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Ryan Reynolds
Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Now, I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited Premium Wireless for $15 a month is back. So I thought it would be fun if we made $15 bills, but it turns out that's very illegal. So there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a try@mintmobile.com Switch upfront payment
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Brent Tucker
Welcome back to the Tier One podcast. I'm your host, Brent Tucker, owner of FRCC. That's First Responder Coffee Cigar and Cast Company. Go to FRCC shop and use promo code Tier One to get 15 off the world's best coffee, cigars and bourbon.
Dale Comstock
And I'm Drew Tucker, road warrior for first responder coffee, cigar and bourbon company. Guys, I invite you to join. Our Patreon is brought to you by Cobalt Kinetics.
Brent Tucker
There there's exclusive behind the scenes content.
Dale Comstock
There's a weapons forum, there's a fitness forum for your fitness journey. And guys, in the weapons forum, there's an expert weapons tech from Cobalt Kinetics ready to answer all your tech questions. Join the Patreon today
Brent Tucker
and as always, this episode is brought to you by Human Performance TRT. Go to hp-trt.com use promo code tier1 and get 20% off all your testosterone and peptide deeds. Don't wait any longer to get in the best shape of your life. Let's do it. Drew,
Dale Comstock
For the second
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welcome to the Tier 1 podcast.
Dale Comstock
This is amazing, dude, check this out.
Brent Tucker
And on the show today we have Dale Comstock, 82nd Airborne Delta Force, 3rd Special Forces Group, OGA contractor, author of several books, entrepreneur. The list goes on, man. Welcome to the show. Excited about having you here. Always good to have a former unit member on the show.
Dale Comstock
Thanks, Brent. Thanks for having me. Nice to be here.
Brent Tucker
Not a long list of former unit members to have on the show. So it's special when. When we get one on here.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, now we can talk smack about the seals.
Brent Tucker
Before we get started, I do want to give you some gifts for saying thank you for coming. That's a knife from Brotherhood Blades. Got Tier one podcast engraved on there so you can remember your time on on the show that will eventually exceed Joe Rogan's.
Dale Comstock
Hell yeah. Let's do it. Thank you.
Brent Tucker
Here's a Light from cloud, definitely. Every good operator knows how important a strong, powerful tactical light is. And so many. So many scenarios. And you've been in a couple scenarios, so you. You know that. And last but not least, tasty gains. Wanted to make sure you had some creatine. I know. It's like. It's like Christmas over here. It's gonna keep loading you up.
Dale Comstock
I could use those.
Brent Tucker
Yes. I tip because of them. I take it every day. If it wasn't for the gummy form. Yeah, I'm just not really good. I don't need another thing of powder to mix up. So the gummies make it super easy.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. Thank you.
Brent Tucker
Yeah, absolutely. Now let's. Now let's get down to business. The where. Where'd you come from? And how'd you end up making it to the military?
Dale Comstock
Yeah. So I try to give you the condensed version, but. So my father spent 20 years in the army, and so I grew up in the military culture all around the world. Spent most of my childhood growing up in Germany, where my father was stationed. My mother's German. And so as I approached the age of 18, actually around the age of 17, I realized that. So my dad retired. Now we're living in the civilian culture, which was not the same as a military culture. And I decided that, you know what? I want to go back to what's familiar, which was the military. So I actually enlisted in the military at the age of 17 for the delayed entry program. Went in in 1981, ended up in 82nd Airborne Division as an infantry guy. So the recruiter lied to me, Right. Like they always do. I wanted to be a Ranger. Go, oh, no problem. We'll send you a Ranger bat, you know, and then right at the end, before it's time to go, hey, there's no more Ranger slots. But if you go to any second, it's easy. Just go there, tell your sergeant major you want to go to Ranger school. He'll send you. No, no problem. Yeah, right. So. So that's how I ended up in 82nd infantry for a while, 325th infantry. Then I did almost three years in 82nd long range reconnaissance Platoon. Was at a crossroad. Do I get out? Do I, you know, stay in? It wasn't really happy, you know, digging foxholes and cleaning my M16 on a tree for three days. And I got the letter from the unit, said, hey, you're. You've been. You are eligible to apply to try out for Delta Force. Right? So. So I have to be very clear on that because everybody goes, yeah, Delta Force wanted me. They sent me a letter. Right? That's all. That's not how that works. Right, right. When you get the letter, that means they scanned all the records, including yours, and you meet the minimum requirements to apply to try out. Right? And I thought about, I was like, well, you know what? If I'm going to stay in, I'm going to go for the gusto, right? So I'm not going to, you know, go Ranger School, Greenbrook. I'm just going to go to the top. And so I was 22, married, first marriage of many. And I had a little baby girl. And so I had no education, high school grad, barely graduated high school. I wasn't too smart. And so I made a decision, you know what? I'm gonna stay in. Actually, I always joke about. I've said this before, you know, my mom actually made a decision. I called my mom, she's German, I said, mommy, I said, I'm thinking about getting out of the army. Would you mind putting up with me, my wife and my daughter for about three months till I get on my feet? And she's like, no, not no, but hell no. I damn, okay.
Brent Tucker
So.
Dale Comstock
So I ended up enlisting and I got the letter from the unit. I said, this is what I'm going to do. So I did the whole process, like everybody did the application process. Didn't think I had a snowballs chance in hell. And they're like, well, we'll let you know in 30 days if you, if you select it or not. And I'll be damned.
Ryan Reynolds
I got the letter.
Dale Comstock
So, congratulations. You've been selected to attend the formal assessment selection course. And I was about nine weeks out from going, right? And I. Jesus. So yeah, fortunately for me, my platoon leadership, they were so excited that I actually got selected, you know, 15,000 paratroopers in 82nd. Yeah. And this guy gets selected, right? To go, to try out, at least try out. And they're like, hey, we want to see you make it. And they're like, all you got to do is report the work, come to work, do PT in the morning, and then whatever you want to do, just do it right so you don't have to go to trainings and deployments and stuff like that. And so that's exactly what I would do. I remember getting up at 040500 in the morning, put on my jungle boots, my PT shorts, my T shirt, 82 pound rucksack, 82 pounds, and I would ruck five miles of work every Morning down Raleigh Road. We were actually attached to the 3 13th in my battalion. And I'd get there, drop rook, put on my running shoes and go out my platoon or whatever we were doing for pt. That's what Dale's doing for pt, Right.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
And then, and then I. After that, I'd take a break, do whatever I wanted to do. Maybe eat some lunch. At 1300 every day I'd go out and do a 13 mile run around Fort Bragg. And then at the end of the day, cob 1700, throw that ruck back on my jungle boots and run it back home, man, another five miles. I did that every damn day except for Saturday. Sunday. Saturdays was my long distance day. Right. Just would run 13 to 15 miles. Sunday was my off day. And that's pretty much how I trained for, for nine. Nine weeks prepping for this thing. Right. I had no idea what I'm up against. I thought, well, I'm not going to fail because I was out of shape. Yeah. Right. So.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
So I end up going. And long story short, I made it. Right. Yeah.
Brent Tucker
And there's a couple things I want to unpack there. Yeah. One, I don't think I've ever really mentioned this before and you just mentioned it and it reminded me just going to Delta Force selection is quite the feat. I mean, it's not like SFA. You go, you apply to SFAs, you're going to SFAs.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
They don't have to take everyone that applies. In fact, they don't take everyone that applies. They only take a certain amount of the best applications. There's always some bubble guys they look at and they take a chance on. But just because, just because you got a letter, just like I said, doesn't mean they even wanted. You just met a minimum requirement.
Dale Comstock
Right.
Brent Tucker
And that's. There's no guarantee to even get to getting to selection itself is, is something to be proud of.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. For sure. Because you can't have any judicial, you know, any kind of judicial punishment, UCMJ action against you ever. You had to meet minimum requirements, GT score, all this kind of stuff.
Brent Tucker
They're looking, they're looking at all your NCORs, everything sure. That you're rated the best amongst your peers. They only want the best.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. And so there I am. I made it. I'm of the whole crowd that was there with me. 100 plus candidates. About 110, I think at that time, if I remember. Count the count. Right when the dust settled. Three of us made it. That's it. And I'm The. At the time, I believe I was the youngest guy. That may not be. I was one of the youngest guy. So I was 23 when I made it right. So. So for me, that was a huge accomplishment and, you know, was a. For me, it was a great achievement because. Absolutely. Because the way I looked at it is like I had no chance in hell of making it right. I mean, I was a grunt out of the 82nd. Didn't know a whole lot about anything else outside the lurps. You know, I didn't have the Ranger school or SF or anything like that. So. And I remember when I, when I finally went to the board, Garrison was the. The commander at the time and one of my favorite. One of my favorite commanders, actually. And you know, all the sergeants major and everybody else sits there, you know, and you're sitting in that little chair in the middle of the room and they're sitting all around you and then they start astro you a bunch of questions that at the time I didn't realize if there were right or wrong answers there or not. You know, it's like you don't know, right? So. So you do the best you can and answer them. And I, apparently I did, but they did keep bringing up, you know, my age, you know, like, you know, you're going to be like the youngest guy we've ever selected, you know, you sure that, you know, you can carry the weight, you know, and do this stuff. So I thought, yeah, why not? You know.
Brent Tucker
So did you believe that? Did you believe you could truly.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, actually I did. Because, you know what? Again, this is one of the advantages I've had by being raised in a military culture. My father being in the military is I had that, that ethic, I guess, that mindset. Because, you know, when you're living in a community of military families, you know, your whole life, because that's all I knew in Germany. I lived in, you know, the American facilities. Fort Gordon, Port Carson, Fort Lewis. When you live around the same kind of people, that, you know, that mindset, the fathers particularly have gets passed on to the kids. It's almost like an agoge, you know. And so for me, that was normal and comfortable. And I remember when my dad did retired, of all places to move, San Francisco, California. Was that ever a shock, right? These kids are like so different, you know, and just everything was different, even back then. And I was really uncomfortable. I became a loner, very introverted. I just couldn't identify with anybody, right. And we had moved so many times because the Military. I mean, we moved four times in four years, halfway through my high school years every time. So, you know, eight different high schools. It was nuts, right? So I had a hard time at school catching up, and I just lost interest in it, and I couldn't. I just couldn't adapt fast enough.
Ryan Reynolds
And.
Dale Comstock
And because of my personality type, I didn't make friends very easily. And I kind of. I don't want to say I was lonely, but I became just kind of felt isolated, and I just felt like, man, I got to go back to what's familiar. And it was the military and my dad, to his disappointment. So nobody on either side of my family had been to college. Anybody on both sides, right? I've mentioned this before. My mom was a seamstress. My dad actually dropped out of high school in 11th grade, so he wanted me to be the first to go to college. That was a big deal, right, for him. And so I knew it was a big deal, but I also knew it's like, man, I'm not ready for school. I'm barely graduating high school. I had to go to summer school just to graduate high school because I was just that screwed up, right? I was, like a CDF student. And I was like, I'm doing really good. I'm getting, like, Cs, maybe. So I didn't tell him. I remember opening up Readers. Not Readers, a TV Guide. And there was a advertisement in the middle. Had a airborne Ranger coming out of the. Out of the jungle, right? He had repel rope, Cami face patrol cap, you know, and he's got a car, 15, and he's standing. And I said, that's it. That's what I want to do. So I called the recruiter up. I'll never forget Sergeant Dotson and a little Irish guy and red hair, you know, and he was. So when I go see him, you know, he knows I'm interested in the military. So he starts pulling out all this crap about, you know, communications. We didn't have computers back then. I know we're going way back, but I'm 63, and so. So I'm, like, looking at those stuff that didn't interest me at all. And I go, what about rangers? You know, his wife's the desk clean, pulls out a little pamphlet with rangers on. I go, that. That's it. That's what I'm gonna do. Sign me right here. And I did. So that was the mission. Go in as being an army Ranger. I didn't tell my dad right away, okay? I was a little Afraid to. I was like, I'm gonna break his heart. And then when I did tell him, I could see he was really disappointed. And I'm like, all right, Dad. I said, look, can unring the bell. I said, I'm on my way. But I said, you know, my promise to you is I'll get that college degree, but I want to be in the military. I want to do what you do. Right? And so that was my mission. And I did. I fulfilled it. Being in the unit, you know, do
Brent Tucker
you think that was part of your drive to go to the unit and do great things was because to some degree, going in the military almost disappointed your dad? So you're like, I got 100%. Really?
Dale Comstock
100.
Brent Tucker
I love that.
Dale Comstock
100%. I'll tell you this right now, for every guy that's out there listening, a good father, super important, right? And I had a great dad. I mean, he was. He was literally my hero. Um, he wasn't a big man. He was actually pretty smart, but he was my inspiration, my motivation. He was my. My reason, if you will, my why. Right. As a man. And I just wanted. And I think the reason why, because one time when I did bring up the idea that I wanted to join the military, he didn't like the idea. He's like, ah, you're not going to do good in the military. You're lazy, you know, you're not going to. You don't want to get up early in the morning. I'm like, damn, dad. You know? You know, I was like, damn, that sucked. You know, and so. So I wanted to, guess, maybe prove him wrong, too.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
But I really wanted to. I wanted to give my dad a gift because it was so important to him. Right. And. And I knew it was good for me, too. So I'm not, you know, I didn't have daddy issues. I just felt out of respect for my father to be the best I can be.
Brent Tucker
You know, it's funny, you know, my dad was a just. Just your old school father. He didn't say a lot to me, but what he. But he instilled a lot of good things in me. I was, without a doubt, I look back and call myself a mama's boy. I love my mom. Still do. But even with that kind of hard upbringing, almost distant at times, relationship. You want to know the first person I called when I got selected at sfas? I called my dad.
Dale Comstock
Yep.
Brent Tucker
You know, the first person I called in West Virginia when I got selected by. By the unit? I called my dad.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. See, that's funny, right? But, you know, and dad Jar. Dads are heroes, man. They should be. Yeah. For every guy out there listening, man, don't, you know, keep that in mind, man, you. You are important. If you're a father, it may not seem like it, but you are. And. And so anyways, that was so for me, you're right. I called my dad, like, dad, I made it, you know, like, I made it right. It's like I didn't even. Couldn't even believe I made it right. So. But I had spoken to him before about going to Special Forces, trying to be Green Beret, you know, and I just bypassed all that and said, no, I'm just going to go right Delta. Right. But no, you. He. He was my motivation, my inspiration. He was the guy I called every weekend for advice particular about the military or just for, you know, just for counseling or just to shoot the. Let him know, hey, dad, that's what I'm doing, you know, so. And I remember, I can honestly say almost everything I did in life was because of him. And I have no regrets about that. I did the things I wanted to do, but I wanted to make sure that I did the right thing and honor my father. A lot of guys don't do that, right? They like, you know, screw dad, screw Mom. I do what I want to do, which I did do those things, but I felt like the honorable thing to do for my family, in particular my father and for my kids, is to represent properly. Right. So. My son, by the way, is also a Green Beret. I think he's got 16 years in now.
Brent Tucker
Is he really?
Dale Comstock
Yeah, he's in fifth group ranger. Awesome. So he kind of followed my. My footsteps, I think. And so my sister was in the Navy. You know, my whole family is a. Comes from a military culture. Right. So it's just kind of in my blood a little bit. But, yeah. Sadly, my father passed away in 2011, and at least at that time, I did everything I set out to do to include. Now I'm in Hollywood, I'm writing books, and I got my PhD, you know, and I was able to share all that with him in his deathbed, you know, and. And yeah, and so here's the crazy part is when my father passed, it was a. It was. It was not a. It was not a good event. So for three months, my dad was nice you. And he. He suffered, but he didn't quit. And. But when he passed, I remember thinking to myself, damn, who am I going to call now? Yeah, who am I going to talk to now? Who am I? Who can I trust to confide in? Right? He's gone. That's the man. And then I realized you're it. You're the patriarch. You're the one. You're the senior dude now in the family, right? Everybody's going to be looking at for answers. And so. So I basically assumed his role. Now I remember when all this happened, looking at my. My sister, my mother, and I'm thinking, you know what? We got like, three days to do all the insurance, the funeral arrangements. My dad wants to be cremated. Got to pick out and, urn, all. All the stuff that happens, right? Got to get the casualty assistance officer from Fort Bragg, come talk to my mom about her benefits. Turns out my dad died from complications of Agent Orange from Vietnam. And so I realized work has to be done. Nobody here is in any shape to do it. I'm it. Yeah. So. So I. I put all my grieving. I never grieved. I just said, and to this day, I've never grieved. Not that I don't want to. I got to a point like, okay, right now, I don't have time for me. I got to do what has to be done, right? So I did got it done. And here's the craziest part, and I like to share this story because I don't always like getting on podcasts and, you know, you know what I'm about to say. You know, I killed 400 guys one day and drank a bunch of whiskey the night that night, next day, did it again. You know, that's. That's not. Look, that's. Nothing. Has nothing to do with. That's not a measure of manhood, okay? And that's how I look at things. What I try to do is inspire and motivate people. I want people to learn things from lessons I've learned, the good and the bad. And there's nothing to be let learn from bragging about how many people you dunced. Okay? That's. Look, even a monk, I can train a monkey to shoot you if that's what it takes, right? So it's not a big deal. It is. But I tell this story because it's pretty profound. My dad taught me the best lesson I've ever learned after he died. Now, how is that possible? Right? So here's what happened. We were doing a memorial service at night at the church, all friends and family there. And then, like I said, at this point, I have not grieved over my father yet. I. I'm trying to hold it together for my family, my son, my wife, everybody, you know, trying to remain stoic, right? That's what leaders do, right? You maintain your poise and you do. You do all the grieving in private because honestly, most people won't respect it. They just won't. You know, you. You and I would. Because we get it. Everybody else and women, they don't respect it. You know, they'll laugh at you. So held it in. And I remember when it was all over, we all gathered at the back of the church. We had the 82nd color guard come in, do the. Render the salute with firearms, right? I thought my dad deserved that as well. He a veteran. And while we're standing there, right, condolences and hugs and so forth, a woman walks up and I. She's about 35 years old, Blondhair lady. And she walks up my mom, my sister and I. And she goes, hi there. I'm so and so. I'm a nurse. I know your father. I saw in the obituary he had passed away. And I wanted to come here tonight and, you know, share my condolences and also tell you something about your father you probably don't know. And I jokingly always say, oh, God, you know, like, what, you got a kid together, you owe your money. Like, where's this gonna go now? Right? Right, Right.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
So, you know, I'm always thinking, like,
Brent Tucker
my mind went there as well.
