Extortion 17: The Truth

Summary

The Antihero Podcast - Extortion 17: The Truth Release Date: February 3, 2025

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Introduction to Extortion 17

In this emotionally charged episode of The Antihero Podcast, hosts Brent Tucker and Tyler engage in a profound conversation with Billy Vaughn, the father of Aaron Vaughn—a Tier 1 SEAL operator who tragically lost his life during Extortion 17. Extortion 17 refers to the devastating helicopter crash on August 6, 2011, in Afghanistan, which resulted in the loss of 30 American lives, including 17 SEALs.

Discrepancies in Military Reports

Billy Vaughn recounts the confusing and distressing aftermath of the crash, highlighting inconsistencies in the official narrative. He shares his initial bewilderment upon learning about the incident through media outlets and the subsequent military debriefing.

Billy Vaughn [00:21]: "I could be 100% wrong, and I would love it if somebody in the military that's not full of crap... would say, no, that's not what it was. Here's what happened."

Vaughn details the debriefing process, where families were told that the Rangers were not in trouble and that a Quick Reaction Force (QRF) consisting of SEALs was dispatched. However, discrepancies arose concerning the type of helicopter used and the absence of pre-assault fire—unusual given standard combat protocols.

Billy Vaughn [14:41]: "He explained about the chopper coming in... there was no pre-assault fire that night when the chopper came in."

Ramp Ceremony Controversy

A pivotal moment in the discussion revolves around a ramp ceremony where an Afghan individual made hostile remarks about Americans. This revelation sparked outrage among the families and raised serious questions about the authenticity and operations of the mission.

Billy Vaughn [46:00]: "An Afghan began to speak. And immediately we looked at each other because we didn't have a clue what he was saying... he damned the Americans to hell."

The interpretation of these remarks was met with conflicting views, further muddying the waters of the official account. The families attempted to bring this footage to light, facing pushback and dismissive responses from military officials.

Interactions with Military Officials

Billy Vaughn shares his personal encounters with high-ranking military officials, including Admiral William McRaven. These interactions were marked by evasiveness and a lack of transparency, deepening the family's distrust.

Billy Vaughn [40:37]: "Admiral McRaven came in very polite. We sat down at the table. He said, 'The military would never lie to someone who's lost a loved one.'"

However, when confronted with evidence and questions about operational discrepancies, the responses remained unsatisfactory, leaving the Vaughn family seeking answers.

Brent Tucker [55:04]: "You're being harassed for asking questions, finding out things that actually happened, and just bringing to light what actually happened."

Consequences and Backlash

The pursuit of truth led to significant backlash against Billy Vaughn and his family. Invitations to memorial events were rescinded, and support from organizations like the Seal Museum was withdrawn almost immediately after publicizing their findings.

Billy Vaughn [80:32]: "Within hours, we got an email... they couldn't help us anymore."

Moreover, members of their organization faced resignations and distancing actions, illustrating the resistance encountered when challenging the established narrative.

Closing Personal Anecdotes

Amidst the heavy discourse, Billy Vaughn shares heartwarming memories of his son Aaron, highlighting his son's adventurous spirit and unwavering commitment to his responsibilities.

Billy Vaughn [110:19]: "The boy was rougher on anything that I ever had and owned than anything I've ever seen."

These personal stories serve as a poignant reminder of the human cost behind the military operations and the enduring impact on families left behind.

Notable Quotes

• Billy Vaughn [00:21]: "I could be 100% wrong... here's what happened."
• Billy Vaughn [14:41]: "There was no pre-assault fire that night when the chopper came in."
• Billy Vaughn [46:00]: "He damned the Americans to hell."
• Billy Vaughn [40:37]: "The military would never lie to someone who's lost a loved one."
• Brent Tucker [55:04]: "You're being harassed for asking questions... bringing to light what actually happened."
• Billy Vaughn [80:32]: "Within hours, we got an email... they couldn't help us anymore."
• Billy Vaughn [110:19]: "The boy was rougher on anything that I ever had and owned than anything I've ever seen."

Conclusion

Extortion 17: The Truth delves deep into the murky waters surrounding one of the most tragic days in Naval Special Warfare history. Through heartfelt narratives and pointed questioning, Billy Vaughn and hosts Brent Tucker and Tyler shed light on possible cover-ups and the relentless pursuit of truth against formidable odds. This episode not only honors the memory of fallen heroes but also underscores the imperative need for transparency and accountability within military operations.

Transcript

[Billy Vaughn]

What is that? Dude, I think they just got shot.

[Brent Tucker]

I'm on it, sir. Extortion is down. Roger. Fallen angel. Fallen angel.

[Billy Vaughn]

I could be 100% wrong, and I would love it if somebody in the military that's not full of crap, but, but has, has the, you know, ability to know would say, no, that's not what it was. Here's what happened.

[Brent Tucker]

Someone at the talk that night knows, you know, and, and knows the truth.

[Tyler]

Hold on, we're not recording.

[Brent Tucker]

Want to buy a rifle?

[Tyler]

Do you want to buy a shirt.

[Billy Vaughn]

To support military dancing?

[Tyler]

People want to see their sausage get made.

[Brent Tucker]

An appropriate level of inappropriateness. Something happens in my family tonight. The Delta Force isn't, isn't coming to rescue my, my family, my kids. Like it is. First responders, you know, that are, that are going to save my, my family.

[Tyler]

They want the culture to be people that not want to be cops. And the people that do want to be cops are now walking into the job scared to do the job.

[Brent Tucker]

I'm gonna try to act like it didn't happen, although we, we all know it did.

[Tyler]

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[Tyler]

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[Tyler]

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[Brent Tucker]

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[Tyler]

We usually like to get some candy conversation, but you guys had it already.

[Brent Tucker]

It's, it's, it's hard not to. I mean, it's, it's a, it's, it's a crazy, it's a crazy story without hearing more to it in the backstory. And so when Mr. Vaughn gets to talking, it's.

[Billy Vaughn]

Call me Billy.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay? Do I have to?

[Tyler]

It's one of those things we're like.

[Billy Vaughn]

Well, whatever you're comfortable with if you.

[Brent Tucker]

If that's what you want. Yes, sir, Billy, it is.

[Tyler]

All right. Welcome back to the Anti Hero podcast. Part Delta Force, part Street cop, all truth. I'm Tyler, owner of Refracted Wolf Apparel. Use promo code Anti Hero and get yourself 15 off. The best at outsider graphic tees, stickers, hats, flags, shirts like this. We even got beanies for the cold weather.

[Brent Tucker]

And I'm Brent Tucker, owner of First Responder Coffee Company and First Responder Cigar Company. Use FRC15, that's FRCC15 to get 15% off the world's best coffee and cigars.

[Tyler]

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[Brent Tucker]

And last but not least, don't forget our Thursday Night Live every Thursday at 8:00pm Eastern Standard Time. And our Patreon best deal on the market with when it comes to Patreons, three and five dollar subscriptions helps us do everything that, that we get done here and equipment and rent that we need. So please. And you'd also get more, more exposure to us, some behind the scenes upcoming episodes and more information. So please check us out on Patreon. Let's get right into it because I am very, very interested in, in, in this episode and I can't, I'm very, I don't use the word excited because that's not the word. You know, it's an inappropriate word, but I can't think of the right word. I'm Just very intrigued. Just very intrigued because we've already been talking about an hour before we started, and. And that. And that hour flew by. So with us today, we have Billy Vaughn. He is the father of SOC Aaron Vaughn, who was a Tier 1 operator for the SEALs that died on Extortion 17. Now, if you don't know what Extortion 17 is, Extortion 17 happened August 6, 2011. It was an absolute tragic day for. For American military. And if it was, it was a tragic day for American military. It was a devastating day in the SEAL community. We lost 30Americans. And that helicopter crash in a helicopter that was shot down in Afghanistan. Of those 30Americans, 17 of them were seals. We lost 17 seals in one day. I remember hearing it when it happened, and it almost seemed like it was like it couldn't even be true. So that is what we're here to talk about before. Before we get into it, I will say this. If. If you're not familiar with extortion 17 now, now you are, and you should be, and it's been one of those things. It's been a hot topic of. Of conspiracy theories, but I don't want to say conspiracy theory necessarily, and in. In a bad way, but some of them are, you know, like, some of them talk about like the whole UBL raid was. Take. Was. Was, you know, taken out via extortion 17, and that's how we removed those guys. That's. That's crazy. If you're hoping to tune in for something like that, you'll be disappointed. But if you're looking to tune in to think, hey, I don't know, maybe. Maybe our military wasn't completely honest with us. Again, you're in for a wild ride. So with that, Billy, thank you so much for coming on and talking about, you know, one of the worst days in your life. And we don't take that lightly.

[Billy Vaughn]

Thank you for having me here, Brent and Tyler. It is something that, you know, the thing is, Karen and I don't talk about it much, and it seems like, you know, when you do like this, as you said while ago, you don't know what the appropriate word is. We do want people to know what happened to our son and his brothers and all the men on extortion 17. It was the largest loss in the history of Naval special warfare. But when we talk about it or even on the way up here, it's just like. It kind of. It just kind of drains you emotionally and makes you feel funny. It's been a long time since 2011. But it can all become very fresh very quick.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

When you start, when you begin to, you know, rehash it. And so I'm, I'm sure you. Thanks for having me.

[Brent Tucker]

Oh, Abs. Yeah, I'm sure we've. We've said this several times, ironically, in the nas in the last couple, I don't know, short, short time frame have. Which is, you know, a man dies two deaths. You know, his. The physical death, and then the last time his name is spoken is the second death, he dies. And so by, by coming on here, you know, telling this story, getting, Getting, you know, tens and tens of thousands of people to hear the name Aaron Von again is, Is. Is important, you know, and, and again, it's. This isn't, you know, to try to go out and, and, and bash any, Any community. It's. But the truth matters, and people don't like hearing it. When, you know, they get. They get told this, then they want to believe it. And if you tell them anything different, they. Their immediate reaction is push back and say, no, that that can't happen, and that. So it's important. And I think that happened. Maybe that happened to you guys a little bit at the beginning. But let's start at the beginning where I believe it's the debriefing. The debriefing they gave you about the, the helicopter crash. Let's talk about that. And then. And the few things that is. You weren't in the military, correct?

[Billy Vaughn]

That's correct.

