Husband, Father, Warrior (S3:E23)

Welcome to "Just Around the Corner." This is a podcast that explores the lives of interesting people examining the moments in their lives that encouraged and challenged them. And as a result, may their stories challenge and encourage your life for what's just around the corner for you. My guest today in episode two is Mr. Aaron Maibin, a leader of the International Security Tech Field, a former Green Beret, a husband and a father. His message is a message of hope and accomplishment for all of us. The day's episode is entitled "Husband Father Warrior." As a business coach, podcast and author, I invite you to subscribe to my newsletter by clicking on my website at DennisMansfield.com on the landing page and hit the yellow button at the bottom of that page. I think you'll like it. I'm Dennis Mansfield. Thank you for joining "Just Around the Corner" with Dennis Mansfield. As John Hay, one of the most famous men of the 19th century once said, "All the great prizes in life are just around the corner." Let's go there together. Welcome back to "Just Around the Corner with Dennis Mansfield" for episode two of my interview with Aaron Maibin. Aaron is a businessman. He's an executive. He is a high-tech security professional and expert and he is a former Green Beret special forces. On episode one, we talked about the moments in his life that led to the opportunity for him to walk in a world of faith. Following Christ, seeing his own life open up and change episode two is about the specifics of those times as a member of the special forces. So Aaron, again welcome to our podcast. Thanks, Dennis. Let's pick it up. You went into basic training and you said, "I'd like to go SF." When the recruiter said sign right here, was there ever a doubt in your mind that you were going to be a Green Beret? It was really an opportunity to show what I was capable of and so it didn't matter whether I earned the tab or not. It was about going and showing what I can do and so part of that is that benevolent detachment of saying, "I am going to go and I'm going to try and even if I fail, at least I won't be part of those cold-timid souls that neither know victory nor defeat." And I tell you when Theta Roosevelt spoke about that at the Subon in France, it was a very, I mean it was the man in the arena and you suddenly find yourself in the arena of international warfare. But before we get into that, let's talk about your training period because there are a lot of people that say Green Beret seals. What is all that? And which branches services it? So you were a Marine right? No, I was in the Army. Help the viewer, the listener understand what a Green Beret is. Yeah, so when we look at this aspect, every branch of the military has its own special operations capability and so when we look at the army, there's actually multiple units in US Army special operations. There's the Green Beret's or Special Forces. There's the Army Rangers and then you also have things like psychological operations and not civil affairs. I'm trying to remember what the CA is for, but those all belong to Usesak and they all have different functions in Navy. You're most familiar with the Navy Seals and that's part of Naval Special Warfare. And then in the Marines, they have the Raiders, which are similar to the Army Rangers. Any Marines, if I'm saying this wrong, please forgive me because I don't know the Marines as well, but I don't want to think of them go, "That's BS!" I don't want to get a wrong either. Well, then you also have just simply choose them off and set a time for a wrestling match. We'll see who's right. And then you also have the Marsoch, which would be very similar to the Green Berets in the Marines. And then in the Air Force, they have some other special operations. You've got the PJs, which specialize in search and rescue. They usually attach to other special operations units in other branches. You also have combat controllers. They're the ones that are lay in waste with fire from the sky. Also attached to other special operations units and those guys, they definitely make a force multiplier. And so you've got these different capabilities within the special operations of these different branches. And so what makes special forces or the Green Berets unique was that our focus is on what's called unconventional warfare. And so what that means is in laymen's terms, we're supposed to be able to go into a country that is likely hostile to US interests. We would connect with a insurgent force in that country and help build them up into a fighting force to help fight against and oppressive government. In fact, how do you how do you even train for that? I mean, the military brings you in. They go through basic training and then they have infantry training. And then you suddenly are in this world that says, oh, all those things that we told you about with order and angles and no, it's different. We're going to put you into a world where you're dealing with insurgents that are not a military force. Correct. But are a guerrilla force. Yeah. Well, and they may just be civilians. They may just be people that were that are being oppressed and are trying to resist an oppressive government because they want their freedom. They want their liberty. Right. And so when we look at it from that perspective, not only do we need to be as Green Bray's masters of the basics because we have to train infantry basics to this militia, to this indigenous force. We also have to understand logistics. And so there's these functions in the military. They go by numbers. So in the army, you've got things like S1 