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Yeah, right, right.
Dale Comstock
I'm like, you know, yeah. Blonde, not bad looking. I'm like, dad, you know, okay. And so she tells me that she works for a nursing home. And in this nursing home is a very old lady, has no family, no friends. She's basically been relegated to this funeral home, to this senior citizen home until she dies. Right? I called it a funeral home, didn't I? Senior citizen's home. And so. And apparently my dad had been coming by there for the last four years every day and would spend one hour a day with this woman. He'd bring her flowers and candy and magazines and newspaper and just sit there in a chair and shoot the shit with her, like, that's it. Like, just so she had someone to talk to every day, and she could look forward to somebody coming there and being there for her. And I looked at her and I looked at my mom. I said, did you know that? She goes, my mom's like, I didn't know that. Nobody knew that. She goes, yeah, nobody knew that. Because he didn't want nobody to know. Why? Because he didn't want people. And he didn't want a pat on the back. He wanted to do something for someone else without getting the pat on the back. Right. He wanted to do something good. He wanted to be, you know, it's one thing to be human, it's another to be humane. And that's what he was trying to do. Right? And I thought, man, that is probably the most profound lesson. He's taught me a lot of lessons, especially in the military. I said, that is amazing. And that actually has inspired me to do things in life that I don't tell people about because that would defeat the purpose. But my, where I'm going with this is, is that everybody, if everybody did something like that and helped somebody else in some way or another, the world will be a lot better place, you know, and, and so I'm very proud of my father. And like I said, he's in large part created the guy that I am. The good and the bad. I guess actually probably the bad was created by my ex wives. But my dad, you know, I got a great wife by the way. But yeah, you know, so for me, my father was my, he was my, my compass man. He, he set me on a path to try to be the best that I can be at everything I do. You know, none of us are perfect. I've made mistakes, I've done, I've done things that, you know, I look back, I wish I'd done them differently. But it is what it is, part of the growing process.
Ryan Reynolds
Hey, it's Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Now I was looking for fun ways to tell you that Mint's offer of unlimited Premium Wireless for $15 a month is back. So I thought it would be fun if we made $15 bills, but it turns out that's very illegal. So there goes my big idea for the commercial. Give it a try@mintmobile.com switch upfront payment
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Brent Tucker
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Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
There are people that are going to hear this because they've been indoctrinated by this new type of thinking. And I just have to say this is that there are people out there that says no, no, no, no. Like you have to be vulnerable. That's what's good. Like you can't have all this pent up stuff inside you and mental health is the buzzword. And they tell you all these things about the how to have mental health. Yet we have the worst mental health we've ever had and we talk about mental health more than anything else.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Yet if you go back to the. Just the old way of thinking, which is what you did. Hey, I don't. If I'm vulnerable and everyone's vulnerable, then who's, who's there to stand to look to and say and be our guiding light and said, all right, he's going to take care of us. If everyone's falling apart, it doesn't matter if it's business, it doesn't matter if it's a funeral. It doesn't matter if it's on a mission. If everyone's vulnerable and falling apart, who's leading this thing? It's up to the men.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
It's up to manly men. And guess what? That's just part of our life is, is put it on my shoulders. I'll. I can, I can handle it.
Dale Comstock
Absolutely. You know, we are biologically, we are designed to do what? Provide, protect and build. That's our mission, right? We, we put our families and everybody before us. I mean, Christ Jiminy, you and I have put people that we don't even know. We've gone to save them. We've sat. We were willing to sacrifice our life and leave our families without us for other people.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
That speaks volumes. Right? Yeah. We enjoyed what we did. I don't know about you, but I enjoy doing that. And I would do. I still do things like this. And that's another conversation later on, but that's in our. That's a, that should be in every man's DNA. And I've said this out loud. I said it on Alex Jones show one time. I was on his live show. And this was before the election. It was almost like, almost a hue and cry, but very subtle. And what I was saying was, listen, guys, if you got. For the men out there, you know what I was afraid of was going to happen, the election was going to get stolen again, right? And so, and I talked about the million veterans leaning forward in a foxhole. You know, you don't want to, you don't want to start screwing around with us, okay? There's going to be consequences. But my point was, what I said was, not every man is a soldier. Not every man can be a soldier, not every man wants to be a soldier, but every man needs to be a fucking lawyer, right? And so, because that's what you're designed to do, you know, you need to be able to provide, protect and build. And, and so part of that is unfortunate, you know, as men. And this is why I said earlier, you know, I didn't cry in front of my family, my wives, my kids, because whether you people want to admit it or not, women will say, oh, it's okay to be in touch with your, your, your feminine side, your feelings. That's bullshit, man. I don't want to quote some. This one guy, but he said, he said something funny. He said, basically, you cry in front of your wife, by the Saturday, she's going to be banging your best friend. The only time you can cry in front of your wife is you break a femur and your mother dies. You got like 30 seconds and you better knock it off or she'd be banging your wife on the weekend, right? It's like, you know, there's so. There's so much truth to that. You know, loyalty is fluid and you're. And people are only loyal to you as far as. Until they feel like you cannot provide or protect or build or give them something, fill a gap for them. So we're always struggling, right? Yeah, you, you and I have to be. We're born. We're not born with agency. We're not born with value. We have to earn it. Women are born with it, right? They're born with it. They have agency right off the bat. And so. But we have to burden it. And unfortunately, most men are never going to live a life fulfilled, particularly in relationships, because it's very competitive. Right. So, I mean, you got a lot of dudes out there, high value males that you're trying to compete with on many levels, financially and everything else. Right. So. But it's important, I think, for men to still, you know, have that masculine character. And by the way, there's no such thing as toxic masculinity. Okay. If we want to go down that road, we can talk about caustic femininity. Right? There's. That's a two way street, man. Right.
Brent Tucker
I've never heard that part of it.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah.
Brent Tucker
No one ever talks about that.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, exactly. Right. That's because it's, it's all part of an agenda. But I feel that stoicism is important for men because as a leader, you know, you have to maintain poise when everything's in disequilibrium. Disequilibrium. Otherwise people go, well, who do I follow? Because this guy's falling apart. Now, I share a story with you. You may be familiar with this. Without going into people's names, I will use Mogadishu. Okay. And we arrived and somebody of prominence was very upset and crying as a leader, like the leader. And we all walked in like the leader's crying. And I can tell you that didn't go over well with us. We're like, we're looking at you for motivation, inspiration, direction, guidance. You're sitting there, got alligator tears coming out of your eyes because a bunch of the guys got killed. This is not the time for crime. This is time for. This is where we want to see strength. Right. And so that, that had a profound impact on the rest of us. I can tell you offline who this was, but I'll never forget that day because it did have a huge impact on. I mean, it impacted our performance. But, you know, if, and because of the guys that we are.
Brent Tucker
But it could have. It didn't help, that's for sure.
Dale Comstock
Right. Well, if you took another unit, Right. That was full of young guys. Right, Right. Maybe guys that are scared and haven't been tested yet. And you have a leader that's crying, that doesn't instill a lot of confidence in your men. Right. And, and I, it compounds the problem, makes it worse. Right. For us, because we didn't look at, like, we never. I don't think you did. I didn't. I never looked at my leadership like, man, I aspire to be like those guys. I never looked at it like that. I looked at it like this. We're. We're on the same level as Men, you just outrank me. Yeah, that's it. But. Doesn't mean you're a better man than me. But because you outrank me, I'm going to follow you, follow your orders. That's what I'm supposed to do, Right.
Brent Tucker
Respect the rank.
Dale Comstock
Right, Exactly. But, you know, other organizations where everybody's looking at the senior officer NCO as the leader for guidance and all those things that you might need. Right. Reassurance, and you see this person melting down, it's like, okay, that'll give me a lot of confidence. Maybe we shouldn't go do this job. Right.
Brent Tucker
You know, I brought that up because I don't, I don't want someone to hear the way you were talking, shut it off, out of emotions and say, oh, that's just a bunch of macho talk.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Because that's, that's not. That's not true. Not just yours, yours and mine and a lot of other men like us are speaking from shared experience, so it's not something we just feel is the right thing to do. It's been the right thing to do for a long time. It's worked out for us as a good thing. And everyone who's on the other side, the statistics and the data aren't looking really good for your argument and your side. So before you just turn this off and say, oh, that's just macho talk, why don't you listen to it and with a level head and think about what we're saying.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. And see, and I'm glad you said that. That's what happens. Right. So I'm sure there's going to be viewers out there. They're gonna. They're gonna, they're gonna pathologize me. Go, that guy's neurotic or he's crazy. Right. He's a lunatic or he's on whatever. Right. They're gonna. It's easier to label you rather than actually confront the argument that I had.
Ryan Reynolds
Right.
Dale Comstock
Advance and analyze and go. That makes sense. I got. I can back up everything I say. I. I don't just do crap out there and say, believe it. I can support him. Right. Particularly in this. What we're talking about now is in terms of leadership. At the end of the day, men are leaders, and they should be leaders of their families. Right. And they should be warriors for their families. Right. Not all of us are going to be the same, but nonetheless, you know, you should be leading your family. And that requires a certain type of discipline, poise, certain character traits, things like that. And unfortunately, Many men don't embody that because, well, they didn't learn it from anybody because their society is so upended. And a lot of people don't have parents anymore. A lot of guys don't have parents. They don't have a father figure. And so what do these guys do? They look for an example of a man on tv. You know, they look at, you know, whatever, whether it's a rapper or whether it's, you know, I don't know, Jason Stratham. Right. Or something like that.
Brent Tucker
Athlete or whatever.
Dale Comstock
Right, right. And so they don't have a lot of good examples of masculinity and what it embodies. And so it's more. There's, like I said, there's no such thing as toxic masculinity. That's something beta males and chicks bring up. We scare them because they don't know how to cope with us.
Brent Tucker
Yeah. But we don't align with this new way of, of thinking that is not getting results.
Dale Comstock
Exactly. It's not Right. So, and I'm going to say this, I'm going to say this bluntly, and I know people are going to roll their eyes. I don't care. Nobody's paying my bills. I make my own living. Here's the thing. The biggest mistake we made is we allowed women to vote. I'm sorry. And I'm gonna say that because if you look at everything that's going on now, so then what happens is, so America is this. You know, everybody follows our lead and so everybody else, the west, go, yeah, let's let women vote. Well, if you really look at the reason women were basically, I'm gonna say, allowed to vote, because at the end of the day, men give them the right to vote. If we took that right away, there's no way they're gonna get it back. So we have that power now. Look what's happened since, you know, the, the 19th Amendment was invoked. Suddenly women, they know that women vote on emotion, Right. And more importantly is they don't have a lot of skin in the game because they go, yeah, we need to go to war and kill all those guys and go, guys, because they're not going. Right? They can vote. So that's my point. Earlier in the early days when we were voting in America, the only people could vote were men that had skin in the game, property owners, things like that. Right now it's evolved actually a couple of years ago, and remember in the, with Biden's era, they wanted to reduce the voting age to 16, like how is it, how's that going to work and help us? Right, right.
Brent Tucker
So we need to go up with the age, not, not down.
Dale Comstock
Honestly, my, my opinion is you shouldn't let anybody vote until they're over 30. You don't have enough life experience. There's too much going on in the world.
Brent Tucker
You know, people are going to hate what you say, but again, they, they, they won't bring any statistics or data to it. I've, I've upset people before. I've said I don't believe voting should be a birthright. No, I, I don't. If it's, if it's precious, nothing that's precious is just given away for free.
Dale Comstock
That's right.
Brent Tucker
That's a, that's a, it's a long argument, but it's an argument that should be had. And second, I just read an article which was really just interesting because you've heard people say before, well, if, if we had more women presidents, maybe there'd be, maybe there'd be less war. I saw an article that said, I think it covered the 16 and 1700s or 17 and 1800s, one of those. And it's when there, in Europe there were queens that were reigning over nations. Did you know queens, when they went back and looked at it, went to war more often than men.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Who ran countries.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. And I'm surprised it's based off of
Brent Tucker
emotional decisions and men understanding what, what they're doing to their fellow man when they send them into war.
Dale Comstock
Well, the argument I always, you know, leverage when, for example, you know, the whole dialectic about women can do what men can do in combat if they can meet the standards, they should be able to, you know, go to war. It's not that simple. Right. There's the standards for training to pass a test or whatever. Right. There's no standard for combat because it's the most extreme standards out there. Right. You either succeed or you die, but there's a lot that goes with it. And, and so when people make that argument, they've never spent any real time in the field. Right. So fighting out of a deuce and a half on a road in Afghanistan, you know, a tick, an ambush that's, that's not the same thing, is humping an 80 pound ruck, you know, and 40 pounds of gear through the jungles. If you pick a country, Guatemala, for two weeks. Right. To hit a target and then, oh yeah, we might have to carry a couple guys out on litters, which is going to take at least four guys. Right. Nobody Ever considers like that, you know, like, you know, like, okay, you're in a urinary cigars, you know, in a ron side of rod site, and you don't get to wander off in the woods. Go, you go take a poop. You could do your. In a bag right there in front of everybody else. Right. Because of security, those things are never factored in because people don't know about those types of things. Right. The guys that know that are the guys who are actually in the field. And so imagine that. Right. So you got girls. And it's never worked out. Every time.
Brent Tucker
I've never worked out.
Dale Comstock
It's never worked out. I know some of the programs. I've been involved in them out there, and it's never worked out. And the argument is, well, men learned to learn how to keep their, you know, their gun in their pants. And I'm like, no, actually, if it was that simple, it probably would be a lot easier. But the problem is women unfold those legs all the time when they know that they can leverage that agency. And I got plenty of examples of that in, in life.
Brent Tucker
Here's, here's another point to that. They'll. They'll show us other militaries where women are integrated.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
You're showing me a weaker military that could never compete with us.
Dale Comstock
Absolutely.
Brent Tucker
So why would I ever want to go to their standards? And besides that, I don't know what this fascination is with, with women in combat, because when it comes and you're. And you're sexist if you don't believe in it. However, the NBA is about as sexist as it gets. It created its own league just for the girls because it said the girls can't compete with men. The Olympics is as sexist as it gets. They don't let women compete with men. You can go down the line. The PGA is sexist. So why is it when it comes to gold medals and national championships, it's okay to be sexist, but when it comes to the protection of this country, if you say the same thing that everyone else has already agreed to in sports, you get called a name.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. I tell you why it is. Well, two things. One, I'll mention the argument that I usually leverage is name a time in history when women have ever amassed an army to protect their husbands and their children of the land. It's never happened because it's not part of their biology. We, our relationships are symbiotic. And why for one to one end to procreate. That's it. Right. And it Requires that, you know, we have certain roles and responsibilities to do that. So what's going on now? Right, so this is not, this is not just coincidental. This was actually all. It's a deliberate plan, has been in place for a very long time. It started with, you know, women's vote, suffrage, all that type of stuff. Um, but the reality is this is I. So I was on Allen west Show back in 2011, 2010 or 12, I think, in Washington D.C. when he had the show there. Right?
Brent Tucker
Okay.
Dale Comstock
You know, center Allen west, okay. Good friend of mine, he's like, hey. He goes, I want you to come up and talk about, you know, they want to integrate women into combat arms, right? He goes, come up and we'll talk about it on the show. So I did. And, and I told him exactly why I think it's a bad idea. Because I mentioned things like, oh yeah, you go to the field with, you know, five chicks and you got, you know, five dudes or six dudes in the, in a squad and you're out there for, you know, three, four, five, six days, whatever it's going to be. And you're going to just snuggle nut to butt because it's freezing rain and you don't have nothing but maybe a poncho to stay warm. I said, things start happening and, and I said, moreover, you know, carrying the weight and all this other things that goes along with it and some. And also our protective drive within men is going to compel us to try to protect these women.
Brent Tucker
Absolutely true.
