BONUS EPISODE: Audie Murphy
Added 2025-09-17 09:28:48 +0000 UTCGET LIVESTREAM TICKETS FOR OUR SHOW ON OCT 4TH:
Audie Murphy, America's most decorated soldier, was a tiny kid who went from hunting rabbits to survive to machine-gunning waves of Nazis within a couple of years.
Sources:
Audie Murphy. To Hell and Back.
Don Graham. No Name on the Bullet.
Bill Libby. A Different Kind of Hell.
https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/audie-murphy-most-highly-decorated/
https://www.nytimes.com/1970/05/29/archives/audie-murphy-is-held-on-complaint-of-fight.html
Comments
This is the epitome of how the US treats their vets. Incredibly brave and competent soldier wants only to go into Westpoint and keep being in the army, and they just say, "Thank you for your service, go starve in the fucking street."
Noblesse Oblahaj
2025-09-24 16:07:05 +0000 UTCAudie Murphy bringing home dead Germans to lay near where his platoon leader sleeps like a feral cat that likes someone
Noblesse Oblahaj
2025-09-24 15:45:16 +0000 UTCAudie’s gamer profile would have displayed KD ratio 55:0. Anyone enemy saw this profile should just lay down their arms and surrender.
Rayrey
2025-09-23 03:05:09 +0000 UTC19 y/o with 241 confirmed kills...that's bloody impressive.
Alex
2025-09-22 14:13:49 +0000 UTCAlso, "oowooga phone" is a banger. Also also, can confirm benzos are a gateway drug to Built to Spill. And Modest Mouse, for that matter. Also also also, I really appreciate the longer "reflection" section at the end, where they all give their thoughts on Murphy. And I feel like Audie Murphy would've been very good friends with Errol Flynn's kid, the war photographer. I think both died in the same year, too.
Brandon P
2025-09-22 12:23:35 +0000 UTCIs the world ready to admit that manlets make superior soldiers? Audie Murphey, Simo Haiya, Vasily Zeitsev (also a short king, I believe). Could just be indicative of the levels of malnutrition across the world at the time but I think there's something to presenting a smaller target. Also, all the Nate haters are insane - dude had "Yardie Murphy" in the chamber and did not hesitate.
Brandon P
2025-09-22 08:19:26 +0000 UTCFrom the discussion at the end of- please do an episode on Sir Sam Hughes, aka the reason Canada ended up with the Ross Rifle and the McLaren shovel/shield. A good source is Tim Cook’s “The Madman and the Butcher.”
Bill Hall
2025-09-21 20:30:54 +0000 UTCAppreciate y’all and onions a lot more
Olin Dunleavy
2025-09-21 05:00:38 +0000 UTCJudo probably so he doesn't accidentally kill people. & ooof Cagney seems like someone really trying to help that ultimately can't
Gil the Gilded Dragon
2025-09-20 20:32:54 +0000 UTCAre we sure this sad eyed woman was not Thetis daughter of Oceanus, gone to weary distant Texas to avoid the fate Necessity bound her to
Gil the Gilded Dragon
2025-09-20 20:18:16 +0000 UTCLying about your age was extraordinarily common back then. My grandfather (who also grew up a dirt poor farmer in Texas like Audie) joined the army at 15. As the oldest sibling he was compelled to join when there literally wasn't enough food to go around for his siblings. Later in life, well into the 90's he still shot squirrels to "make sure he still could" in case Depression-style economics ever came back.
Jake Rawls
2025-09-20 03:14:25 +0000 UTCI know the combat stuff is more your bread and butter, and you do it really well, but I found Audie talking about PTSD in an era where that was unknown to be the most unheard of and most interesting part of the episode.
