WEBVTT - Make Peace or Die 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:04.600 Third Squad is a documentary podcast about war. Every episode 0:00:04.640 --> 0:00:07.600 contains strong language and descriptions of violence that may not 0:00:07.720 --> 0:00:11.600 be suitable for all listeners. I don't want to offend 0:00:11.640 --> 0:00:14.480 you with my skepticism. You're not going to because I 0:00:14.520 --> 0:00:16.239 like you, man, I like you. I don't want to 0:00:16.239 --> 0:00:18.480 be a fucking dick, but you're not a dick. I'm 0:00:18.520 --> 0:00:25.760 just saying, what's gonna fucking change? Right? Maybe nothing? Probably nothing? 0:00:26.160 --> 0:00:28.400 But you know what will change if I don't do it? 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:43.680 Definitely nothing. I'm Elliott Woods. This is Third Squad Episode seven, 0:00:44.840 --> 0:00:58.000 make Peace or Die. Alright, So we've got our side 0:00:58.000 --> 0:01:01.800 by side a t V, all geared up, ready for 0:01:01.840 --> 0:01:06.119 an adventure. David rich Volsky is behind the wheel, wearing 0:01:06.160 --> 0:01:11.200 a mad bomber hat, got our goggles on, shiploads of clothes. 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:15.440 It's what about five degrees outside something like that, all right, 0:01:15.480 --> 0:01:18.759 and we are ready to rock. Dude, this thing's gonna 0:01:18.800 --> 0:01:23.760 sucking all ass. There's one Third Squad marine we couldn't 0:01:23.760 --> 0:01:26.920 reach by road. I mean it was possible, but there 0:01:26.959 --> 0:01:29.840 just wasn't time to squeeze an extra five thousand miles 0:01:29.840 --> 0:01:32.600 into the itinerer. So I hopped on a flight to 0:01:32.640 --> 0:01:35.200 Alaska to meet David rich Volski, who lives about an 0:01:35.240 --> 0:01:41.120 hour northeast of Anchorage. Check check, check, Why aren't you 0:01:41.160 --> 0:01:45.840 showing on my channels anymore? Tommy had to go home 0:01:45.880 --> 0:01:48.200 for a few days, so I'm flying solo on this one, 0:01:48.800 --> 0:01:51.480 getting familiar with the recorder while wearing mittens the size 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:54.800 of boxing gloves. Super fun. Ready for me to go? Yeah, 0:01:54.960 --> 0:01:56.840 I'm gonna spend the tires to see if I can 0:01:56.920 --> 0:02:07.920 see if the fronts turn into Okay, Yeah, Richbolski hits 0:02:07.960 --> 0:02:10.240 the gas and soon we're ripping down the Connect River 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:12.600 at fifty miles per hour, looking like a couple of 0:02:12.639 --> 0:02:18.079 Mad Max characters. This is so cool. My hands freeze 0:02:18.080 --> 0:02:20.320 into claus whenever I have to take off my mittens 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:23.120 to adjust the recorder. But I'm having such a good 0:02:23.120 --> 0:02:27.600 time I barely notice we being out here reminds me 0:02:27.639 --> 0:02:31.639 of Montana, where I live. Oh Man. Thankfully, the sun 0:02:31.720 --> 0:02:33.520 is starting to warm the air when we pull up 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:37.320 to our destination, the Connect Glacier, a massive sheet of 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:39.800 ice that spills down from the chew Gash Mountains, just 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:43.000 ten miles up river from Richbolski's house. Should we jump 0:02:43.040 --> 0:02:46.919 out and walk around exactly what I was thinking. We 0:02:47.080 --> 0:02:48.680 park on a hill where we can see the four 0:02:48.760 --> 0:02:52.840 hund foot calving face where the icebergs break off. I 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:56.880 don't know if I've ever seen anything quite like this before. Man, 0:02:56.919 --> 0:03:00.839 I managed to give a fucking World Traveler reporter guy 0:03:00.960 --> 0:03:05.400 a fucking first time huh. Yep, there you, of course, 0:03:05.480 --> 0:03:08.040 because this is America. There's a guy doing donuts on 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:11.000 the frozen lake in a vintage pickup, and another guy 0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:13.680 shooting a flamethrower next to an iceberg that looks like 