00:01I'm Lynn Smith and welcome to the Bigfoot Project.
00:07My name is Rick and I'm a 20-year Army veteran.
00:10It was the greatest joy in my life being a soldier next to being a father of two.
00:15At that time, my military occupational specialty was 11B Infantry and my specialty was Infantry Scout.
00:22I attended one station unit training at Fort Benning, Georgia, where I was taught the skills necessary to be an
00:29effective scout.
00:30I did deploy to Desert Shield, Desert Storm, Bosnia, Kosovo, OEF, and OIF.
00:38In my heart, I know I served with integrity and honor, so it makes it a bit difficult for what
00:43I'm about to tell you.
00:44But on the eyes and souls of my children, it's the God-honest truth.
00:50I was based at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, in 1996, and we were going to be involved in a joint
00:56training exercise at Fort Lewis.
00:58While preparing all the equipment and other additional things needed to be done prior to leaving, I was informed that
01:04I was going to be the Op 4 leader.
01:06I had been in Op 4 a couple of times before, and I will admit that it was fun to
01:11do.
01:12I had several meetings with the Battalion S-3 in charge of operations and planning and others, and was given
01:18a long list of actions that the Op 4 would be doing.
01:22I was surprised to be informed that we'll be let loose and engage the units however we wished, as long
01:28as it followed the planning schedule.
01:31Two of the missions had us as terrorists with a suicide bomb vest.
01:35We used brown cardboard tubes from paper rolls and toilet paper and painted them and glued and taped them with
01:40wires to make them look real.
01:43In other missions, we were to penetrate the O.A. area of operation and plant bombs on vehicles next to
01:50croutons and leave without being seen.
01:52The S-3 would be informed via radio calls to the TOC, Tactical Operations Center.
01:58We were causing havoc everywhere, and we were having a blast.
02:02We set up our campsite and got our rest near the areas where we would do whatever the plan called
02:07for.
02:08On the night in question, we checked the map to see where the company we would be attacking would be,
02:13since all locations were predetermined.
02:16Seeing where all the other units were on the map, I made the decision of where to bunk down and
02:20get a few hours of rest before we would go on the mission at hand.
02:23We parked the Humvee as close as possible to the hill that I thought would be best to keep us
02:28from being noticed and climbed up the hilltop.
02:31The next day's mission had us attacking on or about 5 a.m.
02:35The plan was to get up at 3 a.m. and I would take the 1-3 guard shift.
02:40It was close to midnight when we were awoken by live small arms fire.
02:45Everyone involved in this training exercise carried blanks, and all had red blank adapters attached at the end of the
02:52muzzle.
02:53There's a very distinct difference in sound between live rounds and blank rounds.
02:57The firing was about 350 to 400 meters from our location on the opposite side of the hill, where, according
03:04to the war map, no unit was to be.
03:08Within moments of the firing starting up, there was a very loud roar.
03:12I heard lions roar, and this was much louder, and you could feel it.
03:16The guys and I were scared straight.
03:19The weapon fire lasted 30 seconds, give or take, and then quiet.
03:23Two of my soldiers were about to run down the hill to see what was going on, and I had
03:27to stop them.
03:29We gathered our M16s and night vision goggles and cautiously proceeded down the hill, going from tree to tree to
03:35hide.
03:36There were a few bright flashlights we could see as we approached.
03:39We were about 75 feet, and I could hear men talking, and one was on a radio, when suddenly, one
03:45of them shouted out,
03:46Move men up the hill!
03:48We got caught, and were told to reveal ourselves and approach.
03:53That's when we saw them.
03:54In front of us lay two Sasquatch.
03:57The male was obviously dead, and the female was breathing heavily, spitting out and choking on her blood.
04:04The men there took our weapons and night vision goggles, and the one talking identified himself only as a captain.
04:11He was talking loudly and was pissed off that we were there.
04:15Much of what was said at first didn't relate to us, because we were looking at the two Sasquatch.
04:20The male was sprawled on his back, and with the light that you had, you could clearly see his penis.
04:26The female then succumbed to her wounds, stopped breathing, and died.
04:31Me and the boys were in shock at what we were seeing.
04:34The captain who was talking to me gave me a slap in the face to get my attention to him.
04:39Once I did look at him and come out of the spell I was in, I noticed the smell coming
04:43from the creatures.
04:45I had identified to them who we were and why we were there.
04:48Once the shock wore off, I took a real close look at these men.
04:52Their equipment and weapons were not standard issue.
04:56I knew they were Delta Force because of the hockey helmets they were wearing.
05:00Five minutes after we were found out, a Humvee was heard approaching,
05:03and now a colonel came up and gave us an ass-chewing.
05:07We were moved down the hill, but before that, the Delta Force were prepping the Sasquatch for extraction,
05:13because a Black Hawk helo came in low and hovered above.
05:17We traveled like two hours until we arrived at a location.
05:21We were ushered into a room where we waited an hour.
05:24They had all our information, unit, and all our equipment.
05:29That colonel, other military officers, and that Delta Force captain came in
05:33and gave us direct orders not to speak of this matter,
05:36and that if it was discovered that we did, we'd be facing UCMJ action against us,
05:42and we'd do time at Leavenworth.
05:44They really put the fear of God on us.
05:47We were told that our battalion commander was informed of us interfering on their training mission,
05:52and we were to return to the TOC after we were debriefed.
05:57Since I was the only NCO of the group,
06:00I was threatened with having my career ruined if I ever spoke of this again.
06:05Some time later, we were loaded up on a five-ton truck,
06:08under guard, and driven back to the hill where all of this took place.
06:12We were allowed to gather our stuff from the hilltop and followed to the TOC's current location,
06:17and the truck following us just continued moving on down the road.
06:22We were given another ass-chewing by our battalion commander.
06:25Although he didn't say it, I got the distinct impression he knew what had happened.
06:30The S3 major and others appeared after we got chewed out,
06:33and we were chewed out once again.
06:36As the old adage goes, shit rolls downhill.
06:40For the final three days remaining on the FTX,
06:43we would do the Ops 4 missions and have to return to the TOC afterwards.
06:49In 2000, I was based in Germany.
06:51I'd gone to WĆ¼rzburg to visit an army buddy base there,
06:54and while at the commissary, I saw one of the soldiers from the Op 4 team.
06:59We talked, but what had happened at Fort Lewis was not brought up until I simply asked,
07:04Do you ever think about it?
07:06His face went pale and he nodded.
07:09We left it at that.
07:11For years, it's eaten at me.
07:14I wanted to climb the roof of my house and shout it out loud,
07:17but the fear of reprisal from the army or the government kept me from doing so.
07:21I kept thinking that some government man is listening to podcasts
07:25to see if anyone military or government-affiliated ever came on the shows
07:30and spilled the beans about what goes on.
07:32I don't know why those Sasquatches were hunted and killed.
07:35I just remember her labored breathing and seeing tears rolling down her face as she died.
07:42There are several things that also are not included in this letter to you,
07:46because it would be a book, more or less.
07:48I just wanted to state the most important things of this encounter.
07:52I just needed to get it out in the open, set myself free from this.
07:56It's been 26 years, and whatever happens, happens.
08:02Thanks for joining me on The Bigfoot Project.
08:05I think you might find this video of interest as well.
08:08If you have a story you would like to share here,
08:10you can email me, Lynn Smith, at thebigfootproject at mail.com.
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