Jamie Farhi-Humphrey
2025-09-19 20:57:45 +0000 UTCCan’t believe they didn’t mention the bird glue grenades at the end
Noah Sodeman
2025-09-19 11:28:00 +0000 UTCQFTL: BAD WEAPONS EPISODE LEADING WITH ROSS RIFLE DESIGNER PLS
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 06:43:01 +0000 UTCand Tom expressed almost word for word what I thought around 1:30:00 lol
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 06:35:05 +0000 UTCAt 57:24 Joe channels the crew and cast of the movie Rust.
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 06:08:25 +0000 UTC“Audie, if we hit those co-ords we’re 100% going to kill you” “-FUCKING THANK GOD, FIRE!”
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:57:28 +0000 UTClike holy shit he really was the first Zoomer
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:45:58 +0000 UTC“I won the DSC but alls I got was this lousy T-shi(r)t and a wicked case of CPTSD.” -the ww2 version of Captain Danté from WH40k
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:43:46 +0000 UTCas always. also fuck tom nook rent is theft
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:17:11 +0000 UTCAudie Murphy is what happens when Aries and Athena somehow agree for a little bit lmfao.
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:16:14 +0000 UTCthere almost certainly is lmfao. can’t wait to take the Dino-Minh Trail
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:15:32 +0000 UTCTIL both Joe and Nate Napoleon the Third’ed themselves by standing out in front trying to get atomized out of this purgatory realm and not having their wish granted. I for one am glad.
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:11:10 +0000 UTCApropos of nothing, I just saw a trailer for what I thought was an Asylum/Syfy Channel-type shlock, but no, it's an actual big studio film with a wide release. Title: Primitive War. It's a Vietnam War movie... with dinosaurs. It looks so goddamn stupid, but like it would be a fun stream/make fun of it on the podcast. I'm now imagining there's already an AO3 tag with dinosaur erotica fanfic for it, but I'm too afraid to check.
Page Chase
2025-09-19 05:08:15 +0000 UTCholy shit he really was a “fugitive from the law of averages” in many respects. trans antifa super-soldier vibes. oh shit apparently that makes him a terrorist-by-category according to the US govt now, almost like that government fought the 3rd Reich to become the 4th one and maybe now 5th one?
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:06:38 +0000 UTC≈70% casualty rate for one company in one battle is like Warhammer 40k Imperial Guard stats goddamn. has there been an episode about Anzio?
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 05:02:54 +0000 UTCJoe, while he did only hold one woman at gunpoint, one is definitely a lot.
Sam Blackman
2025-09-19 04:29:11 +0000 UTCMan started his combat experience in wwii playing as oddjob in goldeneye and ended it with helldivers 2 gameplay
Mildly invested
2025-09-19 03:44:25 +0000 UTCI also just potentially figured out why even at the age of 75 my father will not eat onions in any form. His mom was born in the 1920s and his mom was very talented but not a good cook at all. I think he got subjected to the boiled onion soup.
Rosemary S Callahan Gray
2025-09-18 22:44:56 +0000 UTCMy biggest laugh of the episode had to be "Onion based Princess Mononoke" and imagining Audie Murphy with a mournful of blood.
Rosemary S Callahan Gray
2025-09-18 22:13:52 +0000 UTCTom killed it this episode.
Animal Crossing Sovereign Citizen
2025-09-18 11:37:21 +0000 UTCAch nein, der Zwiebelteufel ist da!
Sharkdog58
2025-09-18 07:49:51 +0000 UTCMy father fought in the ETO - fine, I’m old- and he turned out okay but I had uncles who became druncles, and uncles who didn’t. They were just ordinary men called on to do something extraordinarily (heroic) epic. They didn’t become superhuman. We can’t forget that. Media can mythologize
Snorks
2025-09-18 06:56:13 +0000 UTCsame onions are awesome
Sam Blackman
2025-09-18 04:26:57 +0000 UTCYou can see Cagney doing judo in Blood on the Sun. Not a great movie, but the judo is legit
Sam Larson
2025-09-18 03:41:22 +0000 UTCJames Cagney, a short king himself, probably thought since judo had really helped him out that it might work for Murphy. He was an actual black belt in judo and really loved it as an exercise. Though teaching a Terminator with crippling PTSD the secrets of choking a man unconscious with one's own collar does seem a bit short sighted.
