#344. Mi5 Spy Breaks Silence on Britain’s Secret War on Terror - Mike Bates

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2:14Mike Bates: What was London like back in 2005? Busy kind of metropolis of a mix of people. and right in the centre of that is like this game happening that no one else can see. This shadowy, murky world underneath. And that's where I was. You'd pass me in the street and I'd be following someone around or whatever and you didn't know I was doing that. Is this the day we miss it? But the one time it really hurt, mate, if I'm being honest, was the Aran had a Grand Day concert. I was one of the first officers on the ground the next day. Were you? Yeah. And to see, as a northerner, to see the devastation and the impact.

2:43How many people died in that Manchester bombing? Too many. I've got Osama bin Laden, man. I went hunting that guy in 2002 after 9-11. I had a presence about him, had a vision, and people bought into that. But to behead someone as he's come out of the army barracks, that's barbaric. There was just as much threat from people who were born in the UK than people who came from outside. Okay. I don't think it's an immigration issue, Dodger, I don't. So we've got to look inward. I think the division that we're seeing in the UK today isn't helping. Driving people into corners, and when you pop someone in a corner, they're going to come out fighting.

3:13What's the most brutal thing you've seen?

3:24Mike Bates: Welcome to the Eventful Lives podcast. I'm your host Dodge and I'm the founder of Bournemouth 7s, the world's largest sport and music festival. On this podcast I speak to proper characters of all lived eventful lives. Do us a favour and hit that follow button and be sure to check us out on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok at Dodge Woodall, where we've now had over 100 million views.

3:47Mike Bates: Let's roll all the way back. What's it like working for the Secret Service MI5 for the past 15 years? You promised you wouldn't say that. And I did not say that. For anyone watching at home, they are not my words. Let me say that straight away. They're my words, everyone. It was around 7-7. In fact, I was in training in that organisation when 7-7, the London bombings, happened. I was thrust into this most kinetic, chaotic environment of defence. We'd never seen it before in the UK. And I was on the front line, mate. And every single day operational on the front line, gathering intelligence against the most dangerous people in the world at that point trying to keep our country safe right trying to stop bombs going off and it was a a wonderful career a career that saw me work all over the world saw me go head to head with terrorists people who wanted to kill us all and who would have definitely killed me had they known who I really was but underneath it I think when I reflect back the thing that kept me going back every day was the mission you know I was part of a group of people who, you know, there's no social media, mate.

4:50You ain't telling people you can do that. You're doing this. This is a secret world, but you're proud of it. And you're proud of the mission and the contribution that you're making quietly. I think these days people are looking for the next click or they're looking to do stuff so people can talk about it. No one talked about it. There was something really special about that. Very proud, very proud 15 years.

5:10Mike Bates: Give me an example where you lived, what it looked like, who you're dealing with, where the intelligence was coming from and just your role day to day. So I lived a normal life, right? Like all intents and purposes, my neighbours didn't know what I did. My family members didn't know what I did. Did your family not know? Did your missus know? My wife knew. My wife knew. A couple of close friends knew. I always felt it was helpful to have some people in the circle because when I couldn't turn up to a birthday last minute or, you know, Mike's never at these parties, they could kind of say, well, he's off to him, whatever, and kind of uphold that cover.

5:45So a few people knew, but not many. But for all intents and purposes, mate, I've lived a normal life. I would walk my youngest son to school as the dad, holding his hand. I'd drop him off at school, give him a kiss. I'd drive to work. I'd maybe go through a few protocols and emerge into the world as somebody else for a short amount of time and interact with people who we were trying to gather intelligence on to try and keep us safe. as a completely different individual. Then at the end of the day, reverse it all back, go pick him up from school again. And that's a weird existence. You have to compartmentalise your life to some degree.

6:24But it's exciting too, right? Super exciting, man. I loved it. What year did you start? I started around the London bombing, so 2005. 2005. And what was London like back in 2005? It's the best opera environment ever, right? like it's why all the films are shot there it's this busy kind of metropolis of a mix of people and right in the center of that there's like this game happening that no one else can see and that's the way i view that kind of world now right there's this game above the table we can all see and this shadowy murky world underneath the table that no one can see and that's where i was you know walking down the street like any normal person but doing something completely different and you would never know.

7:08You'd pass me in the street and I'd be following someone around or whatever. And you didn't know I was doing that. But I knew and the team knew. And the job we were going out to do today could potentially stop a bomb going off in London. And that was the thing that always kind of got me fired up going to work. I felt nervous every day. I felt excited every day. I felt driven every day to make that difference, man. So what were you looking for? well i mean if we go back to the marines which we will do at some point i think i was looking for in some sense a community yeah didn't have that growing up i think what i was really looking for in that other career was that continued sense of service my whole life has been well the thread that connects everything i've ever done is service mate like it's the reason i'm here today i hope that there's somebody out there who hears my story who maybe just believes themselves a bit more that sounds a bit corny but it's true it's true I'm nothing special me Dodge I'm a kid from Doncaster handful of GCSEs no A-levels no degree yet I went on to live a life that they make movies about and anyone listening out there can do that with just a little bit of self-belief a little bit of courage and a bit of hard work

8:23Mike Bates: so I want to go back to that 2005, 6, 7 when bombings were going off who were you hunting down there who was the biggest who was the biggest problem to our country then? Well there was no one big problem there was a lot of problems. I remember a certain head of an organisation going into the BBC I think you probably get it on YouTube or whatever and saying at that time I think there were 2 ,000 people of interest that those organisations were looking at 2 ,000. In our capital or in the country? In the country but mostly in the capital at the time. Later on it became more regional because you had Birmingham there was a big hot spot there the northwest as well had a problem and i served in all of them i operate in all of them in all the major cities around our country um but at the time the scale was almost incomprehensible and i remember saying once to my wife like if people knew how dangerous this place was right now you won't go out your front door you won't go out mate there were scores of people in planning stages for attacks, being radicalised, you know, emerging out from the bedrooms, having hatched some kind of plan to hurt somebody.

9:35It was just everywhere. And I think the IRA put it best, right, when they said that we have to get lucky every day. They don't have to get lucky once. And I felt that every day, mate, genuinely. I want to go into work, like, is this the day we miss it? Now, thankfully, in all those years, we didn't. certainly not in my operational world leading those teams and leading those operations but the one time it really hurt mate if i'm being honest was the manchester i mean they had a grande concert i was one of the first officers on the ground the next day yeah and to see as a northerner to see the devastation and the impact not only on the public of course but on the people in our organisation who were desperately trying to put it right.

