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Security Halt!
#210 Blackwater Worldwide: Morgan Lerette's life as an American Mercenary
In this episode we dive head first into Morgan Lerette's life as an American Mercenary. Working for Blackwater Worldwide in Iraq, was not for the faint of heart. Morgan breaks down the allure of working for Blackwater, the lack of rules and regulations on the ground, the challenges of navigating different agencies and their conflicting objectives, and the futility of the mission in Iraq. Morgan shares stories of the camaraderie among contractors, and of course the hate and discontent that comes with working with the State Department and agencies like the CIA and DIA.
Being a Mercenary isn’t always fun however, Morgan also discusses the moral dilemmas he faced, and the impact of the money he was making. From divorce to being fired, Morgan also covers the “uglier” aspects of being a gun for hire, highlighting the challenges faced by all private military contractors. He shares stories of the intense and dangerous situations he encountered, as well as the toll it took on him personally. In the end Morgan encourages veterans to share their stories and experiences to raise awareness and promote understanding. The conversation highlights the evolving nature of warfare and the importance of cherishing family and personal well-being.
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Chapters
00:00 The Allure and Challenges of Working for Blackwater in Iraq
09:10 Camaraderie and Detachment Among Contractors
14:10 The Lack of Rules and Regulations on the Ground
18:02 The Futility of the Mission in Iraq
26:16 Firings and the Decision to Leave the Contractor Life
30:36 Tax-Free Income as a Private Military Contractor
32:21 The Challenges of Communicating with Family
36:45 The Isolation and Lack of Support for Contractors
38:42 The Need for Support Systems for Contractors
43:33 The High Suicide Rate Among Contractors
48:14 The Importance of Sharing Stories
53:30 The Value of Personal Reflection and Writing
57:08 Prioritizing Family and Personal Well-being
01:00:34 The Future of Warfare and Personal Fulfillment
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Produced by Security Halt Media
security hot podcast. Let's go. You're dealing with an expert in guerrilla warfare, with a man who's the best with guns, with knives, with his bare hands, a man who's been trained to ignore, ignore weather to live off the land job was disposed of enemy personnel to kill period that's what bill o'reilly on his damn right.
Speaker 1:That's the man the legend himself fucking we'll do it live. Yeah, it's weird, like all these people that are in these high-stake professions like they always feel like this, they have this bravado and I'm like dude, chill the fuck out, you're a newsroom yeah, just just take a breath.
Speaker 1:Nothing, nothing bad's gonna happen to you today yeah, man, dude morgan, thank you for coming on the show man, I really appreciate it. It's um, it was actually before you. You hit me up. I was reflecting on that whole era, the blackwater era, I like to call it when every grunt and I remember like vividly in Iraq, you know, around the smoke circle with friends and people before they even went selection, before they even went to become a cool guy like, yeah, you know, what I'm going to do is I'm going to do this Iraq tour. You know, go soft. In a couple years I'm going to go Blackwater, I'm going to be a contractor, no matter who you were at that time period in Iraq, like that was the most alluring thing, seeing those dudes roll out. It's like you wanted to know what that world was like. I think many individuals really found it attractive, but yet very few got a chance to do that. So, morgan, I want to hear from you what was it like in those years in Blackwater?
Speaker 2:my man, oh, dude, it was insane. So we would actually like we would be approached by soldiers all the time we're going to come and we're going to work for Blackwater man. And then I'd be like, yeah, just here's my email address, shoot me an email and never hear from him again, dude, because, like, when you get get home, you get paid on the first and the 15th and your family and your bah and your food, and then, like the the prospect of being in black water when you're not overseas, people are like maybe it's not, as is what I, it's not what I thought it was going to be anyway.
Speaker 1:So I better just found out the hard way, because they went and they joined up like triple canopy and it was just like gate guard duty for like eight to nine months. It's like that's not the same yeah, no, that's fair, dude I.
Speaker 2:It was absolutely insane, so I got over there in like 04 when it like first kicked off when black, because blackwater was there for a while.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh yeah but I got there at 04 when they got the state department contract and there was no like, there was no rules of engagement. There was no like what the hell are we going to do? Where are we going to go? Like no gps. So you just had this big map and we'd be like, hey, we got to drive around that part of the river that looks like cock and then, after we get to that part, on the, the 14th july bridge, we'll take a left.
Speaker 2:And it was just like we made it up as we went and the whole mission was you get an important person from point a to point b and you get them back alive and then after that, like, all bets are off. So then you go to the pool and you just start drinking heavily, or you go and you start playing like no limit texas hold'em, and there's like three thousand dollars on the table and rockets are coming in and you're like, dude, I'm not leaving. I'm like if we get rocketed, that's just life. Like, yeah, there's three thousand dollars here and I don't trust any of you fuckers. So, dude, it was absolutely like insane. And but that's why I had to write the book.
Speaker 1:I was like people, people are gonna forget about just how crazy it was I can't even fathom, because movies don't do it justice you really, unless you get like a really good director, because everything that we imagine, as you know, in that time period, my my first deployment was during the surge, like that 0707, 08, then the 2009, 2010. But you already started hearing stories about how crazy the Blackwater guys were and we already had those national incidents. But I want to take it back to like that origin story, because you weren't always a Blackwater guy. Like how did you first hear about it and where did your military service? How did that get you into Blackwater?
Speaker 2:Dude, I was like the poster child for knowing somebody and being able to get in right, like like blackwater in 04, blackwater. Nobody knew about him except for the fallujah incident, uh, when they had like the contractors get killed. And then my buddy was a force recon marine, we were in the air national guard together and he's like dude, I'm gonna go work for blackwater, like have fun, like I'll look for you on the news, uh. So he went over there and literally the day you got to moyak, it happened to me also. They said, hey, do you know anybody that would want to work for us? Because, like, we're just randomly calling people. So that's what happened to me. I was like dead asleep. It's 5 am and I get this random call from a guy, call him Steve, and he's like hey, you want to work for Blackwater? And I was like not really. And he's like, how about for $550 a day? And I was like, yeah, I do. Yeah, I think, I think I want to do that. And he's like dude, we can get you on a plane tomorrow. And I was like wait, hold on. I'm like two weeks away from finishing my college classes, just let me finish my college classes. And the guy's like what the fuck do you want to do that for you can start making money right now. And I was like, yeah, I didn't, like I get it, but like I've been in, I've been in summer school for a while, so let me just finish this. So I finished those college classes, dude.