[Brent Tucker]

So. So for something to sound odd to you, you know, you know, let's be honest, like, has to be. I don't know, I feel like it has to be pretty blatant because, like, small things could jump out at us, like. Yeah, that kind of doesn't sound right. But for you on your first time and in a deeper. If you'd be like, I don't know if all that's adding up seems pretty significant.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's. That's. That's correct, Brent. But I'll tell you what, if it's hard, I'm just. Because you did say that. That things happened to us early on. And I'm gonna back up just a little bit to the time that. When Aaron was. When Aaron was actually killed, because the first thing that happened that day, I was in Vancouver, British Columbia. Karen was at home with our daughters in Florida. And my mom and dad, I'm a junior, so my dad's name is Billy. My mom and dad live in West Tennessee. And that very morning, CNN called my mom and I remember when I was getting. When I was at the airport there in Seattle getting ready to fly home, I heard my mom's voice on tv And I turned around and looked at the TV and there was a full picture of Aaron. And she was talking about him and saying that he had called her before he had deployed and CNN was talking to her. The first thing that happened is the Navy got onto us because my mom went on tv. We got a call. I got a call from. From Dev Grew, talking about my mom and say, the grandma went on tv. And I said, well, what was she supposed to do? And we did. We didn't know anything. We were just parents. She said, well, she. She's not supposed to do that. And I said, well, why didn't you contact her and tell her? And they said, we didn't know where to find her. And I said, well, it's funny, CNN found her by 11:30 that morning, and Debra couldn't find her. And. And Karen and I were. Anna's widow, were invited to go on NBC that morning. And we went, and then FOX called Karen and I asked us to come on Fox and Friends. And immediately the Navy said, you can't go on Fox and Friends. And I said, I've already told them we would, we would. We're going. And he said, the guy told me, he said, we're afraid that you're going to give away operational security, that you may leak something. And I said, we don't know anything. I said, you don't need to worry about the leaks coming from my house. You need to worry about the leaks coming from the White House. Because if you remember, Joe Biden had outed Special Warfare and had caused all the Special Operations, Special Forces community to be up in arms because he had outed them. And so immediately they put some PR persons in front of us. And when we showed up at FOX in our car, the Navy was there and went in and told FOX what they could ask us and what they couldn't. And then we returned back to Florida after that. And those people stayed in Florida for about two months. And anytime anybody wanted to talk to us or interview us, they had to go in front of those people and talk to them first and ask what they could tell. And, you know, we went to a debriefing. The families were invited to a debriefing in October of 2011 at Little Creek Base. And then we didn't really know anything. The story that we had heard up to that point is that the seals were going to save the Rangers because the Rangers were in trouble. That was what was out publicly. That was what had, you know, had been said that day. General Bradley Colt, leader of the investigation, made it clear the Rangers were not in trouble. He said it was a quick reaction for us and that the SEALs were going out as a QRF. And so that's what we bought that day, and we believe that. And he made it clear the Rangers weren't in trouble. In fact, their mission was already over. But he did say some things that day that were very troubling. He pointed out first that they were flying on a CH47 that was built in the 60s, retrofitted in the 80s. And you know, we knew that usually, or as far as we thought, they normally flew on MH47s. And I asked him there and I said, why weren't they on an MH47 that night? And he said there wasn't one available, but the CH47 is just as capable as the MH47. And then he's.

[Brent Tucker]

But not defensive.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's what he, that's what he explained to us. And then he explained us, you know, what we thought was the whole mission as things took place. And, and then when, when he explained about the chopper coming in, he stated that there was no pre assault fire that night when the chopper came in. And you know, to me, not billing, as you pointed out earlier, this is one of those things that stood out big, you know, to me, because I mean, you know, anything you've ever watched on tv, all the way back to John Wayne, all the way up to tears as a son or anything else, you know, there's. You always lay down fire, you know, to cover for your guys coming in. And he said that it was because of the rules of engagement, you know, that it wasn't allowed. And so we went through the debriefing. And I remember Admiral Harward, one of the fathers over here away from us again asked, well, no, actually he asked, so why didn't we use a drone strike that night? And Admiral Harward turned and said to the grieving families, he said, because we want to win their hearts and minds. And that's what came from a SEAL commander, an admiral who men and women, fathers and mothers would think is a great war hero, that he had our sons winning hearts and minds of the Afghans. And that, that, you know, again, that, that was terrible to hear. And, and when the debriefing was over, we went, actually, I went and talked to Karen and I did Lieutenant Colonel Matthew Grant, and we went to actually Actually, they showed us that day footage of the chopper going down, the rotors separating from the chopper, told us how quickly our sons were killed, told us that none of them suffered. It happened so fast. And so some of us wanted to see that footage again. And while we were in that room by ourselves, I asked him again about the pre assault fire. And he reiterated to me again to Mr. Vaughn, pre assault fire was not allowed. The rules of engagement would not allow pre assault fire. And that's when I thought, there's something terribly wrong with the rules of engagement. They also told us in the debriefing, because another father asked, well, what about the black box? What did the black box say? And General Coats said, well, the black box was washed away in a flood that night. That was a story that the military, the Pentagon, the Department of defense carried for two years, until June of 2013. There was a congressional hearing. And in that hearing, Gary Reed, Deputy of Defense for under Obama, when asked by Congressman Jason Chaffetz, well, we, we understand that the black box was washed away in a flood. He stated that, well, there, there was never a black box on the chopper. That CH47s are analog and they can't carry a black box. They can carry a black box that gives the engine performance, but they're not capable of any other. Chaffetz didn't ask a rebuttal. And the next morning, Karen and I were on Fox and Friends, and I just made that statement that Gary Reed had said that under oath. And before we got out of D.C. that day, we had three phone calls from people we knew in D.C. that said those, those choppers absolutely had a black box. So that was one of the things I have no way of proving it, you know.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Billy Vaughn]

But if they had told us at the beginning that it didn't have a black box, the families would have bought it.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Billy Vaughn]

If they told us at the beginning, well, this is what happened to the black box. We'd have all bought. Nobody believes that you can, that you can have a flood in a wadi in Afghanistan and the black box never be located when we can find them in the ocean, you know, JV team for life.

[Brent Tucker]

Tyler, how many critical incidents do you think we've covered so far in this podcast, man?

[Tyler]

At least five, six.

[Brent Tucker]

And they're not going to stop, you know, there's, you cannot stop them all. So they're going to happen. And you really have, you know, two charters of that. Obviously, one is to stop them from happening, but since you can't stop them all from happening, you owe it to the people that you protect and depend on you to react to those situations in the most effective and efficient manner. And right now, really, whether you know, you're a fire department, ems, law enforcement, you know, you're stuck with essentially radios.

[Tyler]

And Apollo is the best way to manage resources during these events because it's designed by first responders for first responders.

[Brent Tucker]

It gives first responders a common operating picture which allows them to see where everybody is in real time, overlaid onto a map to see where they are. You can drop pinpoints and let them know where they need to go. And without constant talking on the radio, everybody knows where the incident is, where it's happening and where they need to be.

[Tyler]

Apollo is an app based application. It's just download and go.

[Brent Tucker]

It's an app and so it works with androids, it works with iPhones.

[Tyler]

Apollo makes sure on the back end everything works and you can just plug and go. They handle all the licensing, all the encryption compliance, all the security. It's all handled by Apollo. It's crucial to know where everyone is and what they are doing in order to effectively control chaos in one of these, either natural disasters or shootings or anything like that.

[Brent Tucker]

So if you want to learn more about Apollo, scan the QR code and ensure your department is ready to react to any crisis in its most effective and efficient manner possible.

[Tyler]

JV team for life.

[Brent Tucker]

Go ahead. The chances of a flood happening in a wadi is so, I mean, they happen, but yeah, that's so small. I got, I got a few questions for you. Yeah. You know, you talked about the CH and the MH 47 for, for the listeners. Can you tell them the difference between the CH and the, and the mh? Because they may not understand the difference. And I say, and I, I assume that maybe you know that because you've been doing some research and if you need me to help me out, help you out, I will.

[Billy Vaughn]

So here's what I'm going to tell you about, about what my son told me, okay. When he came home off leave, you know, after his first deployment and told me that they flew on the mhs, you know, he said, dad, you've never seen anything like scene inside a ch.

[Brent Tucker]

You know, @ air shows and stuff.

[Billy Vaughn]

He said, dad, you've never seen anything like it, like the pilots, what they can do, right? When and where we can do it. And so yes, I did a little bit.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

And I know that the MH after Aaron died and when you're talking about the MHs were, were equipped to where they could go in and do a swoop landing. The, the chs had to do push up landing. You know, they had to come in.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And, and the mhs were, were, could defend themselves. The, the matches were called dark horses. And we only, and according to the Internet, we only had 66 at that time. And I brought that up to General Colt and he said, Mr. Vollan, he said, your numbers are correct. That's how many we have. Well, when we went to a break, because again, I asked why weren't they on it? And when we went to a break, an admiral, a SEAL admiral, came up to me and he said, Billy, for your information, he said, yeah, we do have, I think, actually, I think it was 60. He said, we do have 60. But he said, here's what you need to know. If we have 60, 20 are down for maintenance, right. 20 are you being used for training and 20 are in theater. So, so, so there, there weren't that many choppers. So. But why don't you tell us about the. No, you did a great job.

[Brent Tucker]

No, no, you did a great job.

[Billy Vaughn]

I don't know the specifics.

[Brent Tucker]

The only, like, one other thing I would add was as. They're armored.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah. As well.

[Brent Tucker]

Which is. Which, which can be a plus and a minus at times because they're much heavier. But that's. They, the, the MH47, just the, the upgrade package, electronics that they have, the weapon systems are so much better and they're armored. That's exactly what you want your most elite force riding in. And I don't, I don't think I have ever got on a CH47 in, in my, in my, my tier one career. So that, like that, that, that alone is just when we heard that. It's like, why were they on a CH47? But that's, but it's, it's the other one that, that you brought up that is just news to me. Like I said, I got no, like inside and, you know, information on this. In fact, I could have, but, you know, I mean, I could have, you know, asked around, you know, possibly, but it's such a, you know, sens. Um, we were talking a little bit before the podcast. I mean, those, you know, the, you know, Seal Team 6 lost a whole troop, you know, overnight. Nothing I tell you anything. You lost a son, you know, but those guys went from, from funeral to funeral to funeral to funeral for about a month straight. It just absolutely wrecked those guys. So those are, that's just one of those topics we don't really talk about. And so I always assumed that they were or you know, doing a QRF mission for the Rangers. But you already said it. You said the Rangers weren't in trouble. Obviously a QRF is a quick reaction force. And anytime special operations element goes on, on a mission, they have a QRF designated. The closest capable special operations unit that can support them in case they get into trouble is their qrf. And if anything happens, those guys will be there. But to your understanding, and not just your understanding from talking to the guys on the ground, the Rangers were never in trouble. They didn't call in the qrf.

