Nothing. When you realize theyre dead, what do you do . I just kind of said a prayer over each one of them. I grew up out on the farm, rode horses as much as i could. And worked with cattle. My mom had a book that what your career would be what you wanted to grow up to be. Mine was always a police officer, firefighter or a soldier. It was december of 1982 i wanted to be in the infantry because thats where you get to do the fun stuff. When i got out of the military i started working as a police officer. And after that i picked up a job as chief of police in a small town. And then moved onto contract. When i got to benghazi, i was going to be there for 60 days. It was my first time into libya. I remember walking through our university and there was an Army Recruiter and he picked me out of the crowd and he said, hey, what are you going to do after college . I said that looks pretty tough. Pretty tough to get in. A lot of people cant do it. I want to do that. In 2003 i was medically discharged and out of the blue i got a call from black water. Just starting saying, hey, were looking for contractors to go to iraq. I say yes. I got the call to go to libya was early 2012. Third grade. Thats when we lived across the street from the recruiting station. I just kind of kept going over there. I joined the marine corps always hear theyre the toughest guys. So i tried out for the toughest one i could find. Got out actually about two months before i got totally bored and had to find work. I ended up going and getting a job. I did that until i got into contracting. The first time i actually went there, to libya, i went to tripoli. That was my first trip. The second time i went back the third time, the fourth time, they were all benghazi. This attack lasted 13 hours. Four people died including our ambassador. And it was on 9 11. So i want you to take us back to the beginning. For people who dont know this job, you know, contractors. How do you explain it to them . For us it was protection. It was protecting c. I. Case officers overseas, doing low profile protection. How did the hierarchy work here . You have the chief of base, the main guy in charge. That was bob . Yes. And then you have the team lead which would be in charge of us. Our team leader is a staffer. Hes an employee for the agency and then all of Us Contractors are like if you are talking military wise we are like the unlisted folks. Other members of your team are not here. Obviously tyrone woods, who you call rone. There are two other members who remain anonymous, right . Correct. Jack and tb. Yes. So you were set up to protect the annex, which is the cia. The personnel at the annex, yes. This is a perspective of the other facility there which was what you guys call the consulate. Where are we here . Heres the consulate. And then heres us. Heres our compound. So pretty close. Threequarters of a mile as the crow flies. About a mile drive. Maybe a mile f. You did the whole thing. So this site was it well protected . It looked nice. It was a beautiful compound. It had orchards. A swimming pool. They had their own security. They were their own security. The Diplomatic Security. The Diplomatic Security. They didnt have an American Force like a marine detachment. They did it themselves. So whatd you tell them . Me and my bluntness, i said if you get attacked you are going to die. I said, remember, if you ever need us, call. Whats your reaction when you hear ambassadors coming to benghazi on september 10th september 11th . We were thinking theres only five guys to protect him and thats a huge compound. So 9 11 comes. Pretty routine day. Normal day. Just doing normal task stuff Task Organization stuff. You had a move late in the afternoon. Went out to meet some people for dinner. Town looked normal. There was nothing that looked any different than any other day. And there was no whisper that this video was a major problem in benghazi or something . Didnt know about a video. Had no idea about any video. No. No, sir. So how do you hear that somethings wrong . Our team leader. He came across the radio. And i remember i looked at my watch and it was 9 32 when i got the call first got the call on the radio that said hey, we need grs. What is that . Global response. I looked at d. B. And said somethings going on grabbed my stuff and threw my shoes on and started moving to our team room. Where were you . Myself and jack were building d, just getting dressed ready for bed. I remember saying hey, man, whats happening . He said consulate is under attack. You can hear the actual concentration of fire and some explosions. It was a relatively quiet night in benghazi. And by 9 00 the seven americans in the compound are settling down for the night. Youve got the ambassador in his room writing in his diary. Youve got sean smith, the Communications Expert online talking with a friend. Youve got five Diplomatic Security agents. Somewhere around 30 or 40 minutes later men stream on to the compound bearing ak47s, chanting in arabic, shooting off their guns. Almost instantly theyve overrun the compound. 17 february militiamen who were supposed to be guarding the compound, they just flee. You ready to go . Five minutes, were ready. Thumbs up, ready to go. Then what happens . I go to the t. L. And he looks right through me and says you guys need to wait. He was on the phone talking with somebody. I assume they were trying to coordinate with us to meet up with 17 february. Which is a local militia. Itd been 15 minutes, i think, and i got out of the car and bob and team lead were standing on the front porch. I said, hey, we need to get over there. Were losing the initiative. And bob just looked straight at me and said stand down you need to wait. Were starting to get calls from the state department, guys, saying were taking fire. We need you guys here. We need help. Why are we waiting . Ambassador stevens and sean smith are forced to take refuge in a specially protected area, the safe haven inside the villa. With them is scott, a security agent charged with protecting the ambassador. They hide behind a locked gate. Wickland waits in the shadows with a rifle ready to shoot anyone who tries to enter. The attackers cant get in. They use nearby diesel fuel to set the villa on fire. From beginning to when youre ready to go thumbs up youre ready to go out, to