Name: Former SEAL's on the Criticism of Navy SEAL Training
Uploaded: 2022-10-20T17:06:14.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Former SEAL's on the Criticism of Navy SEAL Training' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-10-20. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Former SEAL's on the Criticism of Navy SEAL Training' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-10-20. Transcript available.

- The Joe Rogan experience.
- The thing about things like, whether it's SEALs
or any high-level military operation group,
whenever you're dealing with people
that have done something that's extraordinarily difficult,
there's like a rite of passage you guys have gone through
that a lot of people think is missing
from particularly young men in our society and culture.
There's no real moment where you recognize
that you've done something incredibly difficult
and you've actually become a man.
- It almost seems like society is pushing it
the other direction where that shouldn't exist
or it should be avoided.
- Even with the teams.
One of the things I hear is this narrative
that it's too difficult.
- I think you gotta consider the source on that one.
You know, like the most recent thing that came out,
I'm sure you saw this, Mike, was the,
there was a video of training that occurred,
I'm pretty sure it was on San Clemente Island
'cause that's where they CS gassed us.
And there's guys who are outside
and they're getting exposure to CS gas,
which I remember before I joined the military,
if you look at any movie,
probably up to and including like Full Metal Jacket,
or if you even went into a recruiting office,
exposure to CS gas is something that you do
in basic training, except to the air,
I don't know if the Air Force does it.
- Yeah, I don't know.
- Let's assume that they do.
Probably they don't, but let's assume that they do.
It was completely standard and normal to see.
And that room sucks.
You go into a room, you have a gas mask on,
and they make you take it off,
and they make you either do something
or say something or talk so you can't hold your breath.
That's the point of all that.
So this video comes out of students that are outside,
which one is actually a huge advantage
'cause it dissipates quickly,
especially if there's any kind of wind,
and they're getting gassed.
And there's already issues with the story
that I'm telling 'cause one,
who the fuck is filming this?
Like, just the fact that there was somebody there
who was filming this thing
and it made it onto the internet in any way,
shape, and form is a mistake in and of itself.
- So it couldn't have been someone
who was in the program.
- There's no-- - It was an instructor.
- It had to have been an instructor.
So the students, the last four weeks of training,
you go out to San Clemente Island.
It's called Third Phase.
And you get a very basic indoctrination
into small unit tactics, rifle, weaponry, explosives,
you throw some grenades, you do some underwater demo,
but you're out there for like the last
tight four weeks of training.
The students, I mean, I don't even remember
having a cell phone when I went through actually in '97.
I'd be shocked if they're allowed
to have cell phones on there,
so it had to have been an instructor.
But they're getting gassed.
They're being made to sing, "Happy Birthday," again,
so you can't hold your breath.
And it looks horrible.
Because it is horrible.
And the point of that training is,
is it's supposed to suck.
It's supposed to be difficult.
You're supposed to be exposed to that
in a controlled training environment.
People are like, "Well, this one person
looked like they were passing out
and there's mucus coming out of their face."
Like, "Yeah, it's CS gas.
It sucks."
But the first time you experience that
shouldn't be in a combat zone.
So it's a volunteer-only program.
You can leave this particular training block
if you want to at any given time.
And, oh, by the way, every branch of the military
exposes their people to this.
So although there are people who are saying,
"Yeah, it's too difficult,"
I think you have to consider the source.
I don't think they know what they're talking about.
- We expose people to it on Fear Factor.
- Yeah, again, voluntary.
And if they didn't want to, I bet you they can be like,
"You know what, Mr. Rogan, I'm done with this episode.
Like, I'm out of here."
- So what happened with that particular video?
- It made its way onto the internet.
And because of what it looks like,
it looks like exactly what it is.
A really shitty evolution where you can't breathe.
Your sinuses are running more than you ever have had them run in your life.
You can't see, you can barely talk, you're choking, you're gagging.
Some people throw up, so it made it onto the internet.
