And remember, they just held up pictures of people. They would just, like, they'd sit around and go, hate, hate, and just like, make fun of them. And I would just throw shade at my chain of command. You know, talk about. I had a great relationship with Jocko. Like, we love. We all love Jocko, but, you know, the next level up in the chain of command, our commanding officer and staff, they were always asking for paperwork and, you know, look, they were good people. I liked them but they, they would, they would pile a bunch of paperwork requirements on them, like, I don't have time for this stuff. We're out here trying to fight the war. I don't need to be doing that stuff. And then you get questions from the siege of SOTIF in 80 miles away and the JAG officers asking about the rules of engagement and just making sure that everything was followed precisely. And you start to. It's really easy to get frustrated and get emotional and push back on that. And I'm lucky that I had Jocko to, to ask me is like, hey, does it help you to not have a good relationship with your chain command? And I was like, no, it actually doesn't. And worse than that, it actually hurts my team because if I don't have a good relationship with my chain of command and they don't trust me, well, they're not going to prove our operations right. They're not going to give me the resource I need. They're certainly not going to be, we're not going to be the go to unit that they choose to go action a target if they're going to pick one platoon out of the entire team where it's not going to be us. And so when I would vent, sometimes Jocko would just allow that and then just ask some questions to turn it back around to think about what could we do to actually lead up the chain command. Our commanding officer and staff, what do they want? Do they want us not to be successful? They want us to win. They want us to win. So if they've got questions about what we're doing, about how we're mitigating risk, I haven't pushed enough information up there. They don't understand why this mission's important and they're questioning that mission. I need to actually push some information to them and talk to them about why we're doing this, pick up the phone and call them and talk them through it. And then the JAG at Siege Soda, we were writing these really basic, like engaged military age male, you know, with a AK47. And the Jag is like, well, every, you know, senior male of the household is allowed to have like one ak, you know, within their home. If you remember, they had, they, they were allowed to have one firearm. It's like their, their second amendment because a lot of people didn't have access to banks and so they had their valuables in their home and that was how they defended their valuables. So the JAG is like, hey, this is. Was, is it illegal for them to have an ak and meanwhile, I'm like, are you kidding me? This guy's shooting at us and you're questioning my decision? But I didn't write that in the report. So that's why he had some questions. And the moment that I put the haterade down, stop hating on the chain of command and telling them they just need to back off and let us do our job and realize, oh, I need to push more information to the chain, we started thinking, okay, what does a Jag? He's never sat behind a sniper rifle, he's never looked through a.22 Power Night Force scope. You know, he's. These, these snipers are operating with incredible discipline, man. Incredible discipline. I'm talking, you know, watching hundreds of people walk in front of their sniper scope and they're engaging enemy fighters. And we're talking about like, with. With minimizing collateral damage in a way. Sometimes these, sometimes these savages would use, like, human shields, like children, like hold them in front of them and try to run across the street with their RPG and snipers, like Chris and Tony and others were able to drop those guys and not injure the children. I mean, amazing in a way that nobody with a machine gun is going to be able to do that. Nobody with a Bradley fighting vehicle, 20 millimeter chain guns going to be able to do that. And so I was very proud of our snipers and the discipline that they were using. And I realized that the problem was we weren't describing it in a way that articulated to someone who had never been there what we were actually seeing. And the moment that we started doing that and putting that into our shooter statements, man, they were like, awesome. That's great. Keep doing what you're doing. What support do you need from us? So I think so often we feel like we're in a hopeless situation if we're getting scrutiny from our chain of command. And if we take ownership and actually just lead up the chain, it makes all the difference. And I realized when I was venting to my guys and kind of throwing hate at the siege of Soda for. At our task group that was 30 miles down the road in Fallujah, all that does is just undermine my authority as well. That never helps you if you're going to just throw your chain of command under the bus that just undercuts everybody in the chain of command. If you do that, it's not good leadership. And the best thing you can do is to say, hey, listen, understand this is frustrating. Here's what we're going to Do. We're going to put this paperwork together, going to get this done, we're going to send it to our chain of command because they need this information. And we're going to do this so we can build a relationship with our chain of command so that they're going to support us where we need it. And so when you can talk to your chain of command about the realities of it, you don't have to just sugarcoat something that doesn't make sense. Like, hey, they're telling us to do this stuff. It's not fun. It's a bunch of extraneous work that we have to do. We're going to have to put in a bunch of extra hours. Maybe you have to stay long, you know, stay late or stay over the weekend or whatever. You don't need. You don't lie to the team. Right. You don't say like, oh, this is great, we're going to do it. Like, they're going to see right through that.
- [281:11]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [281:11]
Leif Babin
What you have to do is tell them the truth, tell them why you're going to do that, and then help them see that you're building a relationship up with the chain of command. You're putting some leadership capital in the bank so that you're not pushing back on everything. So that when it, when it comes time to really push back on the things that matter, you're able to.
- [281:27]
Sean Ryan
How much of your decision making process and the reason that you made certain decisions did you share with your guys, if any, did you ever feel like these are personal questions? I'm asking for myself as a guy running a company and I feel the need to explain some of the decisions that I make to my guys. I don't necessarily know if I should be doing that. And so I'm just curious, you know, what, what do you do?
