While serving in iraq from 2003 to 2009 u. S. Navy s. E. A. L. Sniper chris kyle accumulated more officially confirmed kills than any other sniper in u. S. Military history. In his bestselling autobiography, american sniper now a major motion picture, mr. Kyle described his early career as a professional rodeo rider. The challenges he had to overcome become a s. E. A. L. And experiences in iraq. Chris kyle died on february 2 2013 at the age of 38. This program is from 2012. Its about an hour. Host chris kyle why did you decide to join the navy . Guest actually i grew up thinking the marines were the biggest baddest guys on the block in my eyes wanted to be one so i went to enlist and try to become a marine and a marine recruiter was out to lunch and then in the strip mall all of a sudden there youve got the Army Recruiter in the Navy Recruiter coming out to be snipers themselves and pick you up and get you to come to them. I talked to each one of them and the Navy Recruiter sold me on being a s. E. A. L. Host at that moment you knew you wanted to be a s. E. A. L. . Guest yeah i mean everything he was telling me which they recruit are built it up to where was more of a jason bourne typing that he sold me that the navy s. E. A. L. S do all the stuff that you never hear about and all this great adventure and you are going to be the most highly trained person out there. Youll be able to have all the skills shooting and handtohand and i thought that sounds great. If they are the best i want to be the best. Host what. Host what was your. Guest well the initial boot camp to become a s. E. A. L. Is called blood and that was basically felt like seven months long standing there with your feet shoulder width width apart getting kicked in the job. It was wet and sandy every day and there were times that i thought about quitting but i didnt know if i was too lazy to get up from where it was and find the bell to ring up but somehow i managed to make it through. Host when did you serve . Guest i went in and 99 and got out in february of 99 and got out in november of 2009. Host chris kyle is the author of a 13 week bestseller and heres the cover of the book. Its called american sniper the autobiography of the most lethal sniper in military history. He is our guest for the next hour here on booktv on cspan2. We are going to put the numbers up on the screen if you would like to talk with mr. Kyle. 202 is the area code 7370001 in eastern and central timezones and in the mountain pacific time zone 7370002 and we have set aside a third line this morning for iraq and afghanistan vets and active duty 202 6280205. You can also contact us electronically. You can send an email to booktv at cspan. Org or send a tweak to twitter. Com booktv. Chris kyle in your book you write you were not the best shot at all in your class. Or before you went into the seals. Guest no sir i never claimed to be the greatest sniper. Through Sniper School i was middle of the pack and when we graduated i almost failed out of Sniper School. Everyone tends to think when you get the number of kills that all of a sudden you are this great sniper. Thats not the measure of a sniper. The measure of the true greatness of the snipers to roll everything all into one. I mean its the stalking in the observation come everything and that is why in my mind carlos 93 confirmed kills i think he is the greatest sniper ever in history. Not just america but all over the world. He is the guy that would go and buy himself sneak in, take a shot with a lot less capable weapons and we have today and optics that he would take that shot and sneak back out undetected and i think thats the true measure of a sniper is being able to get in and identify your target, take a shot in get out jim mertens jim anderson sent an email mr. Kyle how many and confirmed kills that he had or were all of years confirm . Did you ever trained with the m. 25 . Guest i never use that rifle and as far as dan confirmed kills you never count those. There is no point in trying to keep track of what could have been or might have been. You are just wasting your time. Your whole thing is youre out there to try to take these bad guys off the streets and make it safer for your guys to allow for more of your guys to be able to make it home. The ideal thing if i knew the number of lives they saved that something i would love to be known for but you cant calculate that. Host what was your reaction at the time to a kill . Guest i mean when you are looking at these people you are not thinking of them more or less as people. They are a target because most of the time they are actively engaging in trying to kill your guys so you were trying to see yourself as a Guardian Angel to protect the guys on the ground who are in danger. You are so removed from it you dont want to think about it at the family and what is their job and one of a gun. You just try to in your mind think i want this guy to be able to go my guy i want him to safely be able to go home so im going to take up this target to allow them to do that. Host where did you serve . Guest iraq. Host but when . Guest i was over for the invasion in 03 went back in 04 and then was attached to the marine corps for the battle of fallujah, sent back to baghdad and onto the nia. I did a little bit on haifa street for the elections and then went back in 06 and spent all that time and ramadi for the battle of ramadi. And then went back again in 08, was sent out west but then send our call for s. E. A. L. Snipers to come to baghdad and help secure the green zone by going into sadr city. Host chris kyle why did you leave the seals in 2009 . Guest being a s. E. A. L. Is extremely tough on your marriage. We have got extremely high divorce rates. It was about 95 divorce and my wife and i constantly struggled trying to keep the marriage afloat and even when you are not deployed when you are come home your training is not at home so you are never really truly home. And it was causing stress on the marriage and i finally got to the point to where needed to decide is it going to be god country and family ores are going to be god, family, country and i chose to hang it up and quit and get everything back to my family now. Host and your wife is today a . And you have children as well . Guest yes sir i do. I have a son and a