[Billy Vaughn]

No, no, that's crazy. And in fact Colt, you know, Colt, the, the answer that or the way Colt had stated it, he, he had said the Rangers mission. Moreover, he said they, they were into the interrogation phase of their mission when the QRF went out. Now, now at that time I, I didn't even know to, to ask the kind of question, well, why would a QRF go out? That was the first I'd ever heard of a qrf, you know, so, but.

[Brent Tucker]

And, and not just it's about the. You said General, I was using Bradley Coke. Colt was the first one to say it. But since then you've, you've talked to Rangers on the ground over and over and over who all said the same thing. We were never in trouble. We didn't call, we didn't call the qrf. So now this is where we didn't want to call it a conspiracy theory because of the negative things that it has are these wazoo things. But now we have things that just aren't adding up, which is the. Why is it? Why are they on a CH40 unusually? No. One of these is, is the aha moment. But now you're starting to get several things that. Why are we lying? Why. You know, why are we lying about a black box? Why are we lying about a qrf? Why are they on a ch. Real quick, Aaron's mom has something she want to say and she. And she can't.

[Billy Vaughn]

We lost. We've lost chain of custody.

[Brent Tucker]

Right. You know, she was saying the, the AC. In fact they got to talk to the AC one the AC 130 pilots.

[Billy Vaughn]

Or fire fires officer.

[Brent Tucker]

The fires officer and they were asking not to. To launch the qrf. I'm sure they heard over, you know, over the, the channels that the QRF was launching and they're like we've lost chain of custody. Of, of of the enemy. Do not send them. And, and they, they were pleading for them not to go. There's no reason for, for them to go essentially. And asked seven times to lay down suppressive fire for the, for the qrf. And now I don't know what to call them because they're not a qrf. No, the Rangers were never in trouble, so we have to not call them the qrf because that's not accurate. And again, not, not by one general officer who may have been detached and didn't know what was going on the battlefield. We're talking about multiple Rangers on the ground saying we weren't in trouble. We never called in a qrf.

[Billy Vaughn]

Exactly. So. So do you want me kind of give you a, A kind of a step by step, and if it's going too long, you tell us what, what happened? What happened?

[Brent Tucker]

I'm here. I'm here for this. You've got me.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay. So what happened next is when we left the debriefing that day, they gave each family a folder.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay. Now, we went home in October and I, I never, we never, I never looked at. Inside that folder was a disk. I never looked at the disc until after the first of the year. Just. It just. I mean, this is just like, not something exciting that you want to do, you know, it's not like a. You want to see the replay of the football game, you know?

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And. But what I did do is when I, when I went home, I called Congressman Tom Rooney.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

And Congressman Allen west told him what we heard at the debriefing. Now, Allen was not our congressman, but we knew Alan.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

Tom was. And Tom told me, when I told him the two things, they were not on a CH47. I mean, they were not on an MH47. They were, they were on the National Guard helicopter. And that there was no pre assault fire. And he said that, he told me, he said, we're going to have a classified meeting. And he said, I will ask those questions. And Tom did not respond to me. In, in, in a phone call. He wrote me a letter.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

Right. Got it right before Christmas. And, and by the way, in the debriefing, Colt had said emphatically that the shots, the RPG shots, came from a collote as the chopper was landing. Three RPGs fired, two missed. But the middle shot, the second shot, hit the chopper. And the description they gave of what happened to the chopper was unbelievable. Now remember, it's the middle of the night. Maybe this is 100% true, but I don't see how that you and I could sit in a room and look at the TV a hundred times and describe it this perfectly. If we saw it happen, every time that the RPG hit the end of one of the rotor blades, broke off a couple feet of the rotor blade, caused the chopper to be out of balance, right? The rear rotor blade caused it to be out of balance, which caused that rotor to tip into the front rotor. All of this immediately the chopper spun around, slung some of the guys out, and it. And it hit the ground so fast. And everybody was killed so fast that nobody felt anything. That's what they described to the families. Maybe that's exactly what happened. What I don't know is how they know. That's what I don't know is how they know. Because it all happened in the middle of the night. Now, maybe they're able to tell by camp, but anyway, went back and got the letter from Congressman Tom Rooney. I backed up to say all that, that Colt said exactly where the shots came from and that they did not engage the people who fired the shots. Congressman Rooney wrote me and he said. Congressman Rooney said, yeah, Congressman Rooney wrote me and said, Mr. Vaughn, he said the reason why they did not engage the enemy in the colat because they didn't know where the shots came from. That's what he was told in the classified meeting, which was 100% different than what we'd been told twice. Once by the. Once by Colt, once by his lead investigator, Lieutenant Grant. So I called the admiral over Naval Special Warfare, okay? And I said, call his name and said, admiral. And he said. I said, this is what I heard in the debriefing. I repeated it. And he said, billy, that's exactly what I heard. That the shots came from the Colot and they didn't take them out because of the rules of engagement. And I said, why would somebody at a classified meeting tell Congressman Rooney they didn't know where the shots came from? He said, billy, I have no idea. It's these kind of things that make you want to know why they're lying. I call Grant then, right? I called Grant. Ask him again. He said, Mr. Vaughn, I told you exactly what it was. It was because of the rules of engagement. And he said, Mr. Vaughn, by the way, the military wanted us to come get the folder and the disk that everybody was handed out that day. And he said, but we said, we don't. We think it's going to cause too much of a problem if we take those up. So we. So. So we kept it. Go ahead.

[Brent Tucker]

Have you ever seen they have to have it? I say, they have to. But now there are things that aren't in the norm going on this mission. There should have been ISR footage or AC130 footage of, you know, of the helicopter that night. And, and it should have been in black and white. So that, but if they, but, but if they have it, then that's, that's, that's where we get our information of. On, on, you know, on the ground or the air, where those fires came from. They know where it came from because they saw it on ISR when it happened. So that, that makes no sense.

[Billy Vaughn]

What, what we, what, what it said in the report, the 1250 pages that the AC130 identified where the shots came. That's, that's what it gave. It didn't say anything else.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay. Yeah, it definitely could have had the. Has equipment to do that and should. Should have been looking that way.

[Billy Vaughn]

Didn't say. I'm not saying the ISR wasn't there. I'm not saying. It just didn't mention.

[Brent Tucker]

And it probably, I'm just. Now I'm guessing too, they probably had, you know, ISR stacked as well as an AC 1/3. They had, they should have had cameras all over the air now.

[Billy Vaughn]

So what happened is one of the fathers called me Charlie Strange. I don't know if you've ever talked to Charlie, ever heard Charlie's son was Michael Strange, a cryptologist on the chopper. And Charlie said, hey, Bill, he says, you gotta look at the disc. And this was right after the 1st of the year 2012.

[Brent Tucker]

You haven't looked at the disc yet?

[Billy Vaughn]

I haven't looked at the disc. So I took the disc in and I looked at it and it was unbelievable. I couldn't, it was so much there. I couldn't make really make heads or tails. So we printed it out.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

It was 1250 some odd pages.

[Brent Tucker]

Oh, wow.

[Billy Vaughn]

And then I began going through it and I did. And I mean, right on page seven. I couldn't believe the way we were operating over there that we had to tell the Afghans clear every mission with the Afghans. Did you know that or am I wrong? Because it's in the investigation.

[Brent Tucker]

The, at a, at a Tier 1.

[Billy Vaughn]

Level Afghan coordination Group of Afghanistan. That's who they said that we. This, these are the people who are being interrogated or interviewed by Colt and his group now that the, the, that they had their own little cubicle. And every mission that we ran. Now whether we did or not, I don't know. I hope we didn't. But every mission that we ran had to go through them, and they had. Now, but what I thought first about that is we don't trust those people.

[Brent Tucker]

No, we don't. My son doesn't trust people.

[Billy Vaughn]

He's come home and said to me, you know, dad, they're loyal to the highest bidder, right? We.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, we.

[Billy Vaughn]

We get out on an op, and sometimes they won't fight with us.

[Brent Tucker]

You know, there's. There's a few good ones, but I. I don't trust. And I'll say this just because. Because you asked me, and it, and it's. And it's worth, I guess, letting people know. Yeah. At, at that level. Like, I, I don't know, our, our complete approval process. You know, I, I, here's tonight's job. You know, go do it. You know, I. That, you know, those decisions are, are way above me. So maybe that did happen, and I didn't even know about it, but I'm telling you, it, it would surprise me if that happened. But, but, you know, that's. Those are above me.

[Billy Vaughn]

And it may not be true, but it's in writing.

[Brent Tucker]

And now the military report, and now that we're talking about it, I'm a find out. I'm gonna get back to you. Well, I will find that out.

[Billy Vaughn]

Well, and then here, here's the thing. I'll tell you something else.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

Is on the day that it happened, Harmony Karzai was the first one who came out and said it was SEAL Team six on the chopper. Now, that may or may not, you know, but. But, but anyway, but anyway, so these, these things started getting my attention. Okay, then, then I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna go through the whole report, but, but then what happened is we began to talk about some of the things that, that we knew. And, and after I studied the report and the things that were in there, I ran into Admiral McRaven. Karen. And I did, in November of 2012, up at the Seal Museum. And I went up to him and introduced myself and said, I'm Billy Vaughn. You may not remember. Oh, yeah, I remember you. I remember you. And I said, okay, I said, when you get done talking, I'd like to ask you a couple things. So he comes over to me by himself, and I said, admiral, I just want to know if you've done anything different to help prevent what happened the night my son got killed. And he thought I was talking about Benghazi. And he started right in on Benghazi. And I said, sir, I'm sorry. I said, you said you knew who I was. And I said, but apparently you don't. And I said, my son was killed on extortion 17. And he said, what do you mean if we don't do anything different? I said, well, sir, there was no pre assault fire that night. And he said, they can get pre assault fire anytime they want it. And I said, well, not according to the testimony of the two Apache pilots. I said, one of them said, we don't even ask it anymore because it's denied. The other one said, because their testimony was in the 1250 pages, the other one said, There's a one in a million chance we can get pre assault fire. He said, what do you want to do, shoot up a whole village? And I said, well, sir, the chopper was shot down over a wadi away from the village, right? And he said, well, war is complicated. And I said, sir, I want to tell you, I said, if a man of your rank had the nuts and the guts to speak up, you could stop our warriors from getting killed like they are. And he put his finger up against me like that. And I said, sir, I said, I don't. He didn't touch me, but he's a lot bigger than me, you know. And I said, sir, I don't think that we want people to see us like this, you know. And so we left.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay?

[Billy Vaughn]

And then that's when a month or so later, it wasn't a month. A few weeks later, they call, his chief of staff called and invited me over to, over to socom, socom. And I didn't go. And they called, invited me again, and, and I didn't go. And then right close to Christmas, he called and he said, Admiral McRaven would like to come to your house and visit with you and Ms. Vaughn. And I said, okay, that'd be fine. So on January 13th of 2013, McRaven showed up, came to the door with Chris Farris, okay, And his, his, his chief advisor that day. And he had two security out outside our house and he was there about three and a half hours. He came in, is very polite, apologize. Now I apologize for what happened to us up there. Went in and sat down at the.