- [282:06]
Leif Babin
I think it's absolutely the right call to, you know, this idea of like 100% transparency. Not everybody needs to know everything that you know. You know, you would spend all your time trying to communicate things to people all the time. That's, that's not a good use of your time as the owner of a company. But if that's one of the biggest lessons and the most humbling lessons that I brought back with me, I wrote an entire chapter about that. In Extreme ownership, it's chapter 10 leading up and down the chain. So I talked about leading up the chain, but this is leading down the chain, which is, I don't think you can do it enough to explain why we're doing what we're doing. Because I think when you kind of think people get it, you know, leaders will think, well, maybe they get it like, seven out of 10. Like, no, they get it like three out of 10. Maybe one out of 10, maybe zero out of 10. And your job as a leader is to connect the dots between the hard work that people are doing, the overall success of the mission. And it's because they don't see it, right? They don't see it when they're out there in the grind. You know, every day, you got to constantly help them see how what they do contributes to the overall success of the mission and how it's going to ultimately benefit them as well. So I don't think as a leader, you can remind people that enough. And I mean, I planned so many major operations to go and take areas of that city back. And we were the lead element on the ground with a thousand soldiers and Marines and all the tanks and everything we talked about. And when we got back, Jocko put this slide together. He was tasked with going and giving a brief to, like, the. I think it was the chief of Naval operations, you know, the senior admiral in the Navy. And he put this slide together, and it showed the map of Ramadi. It showed the red areas that were al Qaeda battle space, where we'd arrived. We'd been told, don't go. They're all gonna get killed. And then it showed these blue circles going in with these combat outposts, the US Outposts that went in. And then it showed, like. And each one had, like, what our SEAL involvement was and how we supported them. And then it would have, like, yellow and green kind of expanding out. And he put this. It was like a building slide on a Microsoft PowerPoint slide. And so the map overlay with this building slide. And before he went to brief, just because Jock was a great leader, he always was like, hey, man, take a look at this. Tell me what you think. And he played that slide for me, and I was like, damn, dude. Like, that's what we freaking did. Like, I never put it together like that before.
- [284:38]
Sean Ryan
Wow.
- [284:38]
Leif Babin
Never. And it was. I planned and led every. Every single. Almost every single one of those operations that are the blue circles that are going in. Like, we were the first boots on the ground for these. You know, I was intimately involved in the planning for these things. Some of them were weeks in planning, you know. And when he saw my reaction that he was like, I had never put it all together because, man, I'm coming back from mod event. We lost Mark. We Lost Ryan. Like, I'm like, man, I know we made a. Like, we certainly had some impact there, but did we have any lasting impact? Like, should we, should we have done what we did? Like, all these questions, right? That I'm constantly running in my head all the time. And when he put that together, I was like, that's what we did. That's what we contributed. We contributed to take that city back. And you could see it in the combat outpost knowing that hundreds or maybe a thousand soldiers and marines for each one of those blue circles are going in. These are people that dozens of them might have not come home with their families otherwise. When you start putting that together, what's cool about that, Sean, is we all split up and went. Our separate rays and I have had the chance over the years to pull some of my guys together and show them that slide.
- [285:57]
Sean Ryan
Do you still have that slide?
- [285:58]
Leif Babin
I do have that slide.
- [285:59]
Sean Ryan
Can I put it up on screen?
- [286:01]
Leif Babin
Absolutely. And it will be. It was. When I show them that slide, they say the exact same thing. Damn, dude, I had no idea that's what we did.
- [286:10]
Sean Ryan
That's cool, man.
- [286:11]
Leif Babin
And so I think it's a reminder that you can't do that enough as a leader. And it's one of the most humbling lessons I learned of, like, if I'd have just taken the time to take a step back, remind people about what they're doing, how the impact, you know, our, our mutual friend Jake, you know, that we went through buds with, was, was a machine gunner for us. I remember him telling me, you know, he's like, man, I'm just carrying this machine and he's carrying this 600 round loadout and his machine gun. And, and we put, I mean, we put optics on those machine guns because we, they needed pid. They were, they weren't using like the ACOG to, to, to shoot the gun with it. We needed a pid, a target. So I mean, it's, it's getting heavier, right? With all this gear you're putting on, it probably weighs 20 pounds, you know, and you're carrying, you know, 600 rounds. Each of those 100 round boxes is what, seven and a half pounds they're carrying. Plus you got helmet, body armor, water, you know, all this stuff. They're patrolling multiple kilometers to get in, you know, some of these areas, particularly in the rural areas outside the city when we were doing some of that work and, and I remember Jake coming to me being like, dude, I'm just a security detail for Chris and the snipers, man. And I was like, man, I have just failed him as a leader. I was like, Jake, when we get attacked, which is pretty much every operation, and we have three dozen enemy fighters trying to overrun our position, we're not beating back that attack with a bolt action rifle, bro. We're beating back that attack because of you and your machine gun. And that machine gun has saved our lives over and over and over again. We could do none of this without you carrying that heavy firepower. And then we talked a little bit about, I was like, how many times have you like shot your, your loadout, you know, your entire loadout? And he was like, I don't even know. Like, I don't even know. Like, he didn't even know. And, and it was interesting because I talked to, I talked to some of the Vietnam seals and some guys that were machine gunners, including Moki Martin, who's a phenomenal seal, if you remember. Moki was just a legendary west coast seal, six deployments of Vietnam. Amazing guy. And he was telling me like, we were just talking about like, how many times they actually like changed the belt on their machine gun, their stoner, you know, their M60. And it was like in his sixth deployments, he was, he told me it was just a, it was a handful of times, like a, you know, they would break contact and they would break off. And I was like, well, how many times did you guys shoot your, you know, like your entire loadout of belfed rounds you're carrying? He's like, I don't ever remember a time doing that. And so, you know, Jake and our machine gunners did that. I mean, like almost every single operation we went on. So I think I had, I did not help him understand just how important he was for the mission and how he was contributing the mission. We couldn't do any of this without all the work the snipers were doing. And making precision shots is not possible without those belt fed machine gunners, you know, guys like Jake, guys like Mark, guys like Ryan and Mikey Monsoor that were out there, you know, carrying that heavy equipment. So every leader, I think has to do that. And then when you can put it.
