Former Navy SEAL David Rutherford reconnects with Black Rifle Coffee's Jarred "JT" Taylor, years after their last sit-down, to talk about the most ambitious thing JT has ever built.
It started with a promise to a friend. When Colonel Pete Donnelly died, JT remembered the question Pete always asked him: "What do you got for me?" Three days later he started writing. Twenty-two days after that he had a first draft of Deep Scythe: Zero Hour, a military thriller about a carrier air wing that answers only to JSOC, where every character is a real pilot JT flies with in Digital Combat Simulator.
Then JT went further. Readers can join the Wet Boys, go through flight school, earn a call sign, and fly the actual missions from the book with the actual characters on the radio. David and JT get into why putting veterans back on comms "wakes them back up," how an 80s paratrooper learned to fly an F-16 in the sim in about a month, and why JT thinks artists who fight AI have the wrong mindset.
✅ Sponsors: ☕️ Black Rifle Coffee: https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/
🏫 Get coaching by David Rutherford: https://www.froglogicinstitute.com/
Links
Fly with the Wet Boys: https://flywetboys.com
The book: https://weexecutethings.com (Deep Scythe: Zero Hour on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible)
Timestamps:
00:00 - Cold open: "You wake him back up"
00:48 - Jarred Taylor returns to the show
03:42 - From VHS edits to writing without limits
09:11 - The drunk submarine trick for writer's block
10:31 - Colonel Pete Donnelly and A15 Publishing
15:50 - The book he owed Pete: a draft in 22 days
19:46 - The premise: a carrier that answers only to JSOC
23:08 - Read the book, then fly with the characters
25:56 - Inside flywetboys.com: flight school and call signs
34:44 - The Andy Stumpf surprise
36:29 - Two soundtracks, AI music, and the Top Gun mood
38:43 - How to start flying DCS without going broke
41:08 - Why veterans come alive back on the radio
46:26 - DCS and the 24/7 living war server
53:02 - The $4.5M report and the case for AI
54:57 - Where to find Deep Scythe and the Wet Boys
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