TRIGGERnometry - The Truth About War with Combat Veteran Kelsi Sheren

00:00:00.560 We don't know what we are asking people to truly go do.

00:00:03.780 We just tell them to go do it.

00:00:05.100 That's why rich people don't send their kids. 1.00

00:00:07.980 And we say, ah, but that was their job.

00:00:09.860 They signed up for it. 0.99

00:00:11.480 Most of us don't have a goddamn clue. 0.99

00:00:13.580 What does it feel like to pull a trigger on a kid? 0.99

00:00:15.640 What does it feel like to watch someone get stoned to death?

00:00:18.000 What does that smell like when you have to go pick up burning bodies?

00:00:21.380 It's like you're not going to win against cultures like this.

00:00:25.040 They are willing to do what we are not willing to do.

00:00:27.780 We don't know how we're going to react until we react, until we're in it.

00:00:31.560 And I thought I'd be fine until I wasn't.

00:00:34.920 Compliance moves fast and Moody's can help organizations move even faster.

00:00:38.880 Leveraging AI to help you gain quicker insights and reduce bottlenecks.

00:00:42.400 Let Moody's help your organization navigate change with confidence.

00:00:45.520 Visit moody's.com slash kyc slash ai dash study to discover how.

00:00:50.140 Kelsey, first question.

00:00:52.820 What makes a 19-year-old girl want to join the military and go and fight abroad?

00:00:57.780 I didn't necessarily want to fight abroad as much as I wanted to join the military because I was a lost 18-year-old kid that came from a small town.

00:01:08.200 And I met an incredible lady on a bus. 1.00

00:01:11.020 Yeah.

00:01:12.200 I met a lady on a bus. 0.99

00:01:14.100 And she changed my world.

00:01:16.400 I was going to the—so you guys here in the U.K. call it Remembrance Day as well, so I don't have to Americanize it for you.

00:01:22.080 But it was Remembrance Day, and I always go down to the ceremonies.

00:01:25.940 I grew up with a family that was very much supportive of the military, the people who fight for the country.

00:01:31.960 We never had military in the family, but Remembrance Day is a non-negotiable.

00:01:35.560 So I was in college at Algonquin in Ottawa, Ontario, and that being the capital, they do the biggest ceremony.

00:01:42.280 I went down, and I came back to the college, and there was a lady on the bus who—God, I was young, so I could have said she was older, and I wouldn't have guessed how old, but she was quite old.

00:01:51.340 And she was in an Air Force uniform, and she just had rows of medals, and she just looked like she had lived a life worth dying for.

00:02:00.340 And that intrigued me, so I spoke to her for a little bit, and for whatever reason, I got off the bus that day, and I walked into my professor's office and said, I'm quitting.

00:02:08.960 And I went and found the closest office to join, and I joined the military.

00:02:13.860 Wow.

00:02:14.580 Yeah.

00:02:15.160 And then how long did it take you before you were on the front line?

00:02:18.860 Let me do the math here real quick.

00:02:22.600 Less than a year and a half.

00:02:23.900 Less than a year and a half.

00:02:24.820 Yep.

00:02:25.780 Wow.

00:02:26.280 Yeah, it was fast.

00:02:27.380 And what was the training like?

00:02:29.340 Were you given intense training?

00:02:30.860 Were you taught everything that you needed to do?

00:02:33.420 Well, here's the kicker.

00:02:34.840 So I'm an English-speaking Canadian, even though our country's second language is French.

00:02:39.240 You learn it a little bit in elementary school, but it's not the language of predominance unless you're in French immersion.

00:02:44.280 So I was joining the Canadian Army knowing that French is around.

00:02:50.340 I did basic training.

00:02:51.920 I did SQ and DP1, which is like your trade-specific training and all your weapons handling.

00:02:56.440 From that point on, I was then posted to an all-French-speaking unit, completely French, out of Vachetier-Quebec.

00:03:03.540 I did not speak fluent French, but I was given the option to go to my posting or go to this posting who was going to be deploying faster.

00:03:11.180 And at the time, they have you playing war games, right?

00:03:14.540 They have you, you know, feeding it down your throat.

00:03:16.840 The media, you know, these bad dudes, these bad dudes, coffins are coming home, flags are draped.

00:03:21.380 You want to go.

00:03:22.440 You want to go use your training.

00:03:23.700 You want to go fight.

00:03:24.360 So I was given the opportunity to switch postings from an English one to a French one.

00:03:30.040 So I did.

00:03:30.600 And I went with an all-French unit.

00:03:32.560 That's where it got a little tricky.

00:03:37.400 Really?

00:03:38.300 Yeah.

00:03:38.780 So I was a blonde 19-year-old, five-foot, you know, 100-pound female that walked into an all-male platoon that was an all-French-speaking platoon.

00:03:47.960 My sergeant to this day, he speaks English now, but when I got there, the only things he mustered was, I don't want you.

00:03:57.760 And I was like, yeah, well, we're here now.

00:04:00.980 But anyway, great guys.

00:04:03.540 My sergeant, he's now an officer.

00:04:05.260 He's a good friend of mine still to this day.

00:04:07.100 But it was just a new experience, and I was open to the new experience.

00:04:11.200 And I didn't have that idea of what I was walking into.

00:04:14.200 You know, we ask people to go do these jobs, and we say, ah, but that was their job.

00:04:19.020 They signed up for it. 0.98

00:04:20.640 Most of us don't have a goddamn clue. 0.98

00:04:22.800 But also, you, because I've heard another interview of you where you were talking about you were into taekwondo. 0.99

00:04:29.480 You were getting to a very good level.

00:04:30.940 Yeah.

00:04:31.360 And then there was, I think it was your coach sexually abused one of your friends.

00:04:37.140 Yeah, my training partner for a few years.

00:04:38.700 Yeah.

00:04:39.100 Yeah, so I'll clarify that because there's been some, ugh.

00:04:42.440 So I fought high level.

00:04:44.460 I was a national champion by 12.

00:04:45.880 And my training partner up until that point, there were multiple years we did not know that he was sexually assaulting her when I wasn't at our morning sessions.

00:04:53.760 So if I didn't go, that's when it was happening.

00:04:55.080 They say it was consensual.

00:04:56.260 I don't know how much a 13-year-old girl and an almost 40-year-old man can be consensual, but we'll leave that up to the courts.

00:05:02.480 So at that point, I stopped fighting right around 13.

00:05:07.300 I stopped that track of where I wanted to go professionally with it, left it, and I then, you know, just focused on other sports.

00:05:14.640 And then I got back into fighting again once I joined the military.

00:05:18.320 So I started to fight within the military service.

00:05:21.240 And my last fight was in Las Vegas at the U.S. Open, and I believe I was 19.

00:05:24.960 It's the last time I fought.

00:05:26.320 Something about getting kicked in the face and having to skip in the sauna to lose weight was just not something I was in for anymore.

00:05:31.080 Yeah. And you mentioned that a lot of people, when they sign up, they don't know what they're signing up for.

00:05:35.940 We had a very interesting interview with a British colonel, Richard Kemp.

00:05:40.120 And when we asked him why people joined the military, he was like, because they want to go and fight, and that's what they want to do.

00:05:45.840 But you signed up because this woman inspired you.

00:05:50.060 Did you anticipate actually, like, then ending up in a conflict zone?

00:05:54.160 For sure. I can't be naive and say I didn't.

00:05:56.220 I walked into the recruiter's office, and they were very, very clear.

00:05:58.780 I mean, we were seeing it on the news.

00:06:00.380 We were, coffins were coming home, right?

00:06:02.000 More American, for sure. 0.75

00:06:03.260 Canada just started to become an ISAF nation within Afghanistan.

00:06:07.260 But in two, I think, I don't want to get this wrong, but I believe 2006, 2007, Nicola Goddard was our first female killed.

00:06:14.280 And she was a FU, forward observation officer.

00:06:17.200 And I knew, they made it clear, you're going to deploy.

00:06:20.500 We're doing six-month cycles, and you are going to deploy.

00:06:23.860 It's just a matter of when, because the trade I had chosen was tagged red, meaning we need people, desperately.

00:06:30.940 So I knew I was going to be going.

00:06:32.500 And what was the trade?

00:06:33.460 Artillery.

00:06:34.060 Artillery.

00:06:34.540 Yeah.

00:06:34.920 So I ran the M777 155-millimeter howitzers, which shoot around upwards, max 40 kilometers, about 100 pounds per round.

00:06:44.340 And did you choose to go into the artillery, or was that something that was chosen for you?

00:06:48.400 I wanted to do infantry.

00:06:49.720 They told me I was too small.

00:06:51.500 And then they suggested artillery as the next option, because something about sitting in a tin can while it drives down the road that's filled with IEDs didn't, you know, wasn't a pretty good thing to me.

00:07:00.480 I would have been a great driver because it's small and compact.

00:07:04.360 But I wanted to be more effective on the front lines.

00:07:07.840 All I kept, and the only thing I really knew was I wanted to make sure I was affecting change.

00:07:13.520 And it takes all types.

00:07:14.920 You need the clerks.

00:07:15.780 You need the QM.

00:07:17.320 You need all the people that do the paperwork and get the ammunition and all that.

00:07:19.880 But I didn't want to be one of those people.

00:07:21.660 I've always been the forward-leaning, and as you can see at lunch, a type personality.

00:07:26.080 Yeah, you're pretty high energy when we're talking about that.

00:07:28.480 But it makes you fascinating to speak with.

00:07:30.680 And I was wondering if, you know, the time you had with this French-only speaking unit, you're the only one there.

00:07:41.260 You're a five-foot small woman. 1.00

00:07:43.900 The guide doesn't want you there.

00:07:45.920 How do you get from that to, you know, deploying?

00:07:49.800 You clearly, you know, you actually doing the job.

00:07:52.220 What was that period like?

00:07:53.380 Was it like a GI?

00:07:55.260 No, God, no.

00:07:56.480 It's the Canadian military.

00:07:57.480 Relax.

00:07:57.820 We're hard people, but, my God, no.

00:08:01.080 It's like basic training.

00:08:02.560 By the time I got to him, I'd already done my training.

00:08:04.840 I was already a trained gunner.

00:08:06.560 I'd already pulled the lanyard.

00:08:07.600 I'd already done the sleep deprivation, the weapons handling, all of the things that make you a, quote-unquote, soldier, right?

00:08:15.180 Once you do your trade-specific training and you graduate through that, then you are considered, like, that trade specialist.

00:08:22.220 So I was already a gunner.

00:08:23.480 You don't become a gunner until you pull your first lanyard.

00:08:25.600 You know, that piece of string really matters.

00:08:27.060 So you got to do that.

00:08:29.480 To actually fire the howitzers.

00:08:30.600 You actually have to fire the howitzers, yeah. 0.99

00:08:32.140 And so we trained on the 105s, which are smaller. 0.99

00:08:35.180 But once you do that, then you graduate from that and then you get to your posting and you go to your units and things like that.

00:08:40.460 So for me, it was pretty simple.

00:08:41.860 I annoyed the living shit out of them until I understood enough of the language where I didn't have to be like, hey, sergeant. 0.85

00:08:49.180 And I would use him like a translator. 0.99

00:08:51.240 I'd be like, question pour vous, quoi clock en français, anglais?

00:08:57.640 And so he just built up a tolerance.

00:09:01.720 But I think the reason the tolerance was there, in my opinion, at least, was I was willing to do the job.

00:09:08.020 And I loved the job.

00:09:09.120 And I loved the hard work.

00:09:10.360 The harder, the better.

00:09:11.240 The more volunteer, like, I'm here for it.

00:09:14.280 And from a physicality standpoint, I was in shape.

00:09:19.420 I could handle the job.

00:09:20.820 I didn't have an issue with the job.

00:09:22.240 So as long as you show up, you normally have to prove yourself a little bit.

00:09:25.620 Prove yourself.

00:09:26.240 Once you do that, then the respect is there.

00:09:28.120 But you have to kind of go through that first.

00:09:30.160 And so you got deployed to Afghanistan.

00:09:32.980 And what was that like the first time you set foot on Afghan soil?

00:09:37.420 Because that must have been a hell of a culture shock.

00:09:39.840 Hot.

00:09:41.040 Yeah.

00:09:42.300 Hot.

00:09:42.820 50 degrees.

00:09:44.020 That was an interesting concept because we did our workup training for Afghanistan in Wainwright, Alberta, in the winter.

00:09:50.020 So it made sense.

00:09:52.460 It tracked, right?

00:09:53.160 That tracked, as the military does, that makes total sense.

00:09:55.560 We did a little bit in Texas.

00:09:56.760 It wasn't super hot, but it was hot enough.

00:09:59.060 But yeah, I mean, I got to the country.

00:10:01.300 And just like everyone else, we fly into CAF, or at least Canadians, we fly into CAF, which is this spot in Kandahar.

00:10:06.660 Which is a, you know, there's a Tim Hortons there.

00:10:08.900 There's a boardwalk.