0:03:13.680 --> 0:03:17.640 a giant hunk of frozen wind. As the carbon orgy 0:03:17.760 --> 0:03:21.280 clashes a bit with the pristine surroundings, but rich Volsky 0:03:21.440 --> 0:03:25.960 digs all of it, living the dream. Rich Volsky, it's 0:03:26.000 --> 0:03:30.480 pretty good, man, pretty good. The combination of remote wilderness 0:03:30.480 --> 0:03:33.040 and Arctic redneck culture is what made him fall head 0:03:33.080 --> 0:03:35.800 over heels for Alaska. I feel like it's one of 0:03:35.840 --> 0:03:40.360 the last free states. Honestly, I just have freedom. I 0:03:40.400 --> 0:03:43.480 can do what I want. I can come out here 0:03:43.480 --> 0:03:45.800 and get out here by myself and cruise around and 0:03:47.560 --> 0:03:50.080 hang out. Man, it's a great place to decompress after work. 0:03:54.280 --> 0:03:57.880 Rich Bosky grew up in most people's idea of Paradise, Hawaii, 0:03:58.680 --> 0:04:00.520 but he had no desire to go there. When he 0:04:00.560 --> 0:04:03.400 got out of the Core in two thousand fourteen, he 0:04:03.520 --> 0:04:05.400 hit the road for Alaska with the promise of a 0:04:05.520 --> 0:04:11.720 job and never looked back. It was around the same 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:13.920 time that I moved to Montana from the East Coast 0:04:14.000 --> 0:04:17.680 for some of the same reasons. It took rich Bolski 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:20.080 two weeks to drive all the way from Camp Pembleton's 0:04:20.160 --> 0:04:24.159 up through Canada to Anchorage, his first landing spot. Now 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:27.120 he lives in a secluded subdivision near a town called Palmer. 0:04:27.880 --> 0:04:30.000 He makes his living as a plumber, working on big 0:04:30.040 --> 0:04:33.880 commercial projects all over the state. His hobbies are pretty 0:04:33.880 --> 0:04:38.039 full time too. Like me, he's a serious hunter, and 0:04:38.080 --> 0:04:40.719 in Alaska that means lots of scouting and planning for 0:04:40.800 --> 0:04:44.280 bear and moose hunts. With so much going on, rich 0:04:44.279 --> 0:04:48.000 Wolski tells me Afghanistan isn't something he thinks about much anymore, 0:04:48.640 --> 0:04:53.640 almost never, almost never do on a different portion of 0:04:53.640 --> 0:04:58.400 my life moved on. So when you do think about Afghanistan, 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:04.800 what do you think about? Ah? The funny stuff, sad stuff. 0:05:04.839 --> 0:05:11.640 Sometimes I no excitement, you know, adventure is there? Anything 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:16.360 that you miss about it. That's simple, man, a simple 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:20.160 place to be. You know. You get up and walk around, 0:05:21.800 --> 0:05:25.599 get shot at, you walk back and sleep and do 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:28.600 it all over again. A lot of people, I think 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:32.680 would be shocked to hear that being at war, even 0:05:32.720 --> 0:05:35.320 in a very dangerous place in certain ways, is kind 0:05:35.320 --> 0:05:39.400 of easy. It is. It's it's it's definitely easy, you know. 0:05:39.800 --> 0:05:43.800 I mean, now I got you know, bills, gotta go 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:50.640 to work, you know, I mean, it never felt like 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:54.320 work to me. As we're talking, heard a moose trots 0:05:54.360 --> 0:05:57.320 down the river bed. We're a long way from Hawaii, 0:05:57.480 --> 0:06:00.160 and we're even farther from Sangin, where we first had 0:06:00.160 --> 0:06:03.760 a decade ago. All right, So the first thing I 0:06:03.760 --> 0:06:06.520 need you to do is just introduce yourself in that 0:06:06.680 --> 0:06:10.560 kind of outside voice. I'll just see your regular voice, 0:06:10.839 --> 0:06:13.840 all right. Um, I'm last Corporal Davids Falsky, and I'm 0:06:13.880 --> 0:06:18.040 nineteen years old and not from Hawaii. Great, perfect, Okay. 0:06:18.080 --> 0:06:20.240 So number one, why did you join the Marine Corps? 