Mike Durant

So if you do that, this guy just got shot down and you put another one, right?

What do you think is going to happen to that bird?

Same freaking thing, right?

Well, I wish I could take credit for it.

I can't, I don't know whose idea it was, but somebody raised the flag and said, that's a dumb ass contingency.

We need another solution.

And we concluded, we, general term, not me, that we needed a tank because a tank,

could have gone from the airfield to any crash site in the city within five minutes, maybe 10.

Request goes all the way up the chain of command, gets to SecDef, who says no.

why not because we have tanks all over the world i've talked to so many tankers since then because they were put on standby somehow they knew that there was a potential they were going to be called upon to go and

They were—every single one I've spoken to said, we couldn't freaking wait.

I mean, we wanted to go.

We would have absolutely been able to go through those streets.

We would have got to you guys.

We were ready to rock and roll.

And SecDef says no, and it's for political reasons.

We had been—we took the forces out.

We went from 38,000 to 1,500.

That appeases the American people who don't want to be in a conflict.

We took all the armor out.