00:10:09.880 There's a ball hockey.

00:10:11.620 I can see your face.

00:10:12.580 There's a subway.

00:10:13.740 There's, it's where the officers and your in and outs kind of go.

00:10:17.340 And we were only there for three days.

00:10:19.140 So it was kind of a, a soft entry into the country, if you will.

00:10:23.400 Once we got picked up by the Chinook and got taken to the FOB, we were with an American FOB out in the middle of the Mewan District. 0.68

00:10:28.980 That's when things got real, real, real, real, real quick.

00:10:31.880 Because you realize within this tiny base, everybody outside of it wanted to kill you.

00:10:35.720 So these were just HESCO walls filled.

00:10:38.240 HESCO is like a, like a material, like a soft material.

00:10:41.480 And you fill it with stone and then you make walls out of it.

00:10:43.700 So you realize really quickly that, you know, you stepping outside of here, you don't know what you're getting and who wants to shoot you.

00:10:49.620 But most people, for sure.

00:10:51.440 So that was a shock in terms of that.

00:10:53.260 And then our very first fire mission was, was an interesting one.

00:10:56.940 Tell us about it.

00:10:57.580 Well, I mean, it's the first time you realize that you're not just shooting for target practice.

00:11:01.720 You're shooting HE, you know, high explosive rounds downrange.

00:11:04.780 What do you think you're landing on?

00:11:06.660 And even then there's a disconnect, right?

00:11:08.680 Because you're pulling a lanyard, waiting for the all clear, saying, you know, you hit the target or, you know, adjust, which means, oops.

00:11:16.580 So we adjust.

00:11:17.800 Well, we missed as much because once you drop an artillery round, I mean, it just takes out a lot.

00:11:23.340 So you're not going to miss per se, but it was a disconnect for sure.

00:11:28.520 You hit the wrong thing is what you're implying.

00:11:30.380 It happens.

00:11:31.600 We try not to hit the, listen, we, most of our people, my guys were super accurate.

00:11:35.220 I, every guy I served with, I got to be honest, like they were switched on.

00:11:38.240 My unit was switched on.

00:11:39.340 Like I can speak for my guys and not the rest of them, but my guys were switched on.

00:11:42.700 And I got the privilege of my gun troop, my gun troop was, out of all the Canadians that deployed that time, we were taken to an American fob.

00:11:53.740 Everybody else went to Canadian fobs.

00:11:55.400 So then I got to work with Americans, learn their culture a little bit, which is hilarious when you jump on a radio and only French speaking starts speaking to Texans. 0.98

00:12:05.160 I got to tell you, the comedy was the greatest part about that.

00:12:08.680 And what's the main difference between the Canadian and the American military?

00:12:13.960 I would think.

00:12:14.960 Really?

00:12:15.560 I mean, we're drastically different in the sense that we don't have Marines, right?

00:12:19.160 So like Americans have, you know, the Marines and the Air Force and the Navy and the Army, and we just have Army, Navy, Air Force.

00:12:24.140 And we have special operations as well.

00:12:26.460 But I mean, we have similarities, but we have differences.

00:12:29.040 Language is different.

00:12:30.040 Weaponry can be a little bit different.

00:12:31.660 They get the Gucci kit.

00:12:32.880 We get what Canada will give you.

00:12:35.060 You know, it's just, it's a different dynamic.

00:12:36.880 And we're part of, you know, we're part of the British, the monarchy.

00:12:41.480 I mean, Canada falls under, you know, you guys, you guys control everything.

00:12:44.660 So it's just different.

00:12:46.680 The culture is different, right?

00:12:48.040 Drastically different.

00:12:49.040 Because a former guest of ours on the show, he served in Afghanistan.

00:12:54.220 And he said a lot of the times, and I'm not putting words in your mouth, you can push back on this.

00:12:58.820 Americans very much had a policy of fire first, ask questions later.

00:13:02.500 And he said that as a British soldier, particularly as he was a conduit between the British and the Afghan tribes, he would be building these bridges.

00:13:11.960 And then the next day, they would just get burned to the ground because, you know, people would die on friendly fire and whatever else.

00:13:19.100 It happens.

00:13:20.020 It's an unfortunate result of war.

00:13:22.200 I personally had never experienced a friendly fire incident.

00:13:25.280 And I have a lot of friends that do that live with that for the rest of their life, and they'll never be the same from it.

00:13:29.720 They arguably struggle more from that than they do from anything else in the war.

00:13:33.720 You know, that's never, it's never what you want.

00:13:35.360 It's not ideal.

00:13:37.200 It's really hard to win a war against people who don't play by the same rules.

00:13:41.420 That's a really interesting thing.

00:13:43.120 I think particularly topically speaking, when we talk about Israel, Palestine, for example.

00:13:49.300 I knew that was coming up.

00:13:50.160 Well, I actually, I had no plans to talk about it, but I just, I think you probably have an insight into that conversation that the overwhelming majority of people don't.

00:14:00.140 Do you have anything to say about that?

00:14:02.320 Playing by the different set of rules to the enemy?

00:14:04.860 I think that we're doing the, I think we have the same problem, right?

00:14:07.360 I think it's, I'm not going to, I'm going to be very clear about this.

00:14:12.300 You've never seen me talk about it on Instagram or social media for a reason.

00:14:15.540 I'm, I try really hard ever since I started podcasting on my show about three years ago to really stay in my lane unless I am really, really knowledgeable.

00:14:26.680 What I will say about that involvement is it's really hard to win against an enemy that values death more than they value life, period.

00:14:37.640 You can't, and it's not that we should ever eradicate humans.

00:14:43.700 I don't, here's the thing.

00:14:47.380 Anybody I believe who's ever been to war and seen true violence will never advocate for war.

00:14:52.140 But we will advocate for strategic insertion because there are bad people that need to die.

00:14:59.780 That is a reality.

00:15:01.340 And I'm not going to pretend that there's not.

00:15:03.000 There are people out there that should not be here.

00:15:08.720 And we do our job to send the SEALs and the JTF-2 and the, you know, the Rangers and the guys that know how to do this without a conventional fighting force on the ground.

00:15:17.800 I'll never advocate for a fighting force on the ground conventionally the way we did in Afghanistan.

00:15:21.480 I think a lot of people died that didn't need to die.

00:15:24.720 That being said, I don't love either side of that war.

00:15:29.920 Look, they're part of the Geneva Convention.

00:15:33.980 I have issues with the way some things are being done.

00:15:36.660 It's hard to fight a force that has a government, a recognized government that's a terrorist organization.

00:15:43.280 But here's where I get controversial.

00:15:46.820 Where was everyone when the Taliban were cutting hands off kids and blowing them into pieces? 0.63

00:15:56.660 Where was everyone's rage when women were being stoned to death and raped?

00:16:01.620 Where was everyone's rage when people were putting teddy bears in backpacks full of IEDs and setting them in front of schools?

00:16:08.400 Where were you all for the past 20 years?

00:16:10.080 You didn't say anything then.

00:16:14.320 Innocence were happening then.

00:16:16.460 So why now?

00:16:18.780 Why the outrage now?

00:16:20.560 Because it's we pick and choose what we have outrage over. 0.85

00:16:23.260 I have a hard time with that.

00:16:25.100 I had an actor recently say this to me.

00:16:27.820 We were doing a thing for Apple and we were chatting after and he said, you know, I'm going to go.

00:16:32.720 I'm going to go over there next week.

00:16:35.080 So what do you plan on doing?

00:16:37.240 I want to record the things people aren't talking about.

00:16:41.020 I think Douglas Murray's got that dialed right now, bro.

00:16:43.960 I think we're I think we're we're good.

00:16:45.780 And he goes, I got to I got to go in.

00:16:47.440 They're my people.

00:16:48.680 And by his people, he meant Jewish.

00:16:50.700 And I was like, OK, I fully hear you.

00:16:52.560 Like, I get that.

00:16:53.600 But you're about to see some things that you're never going to unsee.

00:16:56.240 And I don't know that you're really ready for that.

00:16:58.720 And he goes, well, I have to tell the story.

00:17:00.120 I said, OK, cool, man.

00:17:00.800 Cool.

00:17:01.320 And he goes, and this is where it got me.

00:17:03.080 And my husband was in the room and he looked at me and he's just like, don't don't.

00:17:06.560 He goes, it's never been this bad.

00:17:09.980 People have never died like this.

00:17:11.400 This brutality has never been seen before.

00:17:16.080 OK, bud, let me tell you some stories.

00:17:20.460 And then I did.

00:17:21.400 And he still couldn't believe me.

00:17:23.960 And that's the thing that gets me.

00:17:25.700 It's like we we bomb people all the time.

00:17:29.560 We kill innocent people all the time.

00:17:32.240 But why?

00:17:33.220 Why the outrage now?

00:17:34.260 Because it's convenient outrage.

00:17:35.880 It's convenient.

00:17:37.260 It's politically better to side with one side or the other right now.

00:17:41.740 I've never seen anything like I have seen these Hamas protests across the world.

00:17:48.680 I don't know how you guys are feeling about that.

00:17:50.700 I think I know how you guys are feeling about that.

00:17:52.660 I'm just going to go with that.

00:17:54.440 But I've never seen anything like it.

00:17:55.940 That's like that's like us during the Afghanistan war having the Taliban.

00:18:04.560 Marching around London and everyone being like, it's cool.

00:18:08.220 It's cool.

00:18:09.100 It's not cool.

00:18:10.220 None of this is cool.

00:18:11.360 None of this is acceptable.

00:18:12.800 None of this should be OK.

00:18:14.840 Spreading hate for hate's sake.

00:18:18.380 Like.

00:18:19.840 You go out on the streets and ask somebody what river, what sea.

00:18:24.340 What's their response?

00:18:27.320 From the river to the sea.

00:18:28.380 Of course, I've chanted it. 0.79

00:18:29.680 Do I think that all Israelis should be pushed out of the country or Jews or should be treated like this?

00:18:35.520 No.

00:18:36.460 Do you know which river and sea they're talking about, by the way?

00:18:39.300 I don't know the name.

00:18:39.860 The river, I know the Mediterranean, it would be the sea, but no, I wouldn't know the river now.

00:18:46.020 OK.

00:18:46.500 Yeah.

00:18:47.580 That's it, yeah.

00:18:48.460 OK, perfect.

00:18:49.080 Thank you.

00:18:49.420 I'm so tired of the social justice warriors who have no clue what they're saying. 1.00

00:18:55.580 And when they say, go kill them, go kill them all. 1.00

00:19:00.380 You have no idea what it's like to watch someone's lights go out. 1.00

00:19:05.720 So don't tell me, go kill them all. 0.99

00:19:08.260 You have no clue what you are asking another human being to go do. 1.00

00:19:13.140 If you think it's so easy, you go do it.

00:19:16.600 Send your kids. 0.52

00:19:18.060 Tell me how that works out when they come back.

00:19:19.760 If they come back.

00:19:22.060 I just, I think we, I think we just start wars. 0.81

00:19:27.180 And I think everything that happened on the 7th is not OK.

00:19:31.740 And there has to be repercussions, obviously.

00:19:34.540 Honestly, I just don't, I don't agree with it.

00:19:38.980 I just don't agree with like on either side, just mass violence.

00:19:41.980 I just, I've seen it and I've seen what it does to both sides of people.

00:19:47.460 And it's the kids that are going to have to live with this.

00:19:50.880 It's the families.

00:19:52.500 It's not the person that dies.

00:19:53.940 They're gone.

00:19:55.420 They're gone.

00:19:56.480 They don't feel it.

00:19:57.220 They don't experience this.

00:19:58.140 But like we, what that creates.

00:20:01.680 OK, let's just pull that apart for a second.

00:20:03.140 What does that create when someone dies?

00:20:05.240 Or when someone's murdered?

00:20:06.400 Because that's really what this is.

00:20:07.660 This is murder.

00:20:08.220 This is genocide.

00:20:09.460 Both parties. 0.74

00:20:10.280 Everyone's just killing everybody.

00:20:11.660 What does that create?

00:20:13.160 Well, what did it create when the Soviets were in Russia? 0.86

00:20:16.360 I don't know.

00:20:17.040 I was being shot at with Soviet weapons.

00:20:19.300 So it creates kids and uncles and brothers and aunts and cousins and family members who are

00:20:26.840 now brought up generation after generation to just continually hate each other and perpetuate

00:20:33.080 more violence and perpetuate more war.

00:20:36.040 For what?

00:20:37.780 It's that saying, an eye for an eye makes the world go blind.

00:20:41.960 So how do we fix it?

00:20:44.460 I'm not the person to ask.

00:20:46.280 Kelsey, do you think part of the problem is that war is one of those things that you just

00:20:51.840 simply can't explain?

00:20:52.960 And everybody that I know who has been to war, I remember my grandfather, who was a desert 1.00

00:20:58.320 rat and fought in the Battle of El Alame and fought in Italy in the Second World War.

00:21:04.260 He never talked about it.