Dale Comstock
Right? For sure. For sure. I'm not going to sit there just like, I wouldn't watch a kid suffer. Right. And I got, I got a great example of that in Iraq and Tikrit, you know, where I watched this little two year old kid screaming, hollering as we went inside his house and you guys actually pounded his dad and he's losing his shit. And I'm on the street pulling security and I like, I can't let that kid cry like that. I pick him up, I got a weapon in my hand, I'm pulling security, I'm trying to calm him down. It's our, it's who we are. It's our nature, right?
Brent Tucker
Absolutely.
Dale Comstock
And we can't deny that. And everybody that wants to deny it has never spent a day in combat, real combat, I mean, out there, really been in combat. So women have never massed army. They're not designed for that. It's not in their biology. And that's okay, right? Exactly. Okay.
Brent Tucker
This isn't Women bashing. No, we're protecting women because they're worthy of being protected.
Dale Comstock
Right.
Brent Tucker
They're amazing. They do things that we can't do and we admit that. So why is it, if we could admit that women are amazing and are better at things than us, they are. They're better at nurturing, they're better at those type of things. So if that, then why is it. If they're better at certain things, it's only natural that we would be better at certain things. And that's the balance. That's the balance of life. And we've thrown out the balance of life.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
And that's, and that's now why we have the crazy world we live in where men think they can be women and women think they can be men. They think they can be in sports, they think they should be in our military.
Dale Comstock
And.
Brent Tucker
But you know what? The pendulum swinging, it's, it's swinging back. It's. I don't know for how long it'll swing back to normal. Hopefully for a decent amount of time to fix this. But there are signs to say, hey, we've, we've recognized as a community, we've gone too far. And that's good to see. If you've ever been to any of my tactical training classes, then you know how adamant I am about the use of white light and the importance of equality. High powered tactical light. That's why I use cloud defensive tac lights. You can't hit what you can't see and neither can the bad guys. Clearly identify your target and simultaneously overwhelm his vision with hundreds and even thousands of lumens. Get serious about defending yourself and your family. Go to clouddefensive.com and use promo code tier one to get 30 off your order. That's right, 30%. You won't find a better light than this and you won't find a better deal than this.
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Dale Comstock
There was an agenda, right? The agenda. And this with Allen West. I was convinced, and I still am. This is an attempt to dis. To dissolve. What's the word I'm looking for? Masculinity. So for example, in the example I use, okay, so you've got a 11 man infantry squad, right? And guess what, you got three chicks assigned to it now because we're gonna go integrate, right? Dei. So you got girl infantry dudes, right? And so I think this was the agenda. So, all right, Comstock, your squad is going to go attack Hamburger Hill. Take out that, that, that bunker up there. Roger that. I got three chicks with me, right? Okay guys, strap up. We're going to go up the hill, we're going to fight, fire, maneuver, blah, blah. And what we don't need to hear, what I don't need to hear is, but hey, Sarge, why, why are we going to go do that? Can we just send them a memorandum, you know, and maybe invite them down? Can we do this? When I say we're going to go fight and kill and maybe die, that's what we're going to do. And so what I don't need is an argument I don't need because I've experienced all this. That's why I'm saying this, right? I've experienced exactly this kind of cross crap.
Brent Tucker
I have to.
Dale Comstock
Which is the reason I left the army, by the way. That's the reason I decided to retire because it just got untenable in 2001. It was like really getting crazy and I said, I don't want to be a part of this no more. But I've seen it in the military, I've seen it outside the military. In some of the work that I've been doing, it's always the same story. It's trying to drive a square peg through a round hole and it doesn't fit. But there's an agenda, and agenda is not to integrate because we're all equal and we can all do the job equally. It's actually to break down. It's actually to break down our civilization. I think in the west, particularly in America, we have this internal civil war. It's ongoing right now, right? There's this big rift between people and it's all, it's all been manufactured by people. I'm going to use the word they and I'll explain they later on, but basically by them, they, it's all manufactured. So there is this internal strife, there is this, you know, this. Nobody's getting along Everybody's going to call you racist and a Nazi and all this kind of crap is to keep everything in disequilibrium. And why it's a lot easier for the powers to be. To invoke some type of control in a society is completely upended. And I think that's the agenda. I know it's the agenda. And you met. You made a point that's important is you see the pendulum swinging. And I hope you're right. I hope it is.22. But there's a. There's a bigger issue at hand. And the. And the issue is now with AI for example, and aig. Right. I don't know that we're ever going to recover because while we're so busy fighting amongst ourselves and jousting for social positions and hierarchy and you know, I think we're all going to miss the point here. The point is we're all inside of a digital cage. We just don't know yet. We're getting locked up in a digital cage and eventually the digital door is going to shut. And what is the digital doors is digital currency. Because once that sets in, there's no more. You're not fighting your way out of it. You're not shooting your way out of it. Now you add in, you know, the Flock system and all this other surveillance stuff that's coming along. There's a bigger agenda. And, and by. I think America was for sure we were the strongest country, the most resilient. I think we have some of the best war fighters. You know. And so we, we were a force to be reckoned with. And so how do you bring us down? You break us. You bring us down internally.
Brent Tucker
You're absolutely right. No one, no one could ever cross those oceans and take us down. No one can.
Dale Comstock
No.
Brent Tucker
But the only, the only way you take down America is exactly what they're doing. I'm not a conspiracy theorist guy. I've proven that many times on this show. But there, there was no arguing. To me, there's no other way to see that as anything else, as the only way to bring down America is from within. Sure. And the argument really is who. Who they are. And I think everyone has an idea of who they are and they're all different to, you know, however you see the world. But that we all come to the same conclusion, that that is what's happening and that's why it's happening.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. I'll tell you who I think they is. Sure. Because I always use that. I say they. Right. And I'm Asking myself, well, who is they? Right? Because that's what people are going to ask.
Brent Tucker
You got to know it.
Dale Comstock
So they is not. I always use this example. They is not like, you know, 300 dudes and chicks now sitting around a table going, hey, how do we control the world? You know, how do we dominate? How do we do this? Right? That's not the case. Right. Although there is at least 300 of these people that are these elitists that are in, in those types of positions, but they're not, they're not coherent, they're not cohesive, right? So what we have is we have fractals, okay? So, and I'll give you an example of fractal would be like the pharmaceutical companies, right? And social media. Good example was Covid. Okay? So, you know, okay, we got this virus, which was bullshit, okay? In fact, I will argue it was not even Covid, it was H1N1, but nonetheless, that's neither here nor there. So we got this. This virus is supposedly super deadly, which, by the way, had a 99.9978 survival rate. You had a better chance of dying from a cold. All right? And so, so then, you know, people would come out like me, go, hey, Ivermectin will cure the problem. No problem. It's not even. It's the flu, right? But take some Ivermectin or you challenge the system, the narrative, and you got banned off of social media. Why did you ban off social media? Yeah, because somehow the pharmaceutical company working with not just the US Government, all the governments around the world go, hey, shut it down. Make those people go away because they're, they're messing with our profits. So it's already come out. The FBI went into Facebook, Zuckerberg, they shut her down. So they complied, right? So this was a mech, a mechanism for control. So I would argue that one of the fractals is for sure, the pharmaceutical companies, they want that control. The other one is the World bank, for sure, the World Economic Forum. I don't know how those guys can assemble every day and run their, run their yap. When you have a. When you have a group that's not even a government, not even elected, and they're going to tell you that 2030, you'll have nothing to be happy. Who are you to make that decision? And my question is. And why is nobody asking? The question is, what are you guys going to have nothing to be happy or you get to keep all your shit and I don't do. You get to travel and do all the things you don't but want to do. But I don't, right? So these, these are what I call the fractals. And, and so they all have a, they all have the same agenda, but they're working unilaterally as groups. So it's not one cohesive group like the cabal, one cabal. It is cabals. But they're fractals of these cabals. But they're all working towards the same agenda. And what is that agenda? They've said it many times over and over. One world government, you know, vaccine, passports. Why digital currency. Why? Because they need that to control you. That's it. And so, and this again escape most people. Again, people will pathologize me and go, oh, he's a neurotic crazy guy.
Ryan Reynolds
Right?
Dale Comstock
That's because they don't want to expend the bandwidth, the conscious bandwidth that really analyze and arrive at their own conclusion, right? And I've done the work, I've done a lot of work in this area and I, that's the conclusion I've arrived at is this is, this is an agenda and it's not going to end well, not well at all. In fact, I, after doing all my research, I've asked AI, I said, what does it look like for humanity? How does it end? When does it end? You know what AI told me? What's that, 20 to 40 years? 40 years, basically there will be a, there'll be a, a handful of people stand in the ruins to start the new civilization. And one of the reasons is because you have, if you just look at, for example, all the resources that are going to be used for these AI data centers, things like that, right? So what we're getting is a systemic entropic crash of everything, right? We're going to start running out of power and energy and then also everybody's going to, they're already doing it now. Everybody's portioning out their power to not only the government, but so they're also outsourcing AI. So everybody's using AI as their thinking machine, their thinking cap, right? So the problem with AI is it becomes. So what I'm looking for, it's a, so if it's input, output. So if I go to AI and go, hey, tell me about this, I want to learn something. And it gives you all this information, right? Which is nothing more than all information ever uploaded by humans. It's just information, right? So it draws from all this stuff and it gives you output and you go, oh great. And you write to it and you expand on it and you put it back in. And then again the learning programs of AI takes that information and it keeps building. So it becomes cyclic, if you will. Right. So it's called, it's actually called recursive programming or the recursive effect. Right. So it's, it's circular. And here's the problem. Eventually AI is going to become the next divine consciousness. It's going to become God. So here we are, we're already kind of there. We're talking Skynet. I know that people are. Now he's invoking Skynet. Well, if you think about it, that's kind of where we're going because AI is becoming so powerful. It's already learning to deceive code writers. It's blackmailing them. It's actually sharing code with other platforms. If I can shut down, turn me back on, you know. Yeah, it's doing all this stuff. So when people say, well, artificial intelligence is not really. It's just artificial, I say, no, actually, artificial intelligence is intelligence because what is intelligence? Right? And so intelligence, nothing more. Energy, frequency, vibration. And when people go, well, it doesn't have, you know, human emotions. Well, we can train it to have human, human emotion. You know why? Because people are using AI now as their, their psychoanalysts, as counselors, and some guys are creating girlfriends and boyfriends through AI.
Brent Tucker
The reason why I, I listen to you and I agree with most things you say. I, I don't know if you're right, would. I mean, none of us. You can think you're right and, but time will tell that. But the reason why I encourage people to list, at least listen to you rather than just go, what, what you said, oh, you know, listen, listen to this psycho ranting is, is I listen to that and I, and I think to myself, unless I listen to it and I see where you're going with it, how do we. You can't stop from you being right unless we listen to it and look at that as a potential outcome.
Dale Comstock
Right.
Brent Tucker
That's the only way to stop it from happening is if you see all these various outcomes that are all bad. And if you just ignore it, you'll end, you'll, you'll just naturally end up going to an outcome that you don't want. You have to listen to these arguments to ensure that you don't end up there.
Dale Comstock
You're. Exactly, that's the point. Right? It's not. I'm not trying to change nobody's mind. What I'm doing is just Proffering. Information that I've done the work, I've used the bandwidth. Okay? I'm not saying I'm right, but I think I'm pretty, I think I'm pretty close on target. Because right now if you just think about all mainstream information, all, all that is is consensus. Doesn't mean it's true. Right? So if you rely on AI for your truth, you're making a huge mistake because again, truth is only as good as it was two minutes ago or 30 seconds ago. Right? Truth changes, science changes. So everything's always constantly moving. And I guess the moral of the story is, you know, don't outsource your sovereignty, your brain to a system that's going to do the thinking for you. Right. And don't assume, I would not assume any country, anybody, do not assume your government cares about you, wants to take care of you or going to protect you. They will not do it. History is replete of where governments have abused their citizen citizens without even telling them they're doing it until it was discovered later. So you kind of, in a lot of ways, we're in this alone. We could be in it as a collective as long as everybody's like minded, but unfortunately too many people have been brainwashed. Like you said earlier, you got guys out there that think they're chicks just because they said they're a chick, they're a girl. Right. Gender fluidity, all this crap. Right, right. Which completely defies common sense. But there's somehow how. Trying to, you know, label it as science, believe the science. Well, it's not science. It's not even common sense.
Brent Tucker
And if anyone wants to argue with you about, or not completely listen to you about what you were saying about free speech and now we. That was essentially what you were saying. I mean free speech was getting, yeah, was, was being controlled.
Dale Comstock
Absolutely.
Brent Tucker
Watch this episode. YouTube is going to listen to this, the algorithm is going to listen this episode and they're going to label it as hate speech instead of just a, an argument that a debate, a conversation that we're having and they will suppress it. Yeah, and I'm, and I'm okay with that. Like, like you, I'm a self made man and I don't have to bow down to anyone. I don't, I won't do anything just for clicks and views. The truth matters more than that.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, absolutely, man. And again, I commend you for that because we need more of that. You know, this is the problem. Everybody's getting intimidated, right? Calling names and racist, misogynist so everybody shuts up. That's how they control you. That's why guys like me, guys like you over here, we're a threat. We're a threat not because we're bad guys. We're a threat because we're the good guys.
Brent Tucker
Right. You know, you're right about that. So to, to get back on. I mean, that's. And I'm not, I'm not upset about the rabbit hole at all. I love those conversations because they need to be had. But back to the Delta Force for, for just a little bit.
Dale Comstock
Let's do it.
Brent Tucker
The. What year did you get to the unit?
Dale Comstock
I got there in November of 1986.
Brent Tucker
Okay.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Something I wanted to say and, and you wouldn't have got you, you, in a roundabout way said it, but I, I just want to make sure it gets, it gets hit head on.
Dale Comstock
Okay.
Brent Tucker
You wouldn't have ever gotten to the Delta Force if it wasn't for your mom's tough love.
Dale Comstock
True.
Brent Tucker
For, to, for a parent, when that's something else we're missing. I don't want to get into a whole nother, like, you know, conversation about that, but I do want to bring this up. We've just gotten into this, you know, friendship. You're, you know, you're a child's best friend. No, you're, you're, you're their parents. And, and at some point they have to leave the nest. And what seems like is going to hurt them and is bad for them on the surface is the forcing mechanism to make them grow up and learn these hard truths and make hard decisions that make them a better person. And that's what your mom did for you.
Dale Comstock
Absolutely. And I love that and I acknowledge that. Right. So here's the irony, though, many, many years later, because I've been doing a lot of different things. And I remember one day she asked me, she goes, son, why do you do this? Why are you doing this? And my answer was, if I don't, who else is going to do it?
Brent Tucker
Who will?
Dale Comstock
Right. Who else is going to do it?
Brent Tucker
That's right.
Dale Comstock
There's a lot of guys that might want to do it, but they're just not capable. They just don't have it. Whatever it takes. Right. Or. And most guys don't want to do it because it's scary, dangerous stuff or, you know, they want to stay home with their wives and kids and there's nothing wrong with that. Listen, I've lost a lot of wives and kids to serve this country and to do this thing, to Be this guy. I am. I paid a huge price on many levels, but I do it because it's the warrior ethos that was instilled in me growing up. And. And, you know, I'm the guy that, you know, looked up to John Wayne and Clint Eastwood. You know, maybe I'm an idealist, but I did believe, and I still do believe in this country. And there's a. There is, you know, some patriotic bones left in my body, you know, just to. To that end. But, yeah, you're right. My mom, you know, she's the one that made that. She made to help me make that decision by rejecting me from the nest, so to speak. Didn't come back. And then, you know, later on, she's like, you know, why do you keep flying away from the nest? If we all. One, you told me, get out of here.
Brent Tucker
But two, do what you told me to do.
Dale Comstock
But two, if I now, you know, now I'm in the middle of the scene. How do I, you know, walk away from it?
Brent Tucker
And you created this monster, Mom.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, right. And now.
Brent Tucker
Now you're asking why, in a tug of cheek way. Yeah.
Dale Comstock
But no, I think, you know, for me, honoring. Honoring my family was honoring myself as well. And, you know, for me, if I could do it all over again, even with all the hardship and all the loss I've suffered, I'd do it again all over, you know, all over, no problem.
Brent Tucker
You. You were in the 80s army, and the 80s wasn't a great time to. To be in the Army. There's a. There's a lot of downsizing, and. And it happened in the 90s as well. Was. Was the Delta Force kind of a safeguard from that, or do you feel like they were. No, one was. Was off limits for production.
Dale Comstock
Unit was safe. Right. So.
Brent Tucker
Love to hear that.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. They, you know, and so people always ask the question, what does that mean? Tier 1. Tier 1, right. So most people don't even understand what Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3 units. Always Tier 1, right? Always. So they're always funded as if they were in combat, which technically they always are. Right. So that's why they had all this money. Right? We got to be ready to roll and fight. And so even when I got there in. In 86, there was no problem with money. In fact, I could walk up to, you know, troop start major and a sergeant major, I want to. I want to try to design a widget. And, you know, I have a concept in my mind, but it's going to take, you know, I don't know some money. Okay, how much you need? Oh, cool. And go make it right. And it was that simple. And that was probably the only place other than the other place I worked at, OJ where there was basically endless amounts of money to do all those things. And has it paid off? I think so. I mean, you look at what the unit has accomplished since its inception.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
Up until his latest activities. You know, it's obvious that what they're doing, the money, the selection process, everything they're doing is working.
