Let's get into the fight. - Thomas Payne

In combat you are constantly studying the enemy, and the enemy is constantly studying you, but conducting a hostage rescue mission behind enemy lines at night is something we prepare to do every single day at Special Operations Command. We start planning hostage rescue missions from the simple conviction that failure is not an option. When the Kurdish government reached out for assistance in a hostage rescue mission, we all considered it a 'no fail' mission. We were not going to fail our partners. We knew it was highly probable that those hostages would be executed if we didn't action that target. And we considered it our duty to bring those people home.

Every man on the mission that night was engaged in their own unique problem set. My teammates were also looking for some way to liberate those hostages. I just happened to be the man at the right place with the bolt cutters. So I had to find a way to capitalize on the opportunity that I was given.

It was pretty special being from a small town, where we kind of drew inspiration from our veteran community. Those old-timers kind of built us up as young men, and gave us a solid foundation to grow on.