And people started saying, "How could you do that?
Like, this is too brutal of training.
How could you possibly do this?"
- That's weird that people on the internet had opinions.
So they just had opinions?
- Did you just say it was weird
that people on the internet have opinions?
- I'm joking.
Clearly being sarcastic.
- Okay.
- But the fact that anybody paid attention to those opinions.
- It trended for a while.
It actually, not only did they have opinions,
it started getting shared.
And then it started, you know, the next thing you know,
it's on major news outlets.
And then I actually think I saw an article saying
that the Navy opened an investigation into it.
- They have to.
At that point, you have to.
- They should open an investigation.
- So here it is.
Navy launches investigation to seal tear gas video.
Newly surfaced video showing Navy SEAL recruits
being tear gassed is adding to scrutiny,
adding to scrutiny over elite military units training practices.
- But you, I mean, you can speak to this, please.
Because you have to have brutal training.
- So you have to layer onto this.
- I'm going to say this.
- Yeah, go ahead.
- I remember going through this in the Marine Corps.
- I cannot recall that evolution on San Clemente.
And I asked somebody, they're like, oh yeah, it happened.
I can't, I can't remember it.
- We went, we went out into a demo range
and they had sprinkled in CS powder into the dirt.
So we didn't actually realize we were having an exposure to it.
And people were just covered in, I remember I'm sitting there
and we were trying to do demo calculations
or like cut debt cord and you're like dry heaving.
The reason, I would say the reason that this is probably
the bigger issue is that there was a high profile death
in SEAL training not too long ago
with a student who had just completed hell week
and died in the hospital shortly thereafter.
The young man's mother is a nurse
and she's very vocal about what has happened.
And there was an investigation involving that.
So it seems like not to, I mean, horrendous
to lose your son in any way, shape or form.
I don't want to take anything away from that,
but from that incident, you know,
this is like another layer on top of the onion
on something that people were already talking about,
which in, you combine the two and it just seems like,
for one, I wish SEALs could get the fuck out of the news
in general, but since it starts, you know,
they're layering on top of each other,
it can seem to be a bigger deal than it is.
- What did he die from?
- Infection.
- Yes.
- And so during hell week, you've got open sores,
you're in the water, which isn't far from the Tijuana
where it drains off.
So there's, that's always been a concern
and we mitigate it extremely well.
And first off, my condolences to the mother
'cause this kid was a stud.
He was the captain of the Yale football team.
He was gonna become a SEAL.
He passed the hardest phase.
- So was it like a staph infection?
- It was a staph infection.
- And you look at the source.
- Bacterial pneumonia.
- Yeah.
- You look at the source.
This is all New York Times.
- Yeah.
- It's a string of reporters.
- It's the same authors.
- New York Times that have just been,
they've had a hard on for the SEAL teams.
They have been going out.
In fact, they wrote a book and you have the author,
Matt Cole, Code Over Country.
- Yeah.
- And they have just, for the last half decade,
if not more, have made it their personal crusade
to bring down the SEAL teams.
And the Eddie Gallagher incident did not help.
But here's what I'll say.
One, Eddie is a friend.
Eddie didn't handle all situations well,
but it's amazing how Eddie can have,
and I think Eddie had like eight combat deployments,
how he can serve honorably.
And he was number one at the SEAL team,
his SEAL team, I think for E6, I believe.
He served honorably for 19 years
in the last incident he's involved in,
which he was acquitted for.
That defines his entire career.
The last sentence of his chapter as a SEAL
defines all the 19 years and all the good work
that he did in defense of our nation
for those who would never even think of serving.
- And he was acquitted.
What was the charge again?
It was something about a detainee?
- I think the charge was murder.
- Yes.
It was a ISIS prisoner that had been wounded in a strike.
And while rendering medical aid,
they accused Eddie of murder.
- But he was acquitted?
- Yes.
- But they still don't appreciate that he was acquitted.
Like they still treat him like he's guilty?