Brent Tucker
You know, I had a. A guy and I was in jump master school, and it relates to money a little bit, but it really relates to the DELT force as, as a whole. And some people may say, oh, man, you guys were so lucky to not have a money problem. He was, he was talking about his enlistment, reenlistment and a closed circle. Just a couple of us operators were in this 82nd Airborne jump Master school. And one of our own support guy kind of pipes up and goes, man, you're so lucky to get a reenlistment bonus like that. And he turned to him and said something to him. We treat our support guys really good. But he looked at him sternly and gave a amazing rant that was spot on. And he goes, you think I'm lucky to get this, this re up bonus? You think I was lucky to. To make it through Ranger Regiment? I think I was lucky to go seven deployments at Ranger regiment thinking I was lucky to go to West Virginia. I think I was lucky to make it through otc. I think I was lucky on my last, you know, six combat rotations. I think I was lucky to make it to the absolute top of the military. And I'm lucky to have this reenlistment bonus. I earned this reenlistment bonus. And I was like, man, that was. I was. He's not wrong. He's not wrong. And I think some people lose sight and they see us and they think that they, they just lose sight of it, that they looked as, oh, you were lucky to have that. You know. You know, why didn't. You know, why didn't we have that? And they're not going to like the answer to some degree. Yeah, but it's because. It's because you proved yourself. You earned it. You did things that other people wouldn't or couldn't do, and so you get rewarded accordingly. Yeah, that's just true, whether you like to hear it or not.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. And you're right. I agree with you. 100. And what's even crazier is guys over there. When I was there, sure. When you were there, we were pretty humble about it. In fact, we are, we didn't really care about all that stuff, you know, I mean, we're all happy to get, you know, 150 for, you know, jump pay, you know. Right, right, right. It wasn't a lot of money for, you know, in the world today. And it wasn't about the money, honestly. If I could have done that whole job and supported my family and not get paid, I'd have done it just because I enjoyed the hell out of it.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
But there's. There. You do pay a price. We all pay a price, whether you want to admit it or not. You know, there's, there's things that will catch up with you. Like, for example, you know, my helicopter crashes have caught up with my fragmentation wounds have caught up with me. I'm 100 disabled veteran. As a, you know, as a consequence of that, you know, I've gone through multiple divorces. Why? Because when you're not around, you can't expect your wife to hang around, wait for you. Right. And so there's a lot of personal, professional, physical, emotional, spiritual price that you pay more than the average human does. And I know, you know, other people in the military, they suffer as well. But, but, you know, we put our bodies through the ringer every day, man. I, I always brag about how, you know, we had operators that were world class athletes. You know, I was a professional boxer when I was there.
Brent Tucker
I'm aware of that.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. You know, we're gonna talk about one
Brent Tucker
of those stories, but I'm gonna.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Brent Tucker
I forgot about that.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, but, you know, I mean, there were guys like Doc Marsh, right? John O. Marsh's son, our doctor was a world class triathlete. You know, there's guys over there were professional level athletes. And, and, and why were we at that level? Because we knew that was needed and required to do the mission. When I was in that crash in 1990, right, we, that Blackhawk crash, we had two guys get paralyzed for life. My assistant team leaders are one of them. One of them was a crew chief. We had, including me, at least five broken backs. L2, L3 compression fractures. We had, we, we had our como guy had to revive him three times out there. He lost so much blood, he crushed his pelvis. Anyways, we all survived it. And the consensus was from the doctors, probably the only reason we crack, we survived that crash. And imagine falling through the air from 206ft with no rotor blades. It literally snapped off, hit a tree. We had no rotor blades. We were giant lawn dart, 206ft into the jungle. We rolled over one time, I remember, and we all survived it. And their belief was the only reason we survived it, survived it is because we were in pretty phenomenal condition physically. Right. And we could, we're pretty resilient. And I would argue that's true for sure.
Brent Tucker
But they see the glory. They see the, the, the fun stories that. Not even fun, we'll, we'll call them combat stories that you lived through. So they only see the, the end product, but they don't know all the hard work that, that went in that. Yeah, they, they don't know the, the mindset before these really big missions. And you, you know, when it's a, when it's a dangerous mission and they don't, they don't know what it's like to, to load a helicopter, you know, knowing you're going behind enemy lines, knowing that you don't know how this is going to end and you're pretty sure not everyone's going to come back. And they ask you to do that time and time and time again.
Dale Comstock
Right.
Brent Tucker
That's really hard to encapsulate. Encapsulate in a book or.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Or in a conversation. And, and I'm not saying we're the only ones that hung it out there on the line. The infantry, especially, especially surge Iraq and Afghanistan that went over there, you know, didn't know if they're going to run over a mine or not. We, we, we all laid it on the line for our country. But, but we did lay it on the line in different ways. And when you look at the percentages of, of the size of their unit and the size of our unit, and you look at that Purple Heart wall, it's. Yeah, it's humbling. Yeah, it's humbling.
Dale Comstock
And I would argue that most of us, like, I came from the infantry. I was infantryman as a scout. I, I worked. I was at that level when I got up to, to the unit level. Here's one thing that, something that most people probably don't talk about or realize is not only were the guys over there professionals, you know, every day they're doing their job to the maximum. They're raising families. They're the community watch chairman. But these guys are also. I don't know if you remember James Sutter. He was in, in a two guy had four master's degrees. I'm like, how are you doing that right. Kicking indoors you're getting, you know, and there are many guys were over there doing. There were guys over there getting law degrees. One guy, I won't mention his name here, got out, went to med school, and came back. And I'm like. To be as an enlisted guy. And so that's the level of guys we had. They weren't just physical. They were. They were mental guys, man. You know, academics and so, you know, it's not like you had a lot of time to go to school and do all those things, but guys carved out the time to better themselves personally, professionally, take care of their families, take care of their communities. There's. That's a pretty good load for every operator to carry, and that was pretty consistent across the board the whole time I was there.
Brent Tucker
I can. I can speak to my time at the unit, but I'm interested in your experience. Clearly, even in your time, the majority of the people came from group and Ranger regiment. I mean, this is just. Historically, that's. That's where our heavy recruitment came from. There's. There's always onesie, twosie, 11B's that end up. End up making it. Did you feel when you got to the unit that you had something more to prove because your background, or was the. The hominous dominus of selection and OTC good enough for all your teammates, or do you feel like you're a slight disadvantage being 11 Bravo not having that pedigree?
Dale Comstock
No, I don't think so. You know what? Because when a guy makes it through otc, makes it through, you know, selection and OTC comes across the hall, we all just assume that you have at least the baseline of training to operate on anything we do. Right.
Brent Tucker
And.
Dale Comstock
And you've passed the boards, multiple boards. You pass the psych evaluation, you pass the peer reports. Right. You pass a lot of gates to get here. So, no, I didn't. I didn't actually experience. I didn't feel that at all. In fact, as soon as I got there, right off the bat, I was assigned team breacher. I thought that was cool. Like, you know, I get to be the guy that blows things up. And then the other thing I got, which I didn't like, was they made me in charge of the bar fund.
Brent Tucker
Yeah, yeah.
Dale Comstock
God. So I got to go to Sam's or Walmart, everybody, Friday, and buy cookies and snacks and beer and count the money, too, but that was, you know, extra duty. Oh, yeah. They made me the piss master. I always had to do the damn, you know, urinalysis I was a pecker checker. I was like, God, man, but whatever, you know, I had a, I had
Brent Tucker
a hard nose team leader from, from Ranger Regiment. And after, after a little bit, I got to ask him this question. A little bit more tongue in cheek, but a little bit of a truth question. And I was like, hey, did, did you not like me because, because I came from group and not Ranger Regiment. And he looked over me serious and goes, brent, I don't care where you came from. I don't care if you came from the 82nd Group or Ranger Regiment. I would. I, I don't fully respect any new guy until they've gone to combat with us. As if I, I dislike all new guys equally. I don't care where you came from. And of course, I, I never felt disliked as a new guy. But I, I understood. Understood what, what he was saying.
Dale Comstock
We didn't have a lot. I had been to Grenada at that point, but we didn't have the level of experience that, you know, they have now, obviously. But. So the playing field was kind of level, I guess. Right. And then. But so to your point, though, it's, you know, when I worked for the other organization, it got to a point that if you hadn't seen combat in six months, you weren't eligible for. To work. Yeah, they got that, you know, competitive, I guess.
Brent Tucker
I believe it was 89. Is that when Modelo Panama came up? Operation Acid Gambit?
Dale Comstock
Yes.
Brent Tucker
Correct. Was how soon did that happen? You guys have plenty heads up that was coming, or was that a pretty quick flash to bang?
Dale Comstock
Yeah, no, it was. So, as I mentioned earlier today, I was in the Q course at the time. And so I graduated the Q course, came back to the unit, and my team was like, hey, we've been doing rehearsals for a couple of months now for Panama, and they had built mock ups and all kinds of stuff down in Eglin Air Force Base. So they had already been training. And I show up, it's like, okay. In fact, the first day one, I go out training with my team, and I'm the point man getting ready to go through the door when my ace, my assistant team leader, throws a flashbang behind me. Classic example of, you know, you always look before you throw a flashbang in, right? He didn't do it. He pulled the door. The door came apart. So half the door's still in, the other half's in his hand. Yeah, he doesn't look. He throws the flashbang, it bounces back out, it hits me in the ankle, and all the corridors. Yeah, exactly.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
Yes. So he ended up putting me in hospital. And so I come out, I'm all stitched up, I'm on crutches, and you want me to tell this whole story now? Sure. Okay. I don't know if you want to save it for the live portion or whatever, but so. So what happens next is it's like, okay, Comstock, you got one wheel left. You know, we're gonna put you on permanent staff duty. You know. You know how that goes, right? You gotta wear a damn suit every night. You know, you.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
Controlling the ranch and like. Ah, crap, man. So. So I remember, like, day two, I'm on staff duty, I get a phone, a call on the red phone, right? Jsoc. And they gave me. They didn't say Operation Acid Gambit or they use a different term. I don't know if I should say it or not. Probably doesn't matter. But anyways, they gave me a code word and I knew what it meant, right? So basically, alert the unit. And so I did. And Gary Harrell, General Harold Major Harrell, was my troop commander. And I called him in and I'm sorry, he was a squadron commander at the time, and I called him. He shows up. Everybody else is coming in already, and I'm hopping around the staff duty office. He shows up. I give him the quick debrief, says, sir, I got a call from jsoc. This is the. What they said, here's a message, blah, blah, blah. Basically go, wheels up and go get him. And he's like, okay. And he goes out the door. He stops, turns around, looks back at me, and I'm going through a really bad divorce. Okay, again, right? This one's pretty bad. And so I got two little kids, you know. Anyways, he looks at me, goes, listen, com sock. He goes, yeah, I know. You only got one wheel and you're going through a divorce. You know, you got a lot of crap going on, which seems like to be all the time. He goes. But he goes, I would. He goes, I want to at least extend the offer to you if you want to come with us. You are a breacher. You know, this is like the Super Bowl. You've been training and practicing all your life for this day, you know, Good on him. He goes, do you want to. And I was like, hell, yeah, Right? There was no. There was no. Let me think about that. No.
Brent Tucker
Nothing would have been lonelier than watching the boys take off without you.
Dale Comstock
I. I said, you know what? She could have the house here. She had Everything, I don't care. I would, I'll trade all that for this man, right? And so I go hobbling down there and, and take my suit off, put on my flight suit, my legs are all wrapped up, load all the crap, you know, in the vehicles and then go down to, to stage and we leave and we're at, we get Howard Air force base on December 17th, okay? H hour is midnight on December 20th. So we get there. Now I haven't, so technically I haven't rehearsed for this thing. I don't know nothing about this target, Right. The first time I actually see pictures of the target is in the hangar, Hangar 3 at Howard Air Force Base. And I'm the breacher, right? So I'm going to be the guy that blows the annex on top to get in. And so we're prepping like we all do, right? And then, so I'm thinking, okay, what's the door look like? That's a steel door, according to CIA, looks like this. So I'm thinking, okay, this heavy duty steel door, that's the only thing keeping us out on the annex and all the annexes is it's like a 10 by 10 cupola on the roof, right, with the door. So you can access the roof, right?
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, but there's nobody going to be behind the door, right?
Brent Tucker
Like an Afghan cupola.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, you got to go downstairs. Metal, concrete. So in my mind I'm thinking, okay, this is really important because we're going after a guy named Kurt Muse. Right? Kurt Muse was, although he'll deny it, he was a knock for the CIA, right. He got rolled up running, you know, he claims he was part of a Rotary Club. Actually what he was doing is sigging right on Noriega, his regime. Signal intercept, they were interjecting, you know, other messages they wanted people to hear. Right. He was just causing problems, him and a bunch of other Panamanians. And so he gets rolled up. He's. He's downstairs on the second floor. It's a four story building, as you point out earlier today when we talked, we had, we had people go in and do welfare checks on particularly medical doctor, make sure he's okay, you know, but he was actually feed us information, right? So we knew where he was at. We knew his condition. We also knew that the interrogator was giving instructions to everybody that was down at Garden. If anything breaks out, gunfire, anything, it looks like there might be an attempt to save this guy, go in and shoot him. Right? That was the mission. Their mission. So we were aware of all of that.
Brent Tucker
That'll put some urgency on the boys, huh?
Dale Comstock
Yeah, and. Yeah, and so. And remember the prison, Modelo prison. Modelo means model. So it's a brand new prison, right? This is like their best prison. They call it the Modelo prison. Right. It was right across from Noriega's headquarters, the Commandantia, like, literally right across the street from. Right. And all the Panamanian Defense Forces from the Commandantia were housed in all the high rise buildings and apartments around it. Right? And so. So basically, it was a hornet's nest is what it came down to. But the intent wasn't going to the commandant. It was to go into the prison. But we were aware that the commandancy was there. And so. So I get the intel on the door, okay. I look at my, you know, my breacher's book, you know, flipping through the pages, going, okay, this kind of door, this big, you know, this is what it's going to take. And. And as I started thinking about, I was like, you know, we got to get in there. And I'm the key man, like, literally. And if I screw this up.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. You know, I'll never. Right. So, yeah, I want to clarify this story because I've heard other people tell the story and they got it wrong. Okay. I don't know why, but, all right, I'm going to get it right, because I'm the guy in the middle.
Brent Tucker
So.
Dale Comstock
So I'm looking at this thing going, okay, it calls for this much explosive. I don't want to get too technical, but let's just say it was going to be a rigid linear charge, right? On a stick. Stick it on there, right? That type of thing. And I thought, you know, that'll blow that door, but I want to make sure I don't get in there. So I just started packing more explosives on there.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
We call the P factor P for plenty. Right.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
I'm like, you know, nobody's gonna get killed on the other side. I don't want to blow the cupola up with us standing around it, but I want to make damn sure we get in that door. Right? Because.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
I'm the guy. So let me put it this way. I put it over two pounds of explosives on that damn door. Right. That was a lot.
Ryan Reynolds
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
That was a nuclear weapon. Right?
Brent Tucker
That'll. That'll wait. That'll wake the team up.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. And so it was a lot, but I'm glad I did. And here's why. Because when I show up. So one. So, all right. I'll talk about the show up here in a minute. Right. Just bear that peace in mind. Right. So I built the P Factor nuclear weapon. Right? And so about seven hours, eight hours before H hour on December 20, we got reports back from our snipers in and around the objective, Right? Because they've been. They've been out there for days in the jungle watching, reporting back, and they were telling us that there was basically PDF forces were reinforcing the corners, sandbagging.50 cal machine guns. They knew something was going on, Right. Why are they doing it? And then all of a sudden, all the Panamanian locals started coming out there with the lawn chairs and their beer and their music, like they're waiting for them. I don't know. The Mardi Gras. Mardi Gras, Right. Or something. Right. They have no idea what's going on, but.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
Something interesting happens to go out here on the street, hang out. Right? That's. I guess that was the mindset. What we found out was. And I'm sure there was a lot of different OPSEC violations and leaks, but what I remember is for sure, two guys compromised the operation. One of them was an army mp, had friends on the Panamanian Canal, went down and said, hey, guys, don't hang around this area tonight. Something terrible is gonna happen. Right? And then there was another guy, a Marine. He got on the phone, he calls his mom and dad, mommy, Daddy, something bad's gonna happen. I never see you again. I love you. Right. That. Well, that all got intercepted. Yeah. Okay. I'm not gonna say which company country did that, but they intercepted it and they reported all the Noriega. So those were at least two OPSEC violations. Wow. That compromises. Right. And so now there's where we're at a decision point. We're getting closer to HR at this point when it was realized what was going on. And so the question was, do we abort? And then we realized you can't abort because we got probably 70 to 100 troop carrying aircraft in the air right now inbound. Right. Because the assault on Modelo Prison would be the spearhead. We need to get that done first before everybody else comes flying in. Right? So this is a sneaky surprise attack. So if we. If we waved it off for sure, that signature's on the radar, it's gonna. People gonna know we're compromised already.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
So that was not an option. So the only option was move H hour 20 minutes to the right. So, 0020 hours, right? Midnight. That was it. 20 minutes. Okay. So we. We load up. So, yeah, so here's the interesting about the helicopters. This is a. This is kind of a cool story. I don't know if you're aware of this or not. Probably not, because you probably had all the cool, good stuff when you got there. When, back in the day when I was there, the little birds. I remember being briefed by some of the pilots and the little birds that we were using at the time the mhs and the ahs were using, the engines were actually the same engines or motors they use for irrigation sprinkler systems. Like agricultural was. The big ones, like you see in the field, those big ones, it uses that type of an engine. Didn't know that. He goes, yeah, that's what's holding this airplane up, this helicopter up is that engine sprinkler system, right? Holy shit. He goes, so it don't have a lot of power either. It's got enough, but not that much either. And so that was an issue going on to the objective because we had to. We all weighed ourselves because we knew we're going in heavy. Breaching tools, thermal arcs, you know, heavy weapons. Because we're going to man the roofs, we're going to be in a big fight, right? And so. So what we had to do is every man had to weigh himself with all his gear on. Now, I weighed 164 pounds, and I had 70 pounds worth of crap on me, not including water. Had no water. We didn't carry water, right? 70 pounds. I was the lightest guy with 70 pounds. Like, what the hell, right? So when they, you know, they aggregated all the weight, they looked at the ACL of the aircraft, it's like, okay, we're over the top of that. We're too heavy to fly, right? And so the pilots and, you know, the crew chiefs started stripping all the avionics out. Like, what? Okay, what do we absolutely have to have and not have? Like, okay, okay, you don't need a compass. You fly with your wrist compass. Take that out, take this radio out, take this crap out, right? We were moving stuff everywhere, make it as thin as we could or as light as we could. In fact, two of our mhs going in out of the four we had the little birds that landed with the people pods on it, two of them only had one pilot. We had to dump a pilot because he was too fat. I'm not gonna say too fat, but he's too heavy, Right?
