This is Jocco podcast number 249 with Echo Charles and me, Jocco Willink. Good evening,

echo. Good evening. One seal, KIA is inbound to Camp Ramadi. KIA killed an action. When the call came

over the radio from the Army company commander who was supporting my seals in the field, I felt

instantly nauseous. I wanted to throw up, but I knew I had to remain calm. I had to keep my emotions

in check as the commander of SEAL Team 3 task unit bruiser. I knew the whole tactical operation center

and my entire task unit would be watching my reaction to this. So I took a breath and did my best

to seem composed and in control. Beyond that, I wasn't quite sure how to react,

or what to say, or what to do, this seal. Soon reported as Mark Allen Lee, the first seal killed in

Iraq. He was shot and killed while assaulting a building in South Central Ramadi on August 2nd, 2006.

A hero.

A young, full of love, life, spirit, and now in an instant. Gone. Seals had been fighting in Iraq

for more than three years at this point. There had been some casualties, but no seals had been killed.

And no seal from SEAL Team 3, which was formed in 1983, had ever been killed in action.

While other seals from other teams had been lost in Afghanistan, no one above me in the immediate

chain of command had ever been in sustained intense combat, much less suffered their men being killed.

Even though we had drilled the tactical mechanics of how to react when a man was lost,

we had never trained for how to handle death from a leadership perspective. No one had ever

even discussed it with me. There was no guidance from my senior officers on the matter.

I had to get my guidance from somewhere else. So I turned to a man who had offered me so much

valuable advice about war and about leadership. I turned to Colonel David Hackworth and his book

About Face. In its well-worn pages, I found the counsel I needed, quote, the fact is

generally there's no time out for mourning on the battlefield. But it's really no different

...