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:22.840 I joined the Marine Corps because I wanted to have 0:06:22.960 --> 0:06:26.200 the island. Back then, he was a lanky teenager and 0:06:26.240 --> 0:06:27.800 I'm not sure he could have grown a beard if 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:31.719 he tried. Now he's six ft tall and two thirty pounds, 0:06:31.720 --> 0:06:34.880 with the righteous beard and thick forearms covered in tattoos. 0:06:35.600 --> 0:06:37.719 His hair is still buzz short, but that's about the 0:06:37.800 --> 0:06:41.240 only thing that hasn't changed since Sangon. Sitting in the 0:06:41.240 --> 0:06:43.560 a t V by the river, I asked him why 0:06:43.600 --> 0:06:45.279 he was so eager to get out of Hawaii all 0:06:45.320 --> 0:06:50.120 those years ago. I think it's just hot, small, you know, 0:06:50.240 --> 0:06:54.040 to go to the beach so often surfing gets quite repetitive. 0:06:55.360 --> 0:07:00.040 I was ready to go, you know, independent, young and 0:07:00.320 --> 0:07:04.119 looking for adventure. He tells me Hawaii was a great 0:07:04.120 --> 0:07:06.480 place to grow up, and he had a happy childhood. 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:09.200 He just never felt like he fit in there. The 0:07:09.279 --> 0:07:13.000 military promised away off the island, but like several of 0:07:13.000 --> 0:07:15.720 the other members a third Squad, rich Folski was only 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:18.880 seventeen when he started thinking about enlistening, so he needed 0:07:18.880 --> 0:07:22.200 his parents permission. I told my dad and he goes, okay, 0:07:22.600 --> 0:07:27.120 we'll go talk to some recruiters, right. So we go 0:07:27.520 --> 0:07:32.000 to town and there's like an Army and Marine Corps 0:07:32.040 --> 0:07:36.040 recruiters right next to each other, like sharing a wall office. 0:07:36.480 --> 0:07:38.400 He didn't have a clear idea of what he wanted 0:07:38.440 --> 0:07:40.720 to do in the military, let alone which branch. He 0:07:40.760 --> 0:07:45.400 wanted to join Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, but first 0:07:45.440 --> 0:07:50.880 impression settled things. The Army recruiters were literally fat and nasty, 0:07:51.720 --> 0:07:54.320 and the Marine Corps recruiter looked like a guy in 0:07:54.360 --> 0:07:57.400 the military. And I hate to say that because the 0:07:57.400 --> 0:08:00.400 Marine Corps is all about appearance and the unit form, 0:08:00.440 --> 0:08:02.480 and I always hated that about the Marine Corps. But 0:08:02.680 --> 0:08:04.840 that was the turning point where we were like, no, 0:08:04.880 --> 0:08:08.040 I don't want to be in the Army. You're not 0:08:08.040 --> 0:08:10.800 gonna hurt my feelings. Don't worry. I was in the 0:08:10.880 --> 0:08:14.120 National Guard, a reserve component of the U. S. Army. 0:08:14.280 --> 0:08:17.120 We get made fun of by pretty much everyone, including 0:08:17.120 --> 0:08:21.080 the regular army. Anyway. It was two thousand nine when 0:08:21.160 --> 0:08:23.800 rich bold Sky and his dad visited the recruiter, and 0:08:23.840 --> 0:08:26.320 the war in Afghanistan was barely on the radar for 0:08:26.360 --> 0:08:29.400 the average American. But we'd just come through the most 0:08:29.480 --> 0:08:33.760 brutal years of the Iraq War. What was your awareness 0:08:33.840 --> 0:08:37.319 of of what kind of fighting was going on at 0:08:37.320 --> 0:08:38.920 the time, if you can remember when you were in 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:41.079 high school, I mean, I always knew there was fighting. 0:08:41.120 --> 0:08:43.720 You see the ship on the news, you know. But 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:47.680 I mean I wasn't come from a family that's in 0:08:47.760 --> 0:08:50.800 the military, you know. I didn't. I didn't know anybody, 0:08:51.400 --> 0:08:56.120 you know, that was in the military. So my understanding 0:08:56.200 --> 0:09:01.800 of what it actually was, you know, was zero. But 0:09:02.160 --> 0:09:06.520 I knew for a fact that there was a war, 0:09:07.400 --> 0:09:10.040 if that makes sense. Did you know where that war 0:09:10.280 --> 0:09:13.600 was in the Middle East? I could, I could narrow 0:09:13.640 --> 0:09:17.960 it down to the Middle East at that time. Did 0:09:17.960 --> 0:09:19.800 