daughter. Host George Lerner emails into mr. Kyle after returning to the u. S. Numerous times did your tours have their regressive impact on your family and if so what did the military do to ameliorate them . Guest well, the first time i went over it was definitely difficult because at the time we were really getting the coverage while we were there. As far as all the support behind the troops, with everybody protesting us we felt like america was against us. And we thought this is going to bf vietnam. When they come home are people going to spit on us but toward the end of the deployment we were able to get a few more channels and see a lot more of the actual coverage that was going on and all the support so that definitely helped it out. But when i came home it was difficult because you leave from a war zone one day and you are home the very next day. They fly a straight home and it takes a little bit. You know i would always have about a month off to where you react to make yourself. You spend a week at home and just hang out with a family and try to get to know them again and hope that my kids werent afraid of me and they remembered that i was daddy trade but especially the first time i was a little upset coming home. I saw everybody doing their daytoday normal lives and i was thinking they dont even know theres a war going on. There are people dying but as i continued doing this i came to the realization that is why we are doing it. We are over there fighting so everybody can lead their normal daytoday lives. Thats what its all about. Host chris kyle what was your first confirmed kill . Guest we were in the city and we were trying to soften up some of the locations. We were going to make it safe but just try to make it as little as possible at something to it and wild in the city the marines started to approach. The people came out to show that they were supportive of the military and they werent going to fight. At that time there was a woman who came out and she had something in her hands. I was watching her. I was relaying back to my chief everything she had and what she was doing. He informed me that it was a chinese great grenada and told me i had to take the shot because she started approaching the marines. At this point i had never killed anyone so it definitely made me pause but also the fact it was difficult. We tried to radio the marines to let them handle it. I didnt want to have to be the one to take the womans life. We couldnt raise him on the radio so i ended up having to take the shot but in my mind she was dead anyway. She was either going to kill herself by the grenade being a suicide bomber or she would die by my bullet. I would rather shoot her than to sit there and watch her blow up the marines. Chris kyle right as the americans organized a woman took something she had said a grenade and i didnt realize at first. It looks yellow until the chief describing what i saw as he watched himself. Its yellow shes got a grenade to the chief. Its a chinese grenade. Get the grenade. I hesitated. Someone must turn to get the marines on the radio but a good reason. They were coming down the street heading towards the women. Schute said the chief. I push my finger against the trigger and the bullet left out. I shot. The grenade dropped. I fired again as the grenade blew up. It was the first time id killed anyone while i was on the sniper rifle in the first time in iraq and the only time i killed anyone other than a male combatant. The first call for chris kyle comes from arthur in norfolk virginia. Go ahead arthur. Caller hey thank you for your service everybodys service in iraq and afghanistan. My question is if you could speak to the gold star mothers and wives on behalf of their sons and daughters who died over there what would you tell them about the war and about. I appreciate their sacrifice. In fact im very close with some of them because some of those that died were my guys. I remained close with those families. As far as telling them their sons or daughters sacrificed and was it worth it and he wore no matter where it is not a single American Life is worth it but for the overall cause, to be able to make a play safer in the world, these guys and girls are out there putting their lives on the line and they are cherokee rose. There is no cause. They are out there because their country sends you out there to you dont have to believe in the war and you dont get to choose where you go. You just have that sense of honor that you are going to serve this country no matter where congress or the president tells you you were going to go. You just go and you do your duty. You are fighting for the guy or the girl on the right and left of you. I hate to say it but i wasnt really fighting for america. I was fighting for my guys. I wanted to make sure every one of those guys came home. Host chris kyle writes the reminder of what we are fighting for cause tears as well as blood and sweat to run freely from all of us. I have lived the literal meaning of the land of the free and the home of the brave. I feel it in my heart. I feel it in my chest and then mr. Kyle in a different chapter you write when i was heading out it happened that i passed a small group of protesters demonstrating against the war. They were protesting the wrong people. We didnt vote in congress to go to war. I signed up to protect this country. I do not choose the words. Happens that i love to fight but i do not choose which battles to go to. You also made to them. I had to wonder why these people were protesting in the congressional hearings are in washington. Clanon freeman michigan you are on with chris kyle, the autobiography of the most lethal sniper in military history. Caller thank you gentlemen. My question for mr. Kyle is in the wake of the Trayvon Martin case and the shooting at the college in oakland last week i think it was and a lot of other cases like that. What do you think of this hypergun culture we have in america where anyone who wants a gun can get one and use it if they like and specifically what is the opinion on gun control . Thank you very much. Host mr. Kyle . Guest i am 100 behind the second amendment, the right to own and bear arms. I am here in texas and that is a big part of the culture here. Its my right to be able to have it but its also everybodys