10:25It was hard, man. It was hard. How many people died in that Manchester bombing? Too many. Too many, man. And they were all young people. It was awful, man. Yeah. I mean, one life's enough. I walked past that memorial again the other day, just outside Victoria Station. And I always stop. And I always have a minute. Because it's tough. And people can blame whoever they want. They can say, you know, organisation missed things or made the wrong judgment. But when you're dealing with this kind of constant evolving picture, it's very difficult to get every single one right. What I can tell you from my own experience is every person I worked with and every time we went to work, we were galvanised by this mission to do good and to help the country, mate, and keep us safe.

11:14And that never, ever wavered.

11:15Mike Bates: So when you're seeing this, who are the people who are the main ringleaders here? It varies. Yeah. Usually in my experience, charismatic individuals, these, these guys are no different to any leader in the business, in a sporting context, they're able to get people to do stuff. And so, you know, look at Osama bin Laden, man, I went hunting that guy in 2002 after 9-11. Very charismatic individual, very statuesque, almost tall, had a presence about him, had a vision and people bought into that and so these people who are creating terrorist cells in my estimation are just the same as you and i mate in some sense and what i found later on in my career when i tried to build relationships with these people covertly is that there's a lot in common and it's a very fine line between good and bad and we all have that in us that's the thing that most people never accept we all have this line that we could step over and do evil but we choose to do good and that's a choice we all have to make what are your rights at the time like you're spotting these people you're clocking them you're undercover you're covert and you're seeing how they're operating can you not just go and get them pick them up with a group bam get them out and out of the country what are the rights here what did you have what laws were there I mean we wouldn't do that the police would do yeah but what you're trying to do is tread this very fine line between allowing an operation to run long enough to gather enough intelligence and enough therefore evidence to put these people away for a long time yeah the worst possible thing you can do is back the doors down on day one lift them they get off on some technicality in the back in the streets yeah so allowing these operations to run it takes some courage man you know should we give it another day should we give it these are all judgments you're to make, ultimately you want to get it to the very point of where that person's placing a bomb on the ground.

13:14Because at that point, they're red-handed, right? And then they're going away for 40 years.

13:18Mike Bates: But how mad is that to wait to that point, really? And I understand why you're doing it. It's like when someone's serving up cocaine, they're waiting for the big dog, build it up, build it up, let them get away with it, let's find out who the top man is and then go in for it. But you're dealing with bombs, you know, and I know your drug is bad as well, but you're dealing bombs waiting for this time to go and lift a group of them if you're clocking all of them how are you personally dealing with that emotion knowing that i know he's a wrong one he's a wrong one he's a wrong but let's do something now do you were you tempted to go we need to do something about this yeah and you have to hold yourself back right and ultimately as i say there's a there's a there's always a team it's never an individual's choice this is a team effort when i say team i mean the whole organization right like everyone's working on this if it's the number one priority of the time everyone's working on this right and the world stops man I saw people not go home for days for weeks living in the office just dealing with this threat and that collaboration I think is the thing that makes those organizations so strong the collection of great people coming together to do good stuff it never got to the point where they were placing the bomb of course because that is too much of a risk but at some point you've got to call it you don't want to call it too early you want to leave it as long as possible get over as much intelligence and much evidence as you can ultimately put these people off the streets and the other thing you want to do is identify the whole network yes that's the key right is the whole network yeah it's the web right yeah yeah you know you lift someone you throw them away but you miss someone else a family member coming through yeah okay and that happened right that happened in seven seven what happened there?

14:587-7 London Bombings. The guys came from my hometown, from Leeds. That's where I've travelled from today, right? But they were on the radar of that organisation before I joined it. But they were kind of discounted as kind of not being the main players. And you can't watch everyone dodge. That's the thing. It's a judgement call. So they made a judgement not to watch them. And they became the biggest attack we've ever had.

15:21Mike Bates: But you say like, but they're on the radar. Surely common sense. Well, if he's on the radar, he's been banged up before for doing something really annoying. He's been banged lift them, let's get them out. Is there not enough police to do that? Is there not enough laws here? Are the laws weak here? I want to know the answer there. I think it's a combination of too many threats to deal with at any one time. And so you have to make judgment calls on where you're going to place your chips. But also not enough evidence, not enough. Because there's a difference between intelligence and evidence, right?

15:52The organizations and the world that I worked in gathered intelligence. that's no use in court you need evidence

16:00Mike Bates: you need proof proof yeah okay and the two things are quite different so we might have intelligence on someone but very little evidence so you can't lift them because they're going to get out yeah okay and then they know you're looking at them yeah so now you know more intelligence yeah okay the pipeline shuts off catch 22 isn't it man it's tough I've given it so much time to go right we've got enough now to then lift them that's right but you're not fine that when you're lifting them they get banged up they get a 7 they get a 5 they're out in 2 and a half and they're at it again And maybe the radicalised even deeper in prison, right?

16:29It's tough. It's tough and it's almost an unwinnable game, but you have to remain positive. You have to, you have to remain completely aligned behind this mission, man. Like I can't kind of almost articulate it well enough that the mission drives everything. You know, keeping the country safe, there's no greater mission than that. and so that's what drives you every day mate and it's frustrating you see people get let off you see people get whatever off on the technicality you've got to keep going the next day because there's someone else there's another threat out there coming you can't take your foot off the gas every day

17:07Mike Bates: if you could wave a magic wand you were in there for 15 years and what you've learnt and what you saw in 15 years must have changed a lot what would you do today? I think there needs to be I think a lot of those people are disenfranchised well certainly towards the end of my career kind of loners and I think we've got to do better to build communities. I think the division that we're seeing in the UK today, I don't want to stray into politics, but the division that we're seeing isn't helping. We're driving people into corners and when you pop someone in a corner, they're going to come out fighting.

17:38You drive them into the bedroom, they don't feel like they've got a place in the society. So they hunker down and they get online and they start to radicalise and all of a sudden they're coming out with kitchen knives, right? I think if we spoke more openly about this and we tried to be kinder to people and we were more accepting, I think there would be a safer place. I don't know.

17:57Mike Bates: As you're looking in from someone who's one of the best in the world at what you do, are you looking in going, these aren't good signs right now? I don't think it's an immigration issue, Dodge. I don't. But what I would say is in my experience, there was just as much threat from people who were born in the UK than people who came from outside. Okay. So we've got to look inward. You know, the emergence of the extreme right wing happened when I was in there. and that was just as dangerous as isis so i mean it covered the whole remit really from kind of counter espionage work which means which foreign states foreign actors um all the way through to yeah the emergence of isis initially it was al-qaeda and bin laden and then that morphed into isis and then the emergence of the right wing and again that that's in my estimation a direct result of the isis issue yeah people rose upon the far right to combat it right and so there's a middle ground we're trying to find i think in society where we can be more tolerant i'm not here to kind of be a trio there absolutely not but i think if we polarize people we create an issue but i worked across the lot mate everything irish stuff everything in those 15 years and they all presented a slightly different challenge a slightly different conundrum but all again a line behind that how would you explain the isis crazy i mean i mean every religions had their fundamentalists right the crusaders the jesuits that every religions had their kind of hard line element but i mean that just went to a whole new level right and that the issue that we had with isis of course was this is well documented they were directing attacks from overseas here in the uk they had a very powerful reach into the psyche of the young person here in the UK.