Speaker 2:Like the next day I'm on a plane to moyoc, north carolina, and I showed up as like the air force security forces guy, right like the mp, nothing cool. And the guy that's sitting next to me is like, oh, yeah, I was a seal, and the other guys like I was a ranger and dude. It's like all these special operations guys. And I'm like, yeah, the air force security forces. Like yeah, just really. But you have to remember, back in 04, nobody had any war experience, exactly. So, like I was there during the ground offensive in 03. And people are like, oh, you were in the war. And I was like, yeah, I got to watch airplanes land. It was really terrifying, uh. But I mean, all these guys had trained for 10, 15, 20 years and unless you were in somalia, you didn't have any combat experience. You didn't have combat vets.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you just came in like dude, I just shut my mouth and listened. It was like, oh, that's how you're supposed to do cqb. I don't think I've ever even tried this before. So we're doing like learning how to do cqb. And then they would just walk in and grab somebody and be like, hey, I need to talk to to bob over there, and then you'd never see bob again. It was like, yeah, it's just a weird.
Speaker 2:Like we started with 50, may have graduated like 22. So they would be doing your background check, something would pop through. Those guys just gone left or right, and you'd be shocked how many people will show up to moyaka, north carolina, like out of shape, it's a mile and a half run, dude. Like like you can gut this out, okay, guys, but like people, we lost people on the run. How many people they were like former rangers and stuff. They couldn't shoot. They hadn't shot in like 10, 15 years, right, so they, we lost them at the rifle range, in the pistol range. Like it was shocking how many people just got filtered out over the course of two, two and a half weeks and then most of the time was just waiting for your security clearance. So, dude, I'm 23, like the all-american boy. They're like you ever smoked marijuana and I was like never, sir. No, I had never have you ever never did that.
Speaker 2:Um, so do my security clearance pop through really, really fast? And next thing, I know I'm like I'm on a plane to jordan to go into baghdad. It's just, you know, it's not as cool as like deadpool and wolverine, but like it, just, it just happened, man dude, that's a truth, though a lot of times these processes, uh, are exactly what you just talked about.
Speaker 1:It's just hurry up and wait for a clearance to come through, the background to come through, and then testing and people would be shocked. I think a lot of things you have to experience to really understand, like killing those myths. Like before I went to selection, same thing. I'm like you're gonna get beat up by cadre every single day. They're gonna choke you to the point that we pass out and die. And then you show up and it's just like pay attention to the whiteboard, be here at this time. Hey, you didn't pass this, you're're done Go. And it's like wait a second, no one's going to jump out and beat the shit out of me. Well, not a selection, but that comes later. Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's never. It's never as like hard or as crazy as you think it's going to be. Which is I mean and dude. I was with some of the most hardened dudes on the Like who's the guy from Black Hawk Down that was like this is my safety? Sure Like he was there. There was a bunch of DevGuru guys there that you just like these were the baddest dudes on the planet and you would just talk to them and they were just normal humans. Let's have ourselves a Corona beer so was Seal.
Speaker 2:Team 6, huh Weird. I was, like I've heard of those guys. I watched that Charlie Sheen movie and like that's it right did you notice that?
Speaker 1:was there a difference in the camaraderie I mean it's? We have to think that brotherhood is brotherhood. But when you're getting paid a ridiculous amount of money, like is there still that bond there or is it just like, hey, when I clock in we're teammates, but as soon as I'm back like I don't fucking know you.
Speaker 2:Dude. I mean there's definitely the camaraderie, like there's some of the dudes I still talk to this day. It's been almost 20 years. But at the same time, like it's not like basic training, where you go in and you're hanging out with people for six to 12 weeks, whatever the heck it is. It's like you go in, they put you on a plane, you're in Baghdad and they say, hey, now you're on team 12. So you go over to team 12 and then you only hang out with your team. Like I know there's a number of people that are that tell me oh, my buddy X was over there and I was like dude I have no idea who it was Like if you weren't on my team, or like I didn't have direct interaction with you on a regular basis. I have no idea who you are. But at the same time, like it got very political because you have a bunch of dudes that don't like to be told what to do.
Speaker 2:And you put a team leader on top of them and the team leader is trying to run it like it's a military operation and people are like no, fuck this, you're wasting my time. Like I'm here to make money and then I'm here to go drink beer, so let me be. And we, like we ended up firing um two team leaders while we were there just because it was like dude, like sergeant majors, you can't get out of that military mindset. So you know, grown men are not going to deal with that crap. If you don't have to, I'm not an e5 anymore.
Speaker 1:Like, leave, meet me yeah, at the same time, that's such a hard thing to wrap your head around, right like you're, you're in a combat zone and you're working and I I don't know how I feel about that term mercenary, because it's not like you're going out there without any rules and regulations, but at the same time, it's like you're not a government employee, you're not a rank and soldier. So how do you lead and how do you work within that team structure? How did you guys figure that out?
Speaker 2:I don't think we ever did. To be completely honest with you and I know some people take umbrage with the term mercenary but if you hadn't waved $500 in my face every day, I wouldn't have gone back over there, especially to do that job. So people sit there and say, oh, we're working for the State Department, we did great things. Yeah, that's fine. But if they weren't giving you $500 a day, you weren't going to be there. So the dynamics, it was all team by team, right. And then slowly by the time you got through having X amount of people on a team, because people rotate in, they rotate out. You kind of get this core group of five, six guys on a team and then everything just kind of starts working itself out.
Speaker 2:But it really is like the team leader and the TC. If those guys are locked on your set, if those guys were like, it made life miserable, man and I. I was on both types of teams, right. I was on the qrf, which was just like a vote on, vote off, you know, straight survivor style. And then I was on another team where they were like here's a sergeant major that volunteered to be a team leader and that kind of lasted like two weeks he had to go, man high in tights and everybody shaves yeah where's your polo shirt?
Speaker 2:like, dude. Like when I got there, this is like wearing a t-shirt and shorts out on a run, that was just normal day. And then after a while people were like you need to wear polo shirts. And we, dude, we're making 550 a day. We're like, oh, it's terrible, I can't believe that they would make us wear a polo shirt and pants. Like like, even the biggest, the smallest little slight was like we're soldiers, we're gonna bitch about stuff, but it was. It was like the dumbest thing looking back, because now I wear polo shirts for work all the time and I'm like, yeah, they're not so bad it's not so bad.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's just when somebody tells you you have to do something. That's when it gets you irked, yeah, dude. So one of the things that, like, I really want to know is getting on the ground. We always have restrictions in the military. You're constricted by budget allocations, rules, regulations, lines of effort, lines of operations. What was it like on the ground not having those? But I'm sure you had impediments, I'm sure you had restrictions, but what was like navigating those new rules and new boundaries?