Jack McReynolds
2025-09-18 02:51:49 +0000 UTCMy grandfather also fought in the European theater of WWII. He was part of the force that relieved bastogne, he helped liberate a concentration camp, he described it to me when I was a kid as "the world's worst camping trip". He also became a violently abusive alcoholic who beat his kids frequently. He basically refused to go outside unless he had to because of it. I'm glad Audie Murphy helped bring PTSD into the public eye to help try to get help to the people who need it.
Hannah Oberhardt
2025-09-17 23:54:11 +0000 UTCThe Johnny Cash song honoring Hayes is great, though.
Matt
2025-09-17 23:31:23 +0000 UTCIan would be such a perfect guest on LLbD!
Major Dork Thorklestein, HonFRS
2025-09-17 22:19:13 +0000 UTCDude get Ian from Forgotten Weapons on for the SA 80, the Toss Rifle and the Cheauchat
The Squash
2025-09-17 20:53:48 +0000 UTCShrek maxxing.
Alistair
2025-09-17 17:33:56 +0000 UTC“It’s called amphibious landing, lethal to Wermacht, deadly to GIs”
Jason Machacek
2025-09-17 17:32:49 +0000 UTCChesty Puller? Never heard of her
RF is a theory
2025-09-17 16:35:49 +0000 UTCGod, picking onions sucks, too. Endless fields of little stinky balls that permeate your skin and clothes for days. Worse, if you have a cut under your fingernails - and everything on the farm can cut you up - the juice will sting for a long time. Sucks. But...I still love onions.
LensWipe
2025-09-17 16:10:19 +0000 UTCThey did a “chicks rock” episode about Cheng I Sao once, but I agree! It would be cool to feature more—Nzinga of Ndongo and Matamba comes to mind as an honest-to-god warrior queen
Paloma Alcala
2025-09-17 15:45:13 +0000 UTCDidn't expect lions led by donkey's to have a resident onion expert here but I guess Nate's full of surprises.
Mike Lukas
2025-09-17 15:00:57 +0000 UTCMy favorite part is when Audie said to those Germans “it’s Murphin time” and Murphed all over them. And gosh 38:00 is like when you get wasted in GTA only to get hit by an ambulance as your character steps out of the hospital.
Jason Machacek
2025-09-17 14:02:52 +0000 UTCId love for you guys to do a dudes rock type episode on a woman sometime. I know theres WAY less due to. History. But itd be neat... Even something like that civil war surgeon whose the only woman to ever get the medal of honor.
Brittney With An E
2025-09-17 13:17:16 +0000 UTCWhen you get around to doing Iwo Jima, you'd better give a special section to the life of Ira Hayes and his depressing post-war life as well.
NowhereMan661
2025-09-17 12:58:20 +0000 UTCOnions are a pain. They take forever to grow, have to weeded by hand, you can only water them during certain parts of the day and usually with siphon irrigation (which sucks). Real pain in the ass crop.
David Schuller
2025-09-17 11:54:07 +0000 UTCHis early specials are truly fantastic.
Philip Malcolm
2025-09-17 10:16:29 +0000 UTCThe people who like to ignore Audie Murphy's later life are fucking losers IMO. Like perfect person? Hell no. Fascinating story though? Yes.
Peter Larkin
2025-09-17 09:36:10 +0000 UTCGood choice to make the episode about gunning down Nazis a bonus right now 😅
Alex Duggan
2025-09-17 09:32:51 +0000 UTCLET'S FUCKING GO! The anti-Alvin York time.
Peter Larkin
2025-09-17 09:30:22 +0000 UTCwoo
Drakkalen
2025-09-17 09:30:01 +0000 UTC