- [289:12]
Sean Ryan
You'Re just consistently empowering your guys every chance you get.
- [289:17]
Leif Babin
Well, I think the lesson is that I was, I wasn't doing a good enough job of. I did not do a good enough job of taking a step back and realizing like, hey, they don't know that. And they don't know that because I'm not telling them.
- [289:28]
Sean Ryan
That's what you, you did.
- [289:29]
Leif Babin
That's the Lesson I brought back is like, I got to do a better job of telling them, of letting them know what they're doing, why, you know, why they're doing, the impact they're actually having, what's the strategic impact that they're actually having? So, you know, I think when you've got people on your team that are in the grind, you know, they're head down, they're doing a thankless, you know, what seems like kind of thankless. Whether it's editing videos or posting social media clips or scheduling travel for podcasts, whatever it may be, it is absolutely imperative that you constantly remind them about how important their job is and how what they do contributes to the overall success of the mission and how that ultimately is going to benefit them down the road as your team continues to grow and expand. And I think it's every leader's job to do that.
- [290:14]
Sean Ryan
Man. There's some great advice in this one. Thank you. So after the, I'm sorry, the leadership, what was the unit? Where did you. I'm sorry, after your next station.
- [290:32]
Leif Babin
So I went back, I talked to the junior officer course for two years and tried to teach those junior officers everything I wish someone had taught me before. I'm going to do a. A tough combat situation. And then I went to the director of training, was an awesome leader who came to me and said, hey, why don't you come be my operations officer up at Seal Team 1? And that was Keith Davids, who was just stepped down as our Naval Special Warfare Admiral. He was phenomenal leader and was an awesome guy to work for. So got a chance to, Got a chance to go and serve with him as operations officer at SEAL Team 1. Did another deployment to Iraq, supported some guys in Afghanistan. You know, we sent to. We sent guys to multiple locations around the world. But I was pretty frustrated on that deployment, man. Like sitting in, you know, we did a. The theme was to, like I had said, for all our guys in Iraq, we were trying to embrace mediocrity and not operate a bunch so that we could try to pull our guys and move them to Afghanistan, where the fight was going pretty hot and heavy. That was 2009 and 10. And so things were kind of just ramping up for like the, you know, the Marine push down into Marja and Helmand province and some of these big operations that were going on in kind of the Taliban strongholds in Helmand and Gondora province. And we didn't do a good job of embracing mediocrity because we did a ton of operations. But I don't think I single SEAL on that operation in Iraq. We captured a bunch of bad guys and disrupted some terror cells and guys did great work man, we had an awesome team, but we didn't have a single seal of fires weapon in anger in Iraq on that deployment. And meanwhile just was. Marines are getting blown up all the time, soldiers getting killed and in Afghanistan. And it was very frustrating to me every time we tried to say hey, we can send more guys to Afghanistan, we can support the conventional units and they're moving into these villages and Taliban stronghold areas. We can do what tasked abuser did for the army Marines in the urban environment just from the high ground on the ridgelines with SEAL snipers. And we would constantly get to like no demand schedule for more seals.
- [292:53]
Sean Ryan
What changed?
- [292:55]
Leif Babin
I think it was a force cap. President Obama approved the surge numbers there and I think there was just a, I think there was a force cap limitations. Hey, we'll surge force is there but we're only going to serve X number of forces. So people are tracking everybody that's there. And frankly I don't know that there was a lot of appetite in our senior, in our senior leaders. I think there was more of a, there was kind of an argument going on that we should be more on the kind of the find fix and let the kind of host nation forces do the finish piece, you know.
- [293:31]
Sean Ryan
You know, it was a really interesting time. I mean I had no idea you were Senegal down to Marja in Helmand at the time. And I was down there contracted for the agency. We had a safe house get hit. And I remember the, it was supposed to be the biggest offensive, the second biggest offensive force of the entire global war on terrorism since Fallujah. And they had amassed a ton of marines down there to do this push. And then I remember when the roes came out for the military that they were, somebody could shoot at you and drop their weapon and you, you could not engage them. And you know, I just, I remember hearing that and, and thinking like, holy, you just chop the legs out from every marine down here that you want to conduct this massive offensive force with. And it was just, it was, it was mind blowing to me. Like talk about demoralizing your fucking people.
