For me, one of the most impactful lessons
That I learned from war was in the spring of 2006
In the city of Ramadi, Iraq
Which at the time was the epicenter of the insurgency
Where brutal and determined terrorists ruled the streets
With torture and rape and murder
And it was in one neighborhood of that city
During an operation that I was in charge of
When all hell broke loose
We had multiple units out on the battlefield
Fighting the enemy
We had friendly Iraqi soldiers
We had U.S. Army soldiers and U.S. Marines
Along with small elements of my SEAL team
And then the fog of war rolled in
With its confusion, chaos and mayhem
And with its gunfire and enemy attacks
And screaming men and blood and death
And in that fog of war
Through a series of mistakes and human error
And poor judgment and Murphy's Law
And just plain, bad luck
A horrendous firefight broke out
But this firefight it wasn't between us and the enemy
This firefight tragically was between us and us
Friendly forces against friendly forces, fratricide
The mortal sin of combat
And the most horrific part of war
And when it was over and the fog of war lifted
One friendly Iraqi soldier was dead
Two more were wounded, one of my men was wounded
The rest of my SEALs were badly shaken
And it was only through a miracle
That no one else was killed
And it was reported up the chain of command
What had happened
That we had fought and wounded and killed each other
And we got back to base things didn't get better
There was a message waiting for me from
My commanding officer
And it said "Shut down all operations"
It said that the commanding officer and the master chief
And the investigating officer were inbound to my location
And they told me to prepare a debrief
To explain exactly what had happened on the operation
And what had gone wrong
Now, I knew what this meant
It meant that somebody had to pay
Somebody had to be held accountable
Somebody had to get fired for what had happened
So, I began to prepare my debrief
And in it, I detailed every mistake that was made
And who made it
And I pointed out every failure in the planning
And the preparation and the execution
In the operation and I pointed out who was responsible
For that failure
There was plenty of blame to go around
There were so many people that I could
Incriminate with guilt
And something wasn't right
For some reason, I just couldn't put my finger
On who was at fault and who specifically i should blame
For what had happened
And I sat and I went over it again and again
And I struggled for an answer
And then when I was about 10 minutes from
Starting the debrief, that answer came and
It hit me like a slap in face
And I realized that there was only one person
To blame for the confusion
Only one person to blame for wounded men
And only one person to blame for the dead Iraqi soldier
And I knew exactly who that person was
And with that knowledge I walked into the debriefing room
With my commanding, the investigating officer
Were sitting there waiting for me
Along with the rest of my men
And I stood in front of them
And I asked them one single question
Who's fault is this?
One of my SEALs raised his hand
And he said it was my fault
I didn't keep control of the Iraqi soldiers I was with
And I said no it wasn't your fault
And then another SEAL raised his hand
And said it was my fault
I didn't pass my location over the radio fast enough
So no one knew what building we were in
And that's what caused all this confusion
It was my fault
And I said no, it wasn't your fault either
And another SEAL raised his hand
And he said boss, this was my fault
I didn't properly identify my target
And I shot and killed that friendly Iraqi soldier
This was my fault
And I said no, it wasn't your fault either
And it wasn't yours or yours or yours
I said as I pointed to rest of the SEALs in the room
And then I told them
That there was only one person responsible
For what had happened
And there was only one person to blame for everything
And that person was me