- Some of the things I've seen in the press,
and I'll keep reporters out of it.
One, I can't remember their names,
but a lot of the liberal news media
just have painted him as a war criminal.
Bottom line.
And his life has been impacted.
If you look even at, so first off, NCIS.
- Naval Criminal Investigation Service.
- The branch in San Diego was never held accountable for,
let's just say, bad practices that they implemented
while trying to bring Eddie down.
They also had a hard-on.
NCIS is not always your friend,
and they're looking to make a name for themselves as well.
And in fact, I was investigated the day I retired
by the same crew of people from NCIS San Diego,
only six months previous to when the whole Eddie Gallagher thing
sort of came on.
But I mean, they tapped, or they put a bug
into Eddie's lawyer's emails
so that they could read all the documents
coming into that lawyer.
They did some pretty lame tactics,
and they were never held accountable.
- Is it legal to do that?
- No, the initial lawyer was fired, relieved,
and they replaced him rapidly, but.
- Was he relieved from military service?
- No, he was not.
- Or was he laterally transferred?
- Laterally transferred, and that's how they dealt with it.
- Jamie, go back to that article again.
I wanna say something when you first pulled up
the first initial complaints,
'cause I wanna scroll, yeah, right there.
So, they were talking about the protocols.
Here, let me be clear, we have absolutely zero tolerance
for hazing, abuse, or deviations from safety protocols.
As Navy SEALs, we serve our fellow Americans.
Uncompromising integrity is our standard.
Our character and honor are steadfast.
Most of all, we are expected to lead by example
in all situations.
So, if that is like standard operational procedure
for those kind of training programs,
why does he have to say that?
It's not hazing, right?
- It's not, I mean, you could,
could you haze somebody with tear gas?
Yes.
What I'll say is, as somebody who was a BUDS instructor,
there is an evolution sheet and matrix
for every single thing that happens in training,
to include remediating the students.
When they fall short of a standard,
there are limits to how long you can remediate them for.
There's limits to the exercises that you can use.
There is an oversight matrix
of who's in charge of the evolution.
What's the ratio gonna be student to instructor?
There is somewhere a matrix in evolution sheet
for exposure to CS gas in BUDS.
There is absolutely no way that those instructors are like,
hey, Mike, you doing anything tomorrow too?
Let's go gas these fuckers.
Like that doesn't happen.
Every single day in BUDS is templated.
Why that person said that, I'm not sure.
But as somebody who worked in that pipeline
with that curriculum, it exists.
And what they need to say is,
yeah, there's a reason that we do this.
And the reason that we do this
is so that their first exposure isn't in an environment
where their life might be on the line.
That would actually shut it down.
Because what that does is it leaves the door
and it leaves question in people's minds.
Did they make a mistake?
Were they hazing people?
Do we need to do this?
My resounding answer is yes.
And also, I'll add to that.
My answer when people ask me about students
who have died in BUDS,
I think there have been 10 in the history of BUDS since the 50s,
is that it needs to continue to happen.
I don't want it to happen.
I don't want anybody to lose their life.
But if the training becomes so exceedingly safe
that that's not a potential,
then we're not serving people in that training
and we're not preparing them for what the battlefield is going to expect.
I'll push against you on that one.
If you explain it to the American public,
more than half still won't understand.
They will still view it as brutal, as unnecessary.
But, you know, there's been a push to make the military a playground for
progressive policies.
And it is the last place politically that we want people playing.
And, I mean, you even see China has an initiative to actually make their men
more masculine.
Yeah, I saw that.
And we're going the opposite direction.
You know, there is a diversity, equity, and inclusion chief at the Pentagon now
who wrote a book that basically called the first responders menaces.
And, you know, basically painted them as white supremacists.
And it's going a very bad direction.
I will say this about the military.
What people don't understand is it is highly professional.
I've always been impressed.
There are standards.
There's doctrine.
And instructors know that they follow that playbook.