- [294:46]
Leif Babin
I can only imagine, Sean, there's, there's no way you can win, right? It's what I talked about before, right? If you're gonna go to war, man, you gotta have the will to kill the enemy and you gotta have the will to die. And I mean there's this is what it takes to win. And I think the, you know, my frustration was that we didn't. We couldn't. We couldn't get hardly anybody involved. So we had one troop that was working out of Kandahar at the time, and they kind of got split up and tasked to some different provinces. And we had some guys that did some great work there, man, and made a difference. It made an impact, for sure. They did awesome, awesome work. Did a bunch of combat operations that killed a bunch of bad guys and opened up some areas that Taliban had kind of controlled before and enabled freedom of movement for US Forces and kind of pushed the white, white space back around some of those bases where they kind of, you know, kept people, you know, in where they're attacked the moment they get off a base. But we couldn't get more people there. And, you know, we only had a handful of guys that supported, you know, some of the Marines pushing into those areas. And the whole time, like, you know, there was just a pushback with the Naval special Warfare. And I just felt like, to me, that was probably the number one driver, you know, our friend Elliot, that a month after we left Ramadi, got blown up coming out of a sniper overwatch position. He'd been wounded. One of the insurgents had crept up near his position and literally rolled a grenade through a loophole. So he's sitting there on his sniper weapon, and they pushed a grenade through the loophole. They, like, snuck up, like, somehow jumped from rooftop to rooftop, pushed the grenade, grenade goes off, wounds him in the arm. So as he's getting cassavacked, you know, they called in the Bradley fighting vehicles, and as they're getting casablack, they clacked off a big ID on him and they could, like, ripped an Iraqi soldier in half in front of him and blew him up, you know, really bad. He lost a leg, I think. There were white phosphorus shells, Willie Peachells so, like, horrible burns on his body and. And, yeah, man, he just was like, man, Ellie's just as good a dude as there is, you know, just an awesome, awesome team guy. And we'd serve together Seal Team 5 and been to Buds together, served together Seal Team 5. Then I turned over with him. I remember seeing him and my close friends that are now relieving me, you know, as we went home. And I remember seeing him in the turret. Turret of a 50 cal man in the 50 cal and a turret of a Humvee about to make the push across down that horribly dangerous road route Michigan, that was the most heavily ID road in all of Iraq. And he was, like, all smiles, like, fired up, you know, And I was just. Man, just. Just said prayers to, you know, protect these guys and look out for them. I knew what they were up against, you know, and I think it was November 19th. Like, he. He got injured, and then one of the other SEALs got injured. Like. Like, thought he lost both his legs. Like, just, you know, was like, blasted on his back with an id, Lifted his legs up in the air, but his. Like, his tib fib is like. Like he's got double compound fractures. So, like, all he sees is, like, his stomps and he lifts his legs up. They're, like, hanging down. So I thought he lost his legs. And that guy, thank God, ended up recovering and had, you know, these titanium inserts in the legs, like, amazing, amazing guy. But Elliot was in real bad shape, man. And I. So I spent a bunch of time with him when he came back to the States, and he went to Burke Army Medical center, which is the primary burn care facility center for the. For the military. And, you know, just seeing some of the guys were in the ICU there and coming out of Iraq at the time was. Was a horrific, horrific thing, man. Just knowing, like, you know, you see these soldiers, Marines, with, like, their faces burned off and no fingers and, like, no ears and noses and lips and stuff gone, and just. And many of them still are, like, you know, they're. They're making the best of it, man. You know, they're happy to be alive, and they're. They're continue on their lives. And it was. It was, man, those. Those guys were just. Just heroes, man. Just heroes. Just awesome. Their. Their attitude on life and. But it made me wish that we'd put a lot more of those insurgents in the dirt than we did. And we did everything we could. But then when I, you know, as I was serving, I would go over and Elliot then went to. He then went to Balboa Naval Hospital. And so I was going up there and visiting with him, and I'd see a bunch of those Marines that were coming in. Coming in from Helmand province and Kandahar Province and places like Sangin and, you know, Marja and, you know, legs gone, arms gone, you know. Yeah. And. And to me, it was. I think that was kind of the final straw for me of, like, man, this is. We can help these guys. And. And, you know, we're not being allowed to do it for political reasons, whatever those are, whoever's responsible, you know, and. And, you know, I felt like it was, that was. That was probably the final straw for me of like, you know, I think it's time for me to probably get out.
- [299:48]
Sean Ryan
Yeah.
- [299:48]
Leif Babin
Do something different.
- [299:50]
Sean Ryan
How was it getting out for you? A lot of people trouble with that.
- [299:53]
Leif Babin
Hard. Like, I never wanted to do anything else, you know.
- [299:56]
Sean Ryan
And did you met your wife yet?
- [299:59]
Leif Babin
I did. I met her. She put up with a final deployment for me. We were dating.
- [300:04]
Sean Ryan
So she. So you married her in service?
- [300:06]
Leif Babin
Well, we didn't get married until right as I left.
- [300:08]
Sean Ryan
Okay.
- [300:09]
Leif Babin
So we, we got engaged right as I got back from my. My last deployment. So I was like, you know, we're gonna put her to the test, see how she does to the deployment. But we had met at the SEAL Warrior Fund event, which is the big fundraiser for the SEAL teams in New York City in October 2008. So the financial world had just melted down, and yet we still had some very patriotic Americans that are giving money to support SEALs and their families. And Elliot was there for that. Ryan Joe was a speaker for that. In fact, I don't think I have anything have spoken. I don't think I would have attended if Ryan Jobe called me and said, dude, if you're not going to this, we're never talking again. So he was a speaker. He gave an amazing speech. And they handed him the speech the night before and he's like, hey, knuckleheads, I can't read. I'm blind. Someone's gonna have to read this to me. So you're gonna have to give me the speech. But yeah, he gave a fantastic speech, man. And we were all there because the Monstor family had wanted Mikey's teammates to be there. You know, Mike had received the medal of Honor for jumping on a grenade to save his two teammates on either side of him and our teammate and, you know, Delk Platoon. And so the Monsoor family had asked that Mikey's teammates be there. So they flew a bunch of us out there. And it was amazing. I sat right next to Mike's mom, Sally, who's as. As I met Jenna for the first time at this pretty red haired girl. I was like, what's, what's her deal? I want to get to know her better. And I told her that we had, you know, she worked at Fox News. I told her that Fox was on in our tactical operations center. She's like, well, if you guys want come by, I'll give you a tour. And so we, I brought me Seth Stone and another one of his guys by, who were like the biggest, like wannabe lady killers ever, and they were just spitting game. And everybody from the, you know, the interns to the. You know, to the. To the anchors and Jenna, who just put them up, just put everybody in your place, like, didn't take any of that stuff from anybody. And then I took her out that night. Like, I talked her into coming and meeting us for a drink, and I took her to meet Elliot. She met Elliot and, you know, was instantly, like, loved Elliot and, you know, was fast friends with him, and. And so the rest was kind of history there, man. But that was. That was another contributing factor for me, certainly, to get out. I mean, I had. You know, we had been dating two and a half years on the opposite sides of the country. I was stationed in San Diego. She was in New York City. Closest the Navy was going to get me was the Pentagon. Had zero interest in being a staff officer at the Pentagon. And so I was like, it's time for me to move on.