00:21:05.720 He talked to me about his training. 0.93

00:21:07.500 And being a kid and being an ignorant little kid, and I remember trying to ask him about 0.95

00:21:11.540 it. 0.96

00:21:11.660 He always never talked about it.

00:21:13.960 But people who have never been have this almost idealized, romanticized image of what war

00:21:19.960 actually is.

00:21:20.960 Hollywood's done a great job of that.

00:21:23.960 Right?

00:21:24.420 Because we'll think about what people are learning.

00:21:27.220 They're not learning from textbooks the way that we used to learn, where you would open

00:21:30.640 the page and be like, oh, there's Pompeii.

00:21:32.260 There's the bodies.

00:21:33.060 There's the conversation.

00:21:34.460 Then you go to Pompeii and your jaw drops.

00:21:38.320 And you think of all of the damage.

00:21:40.000 We were walking back from lunch.

00:21:41.160 And what did I keep saying?

00:21:41.880 It's like, somebody died there.

00:21:43.180 Somebody was shot there.

00:21:44.080 Something bad happened here.

00:21:45.500 Because there was war here.

00:21:49.260 People don't forget.

00:21:50.900 It's not that people don't forget.

00:21:53.020 Places don't forget.

00:21:54.080 It's the people that change within that.

00:21:55.920 And we, you know, the history is written by the victors in every sense of the word.

00:22:03.300 I think Hollywood and other people glorify violence to make a lot of money.

00:22:08.020 I think we don't talk about what it really means, what it smells like, because war has

00:22:15.060 a smell, what it feels like, because it has a feel.

00:22:20.920 And I don't think that we articulate it well enough.

00:22:23.860 I think that's why we're so quick to just send our kids over.

00:22:27.040 We don't have an understanding of what they're about to see and what they're about to do.

00:22:30.680 I mean, there's a few films that have done an incredible job.

00:22:32.440 Fury with Brad Pitt was brilliant, was brilliant, like illustrating the smells and like the

00:22:38.600 textures of what war is, you know, but then you have like glorified Navy SEAL movies and

00:22:44.060 all of these things, right? 1.00

00:22:45.220 It's like, rah, rah, rah, let's go to America, let's go fucking kill everybody. 1.00

00:22:48.340 It's like, okay, but what does it feel like to pull a trigger on a kid? 1.00

00:22:52.140 And what's it feel like to watch someone get stoned to death?

00:22:56.480 What does that smell like when you have to go pick up burning bodies?

00:23:01.520 It's not illustrated in anything.

00:23:04.480 Do you think there's a part of human nature that, it's a strange thing to ask, but enjoys

00:23:11.100 it, that likes it, that, you know, chimps go to war, humans have gone to war for our entire 0.95

00:23:16.820 history. 1.00

00:23:17.220 Is there a part of us that is actually into this shit? 0.99

00:23:21.200 I think there's got to be some level baked into humanity. 1.00

00:23:24.580 I mean, we're human beings.

00:23:25.900 We live these human experiences.

00:23:28.460 I mean, I'm guessing you would have served with some people who would have had a great

00:23:32.600 time out there.

00:23:33.180 Rock hard during firefights.

00:23:34.960 Yeah.

00:23:36.100 Some dudes loved it.

00:23:37.660 Some dudes loved it.

00:23:40.240 I can't speak for them.

00:23:41.740 I didn't love that.

00:23:43.460 I, uh, it's not that I didn't hate it either, but there's something that happens when you

00:23:52.020 watch someone die.

00:23:53.120 That's one of your own that switch flips and it's not that you love it anymore, but you're

00:24:00.220 willing to do it on a different level now.

00:24:01.840 Because you are, quote unquote, radicalized by the experience?

00:24:07.000 I would think so on a level.

00:24:08.380 Yeah.

00:24:08.680 Yeah.

00:24:09.060 Now it's like, well, you killed mine. 0.94

00:24:10.720 I come for you. 0.99

00:24:11.860 Right.

00:24:12.280 And then that notches up a different level.

00:24:13.960 However, that changes the mind psychologically in those events.

00:24:16.980 Something happens.

00:24:17.760 I felt it.

00:24:18.380 It's like a light switch.

00:24:19.780 I can't describe.

00:24:20.480 That's the only way I'm, I've been able to articulate it to this day.

00:24:23.240 I mean, it's been almost 14 years.

00:24:25.680 I still say it's a light switch where I could feel, uh, almost a wall go down where everything

00:24:33.000 I was feeling, the rage, the level of anger, the violence was okay to me.

00:24:37.380 It was okay.

00:24:38.760 So you were talking about basically being desensitized.

00:24:41.780 A thousand percent.

00:24:42.800 Yeah.

00:24:43.560 And that to me makes complete sense because that's a survival mechanism.

00:24:46.760 Because if you were aware of everything that was happening and you were taking it all

00:24:49.940 in, I mean, that would destroy you psychologically.

00:24:52.500 Oh, it did.

00:24:54.240 Oh, it did for like a decade.

00:24:56.920 Um, but I think some people, it doesn't have that effect on, which is really, really fascinating

00:25:02.580 to you.

00:25:02.920 I mean, I've got guys who, you know, nine, 10, 11, 12 tours and yeah, they've got some

00:25:08.900 stuff and they work through it. 0.99

00:25:10.120 I'm like, damn, like, damn, like you've been, I do not claim to be that person. 0.99

00:25:18.300 I don't, I don't know that I could have been that person. 0.99

00:25:19.760 I'm not made for that, but I think you desensitize.

00:25:22.360 And I think your job depends on that.

00:25:25.100 And the people to the left and right of you depend on you to be able to pull a trigger

00:25:28.560 without having an empathy switch turn on.

00:25:30.580 Like, oh, I'm not sure about this.

00:25:32.020 Like, you know, we, they, they do a good job of baking that into you when you're in the

00:25:35.860 service.

00:25:36.180 And tell us more about your time in Afghanistan, because, um, most people listening would go,

00:25:41.780 well, look, you're, you're pulling the lanyard on a Howard.

00:25:44.340 So how are you experiencing all of these things?

00:25:46.800 How do you go from that particular situation to having these terrible experiences and everything

00:25:52.720 else that you talk about?

00:25:53.880 I got borrowed.

00:25:56.140 Uh, I got, I got borrowed.

00:25:58.360 So at the time when I was serving, the Canadians allow women to do combat arms roles, but the

00:26:05.180 British and the Americans did not. 0.90

00:26:07.280 Um, and this was new.

00:26:08.380 The, the United States military started integrating women like 15, 16 into these more combat arms 0.98

00:26:12.580 roles.

00:26:12.840 Like women are around for sure. 1.00

00:26:14.260 But I went with the British. 0.96

00:26:16.560 And so, uh, we got, I just, listen, I'm not, I wasn't anybody special.

00:26:21.500 I just got told where I was going.

00:26:23.220 I got ball and told is what I call it.

00:26:24.960 I just got a call, came down, uh, to my Sergeant, uh, the FOB and they said, uh, she's been picked

00:26:29.940 to go with the, the, the, the, the third Scots and the Blackwatch people.

00:26:34.520 And she's going to go out on operation.

00:26:36.060 We're picking her up in two days.

00:26:37.760 And so I got picked up in two days.

00:26:40.740 Um, at the time my Sergeant fought it tooth and nail.

00:26:43.520 He's like, no way she is going.

00:26:45.760 It's not prepared for that.

00:26:47.480 I'm a gunner. 0.96

00:26:48.800 I shoot the howitzers. 0.56

00:26:50.420 I don't run and gun and kick doors in. 0.93

00:26:52.520 We're trained.

00:26:53.380 Obviously every, every soldier is a soldier.

00:26:56.040 You know how to shoot a gun.

00:26:57.020 You know how to move with a gun.

00:26:58.500 But the only way that I survived that was because I was given extra training because

00:27:01.460 my Sergeant had under been to war before and understood what that could potentially

00:27:05.260 look like if we had to move those guns and go outside the wire with them.

00:27:09.340 So.

00:27:10.180 Can I, yeah.

00:27:11.000 Why were you borrowed in this way?

00:27:13.020 I was a female.

00:27:14.200 This is what I was going to say.

00:27:15.340 Because before we started, you were like, the reason I watch your show is you ask questions

00:27:19.000 that everybody has on the tip of their tongue, but is afraid to ask.

00:27:22.160 And that seemed to me like the most obvious question to ask. 0.99

00:27:24.760 Yeah, the vagina in the room. 1.00

00:27:26.100 Right. 0.99

00:27:26.540 That was me.

00:27:27.060 Yeah.

00:27:27.540 I have one.

00:27:28.080 I'm a woman.

00:27:28.520 I'm one of those.

00:27:28.840 So they actually put you in more danger in order to put you so that they could.

00:27:34.320 We abide by the Geneva Convention.

00:27:36.220 And what does that state?

00:27:37.500 Well, when you are with women who are in burqas and things like that, the men cannot 1.00

00:27:41.620 search them, nor can they touch them.

00:27:43.020 But I can.

00:27:44.440 Right.

00:27:45.080 I can get all kinds of handsy with you.

00:27:46.640 Right.

00:27:47.080 Right.

00:27:47.540 And what we were seeing was they were starting to hide radios, money, other things that would

00:27:51.820 indicate that they were working with the Taliban.

00:27:54.980 So my job, we would stack on a house, kick the door in.

00:27:58.700 I would go in and take the women and kids, put them all in a separate room. 1.00

00:28:01.940 I would put a translator and a Brit at the door.

00:28:04.440 And then I would go in and I would search all the women and kids for anything, really. 0.99

00:28:09.240 And so you were also, so you were always the person to do that.

00:28:12.860 Now, that is high risk because obviously you don't know where you're going into.

00:28:16.260 But there's also the risk as well of suicide bombers.

00:28:20.360 There was a lot of risks.

00:28:21.320 I think there was one situation, well, there was only one situation where I was concerned

00:28:25.360 and it was a mom that came at me with these like material cutting shears. 1.00

00:28:29.780 But that's an easy handle.

00:28:31.740 It's not, it's not the end of the world.

00:28:33.460 It's more of being in the room when you are alone with a bunch of people and their children,

00:28:39.300 right?

00:28:39.540 So you've got kids that are crying and screaming.

00:28:41.640 You've got a bunch of women that don't, I mean, we kick their door. 1.00

00:28:44.680 Okay.

00:28:45.420 We wait till morning prayer is over because at least we did that.

00:28:49.040 And then we kick your door in. 0.96

00:28:50.500 I mean, that's, imagine I'm a mother now.

00:28:53.620 So it's like, I can imagine somebody kicking my door in and going, I'm taking your kid with

00:28:57.440 me.

00:28:59.000 No, no, no, no, no, no, no, you're not.

00:29:01.340 So I can imagine and I can understand and have empathy now for why the women act the way 1.00

00:29:05.360 they acted.

00:29:05.960 But I was also in super rural areas where, you know, the imam or the person was there.

00:29:11.560 Like, that's all they knew.

00:29:12.640 They couldn't read or write.

00:29:13.940 They didn't ever see photos of themselves.

00:29:16.180 And they would chew.

00:29:17.220 And I still don't know what it's called, but it's like this, it acts like a drug really.

00:29:22.440 And even young girls would chew it.

00:29:24.040 And so sometimes you get them in the room and they're all just doing this and you got

00:29:27.480 to put them up against the wall in a duck position to kind of put them off guard.

00:29:30.680 And it's, it's just a whole, it's just a whole vibe.

00:29:33.000 But the kicker was, I wasn't trained to do that job.

00:29:35.040 I did not deploy to do that job.

00:29:36.760 That was not my specialty at all.

00:29:39.940 I got zap straps right before and a pair of gloves and said, good luck.

00:29:44.540 And so, and obviously you had to do the job.

00:29:47.340 There was no, there was no, there was no choice.

00:29:49.160 But that seems to me just really bad practice, isn't it?

00:29:53.400 No, it was.

00:29:54.920 It was not meant for success, man.

00:29:57.480 That's not what I was there for.

00:29:58.820 I was there to, basically all I was told was like, look, like when I deployed, I was

00:30:04.000 a no hook gunner.

00:30:05.040 So I was in the army for a year and a half.

00:30:07.480 They dropped me with the Brits and then they, the Brits told the Brits, like, if she says

00:30:10.580 stop, everyone stops.

00:30:12.120 Meaning like, this was my specialty.

00:30:13.680 It's kind of like the bomb dog handler or the medic.

00:30:15.460 Like there's only a few of us, right?

00:30:17.040 So we listen when that one speaks.

00:30:20.400 I'm doing here.

00:30:21.340 I'm like, if I find something, I know what I'm looking for.

00:30:23.840 I know what I should be seeing.

00:30:25.200 But ultimately I was not trained to do that job in the way that I should have been doing

00:30:33.780 it.

00:30:34.040 So maybe I was a little more rough.

00:30:36.640 Maybe I could have been better.

00:30:38.120 Maybe there was a better way to go about it.