the time when you actually pull out. Uhhuh. Whats that time . Its close to 25 25 minutes. I went to bob i said hey, we need to go. And got the wait again. And i got in the car and told the t. L. Get in the backseat and gave a thumbs up, i gave him a thumbs up and we left. You guys did that pretty much on your own. Yes. We were never given the okay to go. We got the final straw for us to go or at least my opinion and how i felt was where one of the agents said, hey, theyre starting to light the buildings on fire. You need to get here. They used the word stand down. A number of people now including the House Intelligence Committee they insist no one was hindered from responding to the compound. There was no standdown order given to american personnel attempting to officer assistance that evening. What do you say to that . It happened. All i can talk about is what happened on the ground that night. To you. To us. To myself twice and to tig once. It happened that night. It happened. We were told to wait and stand down. We were delayed three times. You ask for support. After i was leaving i said well, get us an isr, which is a uav, a drone. So the drone would have given you eyes eyes. Above. And support. Protection and fire power. Exactly. I remember, i still remember gives me kind of chills. They said theres a line of buildings on fire. If you guys do not get here, we are going to die. Scott wickland leads ambassador stevens and sean smith to a spot in the bathroom inside the safe haven. The window there is barred. Acrid smoke billows into the area. He hopes to get them to a nearby bedroom which has a window that can be opened from the inside. He says follow me and crawls toward that spot. Its dark and smoky. But he makes it to the window. He opens it and drops out. Only then does he realize stevens and smith havent followed. He goes back in several times but cant find them. Finally, exhausted and choking, he climbs to the roof and radios Alec Henderson and dave uben, two security agents elsewhere inside the compound. His message the ambassador and sean smith are missing. Now, tig you and jack and rone are going the front gate and its open . When i was standing right here the land cruiser came from this direction. I thought it was like bad guys still in the land cruisers. So i drew down my weapon. Saw it was d. S. Guys driving it. And thats when i heard hey we cant find the ambassador. Started moving towards the front porch, getting up on the front porch and thats when theyre pulling seans body out of the window. Sean smith . Sean smith. But the ambassadors still lost. But the ambassadors still lost. To you and tyrone woods rone, go into the building one of many times. But go in and theres a moment there. He was saying, hey, i cant find my way out. I was saying come to my voice, but he almost made another right into where, i think, it was the dining room. And it was totally engulfed in flames. I reached out and grabbed him and said this way. We went out and coughed up a couple lungs. Now, youre back here with db. Yes. Looked one of the libyan guards in the back. Came back opened the gate, i looked at the commander. I said when you come through this gate, you close it, you lock it. And i moved forward. I find later that he didnt do that. And we paid for it. We paid for it down the road. Youve been there for a while now. And you cant find the ambassador ambassador. Youve been in multiple times. Then you hear gunfire from outside the compound. And then rocket propelled grenades. Also a big explosion. Bam. Huge. Where does it hit . It was over in this area. So it was basically on the other side of where we were trying to mass and collect and get out. And another explosion goes off. And its coming from the gate that was left open. And i just started returning fire. When i was inside the safe haven thats when i heard the explosion and gunfire started cracking off. Whatd you do . I moved from here over to here crouched all the way down at the same time a guy with an rpg moved into the view of the gate. Thats what he was coming up here shooting and hed run away, come up here, shoot and run away. Just as he was shooting i shot him. You shot him. He went down. And then it was just like a light switch everything stopped. So you guys finally get together, you what . Give up the search for the ambassador. The team leader wed done everything, it was his call. The state department guys had left the compound. They were gone on their way back to ours. Rone tells them make sure you take a left. And in the confusion of the counterattack they take a right. Take a right. I said to myself well i cant say what i said to myself on camera, but it was damn knuckleheads. Now were holding a piece of property that basically theres nobody else on. The t. L. Comes over the radio and says everybody get down. Were getting out of here. Get excited for the 1989 world tour with exclusive behind the scenes footage all of taylor swifts music videos interviews, and more. Xfinity is the destination for all things taylor swift. To stay away from the consulate. You tell the case officer. Yeah. Shes trying to say her goodbyes. And im like we need to go now. And like any good case officer, shes trying to gather information on whats going on. I just looked at her and said youre in my world now. You need to be quiet. Let me do what i need to do. Now you have been back on the compound in the annex for a while. You said before you felt like you wanted to be with your team. But you also knew you had a job to do there. And youre the only one we had two flight Security Officers who were a great help. But from the grs side i was the only one that was there. The ds guys come back first . Yes. The armored car held up. But they roll in. I could hear when they were leaving they announced it over the radio and then i heard tons of gunfire and knew kind of where they were at just from the direction. And then all of a sudden theyre calling that theyre coming in. Hot. Coming in hot. Which means . Theyre coming in fast. Have the gate open. You hear that flapflap sound of tires. You still hear that sound coming through. Both sides in the front windshield were all shot out. You can see the relief on their face once they got in. Scott got out, he looked like a chimney sweep. I told him to get inside and get some medical help. The