Speaker 2:I do. Well, that's. The problem is that there weren't rules, right, like, like you talk about rules, restriction, rules of engagement, we just didn't have those. Or if we did, like it never got down to the lowest level to say what you can and can't do, literally lack. It's insane when you think about it, right, well, because we don't have the UCMJ over us. Yeah, we're not State Department employees. The local laws of Iraq don't apply because we're US citizens. So what laws actually govern us? And the truth is, I still don't know, no idea.
Speaker 2:And I think there's a reason for that, right, like that's why you have private military contractors go over there instead of sending soldiers. It's like you can push them in, you can push them out. Some bad happens, you get to blame them. If you know everything goes good, the State Department gets to take credit for it. So, really navigating, it was like here's your mission Get this guy from point A to point B, get him back alive.
Speaker 2:And whatever you have to do in that timeframe is what you have to do, like don't go out there and, you know, shoot up a bunch of people, but at the end of the day, you know, 04, 05 was all the car bombs, the IEDs.
Speaker 2:So when a car is coming up on you, you have to make that decision. Am I going to pop open my door and shoot at this car or am I going to like let this car come into our convoy? And it wasn't even a decision at that point. It's like look, I got the ambassador to Iraq. This car is coming up on us at 35 miles an hour. I can try to shoot out his tire or shoot out his grill and hopefully he'll stop, and if he doesn't, then you know I'm going to start moving my rifle rifle, naturally. So it really was just making a split second decision at any given time and then being able to go home and like put your head on the pillow after reading the harry potter book and being able to sleep right, like everybody thinks that we're out there, like losing our minds and just shooting everything up.
Speaker 1:but it just wasn't the case yeah, how many trips did you do with blackwater?
Speaker 2:well like outside of the green zone yeah oh, hundreds. I mean, dude, there was like when I first got there we would do like one to two a day, uh, and then when I got on the qrf, we were probably doing six to twelve every day. So and then, and then a couple of uh state department guys got killed. One got rocketed while he was like washing his beanbag and uh, horrible way to go yeah, yeah, with your loofah in your hand right, um.
Speaker 2:but once they realized, like holy crap, there's a real combat zone, you could see that the missions were like they were going downhill pretty quick. There weren't a whole lot of people that really wanted to go out there and help the government of Iraq run itself. So put this in perspective when we got into Iraq, we got rid of the bath party and everybody says, oh, we got rid of the military, worst mistake we ever did. No, we got rid of their entire government. Nobody knew how to clean up garbage off the streets, nobody knew how to land planes, nobody knew how to import, export.
Speaker 2:We went to the stock exchange and it was like people with chalk on chalkboards that were straight up saying, oh, somebody's buying this stock for three squigglies and now somebody's offering us four squigglies and they'd take an eraser and do four squigglies. Man, like nobody knew how to do that. So the state department was tasked with putting these people over there from waste management, the faa, from, uh, like exxon mobile, so they could figure out the oil, and going out there and teaching these guys how to run a government. And dude, it was a lost cause from the beginning, because if you, if a guy can't figure out how to use an excel spreadsheet to say, today's monday, maybe we actually put the trash in like hypha. Then there was no way we were actually going to build them up to a point that they could actually run their own place dude and I saw it as a young paratrooper like that's one thing people don't understand.
Speaker 1:Like it was fucked from the get-go. Like we did. We threw so much money at infrastructure but infrastructure doesn't do shit when you don't have people that can actually go in there and like work in hospitals, run the schools, run the community center. Like it doesn't fucking matter how many things we built for them. They didn't have the people or the knowledge to run the country. As you're sitting there, you have a front row ticket to seeing our failed American policy. How did you maintain your composure and not say like fuck it, I don't care how much money they're paying me. I can't see the stupidity anymore.
Speaker 2:Well, dude, I mean the money. Let's be honest here, it was just the money. It was spectacular, because who cares? I think there's a natural progression when you deploy overseas, like the first three months, you want to help the next three months, you're like okay, it really feels like I'm wanting to help them more than they want to help themselves yes, dude, that's it right there and then, and then like month six through nine, you're pretty much like fuck it, I don't care.
Speaker 2:and then months nine through twelve, you're pretty much like fuck it, I don't care. And then month nine through 12, you're like I just got to get out of here and it was the same thing with Blackwater. Right After the first three months we went through the elections and we got to see people with their finger and they had the purple on it, right, and they're like, oh, democratic elections, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then after a while you're like're, like, okay, well, they don't actually give a crap. So why do I give a crap? And once you hit that I don't give a crap. At the six month mark it's really easy to be like I'm just gonna sit here and collect my paycheck and get as much adventure as I can. But, dude, like I went there as a junior enlisted guy, I went there as a blackwater contractor and I went back as an army intelligence officer.
Speaker 2:So I've seen the perspective of iraq a number of different like, like perspectives and I can tell you that what was happening is that every government agency over there wanted to take credit for making iraq this bastion of democracy. None of them played well together. Like we never told the army where we were going, when we were going, we didn't have blue force tracker. Like we just jumped in the vehicles and jammed out. So I remember I think it was like the third run we ever did I take a left out of the green zone up by the northern bridges and I pop around the corner and there's like this army convoy and it's got the old humvees that weren't even up armored and the guy's in the back with a 240 bravo on a swivel and he looks at us, we look at him and we're like we're friends and he takes that 240 bravo goes.
Speaker 2:And I was like oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. And then he figured out like okay, they're suburbans, they're probably our guys and we were fine. But like nothing, nothing makes your butthole pucker up like a 240 bravo being pointed at you. I don't care if you got armor or not, it's going through it.
Speaker 1:Which is being manned by a fucking 19-year-old private that gives two fucks.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm still in my eye care part Nobody coordinated with anybody, and that goes from military unit to military unit, from the CIA to the DIA to the State Department. Everybody just kind of did their own thing and took credit when things were going good and then, when things were going bad, it was like that Spider-Man meme, right, it's like ew, ew, ew, yeah.
Speaker 1:So, dude, I have to ask you, with the title of the book being Guns Girls Greed, when did shit go south for you where you were?
Speaker 2:like you know, I'm gonna push the fucking envelope, with bag that or with the book, because, uh, because, because both with bagdad, um dude. So it's like a natural progression, right, like I mentioned. But then in April of 2005, we had six of our guys get shot down in a helicopter and I knew two of them pretty well and then we had another contractor get killed in Ramadi or coming back from Ramadi, and I realized at that point it was like, dude, I'm just here for the cash. I could die at any given moment. I don't give a fuck, so I may as well just make the money while I can.
Speaker 2:And, dude, we went out on the qrf and just ran roughshod over baghdad. After that, man, it was like you're oh, the car gets in the way, dude, you can watch it on youtube, like all those youtube, like people oh, blackwater did such a great job, go watch youtube. That was us. But it was at that point where it was like fuck it, man, like I'm here to make money and I'm here to do fun shit and my definition of fun shit is not the same as yours. So we were coming up on this car being hood rat as fuck yeah, yeah, I'm just doing hood stuff.