[Brent Tucker]

Table and good on him for, for coming out. He could have got his admiral feelings hurt and never talked to you again. So I'll exactly, I'll give credit where. Credit.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's exactly right. We, we were glad he was coming to see us because we thought we'd get some an fact. I'm glad you brought that up because we told our family, we told our friends. Admiral McRaven was coming to our. We'd never had anybody like that in our house. We're just a mom and dad, you know, who lost a son. And everybody's like. It was on a Friday. And everybody's like, well, call us. Tell us how it goes, you know, tell us when it's all over. Yeah, well, it went. It went well enough that after we found out the magnitude of it, we didn't take a phone call. We didn't make a phone call until Monday morning because we sat alone together in our house the rest of the weekend, and we saw how big the problem was in our military. McRaven came in very polite. We sat down at the table. Mr. Ferris sat across from me. Karen sat right here. McRaven sat right here. Almost the first sentence out of his mouth. We just want you to know that the military would never lie to someone who's lost a loved one. Oh, wow. And my wife is.

[Brent Tucker]

How we're going to start this out, huh?

[Tyler]

Why'd you even say that?

[Billy Vaughn]

Sitting there, quite relaxed.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And she says, what about Chris Till?

[Brent Tucker]

What about Pat Tillman?

[Billy Vaughn]

Pat TILLMAN, yeah. And McRaven, look at you.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

McRaven came up on the table with his elbows. Yeah. Blood screaming. What about Pat Tillman? It was just a case of friendly fire. And everybody sits there with their jaw dropped because. Yeah, but you lied about it for two years.

[Brent Tucker]

That's right.

[Billy Vaughn]

For two years.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

You know, and then. So it started, right. The conversation started. We went through. We asked him several questions, and it was. He did. Well, that was later in the conversation. And. Yeah, he did. And he. And, you know, there was either so much he didn't know about the report, or he was so. So smooth with it that it was unreal. When we asked him things, things that I've already mentioned to you about the Afghans, about. About the helicopter and about the rules of engagement. And then Chris Farris, Actually, before that, I asked Admiral McRaven, I said, well. Or I said to him, I said, sir, well, I'm afraid that we're going to lose this war in Afghanistan, and my son's death's going to be in vain. And he says, well, George Bush got us into the war in Afghanistan. And he said, obama's going to get us out. And I said, yes, sir, at what cost? And he said, well, let me tell you, Obama is a great president. And he said. I sat with him often and he said, he's not just a good president, he's a good man. And I Said, sir, I'm going to have to ask you not to mention the man's name again in my house. And then Chris Farris, like. Like Karen, like Karen had earlier, said. He said, Mr. Mrs. Vaughn, he said, did you guys get a copy of the Ramp ceremony? And Karen said, I don't think anybody got one. And he said, I'll get you one. About two weeks went by. He said, I just want you to know a lot of your son's teammates were really pissed off because an Afghan spoke at the Ramp ceremony. And so the meeting concluded, and they left. I'm sorry, I have to say this, because it was a good moment for me when McRaven was at the door, and I'm looking up at him and we're saying goodbye, and Master Sergeant Ferris is right behind him. And I was Saying to Admiral McRaven, I said, When Aaron would come home from a deployment, he'd always bring me something, you know, like maybe a knife or some kind of souvenir or something like that. McRaven's going down like this.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And I said, but. But this time he didn't come home. But I do have the flash suppressor off his gun that night, and I showed it to McRaven, and again, his face got blood red. And he said, where'd you get that? And I said, I found it. And Ferris just smiled really, really big behind me, you know, and. But anyway, a couple weeks went by. We didn't get it. We didn't get the Ramp ceremony. Karen wrote him, and he wrote back, and he said, Ms. Vaughn, it's been a lot more red tape of getting it than I thought it would be. I'll send you mine. And he did.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay, nice.

[Billy Vaughn]

And then when we watched it a.

[Brent Tucker]

Couple weeks later, there's a Delta Force guy for you.

[Billy Vaughn]

He did. Let me tell you something. I'll tell you what.

[Brent Tucker]

Had to sneak that in. Had to sneak that in.

[Billy Vaughn]

Chris Farris was the nice guy we've ever met. He was that whole day, you know, in the meeting and everything. And he sent it, and we. We watched it. Everything was, you know, perfectly normal until it got to. After the. The American chaplain did his part, and then an Afghan began to speak.

[Brent Tucker]

You talking about the Ramp ceremony recording that you're watching?

[Billy Vaughn]

Yes, sir. And an Afghan began to speak. And immediately we looked at each other because we didn't have a clue what he was saying. And right after he spoke, Votel spoke and thank the Afghans, we're all brothers in arms and all such. But we said to Each other. We got to know what the Afghan is saying. And we took it to a Middle Eastern expert, Karen Tech, savvy enough. She just pulled the audio off. No pictures, nothing, you know, and we sent that to them the next day. Called us back and told us, he's damned the Americans to hell. So the Muslims were the winners. The Americans are fodder for hellfire. And so we took it to Washington, D.C. and we took it to Congressman Louie Gohmer, Congressman Michele Bachmann, and both of them told us, well, we don't know if this is right or not. We're going to have to have it verified. Yeah, we're going to have to have it interpreted ourselves. They did. Yeah, we took it to Glenn Beck's people. Those three all came back with the same interpretation. Took it to Brigitte Gabriel.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

And y'all came back with the same interpretation.

[Brent Tucker]

Now, now I have to say this for the listeners, because when you told me that story earlier blew my mind. I don't know how many ramp ceremonies I've, I've been to of out of all my deployments. I remember all of them. They're, you know, they're horrible. I would know. My God would I know if there was ever an Afghan, you know, if there were Afghan remains out there. And that's nothing anti Afghan at all. It's just that they have their own process and we're in their country. And I will get to this in a second because I had this same question for you. But that is so unusual to do that, that they are at our ramp ceremony and to have, you know, the Afghan bodies with ours again, because they're two separate ones, they go have their own ceremony, you know, in their country, and we're going to fly our bodies back. So I've never seen it commingled like that. This will be another first of just part of the story that's blowing my mind. And then to have the imam come over and, and pray over it is just. That's. That's crazy to me. And then, but then I asked you, I was like, why would they do that? You. You'll give the answer in a second. But even when you give the answer, which is the answer, it still blows my mind. We'll talk about that. We'll talk about that when you're. Why were the commandos caskets even in our ramp ceremony?

[Billy Vaughn]

So they were flown back to, to Dover on the same planes that the, that the, that the Americans were flown back. And, and we, we were told that the bodies couldn't be Identified. Now, some of them were thrown out, so they were easily identifiable, but the rest of them, including our son, were trapped in a chopper and they burned. And so we were told that the bodies could not be identified without bringing them back to Dover. So they brought them back. And then if what they said was true and they didn't identify the bodies before they were brought back, then they randomly put eight Afghan flags over coffins that may very well have had American warriors in those coffins.

[Brent Tucker]

How could they. Who's making this plan? And was like, yep, let's. Let's do that. That just the. The slap in the face that that is.

[Billy Vaughn]

Is.

[Brent Tucker]

Is on another level.

[Billy Vaughn]

You're right. That's. That's what it was to. That's what it was to. To. In fact, we were also told. And, you know, this is hearsay, that. That when the bodies were put on the plains, that the warriors on the planes with the seals put American flags on all the coffins.

[Brent Tucker]

You better believe they did.

[Billy Vaughn]

And then when the bodies arrived in Dover.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

That the politicians put the flags back on.

[Brent Tucker]

Eight random caskets.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's exactly right. Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

It's just grandstanding, and it's just. It's just grandstanding and it's. And it's pathetic. That's how pathetic our politicians are.

[Billy Vaughn]

I'll tell you how pathetic they are. This doesn't even go with Aaron being killed. Karen found out a year or two later that there was a Ranger that was killed the night after. Three Rangers killed the night after Aaron.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

And that. And I can't remember his mom's name. You might be able to hear it. But. But Karen talked to her. And in fact, she talked to her son the night after Aaron was killed because she was afraid he might have been on the chopper. Okay. And in that conversation, she was told that her son was flown back on the same planes. These three Rangers were flown back on the same planes with the guys from extortion 17. When we were at Dover, they. They treated us great. They had. They brought. They brought. The families were there. We were in a big, great, big greeting room. All the dignitaries came through. McRaven. Obama. Yeah, Obama. Leon Panetta. You know, they all came through and talked to us and all that stuff. And all the families were. We each had our own little couch and all this stuff, all kinds of food. And a year or so later, when Karen talked to this mom, here's what we found out. And it made us feel so bad, even kind of embarrassed for. It wasn't our fault. But still, she she was held off in a room by herself while she was grieving her son. And when we were gone and left, a couple of the dignitaries came by and spoke to them, but their. Her son had died just like ours in Afghanistan.

[Brent Tucker]

I just wanted to look it up real quick because if we're talking about, you know, fallen soldiers, I want to. Want to say their names. And it seems as if according to those dates, it would be Sergeant Alessandro that died. So I just wanted to say his.

[Billy Vaughn]

Name and just so you know how he died. According to his mom, they had taken fire. This is along with the rules engagement. They had taken fire. And he radios back to his base, hey, can we return fire on these guys? And whoever he's talking to at the base says you have to make sure they have not laid their gun down. And so while they're trying to verify, he and two others are shot and killed.

[Brent Tucker]

Here's. Here's this. Actually, I'm glad this, this ties into something I wanted to say earlier.

[Billy Vaughn]

Go ahead.

[Brent Tucker]

One, we have American Army Rangers scared not, not of combat. Scared to do the right thing. Scared to, Scared to be in combat. Scared to take action when they know what's right and they have to ask, you know, mommy and daddy for, for permission. That's not how you run a war. Which goes back to, you know, the Admiral saying, well, it's complicated. Yeah, no, no, war is not complicated. You, sir, complicated it. You complicated it needlessly war, it's. It's the biggest cop out in life. It is, is to say, oh, it's. It's complicated. So few catching a spaceship with chopsticks that, that SpaceX does, that's complicated. Nuclear engineering, that's complicated. Combat is one of the simplest things I've ever done in life. The only thing you, Admiral McRaven, are complicating. It doesn't have to be this way. He was shot in the head while begging for permission to engage. And that is on are spineless politicians. And, and make no mistake about it, our generals and admirals, generally speaking, are politicians.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

And have we learned that the hard way? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I had to learn the hard way too.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah, yeah, no, I know, I know, and I'm sorry. I mean, you know, we had, we still have, we have the greatest respect for war fighters. But, but the people, the people up there, like McRaven, McRaven, Harvard, those people that we thought votel. You know, I mean, we just. And McRaven even told us at our house, he said, I mean, he said, this is Hard for me to even say because people are going to think this is so outlandish. He said, I know you lost your son, but I've seen so many guys die that it's probably just about as. It's probably just about as hard on me. He did. He said that. He said that and he said a.