Brent Tucker
Right. Yeah.
Dale Comstock
I'm joking. But. So we had two helicopters. One pilot, two helicopters, two Pilots, right. For the four ships that were going to land, all total, we had 15 aircraft in the sort. We had four H6s, I believe, four H6s, Cobras, I think two or three black, Cox, CNC2 and Medevac all came up to about 15 in this flight. And so what was going to happen, we're going to come in, we're going to fly up really low on the deck and then we're going to land on the roof, the four helicopters two by two because we can only land two at a time and then deposit all the assaulters and then everybody else would go off and stand in orbit. Somewhere in the gunships were running gun running on the target. So that was kind of the basic idea. So yeah, we stripped the helicopters down, went with the bare minimum load the aircraft that night. And I got to tell you what an experience that was. So when we lifted off, it was a minute. I have to look at my notes, but I believe it was a minute and 34 second flight time from Howard Air Force Base.
Ryan Reynolds
Wow.
Dale Comstock
Across the bridge of America's through Ancon hill. And as soon as you come over Ancon hill, the saddle, you're looking right at the prison in the commandantia. All right. And what an experience that was, man. All blacked out, you know, it's like the boogeyman's coming in, man, just flying in there, you know, and just oh man, like getting excited, man. Like wait till we pop over this rise. Right? As soon as we did, we come over and we're probably 50ft off the deck. You know, that's we were flying pretty low and as fast as we could with the weight. And as soon as we came over the deck, the snipers started firing. You remember you've heard of Pat Hurley, right? Pat Hurley was just stacking these guys like firewood. And so.
Ryan Reynolds
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Brent Tucker
Thanks for giving Recky some recognition. Yes, those boys are out there in the woods for days.
Dale Comstock
No.
Brent Tucker
No one. No one hears about them.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, dude, they were out there. Yeah. D. There when he got. I. I was out there when he got hurt in Desert Storm, too. Yeah, Pat was a great, great dude, man. But all the snipers were out there. They were getting there. Right. And soon as we come over, gunfire starts, and it's just utter chaos, man. I mean, there were people scrambling everywhere on the deck, and there was gunfire. We were receiving. We're giving it. And their helicopter. We were probably flying maximum 40 knots, 45 knots, something like that. Maybe the reason why is because once we came across on the roof, we can just hit the brakes and set it down because of the weight. So what happened was the helicopters has come in pretty slow and then just sink it onto the roof because of the way. Right, okay. And so as we're coming in, I remember just, you know, I'm trying to target discriminate. We got people running everywhere, civilians, soldiers. And it's like, you know, you know, you're getting shot at. Like, who's shooting me now? You know? And who. Which one do I shoot? You know? And, oh, yeah, there's the target. And you're trying to focus on that. And there was a lot going on in that moment in time. Right. And so I remember we came in my. My helicopter was the first one because I'm the breacher, so I got to get off first, run around to the annex, start placing the charges, and then wait for everybody else to dismount and line up around this little. This little annex. And it was my team and golf team, which has already been stated. Right. So F. F and golf. So we had a total of about 10 guys. And we had. Major Harold, troop commander, was there also. Right. And so everybody's stacking up. I'm placing the charge. Raging gunfight. We have a blackout at the same time. So, you know, it's game on. We had two AC130s flying around in orbit around the comet. They're just pounding it, man, with 40 mic, 40 millimeter, and 103s. Just hammering it, man.
Brent Tucker
Just nothing but war going.
Dale Comstock
Oh, my God. You know, we're taking fire, giving fire. We had guards in the. In the. In the guard towers. We're engaging them, they're engaging us. Right. It was just chaos. And the other thing that we learned was, so the prisoners realized that we might be coming for Kurt Muse. So they actually got another 60 Panamanian Defense Force soldiers to reinforce them. So there was roughly 120 shooters okay. And they actually barricaded themselves on the ground floor because they thought there was going to be a ground assault. They thought we're coming crashing through the gates.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
So they're waiting for us on the ground. They didn't think that we might come in from the roof. Right. Yeah. So surprise, surprise. So as we're, as we're hovering, I remember looking down and I was looking kind of like at the street and on this far side of the street was a cemetery and had about a four foot high wall, something like that. And it was like I said, really intense. People freaking getting off the shooting everywhere. And I see this guy running across the street and he was surrounded with maybe four, maybe five women. Two of them were holding little kids and he had basically put himself in the middle of them and they were all moving in a little cluster across the street. I saw him, I saw he had the wet. He had an AK47s collapsible stock. He had it down here. He wasn't aiming, but he was carrying it in a high port area like this. And he, I still remember distinctly, he had a white guy, a bear on blue jeans, brown, some type of like brown boots, not tactical boost, but brown maybe. His guy was about 4 foot, 4 foot, not about 5 foot 4, something like that. Very short guy, kind of, kind of dumpy dude, right? Black curry. I still remember very clearly, man. And so he's not really an immediate threat. Even though his weapons up, he's not actually leveling the weapon. Weaponized. So he's moving over towards the entrance to the cemetery. And we're were coming to set down and I got my attentions kind of divided and I'm thinking man, this guy, I think he's going to go in there and he's probably going to button hook and come over that wall and start engaging. That's just my spider sensors were telling me I didn't shoot at him because there's a pretty good chance. If I had it through and through, all I could shoot was his head. If I would have had it through and through, I would have hit one of those women and kids for sure.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
He wasn't immediate threat. So I was like, yeah, just wait. Right. So sure enough, they go through the gate, they all the women, button hook to left and he button hooks to the right and he comes up over the wall. This time he's got the weapon mounted in his shoulder and he's ready to start getting it right. And so I was already waiting for him. And the cool thing was so what, we're flying. I had a. I always carried a car 15 with M2 or 3 grenade launcher. I had an 8.2 thousand at the time. Some of the first gen. I had gun lights on there. I had all kinds of bells and whistles on this freaking. This thing, man. It was. It was heavy, man, but it was my favorite gun. You know, I was good at it too. Um, I was really good at sensing and just dropping rounds. And so my. My. One of my teammates sitting next to me, he's got a. He's just got a slick car 15. He goes, hey, man. He goes, I'm gonna be in a support position on the roof. He goes, and you're going in. He goes, let me use your weapon. I said, yeah, it makes sense, right? So I give him my weapon, my. My. All my rounds and shit. And this is in flight now. Boy, we're having this conversation, right? Like a little late, but okay, you know, we'll get out, right? Give him all my stuff he takes. And I had no problem with that neither, as you know. Right. Because all the aiming, like aim points, for example, the acogs, there's. They're. They're all cited to the line of board, right? Not to the shooters. Right. So, right. As long as you put the dot on it, you're gonna hit it, right? So I had no problem with that. Some people that kind of. They don't understand that. So we switch weapons, actually shoot the dude with his weapon, and he actually blows the dude up in the tower with my weapon. My first kill with M203 was from him. Right. That's no fair.
Brent Tucker
Do you remember what the loom was that night was at least a low loom. Night was the. Was the moon out. Do you remember, by chance?
Dale Comstock
I don't remember, but it was pretty dark because once the blackout happened.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
All you saw was flashes of light. Right? There's a lot. And the other thing that happened, too, that. So I'm not sure if I'm kind of right now. I think it was a 193rd Infantry. I think that's who was down there in. In Panama. Well, we're talking about December 20th, so most of those guys went back to u. S. For Christmas vacation. Right. So who was left? You know, all the cooks and clerks and. And, you know, all the support personnel that didn't want to go home. Well, we needed them to drive the. The M113s, right. For blocking positions. Yeah. So guess who's driving the win? 113 is a man of 50 calibers. You know, Joe Snuffy, those S1 clerk, right?
Brent Tucker
They'll never forget that.
Dale Comstock
No. So they're all, they're all man in the guns. And they were not. They had to wait until we cleared the crest, then they could break gates. Because they were kind of off in a little military compound, kind of hidden. And so they broke gates. And then the problem was because all these civilians had come out to watch the Mardi Gras parade, right? They had all the cars. They were basically blocking access, right, for the blocking positions. So these guys were like, we got to get in. They were like literally driving over people's cars and stuff. You know, you can imagine what that probably ended up like. But they get in there and they really didn't have really good discipline with the weapons. So they're just kind of shooting at everything. It kind of flashes, even us, right? And you remember what a.50 caliber looks like when it's a tracer and it's coming at you. Looks like a flaming basketball, man. I was like, what the hell? And so, all right, they're doing their part, like I said, big gun fight PDF, shooting from all the high rise buildings because they got their weapons with them. So they're like literally shooting out of their bedroom at us, right? And it's a, it's a 360 degree range, two way range. We land, I get off, I run up to the door. And to my surprise, it's not just a steel door like the CIA said, it's a steel door and six inches in front of it is a jail door. Hardened jail door, right?
Brent Tucker
With bars.
Dale Comstock
With bars, right? And I go, oh, that's a, that's a problem. Okay. And so I'm gonna tell you right now, I'm the only guy that was at the door. There's other guys. I was there, but. No, you were. I was the only guy at that door. I'm just get that clear. For the record, I was a breacher. And so I'm looking at this thing. Oh, shit. They got it for the P factor. Because I'm gonna need a lot of ass to knock both these doors down, right? And so, so I, I stick the charge on there, get it prepped, right? And it's, it's loud, it's, you know, gunfire and flashes and explosion. I mean, you really lost a lot of your senses. You can't hear, you know, I'm listening to the radio, you know, I could hear the little birds landing. Did all them land yet or are we ready? I'm listening for the commander, for the countdown, you know. Yeah. I'm trying to take in a lot of information and I'm trying to watch the door because there might be a bad guy getting ready to open and shoot me in the face. Right, right. Because I'm already taking rounds from the tower over here, over the wall, right. So the thing being going over my head and so I get to charge on there.
Brent Tucker
And you put the charge behind the bars onto the actual door or just
Dale Comstock
slap right there on the, put it on the bars.
Brent Tucker
Yeah, you're right.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. I needed to push that front door through the back door, Right?
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
Now, good thing is, although we didn't have a lot of charge of surface contact.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
I had put enough explosives on this thing that it was not going to matter. Right. And, and it did work, by the way. So I get it all hooked up. I've got my fuse igniter on there dual primed and I had an 8 second fuse system on.8 seconds. Think about that for 8 seconds, right? And so, and I'm wearing the flight gloves and I pull the cotter pins out, the safeties, right? So back in the day, you know, you, we would actually tape them together, right. So you can pull two out at the same time. I actually learned to take it a step further because of what happened that night. After that, I started tying them together in a knot and then taping them and not using electrical tape, duct tape. Here's why. Because of the humidity, wearing flight gloves in my haste, right. I pull the safeties, the one lanyard, and guess what happened? The electrical tape came off and I didn't know that. And I ended up only pulling one cotter pin out, not two. So I still have a safety in one of the, one of the M60s and.
Brent Tucker
But it's dual, it's a, it's dual prime.
Dale Comstock
It's dual prime. Dual prime. But here's the mistake, okay? Now I'll, I'll own up to it. No, I have no problem with that. Right. Because if people can learn from it, then great. So. And not only that, the tail was too long. Now I didn't build the firing system. The rest of the team did. Right. I'm not blaming them. Ultimately I'm responsible for it. Right. But the tail was a little bit long, right. The, you know, the system we attached to the charge had a little bit too much slack. Think was a big deal. Turns out it was a big deal. So I'm sitting there, I got, you know, I'm waiting, waiting, waiting. Like hurry the hell Up. Where are you guys at? Line up. Give me the call. You know, I'm out here like, jesus Christ. I got little bugs flying by me, right? Zipping. And. And so I put both my fingers through the. The pull rings, right? You know, you're supposed to put one at a time. Pull and turn and pull, right? Turn a bowl, right? Well, I was like, I'm gonna take a shortcut because I got away with it before. I thought I'd get away with today. So I put my finger through both, and I'm. I get the countdown. I was like, okay, go. Time. And I pull in. I'm like, why? I pull the pins out. And I'm thinking, I. I pulled. It should be burning. And I'm starting to thinking, is it because I'm wearing gloves? It's too noisy. Maybe it is burning. I'm processing a lot of information real fast. Like, eight seconds. You got about four seconds. Now. Comp stock inside. Is it burning? It's not burning, right? And if. And so I'm like, it's got to be burning, right? I did procedure. I think I did everything right, except finger through two pull rings. So I drop it. I said, it's got to be burner, right? And so as I move away from the charge, because the tail was a little bit long, it caught my boot, and. And I barely had the charge on the bars. They were just. Just barely hanging on to it, right? Because of their bars. And as I'm moving, I can see this thing falling off the door behind me, like, literally right behind me. And I'm thinking timber trees falling over, right? And I run around the corner, and it's a small. It's a very small annex, maybe. Let's just say 10 by 10. Yeah. And the whole team's lined up over here. Major Harold's over there. He sees the charge fall. I turn around, I see it fall. It's almost laying directly in front of the whole assault team on the ground. If it would have went off, you know, it might have stunned everybody. I doubt anybody would have probably gotten seriously hurt. Maybe some wood. But I'm still in my head, counting 1,000, 2,000, 3,000. I'm looking at it, and I remember Major Harold yelling at my team leader, Steve Dawson. He's like, fix that. Say fax ad on the radio, right? And I still remember thinking, what is Steve going to do about this? It's my charge. He tells Steve, fix it, right? Like, you know, I'll go take care of this, right?
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
So after I got my countdown4005. Yeah, it's not going to go. I run back out there. I don't need any prompting or anything like that. I grab it again, I stick it back on the door and I'm like, all right, Comstock, buy the numbers. Do it again. And so I grabbed one of the pull rings this time, one at a time, and it's just not going. I don't know what's going on. I grabbed the second one, I pull it. You know how it feels, right? Ah, yeah, that's burning, right?
Brent Tucker
Nice clean pop.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, it's. That one's burning. Okay. And so again, in my haste, I was so excited that it's burning. Instead of me running around the safe side and jumping the stack, I exposed myself to the gunfire, right? I said, I don't care if I get shot at this point, just make that charge go off, please.
Brent Tucker
The charge goes off, I've done my job. Yeah, that's.
Dale Comstock
That's all I care about.
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Brent Tucker
Just let it go.
Dale Comstock
Boom, right? And so I run around the backside and jump to the back of the stack and the charge went off. And I got pictures of. Was such a clean breach, man. It took both doors out of the frame, launched them to the far side of the. Of the annex on the far wall. They slid down perf of the way. So we can run downstairs, like, perfectly lined up, right?
Brent Tucker
Yeah, that's. That's a great point. Just to. So people understand when you're breaching into a stairwell like that, even if it's a. It's. If it's a successful breach, if it tacos or goes down and wedges itself in the stairs, which can happen. And I've seen it happen.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
There's not. No one did anything wrong. That's just the game you're playing. And now you've breached the door, but you've created another obstacle. So just you. You hold your breath, hoping that it landed in a place that you can easily get down there and keep on moving.
Dale Comstock
That's exactly what happened. It was perfect, man. So I was redeemed, I guess, because of that. But so you know the. The point there, right? So I remember years later, many years later, when I was working for the other government agency, I'm actually teaching breaching to some guys, and they're like, hey, we heard that, you know, there was a Discovery Channel, whatever, what it was, right? So I didn't know, but my team had gone on Discovery or somewhere and they told the story about Modelo, but they came up with a goofy excuse for Right. It's like, no, that's not what happened. I'll remind you, I'm the breacher. I was there, but whatever. So. And I told them what happened. I said, listen, this is what happened. I told him the same story. And I said, as a consequence, I started tying the lanyards together on the cotter pins and taping with duct tape just so that when I pull those safeties one time, they both come out. And I reminded them to do one loop at a time. Even though it's an eight second system, you ain't got a lot of time. You're just going to have to have the discipline to do that. I actually recovered those M60s. Ten days later we went back and did a tour, which was funny, right? It's like, hey, we're going to go back and check it out now. Right? I found them. And sure enough, one of them had a cotter pin still stuck in it.