you have a sense of what the war was about, 0:09:19.880 --> 0:09:22.640 or how it was going or anything like that. No, 0:09:23.280 --> 0:09:25.760 I don't think I have a sense now. I mean 0:09:26.559 --> 0:09:29.760 when I tell you right now that I legitimately kind 0:09:29.800 --> 0:09:37.760 of still don't understand. I'm serious. No, you know, yeah, 0:09:38.040 --> 0:09:42.560 I do know. Rich Foldski's dad, who's also named David, 0:09:42.679 --> 0:09:46.120 supported his son's decision to join the Marines. They signed 0:09:46.120 --> 0:09:48.640 the paperwork together, and as soon as high school was over, 0:09:48.760 --> 0:09:51.280 rich Folsky shipped out for boot camp at Marine Corps 0:09:51.320 --> 0:09:56.400 Recruit Depot San Diego. Yeah, that's funny. My My my 0:09:56.480 --> 0:09:58.640 first thought was, oh my godly, all these white people. 0:10:00.920 --> 0:10:02.640 I just went to a high school. It didn't have 0:10:02.720 --> 0:10:05.960 very many white people. Your your school is mostly what 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:11.720 a lot of Filipino, a lot of Asian, uh, you know, Polynesian. 0:10:12.480 --> 0:10:14.480 So suddenly you were in a group of people who 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:17.760 looked like you for the first time. For a lot 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:19.920 of recruits, the shock of the first few days of 0:10:19.960 --> 0:10:23.760 boot camp is utterly terrifying. Some of them literally pissed 0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:27.680 their pants, But not rich Volsky. You kind of thought 0:10:27.679 --> 0:10:33.480 it was funny. Everybody's yelling and everybody's running around checking 0:10:33.520 --> 0:10:35.920 with their head cut off, all this kind of just 0:10:36.920 --> 0:10:41.360 taking her all in. Were you intimidated it all? You know? No, 0:10:41.520 --> 0:10:44.280 I really wasn't. I knew I knew what it was 0:10:44.400 --> 0:10:46.400 gonna be like, so you kind of knew it was 0:10:46.920 --> 0:10:55.040 theater a little bit for sure. After thirteen weeks of 0:10:55.080 --> 0:10:57.280 boot camp, rich Volsci went about an hour up the 0:10:57.360 --> 0:11:00.280 road to Camp Pendleton for Infantry School, where you learned 0:11:00.280 --> 0:11:02.400 how to be what the Marines call an O three 0:11:02.520 --> 0:11:05.920 thirty one, a machine gunner. Then it was a short 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:10.520 ride to his new unit, Weapons Platoon, Blackfoot Company, first Battalion, 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:14.000 fifth Marines. He barely had time to settle in before 0:11:14.000 --> 0:11:17.679 he shipped out to Afghanistan. In about ten months. He'd 0:11:17.720 --> 0:11:20.079 gone from surfing in Hawaii to slipping an m to 0:11:20.240 --> 0:11:24.920 forty Bravo machine gun and sang it. Here he is again, 0:11:24.960 --> 0:11:28.120 back at patrol based fires. I live in a fucking 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:32.480 mud hut. It's just three ft thick walls of mud 0:11:33.000 --> 0:11:36.400 right now. It's actually pretty dirty, just because I've been 0:11:36.400 --> 0:11:40.920 discussing and not cleaned it. And uh, I got fleas 0:11:40.960 --> 0:11:44.840 because of the fucking chickens that run around. At just 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:47.720 nineteen years old, rich Volski was the youngest guy in 0:11:47.800 --> 0:11:51.040 third Squad. He joined the Marines looking for adventure and 0:11:51.080 --> 0:11:54.040 he definitely found it. But by the time I arrived 0:11:54.120 --> 0:11:57.680 four months into the deployment, the novelty had worn off. 0:11:57.720 --> 0:12:00.320 I always like doing my job when I'm shooting. Is 0:12:00.360 --> 0:12:04.160 that makes carrying the two forty round not just seemed 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:06.319 like a giant piece of metal that's pulling me into 0:12:06.360 --> 0:12:11.480 the air slowly, But like getting shot, It's it's not 0:12:12.280 --> 0:12:15.040 it's not fun. It's it's fun when you're shooting. You know, 0:12:15.120 --> 0:12:17.280 sometimes you a hammer, sometimes you nail. It's real fun 0:12:17.280 --> 0:12:20.240 when