00:30:40.320 But I was given a 30 minute crash course from the RCMP about like my legal rights and what

00:30:46.060 I can to do to someone and what I can't.

00:30:47.640 Can't duct tape them, but I can zip tie them.

00:30:49.740 Can't put a bag over their head, but I can cover their eyes.

00:30:52.600 Get what I mean?

00:30:53.980 Small differences.

00:30:55.180 Small differences.

00:30:55.740 If they had things on them, I had to place them down in front of them and show them that

00:31:03.220 I didn't take it, but it was in their vicinity.

00:31:05.740 And eventually that just became out the door with it because I'm not tolerating it anymore.

00:31:10.680 Right?

00:31:11.280 You're in a room with a lot of people.

00:31:12.820 You don't really have time to be like, this is where your necklace is.

00:31:15.040 With no translator either, which was awesome.

00:31:19.200 So, and most of the time they thought I was a little boy.

00:31:21.240 So then the men would freak out in the room.

00:31:23.200 Then I'd have to take my, because it's like a little boy's going in the room with all

00:31:25.960 these women. 1.00

00:31:26.640 And I have to take my helmet off and show that I was a female. 0.99

00:31:28.800 And then we'd have that dance.

00:31:29.940 And it's always fun.

00:31:32.380 And again, politically incorrect, but this is so fascinating.

00:31:38.060 I imagine there is, I imagine kicking someone's door in and invading their home in that way,

00:31:46.480 particularly initially, is a kind of internally very unpleasant experience.

00:31:51.320 Even if you're quite low empathy like me, I don't think I would enjoy doing that.

00:31:56.520 The first time I did it, it was very uncomfortable.

00:31:58.540 Right.

00:31:58.800 But I also imagine that then your own concern for your own security and the security of your

00:32:05.400 teammates kicks in and overwrites that.

00:32:09.520 And eventually it becomes automated.

00:32:11.880 And it's only later that perhaps you start the process.

00:32:15.180 I didn't process anything.

00:32:16.780 For me, it took, it took a little bit.

00:32:20.760 But once we started to lose people and bullets started to fly, I didn't care at all.

00:32:28.200 Frankly, I just only cared about the people in our uniforms.

00:32:31.340 Like that wall that you talked about earlier.

00:32:33.660 Yeah.

00:32:33.900 That's a real wall.

00:32:35.200 Yeah.

00:32:35.660 It allows you to do a lot of things.

00:32:37.640 And it's also as well because you inevitably see these people, I imagine, as the enemy.

00:32:43.320 You have to.

00:32:44.080 To an extent.

00:32:44.700 Like, look, I, for a long time, the women and children, I never really had an issue with.

00:32:50.700 The men, though?

00:32:51.700 Yeah.

00:32:52.500 Yeah.

00:32:53.120 That took, even when I got home from Afghanistan, that took me a hot minute to be around a Middle 1.00

00:32:57.220 Eastern man without just being, you know, shifty. 0.98

00:33:00.640 You know, that, that whole feeling.

00:33:02.040 But, yeah, it took a little bit.

00:33:04.580 But I did my best.

00:33:05.560 I did my best.

00:33:06.640 I did my best to see people as human beings until all of a sudden they weren't.

00:33:10.520 Yeah.

00:33:10.740 And the moment that they weren't is at the moment that they became a threat or they showed

00:33:16.740 a particular side of themselves or?

00:33:18.700 They didn't do anything wrong.

00:33:20.420 Most of the time, the women and kids never did anything wrong, right? 0.99

00:33:23.320 They may have hated you, but they weren't violent with me until they were violent, right?

00:33:28.220 So it's like I judged people just like I judge in life.

00:33:31.560 It's like if you give me a reason to dislike you or have a reason, I'm probably going to

00:33:35.280 feel some type of way.

00:33:36.160 I'm going to look at why I feel that way and go, is that a projection of something going

00:33:41.280 on with me first off?

00:33:42.480 But when I was over there, no, I, I, you're outside the way or you were a threat.

00:33:48.540 It's that simple because they wore the same clothes as everyone else.

00:33:53.460 They made a good job to blend.

00:33:55.140 And that's really hard to win against.

00:33:57.540 Right.

00:33:57.680 Because you're not fighting an army.

00:33:58.880 You're fighting a resistance force.

00:34:00.500 Correct.

00:34:00.620 And that's completely different, like Hamas at the moment.

00:34:03.080 Absolutely.

00:34:03.600 So you get borrowed into this.

00:34:04.860 Your job is to go in with a team that kicks in doors.

00:34:07.920 You search people, et cetera.

00:34:09.720 What happens from then?

00:34:11.200 Afterwards?

00:34:12.440 Well, you had a whole bunch of experiences in Afghanistan.

00:34:16.120 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:34:16.440 Tell us about that.

00:34:17.360 Yeah, I had, I was out with the Brits for, it sounds short, but we're out there for a week

00:34:22.800 and it was just not a good week.

00:34:24.500 It was a larger conventional fighting force that was kind of attacking things.

00:34:28.800 And I only recently found out last week what we were even doing.

00:34:31.700 So that was interesting.

00:34:32.720 We were looking for IEDs and caches and things like that.

00:34:35.940 So, sorry to interrupt.

00:34:37.220 You were out in Afghanistan in armed combat and you weren't even informed about what you

00:34:43.740 were meant to be doing.

00:34:44.740 It's above my pay grade.

00:34:46.820 Search the women and kids. 1.00

00:34:48.460 Shoot we need to shoot. 1.00

00:34:49.620 Move we need to move. 0.99

00:34:50.700 Protect you guys.

00:34:52.400 That's all you need to know.

00:34:54.400 Wow.

00:34:54.720 I mean, dude, I was in the army for like a year and a half.

00:34:59.360 Like, what are they going to tell me?

00:35:00.240 Like, oh, we know we're Saddam.

00:35:01.420 Like, they're not going to give me the...

00:35:03.540 But, you know, I would imagine...

00:35:05.160 Yeah, it's messed up.

00:35:06.020 Yeah.

00:35:06.400 I would imagine the reason is, look, you need to do this because ultimately we need to

00:35:12.520 secure this area and blah, blah, blah in order that this can happen.

00:35:16.240 I wouldn't expect you just to be put in somewhere and you literally have no idea.

00:35:22.760 He's a military expert, you know.

00:35:25.120 Yeah.

00:35:25.660 Well, you might not have been in Afghanistan around that time, but we were...

00:35:30.500 It was a rough, I mean, you know, 7 to 12, whatever you want to say, Canada's involvement.

00:35:36.420 2009 was a really rough year, really rough fighting summer for a lot of countries.

00:35:40.900 The Brits lost a lot of guys.

00:35:42.120 Americans lost a lot of guys.

00:35:43.080 Canada lost a lot of people.

00:35:44.140 It was a particular aggressive...

00:35:46.400 There was a vote that was going on that year.

00:35:48.560 It was just vicious.

00:35:49.880 And ultimately, the summertime is the worst because they're harvesting opium.

00:35:53.900 Well, what do they use to buy weapons?

00:35:55.560 What is the...

00:35:56.000 Like, you know, the summer, they're going to put more of a resistance up.

00:35:59.900 At least that's what we found on my operation.

00:36:01.780 I'm trying not to be blank because I know there's people who are going to be like,

00:36:03.700 well, the summer was in the winter too.

00:36:05.300 I get it.

00:36:05.900 I get it.

00:36:06.560 We all had our experiences.

00:36:07.880 I get it.

00:36:09.940 But yeah, so for me, it was definitely interesting.

00:36:13.320 When I was with the Brits, we end up having an IED death where somebody, their foot hit

00:36:19.480 an IED.

00:36:20.240 That was my first experience of what an IED will do to a human body.

00:36:25.000 And then I was one of the people that...

00:36:29.580 It's always a gross conversation.

00:36:31.880 I was one of the people that was body collection for that individual.

00:36:36.200 And if you know anything about the Taliban and what they love to do is they love to watch.

00:36:41.380 And they love to set off secondary devices once everyone rushes in for help.

00:36:45.260 So as soon as that first IED went off, things happened.

00:36:49.920 They kicked again.

00:36:51.220 Mortars started coming down.

00:36:52.260 Rounds started coming down range.

00:36:53.240 And then we had to get to there to get him out.

00:36:56.160 But I wasn't prepped for that.

00:36:58.940 I didn't handle it great psychologically.

00:37:02.360 I mean, I did the job really well.

00:37:03.860 Like, you know, autopilot, do things, move, run, shoot.

00:37:07.980 When I got back, that's when I started to rub my hands pretty excessively.

00:37:11.540 And I started to struggle.

00:37:12.560 And the medic saw it and noticed it and was like, you're good.

00:37:15.100 It's good.

00:37:15.780 You're fine.

00:37:16.480 It's all good, bro.

00:37:17.280 And I'm like, oh, good.

00:37:18.260 And then we just cracked on 15 minutes later.

00:37:21.220 So that was the first time I had experienced a death in front of me.

00:37:24.560 And also listening to the ICOM radio, listening to the Taliban praise that they got one of our guys.

00:37:30.480 So that infuriates and stokes a level of anger that's really hard to articulate.

00:37:36.740 But then after that, you know, just we were just in countless firefights.

00:37:39.520 And we were just dealing with war stuff.

00:37:41.920 You know, every time you move, they shoot.

00:37:43.280 Every time you shoot, they shoot.

00:37:44.560 You're just fighting a group of people that would rather die and be honored to die, right,

00:37:51.720 than you are anything else.

00:37:53.160 And that's hard to wrap your brain around that people would prefer to die than to live.

00:37:57.820 But I mean, like a million songs have written about it.

00:38:00.120 They've told us now, like they've showed us who they are.

00:38:02.500 I don't know why we're all surprised.

00:38:04.560 People are shocked.

00:38:05.680 It's like, really?

00:38:07.240 And this may sound like a weird question, but does it ever occur to you at this point to go,

00:38:11.940 guys, guys, I signed up to be a gunner.

00:38:13.660 Oh, you don't get to say that.

00:38:15.900 Right.

00:38:16.500 No, no, I am property of the Canadian Armed Forces, son.

00:38:20.660 You go where you're told, you shut your mouth, you do your job.

00:38:23.700 I was excited to go.

00:38:25.640 I'm not going to pretend I wasn't.

00:38:26.620 I was super stoked.

00:38:27.720 We were in a fob.

00:38:28.800 All we were doing was sending rounds down range.

00:38:30.800 It gets boring when you're not shooting, right?

00:38:33.040 And for artillery, it's like you're on call.

00:38:35.660 It's not like, oh, we're going to shoot today at this.

00:38:37.480 I mean, it is if the Americans are planning an operation.

00:38:39.980 They're like, we're going to need loom at this time, this many rounds.

00:38:43.840 Otherwise, you wait for a radio and then you could be out on a run around the fob or you

00:38:48.580 could be working out or in a shower and you just hear missing all set.

00:38:51.700 And it's like everyone, everyone drops towels, whatever.

00:38:54.900 And you run to the guns and then you get ready to go.

00:38:57.180 And so it was a very already a heightened state all the time.

00:39:01.300 We're like, oh, we're going to, when are we going to go?

00:39:03.260 We're just waiting.

00:39:03.900 And you get bored.

00:39:04.760 And then I got favoritism because I got picked, right?

00:39:09.380 Because I was the woman.

00:39:10.580 So I got picked up and they took me away and everyone stayed at the fob.

00:39:14.480 And I went to do what everybody wanted to go do, which was go fight in war.

00:39:20.940 Did you get hooked on that adrenaline?

00:39:25.360 Oh, yeah.

00:39:25.820 When I came back from that, I didn't want to go back to the guns.

00:39:29.280 I wanted to stay with the guys because they rotate us women, right?

00:39:32.940 Yeah.

00:39:33.260 So instead of just keeping a CST, which is called a cultural support team,

00:39:37.520 is what they call them now, they would just like rotate us through.

00:39:40.840 And what happens is like when you get back, like a CST gets back,

00:39:43.960 what they do is they don't like go with the guys and like process like you were mentioning

00:39:49.340 and handle it and talk about it.

00:39:51.660 They go, see you later.

00:39:52.900 And then you go back to wherever you came from.

00:39:54.460 And then you go back, however you are psychologically or whatever it is.

00:39:59.300 And you have to cope with that in a group of people who don't understand what you just went

00:40:02.260 through, nor do they believe it, nor were they there, nor will they understand. 0.98

00:40:06.380 So you just naturally outcast yourself, which is a really shit situation to be in because 0.97

00:40:11.840 you, it doesn't have to be like that. 0.98

00:40:14.080 We can do better.

00:40:15.180 We can absolutely do better.

00:40:17.400 We just don't.

00:40:17.960 And you talked about the hand rubbing and that's obviously OCD and a form of PTSD as well.

00:40:24.580 Oh yeah, I've got all of that.

00:40:26.240 And when did you start to notice that your mind and the way you saw the world was being

00:40:34.660 adversely affected by the experiences that you were being put through?