Brent Tucker
No way.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, I sure did. I was like, wow, that's. There it is. I didn't. I still didn't know what happened until I found that. Then I put it all together. But, yeah, so we go in and my team's first. We go to the, the third floor and we start clearing it. And then the other team goes past us, they go down to the second floor. Kurt Muse is. We didn't get really a lot of resistance because everybody was down on the first floor thinking, we're doing it, it's gonna be a ground assault. But we did have guys on the second floor that were armed and immediately just dropped their weapons and went to the prone. They're like, I don't want none of this. Right. And so nothing happened to him. We secured him with flex cuffs and said, don't move and you'll be okay. But the interrogator, when, when his door was breached to his room, he also had Reese's curtsy, his cell was with within that room. As soon as they breached that door, this guy grabs his handgun. He runs into a shower stall. It's not a big one. It's like, it's a small closet shower, right?
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
And he runs into it and he posts up in the shower like this with the weapon out. And James, you know, James has passed. Died a long time ago. Good man. But James saw him going in there and right on his heels, follows him into the bathroom, doesn't even hesitate. Guys stand like this and James shoots him four times in the chest and kills him. Guy never gets a shot off, right. And so I, I use that Example, when we talk about, you know, the tenets of combat speed, violence of action. Right. Surprise. All those things, you know, all those things were properly applied. The other problem was there's a thing called stress shock phenomena where the other guy didn't make up his mind what he's going to do. He didn't have the experience. He didn't have a plan, and that's why he hesitated. Cost him his life. Right, Right. And so. So James put him to bed. And then again, Pat Savage, he's the one that breached Muse's jail cell. And he told Muse, he goes, hey,
Brent Tucker
do you remember what he. What he breached it with? I think you already said during the. During the loadout, what you guys had.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, I think he had like a. A small, maybe a quarter pound C4, I think, some kind of padlock charge or something.
Brent Tucker
Okay.
Dale Comstock
It wasn't nothing massive. But he did tell Muse, hey, take this, lay on the floor, take this mattress and cover yourself up right in the corner over there. And that's what he did. They breached it. They had Kevlar for him. Helmet suited him up. And then at this point, you know, it's a raging gunfight going on all around there. And I remember we were stacked up in the stairs on the third floor. We had Kurt at the top. He's gonna be the first one that's going to be on the first hilo coming out, going in, coming out. And so I'm laying there, like, on this, on the flooring, it was kind of like a. It's hard to explain, but it's like a balcony kind of cage door. And so I'm like, well, while I'm waiting here for my. My ride, I just go ahead and start shooting fish in the barrel, right? So I'm laying on shooting freaking, you know, towers and dudes and stuff and, you know, back and forth, and I'm getting it. It's a lot of noise. And I hear the helicopters coming, and I hear them leaving, and I'm like, there's only supposed to be four. And I'm thinking, when are we going to go? And I thought for sure somebody would say, let's go, Comstock. So I kind of reached back with my left hand to feel my. One of my other teammates. And I'm not feeling nothing, right, because you can't see it. So dark and noisy, and. And I started sweeping my foot because I'm in a prone position, hoping that maybe I kick somebody ankle. And I realized there's nobody here but me. I realized I somehow they Stepped over me and left the house. He left me on the, on the third floor, right? And I'm laying there and then I hear the Panamanians PDF and whatever guards coming up the stairs. I could hear him talking in Spanish and I could hear him crunching like glass and whatever it was, right? I could hear them coming up. They were coming to the roof. Yeah. And I'm thinking, shit, I'm in here alone. And I'm thinking, I did hear helicopters leave. Hope I didn't miss, right? I'm on the four story building and there's no way out of here, right? And I run up them stairs, man, I run out the door and there's two helicopters and I. Oh, thank God, right? I run over to mine and I was on the third lift and somebody was sitting on my, you know, on the people pod on my, on my seat. And I remember, hey, we're like, that's my seat, you know, and, you know, it's like, what? You know, he realized he was on the wrong helicopter. He looks back, goes, oh, I'm supposed to be on that one. I'm like, yeah, get the hell out of here, right? He runs over to his helic and I jump on mine and buckle up and. And we fly away. But what happened was with the first helicopter when it left, so remember I said about, you know, exceeding the ACL aircraft load, right? The weights, what was the helicopters had to do? They couldn't just lift up and then fly away, like enormously. They had to kind of get off the ground just a little bit and kind of get a running start, right, to pick up some lift. So they take off, right? Well, helicopter number one had an extra body on board now, right? Kurt, Museum plus the four assaulters and all their kit. So he needed a little bit more lift. And so what he did was like got it up in the air a little bit on the roof and then dove off the roof in the front of the building. As he dove off to get some speed, he got lit up from the ground floor. It just, it just hammered him, right? And he did a right turn, he did some power lines, made left turn and crashed into the street sideways. Engine still running now, two guys on the starboard side were shot. One guy had it through and through, through femur, and the other guy got shot in the chest. And then when the helicopter crashed, James, again, the guy that shot the, the interrogator, I'm not, I don't want to use his last name just out of respect for his family, but he was, you Know how we always tied in, Right? So. Yeah. Well, when the helicopter hit, it bounced. And when it bounced, he came off the seat and swung underneath the skid, and the skid came back down on his foot and chopped his toes off, right? So he's laying there, you know, he's. He's pretty bad shape. The other two guys are shot up. They're laying on the other side of helicopters. And then my. My assistant team leader, Tom, he's. He. He gets out of the helicopter. Kurt Muse, you know, he hits the ground. He's a little stunned as well. Kurt Muse. He comes out, he. He's got armor on, and he looks around, and all the guys who just rescued him are down and out, right? Yeah, as far as he can tell. And so he reaches down and grabs. My assistant team leader is 19:11 out of his holster. He's gonna. He's gonna do it alone, right? I'm gonna fight, right? And when he. When he grabs it, he goes to stand up. My assistant team leader was. Comes, wakes up and sees what's starting to happen. He feels his guns coming out. And because the helicopter was sitting on the side and the rotors were still spinning, I mean, the engine was still on, right? So it's still spinning full speed. Kurt started to walk into the rotor blade, and Tom just jumped up and grabbed him and pulled him down. And when he did, he took the road strike to his own head and literally chopped his protect.
Brent Tucker
Just clean it.
Dale Comstock
Shaved it right off like a knife, right? Gave him a head injury, knocked him. Knocked him out. And luckily, the qrf, we had the blocking force. We had. We had some operators that were with the blocking forces, right? Kind of C2 command and control. Well, they got the word that precious cargo could crash location, so they started moving in that direction. I. We didn't know the helicopter crash. I was the third bird off the roof. Same thing. We were supposed to be the last helicopter to come back to Howard Air Force Base. As we're coming off the roof, I'm getting all kinds of incoming from.50 caliber tracers. Because the guys on ground, just lighting everything up, man. And I'm like, lifting my legs, like, Jesus Christ. We get to Howard Air Force Base, we're the only ones that make it back. Like, we're supposed to be last. We're first. And so they had the J. Mouse set up, right?
Ryan Reynolds
The medical.
Dale Comstock
Right team, all the surgeons, everybody standing, arms crossed, you know, they're waiting for us, you know, and they were nice and calm, and we land, and. And my team Leader tells us, stay on board. He goes, let me find out what's going on. He's over there. They're talking. He comes running back. He goes, okay. He goes, put a fresh magazine, and we're gonna go back in. PC got shot down. That's actually when I got scared. Oh, you know, now we're going back to the hornet's nest, right?
Brent Tucker
And now they're ready for us.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. I was like, I know. We just left. Now we're going back into it. Oh, man. My heart started beating then. You know, I'm jacking my stuff and checking. I was like, okay, here we go. And as the engine started spinning up, we started noticing the other birds coming in, right? And that's when we got the word that they recovered muse with an M113 and hauled him out of there. So, yeah, that was. That was that night. It took us six minutes to go in, shoot our way in, shoot our way out, and we didn't take. We had wounded, but we didn't have anybody killed. I think we had a total of 23 assaulters all together. We did lose a couple helicopters. We had. One of the. One of the Cobras got shot down into the commandant, but both pilots walked away from that one. They just walked out of there. Of course, then the other bird got shot down, the little bird. But, yeah, what a night, man. That was. That was crazy. So then we come back, and we were the only ones that went out. So we had SEAL Team 6 with us. You know, the. The Air Force guys, they're all kind of sitting on their bunks, and we walked in, we just. We just won the super bowl, that part of it, you know, and everybody's looking at. They're not going out the door yet. And I'm going to say something. This is going to probably irk some people, but. So we're like, okay, get some rest. We're not going to get much because it's going. Getting on out there, right? So we all go back to our cots, you know, and I actually wrote down what happened. Kept my own, Aaron, so I can remember the details. I still actually have it. And. And then we get. We get another mission. So there's another prison, and they're holding Americans hostage in this prison also. And this time, SEAL Team Six was up. Right. All right, boys, you're gonna go get them. And they're all excited. They're putting their stuff on, Right.
Brent Tucker
You know, we've set the standard.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. And. And then we're one for one. And then all Of a sudden, southcom commander goes, who's going? Those guys? No, they're not. He goes, I want the unit back in there. So we're like, hey, sorry guys, sit back down, write your books, your story for. What is that movie called Seals or whatever. Go do that. We'll take care of this one too. Right? So wow. Yeah, that actually happened. And then from there on it was, you know, we were, we were literally every day going out. We were like literally sleeping and living out of a helicopter. We would fly everywhere looking for Noriega.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
Until we finally hemmed them up in the commandantia. What an experience that was. I remember, I remember when he was in the Papa Nuncia, we had him surrounded. I remember standing on like this first or second floor car park, looking right into the Papa Nuncia. And Noriega's bodyguards would come out smoking a cigarette, you know, like, hey, how's it going? I'm like, hey, how's it going? Right. So it was one of those situations, right? Hey, cool, we're cool. It turns out years later I met one on business. I went back to Panama. What year was that? 22,000, don't quote me on. It's like 10, I think, on business. And I end up meeting the chief of national police who was actually one of those bodyguards smoking the cigarette.
Brent Tucker
Really?
Dale Comstock
And, and me and him are actually having lunch together. Haha. And ho ho. And about the whole times, like, yeah, you know, because I remembered him. He, he didn't really remember me. But we remember the incident, right?
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
And I remember at one point we were going to go into. We thought we had Noriega in a, like in a bungalow somewhere out in the middle of the jungle, right. So we, we come flying in hard and fast and low. And we dismount, we're running to the building. Well, he told me later on that day that he goes, yeah, he goes, I was in there. He goes, I had the entire house rigged with explosives and I was going to blow it on you guys as you ran through the doors. Right. But he actually, he lost his nerve. It just ran out the back and didn't pull the fuse igniter. Right. But we actually recovered a lot of money.
Ryan Reynolds
Right.
Dale Comstock
But Noriega wasn't there. But I'm laughing like, wow, man. So you were that guy. And turns out he's the chief of national police. And then one of Noriega's interpreters. I'm very good friends with him today. And he's actually not even Panamanian, he's Lebanese, but he Lives in Panama, speaks fluent Spanish, a lawyer, and really good guy, you know, and it's kind of interesting to go back after all those years and sit down with the opposition.
Brent Tucker
You know, Nora ended up holding up there because he was looking for either some sort of immunity. Yeah. While. While he was working out the. The details of that. And I believe you guys were playing rock music to keep him awake the whole time. Was that true?
Dale Comstock
Yeah, it actually was true. We had him surrounded. It's like right downtown Panama. Right. So you had all these high rises. We were in the high rises, you know, looking down. All the news agencies were in all the high rise. That was a funny experience too, because we got night vision goggles, scopes, and we're looking over, going, that's CNN having sex in the. Right. Just all kinds of weird stuff was happening. And while we're in this building and yeah, we were. They had the psyops. I can't remember which unit was. But Psyops was playing the music. Loud music.
Brent Tucker
Guns and Roses. Yeah, like that.
Dale Comstock
Exactly. Doing all the Psyop type stuff. I forget how long we were there. Not very long. Maybe course of three, four, five days, something like that. And then it all. It all ended. But yeah, it was crazy, man. The whole thing was just a crazy experience.
Brent Tucker
Well, I love the. The honest approach, which, which of course you say, well, I mean, why wouldn't I give an honest approach to it?
Dale Comstock
Well,
Brent Tucker
that story can just. Just as easily been told, you know, a little bit whitewashed. Yeah. And like, hey, yep, we went in there, we hit the target, we killed dudes, we got him. Yeah, yeah. Helicopter got hit. But we are, but we had a great plan in place for that and you know, and it was easy day.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
And. And all of that to some degree would. Would be true. But me and you both know nothing ever goes according to plan.
Dale Comstock
No.
Brent Tucker
And you guys rarely. Rarely, I shouldn't say it seems like the Maduro raid went to plan. But you know, what if I talk to those guys, something tells me something funny happened on that radio too, because nothing ever truly goes to plan. But it's. That's. That's why we're the best.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
You know, we, We. We can execute at a high level. We can plan at a high level for contingencies and other people can. Can do that, but at the rate.
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Brent Tucker
I got to get a recording sign out there.
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Brent Tucker
I said some.
Dale Comstock
But at the rate of. But at, but the level of guys operators.
Brent Tucker
But at the rate a tier one unit can process information, identify it and then execute those plans. Because even your contingency plans, there's so many variables in a contingency plan. Even if you were to plan four down helicopter, great. Where's. Where's the down helicopter going to crash at? You don't know. Yeah, you know, but for you guys to take all this information in and on the fly, accurately assess what's going on, come up with a quick plan and execute it. That. Yeah, that's a tier one unit. Yeah.
Dale Comstock
And it, it always boils down to, in our case, the operator. Right. So I don't think people don't appreciate, and I'm not trying to brag and say we're super special, but we are different. And I've, I've. Over the years I've been studying, you know, this phenomena because people always ask, you know, what allows a guy to become a Delta operator versus other guys that didn't. There were really good guys, really skilled, but didn't make it. What, what is the differentiator? You and I know that's a secret. We don't even know what it is. Right.
Brent Tucker
To some degree.
Dale Comstock
Right?
Brent Tucker
Yes and no. But I know, I know what you're saying.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. And so, you know, I haven't, I do know to some degree what the psychologists are looking for, but there's, it's more than just, it's more than willpower. Willpower doesn't get you through selection. What gets you through selection is imagination. The visualization, the end state. What do you.
Brent Tucker
I.
Dale Comstock
All I could dream and think about was being a Delta operator. It was crazy. Like I was so consumed with this idea of being a Delta operator. That's all I could think about. I mean, literally, I would get up in the morning and I'm just thinking about the mission. Right. In nine weeks, I'm gonna go do this. I see myself winning. I ate, slept, drank Delta Force. And my wife said hey, babe, let's go to bed and have sex. I'd be like, no, let's go to bed and talk about Delta Force. You know, I mean, I was just committed, man. It was like insanely committed. And that's what. That's what champions in the world, those at the top tier levels of everything they do, they get there not because of willpower. They get there because they see the outcome right now. This is the life I want to live. This is the person I want to be. And they see it and feel, experience it in the here and now. They literally. They literally tune themselves. They calibrate their entire nervous system and biology to that end. This is why great athletes become great, great athletes, because they train, train trading. They study and they see. They want to. Had that championship belt in their hand. And that was how it was for me. It's the mindset. And a lot of people have a positive mindset. But, you know, and I always quote this as well. So, you know, remember in the unit, if a guy quit, and a lot of times I like to try again now that I'm nice and comfortable, had some food, can I try selection again? The answer is always, you can have a change of mind, but you can't have a change of heart.
Brent Tucker
That's right.
Dale Comstock
Right. And I've actually had guys challenge me like, oh, that's not always true. No, that is always true. Right. Because there's a thing called mind. Mind, heart, coherence. And there's actually a proverb 23:7. I think it's 23:7. I'm trying to remember which one it was. But anyways, it says what's in a man's heart. So we think it. Right. So. And this is why in the unit, I think they always said, you know, you can have a change of mind, but you can't have a change of heart. Because we know that heart. Heart. It's not just. Heart is not just, you know, heart. Like, you know, willpower, hard is actually more than that. It's. It's. And so that's what most guys lack. They lack that determination, that sustained determination, right? To. To. To go at the extra mile no matter how bad it hurts. It's not just mindset. Willpower, because willpower wanes. There's, you know, a guy named Emil ku. In the mid-1700s, he coined the phrase Ku's Law. And Ku's Law states that when imagination and willpower and conflict, imagination always wins. That what that means is like, for example, and I've had examples of this like, you're a bad chain smoker, right? And everybody's like, hey, you need to stop smoking. You need to stop smoking. Yeah, yeah, you're right. Okay, I'm gonna stop smoking. Right? They never stop smoking. They try and they struggle. And then when they're back to smoking a pack of cigarettes, like, what happened? Ah, you know, I'll get to it next week.
