Training Audiobook Voice over
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EnglishVoice Age
Middle Aged (35-54)Transcript
Note: Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and may contain errors.
The gray beards. By the end of my S F career, my team was one of the oldest in the group, probably one of the oldest in regiment. My team sergeant had hunted scuds in the Gulf War and fifth group. And my commander holds a regimental record for continuous time in command of the same ODA first as a captain. Then as a warrant, a record that will never be broken because they've changed the rules to prevent it by 2009, probably half. The team was over 40 and a couple around the half century mark. Staying operational that long is not an easy thing to do in this profession. And my elders on the team were my mentors passing along hard lessons learned. During that 2009 deployment. We had a capture kill mission on an HVT. During the hit. Our blocking position came under fire from small arms and RPGS. We called in air support a couple of times as we wrapped up S S E on the objective and made our way across the village to Ville Dave. And I took two squads of Afghans and moved out to secure N L Z for the Chinooks, while the rest of the team remained uncovered and concealed positions, we set in a perimeter. And just before calling in the pilots, our interpreter came running up to me. He had just heard the Taliban saying on the radio that they would attack our position and get revenge for their brothers. We had killed Dave and I put the Afghans on alert, told the rest of the team to stand by and settled in for more fighting. My trop came running up with a disheartened look on his face. Commander Matt, I'm so sorry. The Taliban, they say it is the gray beards. Everyone go home and hide your guns. No more brothers died today as we filled without any further fighting. I thought about that intercepted transmission much like active cops in the US. The bad guys gave us a street name. Life expectancy in Afghanistan is short and anyone who lives as long as we had is seen as wise and in our case dangerous. My beard wasn't gray yet but I was lucky to fight alongside and be mentored by senior teammates with the breadth and depth of experience. Mine had the lessons they taught and the decisions they made kept us alive. Now that I'm older than my senior leadership on the team and in the regiment was then now that my beard is gray with a weight of experience. I've adopted our Taliban street name for my training company I can't ever repay those who came before me for the lessons that kept me alive. But I can't pay it forward. I can pass that wisdom along to the next generation of warriors and add my own lessons learned to it. More than any victory overseas, more than any arrest as a police officer at home. That is the legacy I want to leave knowledge and wisdom given to me by those who came before, added to and passed along to the ones who came after so that they too can one day be old and gray and wise. Then the next graybeards can add what they have learned and pass it on in turn and so on down the line.