you need a hammer. But is it the kind 0:12:20.240 --> 0:12:21.640 of fun that you want to keep having for a 0:12:21.679 --> 0:12:27.640 long time? Um No, it's it's a kind of fun 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:31.080 where it's like it's like you get really wasted one 0:12:31.160 --> 0:12:32.599 night and you do a bunch of stupid ship and 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:37.599 it's fun to talk about, but you don't want to 0:12:37.600 --> 0:12:40.520 do it for the rest of your life. No, it's 0:12:40.520 --> 0:12:43.679 definitely had way too many close calls to I want 0:12:43.720 --> 0:12:46.600 to do that for this my life. Okay, you can 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:51.240 only dodge bullets for so long. Richbolski managed to dodge 0:12:51.240 --> 0:12:54.520 bullets for his entire deployment, but the bullets were only 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:57.880 one of the threats, and sang In describe like one 0:12:57.920 --> 0:13:01.360 of the scariest or toughest things that you've had to 0:13:01.440 --> 0:13:03.840 deal with out here in as much detail as you can, 0:13:05.080 --> 0:13:07.400 something that really sticks out in your mind that you 0:13:07.440 --> 0:13:10.520 think about kind of like sucked me up. Yeah, it's 0:13:10.559 --> 0:13:14.880 probably when I got bought up. I got me pretty good. 0:13:15.840 --> 0:13:18.760 Rich Volski was one of the seventeen who got injured 0:13:18.760 --> 0:13:22.000 on June twelve. The blast left him with a slight 0:13:22.040 --> 0:13:25.959 stutter and with permanent brain damage. So when he tells 0:13:26.000 --> 0:13:29.280 me he doesn't think about Afghanistan much anymore, there's a 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:33.439 caveat my whole memory of all of this is very fuzzy, 0:13:34.600 --> 0:13:37.560 you know, but uh, and it's hard for me to 0:13:37.679 --> 0:13:47.119 put it in chronological order. Rich Volski's memories all scrambled 0:13:47.160 --> 0:13:50.800 from the explosion. When I try to drill down into specifics, 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:53.760 it goes something like this, So just tell me what 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:58.959 your first impression of Afghanistan was, Brown Sandy. He's talking 0:13:59.000 --> 0:14:01.880 about Camp leathern Neck, the huge logistics base in the 0:14:01.920 --> 0:14:04.200 middle of the Helmon Desert where they stopped over on 0:14:04.240 --> 0:14:08.520 their way to sang It Hot. I don't particularly remember 0:14:08.600 --> 0:14:11.079 Hot too much when we first got there. Well, it 0:14:11.160 --> 0:14:12.920 was probably the perfect time of year. It was like 0:14:13.080 --> 0:14:17.160 March right spring. You don't remember, tell me, man, It's 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:20.040 not like his memories got erased. They're just out of 0:14:20.160 --> 0:14:26.960 order and smashed together. I think I remember, Uh, somebody 0:14:27.000 --> 0:14:29.960 got their foot blown and a half. It was Captain 0:14:30.000 --> 0:14:35.840 Frank Is that right? Lost half his foot? But what 0:14:35.880 --> 0:14:39.200 was that? Right in the beginning, No, somebody else talked 0:14:39.200 --> 0:14:41.160 about that. I forget which I think? Is it the 0:14:41.200 --> 0:14:43.520 foot thing though? Or or am or am I wrong? 0:14:48.560 --> 0:14:52.200 Rich Volsky's memory trouble stem from a traumatic brain injury, 0:14:52.320 --> 0:14:55.440 or t b I. It's a catch all diagnosis that 0:14:55.480 --> 0:14:59.720 includes everything from concussions to open head wounds. Rich Volski 0:14:59.840 --> 0:15:02.440 had both, and he's still dealing with the effects a 0:15:02.520 --> 0:15:08.440 decade later. But well, I have a thought. It's gone. 