Speaker
John McPhee
Appearances over time
1 episodes
Episodes
1
Podcasts
Quotes & moments
John McPhee says just 10 Delta Force operators cleared the Tora Bora mountain stronghold in 10 days — a fortress the Russians could never take with 10,000 soldiers.
John McPhee completed 10 official combat deployments, plus additional surge and extended tours as a Sergeant Major, before retiring in 2011.
John McPhee reveals that Osama bin Laden wrote a death letter during the Battle of Tora Bora because he believed he was going to die, but a mysterious ceasefire and unidentified helicopters allowed him to escape.
John McPhee and his older brother decided they would be better off on their own at around age 12, and ended up living in a brothel run by a woman who was kinder to them than anyone they knew.
McPhee argues the U.S. should have killed Saddam's sons and warned him to cooperate, rather than toppling him. Saddam protected Christians, kept Iraq relatively Western, and was a bulwark against exactly the kind of chaos ISIS eventually created. Removing him broke the whole system.
Redman just read about the 1879 Arctic expedition where men cut frostbite off their own feet and kept walking. He's tough — and he's not sure he could have survived that. The lesson: every generation has to practice hard things or it loses the ability to do them. We are getting softer, and the consequences are real.
McPhee flew from his outpost to Bagram Air Base to restock beef jerky and Pop-Tarts for his team. A senior commander asked if he wanted to go on a solo reconnaissance mission into Tora Bora instead. He said yes. For 10 days he moved alone through enemy checkpoints, posing as a local, and videotaped the man who facilitated bin Laden's escape.
At 15, Jason Redman walked into a recruiting office at 5-foot-nothing and 95 pounds and said he wanted to be a SEAL. The recruiter chased him out. He came back. Multiple times. The recruiter chased him out again. He almost joined the Army Rangers, failed a physical over a ruptured eardrum, found a new recruiter, and finally got in at 17. The lesson: being told you can't is fuel.
Redman's CO had just lost 11 teammates in Red Wings and had every reason to expel him. Instead he gave Redman a second chance and sent him to Ranger School. Redman then quit Ranger School in a moment of ego — spent a month picking up trash at Fort Benning — and it was exactly the humbling he needed.
John McPhee grew up on Chicago's South Side being beaten up daily on the school bus, left his parents at age 12, and lived in a brothel because the woman running it was kinder to him than anyone else he knew. That background of hardship and self-reliance turned out to be the perfect preparation for a career in Delta Force.
John McPhee showed up at the Army recruiting office in the late '80s with a mullet, asking to be an Airborne Ranger. The recruiters laughed at him. He didn't care — he'd been underestimated his whole life, and he would make it to Delta Force anyway.
A buddy handed McPhee a yellow sticky note with a time and a field location at midnight before the tryout. He showed up hungover at 6 AM to a selection process he knew nothing about — and passed. Sometimes your best work happens with a headache.
In December 2001, just 10 Delta Force operators cleared Tora Bora in 10 days — a mountain stronghold the Soviet army with 10,000 soldiers could never take. They bombed the hell out of it with Air Force support, killed bin Laden's inner circle, and then watched a mysterious ceasefire stop them from finishing the job.
McPhee argues the U.S. can't be trusted as an ally because it operates on 4-year election cycles while adversaries plan for 50 years. We flip-flop, pull out, and then act shocked when things fall apart. The bin Laden case is just one example.
The Navy has spent millions trying to boost SEAL graduation rates, but the attrition rate has stayed around 75% since World War II. Two things make a SEAL: the no-quit gene, and the ability to rapidly process information and make decisions in chaos. Physical size is almost irrelevant.
Redman arrived in Afghanistan in 2005 with ego, arrogance, and outdated tactics. He made a catastrophically selfish call on a mission focused on his own glory, and his commanding officer had to decide whether to end his career. His team called for him to be expelled. He nearly took his own life that night.
One week after being shot through the face, Redman wrote a sign on his hospital door banning anyone from entering with sadness or pity. It went viral, inspired Michelle Obama, earned him a White House visit, and now permanently hangs in the wounded ward at Walter Reed. The most powerful thing he ever did wasn't on the battlefield.
Redman says the real pandemic isn't COVID — it's the victim mindset. Political leaders across the spectrum are actively convincing people they cannot save themselves and need to be rescued, usually by the government. America was built on self-leadership, grit, and resilience. We're moving backwards.
Redman got directly involved trying to evacuate interpreters and allies during the chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal. He calls it one of America's greatest foreign policy failures — turning the country back over to the exact terrorist group the U.S. fought for 20 years. It will damage American intelligence collection for decades because no one will trust us again.
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What they talk about
- Government 50%
- History 38%
- Health & Fitness 12%
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