- [302:57]
Sean Ryan
What was it about her that got you?
- [303:01]
Leif Babin
Man, she's beautiful, she's smart, and she's got an amazing heart. And she asked me within, like, two minutes, three minutes, like, she probably learned more about the SEAL teams than anybody. Like, you know, people like, oh, you're a seal. Like, oh, that's cool. Like, oh, that's really neat, or, oh, I'm so annoyed. You know, like, people, you know, that might say something like that. But she was. She was like, well, how do you guys train exactly? You know, how often do you employ and what's the training like? And, you know, how are you organized? Like, she asked all these just, like, interesting questions, and I was like, I definitely want to get to know her better. And it was. Yeah, man, I just. I knew right away. I texted somebody when I was leaving New York City of, like, I just. I just met the future Mrs. Babbins. First night, huh, girls? In the phone book. Yeah.
- [303:56]
Sean Ryan
Right on, man. How long have you guys been married now?
- [303:59]
Leif Babin
13 years.
- [304:00]
Sean Ryan
13 years. Congratulations. What is the secret to a successful marriage.
- [304:09]
Leif Babin
Man? The secret to successful marriage is extreme ownership. It's extreme ownership, man, if. Because it's also. It's the most important place that you can apply these leadership concepts we've been talking about. It's also the hardest because you're so emotionally tied to someone, you know, and your ego's evolved and, like. And I could tell you that when I start pointing fingers and casting blame and making excuses, my wife reminds me that I wrote a book called Extreme Ownership, and I should start taking some. So she definitely Puts me in my place and I'm like, Jack. But all the things that like any team needs to be successful, right? Cover move, we talked about, we got to cover, move for each other on the home front, with the kids, with work, around the house, whatever it is. We got to be able to cover and move for each other. We got to communicate a manner that's simple, clear, concise. It's not that, hey, she asked me to do something. I need to give you a read back to make sure that I understand what it is that I need to do. I need to ask for some clarity, clarification. I need to make sure that just because I asked her to do something, she'll put something out in the morning, like, okay, the kids need to be here, here and here. And then she thinks, that doesn't all process in my brain, right? I gotta write it down, I have to reference it. So prioritize and execute. There's gonna be a billion things going on at the same time for the family. We gotta be able to pivot and be flexible and shift to emerging priorities and stay detached, particularly from our emotions. When somebody's like, you know, had enough, like, the kids are kind of, you know, they got you at wit's end and you're frustrated to be like, hey, babe, I got the kids, I got this. I'm gonna take them out for a little bit, you know, just. I don't need to ask what she needs me to do. I don't need to ask her where she needs me to help. I can just step in, you know, and then decentralized command. I think if we all kind of understand, we understand, like, what's the goal? What's the goal we're trying to do? And I think when we do that, that enables us to, we can all work together toward that goal. You know, she may do something that's slightly different than I might have wanted it done, or I might have not thought about doing it in that way. But if it gets us toward the goal that we're trying to accomplish, if it helps us to raise, you know, some patriotic, God fearing, competent, kind hearted children, you know, that are going to be good members of contributing members to their society and, and community, that's what we want, man. That's what we're trying to do. So I think, I think letting some things go, sometimes you're like these little pet peeves, you know? Yeah, I think that's the most important thing of like, okay, if she's doing something that's annoying me, it's not her fault. It's actually my fault. It's my fault. And that's. I, I need to, I need to figure out a way to like, take ownership of that and like, fix that.
- [306:57]
Sean Ryan
Great advice.
- [306:58]
Leif Babin
I think that's, I think that's the key.
- [307:00]
Sean Ryan
Let's move into your transition into, into civilian life. How. How was that for you? Did you find it? I mean, you know, there's no secret there's a suicide epidemic going on in the veteran community. A lot of addiction, a lot of alcoholism, a lot of drugs, a lot of womanizing, a lot of. I mean, it's just, it's. It's really a nasty time in a lot of our lives. And I'm wondering if you experienced any of that. A lot of depression, a lot of resentment, a lot of anxiety.
- [307:35]
Leif Babin
I, I certainly, I think I experienced some depression anxiety, I think when all of a sudden the thing that I had always wanted to do with my life is like, now behind me, you know, and now what? You know, and I think that's a, that's a, that's a freaking hard thing, man. You know, hard for anybody.
- [307:54]
Sean Ryan
Do you feel like you wrapped a lot of your identity into being a seal?