other guys asked what they could do and i told them to get up on the various buildings. And we had one get up on each one of these buildings here. And i went back up on this building until our guys come in. They knew where they needed to go. Each one went to their preplanned position. Jack is up on this roof. Rones up here. Artano and db are here. Tig is over in this corner initially. And im over in this corner over here. Somebody probably had smoke inhalation and preparing for maybe another fight. My adrenaline went back up. It wasnt long after they showed up you start hearing tires screeching over in this area. We start asking over the radio to the t. L. If 17 is coming over to assist us. And the response is theyre not sure. So we immediately assumed that anything thats coming in is coming in that are bad guys. Asked the status and team lead came across the radio and said checking on it. And thats the last thats the last time i got an actual answer when we were going to get any support or not. I was expecting at least some kind of air support. Even if it was just a flyover by a jet or whatever. Sometimes thats all it takes. It gets the bad guys down. No doubt that would have been nice. I want to put this back up here just so you can describe whats outside the annex that youre most concerned about. The stockyards. A lot of concealment. A lot of bushes. And small trees in this area. And this is what we call zombie land. Coming from right at this intersection. And theyre starting to stage here. This is just a big open parking lot. And heres the house that were seeing people start to go into that little area. And they can come into here and get access to our back gate. So youre watching this develop and these cars and people going into this house that you dont know if its bad guys or not. And whats the engagement . Youre going to wait until they fire on you . Wait until we see action from them that specifies them being attacking us or going to attack us. I mean im not going to wait to get hit before i hit back. We start seeing movement coming from this direction through the night vision goggles. The caveat here. If this house had kids in there, they would come and pester us once in a while. You didnt want to open fire. I dont want to shoot somebody that doesnt have it coming to them and definitely dont want to shoot a child. They were just starting to come up on us. And d. B. Says i got movement. Are you laser . Oh, yeah. I got my laser. Im picking out targets people i see and get on the radio with oz and tig. At this point when theyre moving up, i mean in my mind theyre getting ready to be were going to engage them. Were going to let them get as close as possible and then take them out. The first thing they fired was an rpg and it went flying over the compound. Came over myself and dbs head. I was bringing water over to oz. I got about right here, about the corner of the gym when huge flash bang. Yeah. Homemade explosive. So it goes off. It hit right here just inside. To me it was just, okay its on. And we started fighting. Started lighting them up. I was just lazing targets and shooting them. The fire fight starts. Whats it look like . Its gorgeous. Its awesome. Its a green hue with the lasers dancing back and forth from target to target you see three, four sets of lasers just bouncing back and forth taking targets. And youll see a flash of light which is the enemy shooting at you. And hear the rounds going past your head and youre just reengaging in those spots. Anybody take a hit . Me and tig were up on this corner and they were trying to shoot out the lights. Secondary from one of the rounds hitting the wall or one of the lights splattered up into my face and cut me across the top the bridge of the nose. So you push back. You obviously take down a lot of people. And it stops. To me its hard to explain. Hey, we won that game. All right. Good deal. Morale goes down. I think all of us feel it still wasnt over yet. That was just a probe. Theyre going to see our defenses and theyre going to be coming back with a bigger force. Because thats what we would do. Theres a big break there. Two hours. Two and a half hours. At what point do you hear about ambassador stevens . There was a ds agent up on the building with jack and scott wickland. And he got a phone call. And thats how we found out that he was at the hospital. By 1 00 a. M. Local looters and curiosity seekers have entered the consulate grounds and infiltrated the safe haven. Six apparently Good Samaritans come across an unresponsive man. They take him to the Benghazi Medical Center where hes worked on for 45 minutes before being declared dead. They have scott wicklands phone, which had been given to ambassador stevens during the attack. Calling wicklands stored numbers, someone gets to the American Embassy in tripoli and says a man has been found and hes dead. The caller provides a description matching ambassador chris stevens. Theres a car pulls up and parks right here. A guy comes around from the side of the car and hes reaching like hes throwing something. And right as he brings his arm back to throw, i engage him. I move and shoot him two to three times. He goes down. And whatever he threw landed just short of our back gate and exploded, which then engaged again. The signal. The signal. This was bigger. It was a larger force coming through. Between 20 cars again getting threats and clear like ducks in a row a shooting gallery. But its a burst of fire. They were kind of spraying. I mean they were just constantly spraying. We were doing controlled burst. Aim and shoot. Aim and shoot. Its not in the movies, you dont flip on full auto and go after it. Because you cant hit anything. Youre aiming single shot, shooting, shooting shooting until they turn tail and run. So so far youve taken ak fire rpgs. Yep. Are you worried that something heavier is coming . After the second yes. Yes. Waiting for a third. Waiting for something bigger. [dad]i wear a dozen different hats doing small gigs,side gigs. Gig gigs. Quickbooks selfemployed helps me get ready for tax time. To separate expenses,i just swipe. Its one hat i dont mind wearing. [passenger] i work for me. And so does quickbooks. It estimates my taxes,so i know how much stays in my pocket. And thats how i own it. [announcer]stay in the flow with quickbooks selfemployed.