National Service Series: Brendan O'Byrne
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My guest today is Brendan O'Byrne. Brendan is a veteran of the United States Army. In 2007, he served a 15 month deployment in the Korengal Valley of Afghanistan with the men of Second Platoon, Battle Company. This deployment was documented in Sebastian Junger's films, Restrepo and Korengal. Brendan was also featured in another documentary called The Last Patrol and in Junger's book, War.
Brendan and I discuss good music, the worst parts of combat, the difficulty of coming home, and how war feels more human than modern American society. I hope you enjoy our conversation as much as I did.
The purpose of this podcast series is to talk through problems facing the United States and explore the ways in which national service may solve those problems. The more feedback, the better. If you have any questions, comments, or follow-ups to this conversation, please reach out!
Selected links from the show:
Show notes:
2:00 - The White Buffalo and other good music.
4:00 - Music has been a part of Brendan's life since he was a kid.
10:55 - Brendan's best artistic ideas come to him when he's sad.
14:15 - Brendan's tough relationship with his father.
17:55 - Why spending a year in juvenile detention was the best thing that ever happened to him.
"If my dad hadn't shot me, I'd be dead."
21:35 - Brendan's path into the Army.
34:20 - Brendan's deployment to the Korengal Valley - the mission and location.
38:35 - Winning the hearts and minds of the Afghans.
40:15 - The juxtaposition of beauty and violence.
46:50 - The worst parts of combat.
"The bugs made me want to leave the ambush line, not the bullets."
58:20 - Brendan expected to die in combat, and that feeling didn't disappear when he got home.
"You have to come to terms with being killed in combat...and if you don't do that, you go crazy. But if you do do that then you can survive and react in the situations that are going to keep you and your friends alive, and that's all that matters. The thing that matters is keeping you and your friends alive. Your friends first and you second."
1:00:15 - The hardest parts about coming home from war.
"I couldn't fit in because the entire time I was judging people on standards that they are not living by."
1:02:35 - The importance of putting yourself second to understand human connection.
"I felt the most human on top of a hill, shooting at people, and having people shooting at me, because it was the only place I could put myself second to the group. And it feels so fucking good."
1:09:20 - Brendan and I both feel better now, during COVID-19, than we have in a long time.
1:13:10 - Brendan's lessons on being human: finding beauty even when beauty is hard to find and the importance of putting yourself second to the group.
"I've been pretty good at being miserable for a while, but I'm trying to work toward happiness."