19:45And their call to action was, you know, join us, but over there, you know, go kill, make a kitchen the bomb of your mum was, I think the Inspire magazine headline, the Inspire magazine was the magazine to help show terrorists how to make bombs, right? And that was circulating around. And yeah, I worked on jobs where young lads, particularly in the UK, were being radicalised from people in Syria and told to go and do stuff. And that's devastating, not only for that individual, but for their families and everything else and also dangerous, man.

20:19Mike Bates: But you're saying there, like, you're counter-terrorism, et cetera, but you're also saying the British people. But British people weren't making bombs and bombing our country, right? Not bombs, but there's other ways, you know, people were murdered, knives, guns, you know, and that became more prevalent. They're kind of... But you know, I think that's a lot A lot smaller percentage than someone making a bomb and putting it on a bus or putting it on a London Bridge or doing something massive that's going to get world news. Well, I don't think it's any less bad. I think it's less spectacular. And I think that's the word you would use in that context.

20:56The whole idea of terrorism is to terrorise, right? Yeah. So the more spectacular you can make that thing, the more people are going to put eyes on it. but we moved away from thankfully through the hard work of those organisations we moved away from these big spectacular kind of like bombing attacks and it became more kind of lone wolf which is harder to deal with because you don't know who they are the Lee Rigby attack you know guys just coming out with a kitchen knife and chopping someone's head off on the streets I mean there's nothing worse than that you know someone who was serving our country at the time as well

21:32Mike Bates: bless your soul Lee Rigby do you know what people forget about that that's what I was about to say they forget about lee rigby but what actually happened to lee rigby that day as i understand it he was just coming out of his barracks and just got targeted they were waiting for him two guys i can't remember the guy's name not relevant i don't think to say his name um yeah and they basically tried to be at him yeah on the streets of london but he had joe cox murdered up near me you know what happened with joe cox she was stabbed and peter so stopped um she had mp I think she was joking I think so I might be getting that wrong but I think so and no attacks worse than any other I don't think of course there's more fatalities but to behead someone as you come out of the army barracks that's that's barbaric well I mean but that was the spectacular right that's what ISIS did that was their call of MO that was their calling card because they knew it sent shudders through people like you and me because we cannot comprehend that level of violence.

22:38And it really kind of calls into question those individuals, right? And the role religion plays and everything else, that people can view that as something to be proud of because they were. You know, martyrdom in Islam, as I understand it, is one of the greatest things you could do. And so to do that, they believe they're living their life the very best way. But it's not, man. It hurts people. and just going back to the point I was trying to make about my service, you know, it was difficult, man, to see those things. You know, I had to watch a lot of stuff like that. Agents would show you stuff and you'd have to watch it and you can't unsee it when you've seen it.

23:19What's the most brutal thing you've seen?

23:26Well, I don't really want to describe it to people because like I say, once you've heard it, you've seen it. But some execution stuff was hard to unsee, man. Hard to unsee.

23:41Yeah, but, you know, that's the job.

23:42Mike Bates: Yeah. That's the job, mate. Are you allowed to carry on the job? Not over here. Not over here. No. So were you ever, was there ever a point in when you were working, when you were close to losing your life? Oh, man, if they'd have found out. I used to pride myself on being able to go and speak to some dangerous people who other people perhaps didn't want to go and bump into. And maybe the only time I could get alongside them was, you know, on the street because they, you know, didn't come out much or whatever. And someone needs to go and have a quick conversation with them. And I used to pride myself on being that guy who would go do that.

24:19And of course there are things you're doing in that environment to keep you safe, but I'm not carrying. Yeah. So yeah, you have to be even better at your job. A bit like the driving as well. You know, we were trained to be very, very, very good drivers because we didn't have blue lights. So you're zipping around, making progressive moves in traffic and high speed without other people knowing you're coming. So you have to be even better. And that's what I would say about anyone working in those organisations. They are the very best in the world. I worked all over the world. Saw many other organisations and we are the best.

24:54There's no doubt about that in my mind. We are the very, very best at what we do. And, yeah, it's a cool thing to be part of someone when you know you're the best. Yeah, absolutely. Better than the terrorists. That's what we always want, mostly.

25:12Mike Bates: What were you walking around in? Have you got an earpiece? How are you communicating with people if you are in trouble? Yeah, covert radios. You would normally communicate that way, depending on what job you were doing. Sometimes not. again I'll steer clear of the technicalities because that's tradecraft and we won't protect that but you would have different ways to communicate always supported by a team that isn't on the ground it's important I think to have an objective view of what's going on yeah I mean the team sometimes I operate alone never truly alone but in the environment on my own because that's what it necessitated but I was always supported by other people.

25:55Were you obsessed? It became my whole identity, my whole life. And that's why it was so hard to leave. I was extremely proud to do that job in a kind of like, you know, for my own ego, it was nice to do something that was different and kind of sexy and cool, right? And no one knew. But then it was hard not to tell people because you can't be proud of what you've done. You can't share it. You can't talk about the difficult days. You can't talk about the great days. You can't talk about the wins, the losses. You have to internalize it. And that's hard. It becomes a pressure cooker almost. So I wasn't obsessed with it, but I was obsessed with keeping us safe.

26:41I was obsessed with being the very best at my craft. Very few people in the organization and ended up doing what I did. I think I was the first person in the history of the MOD to do all frontline activities, which I'm very proud of. But it was my whole life, Dodge. And to leave that age 40, having served for 20 years in our country, was the most difficult operation I ever did.

27:11Mike Bates: We'll go into that in a bit. I want to roll back a bit further. What's the... Give me some places where you travel around the world undercover. covert i can't tell you the name of those places mate just know that i served everywhere yeah i've got to protect these operations i understand that um you know i don't know if operations are still happening there i don't know what our relationships are like with those countries those countries um you know it's a very and i'm sure we'll talk about this i've had a very very difficult last few years navigating this shifting identity and trying to share the lessons i've learned from that world and the reason i want to do that is because it's a continuation of that service i genuinely think it's helpful to people without overstepping the line because i'm a patriot bro like i've always served and i always will um and so yeah i need to just be careful about that but I served everywhere, mate.

28:06You know, from this city, this town. Everywhere. Everywhere.

28:11Mike Bates: Across the whole continent? Everywhere. Russia? No. Africa?

28:20Not Russia. Not Russia. I couldn't, I could never go to Russia, mate. I wouldn't come out. Yeah. No, China, Russia, those kind of countries. I don't think I'd come back.