Speaker 2:It's not a big deal. There was this, there was this white kia and I remember, dude, I remember, I'll remember till the day I died because it was clean. There was this white kia and I remember, dude, I remember, I'll remember till the day I die because it was clean. It was actually washed and it was like perfectly white. You know how everything's just coated in dust over there. It's like it was like pristine and we're going around this roundabout and it doesn't get out of our way and, dude, we're hitting the air horn. We're like throwing bottles, like water bottles, at it, trying to get it out of the way. It doesn't move. Dude, we hit the back. The driver hits the back of it and crumples the entire trunk all the way to the point that I can see the carpet inside the trunk as we're going back, holy shit.
Speaker 2:And, dude, I feel like an asshole, like, oh my God, I can't believe that we just did this. And as I'm driving, driving past, I got my head out the window of the suburban and I got my m4 right here and I pointed at the guy and I yell next time, get out of our fucking way. And I was like, oh dude, I like I changed. I was gonna say I'm sorry, but here I am, like letting this guy know he just lost his entire livelihood and that, my friend, there's moral injury.
Speaker 1:You know, it's weird, man, like we experience these moments as you deployed as a uniformed service member. It's like when you juxtapose those two experiences, like how do you reconcile that ability to just give no fucks, make as much money you know, just grabbing as much as you can, but then coming in wearing uniform, like how do you look at that and be like, oh fuck, it's like two different morgans. Or it's like, hey man, like I believe in this cause now. Or like, oh man, I'm still the same person, I don't give two fucks well, I mean, I was still the same.
Speaker 2:I don't give two fucks. To this day I am. So I went back over as a first lieutenant and I had an intel team. We did SIGINT, human and counterintelligence. And we're sitting there on the base and I'm eating some nasty fried chicken. It's like this disgusting JSS in northern Baghdad. Jss Justice where Saddam Hussein got hanged, where all the HVIs were. Jss Justice where Saddam Hussein got hanged, where all the HVIs were. So I'm sitting there eating this nasty ass chicken.
Speaker 2:Hate my life, because I'm making like a third of the money I was with Blackwater. And these PMCs walk in and like sit down and start chowing down their chicken. Like everything's fine and I'm like they didn't tell us that they were coming. We didn't know what was going on. What if something happened? Like we wouldn't have been able to support them. And then like my head flipped back and goes, oh yeah, I used to be that guy. Yeah, no, I would never tell anybody either. So I mean it's it's like two different morgans. It's like you know, leadership army officer morgan, and then it's like blackwater, I'm gonna make all the money morgan and a lot of that just comes with age. But at no point did I ever think that we were gonna win that thing? Like it was a lost cause pretty much from the day we got in. The day we got in, I'm all over the place.
Speaker 1:But um, that's okay. Hey, we have security on man. It's what we do.
Speaker 2:We bounce back and forth so I'm there for the ground offensive. I'm in my mop gear. I haven't showered in like seven days, like I just stink, but the cool thing about mop gear is like it absorbs all your smell so you don't notice it. And I've been eating in our room.
Speaker 1:Is that charcoal baby? Oh dude.
Speaker 2:You sit there and fart in somebody's face and they wouldn't smell it, and then you forget that you, like, took it off when you're going to bed and you fart in somebody's face now.
Speaker 2:oh my god, who's that dude? Yeah, but um, they. They brought in a c-17 with all the freedom fighters that they brought from iraq to jordan to train because you wanted to put like an iraqi face on the ground defense. These guys come off the plane and some of them are like they're like kids in a candy shop they got like nicer cameras than I have like they're just the happiest can be. Some get off and they're throwing up and all of them look like soup sandwiches, dude, Like I don't know how long we trained those guys, but we we probably should have spent four or five more months with them because they they did not like a look like a fighting force at all. And then I heard they went up to Nazario when the fighting was going on there and pretty much like ran like cowards yeah, shit the bed. And I was like, well, if that's the case, if they don't want to fight for their country, yeah, we can go and we can win militarily, but there's no way, man so what was the big drive behind leaving blackwater?
Speaker 1:was it just you made enough money, or was it just a loss of love for the mission altogether?
Speaker 2:no, I got fired. Yeah, yeah, no, I did uh multiple times actually. That's, that's how blackwater works, dude. So the first time I got fired, we ended up hitting a bongo truck oh shit dude, those things are I don't.
Speaker 2:They're made out of like fucking kryptonite, I think, because our suburban was like it was like superman and that thing just demolished, it bent the, it ended up in the frame on it and we had gotten all this up armor that we put on it by going over to the kbr guys and hand them a little bit of the devil's honey. Like how about some jack daniels? And they're like, how about some up armor? So we go and I'm like taking the up armor off, and this kbr guy comes over and he's like you're stealing my equipment and he's chewing our ass. And I'm like, dude, I'm pissed, I'm like I'm about to beat him with his fucking wrench, that I got my hand and, uh, he went and told the state department. The state department's like fire those four guys. So we ended up like being fired almost on the spot. But our site leader at the time was like hold on, can we do some kind of an investigation? So they go through the investigation. It's like three or four days and they say, okay, it wasn't kbr's armor, it was your armor, we get it. Those guys are still fired.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so so I'll do it. I'm all like dejected. I'm like, man, I'm broke. I'm broke already. I already I got a land rover at home. Like I don't have any money in my pocket. So then blackwater is like here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna send you to a different location. Nobody's really tracking anybody anyway. So, uh, we'll send you wherever you want. So I went up to kirk cook and I I ended up staying on contract up there for like another eight months or so and then the second time I got fired was in kirk cook and I got a little bit too wasty-facedy and then remember that movie walk hard yes, where he beats the shit out of the bathroom yeah, that was me.
Speaker 2:I was like I'm gonna go beat up this embassy bathroom for some reason yeah, no, yeah, oh who knows why I like the first time I ever blacked out, but I was like at the time you were in like mid late 20s.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was 25. Oh god, morgan. Yeah, that's, that's typical 25 year old behavior yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So they fired me the second time, but they were pretty much like just let let it calm down for like three to four weeks and you can come back. And at that point I was like, dude, I got to go and actually have like a real life, because and you probably saw it overseas all these guys get so into their life that they lose their entire family. People get divorced, people that are like, oh, she's going to take half my retirement anyway, I may as well stay over here. And I was like I can't be that guy. This is not a career field, this is like a fun little adventure that I'm going on, and it's been 18 months. It's time to get the hell out of here.
