In 2003, Dan Stuewe was a platoon leader in the 101st Airborne Division preparing to cross into Iraq. With only a few weeks with his platoon, Stuewe deployed forward, convinced he’d never see his new wife again. On the day the unit deployed, a soldier handed him some chewing tobacco and a valuable lesson: smiling changes everything. After air assault missions as the unit moved toward Baghdad, Stuewe's soldiers provided him the valuable reminder to smile when times got tough. Combat in Najaf, Karbala, Baghdad, and Mosul all proved the wisdom of smiling when it sucks.
In February 2012, Capt. Jannelle Allong-Diakabana was a military police platoon leader deployed in Nangarhar province, Afghanistan. One day, as she and her platoon...
This episode of The Spear features a conversation with Capt. Lindsay Heisler. An aviation officer and Apache pilot, in December 2015 she was part...
For seventeen years, the US military has been at war in Afghanistan. The guests on this episode were there at the very beginning. Jason...