28:29Mike Bates: Yeah. That's a good move not to get there. Yeah. There were kind of like obvious restrictions around where you could travel. for your own safety. And yeah, I don't really want to go to Rush, to be fair. But do you? No. I've not had the food's great, mate, so I'm not going. No, I'll stay clear, that's all. Yeah. So were you under a different identity? You had a different name? Sometimes. Yeah. How sharp have you got to be with that? Because I've had some people on here who were undercover, old Bill, who were working, trying to get, and basically he was in a boozer one day and his pal, someone shouted out, not his name that everyone knew.

29:12Mike Bates: He got caught out and got rumbled. Was there a time you nearly got rumbled at all? No. No, okay. No, mate. But what I would say is, in my opinion, the best people working undercover know themselves the most. because to be the very best you need to tread the thinnest line between reality and not reality. If you're acting and you're trying to play this part of someone who's nothing like you, people are going to see through it. He was undercover old Bill trying to fit him in the hooligan world. Yeah, people are going to see straight through it. So, you know, I can fight, right? I've got cauliflower ears, I've got tattoos.

29:55So I'm the guy that terrorists want to teach me how to fight, right? So fucking easy. do you know what I mean we can do that no problem I'm not the guy to go and teach you how to dance or whatever it is right get someone else to do that job

30:08Mike Bates: but you know you know you're a trained killer you know you're a trained killer you would never say that but I know you're a trained killer I know that you can handle yourself and put people into all sorts of locks and positions that they won't be able to breathe how much did that play a part in your BJJ in the world that you were in for that 15 years I mean jiu-jitsu is the root I started jiu-jitsu when i was in the marines because i was going to afghanistan yeah so that is the reason i started jiu-jitsu when no one in this country did jiu-jitsu like a handful of people doing it one black belt here maricio gomez that was it in 2000 and then it continued it was just something that i loved doing it gave me you know it spoke about the pressure of that world when you're training jiu-jitsu man you can't think about anything else you are present because someone's trying to pull your head off right it's one of the i think holly gracie once said it's like being plugged into the wall and being recharged and that's how I felt doing jiu-jitsu right you know you just mentioned then uh Gracie holy Gracie a load of people when I started podcasting was like is that Rickson Gracie is that Rickson Gracie yeah you do but I did I didn't know so I had to search up I was like bloody hell it is as well it looks like it's the best yeah I heard he was yeah I think 498 fights undefeated yeah I've just come back from Rio man I was over there with Carlos Gracie Jr yeah yeah I just got my third degree in my black belt so third oh well you're not getting over that quickly third degree in your black belt that's like the creme de la creme well I mean as I said I've been doing for a long time I've been a black belt for nine years it's funny I was chatting I've got an academy up in Leeds and I was chatting to my students the other day about this because they're all obsessed with promotions right they want to progress they want another stripe or a different colour belt but when you get to the black belt it kind of inverses and you almost, I talked about that kind of game on the surface and the game underneath, you start to see a different thing in jiu-jitsu my next promotion will be in five years time and it'll be one piece of white tape on my belt a piece of white tape of five years of hard work, being beaten up and struggle, you're not in it for that anymore, it's in recognition of almost your kind of continued growth and self-sacrifice and humility to continue to train jiu-jitsu because it's a hard life man but i i did it all the way through those careers trained again all over the world i was went to canada for a while trained over there trained in new york and um what i love about jiu-jitsu more than anything dodge is the the sense of community and camaraderie if there's one thing i do miss from that old world it is that I think Jiu Jitsu and rugby come very close can't beat rugby can't beat yeah I agree yeah and of course I've used Jiu Jitsu I've coached Leeds Ryan's rugby league team and used that and so it all kind of meshes together but Jiu Jitsu's been a constant for me for the last 26 years if you're out on a night out and a big lump 6 foot 3 18 stone boozed up do you fancy chances quite quickly to get him on the ground and see him off I'll run off mate yeah the hardest fight you ever have is the one you walk away from oh no I totally agree but if it came on if you're back in the corner mate yeah he's gone he ain't getting back up what a lovely feeling that must be knowing that you've got that in the locker yeah I think I can tell you it's time so there's we had a my wife will laugh at this when she listens to it so we're having our kitchen done right years ago and these two joiners came round uh rob and um yeah one guy called rob and and uh he loved the ufc and i i just walked in one day with my gi and my belt i've been training he was like oh mate you train jiu-jitsu i was like yeah yeah he said oh i fucking love them and his younger brother was on work experience right and he was like yeah you love the ufc you could beat him and he's a black belt and he was like looked at him like don't say that don't say that and he was big guy rob and he said yeah you could and Robert.

34:15No, I couldn't. And his younger brother couldn't get his head around it. He was like, no, you're miles bigger than this dude. You can beat him. I said, come in the garden. So I said, right, you're going to hold me down and you're going to time it, younger brother. See how long it takes me to get on top of you, brother. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. You'll never get out. He's massive. He likes UFC. Click, click, like three seconds, right? Just wrestled up and came on top. I said, no, I'm going to hold your brother down and let's see how long it takes. And he fucking couldn't get out. But as I'm holding him down in the garden, my fucking wife drives up the truck.

34:48She's like, oh, what's happening? He's battering the toilet in the garden.

34:55Mike Bates: Quality. But he never got out. Yeah. Because it's skill, it's leverage, it's timing, it's connection. It's not strength. Yeah. I mean strength counts, don't get me wrong. A good big will always be a good strength. If I know someone in jiu-jitsu, mate, I'm off skis. I listen to that I think the best advice I can give anyone if they're out there is to walk, but you just have to look at people's ears these days. Yeah, I agree. You know, it used to be how big they are. Now a little guy with messed up ears will like it. Agreed. Yeah. It's like I said at the day, I said, I've got to look the size of the collies on both of your ears too.

35:27Mike Bates: Yeah. Can't see them on the other side. They're actually coming out of the sides, those things. So going back, so on your journey of 15 years, what changed for you to go, right, my time's up?

35:43So this is a difficult conversation for me always really, but I'll try and articulate the best I can. So both my boys were born early, mate. My eldest boy who's doing his biology GCSE today, he was born five weeks early. We were in hospital for a couple of weeks with him. I had to feed him through a tube, but he was all right. Ten months later, his younger brother arrived. Eleven weeks early, three pound, see-through. Couldn't breathe for himself. straight into intensive care on life support there for three days, then in and out the intensive care system for about six weeks. And then... Still waiting in line?