- [308:00]
Leif Babin
I don't know if I wrapped my identity into being a seal. I loved it. I mean, I just, I just thought it was the best job in the world, you know, and even though it's. Look, it's not this, it's not without frustrations, right? It's not that. It's. As I, as I got further up the chain of command in the SEAL teams, you get further away from the guys you like to be around and the job that you like to do. So, I mean, just an example of that, I was at the Special Operations Task Force, like, headquarters, and we were in Ramadi, just down the street from Camp Markley. We'd named the shark base Camp Markley. And then. And so what had been a former kind of intel base was named after Mike Monsour. So I was at Camp Mike Muntah. We were working out of there, and, man, there was, you know, I think we had 180 people at the, at the Special Operations Task Force headquarters. And I think there were like six seals there, you know, so it was, we were great people there all performing an important function, but it was. You're just getting further away from the guys you like to be around and the things you actually like to do. So I think, you know, when you, you, you're completely removed from that right when you get out. And so then it's like, okay, now what? And I was going to do like a lot of people do, just go back to school because it's kind of a transition. And you know, there was, you can get paid, you get a, you get money through the post 911 GI bill. And so I was going to kind of follow that path. And for whatever crazy reason, I decided I was going to go to law school. And I had some people help me out because my grades were atrocious in college, but pull some strings to like get me into law school. And like, you know, I was accepted to Fordham Law School in New York City. And so it was just right down the road from where my wife was living at the time. And so we just got married and man, I started this two week kind of academic enrichment program they called it, which was like for the people who've been out of school like me or didn't make good grades like me. And so as I started it, I just realized like, man, I had zero in common with the other students in the class. And as we started to study law cases and things like that, I'm like, I don't think this is what I want to do. And this is a three year program. I have to spend three years doing this. And then extortion. 17 happened and largest loss of life in a single incident in the history of the SEAL teams. Helicopter shot down Brian Bill, Derek Benson, both in our bud's class, awesome dudes, you know, both lost on that. I knew another handful of guys were on that too, as I'm sure you did. And, and Brian, Brian village has been in my, my wedding a month before that. You know, it was just crushing, man. It was crushing. And it was. I mean, he actually like finagled a deal. He stayed to like go to like a jump master school so that he could like stay late, go to the wedding. And then he like flew, you know, flew over overseas to, you know, to meet his, meet his unit. And yeah, it was just horrible, man. It was just a reminder of something that you and I both know, right, which is life is too short, man. You can't waste a day of it, man. Can't waste a day of it. So I immediately deferred law school. I was like, I'm not going to spend three years going to school. And so then it was like, well, now what? Now what I do. So I go in and defer law school. I'm like, I don't have a job, I'm not employed. I don't know what I want to do you know, I had people offer me some positions in like, the finance sector. And I went in and like, saw what they were doing, you know, the traders. And I was like, I don't care how much money they make. Like, I, I would rather, I would rather shear my testicles off with a rusty pair of can scissors than sit here in front of this. Like, you know, trading. Like, it just wasn't what I wanted to do, you know, and it was. And so we went out to this little place down the way, had some good margaritas and. And I was sitting there with my, my wife Jenna, and. And she says, what, what are you going to do now? You know, I was like, I have no idea. She said, well, what is it you love to do? Like, what are you passionate about? And I said, SEAL platoon commander is the best job in the world. Like, that was the favorite job in the entire world. I'd do that over again in a second if I could, but I can't. And even if I could do it, I wouldn't be deployed to Ramadi, you know, like, there's no, I can't go back and relive that again. But as she kind of asked me that question, I thought about it. I was like, the next best thing was teaching leadership to those junior officers. That two years that I spent training those junior officers, putting 130 something SEAL officers through training and trying to pass on all the lessons I wish someone had taught me. Like, it was incredibly rewarding. Rewarding to see those guys grow as leaders, take on that, you know, the lessons that we learned apply it, get better. And then I see them go forward, go, you know, places that I didn't deploy or didn't have any combat experience with like, like Afghanistan, they, they would come home and say this, this was game changer. Thank you for teaching us. Hey, you taught me this leadership concept. I applied that. It made a huge difference. You know, we focus on building these relationships, you know, Damn, that's awesome. Opened up all kinds of opportunities for us.
- [313:11]
Sean Ryan
These guys all kept in touch with you?
- [313:13]
Leif Babin
A bunch of them did. A bunch of them did, yeah. You know, I've lost touch with some of them, but they. It was awesome, man. It was so rewarding to see that and to know the lesson that we learned and that we paid such a heavy price for, you know, attacking a bruiser were being passed on. And so when I said that, my wife said, call Jocko. Start a company. So I did, and we launched a company that became Echelon Front.
- [313:38]
Sean Ryan
How'd the Conversation go with Yako.
- [313:42]
Leif Babin
Let's start a. Let's start a company. You just said, let's. Let's start a leadership company. He said, roger that. Let's do it.
- [313:48]
Sean Ryan
Well, what was he doing at the time?
- [313:49]
Leif Babin
He was working for a mortgage company and teaching leadership for that mortgage company and kind of helping them kind of in their process. And they kind of. They basically, like, carved out like a. You know, I think they made.
- [314:00]
Sean Ryan
Jocko Willink was working on a mortgage company. Interesting.
- [314:05]
Leif Babin
He learned a ton about leadership, right. And how it applied to the business world and saw all the problems that they were having from the inside. And so from that, he taught me a ton about what he learned from there. I thought Echelon Front was my idea, Sean, for about a year and a half. And then I realized that just like, this is Jocko's way, like, about. Jocko retired in October 2010. So about a year before I left active duty, and I went over and was, like, cleaning out his cage, and I did. I was like, man, it's going to be a sad day in the Jocko Lucile teams here when you get out. And he said, I forgot about this conversation. We had a conversation, and we were standing in his office at Training detachment, and he said, what would it take to bring you on board to start a leadership consulting business? And I. I threw out some number that I thought was, like, gargantuan, right? It was like, barely, you know, barely six figures. You know, it just seemed like. Like, it seemed like the most gargantuan number in the world compared to my, like, Navy paycheck. And. And so he had planted that seed like, a. Probably a year and a half before we had that conversation. And I. I forgot about it for a long time. And that's kind of Jocko's way, right? That indirect approach of, like, planting the seed. He wasn't. He wasn't like, hey, remember when I said that? Like, he doesn't care who gets the credit? Like, this is. This is what good leadership looks like.
- [315:33]
Sean Ryan
That's cool, man. And so how did it develop?
- [315:37]
Leif Babin
It developed. The very first year I made less than half my Navy paycheck. And I was like, this thing is never going to pay the bills. And thank God my wife had a great job.
- [315:46]
Sean Ryan
Well, let me. What was the original. What was the original plan? What were you guys doing at the very beginning?
