I enjoyed Seth Harp's appearances on the War Nerd podcast:
(May 2022) and
(March 2023). I recall them touching on Seth's previous reporting including on Special Forces culture in at least one of those episodes. Not sure if either episode is available without subscription at those links, but I believe they can be found elsewhere too.
Thank you for sharing,
@Lethe!
Not familiar with the
War Nerd podcast, but did read Seth Harp's July 2022
Harper's Magazine piece — on the Russo-Ukrainian War in general and the first wave of pro-Kyiv foreign volunteers in particular —
, which presumably echoes
(May 2022), as both were products of his spring 2022 visit to Ukraine.
Seth's piece was generally speaking reasonably
fair, if not
comical in its assessments of (would be) foreign volunteers who raised their hands upon the conflict's transformation into a full spectrum war in 2022:
The volunteers I spoke to mostly struck me as clueless or delusional, with no real connection to the armed forces
In Kyiv, he had met with a group of about sixteen legionnaires at a hotel on Peremohy Square. “Saddest group you’ll ever see,” he told me, “a clown car of misfits.” “The entire thing was an ill-conceived ploy to internationalize the conflict in the press,” he added.
One hopeful, who said that he could do push-ups and “used to go every month or two to a shooting club,” wanted to know whether the Ukrainian military would provide housing with private bathrooms, and whether he could bring his pet turtle. “You’ll sleep in a hole in the ground. You’ll probably die in a hole,” another user replied. “You can bring your pet turtle. . . . He’ll probably die with you.”
However, as Seth observed, there was also a minority of foreign veterans turned volunteers who were on average more suited for the rigors and realities of combat, even if they were typically older. Yet at the same time, these guys were
potentially problematic in less immediately visible ways:
The volunteers were being housed at various locations around Lviv and Kyiv, and few had weapons, body armor, or helmets. There were a few highly experienced veterans at the front, he said, but that was it.
Those who were veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, a cohort now entering or well into middle age, might have felt the possibility of renewed relevance and the old thrill of being at the center of world events. Many of them are still in Ukraine, looking for something—anything—to do.
I dare say that this demographic of foreign volunteers or
more precisely a portion thereof — specifically the hardened foreign fighters who continued to make contact on Line Zero, if not
, especially after all illusions and delusions concerning the war
— are
not all that different from the soldiers and operators turned gangsters and traffickers chronicled in Seth's new book,
.
What these two demographics have in common is that they both
exemplify Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs:
Soldiers, especially elite infantrymen and operators — who are considered among the best at their craft — find purpose, if not self-actualization in warfighting, and if we're to be
blunt about it, in
violence.
This is not a criticism, but an objective truth: just about everyone enjoys doing what they're good at — especially if they're being paid for it — including a
certain variety of professional warfighters who've dedicated years, if not a decade or two of their lives to blowing shit up and killing people.
However, if you're a pipe hitter facing few(er), if any opportunities for making good use of your craft — perhaps as a result of disciplinary issues, conflicts with superiors, the mental tolls of war, the withdrawal of forces, struggles with substance abuse, peace and reconciliation, and/or the defaults of career progression — what do you do and where do you go?
Not to say SOF units in general or SOCOM units in particular are manned by "psychopathic killers," but due to a mix of both nature and nurture, they do draw and cultivate
certain "types of personalities" that
may be easily conflated with any number of tropes.
The overwhelming majority of these guys will find something relatively peaceful to keep busy with after their service, move on to law enforcement, or find themselves elsewhere in or adjacent to the government.
However, there will inevitably be a few who will decide to "go out of their way" or even "bend the rules" in the relentless pursuit for
belonging,
esteem,
purpose and
self-actualization.