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:12.680 It's gone. That happens a lot, doesn't it. It does. Yeh. 0:15:12.960 --> 0:15:16.120 TV is a bitch man. You know what's really funny 0:15:16.120 --> 0:15:19.840 about this whole thing is I feel like, unless you 0:15:19.880 --> 0:15:21.920 saw me there, you wouldn't even believe that I did 0:15:21.920 --> 0:15:27.720 it because I don't remember all of those bullshit, you know, 0:15:28.120 --> 0:15:31.360 because you're asking me questions. I God, I do not know. 0:15:32.680 --> 0:15:37.120 You know, good thing, I did see him there, and 0:15:37.200 --> 0:15:43.360 I've got photos and audio to prove it. We'll be 0:15:43.400 --> 0:16:02.600 back after the break. I stayed with rich Bolski for 0:16:02.640 --> 0:16:04.920 a few days and got to meet his wife, Samantha, 0:16:05.080 --> 0:16:10.000 and all of his pets. This his mouse. He's a 0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:14.680 vicious little bastard. Yeah you don't. You don't like that guy. 0:16:14.680 --> 0:16:17.280 You keep an eye on him, okay. Mouse is an 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:21.080 American Eskimo dog. He looks like an overgrown cotton ball 0:16:21.120 --> 0:16:25.840 with fangs barely bigger than the cat. Mrs Claus Richbosky 0:16:25.960 --> 0:16:29.920 also has a big lazy Bernies mountain dog. Actually they're 0:16:30.120 --> 0:16:35.400 polar opposites. This one's sweet, nothing but love, and then 0:16:35.440 --> 0:16:39.840 the other one is very skeptical. Of everything, including journalists 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:42.840 who show up with big microphones and headphones. Especially journalist. 0:16:42.880 --> 0:16:48.440 I got him trained, you know, journalists, lawyers, auditors, politicians, 0:16:48.800 --> 0:16:51.880 that's who we have them. Bite Mouse's training has been 0:16:51.960 --> 0:16:58.560 highly affected. Hey, no, that one was a straight up ambush. 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:01.320 I keep an eye on MOUs will Rich Volsky shows 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:03.400 me around the home he's building. I guess you would 0:17:03.400 --> 0:17:06.040 call this what open concept, with the living rooms and 0:17:06.040 --> 0:17:08.880 the kitchens in the same spot. It's a quantt hut, 0:17:09.119 --> 0:17:11.600 a prefab steel shell in the shape of a giant 0:17:11.760 --> 0:17:14.760 upside down you similar to the ones cranked out by 0:17:14.760 --> 0:17:17.520 the tens of thousands to house American troops during World 0:17:17.560 --> 0:17:22.959 War Two. Quant huts are quintessential Alaska, gurable, no frills 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:25.600 shelters for the kinds of frontier characters you find in 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:29.080 Jack London stories. But this one would fit better in 0:17:29.080 --> 0:17:32.639 the pages of Martha Stewart living. The three bedroom design 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:35.840 has heated floors, an entire wall of windows looking out 0:17:35.840 --> 0:17:39.600 on the mountains, and a deluxe kitchen for Samantha. We 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:44.720 got the old lady a nice big Viking range because 0:17:44.720 --> 0:17:46.800 she does love to cook. You know, rich Volsky is 0:17:46.840 --> 0:17:50.040 putting the finishing touches on the interior. Now he's one 0:17:50.040 --> 0:17:52.080 of those guys who can do pretty much anything that 0:17:52.119 --> 0:17:57.000 involves tools. And you did this all yourself? Yes, yeah, 0:17:57.080 --> 0:18:00.000 with I mean obviously the help of so my good 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:03.560 friends and co workers and lots of cases of beer, 0:18:03.640 --> 0:18:07.400 lots of barbecues. It's been two years since a big 0:18:07.440 --> 0:18:09.800 group of his friends helped put up the quantip frame, 0:18:10.200 --> 0:18:12.439 and now the end is finally in sight. Are you 0:18:12.480 --> 0:18:19.320 ready to be done? Absolutely? Like last year, the new 0:18:19.320 --> 0:18:22.040 house doesn't have much furniture yet, so when it's time 0:18:22.080 --> 0:18:23.960 to sit down and talk, we walk over to the 0:18:23.960 --> 0:18:26.040 one room cabin that was on the property when rich 0:18:26.040 --> 0:18:28.840 bold Sky first bought it. It's about as close to 0:18:28.960 --> 0:18:32.680 an ideal mountain man hideout as you could imagine, unfinished 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:36.240 lumber walls, a cast iron stove, a bear skull on 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:39.400 the kitchen table, and a double barrel