They mitigate risk to the lowest level
because you always have the risk of getting investigated for something like
this.
So, who's letting these progressive policies infect the military?
How is that ever an option?
Is that just people who are blissfully unaware because they're on the outside?
Like, how does that ever get in to the point where you're considering
things like elite groups like the SEALs having to deal with this sort of
politically correct nonsense?
Personally, I think the policy of transparency that was made or popularized by
President Obama,
and this is, I'm not attacking President Obama.
He was aggressive on the war on terror.
He made a lot of aggressive decisions.
But there are certain communities where transparency, like the CIA, special
operations, is not the best policy,
is they should remain in the shadows.
And there should be just public trust that we are doing the right things.
We don't want anyone to pass away in training.
We don't want to get anyone hurt.
But we also don't want to advertise our capabilities or our training or our
capacities
to potential military peers like China or Russia.
So, the transparency for me, propaganda, do it with the regular military, keep
special operations out of the public.
What are they doing with the regular military? Like, why?
Like, what is that?
I don't have an answer for how it started infiltrating other than it seems to
be the groundswell.
I mean, the military is just a group of people from normal societies.
So, I don't think it's uncommon to see things that our society is dealing with
working their way into
the military, but I do hope that there is a backstop against it.
And in my mind, everything needs to be worked in a reverse direction.
What is it we're asking these people to do in the real-world execution of their
job?
Now, let's work our training pipeline to prepare those people for that.

Former SEAL's  on the Criticism of Navy SEAL Training

- The Joe Rogan experience.
- The thing about things like, whether it's SEALs
or any high-level military operation group,
whenever you're dealing with people
that have done something that's extraordinarily difficult,
there's like a rite of passage you guys have gone through
that a lot of people think is missing
from particularly young men in our society and culture.
There's no real moment where you recognize
that you've done something incredibly difficult
and you've actually become a man.
- It almost seems like society is pushing it
the other direction where that shouldn't exist
or it should be avoided.
- Even with the teams.
One of the things I hear is this narrative
that it's too difficult.
- I think you gotta consider the source on that one.
You know, like the most recent thing that came out,
I'm sure you saw this, Mike, was the,
there was a video of training that occurred,
I'm pretty sure it was on San Clemente Island
'cause that's where they CS gassed us.
And there's guys who are outside
and they're getting exposure to CS gas,
which I remember before I joined the military,
if you look at any movie,
probably up to and including like Full Metal Jacket,
or if you even went into a recruiting office,
exposure to CS gas is something that you do
in basic training, except to the air,
I don't know if the Air Force does it.
- Yeah, I don't know.
- Let's assume that they do.
Probably they don't, but let's assume that they do.
It was completely standard and normal to see.
And that room sucks.
You go into a room, you have a gas mask on,
and they make you take it off,
and they make you either do something
or say something or talk so you can't hold your breath.
That's the point of all that.
So this video comes out of students that are outside,
which one is actually a huge advantage
'cause it dissipates quickly,
especially if there's any kind of wind,
and they're getting gassed.
And there's already issues with the story
that I'm telling 'cause one,
who the fuck is filming this?
Like, just the fact that there was somebody there
who was filming this thing
and it made it onto the internet in any way,
shape, and form is a mistake in and of itself.
- So it couldn't have been someone
who was in the program.
- There's no-- - It was an instructor.
- It had to have been an instructor.
So the students, the last four weeks of training,
you go out to San Clemente Island.
It's called Third Phase.
And you get a very basic indoctrination
into small unit tactics, rifle, weaponry, explosives,
you throw some grenades, you do some underwater demo,
but you're out there for like the last
tight four weeks of training.
The students, I mean, I don't even remember
having a cell phone when I went through actually in '97.
I'd be shocked if they're allowed
to have cell phones on there,
so it had to have been an instructor.
But they're getting gassed.
They're being made to sing, "Happy Birthday," again,
so you can't hold your breath.
And it looks horrible.