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37:34Not all payments are Boost eligible. users who received a boost improved their fico score rate from experian by an average of 14 points some may not see improved scores or approval odds not all lenders use experian credit files and not all lenders use scores impacted by experian boost see experian.com for details

37:51we finally got him home and he was sleeping a lot right and i read all the parenting books like dads do and i said to my wife this is good he's catching up and she was like nah i've just got this funny feeling, something not right. Always trust a mother's instinct. I said, okay, let's take him to hospital, get him checked out. We walked into this little room and the consultant sat us down and they said, listen, if you hadn't have brought him in today, he wouldn't have been here tomorrow. He had meningitis. Back into intensive care again, six weeks. Lost him, got him back. He's now a healthy, happy young lad who's on his way to join the Royal Marines.

38:28Very proud of him. But I did what every guy does dodge right and i've been in high pressure situations i dealt with stuff and i just dealt with it like that what i didn't do was deal with how i was feeling and for 10 years i carried this kind of locked box of trauma around with me and every year on his birthday on the 20th february i'd give him his gifts and i'd make i would just have to go off and i'd be like a mess like this wave of emotion pour out me right this mix of gratitude and grief and shock i don't know and as the world plunged into lockdown in 2020 I thought I've got to deal with this once and for all and the way I could kind of figure out how I could deal with it was to pay back the hospital that saved his life so I need to raise money for this hospital because what I'd realised in there was the kit, the equipment, the care that we all take for granted it's not bought by the NHS mate it's funded by charities and they're kind of selfless fundraising people you're never likely to meet so I set off on this mission to raise some money and I thought, well, it's in lockdown.

39:31No one's got any money. Businesses are struggling. It needs to be crazy. And I discovered ocean rowing. So I decided I was going to row across the Atlantic on my own. Like you do. Hold on a minute. You're going to row across the Atlantic by yourself? I'm going to row across 3 ,000 miles across the Atlantic on my own. I remember saying to my wife, I said, I've got this great idea, love. She said, there's no chance. This is a true story. There's no chance. So I said, okay, this is August 2019. One of my first, because I didn't have social media, right? Ever. Yeah. Couldn't have it. One of my first Instagram posts, a picture of a shower.

40:10And there's a reason for that, right? Cold showers. If anyone goes all the way back. And she said, no, you can't do it. So I said to myself, okay, I need to prove to her I'm serious. So every shower I had in October 2019 was freezing cold. It was the first shower in the morning, last one at night. after training freezing cold shot i froze to death for a month went back to see her in in november and said listen love i've been freezing to death for a month here can we have another conversation on this ocean row she's like oh you're serious i was like yeah i want to do it so i initially was going to do it as a pair and then decided to do it on my own and um i approached my employer and said look the world's changed a little bit we're in lockdown i I want to do this.

40:53Will you support it? And mate, they gave me an ultimatum. It's your career all the road. I was like, After 15 years? 20 years of service. 20 years of service of the country? Career all the road. Oh God. And then, it got nasty, because, and I didn't anticipate this, but once you step out of the lines, and you start to want to do something a bit different, I think people get a little bit unsure, and paranoid or whatever. And I just started to get a lot of shit from a lot of people, mate. I'm not going to go into detail. Internally? Internally, yeah, not good. And it was a real struggle. But ultimately, it kind of made my mind up that I had to make a different choice.

41:38And to leave a 20-year career, my whole identity, and to go out into the world and see if I could start a business, see if I could take those lessons and make it a success, it was a massive risk, right? but I think starting that Atlantic grappler charity campaign and trying to raise money for the hospital was it was an even greater mission and that continuation of service that I've spoken about and so yeah so I ended up rowing the Atlantic solo in 2022 and raised $137 ,000 for charity

42:09Mike Bates: massive respects mate thanks bro 3 ,000 miles by yourself in the ocean and how big's the how big's the 7 metres so I've been for this room a bit a bit longer and what have you got on there what have you got on there where's the food what's your communication what was the weather like did you flip over did you I can't get my head round all of that really yeah yeah and people always ask like you know how hard was it and I've been on a rower for 10 minutes in the gym well there you go that's how I'd graft yeah so I rode for about 15 hours a day I had about 3 to 4 hours of broken sleep per night if that and yeah 46 days 6 hours and 10 minutes and the hardest thing people always say you know what physically it must be really hard you know rowing three quarters of a ton's worth of boat 3 000 miles on your own yeah it's just tough right but by far and away mate the hardest thing was the solitude okay i mean i said to your own mind man i said to sarah my wife i said i'll call you twice a week i'm gonna disconnect and enjoy the silence man called her twice a day every day crying my eyes out.

43:18Mike Bates: Yeah, okay. And I was talking to anything. It was weird, mate. I was speaking to anything that moved. A bird, a fish, the sun, the stars, the moon, just desperate to connect. And when I stood in Antigua, mate, I was broken physically, put back together mentally. I'd raised a lot of money for charity and I discovered for the first time what it truly is to be human. It's this, man. It's conversation. Connection and proper chats. It's looking into someone's eyes and feeling that connection, man. And people tell themselves, I can do this alone. I'm all right on my own. You're not, man. You're not.

43:52You're not. You need people. It's what makes us human. And so I went on to then, you know, do whatever I could in business to try and create communities because I know that's what matters. And I vowed I'd never row another ocean again. Last week I was rowing around Scotland, so it continues, mate. It continues.

44:11Mike Bates: How's the missus with that? Is she okay? She just goes. Oh, you know what? Just crack on. unless you do your thing. No, she's very supportive and I'm very lucky like that. I think you need someone in your corner who is always going to be there. Supportive. I'm very lucky like that. A good missus. Yeah, we're both very lucky. Yeah. Going back to 2020, what emotions have you gone through knowing that you haven't had any support from the people that you were, who you gave your life to? It's funny, mate. I was asked on a, on a, like a military leadership webinar a couple of years ago. by someone in the audience.

44:47What was the greatest lesson you've learned from those 20 years? I wrote about it last week in my newsletter, the Sunday briefing, actually. It's like no one cares. Yeah. No one cares, mate. No one cares. It's right, isn't it? It's a hard truth, but it is the truth. And we tell ourselves that it matters. And, you know, I'll be in touch with this colleague forever. You won't. If you leave, that's it. They're carrying on on their journey and you've taken a different path. Yeah. very we spoke earlier mate about the five people you're close with right those people are special because they're going to be there no matter which way you walk but most of the people they're going to come in and out of your life and i don't say that in a flippant way i don't say that in any way to shock i just it's the truth it's my experience i've lost touch with every single colleague mainly because they've told them all to not be friends with me anymore which is hard apart from one he's special he's special mate he said no he's my mate I'm sticking with him and yeah I love him man

45:50Mike Bates: did you do anything to cause a problem nothing at all there's nothing there they've just gone you know what what is the problem the problem I think is that I think it's two things I think those organisations are in some sense kind of Dickensian and stuck in the dark ages. And you should never say anything about anything ever. Fine. If it's damaging to national security. 100 % on board with that. See, the Americans do it different, right? They champion their veterans. You're allowed to have another life after that service. We don't do that in the UK. We leave our veterans out to dry. Hang them out.