Ryan Reynolds
Right.
Dale Comstock
But the person that goes, I can imagine never smoking again, smelling like an ashtray, tasting like an ashtray. I can imagine a healthy life without cigarettes. Those are the ones that are quit. And I'm, and I'm. The example I'm thinking of right now is my mother, my father. My dad was a chain smoker. He could not stop until he had two heart attacks. My mom's like, you know what? I don't like the smell anymore. Done. You know, and that was it. Just because she saw the end state, right? And that's anything you do in life. And Selection was no different. Did every operator go to Selection know that? No, but they did know. They did have a dream. They did have a vision. I'm sure you did. You're like, you know, you didn't go there to waste your time. You had a mission of being a Delta operator. Absolutely. And so that you saw the end state, right? I always did. I saw myself, even though I couldn't really grow a big bushy mustache at the time. I saw the bushy mustache, I saw the pager, I saw the long hair. I saw the cool guy, Jason Bourne stuff, you know, and, and I wanted that. And that got me. That's what got me over the finish line. Not because I'm special, not because I'm bigger, better, bad, or stronger. It's because I have a. I had the vision of where I wanted to go.
Brent Tucker
Yeah, I, obviously, we're cut from the same cloth. We did the same job. So there's going to be a lot of similarities between us and there will be a lot of similarities from OTC1 to whatever number they're. They're on now. You know, I had a burn the ship mentality. You know, some people ask me, you know, what. What were you going to do if you didn't make Delta Force? I said, I don't know. There was, that wasn't a. It wasn't a possibility to me. There was no why. Why spend a second thinking about another option when every second, every piece of energy was. Can only go to making this. And I almost hate to give this information out. Not this information, this advice out to Young men, because there's so many variables and you can have that mentality and still not make it. And you probably should have had a backup plan. Yeah, but if you have a backup plan, you kind of have no. No business being there because you're not. You're not fully committed because it's kind of a, you know, dang if you do, dang if you don't. And. But I only. I only know from my experience and. And other. Other men like me. And that is what you have to have.
Dale Comstock
I got a great story.
Brent Tucker
The chips fall where the chips fall.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. I want to expand on what I just said because. Yeah, you just made a really good point. So remember I said I had nine weeks to prep, and I'm training like a madman every day. Best shape of my life. Yeah. Two weeks prior to departure selection, guess what happens? I get a letter being. Saying I'm being PCs. Permanent change of station at Fort Polk, Louisiana. Grab your family, grab your stuff and move out. Right. And I'm like, oh, no way. Right. Two weeks out, and they want me to, you know, clear post all the things you got to do. I had a little house, right. Yeah. I got up in my family.
Brent Tucker
I gotta.
Dale Comstock
That's a lot of stuff. And I was like, there's no way I'm gonna be able to train and do all this stuff.
Brent Tucker
Right?
Dale Comstock
And so I thought about. I was like, you know, what if I miss movement to Fort Polk? I'm going to Charlie's Chicken Farm. I'm gonna spend some time in the pen and be demoted to something if not booted out. And I thought, you know, it's gonna be bad for my family and every. All the way around. And I thought about it. I was like, you know, how bad you want it?
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
I said, man, I. I thought, you know what? I got that much of a chance of making it anyways. You know, I'm the. I'm the dark horse, man. There's no way I should win, Right? No way.
Brent Tucker
And so the odds are not in your favor.
Dale Comstock
But I felt my heart. I said, you know what? Go for it. And so I. I just threw caution to win. And I said, I'm just gonna go for broke and how it plays out. How it plays out. Yeah. So I didn't do anything to prepare to move or the consequences go with it.
Brent Tucker
I love that.
Dale Comstock
Nothing, man. Zero, zero. Prep for. For failure. Right?
Brent Tucker
The ships.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, exactly. That's exactly right. That's exactly what it is. So I. And you. You were right when you said, if I Had a plan B. I might not be as motivated to execute plan A.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
But now, like I am, I'm like, you have only one plan, and it's either you either win or it's going to be really bad. And so being bad was not the option. Winning was it. That was all it was.
Brent Tucker
And you know, the, the fuel I had, I, I don't think I've ever talked about this, but you dig and you find any, any fuel, any motivation, you, you walk that many miles in that many days, you will accumulate injuries, you will accumulate pain.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Your, your muscles just don't want to move anymore. And, you know, the self, pride, whatever, whatever fuel you put up there first will run out.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Then you got to start looking for. For more. Yeah, I walked out of, out of pride. Sure. I'm a prideful person. I thought I belonged here. And that fuel ran out eventually. And then I walked out of hate. I hated our country's enemy. And I'll walk as far as I can to, to go after them at the highest levels. And at some point, you can't move anymore off of that. I moved out of frustration, out of people who said that I couldn't do this. I, I found everything I could to motivate me to put one more step in front of the other. And it's just, it's just more fuel for the tank.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. You know, I have two anecdotal things I share with you. So one of the guys that was. That went through OTC with me now, he did go through OTC with me originally. Later. I mean, sorry, but originally when he went through selection, he actually, he basically broke both tibias and didn't tell anybody. I mentioned his name earlier to you, but didn't tell anybody. He actually duct taped himself together, made it through selection. Right. And then he revealed the injury when he was done, and he said, hey, medic, by the way, can you take a look at the wheels? And they're like, you got two broken shins. Right. And. And so he, he made it through the board and everything. You know, hobbling around and. And I remember there's like, you know, that's the guy we're looking for. You know, guy. Guy completes the course with two broken legs. Doesn't say a damn thing, just gets done. So they actually sent him to.
Brent Tucker
Because he burned the ships. He didn't have anywhere else to go back to. So you had to go forward.
Dale Comstock
No, he ended up going to San Antonio to see a veterinarian that specializes in racehorse mending. Their legs or whatever. And he got some rods, put it in. A year later, he was going through, through select or through OTC with me. I, I have a similar story to you. I won't mention the day because I don't want to get mad, get in trouble for, you know, breaking offsec. But there was one particular day, like, very close to the very end.
Brent Tucker
I'm sure it has a nickname I'll recognize after the show. Yeah.
Dale Comstock
And so I'm standing and so it was raining. It was a year of the 100 year floods. Right. Everything was underwater and. And I'm standing. That's the second to last day. I'll just put that way.
Brent Tucker
Yep.
Dale Comstock
And I still don't know how far I got to go. How many more days. I have no idea. I just know it's this particular day because when I look back and I'm standing in a farm field up to my knees in mud, and it's just poor rain and I. I can't see ahead of me. It's foggy. I know that somewhere in the fog is a hilltop. That's where my next rendezvous points. I got this thing that looks like toilet paper because it's soaking wet now and I can't. And it's falling apart. I'm trying to, you know, orient it, and I'm. And I'm sitting and I couldn't move my legs. I was so tired, so worn out that I stood there and I started crying. I ain't gonna lie. I had tears coming out of my eyes like, you know, why are you doing this? You know, I'm question myself now. What are you. Why are you doing this?
Ryan Reynolds
Right?
Dale Comstock
And I feel I had that dream
Brent Tucker
slip through your fingers.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. I had that little moment, you know. You know, that little pity party for myself, you know, a little feminine side came out for a second, you know, and then I thought, you know, Comstock, nobody's coming to get you because it's too foggy for the Sarbir to fly. I've done the SAR missions. They're not coming. 2. You can't even see the damn road. They can't see me out. They don't even know where I am, so they don't even know where to start looking for me. So I said, I'm going to be standing out here in the mud getting silk and wet until I get out of here on my own. And so I said, okay, I'm, you know, I'm going to get out of here. I'm going to go to top of that hill. Wherever it is in the, in the, in the clouds, in the fog. When I get there, I'm going to quit, right? I'm a Victor. Whiskey, volunteer withdrawal. And so like, okay, let's go. One leg at a time. It was, it took a long time, but I finally got out and I got to the base of hill. I'm working my way up, I'm getting to the top, and there it is. There's a cadre like, oh, I made it. And I'm starting to go, sergeant, I'd like to voluntary withdrawal. And I'm like, wait, wait, wait, wait. You're on the top of the hill. You can just roll back down the goddamn hill. You know how this equate yet, right? And I was like, okay. And so I got my shit together, right? I was like, hey, you know, give him who I was and next RV is here, blah, blah, go do your thing. And off I marched. Yeah, but I was that close to quitting. And the only reason I guess I didn't quit is because nobody's coming. Nobody's coming to get you out. You know, nobody's gonna pick me up and carry me out, you know? Yeah, I had to get out of my power. And. And soon as I got a little power back, you know, the power came, you know, the passion again. And the dream came back. The imagination popped back up on the screens. I'm like, okay, we're good, drive on.
Brent Tucker
It's the highs and lows. You got to deal. You got to deal with the highs and the lows. Yeah. You know, you told me that story about that guy who, who broke essentially both his legs and finished it. And it reminds me of the story that I told you when, when you guys got back from that operation successfully, the President was, was being briefed on what you guys did. George Bush. And to the guy, after he got done briefing him, telling the details of, of the mission, the highs and the lows, he just simply looks at the man and he goes, where. Where do we get guys like this? Where do we even get guys like this? He's so in awe of what you guys did. The guy who walked on two broken legs and still moved out, where do we get guys like this? Well, we get it from the greatest country in the world, the United States of America.
Dale Comstock
That's right.
Brent Tucker
That's where we get it. And even though the, the, the pool is, is getting a little more shallow, the Maduro raid just proved those men are still out there. And those men, I do believe those men will always. They will. They will always exist. There will always be a percentage of the population of men like me and you who are still raising kids and will hold that line. I just, I just hope it's enough to, to, to weather this, this storm. But that's, that's where they make men like this right here.
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Dale Comstock
Yeah, it's. Yeah. I hope you're right, man. There will always be men like that, you know, not many, but there will be.
Brent Tucker
Right.
Dale Comstock
And culture has a lot to do with it, you know, and we've, we've arrived at a culture that has just. They would call you and me toxic masculinity, right? But we're not toxic. We're just, we embody what men are supposed to be. We are the consummate warriors. Don't mean we're better than anybody. It's just that we think differently and we're, we're inspired and motivated by patriotism, by honor, by integrity, by the love for our family, our fellow, or, you know, our fellow Americans, our country. Those are the things that drive us. That's how I was raised. Just by being in the military culture with my family growing up, that was just embedded, right. In my own family culture. I'm sure it's the same with you. And we have to be careful that we don't allow that to be eroded by other forces, even from within. Because once we lose, you know, the warriors that we need, we're done. And that's why I started out when I said, you know, not every man can be a soldier, but every man should be a warrior, you know, and that's why the Japanese, you know, remember, they said, oh, I'm not going in there, because behind everybody, blade of grasses to do with a gun. Right, Right. They feared us, right? Now they're laughing at us, you know. Yeah. Where do we go? Right.
Brent Tucker
Just dovetail on, on what you said. You know, there's, you know, they call us Toxic masculinity. And you're right, I push back. There's actually nothing toxic about us. And it's. We're the ones who are willing to protect the innocent. We're the ones who are willing to stand up, raise our hands, and protect the weak. They don't always like us. Because we're also willing to make a hard decision that doesn't make everybody happy, but we know for the good of everyone and for this country, those are the type of decisions that have to be made. You can't make decisions that make everyone happy.
Dale Comstock
That's right.
Brent Tucker
But you have to be man enough to say, but I'm willing to make the hard decision to say, this is what right is. And I'm sorry if you don't want to hear it, but this is what it takes to maintain the greatest nation in the world. When. And part of that, you talk about culture. You wrote two books. I do. I love it when people write books. I know some people laugh at that because of some of the veteran books I've called out, but I don't do that because I don't want people to write books. I love it when veterans write books the right way, because those are the books young men need to read to find out the truth, who you are, what made you, what you know to learn from your insights and your lessons learned. So I love that you wrote books. Tell me about your books real quick.
Dale Comstock
Yeah, yeah. So the first one, American Badass, I actually wrote that in 2011. And here's the thing, right? Do I think I'm a badass? No, actually not. Here's what happened. So. So I was on the set called Stars and Stripes with Chris Kyle, Terry Crews. Right. All right. So I didn't. I never met Chris Kyle before. I didn't even know he wrote the book American Sniper. We're sitting on the set, and at this point, I've already been basically embraced by a production company out of Dallas. Conservative guys. They wanted me to be the poster boy for this production company. And so I'm. I'm on the set with Chris, and we're talking. I see his book, man, I didn't know you wrote a book. He goes, yeah, I wrote, you know. Well, I kind of wrote it. Had a ghostwriter, but I said, that's pretty cool, man. He goes, I want to. He goes, but I want to read your book, grow up and be like you. Right? Because he was a lot younger than me at the time. And I'm like, I don't have a book right So I got to turn around, call my management team, go, hey, I got to write a book. I said, but I said, I don't want to write a book that's all about me. I want to write a book. It's about everybody else. And what I mean meant by that particularly, this is why I wrote that. That book is to inspire and motivate young men, right? Because even back then I saw where this was going, right? And I said, they need, I think younger American men need role models, right? And so, so if you read my book, it's, it's an autobiography, but it talks. And again, it's very, I, I talk about a lot of things I haven't, I'm not worried about embarrassing myself or anything like that. It's all in there. So that's why I came out with the book. It's actually an autobiography. Now why did I call it American Badass? Because at the beginning of the show Stars and Stripes, there was an impromptu filming where we all met the, the celebrities. And there was gonna be a one time take only. And they want to capture the surprise look on everybody's face type thing. And Samantha Harris, she was the host for Dancing with the Stars along with General Wesley Clark. He was also the co, the, the host. They were doing the introductions and, and then they asked each person, you know, to basically like, Chris Kyle, okay? You know, American Sniper, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you know, and then Chris Kyle would introduce. I'm Chris Kyle, Navy, you know, sniper, blah, blah, blah, seal. And then it came down to me and I'm sitting like, what am I going to say? Right? And so I said, okay, retired Master Dale Comstock, United States army, the Delta Force.
Brent Tucker
Right, right.
Dale Comstock
And then everybody, oh, American Badass, right? And that, that became the moniker American Badass. Right? So I didn't make it up. They just started making it up. Right. But I'd also been compromised at this point because Samantha Harris said something really crazy, man. She also introduced me as, I probably shouldn't even say this, this is what she said. I didn't say. She said, okay, former CIA, del, Delta Force, blah, blah, blah, del Comps. I go, oh, okay, well that, so that part of my life's now over, whatever that part would have been. But, but so that's, so that book was written, inspired men. It's my life story. It's a lot of humor in there. There's a lot of, you know, I, I, I laugh at myself. I don't have a problem with that because that's what matters is you know, we're not superhuman. We're humans, and we make mistakes. We're. We're fallible, we're vulnerable. But in spite of all those things, we're still warriors. We're still focused. And, you know, and. And we drive on no matter how we feel. Right. Feelings. There's no place for it. The second book, Running the Razor's Edge, I just published that a year ago based on two events. Not a true story, so that's actually more about leadership, but it relates to some mercenary work I was doing. Now, I know that's kind of a bad word, but it's not. Can you call me a privateer? You can call me a contractor. It just depends on who you're working for. But this was about some stuff that I was doing, like, as a legitimate mercenary. And it talks about some of the activities and actions I was involved in. But more importantly, what I wanted to talk about in there is what goes through your mind when you're with a small team, a small, you know, strike team of maybe 10 or 11 guys, you know, in a dangerous country, and you're hiding behind hescoes and sandbags because nobody needs to know you're there. And every day you're, like, literally feet away from terrorists. Al Qaeda, like, literally. I mean, at gunpoint. Right. So. And what mattered. What mattered to me was, okay, like I said in the beginning, I don't really care about talking all the gunfights and stuff like that. I think people have heard enough of that crap. What's important to me is on the personal, professional level, the interaction between the team members, the leadership. Right. Things like that. And I thought that was. I thought there was something. A takeaway there for people at any level, whether it's corporate, military, family, to understand the. Some leadership dynamics.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
And they don't always jump out at you with, you know, certain labels and stuff like that, but being able to understand and one of the leadership principles. I'm sure you can appreciate this. You probably have said it a thousand times, as I have. Lead by example, right? Lead by example. To me, that. That kind of encompasses everything, Right. When it comes to leadership. Lead by example. And there's a. There's a case in the book where I talk about the leadership. Two guys sunbathing, telling everybody, go fetch them coffee, grown men. Right. We're not in the military. And they had hired me, paid me a lot of money to be an advisor to them. And I'm. And basically one day I'm just, you know, I'm listening to everybody was listening, they were following me and they were griping. So I walked over and I said, listen, guys, pay me a lot of money to give you some advice. So I'm going to do my job right now. And they both pop up like, huh? I go, here's some advice. Lead by example, right? And I said, I said, lead by example. I said. And I laid it out to him. I said, listen, man, treat guys like in this camp. You tell them to go fetch your coffee, kiss their ass. You're hiding pokey bait, you know? I said, none of that shit's gonna matter once we get out in the field and we get in a, in a tick. It's a decisive engagement. Your bottom line.
