This is Jockel podcast number 224 with Echo Charles and me, Jockel Willink.

Good evening, echo. Good evening. There is seldom a Mexican standoff in battle.

You either win or lose. And in many fights, a commander reaches a point where he thinks

he's lost. He sees only his losses and knows only his own situation, not the enemies.

The carnage surrounding him erodes his confidence. Wellington at Waterloo thought he'd lost.

So did easy company in the fight on the hill up north under Desiderio.

Grant summed up the feeling best at Fort Donaldson during the Civil War. He said either side

was ready to give way if the other showed a bold front.

Well we'd certainly shown a bold front, but so had the men from China.

Neri appeared again, this time carrying a little unconscious Chinaman. I found out later

that after I told him we needed a prisoner, he'd taken it as a personal assignment. He charged

up the hill and stormed the top unarmed. Once in the enemy position, he'd smashed this

chink on the head with his fist and hot-footed it back to me. Unfortunately, the POW died

before we got the skinny. He kept trying to pull one of the grenades off Neri's belt

on the way back and Neri had stomped him, obviously a little too hard.

So we got another prisoner, but then just when we needed him most, our interpreter, Kim,

decided to bug out. Speed saw him running down the hill. He stopped

him. I go, I go said Kim and edged away. Jack didn't know what to do. He was good and

ready to waste him. Instead, he leveled his weapon and shot off Kim's hand. This persuasive

little tactic worked and we bandaged up his hand and Kim decided he liked our company

after all. The word from the POW was just what we wanted to hear. Our artillery had

clobbered the enemy reinforcing unit and no one on the hill had any fight left in him.

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