shop, which is for personnel. You've got S3 shop, which is for operations. You've got your S6 shop, which is for communications. And really, those are the logistical functions that typically your your standard infantrymen isn't going to be as involved in. They're more focused on drilling and training and being able to implement their infantry tactics. Well, within special forces, you also have to be able to handle those other functions and build those functions within this indigenous force. So not only are you training and drilling on tactics and raising up a fighting capability, but you're also dealing with implementing medical capabilities, implementing personnel and recruiting capabilities, implementing psychological operations and getting the word out there for the and that would go more to the side-up side, but still working with those types of teams in that environment. And then just being able to build up that force to actually be a legitimate option against the oppressive government. How long is the training for it? So it depends on what your military military occupational specialty is or MOS basically just means job in the military. And so if it's a weapons specialist, a engineering specialist or a communication specialist, typically the training is about a year to a year and a half. If you're a medical specialist, you actually go through a special operations combat medic course where you're basically the equivalent of a PA afterwards, but able to implement that type of medicine in the field effectively. And that's adds on an extra year to the pipeline. So a person wanting to become a member of Special Forces, wearing the Green Bray, is really their committed, their committing to a prolonged period of time. Correct. Now you also go to jump school. And that's typically how long? Airborne school is only like three three weeks, three weeks. Some go to Ranger School. Some do. And that is an additional period of time that they commit to. It is. But the vast majority are focused on their Special Forces time, getting that done so they can then be deployed out into the field. There's some interesting aspects of special operations within the Army. There was an opportunity for me once I learned about the Green Bray to as a with the college degree, I could go in and have a direct pathway to try out for Special Forces. And so that included infantry school or it's called OSET, one station unit training. But it's infantry training then airborne school and then selection for Special Forces to continue training in what's called the qualification course. And so that's my pathway into it. However, the army, anyone in the army, down to cooks can try out for selection and become special operations, can become a green beret. And in fact, I was buddies with guys that started out in those other positions or maybe not even combat positions that came in, tried out and served. Or in their tab, it served. What was it like when you graduated and you were given your tab and you put your beret on it? What was it like for you, personally? Because you were married. You were going all through this time period with two little boys and a little girl on her way. In fact, she was born, I think, while you were in training. That is correct. And when that happened, I will put up a photograph of you holding your daughter so that those you could see. You were involved in training yourself while your bride was training your daughter. How did that work for you? It was a struggle. Being unavailable, even by my wife's bedside, I was studying for a test for the next morning. So it was at that point where contractions were close enough together where she grabbed my wrist and said, it's time to put that down. So you know, was studying, you know, hey, how you doing? Okay, good. I wanted to balance these priorities, right? The birth of my daughter was so wonderful, but it wasn't without its challenges and hiccups. I mean, God's fingerprints were all over the situation, telling me and reminding me that it's not I who I'm doing this, it's him. And we got to see that throughout, from beginning to even when I left the military. You're involved in the military. You're involved in essentially a school for soldiers for the opportunity for the civilian mind. A lot of times people go, no, you're kind of like a police force, right? You kind of help people move along. But the reality is that as a member of the Special Forces, your task as in any combat arms was in if needed to terminate the lives of other people and that our freedom isn't just something that's cavalierly given to us. It's oftentimes things that we have to struggle with blood, sweat, toil and tears. And hopefully it's the blood of the other guy and not us that allows us to have that freedom, to carve out that freedom to continue on. You became very professional aspects of your training. Did you ever in your Christian thinking have a conflict with the idea that you would have to take lives? It was definitely something that was there in the back of my mind. And in fact, when I was going, once I had gone selected, you give your preference for what type of job you want. And because I had already done some IT work before going into the military, I was like, well, if I'm going to be required to take life, I'd also like to be able to save life. And so I had an interest in going the medical route. But because of my IT background, they said, nope, you're going to do communications and it worked out very well. So looking at that aspect where you have force on force and you are faced with the requirement to take life, it's something that you have to come to accept. It's