Speaker 1:Dude, I saw it in the contractors in Afghanistan. All the time Dudes are like I haven't been in the States for like 10 years, man, I just do gigs here and I rotate to thailand. I'm like and they're old dudes, yeah, like they just let everything just go by the wayside in the united states marriages, family, everybody. Just it's like I make great money and I vacation every once in a while in the thailand. I'm like, dude, I get it, money's great, but at some point you've got to have a life, and vacationing in bangkok just doesn't seem like it's a great thing all the time. I mean first group. You might tell me different, but uh, I just don't see it yeah, I mean not in your 50s.
Speaker 2:You're gonna have a heart attack by the time that fourth hooker shows up with the candles.
Speaker 1:You know some dudes love their lady boys oh yeah hell, yeah, it's so. You make it back stateside and, and you know, feel free not to tell me, but how much money did you make in your time with blackwater?
Speaker 2:uh, about 270 000 over 18 months.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah how much did you save?
Speaker 2:well, a lot less than that, I'll tell you. Uh, so a lot of the blackwater guys didn't pay their taxes because they were like oh I was over here as a soldier. It's tax free. Uh, dude, just didn't pay. Didn't pay uncle cheddar man. So I was. I was smart enough to pay uncle sam good you're there for 330 out of 365 days.
Speaker 2:You become like legally an expatriate. Oh, wow, yeah. So your first $85,000 was tax-free because I was there all of 04. And then I paid taxes on the extra 120. And then I had to land over you know all the other horse crap, but you know I probably had had like 110,000 stashed away by the time I got done with Blackwater Fuck.
Speaker 1:Man, nope, definitely worth it. Definitely worth it If you saved and pay your taxes. It's a good little nest egg.
Speaker 2:Don't worry, my ex-wife took most of that, so I didn't need that. Come on, man. You have to know that. You have to Come on. It's like you haven't been listening to me talk. It's not like I made the best decisions here.
Speaker 1:I was hopeful, I was hoping you'd turn it around, but now we have to dig into that. Man Like that takes a toll on life, not only physically and mentally, but the people that are there supporting you and you know no spoiler alert they ended in divorce. But what was the family life like while you're over here in Iraq living the? Uh? The dream of every soldier being a, a Blackwater gun and runner?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, uh, I mean I pretty much alienated everybody in my family, and that's I. Somebody actually dug into this question the other day with me and I started to realize, like when you're overseas, you don't want to tell your family how crazy it is. Right, yeah, I don't want to sit there and call grandma or my aunt or whatever it is and say, oh yeah, by the way, a rocket hit like 50 meters away and blew up a generator and we all thought we were going to die, so you don't tell them. And then, when you're talking to them, they tell you stuff that like you don't give a shit about. Like, oh, little billy's not swimming very well, we have to give him extra lessons and and the price of milk went up 74 cents. And like, like, I don't give a shit about that. Back then I can talk about it all day.
Speaker 2:But like, at some point you're overseas so long that you start alienating these relationships because you don't want to tell them and you sure as fuck don't care about little billy. And then you come home and you're like okay, well, I'm back and everything's fine. And they're like dude, you haven't talked to me in six months. Here's I liken it to like going into a wormhole, right, you start and then 18 months later, a year later, whatever your deployment is, you come out the other end of it and you think you're the exact same guy and the entire world changes. It's like Marvel. It's like everything changed, but it's all really similar.
Speaker 2:So you come back and you're like well, now I'm in charge and I'm going to pay this bill and I'm going to do this and it just causes so many fights and so many divorces and angst and agitation. By the time I got back, man, I I nobody wanted to be around me, I was just a dick Like I can look at myself and say you're an asshole. Hey, morgan, you're a big, fat asshole Like you. You need to, you need to decompress for a while. So, uh, definitely, it took a long time to repair those relationships. Some of them, you know, never came back.
Speaker 1:And that's. You know, that's life. Man Like you can only work on yourself, try to get better and then, you know, have open discourse from the other parts, parties are willing to, and that's the thing that sucks, man. A lot of us can look back at our service when we were younger and we were exactly that. We were just young, fucking assholes, dicks. I remember being in call centers, you know, in 2008 or 2007, 2008, even 2009, 2010,. Like we didn't have the big MWRs you just had. You still had the AT&T call centers. I remember just fucking, getting fucking raped on those fucking AT&T call card, sitting down doing your call and you're hearing other people saying exactly what you were just talking about just zoning out. Yeah, cool, yeah, cool, cool, I'm alive. You don't give a fuck, you're just trying to make that little bit of effort to connect with somebody back then. And it's now on the backside, when you're older.
Speaker 1:You're like, like man, like maybe I could have put a little bit more effort, but at the same time it's a combat zone. You're trying to everybody's, trying to disassociate and compartmentalize so they can make it through another day like it was just a little more difficult when you're a blackwater guy when you can't, like you can't really explain, because I mean bringing up the call center.
Speaker 2:We had a rocket. Go to the call center, there was a Navy guy only guy in there ended up being like splattered all over the wall and you can't really explain that to somebody back home anyway. Right, I remember the first time we got rocketed we were in this big like circus tent. We all had our beds and we had like little foot lockers and the first rocket hits and everybody sits up in bed and kind of looks around. The second rocket hits and it's pretty close and we're like I don't want to go to the bunker but I don't want to be the pussy here. And then the third rocket hits and it's like close enough to where your guts start moving and one guy dude stands up and runs out like the flap in the tent and we all looked around, we're like pussy and then we ran after him. Right, like like you can't explain that to a normal human like I was just sitting there waiting for the first person to wimp out so that I wasn't like that guy yeah, yeah, that's everybody.
Speaker 1:That's fucking everybody. It's just the absolute worst. It's like I'm not moving till somebody else moves, like I am not going to be the one that breaks. Fuck that. Or even worse. You happen to be out at night and you're like, you see everybody running, like and I want to seem like a pussy. So I'm just gonna walk at a casual pace and if I happen to see a bunker on the way, maybe I'll get in that bitch I was talking to my buddy.
Speaker 2:He was in blackwater, uh, and he's like remember when we were like walking from somewhere and the rockets hit this generator and like flew up two generators like 50 meters from us, and I looked over at him, go, uh, we're gonna have to go through the embassy man. And he had just got on ground and was like what the fuck is going on and like that's just where I was at in life. I've been right seven months in. You take so many rockets, so many mortars. You're like yeah, yeah, that was a little closer to normal. We should probably walk this way instead of that way. Plus, we can get some pop tarts on the way through.