Because it is horrible.
And the point of that training is,
is it's supposed to suck.
It's supposed to be difficult.
You're supposed to be exposed to that
in a controlled training environment.
People are like, "Well, this one person
looked like they were passing out
and there's mucus coming out of their face."
Like, "Yeah, it's CS gas.
It sucks."
But the first time you experience that
shouldn't be in a combat zone.
So it's a volunteer-only program.
You can leave this particular training block
if you want to at any given time.
And, oh, by the way, every branch of the military
exposes their people to this.
So although there are people who are saying,
"Yeah, it's too difficult,"
I think you have to consider the source.
I don't think they know what they're talking about.
- We expose people to it on Fear Factor.
- Yeah, again, voluntary.
And if they didn't want to, I bet you they can be like,
"You know what, Mr. Rogan, I'm done with this episode.
Like, I'm out of here."
- So what happened with that particular video?
- It made its way onto the internet.
And because of what it looks like,
it looks like exactly what it is.
A really shitty evolution where you can't breathe.
Your sinuses are running more than you ever have had them run in your life.
You can't see, you can barely talk, you're choking, you're gagging.
Some people throw up, so it made it onto the internet.
And people started saying, "How could you do that?
Like, this is too brutal of training.
How could you possibly do this?"
- That's weird that people on the internet had opinions.
So they just had opinions?
- Did you just say it was weird
that people on the internet have opinions?
- I'm joking.
Clearly being sarcastic.
- Okay.
- But the fact that anybody paid attention to those opinions.
- It trended for a while.
It actually, not only did they have opinions,
it started getting shared.
And then it started, you know, the next thing you know,
it's on major news outlets.
And then I actually think I saw an article saying
that the Navy opened an investigation into it.
- They have to.
At that point, you have to.
- They should open an investigation.
- So here it is.
Navy launches investigation to seal tear gas video.
Newly surfaced video showing Navy SEAL recruits
being tear gassed is adding to scrutiny,
adding to scrutiny over elite military units training practices.
- But you, I mean, you can speak to this, please.
Because you have to have brutal training.
- So you have to layer onto this.
- I'm going to say this.
- Yeah, go ahead.
- I remember going through this in the Marine Corps.
- I cannot recall that evolution on San Clemente.
And I asked somebody, they're like, oh yeah, it happened.
I can't, I can't remember it.
- We went, we went out into a demo range
and they had sprinkled in CS powder into the dirt.
So we didn't actually realize we were having an exposure to it.
And people were just covered in, I remember I'm sitting there
and we were trying to do demo calculations
or like cut debt cord and you're like dry heaving.
The reason, I would say the reason that this is probably
the bigger issue is that there was a high profile death
in SEAL training not too long ago
with a student who had just completed hell week
and died in the hospital shortly thereafter.
The young man's mother is a nurse
and she's very vocal about what has happened.
And there was an investigation involving that.
So it seems like not to, I mean, horrendous
to lose your son in any way, shape or form.
I don't want to take anything away from that,
but from that incident, you know,
this is like another layer on top of the onion
on something that people were already talking about,
which in, you combine the two and it just seems like,
for one, I wish SEALs could get the fuck out of the news
in general, but since it starts, you know,
they're layering on top of each other,
it can seem to be a bigger deal than it is.
- What did he die from?
- Infection.
- Yes.
- And so during hell week, you've got open sores,
you're in the water, which isn't far from the Tijuana
where it drains off.
So there's, that's always been a concern
and we mitigate it extremely well.
And first off, my condolences to the mother
'cause this kid was a stud.
He was the captain of the Yale football team.
He was gonna become a SEAL.
He passed the hardest phase.
- So was it like a staph infection?
- It was a staph infection.
- And you look at the source.
- Bacterial pneumonia.
- Yeah.
- You look at the source.
This is all New York Times.
- Yeah.
- It's a string of reporters.
- It's the same authors.