00:40:38.200 I got back to CAF and I'm mouthy.

00:40:43.040 I know that.

00:40:44.120 Sorry, CAF is?

00:40:45.320 CAF is where you fly into when you get out of Afghanistan.

00:40:47.460 So I got back to CAF because that's where they would do the operations in and out of.

00:40:51.940 And like I said, I'm mouthy, but I'm not.

00:40:54.480 I know my line in subordination.

00:40:56.480 I know the charge.

00:40:57.200 I know the deal.

00:40:58.180 But I stopped sleeping.

00:40:59.820 I stopped eating for like days.

00:41:02.080 I would just pace.

00:41:04.700 And then ultimately it kind of came to a head when a QM warrant officer told me that

00:41:08.540 my braid was a mess and that I didn't have any ammunition left in my mag.

00:41:13.580 When we walk around CAF, you have to have a full mag on you.

00:41:15.720 I didn't have anything left.

00:41:17.720 And I told the, I think I told the warrant officer, you would know if you left CAF why

00:41:24.120 I didn't have any, you know, just like being nasty.

00:41:26.780 And then ultimately that got brought to the staff.

00:41:29.380 They sent me back out to the FOB.

00:41:30.760 And they had medicated me without telling my staff.

00:41:34.260 So I was on 11 different drugs, sleep meds, uppers, downers, you name it.

00:41:38.680 I was on all of these different medications to get me to sleep, to get me to function again

00:41:41.760 while running a machine gun.

00:41:44.260 And ultimately I went out onto the tower one day and I saw something that wasn't there.

00:41:49.760 And instead of like I racked around and my guy was like, what are you doing?

00:41:54.180 It was a kid.

00:41:55.340 She was waving, but I thought she was pointing.

00:41:58.240 I didn't do anything.

00:41:59.480 I knew that wasn't right.

00:42:01.300 And I jumped off the tower and I went and told the radio guys, I was like, I'm not okay.

00:42:05.040 Something is not okay.

00:42:06.140 They had a conversation about it.

00:42:07.700 There was some yelling and screaming.

00:42:08.820 And then they sent me back to the hospital at, in CAF to get me checked out by a psychiatrist.

00:42:13.660 And, oh yeah, he sat down with me within like 10 minutes.

00:42:16.220 He's like, oh, okay, you're going to go home soon.

00:42:19.740 And then they sent me home three weeks early with a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder.

00:42:24.760 And then I was ripped away from my unit and I never saw those guys again.

00:42:29.980 And then I was medically released in 2011.

00:42:32.120 Wow.

00:42:33.680 Yeah.

00:42:34.440 And then how much care was given?

00:42:36.680 Because PTSD, that's a term that gets bandied about, but that is incredibly serious.

00:42:43.220 I mean, I came home and I attacked a Muslim family in a Walmart. 1.00

00:42:46.680 So I wasn't good. 0.92

00:42:48.000 Like it was serious.

00:42:48.940 It was to the point where I wasn't functioning.

00:42:51.540 I wasn't functioning at all.

00:42:54.000 I stopped eating.

00:42:54.860 I stopped sleeping.

00:42:55.720 I got violent.

00:42:58.200 I would say horrible things about anybody who looked like I hated the way I was.

00:43:03.880 When I look back now, I mean, I was 19.

00:43:07.360 It did damage.

00:43:08.100 It did damage for the majority of my, you know, I mean, I'm 34 now.

00:43:12.400 I kind of started getting myself together around 2016.

00:43:16.440 Really psychologically started getting myself together around 19, 20.

00:43:21.040 21 is when it got really good.

00:43:22.540 And that's when psychedelics came in.

00:43:24.920 So, yeah, I mean, there was no care, right?

00:43:27.420 That's why I was med boarded out.

00:43:29.140 Because at the time, Canada didn't, and my sergeant will say this to this day,

00:43:32.340 we didn't know what to do with you.

00:43:34.240 We hadn't encountered what had happened to you yet before.

00:43:37.920 And we did not know how to work with you or how to fix that

00:43:41.160 or how to keep that going or keep you in the service.

00:43:43.320 Is that, how is that possible?

00:43:44.640 I mean, PTSD is pretty common in soldiers, isn't it?

00:43:47.440 Yeah, for sure.

00:43:48.140 But it's, normally the soldier will say, is smart enough to say, no, I'm good.

00:43:54.980 But I was being honest because I was like, well, I'm not good.

00:43:57.960 And these aren't good.

00:43:59.380 But what I didn't realize was that would mean that I would lose my job.

00:44:02.120 So, normally the guys would be like, yeah, I'm good. 0.99

00:44:06.460 They might go and do crazy shit, but it's more, so you write it off. 0.99

00:44:10.340 Yeah, absolutely, 100%. 0.98

00:44:11.780 How do you think most of the special operations operate?

00:44:14.820 You think that they're always feeling great about their stuff?

00:44:18.440 No, they have a job to do.

00:44:19.940 You don't want to abandon the guys that you were with, so you say, I'm good.

00:44:23.700 Doctor goes, okay, check, moves on.

00:44:27.500 I just, because of the operation I was in, it was known what happened.

00:44:31.920 And it was a bigger deal for me to be a part of.

00:44:35.060 And so, they knew what happened.

00:44:37.340 And I couldn't lie my way out of that.

00:44:39.520 I was a part of something that was nasty.

00:44:41.080 They knew.

00:44:41.900 They knew it wasn't going to be great.

00:44:43.620 And the biggest flag was I got quiet.

00:44:50.200 That's, something's wrong if I get quiet.

00:44:51.960 And the support that you got from the military was minimal, I take it.

00:44:59.020 It was just a lot of meds.

00:45:01.040 But there was no therapy?

00:45:03.020 They tried.

00:45:04.320 They tried.

00:45:05.340 They give you a non-qualified social worker.

00:45:08.820 Non-qualified?

00:45:09.760 Yeah, it was really funny because I just found out this year when I was going through my documents

00:45:13.040 with my psychiatrist who's been treating me since 2011.

00:45:16.380 And he flipped through and he went, yeah, no wonder you were as bad as you were.

00:45:20.840 Because they gave me people to work with me that were not qualified to handle what had just happened.

00:45:26.180 Because, again, Canada's involvement was much later, right?

00:45:28.840 We weren't in Iraq and all these places.

00:45:32.480 You know, Canada really started to crack on.

00:45:33.980 Was it 06, 07?

00:45:35.740 I mean, I was 09.

00:45:37.660 So, we weren't super, super, super in it yet.

00:45:41.520 You know, we hadn't gone through all of that yet.

00:45:43.360 But we started to see it.

00:45:44.900 We started to see people turn around with multiple deployments and have issues.

00:45:47.700 But the guys would just come back and drink, right?

00:45:50.000 Our guys would come back and drink.

00:45:51.220 Like, one of my buddies, a sniper, and he was like, yeah, we would just, we would handle it our way.

00:45:55.560 But all we want to do is go back outside the wire.

00:45:58.240 We just want to keep doing our job.

00:45:59.620 And that's all I wanted to do.

00:46:01.820 But I just made the mistake of saying I wasn't okay.

00:46:04.900 That was my mistake.

00:46:06.640 Well, you're not being serious, though, right?

00:46:08.320 Because now that you've been through all that and you...

00:46:10.920 Oh, now I'm not.

00:46:11.880 No, I am dead serious, though.

00:46:13.040 But at that time, that was my mistake.

00:46:14.980 Yeah.

00:46:15.620 Now, I don't think it was a mistake.

00:46:17.340 Absolutely not.

00:46:17.960 I think it would have been compounding.

00:46:19.640 And I think that's kind of what happens, right?

00:46:21.500 Is we put people in these situations.

00:46:23.420 Everyone says they're good, they're good, they're good.

00:46:25.360 Compound, compound, compound, compound.

00:46:28.520 Medication, medication, alcohol, medication, compound, medication.

00:46:32.020 Oh, I'm not good anymore.

00:46:33.120 Yeah, you think?

00:46:33.800 And what you've just described just explains why we have so many problems with veterans

00:46:41.160 when they come back and they're completely unable to function in society.

00:46:45.080 And it's, well, what did you really expect?

00:46:49.020 If you put people in that situation and they do and they get exposed to those type of experiences,

00:46:55.440 it's going to make reintegration and a normal life, in inverted commas, pretty difficult.

00:47:01.760 Well, this goes back to what I stated before.

00:47:03.800 We have no clue what we're asking people to go do, right?

00:47:07.660 So it doesn't, shouldn't be a surprise that we've gone from 22 a day to 44 a day and climbing.

00:47:14.760 44 a day suicide?

00:47:16.240 Mm-hmm.

00:47:16.700 Wow.

00:47:17.240 My TED Talk was on that.

00:47:19.200 I did a TEDx a couple weeks ago for an organization called Honor House that I support.

00:47:23.800 And they let me put in some of my information.

00:47:26.540 And the first thing I started with is, what does the number 44 mean to you?

00:47:29.660 To an audience of 1,800 people who had no clue what that number meant.

00:47:35.220 That's pretty indicative in what's going on in the world.

00:47:38.140 We don't know.

00:47:39.680 When we ask people to go do this, we don't understand what that does to the families

00:47:44.020 and to the children and to all of these people, right?

00:47:46.600 It's, again, we don't know what we are asking people to truly go do.

00:47:50.220 We just tell them to go do it.

00:47:51.540 That's why rich people don't send their kids. 1.00

00:47:55.100 Because it's just the reality, right?

00:47:56.660 You don't see, like, yeah, Harry went.

00:48:00.140 Relax.

00:48:01.280 That's, like, one.

00:48:02.460 Where's all the other politicians' kids?

00:48:04.720 They're at the Ivy League schools being smart, using their brain, right?

00:48:08.140 And if you're lucky enough and you come back and you can use your brain,

00:48:10.600 you can use your GI Bill to go do awesome things, for sure.

00:48:14.380 But there's going to be an adjustment period.

00:48:16.100 And for some people, it's a decade.

00:48:17.300 And it's decades.

00:48:17.920 And some people don't ever adjust and they take their lives.

00:48:20.260 Some people, they adjust, they get home, and they crack on, and they're totally fine.

00:48:24.080 Everybody's different.

00:48:24.560 That's the thing about being humans.

00:48:25.820 We can't, we don't know how we're going to react until we react, until we're in it.

00:48:30.680 Right?

00:48:30.820 I thought I'd be fine until I wasn't.

00:48:33.140 Right?

00:48:33.600 Logically.

00:48:34.520 You know what I mean?

00:48:35.240 Yeah.

00:48:35.880 Yeah.

00:48:36.520 We've had Dan Crenshaw on the show.

00:48:38.000 I don't know if you know of him.

00:48:39.140 Yeah, I know of him.

00:48:39.660 He seems to be one of the guys that is okay, despite all of his injuries and the experiences he went through.

00:48:46.680 Mm-hmm.

00:48:47.900 I don't know, Dan.

00:48:49.740 Yeah, I don't know.

00:48:50.540 I, listen, I, there's something that is said in the community.

00:48:54.620 It's like, nobody hates a successful veteran more than another veteran.

00:48:57.800 I don't know if you've ever heard that saying.

00:48:58.980 No.

00:48:59.500 Yeah.

00:48:59.920 Talk to enough of us.

00:49:02.000 We're comedians.

00:49:02.740 It's kind of the same.

00:49:03.540 Yeah.

00:49:03.680 But that's my point, though, right?

00:49:07.380 Yeah.

00:49:07.820 I don't really have much to say about Dan.

00:49:09.500 I don't know him well enough.

00:49:10.400 Yeah.

00:49:10.600 And I don't know his deal well enough.

00:49:12.300 I mean, like I said, I've got plenty of friends who are special operators.

00:49:16.000 And I'm very, very privileged.

00:49:18.700 And I say that out of the utmost respect.

00:49:20.880 I'm very privileged to be in the circles I am in and to be welcomed into the ones I am.

00:49:24.540 And the special operators that I am around.

00:49:26.660 Yeah, man, these guys were 25-year, crack on, you know, clapping dudes like it was nothing.

00:49:31.420 But now they have to come into this life.

00:49:33.260 And I've seen their transition.

00:49:34.780 And they go through just as hard as everyone else does.

00:49:38.380 You know, it's just about your network of support and if you have one or not.

00:49:41.440 That's the key.

00:49:42.420 I see.

00:49:42.920 That's very interesting.

00:49:43.640 Because in his books, he talks about his girlfriend and family being so super,

00:49:47.220 fiance, I think she was at the time, super supportive.

00:49:49.540 But anyway, can I ask an even more politically incorrect question?

00:49:53.280 I mean, it's your show, man.

00:49:54.860 I'm here for you guys.

00:50:00.060 I'm curious.

00:50:01.420 How do you feel about the fact that women are increasingly encouraged to serve in combat?

00:50:11.020 Yeah, that's a tricky one.

00:50:15.140 That one's hard.

00:50:16.540 Right?