Speaker 1:So like this is a win-win dude and I have to imagine, having served, having been in Blackwater, you have most definitely acquired some injuries and some mental anguish. What was it like finally transitioning out of the military and then finally having to unpack all those fucking bags?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, some of them were probably still packed in my garage like the very bottom of a contigo box. Yeah, it's it. I don't know, man, like I never personalized anything and I think there's a lot of people that like personalize stuff. For, like, a rocket comes in, oh, they were shooting rockets at me. They weren't all right, they were just shooting rockets. Or like an ied, oh, they blew me up. Like they didn't blow you up, they just blew up the vehicle you happened to be in. So I'm really lucky in that I didn't take anything personal.
Speaker 2:It's like, yeah, you get some close calls, you know, and at the end of the day, if I wasn't standing there, it could have been somebody else, could have been somebody else. We had a rocket go through our team tent, uh, and we had a bunch of guys in there and we're like running over there to to like start pulling out the wounded and the dead and all that stuff turns out it was a dud. But the first thing a guy says is, fuck, there goes our internet, right, like, like, it's just like this weird. It's this weird thing where you you either compartmentalize it or you like take it really personal and it fucks with your head. So I compartmentalized it and then slowly, over time, it's like I've done some crazy stuff. So, like, what does that actually mean? And, dude, I don't know, but I can tell you that going through the VA hasn't helped a whole lot. Well, and here's the other crazy thing.
Speaker 2:Like as a contractor actually I'm gonna give some bummer news so we had a blackwater guy kill himself earlier this week happens I'm sorry, brother, because, like when you come home as a contractor, you don't have anybody to reach out to, right, you don't go there with your team or your unit and you get to decompress and then you know you're, you're standing in like three, four days later before you go on block leave, it's just you.
Speaker 2:So as a contractor, like there's no VA, there's no like hey, let's go talk to mental health or let's go over here and have a bonfire. It's literally just you and all your buddies are spread across the earth, like anywhere on the earth. So a lot of blackwater guys, uh, have a really hard time assimilating because they don't have anybody to share those experiences with. And I mean, some of them just never make it out. And, dude, it's been 20 years and you know it's been since blackwater disbanded. It's been at least 13 and some of these guys still haven't made it out, like mentally and they're, they're taking the final out, which is a huge bummer um.
Speaker 1:it's a huge problem that no one talks about because and I had a had a gentleman on a couple weeks ago great dude rhodesian army um service member. But it's the same thing that he experienced After that war there's no country left, country's gone. I can always go to the VA, I can always connect with other veterans and sit down. You still have that camaraderie as well, but it's not the same thing. When you served, when you were part of Blackwater, that was a huge organization. You guys were part of history.
Speaker 1:When it was destroyed and broken apart, where does your community go? Where does that brotherhood go? And it's the same thing we see in the veteran community, it's the same thing we see in the first responder community, but it's even more. I would say it's even more impacted because you don't have your brotherhood. Your sense of understanding. Like Blackwater was disbanded. The name was thrown through the mud by, you know, political figures, by people in the United States. Like, how do we rally and get support and build something for these guys? Like, how do you guys, do you try to keep in touch through a thread? Is there like, is there something you've built together or is there something in the works where you can build some sort of community or a sense of like belonging again, cause I got to imagine like when you can't reach out to that Facebook group, it's even harder.
Speaker 2:Oh, but there is a Facebook group. It's a yeah, it's really helpful. It's a bunch of old farts now that are like put me in, coach, I'm ready and I'm like, I'm like dude you're in, you're. You got like one of those walkers with the tennis balls on it. Stop and you're on oxygen. Knock it off. You can't. They can't be that old yet, it hasn't been that long. But no, I mean, dude, I was 23, but a lot of the guys were in their 40s, right?
Speaker 1:oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're pushing 60, 65, even 70, um. But I mean, there's a facebook group. I can't be on it because it's just a bunch of old fuckers either trying to relive their glory days. Yeah too much negativity dude. As soon as I come out with a book, it's like, oh, that guy, he wasn't. He wasn't real blackwater, because he was security forces before blackwater and he just and it's like dude so you gotta suffer from the same shit in the veteran veteran groups yeah, pretty much yeah.
Speaker 2:And then you have eric prince, our fearless leader that goes on the like sean ryan podcast and he's like let me tell you about blackwater suicides. No, he doesn't do it. He goes in there and tries to peddle his phone, or you?
Speaker 2:know, like private security and how privatization of, like the f-16s in ukraine could have turned the war. So I do it. It really is just like a lost forgotten, like brotherhood, at this point that you know everybody wants to think that it's really cool because we had we had a really cool logo, dude. I mean it was fucking badass um, still it's.
Speaker 1:It's still fox, as the kids say.
Speaker 2:It's still up there but there's nothing that like. This is where I, where I've really turned the page, is that there's no support system for private military contractors. And if you're going to keep putting them overseas, instead of boots on the ground, soldiers, they still come back with all the same scars the mental, the physical. And then you come home and it's just like what do you do with your life? Well, if you're not going to be hanging out on the Facebook group, then you're out, bro. We're not even going to associate with you. I served with a lot of soldiers and the suicide rate of Blackwater is exponentially higher than in the service and I've looked for data on it. And, dude, nobody collects data. And I'm not just talking about Blackwater guys. Right, if you were over there washing laundry, if you were like Triple canopy, all those dudes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's no statistics on how many of those guys came home, their suicide rates, their mental health, because it is just, you know it's, it's a mercenary life man.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that there's. There's gotta be something we can do. I think peer to peer support is one of the most important things that we've seen A lot of people rally to and maybe just takes Morgan reaching up and starting that banner and bringing in people to talk on a Thursday night or Wednesday night. But I think it's important to have that community again, man, and I can't imagine what it's like to have that, especially, like you said, the guy that created it all. He's still a very powerful individual and if you're not backing the dudes that came and supported you and were part of that movement and part of your organization when you need them most, like what good are you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, all the phones in the world are great. I don't think we need another one. I don't know how the well this is gonna do, but there's a lot of work that can be done for the guys that you know work their asses off for you. It's got to be something there. Well and dude, I'm not playing the woe is me card by any stretch of the imagination, but you know, work their asses off for you.
Speaker 2:It's got to be something there. Well and dude, I'm not playing. The woe is me card by any stretch of the imagination. But you know, if you owned a coal company and you sent those guys under underground to do coal, you should probably pay for their black lung exactly.
Speaker 2:I'm just throwing that out there, you know um, and I know that it's like, well, we front load the the price because you're getting paid so much more, uh, but it I I think it's like, well, we front load the price because you're getting paid so much more, but I think it's something that needs to be looked at because PMCs are getting larger. Right, we have them at the US-Mexico border, we have them in Haiti, we have them in Syria, like you name it. We've got them everywhere, yep, and they're going to come home at some point and be like what the hell do I do with my life and I mean hopefully, like I get on as many podcasts as I can. I talk about it.