[Brent Tucker]

Father and a mother.

[Billy Vaughn]

And he sat there and consistently called the guys the Rangers and the Seals. He called them the kids. The kids just don't know. The kids just don't understand, you know, this and that. You talk to him like I'm talking to my. Talk about him, like I talked about my grandchildren.

[Brent Tucker]

Read the room buddy.

[Billy Vaughn]

Just made me sick. It just, it just made it. I had so little respect for him when he left that.

[Brent Tucker]

How do you think Ferris felt? He had to work with that guy. Every day I've been getting trouble for, for the, for the old guys, for that one.

[Billy Vaughn]

So. So, I mean, talk as much as you want to because I'm doing all the talking.

[Brent Tucker]

No, as you should. As you should.

[Billy Vaughn]

But yeah, so. So after we saw the ramp ceremony after, well, when we went to D.C. and it was interpreted for us then we were able to hold a press conference at the National Press Club. And it's just so funny. I mean, these people are such turds, you know, I mean, it's just unreal. I mean, when you think about it, these people that like McRaven that you thought and that the world thinks and that the US thinks are such great warriors. They're such. And I'm going to say, I'm going to say the polite word here. There's such big overgrown babies and sissies and are so arrogant because all my wife did so. So she took the ramp ceremony and put the interpreted words across the screen. So when the, when the Afghan spoke, people could tell what he was saying. We played that at the National Press Club. I mean, you know, and the thing is, the military shit a calf with a barbed wire tail. You know, I mean, they could not, they could not believe that a mom and dad would say, here's what they've done. Because what we said is, this is what they've done. Now let them defend it. They were okay with it.

[Brent Tucker]

What they should have done was owned it and said, we apologize. We had no idea what he was going to say. This won't happen again and you have our full support. Right? That's what. But it goes back to this whole thing of, of. How dare, how dare you expose us for. Exactly.

[Billy Vaughn]

We're going to give you an excrement sandwich. You're going to eat it and you're going to like it. Here's what they did do. Here's what they did do. The Pentagon came out and said, well, we've had it interpreted and we've got a different interpretation.

[Brent Tucker]

So what do you guys, what are you guys up to now? Like 3, 4, 5. Interpret 5. So 5 all saying the same thing.

[Billy Vaughn]

So here. So, so we were invited on Fox and Friends and we went on Fox and Friends and they told me in the ear, you can't talk about the, the imam at the ramp ceremony. And I said, yeah, I'm gonna talk. I said I have to talk about it. And, and so I did. Right. They had it interpreted.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

And, and according to them, they, they said that there are several funeral sayings or speeches or whatever that, that a mom could use.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

But according to their interpreter, who apparently was a Muslim, that this is the most hostel. Yeah. That they could use.

[Brent Tucker]

Most hostile.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah. Huh?

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, I want to see my surprise face on that one. Yeah, that's so.

[Billy Vaughn]

So then, so then. Got anything you want to ask me? I do.

[Brent Tucker]

I'm just disgusted. Yeah, I'm just disgusted.

[Tyler]

This is ISR footage, right? This is what, the ISR footage?

[Billy Vaughn]

Yes.

[Tyler]

Of the, of the crash. So have after it crashes approximately how many minutes after before you see the first people engaging with a crash site.

[Billy Vaughn]

So according to the chronolog, that's why I got my hands here, because I know.

[Brent Tucker]

I'll keep you in the box. Yeah, stay in the box.

[Billy Vaughn]

So according to the chronological time of events. You know what that is?

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. Oh yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

The chopper was shot down at 239, 36. At 3:04am These people walk up onto the crash site.

[Tyler]

Who are they?

[Billy Vaughn]

Huh?

[Tyler]

Who are they?

[Billy Vaughn]

Well, we don't. In the chronological time of events, it calls them an unidentified coalition group. Okay, okay. On, on, on this footage it calls them friendlies.

[Tyler]

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[Billy Vaughn]

And.

[Tyler]

And get yourself 10% off your order.

[Brent Tucker]

Revenge is an act of passion. Vengeance is an act of justice. Injuries are revenged. Crimes are avenged. Almost a century ago, big pharmaceutical companies re engineered medical school curriculum and faculty with one goal.

[Billy Vaughn]

Putting profit before progress.

[Brent Tucker]

Anyone pushing back against the medical matrix they carefully crafted was threatened, silenced, censored, financially ruined, or worse.

[Billy Vaughn]

They are the problem.

[Brent Tucker]

We are the solution. You're clear to engage. Initials Mike Juliet Alpha.

[Billy Vaughn]

You're clear to engage with weapons.

[Brent Tucker]

You're clear to engage with weapons. See how far away easy is.

[Tyler]

JV Team for life.

[Brent Tucker]

All right, I, there's. Let's. Yeah, I hate to jump around of sorts, but there's, there's, there's, there's so much to cover and, and you've uncovered so much. Let's go back to the insertion of, of the Hilo itself and there's just. There, there are some things that we talked about that didn't add up to me. Okay. You know, I asked you if you had seen the ISR video because usually there's always, there's always exceptions and not it's. But let me tell you how it's supposed to go.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay.

[Brent Tucker]

How it's supposed to go before we insert our special operation elements is we, we call it ISR soak like it's. The, the, the LZ is going to be looked at through an ISR platform to ensure where they're going is, is safe. Have you ever seen the ISR footage of, of that?

[Billy Vaughn]

No, absolutely not. We've not seen anything.

[Brent Tucker]

Or was, was ISR mentioned, you know, in any of the, of the reports or when talking to people?

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah, in the, in the investigative report that we were given the mention is, is that what, what I believe to be the ISR was, was being done by a contractor plane that night. And when those people were interviewed, they said that they went off shift and left the landing zone where extortion would be coming in before, before it got there. So as far as I can read and I don't understand all of it and you know, how it happens like you guys do, but there looks like there was none at the time.

[Brent Tucker]

Now that's, I don't know whether to chalk that up as, as bad luck or, you know, or, or a jump in protocol. So there are manned, you know, elements, you know, sometimes are unmanned and sometimes are, man. So that, you know, that, that, that checks out. But for them to leave station before, you know, they got there is just odd for this reason, you know, to have that, you know, that the, the eyes on where those guys can't, because they're, they're inbound, you know, as you Know, the most vulnerable part of, of any operation is, is infill and X fill, especially on those big birds. You know, they're just big targets. So that's, there's two things they, they should have had and this I just, you know, I don't know the answers of why they, they should have had isr and it sounds like ISR checked off station before they got there. And, and usually we talked about this before as well. When something goes wrong, it's never one thing that goes wrong. It's like a series of events that, that falls in line. And usually they also have some sort of armed escort birds as well, whether they be little birds, whether it be daps, whether they be Apaches, like they have an armed escort as well. And, and those are obviously so they can, so they can guard them and, and quickly get on the, the counter offensive and, and just more eyes on, more thermals, you know, more, more eyes on to see what's out there. Do you know if they had an armed escort for these birds?

[Billy Vaughn]

They did not. According to, again, according to the report that we got at the debriefing when I went through that the choppers did not have the escorts. And in fact when the Apache crew was questioned about being over the chopper when it was in the landing zone, their statement was we didn't know that we were tasked to do that. We were still over the Rangers. And also when the chopper came in and here again, you have to understand, I don't know anything about SOP or protocol or anything like this, but what I can tell you is when the chopper was coming in, the pilot asked the AC130 for a sparkle.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay. Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And the comment came back from who I believe to be the Apache crew again. Okay, and the Apache crew made the statement that he's only one, one minute out. Why is he asking for a sparkle right now? You know, and I, I didn't understand that. I, I don't know. But from what I understand about a sparkle, it, it lights up the landing zone. Is that correct?

[Brent Tucker]

It does on, on under nods.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay. And so, so, so here again I, I don't know if that's, if I just, I just know that the, the Apache pilots commented on it. Yeah, and, and right. But the Apache pilots were not over extortion when it came in.

[Brent Tucker]

Do you know this? Maybe I don't know how much, you know, you, you, you know of what the Rangers are doing at the same time because obviously two things going on here at the same time, you know, and, and in what seems to be close proximity yet distinctly different areas. Is that, is that a true statement?

[Billy Vaughn]

It is very, very well.

[Brent Tucker]

Do you know if the Rangers were ex filling at the same time they were infilling. And so maybe it was a Reese like it was a resource problem or they not, or they not getting on helicopter. They were still getting ready to get on helicopters. Do you know the answer to that?

[Billy Vaughn]

So they, they were what what we were told. So what we were told in the debriefing I described to you earlier that the Rangers mission was over, that they were interrogating, they were questioning. What we were told later by a member of the AC130 gunship is that the Rangers had already asked to be exfilled. And then at another point to back that up, one of the Rangers who was on the ground said yeah, we'd already asked for exfilt. And so the choppers, the choppers that had taken the Rangers to their destination that night had been extortion. 16 and 1 7.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

And so I guess they were in the air coming back after them.

[Brent Tucker]

All right. Here's where it gets the story gets intriguing again. There's, there's two Chinooks for this mission, 16 and 1 7. They're the same 16 and 17 that put the Rangers in and are going to get the Rangers out, right? So if 17 is full of SEALs and Americans, 30 people in total, how are they going to get the Rangers out if they're full? That makes no sense.

[Billy Vaughn]

Well, it makes no notice, no sense on you. Makes no sense Unless, unless you start to from information that you've got and you start to figure, you start in your mind figure things that must have been taking place is 16 and 17 we're going out for the Rangers. But 17 had two missions at one time on one flight to drop off the seals and go on and pick up the the Rangers.