- [315:53]
Leif Babin
The plan was to teach leadership. The plan was to teach leadership the same leadership concepts that I taught in that junior officer training course, the same leadership concepts that he taught when he was running training detachment.
- [316:03]
Sean Ryan
To who?
- [316:04]
Leif Babin
To companies, to anybody that wanted to talk about leadership. And just to back up a little bit, the first epiphany that I recognize that leadership applies everywhere. There was a company that did an off site to San Diego, big corporation kind of in rapid growth mode. And they had had like a, so they had a leadership off site San Diego and somehow they got connected to someone at the SEAL team, like one of, one of the junior officers that I put through training. And he was one of my, he was one of my, he'd been an assistant platoon commander, then it was a platoon commander. And, and, and he said, hey, this company's going to come by. There was a retired, his, I think had been his former, like his, the CEO because he was a lateral transfer from the service fleet like me. So he'd been on a navy ship and the commanding officer of that ship had retired and was running this kind of leadership consulting business. And so he was bringing this team of, I don't know, 10 or 12 executives by. And so he's like, hey, will you come and talk to him about the stuff that you taught us in the junior officer training course? I was like, well, how long is that going to be? He's like, I don't know man, 20 minutes, whatever, something like that. Just short, just you know, put out some, share a thought, answer a question or two, you know, that's about it. And so we went in there and I talked a little bit about, I talked a little bit about leadership and like what we were trying to teach these, you know, the, I mean even just like putting the team and the mission first, right? It's not about you sharing resources across the entire organization. They just started firing questions and, and we were in there for an hour and a half of just nonstop questions, being fired. And I didn't know anything but the military, I mean like you, I went to the Naval academy out of high school and So I was 18 years old. I never knew anything about the civilian world other than part time jobs that I worked in high school. But it was the first epiphany for me of like, hey, everything that we learn here applies. And the world needs this. The world needs leadership. Leadership is the solution to people's problems. They don't know that. They don't know it. And what we understood is that leadership is a skill. It's a skill that we're not born with. It's a skill that we have to learn. And just like you don't know how to play the Piano. When you're born, or drive a car or shoot a basketball or wrestle or whatever it is, you have to learn that stuff. You might have some innate abilities that give you an advantage over others, that may give you leg up on others, but if you're not willing to learn the skill, you're not going to improve, you're not going to get better. And I think leadership's exactly the same way. And I witnessed that over and over again when I was teaching that course because I saw leaders who might have what you might think are a lot of innate leadership qualities that would be important, right? Like they were charismatic, they weren't nervous to stand up in front of a room and present an idea or talk to their team. And then you had other leaders that were super introverted, like didn't want to, you know, like were terrified to stand up in front of a group and present an idea. And of course I made them do that all the time, you know, to try and get them used to that. But what I realized is that even people that you might have, think have all this advantage with these innate qualities of charisma or, you know, they're kind of a, you know, loud, you know, person that kind of people gravitate toward or they can engage with people. And if that person wasn't willing to learn, if that person wasn't willing to humble themselves and get better and apply and take ownership of mistakes they made and apply the skill of leadership going forward to improve, like they didn't get better, they struggled. And some of them actually got fired and maybe even had their birds pulled and left the teams as a result. And yet I watch leaders who, who were terrified to stand up in front of a group, like super introverted, like the quiet spoken, kind of soft spoken types, maybe didn't have any of the, what you might define as an innate quality that might give people an advantage in leadership. And they did awesome. I mean, they were phenomenal. As long as they were willing to learn, they were willing to improve and they were willing to get better all the time. And I'd see those guys go, some guys who struggled in the field training exercise, fortunate that course that I ran. And I would see them get better and watch them go out on the battlefield and do amazing things, man, and have their guys talk about what an extraordinary leader they were and how they made, just how they saved lives or were able to build relationships or vector resources, just incredible stuff. That to me it was the recognition of everything that we learned applies to people in the corporate world in the business world. We work with people in the nonprofit sector, in the education space, first responders. We do a ton of work with first responders. And anywhere that people want to talk about leadership, I think we take the lessons that we learn and we talk about how it can apply. And I think we totaled it up last year at the end of last year. We've worked with something like 1600 companies and organizations over the last.
- [321:09]
Sean Ryan
1600.
- [321:11]
Leif Babin
Wow.
- [321:12]
Sean Ryan
How many of those. You know, we had talked about a lot of the. The seals that went through the leadership course with you, you'd heard from, you know, after. Later on in their career about what worked. And do you. Do you get a lot of that in the civilian world as well?
- [321:28]
Leif Babin
We do. We definitely do. And it's super rewarding, man. It's our why right. Sometimes when you hear the grind and you're traveling and you're gone from home a lot, and I'm always thankful for the opportunities that we have, you know, it's amazing to see. I mean, even after, you know, we're pushing. This month marks the ninth anniversary of the publication of Extreme Ownership, and the following book, Dichotomy Leadership, that was published in 2018, has now been re released. But there's still people driving the sales of that book through word of mouth. People are reading it, buying five copies for their team, buying it for their, you know, their kids, buying it for their family members. And that kind of word of mouth, like, hey, this has been impactful and it's been amazing to see that. That. And when people come, come back to us and tell us that, you know, extreme Ownership saved their marriage, you know, when they were blaming their wife for all their problems and, you know, or the wife blaming their husband for all their problems or, you know, having issues with their kids and, and. Or. Or their were frustrated at work that they were in a hopeless situation and didn't feel like they had any influence on the organization, didn't think that their leaders cared about them, and they were able to start to take ownership of those problems and lead up the chain of command. It's amazing to see. It's amazing to see the impact that has. And it's just humbling and mystifying to me, man, to see how those lessons continue to be applied. And I just. It's.
- [322:56]
Sean Ryan
It's.
