Swedish Special Operations Soldier | Arctic Ranger | Special Purpose Unit | Intelligence | Number 788 | Max Lauker
Combat Story
Ryan Fugit
4.8 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 7 September 2024
⏱️ 85 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today we have our first Combat Story from a Swedish Special Operations soldier and intelligence professional, Max Lauker. Max spent 20 years in the elite Swedish forces and was a plank holder for one of the predecessor units to what later became Sweden’s Special Operations Group.
Check out our Combat Story Newsletter at www.combatstory.com/newsletter.
He served multiple deployments that we cover in this episode in what I’ve coined as four missions and a funeral to dig into more of the combat experiences and lessons while also touching on loss that comes with this line of work.
Max takes us through time fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, solo and team deployments to Latin America, doing full cycle cross-border reconnaissance missions in the Balkans, to lonely and frankly frightening intel work in Eastern Europe and Russia. This is just a bit of the action that Max writes about in his upcoming book that he co-wrote with Antonio Garcia titled ‘Number 788: My experiences in Swedish Special Operations - preparing for NATO and the War on Terror.’
I think you’re really going to enjoy this chat with our first Swede on this show, Max Lauker.
Find Max Lauker Online:
https://www.amazon.com/Number-788-experiences-Operations-preparing/dp/1804514233
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🎵 Intro Song: Sport Rock from Audio Jungle
Show Notes:
00:00 Introduction
00:36 Welcome to Combat Story
00:56 Meet Max Lauker: Swedish Special Operations
03:53 Growing Up in Sweden and Military Service
06:48 Choosing the Ranger Path
08:06 Swedish Special Operations Community
11:20 Joining the Arctic Rangers
15:34 Selection Process for Special Purpose Units
22:41 First Deployment: Latin America
29:16 Unexpected Mission in Venezuela
33:38 Team Deployment in Colombia
38:09 Official Mission in Kosovo
40:01 The Full Circle Mission in Kosovo
41:19 Reconnaissance and Surveillance Operations
44:22 Cross-Border Tensions and Discoveries
47:30 Reflections on the Kosovo Mission
49:22 Transition to Iraq: A Dangerous Deployment
52:50 Afghanistan: Intel and Direct Action
57:26 Lonely Intel Work in Eastern Europe
01:10:54 The Challenges of Counterintelligence
01:15:27 Writing the Book: A New Mission
01:20:06 Final Thoughts and Reflections
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | There is a small villages around but it's a very remote area and we had our own |
| 0:07.7 | Intel or we had done Erskine surveillance and they have seen something inside it looks like a |
| 0:13.9 | buildup so we need to go and take a look on this on this region so we do our |
| 0:19.0 | recon our surveillance we get inserted and then at the first night we spot the Serbian Special Forces team |
| 0:26.1 | coming across the border and they are transmitting for a few hours to the |
| 0:31.0 | village through line of sight and yeah this is going to be intense. |
| 0:36.4 | Welcome to Combat Story I'm Ryan Puget and I serve war zone tours as an army attack |
| 0:40.5 | helicopter pilot and CIA officer over a 15 year career. |
| 0:44.0 | I'm fascinated by the experiences of the elite in combat. On this show I interview some |
| 0:49.2 | of the best to understand what combat felt like on their front lines. |
| 0:53.2 | This is combat story. |
| 0:55.9 | Today we have our first ever combat story from a Swedish special operation soldier |
| 1:00.5 | and intelligence professional Max Lauker. Max spent 20 years in the elite Swedish |
| 1:05.0 | forces and was a plank holder for one of the predecessor units to what later became Sweden |
| 1:09.8 | Special Operations Group. He served multiple deployments that we cover in this |
| 1:13.6 | episode and what I've coined as four missions in a funeral to dig into more of the |
| 1:18.4 | combat experiences and lessons while touching on the loss that comes with this line of work. |
| 1:23.0 | Max takes us through time fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, |
| 1:27.0 | solo and team deployments to Latin America, |
| 1:29.0 | doing full cycle cross-border reconnaissance missions in the Balkans to lonely and frankly |
| 1:34.9 | frightening intel work in Eastern Europe and Russia. This is just a bit of the action that Max writes |
| 1:40.6 | about in his upcoming book that he co-wrote with Antonio Garcia |
... |
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