[Brent Tucker]

That's, that seems to check out because traditionally a QRF element has its own curef birds. You can't share the same resources, right? And so it makes no sense why they're, why they don't have their own helicopter if they're a curef. And that has been the narrative this whole time. They were a cure f the Rangers were in trouble. You've talked to some of the were the Rangers ever in a firefight that night? Mrs. They were okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

They were. The way the investigative report talks about it and then hearing from some of them, they came up when they got to the building where Tahir was supposed to be. Either he was never there or he escaped before they got there.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

In fact though the Rangers actually engaged talent on the way, on the way to their mission that night along the road. And that came from the AC130. They were actually engaged along the way. Then when they got there, he was either never there or he had escaped out the door before they left. And the Apaches actually, and I may have this number wrong, but they engaged the enemy on the ground and I believe they killed six. I believe. And then according to the AC 130, some of these men went bounding, this is the word that was used down the valley tactic tactically.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Billy Vaughn]

And then going from door to door and trying to gather a crowd. And then, then, then they were seen loading heavy equipment on up onto a tower where the shots was supposedly fired from. When, when the chopper was taken down, they, the, the, the AC 130 asked multiple times to engage the guys on the ground and they were denied every time.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, I don't, the, the conspiracy to me isn't, you know, this will upset the, the people who want like the grand, you know like deep crazy conspiracy. It's, it's not that but to appease the other side of the, of the, of the, the crowd is well, they're clearly not being honest and so the question always arises when someone isn't being honest is why. So they've created this, this narrative, they've created this questioning of you know, that they've created this, this why. Yeah, it's, it's, it's crazy to me that they've gone to this, this extreme like double down on this many lies. And to me, I don't know, this is just, you know my opinion that it sounds like they were, they're either going to do a follow on mission, a separate mission, they were going to go hit a target. Whatever it is they were doing to me clearly falls within the realm of what those guys do. That's what they do. So why are we covering up something that they're going out to do what they do?

[Billy Vaughn]

You know, that's, let me, let me tell you, let me tell you one other thing. So the AC130 had been watching these guys in the field, according to them basically for hours. And they, they were told, I said earlier that they lost chain of custody. They weren't the ones who lost chain of custody. They were commanded to hand, hand chain of custody over to and the name was classified who they were commanded to hand it over to in the air, maybe the ISR or whoever it was.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

The AC130 argued. We've, we've had these guys for hours. Why not just let us keep hand them over? Hand them over. They handed them over. According to the AC130. Twenty minutes later the, the other aircraft or ISR, whatever it was, lost chain of custody of those men. And then that craft went off shift and so, so I don't know who those men were on the ground, but go ahead.

[Brent Tucker]

I'll tell you this one, one reason why I never want to give a chain of custody away from the AC1. Their sensors are so great. The AC130 never loses, loses sight of someone that they're, they're tracking. So I would never, you, you'd never want to. There, there are things I will say like maybe on the ground, you know, if they're tasked with two or three different, you know, we'll just say it. Ground force elements and maybe they're, maybe they're like, well we don't want to over task them. They're not doing anything. Let's free them up. So there may be a reason for that. I, I don't, I don't like it.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's a good, that's a good answer. Yeah, yeah, let me answer that.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

In this particular situation, the AC 130s statement was that because they were tasked to pick up another group and they, in their statement was we've been watching that group. We know they're farmers.

[Brent Tucker]

There you go.

[Billy Vaughn]

We know exactly what they're doing. We can tell their farmers, these other people, we don't believe they're farmers.

[Brent Tucker]

Right. So they know, yeah, they've been playing this game for a while up there. They know who they're looking at. The other thing that I don't think we've, we've mentioned it yet and, and, and was it goes along the side of, and this isn't. I think one of the, I want to say that an unintended consequence of, of this cover up because at some point that's what's, what if you're not telling the truth, you know, you're covering something up. I think an unintended consequence is, is this narrative that the ranger screwed up and someone had to come save them. And you know, and these guys are heroes for having to come save the rangers. One, these guys are heroes regardless of what goes on that night.

[Billy Vaughn]

Exactly.

[Brent Tucker]

Because of, of, because of their body of work that, that they've done throughout their career. That's why they're heroes. But to have to give this narrative, the Rangers did something, they got in trouble, they couldn't handle, they couldn't handle their own and needed help.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

Now that happens sometimes. And if that happens, that happens.

[Billy Vaughn]

But if that's maybe, maybe both ways. Right?

[Brent Tucker]

Right. Yeah. But if that's not the case, they didn't call for a qrf. They didn't, you know, that's. This narrative is now almost dragging the Rangers name through the mud, saying that they, they were overwhelmed and they needed help when it just wasn't the case.

[Billy Vaughn]

Not. It couldn't have been further from the truth. It could not have been further from the truth. According to the investigative report, according to the rangers on the ground, According to the AC130 in the air, it couldn't have been further from truth.

[Brent Tucker]

And it goes back to the need. Not that it's a cover up, that it's a needless cover up. That's right. And unless someone, you know, as we piece this, you know, together from your guys, years of investigation and talking to everyone, maybe there's something like there, it's. But whatever it is, it's needless.

[Billy Vaughn]

I have to correct you. I have to correct. Yeah, we're not investigators.

[Brent Tucker]

Well, you're investigating.

[Billy Vaughn]

We're just a mom and a dad and we don't even know how to investigate.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Billy Vaughn]

We've had people come to us and tell us and, and yeah, and, and by the way they've been. All they know is their own little piece of the puzzle.

[Tyler]

I'll tell you what, I'll tell you what investigating is asking common sense questions and requesting common sense answers.

[Brent Tucker]

That's right.

[Billy Vaughn]

And each one knows his little piece. And you know what? They want to talk about it because it helps them after they've talked about. So many of them have told us that we feel better after getting this off of our chest, you know, and even to the AC130. I'll tell you what the people, one of the members on the AC130 said, by the time that the engines on our plane were cool, we already had people coming to us saying, you can never talk to the families. You're not allowed to go to any of the funerals. And so I mean, you know, have.

[Brent Tucker]

A problem with that.

[Billy Vaughn]

And let me, let me tell you, tell you something else. Do you know, do you know who Opie is? Did you ever hear of Opie?

[Brent Tucker]

A call sign. Opie? Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay, so on the night of the shoot down, fires officer on AC130 said that they kept on talking to Opie, who was in the talk center, and that's. That's who they were arguing with about bringing. Bringing it in. Bringing. Bringing the. Don't need to bring the chopper and don't bring the chopper in. I believe that Opie is Mark Schaefer. That's who I believe Opie is. SEAL team 6th commander of 2 troop, that was not on the chopper that night they were killed. I think he was in the talk center. And he is now the commodore over all of Naval Special Warfare on the East Coast. Now, I could be wrong about Mark, but I think he's Opie.

[Brent Tucker]

I'll reach out to, and I think can answer that.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, I don't. Because I don't want to be wrong about it. That's right. There's. There's. There's two answers I'm. I'm going to get back to you on. Then that's. That's the. That's the other one. The what? The. The next thing I want to cover, that I hate to say it seems to be a reoccurring issue here is with what happened to you and your family, and the only thing you've been guilty of is asking questions.

[Billy Vaughn]

Right.

[Brent Tucker]

I mean, that sounds like a weird statement to make, but it'll. It'll. That's right. It'll. It'll make sense to the, to the, to the listeners here in a second, which is I'm. If. If. If I'm the commander and, you know, and, you know, someone's, you know, lost under my watch, I'll. I'll answer all the questions you got all day. It's what. It's what I owe you. But that's. That wasn't what you got. Tell me some of the backlash, the word backlash, you know, some of the backlash you've received from the community for asking questions about not not being able to come to reunions and then how that domino effect happened, like you said, within 24 hours.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, that's where we were after the ramp ceremony. Karen and I left D.C. the next day, and driving down I75, and I get a call from command and ask if I could take a call from Captain Howard at a certain time. And I said, sure. And so at that time, Captain Howard called and, Billy, how you doing? I said, sir, I'm doing fine. Are you doing okay? Well, I'm pretty offended. And I said, well, Captain, that makes two of us, because I'm offended, too. And he explained. So he explained to me. Then he said, well, I'm going to have to ask you or tell you that you're not going to be allowed to defend to attend the Memorial Day ceremony at Damneck that we had RSVP for. And at that point, I asked him, I just said, well, Captain, who's in the room with you? And he named off several people who were his staff, I guess, or whatever. And I said, well, it's just me and Aaron's mom, so go ahead and do what you need to do. And so they disinvited us. The call was pretty short. And then within hours, we got an email from one of our. We have an organization called Operation 300 that we started in Aaron's honor in 2013, actually November 2012, and then had our first camp in 2013. And we had one of our board members who was a SEAL reservist, lived in Jupiter, Florida. Hector Delgado emailed us, said he was stepping down from the board. We have our Aaron Vaughan frogman swim at Jensen beach every year in June. And we were notified by the Seal Museum who volunteered with us. They told us they could. That they couldn't help us anymore. And this. What you need to know is this was less than 24 hours from the phone call from. From. No, this is less than 24 hours from the press conference.

[Brent Tucker]

Oh, the press conference.

[Billy Vaughn]

All day. We got the phone call.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

We got the emails and emails all within 24 hours. Hours. And then other things that happened to it. I mean, you know, I got. I got from Dev Grew. This was way before that. That. That I was putting a black mark on Aaron's name and by asking questions. No. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, or.

[Brent Tucker]

Or by putting out. And so.

[Billy Vaughn]

And.

[Brent Tucker]

And to clarify that the press conference, to remind the Rhine people this was.

[Billy Vaughn]

Way before the press conference.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

But when he called, you said, I'm offended that that was. You believe. Because it happened just, Just the. The day before.

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah.

[Brent Tucker]

The press conference that you release, the ramp ceremony and the translation verified from five different sources of the crap that Imam was doing and saying over, you know, presiding over our fallen soldiers.

[Billy Vaughn]

Right.

[Brent Tucker]

So, yeah, he should be offended, but not at you. The outrage is directed at the wrong people. They should be calling and thanking you because they should have done their job and their homework and found out what was going on before you guys did.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's right. You know, actually what I said to him, and it just come to mind now when he said, I'm offended, I told him, I said, well, you know what, Captain Howard, I'm offended that you're offended. That's what I said to him.

[Brent Tucker]

It seems like essentially you're being harassed for asking questions, finding out things that actually happened, and just bringing to light what actually happened. And somehow we're now offended by that. You're right. I'm offended that they're offended.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's right.

[Brent Tucker]

I'm with you.

[Billy Vaughn]

You know, and here's, here's the way we. Here's the way Karen and I looked at it. All we're doing is saying what they've either said to us or what they've done.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Billy Vaughn]

And, you know, they. They recorded the ramp ceremony.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, right.

[Billy Vaughn]

I mean, you know, I mean. And so, so then, then they said one, One of the guys early on from Dev Gruz said, you're going to put a black. And he was one. Aaron's friends said, you're going to put a black mark on Aaron's name. And I said, you know, the only one who can put a black mark on my son's name is you guys. You're the only ones that can do it. We're not capable of doing that. That. And the constant thing we heard from them is you. You are compromising operational security. We didn't even know what the hell operational security was. We didn't. We didn't know anything except the stuff. Stuff that we'd been handed, you know, and so that's, that's how we. That's how we retreat.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, let's. Right, yeah, let's, let's, let's. Let's review the facts real quick.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay?