- New York Times that have just been,
they've had a hard on for the SEAL teams.
They have been going out.
In fact, they wrote a book and you have the author,
Matt Cole, Code Over Country.
- Yeah.
- And they have just, for the last half decade,
if not more, have made it their personal crusade
to bring down the SEAL teams.
And the Eddie Gallagher incident did not help.
But here's what I'll say.
One, Eddie is a friend.
Eddie didn't handle all situations well,
but it's amazing how Eddie can have,
and I think Eddie had like eight combat deployments,
how he can serve honorably.
And he was number one at the SEAL team,
his SEAL team, I think for E6, I believe.
He served honorably for 19 years
in the last incident he's involved in,
which he was acquitted for.
That defines his entire career.
The last sentence of his chapter as a SEAL
defines all the 19 years and all the good work
that he did in defense of our nation
for those who would never even think of serving.
- And he was acquitted.
What was the charge again?
It was something about a detainee?
- I think the charge was murder.
- Yes.
It was a ISIS prisoner that had been wounded in a strike.
And while rendering medical aid,
they accused Eddie of murder.
- But he was acquitted?
- Yes.
- But they still don't appreciate that he was acquitted.
Like they still treat him like he's guilty?
- Some of the things I've seen in the press,
and I'll keep reporters out of it.
One, I can't remember their names,
but a lot of the liberal news media
just have painted him as a war criminal.
Bottom line.
And his life has been impacted.
If you look even at, so first off, NCIS.
- Naval Criminal Investigation Service.
- The branch in San Diego was never held accountable for,
let's just say, bad practices that they implemented
while trying to bring Eddie down.
They also had a hard-on.
NCIS is not always your friend,
and they're looking to make a name for themselves as well.
And in fact, I was investigated the day I retired
by the same crew of people from NCIS San Diego,
only six months previous to when the whole Eddie Gallagher thing
sort of came on.
But I mean, they tapped, or they put a bug
into Eddie's lawyer's emails
so that they could read all the documents
coming into that lawyer.
They did some pretty lame tactics,
and they were never held accountable.
- Is it legal to do that?
- No, the initial lawyer was fired, relieved,
and they replaced him rapidly, but.
- Was he relieved from military service?
- No, he was not.
- Or was he laterally transferred?
- Laterally transferred, and that's how they dealt with it.
- Jamie, go back to that article again.
I wanna say something when you first pulled up
the first initial complaints,
'cause I wanna scroll, yeah, right there.
So, they were talking about the protocols.
Here, let me be clear, we have absolutely zero tolerance
for hazing, abuse, or deviations from safety protocols.
As Navy SEALs, we serve our fellow Americans.
Uncompromising integrity is our standard.
Our character and honor are steadfast.
Most of all, we are expected to lead by example
in all situations.
So, if that is like standard operational procedure
for those kind of training programs,
why does he have to say that?
It's not hazing, right?
- It's not, I mean, you could,
could you haze somebody with tear gas?
Yes.
What I'll say is, as somebody who was a BUDS instructor,
there is an evolution sheet and matrix
for every single thing that happens in training,
to include remediating the students.
When they fall short of a standard,
there are limits to how long you can remediate them for.
There's limits to the exercises that you can use.
There is an oversight matrix
of who's in charge of the evolution.
What's the ratio gonna be student to instructor?
There is somewhere a matrix in evolution sheet
for exposure to CS gas in BUDS.
There is absolutely no way that those instructors are like,
hey, Mike, you doing anything tomorrow too?
Let's go gas these fuckers.
Like that doesn't happen.
Every single day in BUDS is templated.
Why that person said that, I'm not sure.
But as somebody who worked in that pipeline
with that curriculum, it exists.
And what they need to say is,
yeah, there's a reason that we do this.
And the reason that we do this
is so that their first exposure isn't in an environment
where their life might be on the line.
That would actually shut it down.
Because what that does is it leaves the door
and it leaves question in people's minds.
Did they m