46:31That's not fair, man. It's not cool. We could do a lot better.

46:33Mike Bates: Why don't we look after our own? We'll go on to that in a minute because that's something that really bugs me. We're not looking after our own, but yeah. So I think the main reason, and I've been navigating a challenge over the last few years, trying to get a book out, right? Speak about it a little bit, maybe. I think they are concerned that if I'm able to do that, the more people will follow. And I get that. I understand that. But I don't think they will. Because the bar to entry to do that stuff, certainly with the stuff I've gone through the last three years, Dodge, is so high, man. Very few people will tolerate that.

47:11Very few. I'm still on that journey because my values matter more to me than anything else, and they will never break me on that. I believe in justice. I believe in fairness. I believe in free speech. I believe in doing the right thing. But I think there's someone in that organisation who just doesn't like the sound of it. It might be their own ego. it might be envy I don't know what it is but I'm not doing anything wrong mate I'm not trying to do anything wrong I hope this podcast in some sense has demonstrated that I'm not straining to telling secrets I wouldn't do that mate I just want to help people

47:47Mike Bates: So you've written your book Yeah And have they got to sign the book off Correct And they're not signing it off Correct Okay Okay Is there anything Is there anything Because this is I've had a lot of SAS on and SBS and special service etc and there is a grey area but that grey area seems to have gone because a lot of the boys are getting up and not giving stupid details away of you know but they've just gone this is my story I need to tell my story you know and I guess that's what you're doing yeah I just think I'm the first person from that world to do it okay so if you're hacking a new path through the jungle you're going to get bit and buy some snakes and that's basically I think what's happening here you know gonna go and have a role with stas later you know great guys um but a number of those people from that realm have already come out and so that path's already in some sense been trodden and so yeah it is what it is mate but you know genuinely i mean it for the right reasons i'm trying to help people um i mentioned to you earlier the first ever speaking gig i did i was on the high performance podcast right not as good as this one but it's Thank you.

48:59Episode 100. And it was like a listener's spotlight, like last five minutes. And a head teacher from Salford contacted me on Instagram. He said, I've heard your story. Will you speak to my classroom full of seven-year-olds? He said, because all the dads are in strange ways, prison. All the mums are working three jobs. He said, none of them are doing their own work. But if they thought that could be James Bond, they might. So my first ever speaking gig was in lockdown on a bloody Zoom call to a classroom full of 70-year-olds all staring at me. And that's why I'm doing it, mate. Because if one of them kids gets inspired to do it, if a kid from Doncaster is this and goes, you know what?

49:43He's not got his A-levels. He's not got his degree, but I can go and be James Bond. Do it.

49:47Mike Bates: Is there a part on the book they're holding you up on? Are they just saying the whole book is not to go out? Or is there a chapter or is there any words in there? That's the issue, mate. So there are books written about this kind of world all the time. And what usually happens is you enter into a redaction negotiation, right? You can't write this. You can write that. You can't write. Fine. I've always said if there's something in there that they don't want me to write, I'll change it. Not an issue. They're just saying carte blanche can't write anything. I'm like, that's not legal. Yeah. um and i'm like i'm not here to slate my former employer and you know fair fair enough but i just don't think it's fair um and so i'm going to pursue it so it comes to a conclusion mate whatever that is um principle principle man yeah not not stubbornness but a principle that we should have the right to speak our truth provided it doesn't damage national security and that's what i want to do but knowing you you're not going to damage national security whatsoever with her because you'd know that you would have come up against her go take that out why are they not just like you know what fair play you gave her 20 years that's what you write that was your story there's nothing in there that's untoward i get it good luck to you mike there's an irony mate um there's an irony because they said that no one will apply for these jobs if they think people are going to write about them i'm like no you're wrong i think more people agree could ever have agree totally agree it's done in the right way if it's done in a sensitive way if all of the facts are obfuscated and the real secrets are protected you know as i've said before this is an amazing organization these are amazing people doing amazing work particularly the agents because no one speaks about them but they're the ones who are risking it all and they're heroes man and i'm never going to ever share any information about that world but what i can say is there are lessons within that environment in those operations that can help everybody to live a better life and that's what i'm going to try and do how many people were there in your team it depended it depends it could be give me your biggest team give you a smallest smallest team of yourself i'd imagine or one other you're quite happy by yourself never never one no it was always okay or someone you can call upon but on some sort of operation give me an example of an operation you did where you knew you had a team and how long did that last for that operation mate it just depends okay operations can last 10 minutes they can last 10 months they can last 10 years they can be a couple of individuals on a need-to-know basis all the way through to hundreds of people or working behind the same mission it completely varies depending on the risk dependent on the operating environment and the kind of profile of the threat that you're trying to deal with.

52:40Yeah, it completely changes, mate, all the time. And those teams will shrink and grow depending on what you're trying to achieve at the time. Very fluid. Very fluid environment. It's one of the greatest lessons. There's no right answer.

52:55Mike Bates: Okay. What's one of the greatest lessons? Apart from no one cares, let's make it a bit more positive, shall we? That's the truth, mate. No one cares. I think one of the greatest lessons is that to really to really find high performance you need to align all your people behind one single mission I think I speak a lot on keynotes to clients around this idea that setting a mission is fine you've got to constantly reaffirm it in every action you take because people will be naturally misaligned and you're leaking power when you do that so you know the guys you've had on here talking before special force operators very clear about their objectives very clear about their missions very clear about the role there's no room for ambiguity they know what they're going to go and achieve they're all aligned behind it they execute I think business could do that better I think they don't they maybe put a mission statement on a wall in the foyer and think that's enough no no every day you've got to talk about that if something kicked off in London or around it are you on a pager Are you on a call?

54:00Mike Bates: Are you going to be the first person there? If you're the first person there and you're not carrying, who would you want to put in front of you who are carrying? As I said, I never carry weapons. But yeah, we'd get calls. And it's different mechanisms of getting in touch with you. Usually you would go to a location first and collect the equipment you needed for that job. And then you would deploy. What sort of equipment? No comment. Okay. But if you're not carrying and you don't have guns and da-da-da, what other equipment are there? Can you use any other? No, because these people don't know you're there.

54:37This is the difference between the police. They better not know you're there. So they don't know you're there. And so you don't need anything to defend yourself because they don't know.

54:49Mike Bates: So who are you communicating with then for someone to act on your behalf? Well, that depends. If you're getting towards like an executive action, So the police intercepting it. Then it's a very well-coordinated, huge operation, which is people...