[Brent Tucker]

The black box conversation didn't come from you. You. You are just you. You know, it was listed several times in several different ways. So that's out there. That's not you guys. The ramp ceremony happened in public. It happened in public. In, on. On the ground.

[Billy Vaughn]

It was full of Americans.

[Brent Tucker]

It was full of Americans.

[Billy Vaughn]

I mean, they were everywhere. You could see them on the disc. You know, American warriors and soldiers and stuff. It was full. So, so if, if you, if you want to be offended, just think about this. If you, if you don't think about the parents being offended or the warriors being, you know, being disrespected, think about all the American warriors standing at Bagram in front of their commanders and in front of these caskets with SEALS in them. And some of those people in that crowd I'm sure could understand.

[Brent Tucker]

I was just about to say that 100%.

[Billy Vaughn]

So think what they did to their soldiers right there. Oh, just think what they did to their soldiers. The.

[Brent Tucker]

Someone. Several people at that ramp ceremony knew exactly what that was saying.

[Billy Vaughn]

They had to stand there and take.

[Brent Tucker]

And, and when they got, when they left that ramp ceremony, they looked at, at their buddies and said. Do you want to know what he just said? Yeah. Oh, yeah, Absolutely. That happened.

[Billy Vaughn]

I, I believe, we believe 100 that that's why Mr. Ferris wanted us to have the ramp.

[Brent Tucker]

I would like to think so. I would like to think so.

[Billy Vaughn]

And so, so I mean, you know, they, they, they just, that's, that's the way they, they treated, you know, a mother and father and, and, and, and we had, we were told by people that, you know, you, you need to, you need to watch your six. You need to stay in public. And, and, and actually one night in D.C. after we've been in D.C. on Fox, we did get one death threat. But Lord was good to us. I mean, for some strange reason. I mean, maybe we're just freaking crazy. It didn't really bother us. And it may have been a fake. Probably was a fake, you know, but it.

[Tyler]

How was it?

[Billy Vaughn]

Huh?

[Tyler]

How'd you get it?

[Billy Vaughn]

It came to us on your phone, didn't it? Oh, yeah. Really? Yeah, it was.

[Brent Tucker]

She said it was a video of people being beheaded. Here's. You said this over there. And it just made me think of some other things. You're talking about Operation Security. This is the same command that came out with a movie called act of Valor based off of real missions.

[Billy Vaughn]

It is.

[Brent Tucker]

This is the same command that okayed Zero Dark Thirty while this is going on. This is the same command that doesn't seem to have a problem having Rob O'Neill write books and, and come out and talk about being the sole killer of Osama Bin Lad, like, so have some consistency. And not. And now this is where we're going to stand our ground on some parents asking some questions.

[Billy Vaughn]

Parents. And not only that, this is the same, this is the Same commander of JSOP, William McRaven.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

Who came out when Trump was president and talked about Trump and, you know, like, we're sitting at home. Well, he's talking about the commander in chief. How does that help operational security of the troops? You know, I mean, I mean, so.

[Brent Tucker]

You know, I mean, if it wasn't for a double standard, these people would have no standards at all. That saying just rings true to this scenario. And it's just, it's a, it's another one. You, you guys, if Tyler wasn't so sick, he, you, you'd be able to see it more in his face. You got us worked up and, and everyone Listening to this should be. And it, and it's disgusting that, that they're not as worked up as, as the fact they have the exact opposite reaction. Right. I can't, I can't, I can't wrap my mind around it.

[Billy Vaughn]

And, and here's the thing. The, the, the community, they, they never said anything to us about what happened.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And, and honestly, I don't, I, I mean this is, this is hard to say because they're the, they're the most intel people in the world. You know, like you guys, I think they didn't know. They bought the full narrative. The people who gave us information were Rangers, Air Force, you know, and people outside of it who were involved either in the, in the operation that night or in the cleanup after, you know, and the things that took. And you know what those men and women are, Their lives were so wrecked from this that, that it's, that it's unbelievable, you know, and I guess I don't, I don't think we've talked about the people who came up on the crash site.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, whatever, whatever you want to talk about next.

[Billy Vaughn]

Talk about that. Yeah. So in the chronological time of events, and I know you guys know what that is. In the 1250 pages in enclosure H, there's a chronological time of events, everything that took place from the time of the shoot down till days after when the cleanup was complete. And at 2:39, 36am the chopper was shot down. At 3:04am an unidentified coalition group walked upon the shoot down site. Now the reason why that this is important to a mother and a father, to civilians that don't really understand what's going on. We know that there are 30Americans there, 30 dead Americans or who. The AC130 said at first they thought that some of them were alive. And supposedly a medic that was one of the rangers said that when they got there there were a couple alive. But they didn't, they didn't get there until two hours later. But what was so strange, strange about that to me was they came up on the site where their brothers were, they surveyed the site and they left. They left the site. And it states that in a chronological time of events, the Pathfinder Group is cleared to launch according to the chronological time of events, five minutes later. So the Pathfinder Group got there right behind the Rangers. The Rangers showed up an hour and a half after the, after the, the unidentified group left. And also they're mentioned elsewhere in the testimony as being some captured Taliban also testified that, that they saw some unidentified Coalition come up, come up a road, walk to the site and then leave. So in the investigation, the Pathfinder Commander was asked now, have we gone over the black box?

[Brent Tucker]

Briefly? Yeah, other than, like, they said there that it couldn't have one. And they said it got washed away by the wadi. Yeah, by the flood in the wadi. Like, those are the things we talked about.

[Billy Vaughn]

So for two years, that was their story. That was a Pentagon story. Got washed away in the flood. The Pathfinder Commander, when he was in the 1250 page report, when he was asked about the black box, said, what. What were you tasked to do when you got there? We were. We were tasked to find the black box. Did you find the black box, sir? No, we did not find it then because it was too hot. There was a flood later that night and washed it away. And he said, this is the first chopper crash in Afghanistan where we have not located the black box. That's important because Deputy Secretary of Defense Reid, when testifying before Congress, told Congressman Chaffetz, when he was asked about the black box, he. He said the chopper didn't have a black box.

[Tyler]

So I have a question. There was a flood, and then the Pathfinders. Or the Pathfinders and then the flood Pathfinder group.

[Billy Vaughn]

The commander said there was a flood.

[Tyler]

Before they got there?

[Billy Vaughn]

No, after they got there.

[Tyler]

Oh, okay.

[Billy Vaughn]

They got there. They got there, sir. They got there, tried to get the black box. It was too hot. Gotcha. So. So overnight, before daylight, there was a flood and washed it away. Okay. And. And so that's the story they carried.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Billy Vaughn]

And then. And then Reed said, no, there was never a black box on the chopper. And. And then just.

[Brent Tucker]

Why? Why. You know, I blame the five guys.

[Billy Vaughn]

The.

[Brent Tucker]

This is. And here's just something a little bit unique to me. And. And there. There could be answers to this, but usually when you're tasked to go secure a site, you. You're there to secure the site. Like, someone stays on that site until you can pass it over to someone else. The, you know, we talked. You know, we just talked about the. You know, like when. When you're. You're tasked to secure a site, not just go check it out and leave the. The other. Like, again, weird part about that. You said the Rangers, didn't they. They didn't say it was from them.

[Billy Vaughn]

They don't know about it.

[Brent Tucker]

They don't even know about it. Like, where are these five guys? Five guys is way too small of an element to be its own element. Where. Where'd they come from? So who Are these five guys now it goes back to like the answers that they do give or that, that are seen only, only begs more questions.

[Billy Vaughn]

That's right, yeah. I mean if they just told us at the debriefing that there were, that there was, that there were coalition group who came up on the site, they were the first ones to get there, then you never thought anything about it, but they left it. And then two years ago I was given a thumb drive when I met a ranger who was there that night. And we looked at the thumb drive and lo and behold it is of the shoot down. And lo and behold on the thumb drive, the Apache pilots or whoever, there's a lot of other conversation on the thumb drive they see talk about the friendlies walking up to the site. Hey, do you see the friendlies coming up to the site? The other one says, yeah, I see them. They comment about the friendlies.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, so they know they're friendlies.

[Billy Vaughn]

You can, yeah, they identify them as friendlies. You can see them on there as five friendlies. And then they talk about when they walk away from the site, one of them says, well, did you notice the friendlies are gone? The other one says, something you can't understand. And the one comes back and says, well, I understand if you don't want to talk about it.

[Brent Tucker]

What are the friendlies at the crash site? Go the ones that action on earlier.

[Billy Vaughn]

There's no friendlies at the crash site right now.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay, just want to make sure.

[Billy Vaughn]

So the friendlies were there. Now the fact also that we had, after the denial of the black box, we had people tell us in D.C. the choppers had black boxes on it. We had a warrant officer who told us that he and his crew flew that chopper from, from Fort Bay, from Fort Bragg down to Savannah to take it over. It had the black box on there when they took it. And in fact I asked him, I said, Jay, was it the black box up by the engine like Gary Reed said?

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

He says, no, Mr. Vaughn, it was a black box which is orange by the seat. And to make sure that I wasn't crazy, I talked to some of the guys, you know, and the black box was there when it went over. And, and in fact there's a man that flew the chopper two nights before and he says the black box was on there when he flew. So, so again, this is, this is not an expert opinion, but I believe the people who walked up to the site that night got the black box and that's why they left. That's what I Believe.

[Tyler]

I believe that too. Just based on.

[Brent Tucker]

But it could be feasible that it was too hot, you know, of burning to get.

[Billy Vaughn]

How come they didn't find it? Do you think they found it?

[Brent Tucker]

I mean, I don't know again, like, because. Absolutely, you're right. But here's the other, I guess, like bigger thing that I think about is that we bring up the black box. Like, like it has, like it could have some like hidden, you know, secrets to it, which it would have some. It would shed light on this. But since I, the. All the communication that black box is going to be, you know, talking about, you know, them on the radio, them talking about landing. You know, the, the pilots don't necessarily know the details of the mission.

[Billy Vaughn]

Right.

[Brent Tucker]

They know where they're landing. You know, like they know their part of the mission. This is what I'm getting, this is what I'm getting to. I don't believe the black box. Although we don't know because being, being open would answer all this. I don't think it'd have anything on it that's gonna, you know, add a lot of, of information to this. Okay, but, but if it's not, then yeah, it goes back to the, the counter argument. Well, if that's true, then why are we hiding it?

[Tyler]

That's like.

[Brent Tucker]

And that's the problem. Their answers to these things only beg more questions. You know what I mean?