something that you have to follow through with those orders and it's required. And I had accepted that knowing that I was fighting for what's right. And that is freedom and liberty. When we look at it from that perspective, if I am in a combat operation and I understand what the target is, what the mission is, then I also can understand that and put that with the bigger picture and say, okay, here's what are the outcomes of this. How do we need to work through that and how do I need to prepare my own heart for the event of this? This being taken in the very out of life, right? Yes. We understand that. My wife and I understand that because, as you know, our youngest son was deployed to the Middle East and was an officer at that point. He was a first lieutenant and getting ready to become a captain. And something very unique happened with you and me. I received a phone call from you. And I had no idea where you were in the world. You don't go about telling people where you were. Right. Operational security. Correct. And so, you asked me one question and it involved whether my son was by the water or not by the water. And I knew something was up, but I didn't know what. And I remember where I was standing and I said, by the water. And you said, Roger that and you hung up. What happened? So I asked for his contact information and you gave it to me. And after that conversation, I reached out and said, hey, you might be in the same vicinity as me. And we talked about it and said, yep. Hey, here's where I'm at. You should come visit. And so I had the opportunity to run and visit him. And we took a picture outside of his building and sent that over to you. And as far as I was as far as I was as far as I was. I received this phone call out of the stratosphere. God, I have no idea where you were. And then within, I don't know, a few hours. The photo lands. And I go, wait, what? Aaron, how did you do that voodoo? And there was Colin. Yeah. The question I have, obviously you've known Colin since he was a young boy. And suddenly you go in, but you're an enlisted man. Yes, and your son was an officer. Did you salute him? I did. Well, I actually technically know I did because I was in civilian clothing. All of that is half tailed. But I would have. You would have. What a fun thing that was because he has such great respect for you as I for him. And I know that to be the case. You both ended your military careers and moved back into the civilian world. But I want to talk about with your bride and your daughter, you encountered some physical things that you had no experience about. And suddenly you've got a wife and now a daughter that both have similar physical needs. Walk us through that and how you're faith in Christ. Look, I served you. I did all this stuff. But now I've got to confront this. Yeah. So one of the things that we experienced. So my wife, she has a genetic condition called cystic fibrosis. And so she is obviously a carrier of that gene. And so if I were to be a carrier of the gene, any offspring that we have would have a 50% chance of also being born with cystic fibrosis. I had no idea if I had if I was a carrier of that gene. We were married. We were going through. I was had some setbacks in getting into the special forces pipeline. And as I had finally gotten selected and gone through the phase called introduction to unconventional warfare, we, I was in holding, which means you're waiting to go into training. And you're meeting up every morning, showing that you're still there, you're still available. And then you get assigned tasks. And one of the tasks that I got assigned was going to be a point sitter for the land navigation. If you haven't seen two weeks in hell by the Discovery Channel, it's a good example of what special forces assessment and selection looks like. And so you can get a feel for what land navigation was as part of that training. And so in order to support that land navigation training, you need to have people at points where they're navigating to, to be point sitters. And so before that, we found out that we were going to have our daughter. We didn't know if I was a carrier of the gene. So we figured, you know what, we should go find out. And we got the input back that I was a carrier and that our daughter would have a 50, 50 chance. And then we went and got an amniostin thesis so we could determine if for sure she had it or not in utero. And right before I was about to be tasked out to be a point sitter, we got the phone call saying your daughter's going to be born with cystic fibrosis. She has cystic fibrosis. And then 10 minutes later, I got on a bus. I was away from my wife for a week, point sitting in the woods without selcoverge. And just at this point, breaking down of, man, why am I, what are we going to do with this? And I just remember God telling me, I wouldn't give it to you if I didn't think you could handle it. I have this and you have this. I'm going to strengthen you and you are going to be able to do this. And what we experienced has been just a mighty blessing because. When I was dating my wife, she was actually going through a clinical trial for medication for cystic fibrosis that really performs wonders. It turned out to be a miracle drug and it's actually made cystic fibrosis livable for like 95% of the community. Well, the great news is that my daughter was getting that same medication in utero. And so as she was born, we had a stint where she wasn't getting that medication because it hadn't been approved for that young of an age. But we were working through it and she was happy and healthy once we got her the enzymes