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56:36...above my pay grade, making those calls. And then you're talking kind of multi-agency operations of hundreds of people potentially, 24 hours a day until they make the strike. And that's the thing you tend to read about in the papers. what you don't tend to read about is the years before the graft that's gone in before okay

56:55Mike Bates: yeah did you find over the years mike that there as you were in there there was more and more organizations growing in our country and not enough people like yourself within the business to deal with the amount of people yeah the threat definitely got bigger it did and more complex okay yeah and um the environment changes you know the threat changes constantly it's fluid and I think that's one of the things again you can learn from business you constantly got to be looking at the horizon man you can't be looking here because that's changing tomorrow you got to be looking what's coming down the road and I think that organisation did that very well and so yeah it constantly changed but that was part of the excitement of it Dodge right every day was something different every day was something different compared to my time in the military when I was operational for six months at a time then nothing I was operational every single day every day like a normal job you know if we had a day to do our admin it was boring I want to do my expenses get me back I want to go in the mix yeah yeah yeah you loved it out there because it was fun it was exciting you're working together as a team aligned behind that mission you were making a difference and so again that was why it was so hard to leave.

58:12I loved it, man. I can see. And so when those people betray you in the way I feel I've been betrayed, it hurts, man. It hurts,

58:22Mike Bates: man. How have you emotionally dealt with it? How do you deal with the clash of, no, you're not putting the book out. And I'm like, no, I'm going to put the book out. No, you don't want to put it out. It's lawyers back and forward, lawyers back and forward. Who's going to win this? It's going to come to a point where it's one of you is going to give in. You're not giving in. They're not going to give in. The judge is going to decide. The judge will decide. Yeah. I've always said, I will go all the way to the very end. And if a judge turns around to me and says, you know what, I've seen both sides and in this instance it's a no.

58:51Mike Bates: And you'll hold your hands up. Okay. Yeah, respect. Okay. No problem. You just want that answer. What I can't accept is someone sat in an office in London just because they don't want it to happen saying no. Yeah. The unfortunate thing is this could have been dealt with a long time ago because we could have negotiated and found a mutually acceptable position. and I think part of the tactic of this whole process is to keep it rumbling, to frustrate me, to hurt my family, to hurt my businesses, to have the police involved and everything else, right? Like it's been a high pressure, stressful situation for three or so years.

59:30A situation that most people wouldn't tolerate but I like to think that I'm the kind of guy that stands by what it believes and i believe i've been treated unfairly and all i want is justice okay and that's it i'm not here to call anyone out i just want it to be done right mate what

59:49Mike Bates: things have happened since you wanted to put this book out have you had any police raids have you had anything on your family of any proper headaches you're like why are they doing that to me you You won't believe it. Go on. You won't believe it. Everything you just said. Yeah. It's been shocking in some sense, the lengths that the state will go to. You know, it's funny, right? There's a funny story. So I was in Greece last year and I always take a book on holiday. I read it and I went into there. You know, every hotel's got a little library that people leave the books, right? And I went in and on the shelves was this red book and I pulled it off the shelves.

1:00:29it was called the power in the people by michael mansfield kc and michael mansfield kc was one of the guys who used to defend a lot of terrorists back in the day when i was doing that job and he used to be a bit of a bane of ours because he used to win a lot but he's the guy who's fought the state for stephen lawrence for hillsborough okay for grenfell and all that stuff right so i wrote to him i read his book on the sun lounge and i wrote to him i he's never going to write to me about this this like old casey but he wrote back to me in five minutes brilliant and i didn't give him any details but i said this is the kind of thing i'm going through he said you must persevere okay and his whole books about this idea that the state tries to trample on people like me they're trying to hold us down but try and you know ruin our reputation you've just got to stay firm and justice will prevail and i think it will david and goliath really isn't it there you go yeah yeah yeah it's like a jiu-jitsu match as the 18 stone guy in your back seat's a corner yeah you're going to believe that you have the fortitude and the resilience to and the self-belief which i think you know i have this system i call my wall of evidence this idea that you know when people say how do you deal with that 40-foot wave in the dead of night mike or the taliban waiting for you in afghanistan or that terrorist who wants to kill you the honest truth dodges you don't know how you're gonna behave what you really need is a bit of self-belief that you might just be the guy to give it a go and that self-belief is built over time mate it's setting a goal it's walking the path between who you are now and the next best version of yourself and you build every time you do that you put a brick in the wall this wall gets bigger compound interest yeah yeah yeah every day it becomes a fortress of self-belief so you're like I can do anything yeah come on I'll take you on let's go to court and see what happens and so it's not in any way flippant in my part it's not in any way arrogant it's a continuation of me living a life a line behind who I really am agree

1:02:28Mike Bates: that's it good for you I had the same thing did you I had a court case one of the biggest companies in the world I wasn't backing down no where'd you go I had a court settlement thank you very much they push you right to the wire you know but then you got your wife going just let's walk away from no I'm walking away from this I'm a principled man I'm not walking away from this until I get an answer and the answer was last second they bottled it out of court settlement thank you very much but that went on for not as long as yours but that was a good that was a good 12 months yeah yeah yeah you know I mean one of the hardest things when the police came round was my wife's very quite a private person same and naively she said to one of the police officers please would you mind taking your shoes off in the house and they just looked at her and said nah and trampled straight upstairs I thought it'd be a bit easier yeah come on come on you know rooting through my kids drawers and so they are they did they come out just to be a nuisance they banged your door down just to be a nuisance just because of this are they targeted your business have they targeted other stuff yeah yeah i went in the business yeah um no they they believe that i've um shared sensitive information with the people that i wrote my manuscripts with right my publisher my literary agent but of course i never do that yeah um but So they think that you've told a story to your ghost writer and they've taken out, but none of that's gone in?

1:03:56I wouldn't do that.

1:03:56Mike Bates: No. No, I mean, yeah, I just wouldn't do it. But I also think that part of this whole process is to undermine my reputation too and to apply pressure to me and my family. So my wife says, Mike, just fuck it in, mate. We can do without it. And to be fair to her, she's never said that. She's always backed me. and I ain't going anywhere, mate. But it is disappointing. The hardest thing, honestly, Dodge, the hardest thing in this whole process was last year when that happened, 17th of April. Ten days later, nine days later, 26th of April, three miles from my house, a guy walked down Otley Road in Headley and shot two people with a crossbow, terrorist attack, and they missed it.

1:04:45They shouldn't have been around my house the week before. should be looking in the right places. That is inexcusable for me. And in that sense, it feels to me almost like it's a public interest issue. Could they have stopped that attack if they weren't messing around with me? Who knows? But for someone who's served for so long and pride themselves on stopping things like that happening, for that to happen three miles down the road, mate, is inexcusable. Just do your job properly, yeah? Just do your job properly.