Speaker 2:There is something called the Defense Base Act. So if any contractors are listening to this or watching it, reach out to me on any of my socials and I'll get you hooked up with the. It's an insurance claim to the Department of Labor, but it really is still just word of mouth and you know, blackwater guys hate me because I wrote a book, so maybe, maybe I'm maybe the pariah shouldn't maybe the pariah shouldn't be the one that's that's trying to get everybody to come together.
Speaker 1:But what do you, what do you feel is the big um, what's the big issue with the community against uh?
Speaker 2:the book. Well, dude, the butthurt brigade got on there and we're like that's not how it was. Oh, I would, I was over there. That's not how it was. And it's like, dude, this is exactly how it was.
Speaker 2:And, like I said, if you weren't on my team, if you weren't on qrf, um, you, you, you did not have the same experience as me, but at the same time, a lot of those blackwater guys it's what they identify as right. It it's like that Sergeant Major that gets out and all he is is a Sergeant Major, that's it. Yeah, same thing with Blackwater guys. I'm Blackwater, you know, you got your shirts and your hats and all that stuff, and anytime you walk down the street, it's like the thank you for my service, but it's a Blackwater. So a lot of those guys didn't like it because I was straight up, I wasn't sitting here, like you know, sucking on the bear paw as hard as I could, like I tell the good and the bad of what we did. And people are like, oh no, we, we weren't mercenaries. And I'm like, dude, call us whatever you want, but at the end of the day, youtube don't lie, bro, and I was, I was in those convoys.
Speaker 1:I think that the thing that people need to understand is your lived experience isn't necessarily going to be the lived experience of Timmy McDoodle that served in Blackwater at the same time. It'd be completely different. And it's okay to tell your fucking story. You cannot sit here and bash on everybody that's writing a book and wanting to share their story. You don't know what impact that story is going to have. Maybe it'll help another Blackwater guy finally come out and tell his story from a different era, from a different time period, and be able to share like, hey, this is what I went through. It's a little different than what Morgan did, but hey, it's important because without it we don't have the influence, we don't get people that say, hey, you know what? Maybe I want to do this or maybe I don't want to do this.
Speaker 1:Like, being able to write and sit down and share your story is one of the most important things we can do for our time and service. The g what era is going to quickly become the vietnam era and unless we fucking write our stories and share them with the world, people are going going to fucking forget. And then we're going to do what Do? Fucking Iraq 2.0 somewhere else around the world and that's the fucking truth. We need more stories, not less. We need more people like you, morgan, that are willing to get out there and say, dude, I did something fucking wild and fucking crazy when I was in my fucking 20s. And here it is. Judge me if you want, but this is my lived experience and that's beautiful, that's adm, that's admirable.
Speaker 2:We need more stories, not less, and if you're oh, go ahead sorry we need the junior enlisted guys to get out there, get an education and write your damn story. Because if I have to read one more book from a general or president or the secretary of defense talking about how great we were doing in iraq and afghanistan, dude those books, first off, they suck to read you do, and second off, nobody's going to look themselves in the face and say, oh, I did like iraq was a huge failure. Let me tell you why. I love the ground perspective, man. I love hearing about the guys that actually pulled the trigger, as opposed to the guy that was like and then we sent seventh brigade on a flanking mission to who gives a shit? Man like I want the dude.
Speaker 2:That's like I had to figure out when I went through that door if that person was like a combatant or not a combatant. What does that feel like? And that's what I try to do with the book. Right, I mean I I walk through the process of flipping my selector switch to fire and then like how everything gets into tunnel vision. It goes slow-mo and you're starting to fire and you can start like I could see more where my bullets were skipping towards this red car like shot in front of it first and then slowly started moving up and like get your story out there. One supposedly it's cathartic if everybody doesn't hit your guts. It wasn't that cathartic for me. But two, like if you don't know how, how, what a toll if. If you don't write about the toll that war takes on young men and women, then people are going to be more willing to send those young men and go war.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, man. That is spot the fuck on. And I don't think every war book has to be the same. And what I mean by that is there's a lot of hesitancy in individuals that weren't part of combat MOS, that weren't part of a, you know, a direct action raid, it weren't part of a huge convoy operation that got blown up. I'm telling you right now your perspective and your story matters to what you did in Iraq, what you did in Afghanistan. It's just as important. I want to hear all the stories, all the crazy shit, all the funny stuff, all the not so good shit.
Speaker 1:One of the greatest fucking stories I ever heard was from a Marine sergeant, major that was not a fucking infantry guy, but in the early days of GWAT, guess what? You were on a truck and you were an extra fucking gunner and his stories just blew my fucking mind. But the individual didn't want to share them. Why? Because, well, I wasn't traditionally an infantry guy, I was supply and it's like dude, yeah. But in that time period you were just another body that got put on a gun and you got to experience and see life in a whole different world in that time period. And you're right If we don't share this, if we don't talk about it, if we don't normalize being able to promote all different stories from that era, we're going to forget and then it's going to be our kids that are getting sent to some shithole for some stupid fucking idea and it's like here we go again and it's the don't listen to the negative echo chamber Like.
Speaker 1:I do believe that these small pockets of support do help, but to an extent, because when you get in these Facebook groups, when you get in the Instagram and it's just that same negativity over and over again talking about the good old years. Now life doesn't get any better than what it was back then. That can quickly spiral out of control. So we need individuals that are willing to talk and be peer support, be able to engage outside of that and say, hey, you know what? There's an amazing world outside. You have to let go of the days of Blackwater, it's over, it's not coming back. Hope and there's a better life out there, being able to inspire hope. And do you feel that at any moment in that book? Do you feel like that message gets put out there at all?
Speaker 2:Yeah, at the very end I'll be honest with you, because a lot of it's like what you said, dude. It's like the funny stories. It's you talking to your buddy because you're bored. Uh, we had this one guy, really, really intelligent guy, african-american marine corps sniper, and he comes at us with, uh, with this existential question.
Speaker 2:He's like would you rather fuck a thai lady boy or the fattest, ugliest, most disgusting woman on the planet? And we're like the woman. And he's like really dude, like the thai lady boy, gorgeous like stacked like. And we're like the woman and he's like, really dude, like the tight lady boy, gorgeous like stacked like. And we're like no, dude, you fuck the woman, or else you're gay. And he's like no, I'm like I'd fuck the lady boy, but I'm not gay. We're like dude, you're, you're gay if you fuck the lady boy. And he's like no, no, I'm not gay.