shotgun hanging by 0:18:39.400 --> 0:18:42.480 the front door. Rich Bolsky might have stayed in this 0:18:42.560 --> 0:18:46.040 place forever if he'd never met Samantha. He pulls down 0:18:46.040 --> 0:18:48.119 a bottle of whiskey from the top of the refrigerator 0:18:48.160 --> 0:18:51.119 and grabs a couple of glasses. Then he warns me 0:18:51.640 --> 0:18:55.560 and I can remember ship in any kind of real order, 0:18:56.240 --> 0:19:00.520 and it's going to be frustrating for you. Okay, So 0:19:01.280 --> 0:19:06.879 then what's probably necessary is to figure out how you 0:19:06.960 --> 0:19:11.399 remember things, like what how does your memory work? I 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:18.400 can get specific moments, and if somebody else's talking about it, 0:19:18.760 --> 0:19:23.560 you know, I can go, oh, yeah, you know, like, yeah, 0:19:23.560 --> 0:19:25.720 I remember that clear as fucking day, you know what 0:19:25.800 --> 0:19:31.000 I mean. But it's also it's almost gotta be planted 0:19:30.840 --> 0:19:35.159 or or dug up, if that makes sense. We decided 0:19:35.200 --> 0:19:37.920 to dig up some of those memories together, which means 0:19:37.960 --> 0:19:41.040 we have to go back to Sangin. As a member 0:19:41.040 --> 0:19:44.320 of Weapons Platoon, rich Volsky was technically an attachment to 0:19:44.400 --> 0:19:47.600 third Squad, not one of its original members. As the 0:19:47.600 --> 0:19:50.719 machine gunner, his weapon was critical whenever the squad got 0:19:50.760 --> 0:19:54.280 into a firefight. I was normally towards the front of 0:19:54.320 --> 0:20:01.120 the patrol, so that when the sweeper and uh the 0:20:01.160 --> 0:20:06.080 spot or right term there. Yeah, the sweeper and the 0:20:06.119 --> 0:20:08.399 spotter would poke through a tree line, you know, and 0:20:08.440 --> 0:20:10.600 if they got shot, I was normally towards the front, 0:20:11.600 --> 0:20:16.080 so I could pop up there real quick and uh 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:20.359 start laying suppression down. The Only time it wasn't effective 0:20:20.560 --> 0:20:23.160 is if it came from the rear, and then that's 0:20:23.200 --> 0:20:28.880 where you're automatic rifleman Moody was was fucking handling that portion, 0:20:29.119 --> 0:20:35.119 and he carried a slightly while lighter machine gun. Yeah. So, 0:20:35.160 --> 0:20:37.359 while Moody took care of the rear with his saw, 0:20:37.600 --> 0:20:40.960 the M two four nine squad automatic weapon, rich Volsky 0:20:41.080 --> 0:20:43.120 was at the front with his M two forty Bravo, 0:20:43.560 --> 0:20:47.400 a nearly four ft long belt fed beast. The gun 0:20:47.440 --> 0:20:50.880 and ammo weighed around sixty pounds. It was a lot 0:20:50.960 --> 0:20:53.359 to be hauling around in the Afghan heat, but it 0:20:53.480 --> 0:20:56.240 was worth it. The first thing I do is, uh, 0:20:56.320 --> 0:21:01.199 I make noise, even if I'm just flying ship in 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:06.879 the wrong direction. You know, entirely I am. I'm making noise. 0:21:07.520 --> 0:21:10.160 I'm basically allowing the rest of the guys to move 0:21:11.320 --> 0:21:14.760 by keeping the enemy's head down. Most of the guys 0:21:14.760 --> 0:21:17.960 in the squad carried M four car beans, semi automatic 0:21:18.119 --> 0:21:21.159 rifles that fire a small, high velocity round that's barely 0:21:21.160 --> 0:21:24.840 bigger than twenty two rounds used for hunting squirrels. If 0:21:24.840 --> 0:21:26.840 you've ever seen a picture of an A R fifteen, 0:21:27.240 --> 0:21:29.800 then you know what an M four looks like. They're 0:21:29.920 --> 0:21:32.879 lightweight and easy to shoot quickly and accurately, but they 0:21:32.960 --> 0:21:35.840 lack the intimidation factor of machine guns like the two 0:21:35.880 --> 0:21:38.880 forty and the fifty Cow, which fires around big enough 0:21:38.920 --> 0:21:42.200 to take out a truck engine. So tell me if 0:21:42.240 --> 0:21:43.800 you were on the other side of that, why would 0:21:43.840 --> 0:21:46.440 that be intimidating to you? I guess the only way 0:21:46.480 --> 0:21:49.880 to put it would be, you know, twenty two long 0:21:50.000 --> 0:21:52.200 rifle will kill you, but a fifty cow makes