- [322:56]
Leif Babin
I'm blown away by it over and over and over again and about how people are taking and utilizing this. And it's. It's not me that's doing it. It's not Jocko that's doing it. We just shared some lessons learned that they actually have to apply. That's the hard part. You know, I can share some concept with you that can. Then that can help you, but it's up to you to actually put your own ego in check, have an honest assessment with yourself, and actually, you know, implement a solution to get problem solved going forward. And I think, you know, for us, probably the best thing that we do is just help people realize what winning looks like. What does winning look like? You know, what does winning look like for you? And when you start to think about that from a detached perspective, it's not about how much money you make, right? It's not about proving that you're right if you're in a conflict with someone, it's actually about. It's about building the strongest relationships that you can with people and having the most impact in the world that you can, and spending time with the people that you love and care about most, that's most important. So I think when we can get people detached from their emotions, kind of put their ego in check. And if you and I have a conflict at a company and let's say we're fighting over resources and we're two department heads, I want those resources. You want the resources. I'm in there lobbying to have the resources taken away from you, you know, or some cases that may be. So it might be. We'll see conflicts that. That get created so bad that we might have to only. We can only communicate with. Through, like, mediated email by hr. This is what happens. Wow. Human conflicts. And you're like, wow, crazy. When. When you, when you can help someone say, like, hey, is it important? Is that other department important for like, what you're trying to do in your department? Like, yeah, it is. Okay. Do you think it's important that you have a good relationship with the leader of that department? Yeah, it probably is. And so, like, when you can't communicate with someone except through media to email by hr, does that. Do you think that makes you look. What does that look like to everybody else as a leader? You know, when you can help them start to reveal the truth? What's the chairman of the board thinking about? What's the CEO? What's the senior executive team thinking about you? Like, how's that. Do you think you're ever gonna get a chance to be promoted up the chain? You know, if you can't actually get along with people and work alongside and build a friendly coalition so you guys can actually cover and move for each other? You Support one another so that the team can win. And when you get people who start to think about leadership like that and they realize like, oh, you know, they're looking at this little tactical victory of like, I'm trying to get the best of this person, you know, I'm demand that I get the resources from them. And that's what winning looks like. And it's really the opposite, right? What if I care about the team? Like, I should be in there lobbying for you to get the resources. Like, hey, you know what, Sean, we got some limited resources here. Your team needs these resources more than my. I, I think my team can probably do without until we can get, you know, more resource available. I'm going to give these resources to you. We're going to build an awesome relationship, man. I'm going to help the team win. That's, I'm, I'm showing everybody I put the team and the mission before myself or my team and our own interests. And, and it's like this is what it takes right? To, to if I want to be a winning, a member of a high performance, winning team, like, that's the attitude I gotta have. And, and when you, when you start to just get people to see like what winning actually looks like, it's, it's often very different than, but you know, you gotta, you just, if you can put your emotions in tap, put your ego in check, it just, you free your mind, man.
- [326:26]
Sean Ryan
You know, this sounds like a lot more of, a lot more than just a leadership training course. Sounds like a way of life. And that can help you with all aspects, you know, of what you're going through with your family, with your business, wherever, wherever in the military, doesn't matter. Sounds like these aspects apply to every, every aspect of life. And that's really cool that you guys put that together.
- [326:57]
Leif Babin
I appreciate it, man. It's, I wanted to be able to share that. And it's, it's, it's like I said, it's humbling. It's humbling to see how many people have taken and, and utilize that, you know, but if I can help even one person out there in some way to not make the mistakes that I've made as a knucklehead leader, to not lead with ego or try to prove that I know, you know, all the answers. I think that to me makes all the difference, right of, of the. It's in life, right? It's, it's, it's be humble or get humble. That's the way it is. So happy to pass those Lessons on.
- [327:32]
Sean Ryan
Thank you. Well, Leif, you know, we're wrapping up the interview now and I just, I just want to say, you know, it really was, man, it was, it was great to reconnect and. But it was a real honor to have you here to share what you shared with about everything, man, especially, you know, the, your darkest day. I mean, I really commend you for how you handled that and how you described the guys that have passed and man, you're just a hell of a guy, Leif, and a true leader and I appreciate you.
- [328:16]
Leif Babin
I wish I was better, Sean. I wish I was better, man. And I think I'm just on the path, you know, trying to learn from my mistakes like everybody else. And I hope that people can take those mistakes and learn from and apply going forward. It's an honor to be here with you, brother. I can't. I'm so proud of, of all that you're doing in the world, man. You got such an important voice on so many topics that, you know, other people aren't willing to tackle or take on. And I couldn't, I couldn't be more, you know, we were joking on her before we started this. I've never guessed we were working together in buds with 18 year old Sean that you would have the, the wardrobe with so many, so many sport coats out there to put on, but it's awesome, awesome, man, and so proud of you. Love, love what you're doing. Keep doing it, man. You're making a huge difference to the world.
- [329:05]
Sean Ryan
Thank you, man. And just for the record, I personally learned a ton about leadership talking to you today and so thank you, man.
- [329:15]
Leif Babin
God bless Foreign Hi, I'm Joe Sal Sehei, host of the Stacking Benjamins podcast. Every week we talk to experts about saving, investing, personal finance, trends, crypto. Can't do it.
- [329:41]
Sean Ryan
You could have done all that research, all the breadcrumbs and thought, this company's never going bankrupt.
- [329:45]
Leif Babin
Foiled again. You never knew personal finance could be this fun. Throwing down the got one.
- [329:51]
Sean Ryan
I'm bringing it today.
- [329:52]
Leif Babin
I'm only going to be off by six figures instead of seven. Every boy has a dream, doc. Every boy has a dream for sure. Stacking Benjamins. Follow and listen on your favorite platform.