responsibility to learn the safety and learn everything about those weapons. There are certain people that dont deserve a weapon. The people who are going to go out and actually act stupid. As far as the Trayvon Martin thing i have been kept up with that so i can tell you everything thats going on there. I havent heard all the facts and for the most part i have heard one side of the story so i cant comment on that one. All the School Shootings especially in california i know its difficult to be able to carry a gun. Only a few people are legally going to be able to do that so i dont know why hes doing that but apparently gun control itself the only thing its going to do is take the guns out of lawabiding citizens hands. The criminals are still going to happen. Host carl from murray kentucky email sent to you mr. Kyle, what inspired you to write the autobiography . Guest actually was dead set against it. It is something that i felt like these guys who got out and did this kind of thing, they were selling out. I did not want to be a sellout. Its basically cashing it in for a publicity and i was completely against it. But then as i found out there were two other offers who were seeking my story, they were going to write the book. If the book was going to be written i wanted to make sure was done the right way. I didnt want someone else writing a book about made and it being another chest beating story saying hey look at me and what ive done. This way i wrote it and it gets the credit to the proper people the guys around me that with each are heroes. The only reason i look good is because of those guys and their heroics. So this story gives credit to those whether its the seals come the soldiers of the marines. Those guys that fought around man beside me they were awesome and i owe them everything. So im calling them out and putting them up on a pedestal. Letting everybody know hey this is what goes on overseas. The story in my book are not just unique to me as a s. E. A. L. They are unique to every combat vet. These are the hardships that they face. They may not have gone. The exact same story as i did but very similar. So this is just raising the awareness of hey look what your church are going through. But then at the same time you hear my wife. Shes telling the hardships of the family back home. When someone deploys and goes overseas to fight a war its not just them thats in the fight now. Its the entire family thats left behind. So the whole point behind this is i dont even care about the numbers. I dont want the hype but i will stand up and i will be an activist for vets to make sure that they get the proper thank you. Today there is a lot of lip service and im not saying people dont mean it when they say it but going to an airport saying thank you definitely means a lot to the guys. Why cant we take a step further and show our thanks random acts of kindness. You dont even have to get money that mother yard cook them a meal, to babysit so they can take a nap or go on that day. Just little random acts of kindness to show your thanks and thats going to blow them away. Host chris kyle this book is written in the vernacular with a lot of swearing in the book. Guest yes sir and in the military there is a lot of cussing. That is part of the military culture. It is a rough and gruff type of society and we are not politically correct so i dont talk like that on a daily basis especially now here in the civilian world. But in that time its also kind of the way of a stress reliever. You are constantly in hectic situations and this is the way of voicing it and getting it out and then moving on. Host you write about how your wife heard one of your firefights. Guest yes sir it was deadly something i never intended. I didnt realize that the phone wasnt turned off but i thought i was calling it a good time. Usually at night we arent as busy and this night we were an abortion when she was still on the line. Host and what was her reaction . Guest well definitely upsetting. There were several times when i would call home and when she would answer the phone and realized them is my voice on the other line she would cry. There were a couple of times we were in a Helicopter Crash. I would eyes come back and they would see on the news. The media calls the s. E. A. L. S the special forces. This special forces or whatever one calls the green berets. Special operations or spec ops includes everybody rangers so i would always come back and say i was in a Helicopter Crash. In case you hear about it, no big deal. And then another time i wasnt able to call her back and i wasnt in a Helicopter Crash this time. It was actually sf guys and they killed everybody on board in the same thing. When i called she broke down. Host how many Helicopter Crashes were you in . How many times were you injured . Guest several. I dont exactly know how many times. Host were you overshot . Guest i was shot twice. Host where . Guest i was shot or i took around across the top of the helmet and i took one in the back and when the site. Host how long ago put you out of service . Guest fortunately for me it was superficial wounds but the one the back hit the body armor which slowed me down just enough to wear was basically barely punctured my back and it was no big deal. It was just get it cleaned up and you are right back in the fight. Host mark in Virginia Beach or were on with other chris kyle former navy s. E. A. L. Caller hey chris harry doing . I appreciate so much the work you have done as active duty and he talked about not wanting to cash in and all that other stuff but what do you think about people who leave active duty and continue their work as a contractor . What are your thoughts on that and what happened to you and your wife after the book lacks. Guest esparza contractors, you have got these guys that this is what we are trying to do and some of the guys have degrees in some of the guys dont but this is what we know this is what we love. You go to be a contractor and one of the biggest things you miss when you leave are the guys guys. You hate to give that up. So to be a contractor you are surrounded by those guys again. You can kind of do some the same styles of work. Its mainly protection but at least you are getting paid extremely well and you are spending time overseas with their