00:50:17.000 That one's hard.

00:50:18.560 I'm asking from a place of like, I have no idea.

00:50:21.440 I don't have an opinion about it because I genuinely don't know.

00:50:23.780 But you do.

00:50:25.500 Well, you have some perspective.

00:50:27.100 Yeah, I have a hard time with it.

00:50:28.320 Look, women have always been doing combat arms rules in Canada, as far as I'm aware. 1.00

00:50:32.500 I could be wrong and I'm sure I'll find out after.

00:50:36.780 I'm sure all of my opinions will be well known after this.

00:50:40.760 But what I would say is, look, we can do the job.

00:50:43.300 That being said, do we should we be doing the job?

00:50:46.300 That's a different question.

00:50:47.320 That's what I'm asking.

00:50:47.660 Yeah, Mike Ritland asked me this when I was on his show and he goes, look, I don't think

00:50:51.840 women should be integrated with men's units. 0.99

00:50:53.760 There's too much assault.

00:50:54.580 I said, well, let's have the real conversation about how men assault men and no one talks about

00:50:58.160 it.

00:50:59.380 I didn't mean it from that perspective.

00:51:01.060 No, no, no.

00:51:01.520 But I'm saying like normally the conversation is, well, it's an assault issue, right?

00:51:07.220 That's not what I mean.

00:51:08.040 OK, so in terms of actually serving in that capacity, if you can do the job effectively,

00:51:13.220 you should be able to do the job.

00:51:14.400 That being said, there are plenty of men, old school thinkers or even now who are like,

00:51:19.540 whether we like it or not.

00:51:22.560 Men are going to respond differently when women are around, i.e., like if she's in danger,

00:51:27.540 there might be more of an inclination to be like, oh, and then that person gets killed

00:51:31.540 and it's like maybe they wouldn't have reacted if women weren't there.

00:51:34.300 I think there is a need for us, especially when we're fighting up against

00:51:37.860 we're going to be Geneva Convention, so we got to follow it.

00:51:41.320 There's going to be women on the battlefield. 1.00

00:51:42.920 I mean, we got to do something.

00:51:44.060 Otherwise, they're just a soft, they're an opportunity.

00:51:46.700 They're an opportunity for them to abuse us in the sense of we, we respect the Geneva Convention,

00:51:53.440 which means we won't search you or touch you.

00:51:55.160 Well, what do the Taliban start doing for a little while?

00:51:57.560 Berk is on, AK is underneath.

00:52:00.020 So, I mean, you need, I think you do need women on the battlefield. 0.69

00:52:03.400 I think it's hard to, harder to integrate them.

00:52:05.480 I think it has to be a specific type of female. 1.00

00:52:07.860 I think the idea that every woman is going to transition well into that space is naive. 0.99

00:52:12.840 Yeah.

00:52:13.360 Yeah.

00:52:13.820 I guess partly what I'm also asking is, I would imagine just with my cursory understanding 0.99

00:52:20.740 of evolution, this is me talking out of my ass potentially here, very possible. 0.99

00:52:26.460 But is it possible that men evolved to fight more so than women? 0.99

00:52:32.540 I think that's a reasonable statement to make.

00:52:34.960 Yeah.

00:52:35.580 And therefore, how it impacts us potentially.

00:52:40.320 No, for sure.

00:52:41.960 I get what you're saying.

00:52:42.720 So what I'm saying is, just because you can pull the same lanyard that a man can with the 0.87

00:52:49.520 same efficiency and you're strong enough to do it and you're good enough at picking the

00:52:53.660 cord and it's where the shell is supposed to land and you're good at taking orders and

00:52:56.900 you may even be even better, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:52:59.620 Is maybe the impact on you down the line greater because you're just not involved as much to

00:53:07.220 be able to handle the violence, the brutality, the whatever?

00:53:10.020 I've never been asked that before.

00:53:13.720 I feel like I need to ruminate on that before I answer, but I don't think I have time.

00:53:16.880 So let's go with this.

00:53:19.500 I think there's an aspect of that for sure.

00:53:21.220 I think human biology dictates that truly.

00:53:23.940 I think there was plenty of, you know, if you go back into generations of different cultures,

00:53:27.680 women fought a lot. 1.00

00:53:29.840 So I, you know, there's the bloodline, you know, where does your genetics come from and

00:53:34.800 things like that.

00:53:35.480 I was, I grew up as a fighter, so I didn't know any different and that didn't cross my

00:53:42.560 mind at all to even think that, okay, maybe there'll be a genetic component that could play

00:53:46.680 into how I would deal with death and violence.

00:53:50.500 As a mother now looking at that, would I ever go do that again unless somebody kicked my door

00:53:54.920 and hell no, no.

00:53:56.160 So I think for sure, I think there's a biological component that we do overlook that, you know,

00:54:01.780 naturally just due to the wokeism of the world, you know, women can do everything. 1.00

00:54:05.800 So I think there's always going to be a bit of that, but I think it's not about having

00:54:09.980 our place.

00:54:11.240 It's about what is most effective on the battlefield, in my opinion.

00:54:15.500 And unfortunately, due to, you know, the culture, politics, whatever you want to say, you're going

00:54:23.780 to have, you know, we can do everything kind of conversations no matter what.

00:54:28.460 And I think we can.

00:54:29.280 And I have some of the baddest females I know were special warrant officers, special, sorry, 1.00

00:54:33.340 female special warrant officers who went down range with the Rangers, some of the baddest 1.00

00:54:37.000 females I've ever known.

00:54:38.080 But do we need to be there?

00:54:40.760 Well, as long as we're fighting people where we're going to abide by their Geneva Convention,

00:54:43.820 yes, we need to be there.

00:54:44.780 Unfortunately, yes, we need to be there.

00:54:46.760 Until that ends, until we start saying no, we're just going to do that.

00:54:51.600 Well, I mean, that's why we didn't win the war.

00:54:52.860 I mean, we can't, we can't win against things where people aren't playing by the rules.

00:54:56.880 If there's a set of rules, and both of you aren't playing by it, what do you think is

00:55:01.960 going to happen long term?

00:55:03.240 Do you think you're going to win that?

00:55:04.720 No, they're going to outlast you.

00:55:06.640 They've outlasted everyone.

00:55:08.620 I mean, come on.

00:55:10.900 But we have to be politically correct.

00:55:13.120 It's interesting.

00:55:13.680 I think about this all the time, you know, because if I read history a lot, I mean,

00:55:22.380 conflicts are won by the side that is willing to use unmitigated, overwhelming force.

00:55:28.280 And brutality.

00:55:28.960 And brutality.

00:55:29.760 Yes. 1.00

00:55:30.120 Every fucking time. 1.00

00:55:30.940 Every time. 1.00

00:55:31.500 And if you are not prepared to do that, then the other team is going to win.

00:55:35.160 A thousand percent.

00:55:36.240 And we don't, and we, I don't think in the social media world, I said this before, I

00:55:41.080 don't know if the West is ever going to win another war.

00:55:43.500 It's really troubling.

00:55:44.260 And I hate to say that because that sounds terrible, but.

00:55:48.160 I don't know that it's possible.

00:55:50.200 Not, no, because we fall under NATO, which falls over, we have the Geneva Convention.

00:55:54.500 Right.

00:55:54.820 There are things we cannot do, regardless of them being right or wrong. 0.96

00:55:59.540 If we need to kill a bad dude, but he's in a compound filled with women and kids, we're 1.00

00:56:05.060 not going to hit the compound. 0.97

00:56:06.620 Do we need to hit the compound?

00:56:08.840 Probably need to hit the compound.

00:56:10.560 Should we?

00:56:11.820 Well, it depends who you're asking, because the Taliban will hit that compound, no problem. 0.96

00:56:15.620 Better yet, they'll hit the compound, take the women and kids and enslave them into 1.00

00:56:18.300 sex slavery. 0.99

00:56:18.920 So it's like, here, okay, here's the thing.

00:56:21.600 Let me, let me, I don't know if you guys know about this.

00:56:24.080 You might because you're smart individuals, but most people are kind of blind to this.

00:56:27.760 Have you ever heard of, uh, of Man Love Thursdays?

00:56:31.740 No.

00:56:32.200 No.

00:56:33.420 Okay.

00:56:33.880 That wasn't where I expected that to go, I'll be honest with you.

00:56:36.600 We don't even know where it's going.

00:56:38.180 Just give it time.

00:56:39.340 Just give it time.

00:56:41.020 So what happens, you ever heard of Chai Boys?

00:56:44.720 Chai Boys ring a bell? 1.00

00:56:45.740 No.

00:56:45.920 So in Afghanistan, poorer families will take the young boys to the Taliban or those people. 0.97

00:56:53.520 Ah, yes.

00:56:54.200 Okay.

00:56:54.740 Yeah, but.

00:56:55.280 But tell us, anyway.

00:56:56.140 Yeah, so they'll take them to the, um, there, the boys will serve the chai tea and then the 0.99

00:56:59.640 boys get raped. 0.99

00:57:02.200 Okay, well, what do we do about that? 0.99

00:57:05.920 Well, we're not there to fight that, so we let it happen.

00:57:09.100 We let it happen.

00:57:10.860 Well, you see a mother getting buried up to her neck and stoned to death by her husband

00:57:15.240 and children because she looked at a male soldier.

00:57:17.500 What do we do about that?

00:57:18.760 Nothing we can do about that.

00:57:19.820 We're not there to fight that.

00:57:21.480 Right?

00:57:21.900 We're there to fight the Taliban.

00:57:22.760 Yeah, but the Taliban are doing it. 1.00

00:57:24.540 Shouldn't you kill the Taliban? 1.00

00:57:25.220 Shouldn't you kill the father because he's probably associated? 1.00

00:57:27.520 Well, that's just the religion. 1.00

00:57:28.460 It's sharia law.

00:57:29.400 So you can't interfere.

00:57:30.720 We mean it can't interfere.

00:57:31.940 They're about to murder someone in front of me.

00:57:34.860 They didn't shoot you.

00:57:35.640 They don't have a weapon.

00:57:37.080 You see what I'm saying?

00:57:37.980 Mm-hmm. 0.99

00:57:38.280 So it's like we can allow for raping of children and we can allow for open-air sex slavery and 0.99

00:57:45.900 for we can allow for, you know, grown elders to come marry off of seven-year-old girls and 0.99

00:57:53.900 know they're going to be raped the rest of their lives. 0.99

00:57:55.640 But that's fine. 1.00

00:57:57.140 But if you point at me with a gun, then I can take you off the face of the air. 0.83

00:57:59.960 It's like you're not going to win against cultures like this.

00:58:03.340 They are willing to do what we are not willing to do.

00:58:07.020 And that's not about, you know, and I'm going to hear about this for sure.

00:58:09.880 It's not saying that we didn't win.

00:58:11.960 We didn't win.

00:58:14.040 We didn't win.

00:58:15.580 Well, the Taliban's back in charge.

00:58:17.000 So, yeah.

00:58:17.320 They were always in charge.

00:58:19.260 They were always in charge, whether it's by proxy or what.

00:58:22.020 They were always in charge.

00:58:23.560 How about the billion dollars of weapons that were left?

00:58:26.580 I'm sorry.

00:58:27.300 If I lose a flashlight, I am getting a written charge on my record.

00:58:34.020 I had guys on the ground during the pullout who were being told to do the opposite of

00:58:38.380 what we are trained of.

00:58:39.320 We are told anytime you leave something, you destroy it so it can never be used again.

00:58:43.340 You blow up the barrel.

00:58:44.260 You hit the comms.

00:58:45.380 Nothing left.

00:58:46.600 These guys were like, leave it alone.

00:58:48.560 Don't touch it.

00:58:50.160 Why do you think?

00:58:51.620 Taliban can't use broken equipment.

00:58:53.780 Can't they?

00:58:54.820 No.

00:58:56.780 We left everything.

00:58:59.000 It's way above my pay grade, but let's be honest.

00:59:01.800 Like, we abandoned people.

00:59:04.220 Canada abandoned a lot of people.

00:59:06.960 Nobody wants to talk about that because we did a snap election and no one could talk about that.

00:59:10.940 Actually, you'll enjoy this conversation.

00:59:13.040 You know how we were chatting about media prior?

00:59:15.640 Okay, so Afghan pullout happens, right? 0.93

00:59:18.200 And we get this, I get this phone call from a buddy of mine named Griff.

00:59:23.140 He owns a company called Combat Flip-Flops.

00:59:24.660 He's a ranger buddy I was telling you about.

00:59:26.120 And he goes, hey, I got a nine pack of VIP Canadians.

00:59:28.540 I can't get them out of the country.

00:59:30.360 I said, how come?

00:59:31.400 He goes, Canada won't take them.

00:59:33.020 What do you mean Canada won't take them?

00:59:34.440 I don't know.

00:59:34.840 Something's going on with the IRGC.

00:59:36.120 We can't get them in.

00:59:37.020 I need you to try.

00:59:38.320 I'm over here running a jewelry company and a podcast, guys.