you 0:21:52.240 --> 0:21:56.560 feel like you'll be more dead, you know. Yeah, I 0:21:56.600 --> 0:21:58.880 mean it'll make you It'll make you more dead. That's 0:21:58.880 --> 0:22:02.879 the psychological effect it gotta be. Yeah. So do you 0:22:02.880 --> 0:22:05.600 remember the first time that you fired your M two 0:22:05.680 --> 0:22:09.560 forty Bravo and a firefight? Yeah, I was shooting out 0:22:09.600 --> 0:22:13.320 a building. What do you feel like? It's just a great, 0:22:13.920 --> 0:22:16.719 great feeling to just let a let her up. Man. 0:22:16.760 --> 0:22:19.119 I always loved, I always love shooting machine guns. I mean, 0:22:19.160 --> 0:22:23.120 even in training, it was a it was great. So 0:22:23.280 --> 0:22:25.919 did did you get to fire your machine? Got a 0:22:25.960 --> 0:22:29.560 lot after the fighting season started. There's a lot of shooting. 0:22:29.680 --> 0:22:32.280 It's what you wanted to do, right, absolutely, I guess 0:22:32.280 --> 0:22:34.240 the shooting is exactly what I wanted to do. And 0:22:34.800 --> 0:22:36.880 the blowing up is not what I wanted to do, 0:22:37.440 --> 0:22:44.239 and that was the unavoidable part. So tell me about that. 0:22:44.320 --> 0:22:47.320 Tell me about when that happened. It was shortly after 0:22:47.320 --> 0:22:50.960 the ninth, But it feels like like when I when 0:22:51.000 --> 0:22:53.080 I think about it, it feels like we had just 0:22:53.960 --> 0:23:03.320 got back in from picking up O'Brien. In my memory, 0:23:03.520 --> 0:23:07.240 it feels like it was those those two days between 0:23:07.280 --> 0:23:10.560 the nine and the twelfth just don't exist. The the 0:23:10.640 --> 0:23:16.720 unimportant part just gets gone, if that makes sense. It 0:23:16.840 --> 0:23:20.640 was June twelve, two th eleven, the day Joshua McDaniels died. 0:23:20.680 --> 0:23:23.399 In sixteen other Marines got wounded in a series of 0:23:23.400 --> 0:23:26.919 I D blasts. Rich Volsky got knocked to the ground 0:23:26.960 --> 0:23:31.280 by the explosion that hit McDaniels. Then he got hit 0:23:31.359 --> 0:23:35.200 again moments later by a secondary blast that knocked him unconscious. 0:23:36.119 --> 0:23:39.000 The pock marks from shrapnel and debris were still visible 0:23:39.040 --> 0:23:40.800 on his face when he told me about it back 0:23:40.840 --> 0:23:44.280 in Sangin. When I came to, I was just laying 0:23:44.320 --> 0:23:49.119 face down the sand. It's like pull of blood and Sheer, 0:23:49.720 --> 0:23:53.880 last corporal Sheer rolled me over and he has, hey, man, 0:23:53.960 --> 0:23:56.240 you got all your limbs, got your legs. I don't 0:23:56.240 --> 0:23:58.080 know how you did it. I was like, you can 0:23:58.119 --> 0:24:00.840 be okay, and I was like what because I I 0:24:00.920 --> 0:24:05.280 had a severe concussion. Um, I just got knocked straight retarded, 0:24:05.960 --> 0:24:13.760 and uh he started dragging me out in his cabin. 0:24:13.920 --> 0:24:16.320 Ten years later, I asked rich bold Sky what he 0:24:16.359 --> 0:24:19.600 still remembers about that day. I remember when I heard 0:24:19.640 --> 0:24:30.679 the first explosion, Uh, trying to I heard the first explosion, 0:24:30.960 --> 0:24:34.439 and then there was like just the dust, you know, 0:24:34.560 --> 0:24:36.440 and then just like kind of silence, kind of put 0:24:36.440 --> 0:24:40.720 my dick in the dirt, you know, and uh, just quiet, 0:24:41.200 --> 0:24:45.160 and I'm going, fuck, you know. And then I remember 0:24:45.160 --> 0:24:54.200 hearing McDaniels screaming, and uh that was like, holy fuck man, 0:24:54.240 --> 0:24:57.960 this is bad. So I screwed up that direction best 0:24:58.000 --> 0:25:00.800 I can, and uh, I get up there and I 0:25:00.840 --> 0:25:03.880 see McDaniels and looking at him, I'm I'm thinking, uh, 0:25:04.080 --> 0:25:07.360 I can't believe that he can make that much noise 0:25:08.480 --> 0:25:12.600 with how small he is. He was essentially blown in 0:25:12.720 --> 0:25:17.080 a half. Yeah he was. I remember him making an 0:25:17.080 --> 0:25:20.000 insane amount of noise for for how much of him 0:25:20.080 --> 0:25:22.359 was left, and I thought that was crazy. So I 0:25:22.400 --> 0:25:26.000 was talking to him, but it was I'm not sure 0:25:26.680 --> 0:25:30.040