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Join our weekly Combat Check-In Newsletter (www.combatstory.com/newsletter) to get a short email from Ryan for people who love and support our veterans, service members, and their families. It has info on a significant event in military and/or intel history, a funny military joke, an update on a current event I'm following, something I'm doing that week in my life, a book I'm reading, a look at an upcoming interview, a reflection on a past episode and more! ======= Today we hear the Combat Story of former Special Forces Green Beret Eric Neal. In fact, you’ll hear many combat stories in this episode as Eric recounts his four deployments to Afghanistan in just four years from 2010 to 2014 in very kinetic environments, losing many friends and brothers in arms along the way and learning so much about himself. 

Even Eric’s very first combat operation (which jump into in the first two minutes of this episode) was as chaotic as they get with multiple aircraft supporting his ODA going winchester (running out of ammo) trying to suppress the enemy. He would be involved in operations we’ve heard of previously - in one case carrying the bodies of the soldiers we lost in Extortion 17 - and many events we have not heard of, to include one of the largest VBIEDs in the post-9/11 era on the 10 year anniversary of 9/11, that wounded over 70 soldiers and local nationals. 

Eric experienced so much of this combat and loss in his mid-20s and, as he mentions, some of these moments are still with him today. It’s hard to imagine one person could experience this much combat in one lifetime, let alone in just four years and I hope you enjoy this gauntlet of trial by fire, literally, and the combat operations and insights he shares, as much as I did. 

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Show Notes: 00:00 - Intro  01:01 - Guest Introduction (Eric Neal) 02:25 - Interview begins 02:48 - Background with Darrell Utt 04:24 - Medal of Honor recipients before award 06:17 - The importance of 3rd Group 07:55 - First mission outside the wire 21:27 - 4Patriots 24:29 - Childhood and joining the Army 30:00 - The Football Coach  34:54 - Path to Special Forces 39:42 - Combat Story Merch 39:58 - Gaining confidence 43:38 - The Q-course 49:34 - The drive for combat 50:58 - Hazing  56:13 - Loosing a team leader 59:01 - First deployment stories 01:03:14 - First deployment afterthoughts 01:04:49 - Second deployment   01:13:31 - Being on Comms during missions 01:15:16 - First mission back after IED 01:18:33 - A tragic situation 01:33:05 - Second deployment afterthoughts 01:36:47 - Third deployment 01:40:56 - Dealing with losing teammates 01:42:20 - Fourth deployment 02:02:57 - Courageous acts 02:06:56 - Sentimental Items 02:08:17 - Would you do it all again 02:09:28 - Final remarks 02:10:54 -  Listener comments and shout outs