[Billy Vaughn]

I know what you mean. You know, what if they'd have told us at the debriefing when, when the father asked, what about the black box? If they just said we have the black box, but that's classified. You know what, it would have been over that day.

[Brent Tucker]

Right. The way they handle it is causing.

[Billy Vaughn]

You might have been aggravated, you know, but, but you didn't.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, but again, I could be completely wrong about that. I mean, there could be something in that black box that's very important. But I, but my point is, regardless whether it's important or not important, you know, it may be just, it may be a whole bunch of nothing, but.

[Tyler]

They create their own problems, but they.

[Brent Tucker]

Create their own problems without being transparent. That's my point.

[Billy Vaughn]

Right. You know what, and that's, that's the whole story to us. You lied about things that were silly to lie, just silly to lie about. You know, we're grown ups, we can take it. You know, what if they told me that my son was on a reckless mission that night? You know what? I know the boy when he was growing up. You know, I mean, I know why he became A seal, he did a lot of reckless things, you know, when he was at home, you know, and we know that seals, and you got guys like you, you do risky things.

[Brent Tucker]

You know, you do risky things.

[Billy Vaughn]

I mean, they didn't have to give us the details. Just don't lie to us.

[Brent Tucker]

Right? Just don't lie.

[Billy Vaughn]

But I'll tell you one other thing, and I might have mentioned this to you. I had a guy approach me in 2017. We were at an ORW alumni reunion in Colorado, and he came up, sat down at mine and Karen's table, and he said, hey, I knew your son. And I recognized that he talked like I did. And so it caught my attention. And. And he. And then I said, oh, how'd you know him? And he told me how he met him in Jalalabad. And he said that a couple of them. A couple seals were out there jogging. He said he. They finished, and he went up to him and he started talking to him. They. Aaron had on a Tennessee shirt, and they were both. He was from Tennessee. And so they struck up conversation. They went running together the next day. And this. This guy was there in Afghanistan. He'd been. He'd been in the army, been in the infantry. He had gotten out, and he'd come back to work as a contractor working for the Department of Agriculture. And according to him, to me, his job was to go around and talk to villagers and try to talk them out of growing poppies. Opium.

[Brent Tucker]

Opium, yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And convince them to grow food crops and fruit crops.

[Brent Tucker]

Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, that's something we did.

[Billy Vaughn]

So he said he and Aaron talked, that. He told Aaron what he did, and he said, you know what? We might be able to use you on a mission that we're going to do. Now, you have to understand, this is what I heard from this guy. This is his story, okay? And we've heard a lot of stories, and he's a friend, and I believe him. And so a couple days later, while they were still there in Jalalabad, that he was. He was called down to where SEAL Team Six was, and he talked to the commander there and told him what he did, and he said, yeah, I think we can use you on a mission. And so they went on back to Shank. He was at Jalalabad. And his. His boss called him in his office a day or so later and says, hey, SEAL Team Six want you to come down to FOB Shank. And he said, you interested going down there? He said, yeah, I'll go down there. And so now everything that we've heard is this was a last minute QRF mission spun up at the last minute. You know, everything was rushed and all this kind of stuff. But this guy tells me that I was there with them while they were planning the mission on Friday, the Rangers were planning their mission and Dev Grew was planning their mission. And he said, you know, I was off to the side. I didn't hear a lot of it a lot of the time, but I was there. So I'm saying that to say that according to him. And you know what? All he's got is his piece of the puzzle, right? That's all he's got is his story. And his story is they were planning a mission that day.

[Brent Tucker]

Right.

[Billy Vaughn]

Which pre.

[Brent Tucker]

Planned control reaction. Right. Not a reactionary thing.

[Billy Vaughn]

And so that night when the Rangers went out on their mission and then when Seal Team 6 comes running out to get on the chopper, they. He was not allowed to go. And he doesn't know what reason, but that's the only reason he's allowed alive today. He's not allowed to get on that bird. And then, and then his, his. I told you what. I told you what he was there for.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

Now that he didn't have anything to offer Dev Drew as far as firepower.

[Brent Tucker]

No.

[Billy Vaughn]

Anything like that to help them on their mission. And what. But then what he did tell me happened to him after that is he went back to Jalalabad. He was sent to a village on. And he told me where it was, and I don't remember the name of it, but on like far out in the middle of nowhere and had to stay there until he came home. And in fact, when his. When his contract was up, his contract was cut short. He had to get his own way back to the United States.

[Brent Tucker]

Sheesh.

[Billy Vaughn]

And had to. Had to pay his own airfare back when he got back. Now I know for all you people out there that, you know want it, want a good story, okay. When he got back, he planned to write a book about what he had done in Afghanistan, Okay. And he had apparently reached out to a small publisher. Him and his wife and little boy are sitting there in the house in Tennessee at home. And two people come to the door one day. One who identified themselves as FBI, one who he said, and maybe y'all know what this is. I don't. He called them diplomatic security. Have you ever heard of that before? That's how he identified.

[Brent Tucker]

I don't know why they're here in this situation. Keep listening story.

[Billy Vaughn]

Okay, so. And one of. And he told them so. So they asked to see his passport, ask him where he'd been and all such. And then one of them says that, well, we hear you're writing a book. And he said, yeah, I plan on writing a book. And the other one says, well, no, you're not. And the conversation got very heated, very hostile, and they threatened him with prison if he went further with writing the book. And he doesn't know why. And after that, he tried to go to work for other contractors around the country. And he was black. He was flagged everywhere he went, everywhere he went. And so, you know, all I know is. That's all I know.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah. I mean, also notice it's weird. It's not normal. Again, it's not normal.

[Billy Vaughn]

It's not.

[Brent Tucker]

Why is everything attached to this not normal? Raises questions. Unfortunately, this. This. This episode will. Will. Will end just with, you know, with more questions than answers. But what it will do is get out the. The truth, which is why are there more questions than answers on something that really should have been straightforward? That's the recurring theme here.

[Billy Vaughn]

I can tell you right now, everything I've told you is true. And we don't. And have never gone into the suppositions or the possibilities or anything like that because we don't even want to go there. We don't. We don't even want to go farther than what we know. You know?

[Brent Tucker]

Right?

[Billy Vaughn]

And I now. Well, here's what I think, though.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay?

[Billy Vaughn]

Here's what I think, guys. Based on what we know, I don't think it was ever a qrf. This is not a military expert talking. I think that we. We know. We know it's factual that the Rangers had asked to be exfil. Okay, we know Rangers have said that. We know the AC130 said that. We know that 16 and 17 took the Rangers out.

[Brent Tucker]

Okay?

[Billy Vaughn]

We know that 16 and 17 were tasked to come pick up the Rangers.

[Brent Tucker]

Right?

[Billy Vaughn]

This is going to sound crazy, but here's what I believe happened. I believe that when 16 and 17 got ready to leave that the Navy SEALs on FOB came out and commandeered that chopper and said, you got to take us to a certain place. Here's where we're going. And that's why they were all on one chopper. And we know that when they went out that 17 went into the landing zone. 16 set out here empty with nobody on it, never went in. And I believe had they been successful, they were going to drop them off to do a standalone mission that had been planned and that 17 was going to join right back up with 16, go get the Rangers and go back to FOB. I could be 100% wrong and I would love it if somebody in the military that's not full of crap but, but has, has the, you know, ability to know would say, no, that's not what it was. Here's what happened.

[Brent Tucker]

Someone at the talk that night knows, you know and knows the truth. And I think, and you did a great job saying, hey, these, everything I've said before here are facts that we've just, that we've uncovered. And that's opinion based, but ironically enough, that's, that's, these, that's, that's the same opinion that I have as well. I, I, I think you're, you're right about that. Well, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll end it there. I can't thank you enough for coming out. You held, you held it together, which I don't know how you did that. I know I'm, I'm, I'm a father. I, Tyler's a father. I don't know if, if I could. So I, I, I think I know where, where your son got his strength from.

[Billy Vaughn]

His mother's pretty strong.

[Brent Tucker]

But I, but after, especially after, as something as heavy as this, we always end the same way. And I'll, I'm going to spin this question to you just a little bit more direct than we normally do. We don't want to just end with, do you have a funny story, but do you have a funny story about Aaron? It could be as a kid, could be anything. Well, do you have a funny story?

[Billy Vaughn]

Yeah. I'll tell you. The boy was rougher on anything that I ever had and owned than anything I've ever seen. And I can tell you that he believed, he believed everything in life, whether it be, whether it be a gun, a four wheeler, a lawnmower, my boat or whatever. We need to see how much it can stand. This is what we need to do. And the last time, the last time that he came home for Christmas.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And we went out fishing with my buddy Sal that I fished with a lot. And I'll never forget the day that we went out right there in the inlet. And of course I let him drive my boat and he ran it aground.

[Tyler]

When you said my boat, there's something.

[Billy Vaughn]

Running, running, you know, like not quite wide open, but nearly wide open in a place where he shouldn't have been, you know. He ran into ground there, you know. And then it took us a couple hours to get it. I said, son, this boat doesn't belong to the Navy. The taxpayers are not paying for this boat, you know.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

And I can tell you one other one. I'll tell you one other real quick.

[Brent Tucker]

Absolutely.

[Billy Vaughn]

He came home and we went one time and we went to the Keys on vacation. We picked him up, picked him and his, his widow up at the airport in Miami and went on down to the house where all the rest of our family was. And on the way, he said, dad, I want to get, and I want to, I want to stop at a dive shop and get a Hawaiian sling, okay. And, and spear gun. And so we did. And so, you know, we boated. Our house was on the canal. We boated out into the, out into the ocean, all that kind of stuff. But Aaron, our son, got all the lobsters that we ate.

[Brent Tucker]

That'S right off the dock.

[Billy Vaughn]

And, and we, we got back home, I don't know, a month later, he's back doing whatever he does. And all of us going about our lives and the people we rented the house from.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

Got visited by Florida wildlife that somebody had reported.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah.

[Billy Vaughn]

Somebody harvesting lobsters there, you know, in the canal, you know, and gun didn't. Exotic. But, but, yeah, but, but I love it. But that was him, you know, and.

[Brent Tucker]

Sounds on, on, on Brand Sound. It's on point, dude. The guy, the guy ended up doing the, the right job for his personality. Exactly.

[Billy Vaughn]

Right.

[Brent Tucker]

And, and I love that I, I.

[Billy Vaughn]

I often said boys like him, boys like them seals, and guys like you. There's a fine line between, between being on the right side of the law.

[Brent Tucker]

Oh, absolutely. That's right.

[Billy Vaughn]

On the other side.

[Brent Tucker]

Yeah, we make that joke sometimes, too. We need guys that are 49% criminal. Yeah, you have to be 49. You can't, can't be 51. That's, that's what it takes sometimes to do that job.