00:59:42.440 So I get on social media.

00:59:43.660 We start making connections with people on the ground.

00:59:46.260 And I'm sitting on Signal on my phone and I'm trying to, you know, talk, hey, where are these people?

00:59:50.620 They're doing the whole thing.

00:59:52.220 And I get a phone call from the CBC.

00:59:54.880 Love them.

00:59:56.160 And they're like, you know, Kelsey, we'd like to interview you.

00:59:59.260 We're interviewing a panel of Afghan veterans.

01:00:01.320 We want to talk about how you feel about how the pullout's going.

01:00:05.640 So I said, so you want to call in nationally, across the board, gaslight a bunch of veterans

01:00:11.020 to make us look angry, violent individuals to, you know, justify the way you treat us

01:00:15.060 and, you know, leave us alone.

01:00:16.580 And she goes, well, no, we just want to question you.

01:00:19.600 I was like, cool.

01:00:20.180 All right, cool.

01:00:21.560 The next day, Trudeau calls a snap election.

01:00:24.760 I get a phone call from the CBC.

01:00:26.800 Kelsey, the interview's been canceled.

01:00:28.280 Why has it been canceled?

01:00:29.780 The Trudeau administration has set a blackout on anything Afghanistan related.

01:00:33.640 So as this is happening, while the Brits are coming over to Afghanistan and the Americans

01:00:38.580 are there on the ground and you've got ex-contractors, dudes just flying in on their own trying

01:00:44.520 to help, Canada cut the lines of communication and anybody who had a Canadian visa was not

01:00:51.800 getting out of that country.

01:00:53.860 So we got our family out using Americans and some other people that were willing to do some 0.99

01:00:59.640 dicey things on my behalf.

01:01:01.200 But we got them out.

01:01:02.000 They're in America. 0.64

01:01:02.900 They're in Canada.

01:01:03.660 They're doing great.

01:01:04.500 But that being said, the amount of people we've abandoned, it's like, number one, Canada

01:01:11.160 had the means to get you.

01:01:12.900 Number two, we're not going to get you.

01:01:16.960 So what does that mean down the road?

01:01:18.560 Do you think anybody who we'll ever fight against in another country is ever going to

01:01:22.060 trust us again?

01:01:23.500 No.

01:01:23.940 No chance.

01:01:24.960 Not if they're smart.

01:01:25.980 No, not if they're, you have their head on their shoulders.

01:01:27.880 Right.

01:01:28.300 Right.

01:01:28.680 Because they'll leave and they'll abandon you.

01:01:30.220 A hundred percent.

01:01:31.460 There's so few of them that got that that got out of the country, truly.

01:01:35.340 And it was heartbreaking to watch and witness.

01:01:37.100 So, yeah, I think we lost.

01:01:39.280 I think we super lost.

01:01:40.460 I think that we not only lost, but we set back anybody who supported us, any women and 0.99

01:01:45.580 children, anybody who thought they had a future.

01:01:48.040 The second we left that country, that was over.

01:01:51.340 Those women and kids, unless you're a boy, you're never going to school. 1.00

01:01:54.920 You're never going to be educated.

01:01:55.920 You're never going to have literacy.

01:01:56.720 You're never going to leave.

01:01:57.260 All you're going to do is get married off, just like they started doing again.

01:01:59.780 Just like that. 0.98

01:02:01.820 Into sex slavery that nobody wants to talk about. 0.83

01:02:04.740 Right. 0.60

01:02:05.060 Nobody wants to talk about that.

01:02:06.180 What is it?

01:02:06.480 10.3 million women and children that are in sex slavery.

01:02:10.440 We don't want to have that conversation.

01:02:12.320 Let's not have the conversation about 46.9 million people by the United Nations that are

01:02:16.060 in sex slavery and just slavery in general across the world.

01:02:18.640 But I thought slavery ended.

01:02:19.940 Right.

01:02:20.860 Right.

01:02:22.020 Cool.

01:02:22.340 I struggle with these issues because our people who are making the decisions to go to war 0.99

01:02:30.080 have their heads so far up their asses. 0.99

01:02:33.380 They don't understand what they're doing. 1.00

01:02:35.900 Like these colonels, these people who sent who were running Afghanistan. 0.60

01:02:40.560 Not a single one of them has been reprimanded for the fact that we billions on billions of

01:02:44.780 dollars and we lost how many lives and then we abandoned all of the people and then all

01:02:49.740 of the weaponry.

01:02:50.600 Like that's never we've never abandoned that much weaponry.

01:02:53.440 And I can't even I can't even think of a time where that would have been acceptable

01:02:57.240 behavior.

01:02:57.780 So it's like, of course, things are the way they are.

01:03:02.240 Of course, of course, you know, these countries are the way they are.

01:03:05.900 Of course, we lost the war.

01:03:07.360 Bad leadership.

01:03:09.140 Bad leadership.

01:03:10.640 Kelsey, that seems like a crazy decision.

01:03:12.720 Yeah.

01:03:13.220 Bad leadership.

01:03:14.820 Right.

01:03:15.480 Because that's what it is.

01:03:16.240 Always comes down to that.

01:03:17.520 You have a bad leadership.

01:03:19.480 Things fall fast. 1.00

01:03:21.620 Shit rolls downhill. 1.00

01:03:22.460 That's the same. 1.00

01:03:23.180 Right. 1.00

01:03:23.420 Shit rolls downhill. 1.00

01:03:24.960 Look at Canada right now. 1.00

01:03:26.000 Do you regret joining the army?

01:03:28.360 No.

01:03:30.400 No.

01:03:31.880 I don't regret a thing I've done.

01:03:33.680 Not one thing.

01:03:34.500 Not a single thing.

01:03:35.560 Nope.

01:03:36.000 Made me who I am.

01:03:37.560 That's so interesting.

01:03:38.320 Someone was having that discussion on social media.

01:03:40.560 I think it was Twitter the other day.

01:03:41.700 And I was I really don't know how I feel about that because I am always the same as you.

01:03:46.220 I don't regret anything I've done.

01:03:48.060 But then I go, is that really true?

01:03:52.060 I think I think it's possible to regret things if you imagine yourself being a different person to the person that you were.

01:04:00.420 But you weren't a different person to that.

01:04:02.040 You were the person that you were.

01:04:03.480 The only way you were going to learn the things you had to learn is by doing the things you ended up doing.

01:04:07.420 That's why I don't regret it.

01:04:08.420 Yeah.

01:04:08.820 That makes sense.

01:04:09.340 Do you do you the pull out from Afghanistan atrocious, the war in Afghanistan ultimately unproductive and in fact counterproductive, you might argue.

01:04:22.200 Do you think that is because we never should have gone in the first place or do you think that's because the way it was done once we were in?

01:04:31.340 Well, I think we could only do what we can do again following the Geneva Convention.

01:04:34.340 I think that was going to end up similar.

01:04:36.020 Right.

01:04:36.220 We didn't have a plan for a pull out.

01:04:37.600 We didn't have a plan for succession.

01:04:39.240 We didn't have a plan.

01:04:41.280 And when you go into things without an end result here, you're going to kind of flounder.

01:04:46.600 I'm guessing if they sat down and tried to plan it, they'd probably decide not to go in because they would have looked at history and they would have gone.

01:04:53.360 This is a bad idea.

01:04:54.640 They call it the graveyard of empires for a reason.

01:04:56.840 Exactly.

01:04:57.320 But I think we also went into Iraq under false pre-census.

01:05:00.020 So I think I think we should never have gone in.

01:05:03.400 I think we knew from what I'm and other people can say whatever they want.

01:05:07.000 But from what I was told is like we knew where all those key figure where figures were a long time ago.

01:05:11.200 So it's like we needed a justification to go in to war.

01:05:14.680 We needed a justification to send our women and kids to die. 1.00

01:05:17.220 You can't just be like, oh, well, we knew where this guy was hiding the whole time.

01:05:20.760 We could have gone on like you need a justification for everything.

01:05:24.280 Right.

01:05:24.720 You need to be able to tell the CNN and the Fox of the world why our kids are coming back and in bags or if anything's coming back and not filled with sandbags.

01:05:34.140 Let's be honest with ourselves.

01:05:35.800 Those IEDs don't leave a lot left. 0.97

01:05:37.680 So you need to justify why coffin after coffin after coffin is coming home on herks and women and kids and wives and husbands will not have their spouses again.

01:05:50.080 You need to justify you need to have a reason to justify why literally in 44 a day.

01:05:55.960 So if you do the math on that, I mean, took me from October 6th to November 11th to do my speech.

01:06:02.300 And from that time, it was 1,584 deaths by suicide.

01:06:08.180 That's moms and dads and aunts and uncles and cousins.

01:06:11.660 So how many does that represent?

01:06:13.640 Right.

01:06:14.160 How many does that represent if you take one father away?

01:06:16.860 Because I've seen it.

01:06:17.660 I have tons of friends who now are widows.

01:06:20.360 So many widows. 0.99

01:06:21.620 So many widows. 0.99

01:06:22.780 And to watch them raise their kids and to have to explain to them that daddy couldn't stay around anymore. 0.99

01:06:29.700 Well, now those kids think they couldn't stay around.

01:06:31.900 I wasn't good enough to stay.

01:06:33.080 They have to live with that.

01:06:34.600 So how many does one suicide represent?

01:06:37.620 Because it's not just one person.

01:06:39.000 The ripple effect is astronomical.

01:06:41.860 We've now had, I think it's, if I'm not mistaken, it's four times more deaths since Afghanistan than we did in Afghanistan.

01:06:48.960 So you can't say that any of it was worth it.

01:06:51.560 But yeah, our friends that were there, it's really hard for me to say that because I'd like to think that their lives were for something.

01:06:57.720 And they were.

01:06:58.420 When they were there, we had a mission set and we were doing it.

01:07:01.480 But I mean, look at the way we left that country.

01:07:04.680 That's just, that's just tragic.

01:07:07.380 That's just tragic.

01:07:08.620 To abandon it the way we did.

01:07:10.960 And the people we left there and the blood that was spilled in Iraq and Afghanistan.

01:07:15.460 No, none of that was worth it.

01:07:16.620 You mentioned earlier that you wouldn't send a conventional force anywhere, really, to fight anyone.

01:07:22.420 Did I hear you?

01:07:23.120 Yeah, like large boots on the ground.

01:07:24.740 Yeah.

01:07:25.100 You wouldn't do that.

01:07:26.120 I mean, I'm, you're asking somebody with four years of service if I would change up what a general would do.

01:07:33.020 I can speak to what I would know.

01:07:35.060 The dudes that show up in all black are a lot better than we are. 1.00

01:07:39.960 These guys spend years, years training to go in and take someone out.

01:07:47.440 And they do it effectively for a reason because they're good at it.

01:07:50.980 The SEALs, the Rangers, the Delta, the JTF-2, there is a reason they are the elite of the elite of the elite.

01:07:57.340 You need something done.

01:07:58.320 You send them.

01:07:59.820 Don't send a mass group of like 19, 20, 21-year-olds who are just happy to be here.

01:08:06.160 Right?

01:08:06.480 Like, I mean, let's be honest.

01:08:07.480 It's like, who are you going to send to build a rocket?

01:08:09.960 Are you going to go build a rocket, guys?

01:08:11.560 Are you too qualified to build rockets? 0.97

01:08:12.860 No, we're going to send Elon because we know Elon's got his shit together and we know he understands how to do that. 0.99

01:08:17.900 It's no different than saying, like, I'm going to go be a surgeon. 0.99

01:08:21.900 Did I go to school for it?

01:08:23.020 Nah.

01:08:23.980 But I'm going to do it anyway.

01:08:25.460 What are we doing here?

01:08:27.380 Because we were in a war, we didn't have time to train people super effectively to do the job.

01:08:31.660 So, of course, we're going to have casualties.

01:08:33.620 That's what happens.

01:08:34.600 Of course, we're going to have psychological casualties.

01:08:36.080 We have more of those than we have physical ones, right?

01:08:38.640 So, no, I really think that we need, there are bad people that do need to be eliminated.

01:08:45.840 That is not for sure.

01:08:47.020 But I think there's a better way to do it than the way we've been doing it.

01:08:50.720 Because if you guys haven't noticed, it doesn't seem like we're doing well the way we're doing it.

01:08:56.120 Well, look, I mean, if you look at Israel-Palestine, I mean, I understand why Israel is doing what it's doing. 0.52

01:09:01.920 Of course. 0.98

01:09:02.920 But I also, I see all these fucking Hamas leaders on TV from their luxury hotel room in Qatar. 0.99

01:09:08.840 Billionaires. 0.99

01:09:09.340 And I'm like, why don't they have an accident?

01:09:11.920 Why don't they fall out of the window?

01:09:13.600 Maybe that's the way.

01:09:14.640 Do you see what I mean?

01:09:15.240 Yeah, well, of course I do.

01:09:16.300 I mean, one of my favorite moves that Douglas Murray has made recently was making sure the address was known.

