Daniel P. Driscoll

They're under me.

They're filming.

We're doing the plan.

We're getting the Humvees.

We're rolling out.

We're doing the cordon.

We get to this place where they think they're making IEDs.

We have the bolt cutters ready to go.

We call up for the clearance, and we're told that the new rules of engagement that had gone into effect meant we couldn't cut this lock that was a gym lock that was like the size of what my seven-year-old puts on her locker at school.

And so we end up being told, you can't break locks anymore.

We get back in the Humvees.

We drive back over these IED-laden roads.

And it was like at that moment, I was like, never again.

Like, we have got to fix this as a nation, because how could you possibly have risked all of these limbs and all of these lives and then let like a little tiny gym locker stop you from this mission?

Wow.

It's maddening.

Unbelievable.

And then now from this seat, because basically the idea was come back, try to get some experiences, come back and make a little bit of a difference.

And you see how those types of preposterous decisions are output from our training to how we procure things to how our missions come to be.

Very few people along the line think that they are leading to that sort of stupid outcome.