Speaker 2:Like we were going through this whole trans thing before. You know, spitball in the trans thing, before it became popular, and by the end of it it was like okay, so you know, andrew's gay and we're all straight, but we fuck the most hideous pig on the planet. And dude, those are, those are the stories that get lost right? It's just literally sitting there bsing with your buddies through the hooker stories. That's why I put girls in the title, those special operations. Guys love hookers and they are the funniest stories allegedly allegedly.
Speaker 2:Except everybody was like I'm going to thailand to get hookers. Um so, dude, first group yeah. Um so, dude, like, go tell your story. I was talking to a guy he's a c-130 pilot and I was like, dude, write a book. And he's like, oh, it's not really that neat. And I was like, dude, you have a perspective that's like not on the ground but just above it. So when you talk about iraq and seeing all those, all those like uh, trace arounds going around in the air and what was happening while you're flying in and out like dude, that's a cool story, and 99% of the population doesn't have a cool story like that. Get it out there, get it on paper, and if it sucks, who cares?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, just get through that rough draft and if anything, if for nobody else, do it for you. Maybe your kids or maybe your wife. People want to know about that part of your life. Like there's so many things that you experience in combat that have nothing to do with pulling a trigger. Like my own personal story I didn't learn how to play softball or baseball as a kid.
Speaker 1:Growing up Like I played football and it did track. The first time I played a game of catch of baseball with a glove and and other other dudes was in Iraq with my squad. Like I'll never fucking forget that. I'll never fucking forget that. I'll never fucking forget that being able to finally play a catch, and it's like I hope they don't realize I don't know what the fuck I'm doing, but it's those moments. That moment stuck and I remember telling my wife I remember like, dude, you want to know, one of the greatest memories from my early days in the infantry was playing catch with my squad in iraq.
Speaker 1:Like that was that was it? Like that was in those moments there's millions of them for every service member out there like, if you're listening, collect up all those memories, collect up all those moments the good, bad, the indifferent, and write your fucking story. I mean, don't leave it up to morgan like, don't let him be the only person writing books. Uh, go out there and put yours on, be willing at least to share it. Be willing to at least come on a podcast and share it with people, because I think it's amazing being able to look back and reflect on that time period. It's so different now, like war is rapidly evolving to something that does not involve human beings, and it's a very scary thing watching drone warfare advance right in front of your eyes every day in the evening news and online and uh boy, uh, the future does not look good for warfare now.
Speaker 2:I remember in 05 when we like we were doing map recons on google earth and then by the time I got back in 09, you had blue force trackers that you know had street google street view on it and I was like, well, where was this? Um, so dude, war does evolve so fast and I mean I read a ton of vietnam era books and listen to those guys stories and you're just like dude, those guys, those guys were legit. And then the world war ii guys are like those vietnam guys were pussies and I'm sure I'm sure the next war you and I'll be sitting here and be those Vietnam guys were pussies and I'm sure the next war you and I will be sitting here and be like, oh, those guys are pussies, they fought from a joystick in Nellis Air Force Base. We'll be those old salty guys, but it's still something that almost nobody experiences. Get it on paper or at least just go talk to somebody about it, man.
Speaker 1:So fucking true man. So, morgan, what do you do these days? What's life like for Morgan?
Speaker 2:Oh man, I'm married, I got two. Don't tell him this, dude, but I got two pretty awesome kids and a wife. Like and I'm in the corporate slog right, like I got out of the army, I went to this very snooty graduate school up in Boston, tufts University.
Speaker 1:I know me. I went to this very snooty graduate school up in boston tufts university.
Speaker 2:I know I was like, yeah, my man went to tufts. Yeah, so I, I went to the snooty school and then I got into corporate america and just kind of like navigated my way through it and, dude it's. I mean, it's a good gig. People are always like, well, what's the next thing? And it's like dude, I just want to enjoy being a dad. I want to be a good husband. I want to grow lemon trees that actually have lemons on them. Like, as crazy as this sounds, if I could grow a tomato plant and get a tomato I don't even like cake, like tomatoes, but like that's pretty cool, like that's where I'm at life. I'm, maybe I'm like 70 already, I don't know no way, dude.
Speaker 1:That's that. That is this. That's success. That is life. Like that. You've won the game of life. You've made it through the absolute fucking worst, made some money, lost some money, got a good job. Now and you can just focus on what really, really truly matters being a husband, being a father. And so many of us never learned that lesson, by the grace of god. Some of us stumble upon it and we realize, like, have that epiphany of like, oh shit, being a husband, being a father, that's what matters, like, nothing else. Like if I can put food on the table, if I can take care of them financially perfect. It doesn't mean I have to fucking have extravagant getaways to disney every month. It doesn't mean we have to go to the fucking italian coast. No, just provide, give them, keep them safe and have, you know, a successful like ability to look at your kids and say you're not drug addicts, you're not on the street. I've succeeded, like that's what matters in life yeah, thank god.
Speaker 2:I mean they're only like eight and ten. So if they were drug addicts on the street, man, I would have. Really I'd be in a bad spot.
Speaker 1:But um, if you're in california that could happen, that's true morgan, thank you so much for being on here. Man again, um, where can we go get this book right now?
Speaker 2:uh, go snag it on amazon guns, girls and greed. I was a blackwater mercenary in iraq and you have to do it with like a lower tone so it sounds cooler. Um, did you do? Uh, did you do an audible as well? I did, uh, you know jay moore, the guy that was in like um, he was in jerry mcguire yes, absolutely yeah he read my book. He's a good friend. Um, yeah, that's. That's the weird thing that happens when you write books. You get to meet like celebrities and stuff. It's very weird.
Speaker 1:Um, I'm already picturing that dude read your book.
Speaker 2:Holy shit yeah that voice is iconic yeah, no, and he like he's. He's the reason I got sober six months ago, almost in the day. Uh, he's the reason why I got sober and like to your point earlier, you know, be a good human and then trying to help out other people. If I can help out any contractors with like defense base act claims, uh, hit me up on social media. It's easy to get a hold of me. Uh, send me a message request, because that's, you know, just being a good dude is pretty much that's my, that's my mission in life right now, until until blackwater 2.0 comes back and I'm there with my, with my oxygen tank, being like let's go to tajikistan. Yeah, ir, iran is not being nice. We could, we could really free the shit out of them.
Speaker 1:It may be happening. I know that may be. That may be happening. I'm not saying put me in, coach, I've done my time. I'd rather be at home, you know, with my wife and raising a family. But you know, hey, hey to all you out there that are still in the fight take care of yourself. Drone warfare is no joke and we'll see you all here next time. Until then, take care. If you like what we're doing and you're enjoying the show, don't forget to share us, like us, subscribe and remember we get through this together. Take care, thank you.