01:09:22.020 Doxing the living hell out of those people.

01:09:24.260 We were waiting for the Uber to pick us up to come here. 0.70

01:09:27.120 And a guy with a Palestinian flag rode by.

01:09:30.400 I just wanted to take a stick and just put it into his spokes so bad.

01:09:35.840 Because that's like me walking around with a Taliban flag in Canada.

01:09:41.020 And everyone being like, do you think that, look, I'm just trying to.

01:09:48.320 Devil's advocate here.

01:09:49.220 Well, no, not devil's advocate.

01:09:50.620 I'm actually just trying to be fair.

01:09:51.780 Because one of the things we started doing on the channel, I don't know if you've had a chance to see, is going out to these protests.

01:09:57.360 I haven't seen them.

01:09:58.180 I've seen like you were doing it, but I haven't watched any clips yet.

01:10:00.840 So I went to the march against anti-Semitism.

01:10:04.100 I went to a Just Stop World protest.

01:10:06.200 I don't know if you have these people in Canada.

01:10:08.660 Probably not.

01:10:09.280 And I went to a pro-Palestine protest.

01:10:12.660 And there are a lot of people there who, you know, they just have, they see the pictures.

01:10:18.880 Yeah.

01:10:19.340 And if you are a human being, you see the pictures and you go, those are terrible pictures.

01:10:23.980 Yeah, they are.

01:10:24.660 And so I feel empathetic for those people.

01:10:27.340 Absolutely.

01:10:27.940 And therefore, their Palestine flag is more like an Afghanistan flag than it is a Taliban flag. 0.53

01:10:34.140 Do you see what I mean?

01:10:34.600 I think for me, because I've seen what London has been the past little bit.

01:10:37.400 Yeah.

01:10:37.640 And I've seen some of the people walking around.

01:10:39.760 They're not like pro-Palestinian.

01:10:42.820 They're straight Hamas supporters. 0.98

01:10:44.720 There are some of them.

01:10:45.460 Yeah, there are some of them.

01:10:46.360 I'm talking about the ones that I saw yesterday.

01:10:47.920 Yeah.

01:10:48.360 Yeah.

01:10:48.700 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:10:49.220 There's a stark reality that they are not just like.

01:10:52.260 There's an element of the protest that absolutely, you're 100% correct.

01:10:55.760 But there's also people.

01:10:56.800 Of course there are.

01:10:57.520 Like one of my good friends, she's Muslim and she is from Serbia.

01:11:02.120 And the stuff she's been posting, she's like, you know, she's the complete opposite, right?

01:11:05.980 Where she's like very pro-Palestinian and all of these things.

01:11:08.480 And I get it.

01:11:10.260 When you see innocent people getting slaughtered, you have a right to be upset.

01:11:15.180 It doesn't matter what color of their skin or what religion or whatever.

01:11:18.160 You've got to remember, these people have been under terrorist occupation for how long?

01:11:24.060 I mean, I feel for them always.

01:11:26.160 Anybody who's under a terrorist government, I feel for.

01:11:29.860 Starting to feel it at home.

01:11:32.960 I'm being honest.

01:11:34.160 I mean.

01:11:34.740 I mean, what happened over COVID in Canada was crazy.

01:11:37.840 Well, talk about over COVID.

01:11:38.900 We've got something way worse going on that no one's paying attention to that has been really interesting.

01:11:43.440 Well, on that very subject, we've got to.

01:11:46.260 You know what?

01:11:46.960 Well, are you okay for us to wrap up?

01:11:49.640 Yeah, there was actually something that I wanted to say.

01:11:52.800 There's a very famous saying, because when I was listening to you talk, and it brought up to me this saying that it was prevalent during the First World War, lions led by donkeys.

01:12:04.600 And it seems to me that that's actually what you're talking about here.

01:12:08.400 It feels that way a little bit.

01:12:09.800 Because the guys that I fought with, like the Brits, the Americans, the Canadians, switched on as it gets.

01:12:16.240 Dialed at their job.

01:12:17.440 Good at what we do. 1.00

01:12:19.280 Shit leadership. 1.00

01:12:21.780 Shit leadership is what gets people killed. 1.00

01:12:24.500 Bad calls. 1.00

01:12:25.280 Bad decision making because of politics or for whatever reason.

01:12:29.900 One ego is pissed off at this ego, so they don't get the equipment they need.

01:12:34.200 That's all it comes down to.

01:12:36.180 That's the fault of the human, right?

01:12:38.180 Is we have egos.

01:12:39.560 The fault of humans, in my opinion, isn't that we're different and it isn't that we're not all the same.

01:12:47.140 The fault is that we all have egos and we either lean into them or we learn how to work with them, right?

01:12:55.020 That's where, like, the psychedelic conversation comes on.

01:12:57.260 You don't have to kill your ego.

01:12:58.860 It's not about killing the ego. 1.00

01:13:00.260 It's about telling that bitch to take a seat. 1.00

01:13:02.740 That's all it is. 1.00

01:13:03.880 It's about regaining control about where you come from and why you come out the way you do and the perceptions you have.

01:13:10.160 Because most of the time, if you don't like someone and you're seeing something like that where you're like,

01:13:13.700 well, yeah, that shouldn't be done that way.

01:13:15.840 Like, most of the time, the world is just a perception of how we view each other.

01:13:21.340 It's not that it actually is that way.

01:13:23.820 The world, people would say, oh, it's falling apart.

01:13:26.040 It's super violent.

01:13:28.760 Some parts are violent.

01:13:30.880 Some parts are kind of falling apart.

01:13:33.280 Yes, we're seeing signs of communism.

01:13:35.100 Yes, we're seeing signs of tyranny.

01:13:36.600 Yes, we're seeing it.

01:13:38.840 But organically, if you go off the street, most people are quite lovely.

01:13:42.180 The world is quite kind if you choose to see it that way.

01:13:46.240 But if you slow drip the media, the world looks like it's falling apart.

01:13:51.040 Yeah, for sure.

01:13:52.300 Both can be true at once.

01:13:54.040 Absolutely.

01:13:54.800 And I think they are both true at once.

01:13:56.300 I think the world is in a very chaotic period and one that may continue, frankly.

01:14:04.160 But at the same time, we've built these incredible societies, particularly here in the West, that are stable, that are prosperous, that are comfortable.

01:14:13.980 Yeah, I think both can be true at once.

01:14:15.600 Yeah.

01:14:15.820 I think both can be true at once.

01:14:17.260 Listen, this has been longer than most of our episodes because we've enjoyed it so much.

01:14:21.240 My apologies.

01:14:21.660 So let's do this again sometime.

01:14:23.100 It's not your apologies.

01:14:24.180 It's been absolutely amazing to talk with you.

01:14:26.360 As you know, the last question, before we head on over to answer our members' questions, what's the one thing that we're not talking about that we really should be?

01:14:35.140 You hinted at it earlier.

01:14:36.400 Made.

01:14:38.020 Medical assistance in dying and what Canada is doing to its citizens.

01:14:41.280 Basically encouraging euthanasia.

01:14:43.260 Encouraging?

01:14:43.840 Let's try this again.

01:14:44.560 So since 2019, the Canadian government was offering it to veterans instead of PTSD treatment and traumatic brain injury when they were asking for help.

01:14:53.100 We have audio recordings and all of the lovely things they say we don't have to prove, but we do.

01:14:58.120 As of March of 24, the Canadian government is opening MAID up to mental health, meaning depression. 0.96

01:15:07.040 We can kill you now for depression.

01:15:09.300 Children down to the age of 12 with parent consent. 1.00

01:15:12.680 The homeless. 0.99

01:15:13.180 You can kill your own kids up to 12. 1.00

01:15:15.340 Well, if we have a reason to. 0.99

01:15:17.960 Meaning like, does your child, because here's the kicker, right, with MAID.

01:15:21.440 It used to be terminally ill, right?

01:15:23.080 Right.

01:15:23.680 Long-term cancer, you know, real big struggles.

01:15:26.420 Well, how about preventative medicine and better palliative care?

01:15:28.880 Number one.

01:15:29.700 Number two, you've got people walking into the hospital saying I'm suicidal.

01:15:35.340 And the right response is a 48-hour to 72-hour hold for a psyche eval.

01:15:39.880 But instead, what's happening is you've got them being killed within 24 hours.

01:15:45.820 There is a really amazing daughter I got to know, Alicia Duncan.

01:15:49.720 Her mother was murdered by MAID.

01:15:51.420 I say murdered because there's some sketchy situations around how MAID was used.

01:15:56.280 There's other individuals who were off using MAID, another Canadian citizen.

01:16:01.100 His disability was hearing loss and cognitive disability.

01:16:06.740 Well, by definition, then, I qualify for MAID.

01:16:08.760 I have hearing loss.

01:16:10.020 And I am 72% considered disabled by the government.

01:16:12.800 Okay?

01:16:12.920 So I qualify for MAID right now.

01:16:15.560 So it is now going from terminally ill to mentally ill, meaning you can have fibromyalgia,

01:16:20.380 you can have depression, you can be homeless, you can be an addict, and you can, with parent

01:16:25.100 consent, down to the age of 12.

01:16:28.480 The Canadian government is taking the vulnerable population and straight enacting MAID on them.

01:16:35.360 And the reason they're doing it is because they've saved over $98.6 million of palliative care

01:16:42.840 by just enacting MAID on people instead of looking after them to the end of their life. 0.93

01:16:47.440 So just eugenics. 0.90

01:16:49.560 It's totally fine.

01:16:50.920 Canada is doing some things right now that people aren't aware of.

01:16:54.260 And you're not aware of it because Canada is making sure under our iron curtain that you're

01:16:58.300 not seeing it.

01:17:00.320 Canada's fun right now.

01:17:01.700 Start paying attention.

01:17:02.640 Because if Canada is going to start doing this, which they are and they have been, killing 0.89

01:17:06.900 people now.

01:17:07.960 I said this on Piers Morgan and I'll say it again.

01:17:10.560 There has been a stark increase on medical assistance and dying like we have never seen

01:17:15.880 anywhere else in the world.

01:17:17.420 Canada is on a track to break records for the amount of people we kill.

01:17:21.200 And the document I leaked to the Daily Mail back which came out on July 1st was a slideshow

01:17:27.840 of them offering MAID and excited to do so to pensioners who were perfectly healthy.

01:17:34.600 And that was under the Fraser Health Care System in British Columbia.

01:17:37.620 So MAID is being pushed in hospitals. 1.00

01:17:39.680 It's being pushed in nursing homes. 0.77

01:17:42.040 It's being pushed anywhere they possibly can because it saves the government a ton of money

01:17:46.520 to kill you than to look after you.

01:17:49.160 And they are targeting veterans and they're targeting the mentally ill and they're targeting 0.90

01:17:52.620 children and they are targeting anyone they can so that they don't have to pay for them.

01:17:56.220 So please read more about that and look into it because we are screaming about it in our

01:18:02.200 country and no one is paying attention. 0.99

01:18:05.160 That's pretty fucked up. 1.00

01:18:06.560 Super fucked up, man. 1.00

01:18:07.980 Yeah. 1.00

01:18:08.380 I like to bring happiness everywhere I go.

01:18:10.600 Yeah, we do like to end the interviews on a positive note.

01:18:13.020 My apologies.

01:18:13.980 We're not ending the interview because we're heading over to answer questions from our supporters.

01:18:18.680 Perfect.

01:18:18.980 Thanks for being here.

01:18:19.860 I haven't had a chance, neither of us, to read your book, but really looking forward to reading

01:18:23.100 Brass and Unity and we'll have another one of these conversations.

01:18:27.580 Thanks, man.

01:18:28.060 Thanks for having me, guys.

01:18:30.740 What is the average Canadian soldier's opinion of Justin Trudeau?

01:18:34.540 Oh, I don't know if I'm allowed to say that.

01:18:36.660 I might not be allowed back in the country.

01:18:37.960 This is behind a paywall.

01:18:39.000 Bye.

01:18:42.220 Bye.

01:18:42.880 Bye.

01:18:43.380 Bye.

01:18:44.000 Bye.

01:18:44.860 Bye.

01:18:45.200 Bye.

01:18:46.020 Bye.

01:18:46.340 Bye.

01:18:46.980 Bye.

01:18:48.640 Bye.

01:18:48.960 Bye.

01:18:49.080 Bye.

01:18:49.700 Bye.

01:18:49.940 Bye.

01:18:50.140 Bye.

01:18:51.180 Bye.

01:18:51.740 Bye.

01:18:51.880 Bye.

01:18:53.700 Bye.

01:19:00.380 Bye.

01:19:02.740 Bye.

01:19:04.620 Bye.

01:19:04.860 Bye.

01:19:05.180 Bye.

01:19:05.460 Bye.

01:19:06.140 Bye.

01:19:06.300 Bye.

01:19:06.780 Bye.

TRIGGERnometry - March 03, 2024

The Truth About War with Combat Veteran Kelsi Sheren

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript