0:00
[MUSIC]
0:18
This is Undaunted Life of Man's podcast.
0:21
I'm your host Kyle Thompson.
0:23
Let's get into it.
0:24
All right guys, today we've got a special guest on the podcast.
0:26
His name is Jim Lindsey.
0:28
So he's the author of this incredible book, The Sniper,
0:31
the untold story of the Marine Corps's greatest marksman of all time.
0:34
So this is a biography of United States Marine Corps sniper Chuck Moini,
0:38
who served in Vietnam at the age of 18, and get this.
0:42
In just 16 months of active duty in Vietnam,
0:46
he had 103 confirmed kills with 216 probable kills, okay?
0:53
So very, very incredible guy, had an incredibly, I'm just,
0:58
I'm kind of at a loss for words, because as you're reading this guy's biography,
1:02
it just, it almost seems impossible to think that he was able to do,
1:05
but he was in a very target rich environment, and he was doing great work,
1:09
and he was basically having to work every single day.
1:11
And there were different points in his time in Vietnam,
1:14
where he was averaging 4, 5, 6 kills a week that were confirmed.
1:17
And we get into this podcast with Jim Lindsey, who wrote this biography,
1:21
about the difference between a confirmed kill and a probable kill.
1:25
But it's a very interesting story, how Jim Lindsey even got a hold of Chuck Moini,
1:29
and how it even came to be that he would write a biography about him.
1:32
Because Chuck is later on in life, he's in his 70s, I believe.
1:37
And he just never really talked about it for years and years and years,
1:40
even his wife didn't know about his time in Vietnam.
1:42
But he kind of got outed in a book that was released a while back,
1:45
and then he started doing some documentaries and doing some public appearances
1:48
and kind of embracing it.
1:50
But a lot of people, myself included, thought Carlos Hathcock,
1:52
like that's the guy that is the most famous and the greatest marine sniper,
1:56
maybe sniper overall of all time.
1:58
And then it came out that he had Chuck had about 10 more confirmed kills
2:02
than Carlos Hathcock did.
2:04
But this book breaks down, you know, his upbringing,
2:06
how he got into the military, his time in Vietnam.
2:09
And when I talked to Jim, you know, we're talking through some of those things.
2:12
And then he also describes the greatest story, I guess,
2:15
in terms of something that he was able to accomplish in his discussions with him,
2:19
not only kind of, you know, cracking through the outer shell of Chuck,
2:22
who's a very boisterous guy, got a big personality,
2:25
getting him to be serious about these stories.
2:27
But one of the most famous stories about Chuck Moini
2:29
is whenever he shot 16 Viet Cong with 16 bullets in under 30 seconds.
2:37
And if he didn't do that, guys,
2:39
there would have been untold numbers of United States Marines that were killed.
2:43
And so we're going to get into a lot of detail.
2:44
I really enjoyed my time with Jim.
2:46
So without further ado, let's get into it.
2:49
Jim Lindsay, welcome to Undaunted Life of Man's podcast.
2:53
Thanks. Thanks for asking me.
2:54
I'm happy to have you on today,
2:56
but you're doing something actually kind of cool that I didn't know
2:59
and I didn't intend to ask you about.
3:00
You're actually in your, I guess your RV or whatever right now.
3:04
Are you driving around the United States? Is that what's going on, Jim?
3:07
Yeah, I'm pulling this little camper.
3:10
It's a 2017. So I'm not living.
3:12
I'm not like living in the brush or anything, but I pulled up with a 154 pickup.
3:16
And I've always wanted to see America and I've seen a lot of the West in
3:20
because I live in Oregon, but I decided that I better get it done.
3:24
And I took off in the middle of September late.
3:30
I had so much going on it. I finally just got in and took off.
3:33
Went across the North down through Michigan, saw the Ford stuff,
3:38
the museums and went up the Erie Canal, went up to Maine,
3:42
caught the flowers that I'd leave just for just right and had a lobster on the dock.
3:47
And then I went down through the Appalachian Mountains,
3:51
Kentucky and into Nashville. And I spent 10 days in Nashville and
3:55
doing all the cowboy stuff I should have done 50 years ago.
3:58
There you go. Well, hey, at some point you got to drive across the great plains
4:02
and then come through Oklahoma. And if you do, make sure you hit me up.
4:06
But one thing that's very indicative of you and obviously it's one of the
4:09
main reasons that we had you on today is because you are a writer.
4:11
And so you've written several books and we're going to talk about
4:14
the sniper here in just a second. But I guess what got you into writing?
4:17
Because when you talk to people, a lot of people don't like doing it.
4:19
Well, it's kind of a, it's almost evil. It's just, you know, it's one of those things.
4:29
I think I could make that, you know, and you've probably said that before.
4:33
I think I could draw that picture. Well, and I've read a lot.
4:38
I've read all my life with red novels and nonfiction.
4:44
So I started thinking, I think I could do that.
4:48
And I wrote a couple of articles in Hot Rod magazines and they took them.
4:53
And then I wrote a novel.
4:57
And I had some help from a gal who had just graduated from college and had
5:03
us some more often. And it did pretty well. It's called A Little Basterton.
5:08
I learned an awful lot from it. And then I took a class in writing
5:14
because I wanted to write another book. And a lady that was a teacher and instructor
5:19
is, she's close to my age. And she's just very good. Her name's Lil.
5:24
And I knew I needed her. And so I got her interested in the book.
5:30
And so she, we kind of took it together.
5:34
And she is good about the mechanics. There's so many things in about a book
5:39
that you don't realize, if it's a good author, you don't realize this is all
5:44
going on back behind those words. And it's all about
5:48
all the structure and the prose I had. I found out I had a natural voice.
5:55
So I, and that's when I really clicked in. But I needed the mechanics or I didn't
6:00
take, I didn't go to college. And I'm still learning.
6:06
And she's still whipping me.
6:09
Hey, well, that's good. So a lot of people didn't get out of their comfort zone and
6:13
learn everything. They're like, ah, if it doesn't come naturally to me, I don't
6:15
want to do it. So you, so you became a writer. And that really led to, well, I
6:20
guess, in a certain way, to you meeting Chuck Moini, right? And that's how he
6:23
pronounces his last name or Moini, right? Moini, yes. Moini. And so I've heard,
6:28
I've heard it pronounced about a thousand different ways. But obviously, as I said in
6:32
the introduction, you know, the most lethal United States Marine Course
6:36
Sniper of all time. And we'll get to kind of how that all went down. But
6:39
how did you even come across him? Okay, I've farmed on my life. That was my
6:45
major. My brother and I grew up on a farm and we love farming. And we took it to
6:51
end up acquiring a pretty sizable bunch of land. And for 20 years, I was in
6:57
Eastern Oregon running a ranch that we owned there. And that's when I met Chuck.
7:02
And he was, he was working for the Forest Service two years younger than me.
7:06
And we both liked drinking beer. And sometimes before I'd go home in the
7:13
afternoon, after I came into John Deere to get some parts or something, I'd go to the
7:16
Eyelower Tower. And he'd come in there after work. And he was a kind of guy that you
7:22
walk in and you're glad he's there. You know, he's so, he's got so much charisma.
7:28
He could be a movie star, that kind of a guy. He'd jump up and grab a chair for you and
7:34
have a beer. And then we'd talk. And then he came out of my place in 100 ducks.
7:42
But I had no idea I ever wanted to be a writer then. And I had no idea that he'd done what he'd
7:49
done. We never talked about the military. And it was when I got back home from the 20 years,
7:56
I moved back to the other side of Oregon. And I was sitting there watching TV one even in it.
8:01
And there he was. And there was like a history channel or something. And I thought, Oh my gosh,
8:07
that's Chuck. I can't believe it. Well, he never told anybody about all this. Well,
8:12
by that time, I was getting interested in writing. I'd probably, yeah, I'd already got my first
8:17
book published and it was doing pretty well. And so I, I contacted him through some friends and
8:25
he remembered me. And so he, I said to you, yes, Chuck, I had no idea. And he just laughed. He's
8:33
that kind of a guy. He's not, he makes light of everything. So I said, I want to come see you.
8:40
Okay. So he told me where to, and so I went over there and we visited and he, and he'd read my book
8:46
and my first book and he liked it. And he was kind of that, the name of his little
8:52
[inaudible]. And he was kind of a little [inaudible] in school. So I brought up the subject that,
8:59
you know, somebody ought to be writing a book about you. And he, he said, well, a couple guys
9:04
tried and they both died and laughed, you know, and so as time went on, went back and forth and
9:10
back before they started, he, he said, okay, let's do it. And I was, it was a huge undertaking for me to,
9:20
to know where I was, I was gonna have to delve into this guy's life, you know, about a lot of
9:28
things because I wanted to write a book, not about the gun or the bullets or the, or the number of
9:36
kills, more or less, more about the man who did it. What kind of a guy would, how, how would a guy,
9:46
where would he grow up and what would he learn in school and how did he ever get to be the point
9:50
of a man that could do that and have the will to do it. And he was kind of on the same track too.
9:56
He, he wanted it his life story. And so that's why the book starts out when he's just a little child.
10:03
I think that that's amazing how, how you got to talking with them. There's actually a funny
10:07
quote because Chuck wrote the prologue of the book and this quote says this, I told him I had
10:12
worked with an author out of Florida for five years. And just when the book was about done,
10:16
the guy had a heart attack and died. The book never got published. I told him I would never do
10:21
another book. But here you are. He finally agrees. He says, yeah, let's go ahead and do a book.
10:26
But he was very, very adamant. You talk about this in the book that he wanted all of his stories.
10:32
He told you all of his stories are true. And he wanted them to be basically told through his eyes.
10:38
He didn't want you to Hollywood eyes. He didn't want you to change any details to make it better
10:42
for the, for the pros or for the narrative of the book. But it really started with just discussions
10:47
that it was just you and Chuck sitting down probably with a couple of beers and just having
10:52
these discussions. But how did you approach your discussions with Chuck? Because again, he's,
10:56
he's a lighthearted guy. He likes to have fun. He likes to do whatever. But he's talking about
11:00
some really, really serious stuff. I'm glad you asked that because that was really big for me to
11:09
talk about him killing somebody. And I asked him about that. I said, how is this going to go?
11:18
I said, I'm all in. I'm totally honest. I mean, it's part of my job. And it's even more my job
11:28
writing a biography, even in writing a novel that things have to be correct. Well, so
11:40
he had a, he was easy to talk to about that. And we would talk about,
11:46
at first, I know I took notes. I never, on the whole project, I probably met with him 12 times.
11:54
And he lives 400 miles from me. It was quite an undertaking. But I never, ever used to recorder.
12:00
And I just took notes. And then, of course, then I'd go home and try to read them. Then I'd get back
12:09
on the phone. But he was always good about picking up the phone. Yeah. Well, no, it happened on a,
12:14
you know, it was in the fall. And it was a monsoon season. And he had a good memory. I was really
12:22
amazed at how he remembered the details starting out, even back when he was four years old when the
12:29
book starts and about how he remembered the names of his friends and of his school teachers and of
12:40
his boss, you know, he worked part time after school in Lakeview, Oregon. And then he, when he got
12:50
into the military and he got into the Marine Corps and the basic training, he remembered names,
12:59
you know, of his commanding officers and that sort of thing. And then his wife helped a lot with that.
13:07
She did, she did a lot of research for him after he became famous. And he never told anybody about
13:16
this. He never told me. Well, I never expected him to tell me we never talked about that kind of
13:20
thing when I knew him. But he never told his wife that he was that he did all that stuff. And it
13:28
all came out when that book about him called Dear Mom came out. And it was this last spot I wrote
13:35
the book and kind of outed him. And then it was just it was a rush. Well, Jim, that's actually
13:43
something that's you find it to be common with a lot of the guys from Vietnam and the Korean War
13:48
and the World Wars and things like that. Aside from maybe their correspondence writing back and forth
13:53
to family, they didn't really talk a lot about their exploits on the battlefield. And we kind of
13:56
live in a modern era with the with the GWAT. A lot of these people are writing books and are,
14:02
you know, making big public profiles off of the exploits that they did during warfare.
14:07
It's interesting for me because I like seeing some of those things. But I guess from your perspective,
14:11
you're hearing this guy say these things. He's telling you these these stories and we'll get
14:17
into some of the stories here in a second. Was there ever any concern from your end that Chuck
14:21
was, you know, maybe telling tall tales? Because you know how it is like a guy catches a fish that's
14:26
this big, but he tells everyone at the bar that's this big like I could barely pull it into the boat.
14:30
Did you ever think that maybe he's kind of leading me on a little bit?
14:33
I got a really good answer for that. Okay.
14:36
He he was out in the in the he was out in the field. Okay, it's been quite a while since I went
14:46
through and how many spotter they were with a company and there was a big two big helicopters
14:54
come flying in and some officers got out real big shots. And while they were there,
15:00
the general or colonel whoever he was, wanted Chuck to show him
15:05
something about the area there and Chuck had been there for so long.
15:10
And that it was to denage about 20 miles out of that.
15:18
Arizona territory much flat. It's in the book. Anyway, all of a sudden there was these three
15:25
NVA soldiers out there. And and the general says, let's go get it to helicopter and we'll chase
15:36
them down. Chuck says, if we go after the helicopter, they'll be gone. He says, I'll just shoot him here.
15:42
And that general says, I nobody could send me that far away.
15:48
So Chuck laid out on a rock, you know, prone position and and shot by him. And yet by that
15:55
time, he got that done. The other two had disappeared. And he told me, he said, I never told those
16:04
guys, but the one I was aiming at isn't the one I hit. And he it was and he he laughed about it
16:13
because it was but he told me, here I am, I'm writing a book. He never got in the book. I don't
16:21
know. There's two or three things like that that didn't make it. I don't know. That was my fault,
16:25
probably. But he admitted to me that here's one of the best shots he ever made. And he and he
16:34
he got credit for the guy, but it wasn't the one he was shooting at. So I I think he was just
16:42
totally honest. And the fact is, that was one of our problems. Like I dig and dig and into trying
16:48
to get him to know how did that feel when that happened? And how did that feel when you got your
16:54
first kill? And and here's a dead body that was just alive 10 minutes ago. And and he he was he
17:05
never got emotional about it. Or he said it was my job. And knowing him from doing his life story,
17:15
everything he's ever done, he did it. He did it the best he ever could. And even when he went to
17:25
work for the Forest Service, he became a he kind of became the boss pretty quick and they rebuilt
17:33
roads. And he was really of course very good at hunting fishing. He likes fishing. And
17:41
now he's a he's a real guy. He's a and he's he's he's really fun to be around and and he's
17:51
he's just a really a cool dude. One he seems to have that magnetic personality. Because I remember
17:58
you mentioned history channel or something like that earlier. I think it was a history or
18:01
discovery or something like that. That's where I first heard about him and some of his missions.
18:05
And this was years and years ago. But it's again, it's just it's just something with these
18:09
old timers. It's like they don't feel the need to stick their chest out and tell everybody what
18:13
they did back when they were a teenager. But you know, you talk about in the book. And again,
18:17
if I didn't mention the book, I mentioned in the intro, but it's the sniper, the untold story
18:21
of the Marine Corps's greatest marksmen of all time. And the thing about this book, and it'll be
18:25
in the show notes, we're going to be just barely skimming the surface 30,000 foot view today.
18:29
So you guys can go and check it out. But you go through what it was like for him growing up.
18:33
He was a knucklehead. He was hard to control. He got into a lot of trouble. He actually wanted to
18:37
join the military and had to do a little finagling with his paperwork so that he could get in without
18:41
issue. And then he gets in, even though, you know, his mom was a little bit nervous. Obviously,
18:45
this was around the time when everyone's going to Vietnam, going to fight. He wanted to be in
18:49
aviation, but then he ended up going the sniper route. You know, he was setting records and
18:53
graduating top of his class with the sniper stuff because he was an absolute just he was he was
18:57
nailing just about every single shot. He wasn't having having trouble with the weapons systems.
19:02
He wasn't having trouble with the scopes. He was just it was like he was built for it.
19:05
And then when he got to Vietnam, he detailed this in the book, he was actually kept from
19:09
being a sniper initially. And he was made to be a grunt. But I would assume that he would say
19:15
this and you would probably confirm it. The fact that he was kept from being behind the rifle
19:19
initially when he got to Vietnam probably served him better because he was doing the duties of
19:24
all the other Marines who were grunts who weren't specialized. Would you say that he would agree
19:28
with that sentiment that he was glad he was a grunt before he was a sniper?
19:31
In some way, I mean, I think he would agree that
19:36
it made him a better companion as of being a sniper later on. He understood what the grunts were
19:45
growing through. And he he would help him. He didn't have to do anything. He was kind of
19:55
special because he carried the long rifle. Him and his spotter were they would be put on a plane
20:01
or a helicopter, throw somebody else off. I mean, he when you you carry that right for it,
20:06
that he'd just always grow to the head of the line. Well, and so he would be out with a company of
20:15
like a 60 or 120 man or something. And they would get a helicopter would land with supplies,
20:21
mail and all that stuff. He would go he'd go out and help unload. And he would
20:29
he did a lot of he's a lot of his kills are at night. And when he got
20:35
at first when he got a new company, he might be with one for a short period of time or maybe
20:42
a few months, he would go around and introduce himself to everybody and tell them, ask them what
20:50
you know, what they needed it. Usually they were somebody was
20:56
sneaking up on him and throwing homemade bombs over the fence and that sort of thing.
21:01
And so he got a lot of kills after dark, but he he knew what they went through and he
21:07
and how they just got tired and they had these watches at night and awake in the day time. And
21:16
so he would actually take people's watches and let them sleep. Things like that, he offered to do
21:21
that he wouldn't have had to have done. And and I think you're bringing up that points
21:28
important because that is one of the he was that way. I think he probably would have been that way
21:32
anyway. But and then he realized very quickly that he didn't he was going to get he just wasn't
21:41
going to make it. He ended up with the machine with the big machine gun. He watched two guys go
21:47
down right there before he got it. And so he got it. He got an opportunity to
21:55
to get into that sniper platoon in Anwar and he faked a toothache and he got to go back behind
22:07
into Anwar from the field. And that's where he went right straight to the sniper platoon and
22:14
he had the records of what he had done. You know, he'd graduated first in class and all of that.
22:18
And they happened to need a guy right then. They needed a small and he has that kind of charisma.
22:25
He could talk a coon out of a tree, you know, he's that kind of a guy. So so he ended up and then
22:33
the guy go ahead. Yeah, I was just going to say like he, you know, he ended up going in and I mean,
22:38
guys, you have to you have to remember he went as he was 18 when he went over there. But in just
22:44
about 16 months, I believe is how long he spent in Vietnam. So he's not even technically legally
22:50
able to to buy a beer yet. He had 103 confirmed kills with 216 probable kills. And we don't
22:58
have to get into all the Xs and O's, you know, how they do confirm kills versus probable and and all
23:03
these numbers. But there was one particular story that is the first story I ever heard from of Chuck.
23:11
And it was a story again, you mentioned that night. And a lot of people don't really understand how
23:14
the the nighttime, you know, how that worked with the scopes and things like that. So maybe you can
23:20
get into that. But he went to this area where he thought the Viet Cong was going to be trying to
23:25
cross a river. He went to the shallowest point of this river. And he set up with his spotter
23:30
at this riverbank. Because if the Viet Cong were able to get through that area, it was going to be
23:35
terrible for the Marines on the other side. It was going to create a really, really big problem
23:39
for the Marines that we're going to be behind him. So you can pick up the story from there because
23:43
he did something pretty incredible in about 30 seconds. Okay, he was with a company, one he
23:51
really liked to be with. And there was a monsoon coming in. You could just see it black, you know,
23:58
it's getting here come a little airplane over. And they got in the guy on the airplane, the pilot,
24:04
radioed down, saw the outfit, radioed down to the, there's a [inaudible] of NVA on the other
24:13
side of this river. And he thinks they're getting ready to cross. And Chuck's outfit was in between
24:20
them and Danang. And it was a big battalion. It was, they were going to, they, looking back, Chuck
24:31
says they were, they were going to do something, they were going to Danang for some reason. So
24:36
he volunteered to run down, he knew right where they'd crossed because he'd been there for so long.
24:41
So he took a sniper and he's, and they traded rifles. Chuck, the one with a night scope on it
24:51
is called a starlight scope. It's on an M, an M14, and an automatic carbine. So, but with the
25:05
cover of weather, it was going to be really marginal if he could see anything of all fiasco.
25:12
And it's something that he invented about that time that picks up the light from the, from the sky.
25:18
So they get down there and they get ready and where he thinks they're going to cross. And so
25:24
then a scout comes across an NVA soldier and he walks right up and by the, I mean it's dark.
25:31
And he can hear him slash, sloshing through the water and he's carrying a rifle above his head.
25:36
He can see through that school, but he can see it's like looking through a seven-up bottle. It's kind
25:41
of green. And this guy walks right out beside Chuck and Chuck's, and he's hired that they've
25:48
picked up. And, and, and, and Chuck says he was so close to me that you can hear the water dripping
25:55
off it. And, and the guy turned around and looked around and he looked like he was going to start
26:01
walking back towards where the company was. And Chuck wasn't going to let him get between
26:05
him and the company. So he, he released the safety on his rifle and he was going to plug him right
26:12
there, dispatching. So then the guy, uh, looking around looking, there was elephant grass, you know,
26:20
six, eight feet tall everywhere. And so he turns around and he went back across the river. Chuck
26:26
figures they're, they're coming now. They're going to come as soon as, as soon as he gets back
26:31
there. And within a half an hour, here they came and they're walking through this river. And the
26:37
river is, I've seen it. I, I was in Vietnam, researching this book and the river is very calm,
26:43
but it's wide and chest deep at that time. That happened to be that night. And they were coming
26:49
across right where the scouting come and they were carrying the rifles and they had pit helmets.
26:56
And Chuck waited until they started up the bank out towards him. And he shot the first one
27:03
and he went down and then shot the second one and went down. And he shot 16 of them with this M14.
27:11
By then he had, I think I'm 16 holes, a few more rounds, but by then
27:20
it was getting out of hand and the, the NVA didn't, they were confused and they were milling and
27:27
they were, and Chuck knew and the rifles from the other side, they were starting to go off. So,
27:32
he knew it was time to leave. So him and his spotter just ran like Maniac back to the company.
27:37
And he, they, they never crossed. They, they probably thought the whole damn
27:44
Marine Corps was across there. So I don't know how many people he saved, but you could talk in about
27:51
what it takes to have a confirmed kill and a non-confirmed kill. He didn't get any credits for
27:55
those 16 because those bodies flowed, floated down the river up to the ocean. And they found some
28:03
bodies the next day, but they couldn't confirm that we're up on the bank, you know, with a
28:08
Chuck Mooney hole right between the Florida. What's funny, I didn't even think about that
28:13
whenever I was reading the book that those 16 were not part of his confirmed kill list. And,
28:18
yeah, you're right, because they're in a rushing river. And even though they were shot in the
28:22
shallow part, these, these guys were in water up to their, you know, their race or whatever,
28:26
because they were holding their, their rifles above their helmet, the Viet Cong were, and then
28:29
they just went on down the river. But again, like that, as you mentioned, we, we have no idea how
28:33
many lives were saved. Just think about this way. Yes, he made 16 shots and he was 16 for 16. He
28:39
did it under 30 seconds and the Viet Cong didn't cross. But what if him and his spotter didn't even
28:43
set up there? What if they set up somewhere else? Because all these shots were within 100 yards,
28:48
so relatively easy shots. But you've been there if you've ever deer hunted or elk hunted with a rifle
28:53
or something like that. It doesn't matter if it's within 100 yards, you're still shaking. And guess
28:57
what? Your life's not even on the line. The animal doesn't even know you're there. And no one's going
29:01
to die if you shoot and miss, but he doesn't miss any of these shots. And as you mentioned,
29:06
he didn't get any credit. Now, I will say you've already mentioned Carlos Hathcock.
29:10
Hathcock. And what's funny is when I first got this book, I thought it was a book about Carlos
29:14
Hathcock, because I was like, Oh, yeah, he's he's the the most deadly United States Marine
29:18
Corps sniper of all time. And then I looked at the first page and I'm like, Oh, wait a minute. Of
29:22
course, it would be Chuck. But I guess Carlos Hathcock would be considered the more famous of the two,
29:26
whether that matters or not. But there was a lot of debate at one time as to whether or not
29:32
Chuck was actually the guy that had the most confirmed kills because or Carlos Hathcock was
29:38
93, I believe. And those were his confirmed kills. But how did that get cleared up? How did it get
29:43
cleared up that actually Chuck did kill more people confirmed kills while in Vietnam than Carlos
29:48
Hathcock? Well, it was fortunate how it happened. When he was outed by the booked Dear Mom,
29:59
the his spotter that wrote that book told in his book that Chuck Mooney was his first sniper he
30:08
worked with. And when he left, he had 101 kills. And so that sparked a big controversy of experts
30:18
in a rifle, gun, field, military, everybody always knew Carlos was the best. And here's this guy,
30:26
who's this new guy, it's claiming this. Well, so there was a pair of brothers off. There's a
30:32
group of these books about Carlos and they contacted Chuck and and pretty much called him a liar.
30:37
And and about having 101 kills and Chuck says, well, you're right, it wasn't 101, it was 103.
30:46
And that poured gas on the fire. Well, fortunately, Chuck's platoon leader
30:55
kept track of them. And they get everyone when you're a sniper, you carry a booklet of of kill
31:02
sheets. And on that kill sheet, they put down everything you know about the body. You know,
31:09
if he looked like he might have been an officer, or if he was starving to death, or what kind of
31:14
gun he had, what direction was he walking? Where was it? Because and then those would go to the,
31:20
they would go to the base and and and then they're looked over to try for people to try to see
31:26
where this movement's coming and going of troops. Okay. So, Mark kept him and or kept he kept a
31:38
record of him. And he by he and he had to prove. And so finally, everybody agreed with that.
31:48
That Chuck did have a 103. And it's it was just it was a good thing that that somebody was doing
31:58
their work, you know, but and Chuck early on, he was, you know, he was getting a lot of kills,
32:06
a lot more than everybody else. And and they had a on the sniper platoon door, they had a
32:14
they were keeping track of you know, Chuck may win it. He's got 49 and so and so has got one or
32:22
eight or something. And Chuck asked him to take that down because it was it was making people
32:30
too competitive and to taking too many risks, he thought. And and it didn't mean anything to him,
32:37
you know, I mean, I mean, he he it meant something to him that he was doing his good job. He was
32:44
doing what he was came here to do. And I knew he'd tell you he enjoyed it. I mean, it was
32:49
it was it was a supreme hunt, you know, when you're somebody shooting back at you.
32:56
When I mean, that was his job. And that seemed to be he kind of almost had this like all
33:00
shucks approach to it because it's like, Hey, this is my job. This is what I'm going to do. And
33:04
this is I'm going to do it to the, you know, absolute best of my ability while I'm doing it.
33:08
And then when he wasn't in the military anymore, he just went on and did the same thing. You mentioned
33:12
him working with the Forest Service. And that's just kind of the guy he was. He's a guy of a certain
33:16
constitution. But I guess the question that most of my listeners would probably think at this point
33:21
is, so what does a retired legendary sniper do because he retired from the military? And then
33:26
he's now retired from his civilian job or whatever. So what does he do? What is he up to now? What's
33:30
he doing? Well, he smokes a lot of cigarettes to him. And that's one of the reasons it's just
33:35
got a wonderful voice. I trade him. I'd love to have his voice. It's just kind of a gravelly, you know?
33:42
And but he he lives so common. A half minute wife and three boys. And they live in an old house
33:53
and Baker City, Oregon with wood. He is cold there. Really cold. I lived there for 20 years.
34:01
And he has a little man came out in the back. But you'll never see anything inside the house
34:08
in the hallway. You see three or four things on the wall about about some kind of a record or
34:15
when he got this medal or that medal. But but he doesn't flaunt any of it. There's nothing
34:23
anywhere that you never know. If you're asking about something, then he'll go around and he'll
34:28
get past the Harley Davidson and get back there and pull something out of the shelf and he'll say,
34:33
well, this is sad. And he drives. He just doesn't spend any money. Yeah, he doesn't show off
34:44
about it at all. He's got a lot of friends.
34:47
I guess he just still being Chuck, you know? Well, it seems like it's just one of those genuine
34:57
American heroes that is just a guy that, you know, some of the most humble people I've ever met in
35:02
my life, Jim, were people who there there's one guy in particular, he was a former mentor of mine.
35:07
He is the scientist. His name's Dr. Dwight Adams. He was the scientist that him and his team at the
35:12
FBI discovered how they could use DNA evidence for court cases. And so when every we talk about
35:17
court cases and, you know, rapes or murders or something like that, and they find the murder
35:20
of via DNA, he's the reason why I probably knew that man for two or three years before I ever
35:27
knew that he was that because he never talked about it. Just so unbelievably humble. I knew
35:33
a guy Eddie Penney's been on the show several times. He was in seal team six. I knew he was a
35:37
seal, but I knew him for probably three or four years before I knew he was a part of the development
35:41
group or seal team six. It's just because these guys, they're to a degree, they're quiet professionals.
35:47
They had a job to do and they did it. And we all benefited all the civilians here in the United
35:52
States benefited from guys like Chuck guys like Eddie from going overseas and taking care of
35:57
business in the way that they did. Regardless of whether or not you agree with the war or whether
36:01
it was fault under, you know, fought under false pretenses or any of those types of things,
36:05
that doesn't really come into play. But but Jim, I really did appreciate the book. I'm glad you
36:09
have a very quick writing style. You kind of cut to the chase, but you still feel like there's a
36:13
lot of detail in there. But I really, really enjoyed it. And I appreciate all the time that
36:17
you gave us today. But that's all for me. Is there anything else you want to get off your chest?
36:22
No, I think you're, you're pretty good at asking questions. I guess you've done this before, huh?
36:28
This isn't my first rodeo. But yeah, you know, this is what happens whenever you sit in a room
36:33
and talk to yourself by yourself for for years and years on end, you end up asking some questions.
36:38
But it's all out of curiosity. It's all stuff that I would want to know or stuff that I would
36:42
think the audience would want to know. So I appreciate the compliment. But Jim Lindsey,
36:45
thank you for coming on adulted life a man's podcast. Yeah, thanks for having me.
36:50
There you go, guys. I hope you enjoyed my time with Jim Lindsey. But before we let you go,
36:53
we are going to do a quick resilience boost. Add on dog to life. Our mission is equipping
36:56
men to pushback darkness with content that forges spiritual mental and physical resilience. So the
37:01
only thing I've got for you today is a link to where you can buy your own copy of the sniper,
37:05
the untold story of the Marine Corps's greatest marksman of all time by Jim Lindsey.
37:10
Thank you guys for listening to this episode. Wherever you're listening to this, please subscribe,
37:13
rate and leave us a positive five star review. If you want to come speak live at your event or on
37:17
your podcast, you shoot me an email to info@andonton.life. That's I N F O and on to not life.
37:23
Follow us on Instagram and like us on Facebook and check out our website for everything else,
37:26
including how to donate to keep more content like this coming your way. Just go to www.andonton.life.
37:31
And as always, we want to thank the band August Burns read for allowing us to use their music for
37:35
our content. The musical and this podcast is our song, Cutting the Tides, which is off their 10th
37:39
anniversary re recording of their album leveler. The links are in the description. I'm your host,
37:44
Kyle Thompson. Remember, keep pushing back darkness. Keep forging spiritual, mental and physical resilience.
37:51
Keep seeking the lion of Judah.
38:14
[Music]