There’s a sickness that plagues the veteran community, a self-inflicted disease that festers in the shadows of social media echo chambers and back-alley message boards where bitter men sip their daily dose of hate.
It’s an addiction to drama, to public executions of fellow veterans by way of half-truths and outright lies.
The latest target in the Coliseum? Tim Kennedy. A man who has done more for veterans, kids, and this country than most of his critics combined.
This isn’t about accountability. It’s about envy, plain and simple.
I know the playbook because I’ve lived it. When I started building businesses, writing books, having success post-navy, I saw the same grudge-laden mob turn its sights on me. Led by a jealous former teammate who quit BUD/S (but was saved by confusion at night), almost got performance dropped for diving at Team 3, had a failed book, action toy, and beat the shit out of a teenage high school kid in a drug-fueled road rage incident among his other accomplishments.
“Brandon, if all they can find to throw at you is this silly stuff you’ll be fine in the long run.”, said the head of my PR firm at the time.
I just kept my head down and let my professional work and service record do the talking. Consistency always pays off.
Who are the usual veteran woke mob the ringleaders? Not the SEAL warriors who walked the walk. Not the men who served with honor (mostly, some did jump on the drama train). No, mostly it was the underperformers, guys who got booted for drugs, bad performance, misconduct, or sheer incompetence.
They and the wannabes who look up to the community and piggyback on the veteran community drama like the good strap hangers they are. Because nothing gets a lot of listens like good take-down drama.
Worse to me are the men who served with honor, and jump into the fray led by their ego and professional jealousy that rule over them like Gollum’s ring of power in Tolkien’s “Hobbit”.
And yet, in the age of internet media, these same failures appoint themselves as judge, jury, and executioner of men who dared to succeed beyond the uniform.
“You’re one of “those” guys. You need to stop writing books!” said the active-duty SEAL officer at Chris Kyle’s funeral in Dallas.
I told him that he’d understand when he’s out of the Navy.
The same person now has multiple books, a podcast, speaking engagements, and several consumable products with his nickname on them.
I wish him well and hope he has had time to reflect on this.
Chris Kyle and I talked about this before his death and what a shame it was that the veteran community (especially the SEALs) eats their own.
I still remember the irony of the same guys at his funeral who shit-talked him while he was alive for writing a book. And now they were first to jump on the glory bandwagon of knowing the “American Sniper.”
*Note, I never trained Chris Kyle, I only helped create the course that did. I checked in as a permanent instructor as he was finishing the sniper course. Many in the mainstream media jump on the punchy headline of me being his trainer so I feel the need to say it once again, no I did not. I did personally train both Luttrell brothers and many more incredibly accomplished marksmen with more kills than Kyle.
It’s about leadership in the case of my community and hopefully that changes in the future and the SEALs get a proper alumni association and realize going after their own is not a good look.
But the veteran community LOVES their PTSD-fueled drama, and it does us all no good at the end of the day.
They gather their pitchforks and torches, whisper in the ears of grieving widows and gold star families, dangle the pain of lost warriors like bait, and use tragedy as a weapon to fuel their vendettas. Then they bully or scare companies into dropping good guys like Tim, who understandably don’t know any better and are forced to make the “safe” decision.
These veterans claim to despise the “woke mob,” but they’ve perfected the art of speculative lynching—***warning: if you succeed in ways they never could, they’ll find a way to tear you down.
Tim Kennedy’s crime? Thriving. Not asking for permission. Being a good example for kids who need role models. But that doesn’t matter to the veteran bottom-feeders in search of likes and podcast downloads. They just need a name to sink their teeth into, a carcass to pick apart while convincing themselves they’re righteous.
The hypocrisy is nauseating to me. Veterans attacking veterans does nothing but erode the credibility of the entire community. It reinforces every stereotype that civilians already suspect: that we’re broken, that we can’t function outside of the military, that we’re nothing more than disgruntled, infighting has-beens with nothing to offer but bitterness. And when it’s led by men who were cast out for their own failings, it’s not just sad—it’s pathetic.
Here’s the truth: success doesn’t come with a permission slip. You either get after it, or you don’t. Tim Kennedy built something real. I built something real. And that pisses some people off. But guess what? The world fucking moves on.
The men who spend their lives trying to tear others down will be forgotten, buried in their own irrelevance. The ones who actually build, create, and inspire? We’ll still be standing long after the last angry tweet fades into digital oblivion.
So let the hyenas cackle. Let the wannabes, washouts, and the has-beens stoke the flames of their own bitterness. It won’t change a damn thing. Because men like Tim know one fundamental truth: real warriors build. They know a rising tide lifts all ships. And the rest? They just talk.