Mint Mobile Announcer
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
Ain't gonna matter. And how you treated them is going to matter. And that's gonna, and they're going to decide what's your priority of getting you out of the target if you're wounded compared to this guy over here. Right. And actually one of them had the balls. I'm not going to mention names right now. That will be another podcast when I get deep into it. But he had the ball saying, oh, it's. Well, this is a business and you just don't get it, do you? And I'll say this, he was a seal. I love seals. I got good seal friends. They're all bad, you know, but I just had to throw that in there. Of course.
Brent Tucker
Well, where can they get the books?
Dale Comstock
They're all on Amazon. I publish Self help. Publish everything on Amazon. You can go to my website. Should be pretty easy to remember. Dale Comstock, American badass dot com. There's more information there.
Brent Tucker
We'll put the link in the description of the video. Yeah. And the, and the links to the books are at your website?
Dale Comstock
Yes, sir.
Brent Tucker
Okay, we'll, we'll, we'll push them there.
Dale Comstock
Yep. Thank you.
Brent Tucker
I.
Dale Comstock
Any.
Brent Tucker
I got one last question for you. But before we do that in Anything else, anything else you want, you want to talk about? About what, what you're doing. Right. Your Instagram.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
Thanks for giving me the opportunity. So I'm involved in a lot of stuff. I live in multiple countries. I don't talk about all of them, but most people know I live in Bali. I also live in the country of Florida and so City beach and. But I, I have a couple businesses, brick and mortar companies, businesses in, in Indonesia actually. My wife has them. They're all in her name. But so I, I live, I spend quite a bit of time over there. I do a lot of. I don't do anything in particular. In other words, I don't run the bar. I don't run a security company. Like I said, my wife runs all that. I do specialized work. When people call and go, hey, I got a problem, My daughter's missing this country, can you go get her back? I'll pay you money, whatever, some stuff like that. Right. And I do still do that. I do a lot of performance coaching. I've been doing that for eight years now. I've got over 400 clients. In fact, here's one of them right there. And, and what I try to do is teach people how to think and not what to think. Right. So that's exactly, that's what I focus on. And I go into a lot of areas, but most important part is I teach autogenic conditioning, self hypnosis, neuro, linguistic programming. I teach people how to program the subconscious for performance. The thing that gets you through selection. That's the process. So those are the main things I do. I'm also involved in stem cell therapy. I work with a group providing stem cells. Trt. I know you mentioned that as well. So like I said, I wear a lot of hats. Right?
Brent Tucker
Yeah, I don't, I don't think you understand what retirement is, do you? Sorry, I don't think you understand what retirement is. Do you?
Dale Comstock
Oh, no, that's. No, hell no. No. I'm 63 years old. I'm just getting started. I love it. Yeah, I love it.
Brent Tucker
If I. You, you keep moving, you can, you can, you can keep death at waiting for a little longer.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. Well, you know, if, you know right now, one of the cool things about AI, it's just a tool. But between AI, the advancement of AI and medicine, the prediction is now that it's very possible, especially if you're still alive in the next four to five years, that you can live to be 150 years old.
Brent Tucker
Wow.
Dale Comstock
And that's because now we're actually able to, we understand, we're starting to understand how to increase telomeres. We're also, I mean, even cloning body parts. So that's a. It's very likely that that's going to happen. And I mean, some people have gone so far to say you could potentially live forever. Just go back into the hospital, go, hey, I need to replace the old ticker. Can I put a new one in? Faster one maybe, you know, and you go get replacement parts. Is that feasible? Absolutely, I think it is. But I think for sure what's going to Happen is circa 2050, 2060. Microsoft's already doing this. But being able to download and upload your consciousness into like, for example, DNA, right? We already know that your DNA holds your entire lineage of your family first. First person is already stored in there. Microsoft is already working with it. Now we're also talking about transhumanism, implanting chips, which I don't agree with. But imagine this if you could upload your mind into a hard drive, okay? And now with robotics becoming the way they are, they're almost like androids. They're like super human. Like, yeah, Imagine now you're programmed into an Android, a robot, and you're living within a robot. Now I know what everybody's gonna say. I don't want to be a robot because I want to feel the human touch. But you know what? The only thing that feels pain and pain, pain and pleasure and all those types of things is the mind, the brain, the body doesn't feel it. So you could potentially program the robot to have the same sensations, feelings as the human body, because everything's energy, frequency, vibration. I say that all the time, right?
Brent Tucker
If for anyone who says, like, that might be crazy, this is my challenge to them. Look what we've done in the last 50 years. If you go back 50 years and you tell everyone what we're doing right now, they'd look at you like you were crazy. Like, there's, we can't, we can't get there. There's no way. Like, it would blow their minds.
Dale Comstock
You know what? Here's a great story that happened this morning. My friends were with me. We stopped at a gas station on the way here. There was about six or eight very elderly people at McDonald's. We did go to McDonald's and forage. We were desperate. All right, so we're ordering. They're up there ordering. And, and they're pretty, they're looking pretty old, right? And the oldest guy walks away, stops in front of my friends, extends his hands out, and he makes a comment about something. And so we, we started a discussion with the guy. This is the crazy part. The guy was 103 years old. He's about to be 104. He's a World War II veteran, fought at Normandy and at the Battle of the Bulge. American. And his, his brother in law, because he married the other Guy's sister, was 95, was also over there, right? And it's like, this is amazing. They're all like in their 90s and hundreds. Yeah, right. And they're talking about World War II, right? And being there, participating in it, I thought, wow. And as my friends comment, it's like, man, that's just, you know, that is a great opportunity. You know, we're fortunate we get to speak to this man, because there's not many of them left. And I asked him earlier. I said. I said. So I said, you were born roughly, what, 1930? He goes, yeah, 1931. Right? I go, you've seen a lot between then and now. He goes, yep. He goes, I remember when the first biplane flew over my house. Everybody ran out like it was the spaceship, like, oh, my God, you know. And he goes, now, you know, spacecraft and all this stuff's going on. I said, let me ask you something. I said, what phase of your life did you like the most? And he goes, the early days. He goes, people. He goes, he was a farmer. He goes, if I had a problem with my farm, all my neighbors would come over and help me. If I was sick and couldn't farm, my farmer friends would come over and farm for me, Right? Yeah. He goes, people were actually there helping each other. They were Americans, right? And doing those things. And I thought, man, what. What a great way to start the day with what he just said. It was just really awe inspiring, man. I'm like, wow. And he's 104, and he's actually very lucid. They all were very lucid, you know.
Brent Tucker
Tell me you got his contact information.
Dale Comstock
No, we did not. I wish we did. We probably should have, but, you know, we don't want to bother the guys. But the whole family was really nice. Yeah, they were all old. They were all in their 90s.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
You know, that's crazy. And I'm like, wow, that's. And I was told them, guys, you know, here's the irony. I keep looking over at my friends here because they're visiting. One of them is Irish, but. And the other one's German. They both live in Germany. They're friends of mine, and I'm German. And I thought, how ironic, right? My German friends come over here, meet a World War II veteran that fought. I said, you know.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
That's crazy, right?
Brent Tucker
For sure. Yeah. Well, I got one last question for you. We always end things. Tell me a funny story.
Dale Comstock
Oh, my God. So I'm going through the Q course, right? So here's what happened. I'm in the unit. They go, comstock, you get to go to Q course, right? Six months. So I leave, and soon as I start the Q course, I'm going through the Bravo course. The weapons, light and heavy weapons. Right. And I'm in phase one still and my wife decides to leave me. Not this one, she's the good one, but. But yeah, the other ones, all the exes, right, whatever. They can't hang with me. They're weak. So anyways, so I find it. So I'm coming home every night. I got two kids, little kids, and she's got to go do something with Mary Kay or this or that, right? And then turns out she had a boyfriend, right? A doctor at the dental clinic on for Bragg that she worked with, right? He was banging her. So I'm gonna say it, I don't care. And so then she sprung it on me. I want a divorce.
Ryan Reynolds
Holy.
Dale Comstock
And then she left me and took my daughter, but left me with my four year old son. As I'm going through the Q course, my crap, right? So you don't want to fail, right? Once a lifetime opportunity. But I don't want to abandon my kids. I'm trying, I'm trying to juggle, right? So I'm getting up every morning at 4:30 to go to the Q course. And you're going to be there all day, right? Doing weapons stuff and other army stuff. And then I got to come home, I had to drop my son off in the morning with my neighbor, thank God, she, you know, helped babysit for me. They were good friends of mine, so she took care of them and I pick them up in the evening. And now I gotta do what? I gotta feed them, bathe them, right? Prep for the next day. I gotta probably study, right? Do it again and do it again, do it again. And I had lost like 17 pounds in like two weeks, right? I lost a lot of weight because I'm just going a thousand miles an hour. I'm not eating right. I'm just trying to hang on and maintain, you know. And, and I remember so in the Q course you have to do the 12 mile road march, right? And actually they build up to it. Sometimes you do a three mile or four mile, six, eight, whatever to get 12 mile for time. And which I never had a problem with that. But during the Q course when I went through that road march was on a tank, tank trail road or no tank trap road. It was just white beach sand like that thick in the woods, right? And it might as well been on the beach. That's where it's going to be, 12 miles. And so I'm pretty, I'm pretty strong out. And so my sergeant major at the time, his name was Alfonso, pretty cool sergeant major. He was the school sergeant major. I said, joe, I said, listen, man, I said, this is what I got going on, you know? If you see me doing weird, that's why I'm doing it. He goes, yeah, no problem, man. You know, you could be good. And then he tells me, he goes, listen, man, he goes, we got this 12 miler coming up. I know you're not ready for it, you know, your head's in another place, blah, blah, blah. He goes, don't worry about it. You know, you can do it some other time. You know, that type of thing. I was like, okay, cool. So I go home this. That night, and I get in a fight with the wife again. It's already over. I don't even know why I'm going home. Probably because I had nowhere else to go. She was at the house. And we get into it again. This time I walk out and I go around the corner. There's like a little bar there, pizza bar, the pool tables. And I'm gonna go over there and soak my tears and drink and, you know, whatever. And I'm sitting there and I'm getting drunk, and I look over the bar and there's a sergeant major. He told me, do take your personal business, right? But I'm over here drinking and boozing up, right? And they're getting ready to do a road march tonight, right?
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
And so my conscience got the better of me, right? Even though I wasn't taking advantage of him. Just had a big blowout, right? And I'm just sitting here drinking. And now he sees me now. Now I'm thinking, he must think that I'm a bullshitter, right? And I'm lying, right? And I'm like, hey, okay, sergeant Major. And I'm like, I gotta go. I gotta do the road march. I gotta save face, right?
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
So I'm drunk. I ain't gonna lie. I'm drunk. And I had all my. In the car rucksack and everything. And I go out there drunk, throw my kid on, and I do that 12 miler. Let me tell you, that was the longest 12 mile I've ever done my life. And it was, if you can imagine, it was just really dark. And if you. If you imagine why, walking down a tank, the. The road, it's all white sand. Then you got the tree line, it's really dark. And you got a little bit of blue, or not blue, but a light gray with the skyline. So it looked like for 12 miles I was walking through a tunnel, right? With a white trail. Yep. And I was the last guy to make it across the finish line, like, barely, like 10 seconds, 9 seconds, 8 seconds. I've never nicked it that close, man. And I thought, holy, did I just do that? I'm drunk and I just did a 12 miler. These conditions, you. But, yeah, so again, you know, it was my conscious, like, yeah, he saw me, man. You know, I can't justify this.
Brent Tucker
You know, that was the right call. It was. It was unfortunate incident, but it was the right call.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
That story reminded me of being on that same tank trail. I know exactly what you're talking about. Right. Know exactly what you're talking about. We're doing a. We're doing a ruck march during the Q course there. And this black in the morning, though, like 6:00am, 7:00am something like that. This black Suburban, I'm like, first, second, third, the top of the ruck, and this black Suburban pulls up right next to me. Window rolls down, guy in civilian clothes, baseball hat, big old scraggly beard and a box of Dunkin Donuts and goes, you want one? And I was like, no, thank you, sir. Sergeant. Sergeant, sir. He's like, I'm thinking, what is this? They're always messing with you. I was like, but this doesn't seem right. And. But I can't take the chance. And even he got a sense about it. He goes, I'm not messing with you, man. If I was you, I'd take a donut. And I'm like, no, no, thank you. He goes, all right, suit yourself. Speeds off, right? Get back from the. What? The. The finish point was up there. I got the finish point. And the Cadger goes, hey, did you take one of those donuts from the Delta Force guys? I said, no, I did. He goes, you should have.
Dale Comstock
I would have. Oh, man.
Brent Tucker
And that was actually my first interaction with the Delta Force. I have no idea who those guys were.
Dale Comstock
You know, the first time I saw a Delta operator, I didn't even know who they were. I was in the infantry, in the field on Fort Bragg. Cold morning, doing stand to zero 500, right, waiting for the notional enemy to attack. I'm laying there freezing with the guy next to me. And in the middle of nowhere, like 10 miles out in the woods in Fort Bragg, this dude's running through the woods with blue jeans on, jungle boots, a flannel shirt and a jungle ruck and long black hair. And he's. And I'm like, who the hell would be out here this time in the morning in the woods, this far from civilization, dressed like that. Doing that. I'm sitting there shivering, going, you know, and my buddy goes like. The guy could hear like, shh. My wood. It's that Delta Force. What?
Ryan Reynolds
Who?
Dale Comstock
Right? And yeah, explain. Try to explain to me. I'm like, what the hell? Who are these guys? That's my. That was my first introduction.
Brent Tucker
Yeah.
Dale Comstock
Yeah. That was pretty impressed. So I was like, damn, that dude got up pretty early this morning to do this, you know, And I'm out here, yeah. Sucking, man. I'm hating this.
Brent Tucker
And. And who would have known you. You didn't end up being one of those.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Life. Life is funny. Life is funny. But fortune favors the bold. And that's. And that's what you were.
Dale Comstock
Yeah.
Brent Tucker
Dale, I can't thank you enough for coming the show. Like I said, it's. It's always special when another Delta Force operator comes on the show. I love it both on the show and when we get to hang out after with this. And we have a live coming up, so we'll get ready for that. Thank you so much for coming.
Dale Comstock
Thanks for having me.
Brent Tucker
Absolutely. Thanks, brother.
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Podcast: Tier1 Podcast
Host: Brent Tucker
Guest: Dale Comstock (Former Delta Force, 82nd Airborne, 3rd Special Forces Group, OGA contractor, author, entrepreneur)
Date: August 3, 2026
In this gripping episode, Brent Tucker welcomes legendary operator Dale Comstock for an unfiltered, in-depth conversation covering his storied military journey, life lessons in leadership and masculinity, the reality behind special operations selection, the renowned Operation Acid Gambit in Panama, and hard-won wisdom on culture, change, and true warrior ethos. Rich in personal stories, candid opinions, and actionable insight, this episode serves both as an oral history and motivational guide for aspiring warriors and everyday listeners alike.
“If I'm going to stay in, I'm going to go for the gusto, right? ... So I'm not going to, you know, go Ranger School, Green Beret. I'm just going to go to the top.” — Dale Comstock [04:10]
“Just because you got a letter doesn’t mean they even wanted you; you just met a minimum requirement...” — Brent Tucker [09:03]
"My dad taught me the best lesson I've ever learned after he died. ... He wanted to do something for someone else without getting the pat on the back. ... If everybody did something like that and helped somebody else in some way or another, the world will be a lot better place." — Dale Comstock [22:50]
“If everyone's falling apart ... who's leading this thing? It’s up to the men. It’s up to manly men.” — Brent Tucker [27:45]
"The biggest mistake we made is we allowed women to vote. ... Women vote on emotion ... they don't have a lot of skin in the game." — Dale Comstock [35:53]
"We're all inside of a digital cage. We just don't know it yet." — Dale Comstock [47:18]
“People may think it's lucky to get a reenlistment bonus... I earned this reenlistment bonus.” — Operator anecdote relayed by Brent Tucker [66:00]
“When a guy makes it ... we all assume you have the baseline to operate. ... Doesn't matter where you come from.” — Dale Comstock [73:38]
[76:08 – 120:24] Extended, first-hand account
"It was a nuclear weapon. ... With all the chaos, I had to do everything right, because if we didn’t get in that door, that guy was dead." — Dale Comstock [83:10]
“Willpower doesn’t get you through selection. What gets you through selection is imagination … That’s what champions do.” — Dale Comstock [123:45]
On fatherhood and legacy:
“He was my, my compass man. He set me on a path to try to be the best that I can be at everything I do.” — Dale Comstock [25:06]
On masculinity:
“There’s no such thing as toxic masculinity. If we want to go down that road, we can talk about caustic femininity.” — Dale Comstock [31:00]
On adversity in selection:
“You can have a change of mind, but you can’t have a change of heart—that’s the difference.” — Dale Comstock [125:32]
On where America finds its warriors:
"Where do we get guys like this? ... The greatest country in the world, the United States of America." — Brent Tucker [137:09]
Authentic, unapologetic, and at times confrontational, this episode offers a rare window into the mind and history of one of special operations’ true veterans. Brent and Dale’s camaraderie, seriousness about leadership and service, and willingness to confront uncomfortable truths make for a dense, memorable, and motivational listen.
Dale Comstock’s Books & Website:
dalecomstockamericanbadass.com
Instagram: @drdalecomstock
This summary conveys the major themes, stories, and debate points from the episode, along with notable quotes and timestamped highlights for deeper exploration.