1:05:13Mike Bates: But for us, like going through that emotion of dealing with something which is massive like that, you've got to be really principled to stick by it again. I ain't going anywhere. Yeah. Bring it on. Let's get an answer. I'm not backing down. Don't care if you're David and Goliath. Yeah. Yeah. Because I mean, you've got to practice what you preach. Yeah. I agree. I'm always, I'm always trying to encourage people to what I call live a life without limits. And the only limitations you have in our life is the ones we place on ourselves. And I can back out anytime I want and have an easier life. but I know if this book comes out there'll be some kid somewhere reads it and it will change their life because they will believe in themselves more than they do right now and that is enough motivation I ever going to need mate to stay on the path when do you think this you know when we're 2026 now when do you think this will all come to a head because you can't just keep dragging out there's got to be a point where you're just like you know what let's get an answer yeah we're just waiting for a court date okay yeah so we're waiting for that date now and that's due any minute.

1:06:17So, yeah. How do you feel about that?

1:06:23As you might expect, the court isn't set up in a way for me to prevail. So, I'm nervous about it but I'm also quite pleased to find a resolution. Yeah, I was going to say

1:06:36Mike Bates: just have an end date, yeah. Just find a resolution. Give me my answer. If I can't do it, I can't do it, thanks. That's right. We move on. yeah and there's other books I can write is there equality part two is there anyone who you identify who you think's putting a proper block on this

1:06:57I think there might be one or two people okay yeah but you know that's on them that's on their conscience mate and that's fine by me you know that's up to you

1:07:11stick to your principles stick to your values stay classy and do the right thing that's all me to do mate what was the Royal Marines like for you in the five years you were in there my man so good I was so lucky man so just as I was in that other organisation when 7-7 happened I was in training for the Royal Marines when 9-11 happened I was on Dartmoor freezing cold wet and hungry like we always were and it's funny like none of my family have been in the military my uncle bet me 50 quid I wouldn't get through training that's how confident they were in me I was this smoker I was out of shape and I think when I look back at 19 when I joined up I was searching for adventure of course as a young man where I was going to make my mark in the world but I was also searching for community family I came from a broken home still don't have a relationship with my dad and it was difficult I was the eldest of three kids so I had to navigate that messy divorce and take care of my mum she was struggling and um i think i saw in the military a place to connect and find out who i really was and i was interested to know who is who's mike base what can he do yeah what boundaries can he push yeah yeah and i did great first half of training i was the best guy there won the craig medal and then i couldn't climb the 30 foot rope man is that you're not allowed to use the feet

1:08:40Mike Bates: it's just straight in that's it on the knees yeah 30 pound a kit your rifle I could do everything I could do that so say that again say that again what was that 30 pound a kit and your rifle so 30 pound a kit and your rifle having to climb up a 30 foot rope outside yeah and I could do every other test couldn't do that and you get three attempts to stay in your troop right and I fucking fell 20 feet near the last one into a heap got whisked off to get fixed for about a month came back into training and I'd been the best guy right now I'm a nobody I'm a back trooper I'm having to prove to everyone again that I can do it get three more attempts this time not to stay with your mates but to stay in the Royal Marines and I failed the first two man and I was stood at the bottom of this rope I remember it like it was yesterday the winds lashing in off the estuary and this PTI came over to me this physical training instructor a guy called Corporal Toes I don't know if he's still alive but I still remember him he said listen he said I want you to do something different for me today he said I want you to grab hold of that rope close your eyes don't think about anything else just climb I thought fuck it like what have I got to lose can't do this thing anyway so I might as well give it a go so I walked over to this rope grabbed hold of it closed my eyes I started climbing and climbing for what felt like an eternity inching my way up this rope and then my head hit the you got to the top got to the top I couldn't believe it mate I was like what and it was the like such a profound moment because it taught me the power of this power of the mind yeah I taught myself out of it I could have climbed it weeks ago but I told myself this narrative that I couldn't do it and as soon as I released myself from that and just followed the process I did it went on through training month later 9-11 happened got told if you complete training because it still wasn't a given at week 25 or 30 you're going to go out on operations and we were the first guys to go to Afghanistan 2002 find bin Laden in the Tora Bora caves 11 ,000 feet all over the news everyone was watching it and we were in And that's when I started jujitsu because I was like, man, if I'm in the caves with these guys, I don't want to have a tear up.

1:10:43So we started just pulling mats together before we went. And like one guy knew a little bit and we used to get DVDs in and we'd like practice. And, um, and then yeah, I got promoted after that tour, which was kind of like unheard of at the time. I'd only done a year out of training, got promoted. And then led a section of Marines to Iraq for the war the following year. So eight guys, I'd done 18 months out of training. one guy done 15 years one today again a great lesson that leadership isn't about experience it's about how much you care about the people you lead and i loved the guys that i led northern ireland the following year and then the marines wanted to go back and become an officer i was kind of heading down the special forces pathway and then that's when i applied for a job i never thought existed and then i moved into other world a phenomenal five years mate an experience I'll never forget where I was able to discover the art of leadership and what high performance really feels like because I think it feels like you know what it's like on a rugby picture and you're with a set of guys and you think we can do anything today and you trust everyone they've all got your back

1:11:54Mike Bates: yeah and you trust everyone it's a special thing you walk like half an inch tall alright like I love that feeling um then and then i put my chit in to leave and um i'd kind of got this other job um and everyone went away on this exercise in america and i had to stay behind like rear party because i was leaving and i had my final board interview for this job in london head office on the thames and um i said to the sergeant who's in charge i said i've got to go away on thursday for this interview sergeant he said um who's it for so i can't tell you so we're not fucking going then i can't tell you i said um i do i need to go yeah he said well you gotta tell me who it is i said um well look i'll tell you but you can't tell anyone he said all right so i told him he got pissed that nice and told everyone he told everyone in the mess yeah mate and for years after these people kept turning up in the head office of this new job i'd got i fucking know it they'd all heard they'd all followed me yeah there was loads of guys came from that unit um they're great times man great times very lucky how would you sum up Mike Bates if you had 20 seconds in a lift out of a hotel

1:13:13family man

1:13:17values led good person here to help others full stop

1:13:25Mike Bates: mate we'll end it on that note I've really enjoyed this Mike what a life we've missed loads of it I know we've I know there's loads I know there's probably a part two on this one I'd love to talk to you definitely part two I also want to do what we spoke about earlier we just do a a podcast talking about men men's health how men should be speaking up yeah all the things we spoke about before yeah I've been on a mission for the last few years to try and help men in midlife navigate that better and I'd love to share that with you man yeah happy days man Mike you're a gentleman thanks brother good man great to see you cheers mate nice one Cheers, Mike.

1:13:58Mike Bates: Hi, guys. I really hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. Can you do us a favor and leave us a review as it massively helps us grow the show? Cheers, guys.

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