that she needs for digestion. But it was still, that was a thing that was over the whole experience, right? It was something that was part of the experience that we had to work through. But it also kind of put in the back of my mind that this would likely be a one enlistment term versus continuing my career in the military. After Sloan was born, how much longer did you do that? So she was born as I was in the communications course. And so from that point, we also had the CSU, we had language and we had the final exercise, the FTX, that's called Robin Sage. Again, you can look that up on Wikipedia. It's pretty interesting. What language did you study? So my, much like we get a option to give our top three for job function, we also get the option to choose or give it her top three for language or our top three for where we want to be stationed. And because first Special Forces group was based out of Washington State, I wanted to be stationed there, which would put me in the Paycom or Pacific Command arena. And the other aspect is, you know, if you get your choice of station, they'll assign you the language that they deem they need. And so I was assigned tie of all things. That was pretty interesting. Did you become pretty fluent in it? So was relatively fluent in it going through language school. So they have native speakers as the professors and you're just speaking it the whole time. I have this. You're learning about the culture. You're getting to just immerse yourself in learning this language. And then the exam, they've got two different types of exams. One is like a written computer or a computerized test where you're doing listening and reading. And then you've got the oral proficiency interview where you're actually speaking and listening with another native speaker and they're judging your proficiency. So I was able to get pretty good scores in my first oral proficiency interview. But I just never really got the opportunity to really leverage it or get immersed in what an incredible country. What an incredible opportunity for it. Now it's a vision that John Kennedy had from the start. Because although 1945, 44, 45, the whole idea of special forces would come out of World War 2. There were certain key people that picked up on things. It was really John Kennedy in '61 that I came across something that was fascinating to me. And I was like, "I'm going to have a chance to see the world. I'm going to have a chance to see the world. Because of the United States, say, yes, I want that designation for these men." Quite frankly, for my reading up on it, there had been some anger within the Army about anything special being there for braze or anything else. And it was Kennedy that decreed it, the Department of Defense that approved it immediately and the Department of the Army that implemented it. So that from '61 on to your, when did you exit the Green Berets, what year was it? So I left active duty service in 2017, but I also continued for two more years in the National Guard. So there are a couple of special forces groups that are National Guard. So you can actually be a Green Beret and still have a civilian career. So I thought that was pretty interesting that those were available. And so I served in 19th group and that was out of Salt Lake. Yeah, not unusual, though it was in the Pacific area to be able to have to travel to wherever you'd have to do your time as a civilian doing military work. For sure. So let's do a quick recap before we come in for a close. Your daughter and your wife are healthy. Happy and healthy. And the medicine is helping them tremendously. And the medicine is helping tremendously. It's actually incredible how big of a blessing that's been. How old is Sloan now? Sloan is 10. And your sons are how old? I have an adult son. I have an 18 year old who graduates. Like I am entering midlife as I have an adult son, which is quite interesting. And then a 15 year old. So two boys that are driving. And your son's name so that we make sure. Shane and Sila. And I've got to tell you as a father, and now of course as a grandfather, when I look at your family and I see where you were all those years ago to where you are now, it gives me great joy because you were always a warrior. It just so happened that you went in the army. It just so happened that you went in the special forces and got a green break. It just so happened that you served on deployments and did all that you did because you were always a warrior. And one of the things that I think ladies and gentlemen that these two episodes hopefully will have encouraged you on is that you can choose to be a warrior in whatever field you're in. And Aaron's case he has transferred all of the energies of who he was in Christ, into who he was as a warrior for Christ, who he became as a warrior for the United States Army. And then ultimately who he is as a warrior in industry and commerce. And so where you are, what you're doing in your life, you're there for such a time as this. It was Mother Teresa who said that there are no great things. There are only small things done greatly. And so my encouragement and Aaron's encouragement to you is whatever thing you're doing, smaller, medium-sized, do it greatly. Be a warrior. Love the Lord God, will your whole heart, soul, spirit in mind, and walk in Him. If you haven't signed up for His service, He's only a prayer way. Just as Aaron did and I did in our lives. This might be the moment for you to make the decision to ask Him to enter your life and equip you for the future because the future is wonderful. Even if it's going to be difficult, it's wonderful. [MUSIC]