Ryan Payne the fake Ranger at Bundy Ranch

The Canada Free Press reports that Ryan Payne, the fellow we talked about yesterday who was head of security at the Bundy Ranch and claimed to be a Ranger was walking right up to the line, like so many embellishers; he was assigned to F Co, 51st Infantry, 519th Military Intelligence Battalion. I’m guessing that our Canadian friends like what happened at the Bundy Ranch and so they make excuses for Payne;

Note that he served “as a long range surveillance senior scout observer and assistance team leader.“Not only were their Rangers doing “long range surveillance”, there were Airborne qualified personnel doing “long range surveillance” They did the same duties as a Ranger, though they were only rangers. They did not earn the tab “Ranger”, and Payne has never claimed that he had earned the tab.

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However, the nit pickers, in their efforts to demean Ryan Payne, have chosen to attack his successful (read the citations, again) “meritorious service” at Bunkerville, holding the chaotic mass of militia and molding them into a cohesive force, by attacking his likewise successful service to his country as the tool to accomplish their nefarious objective.

No, this is not a case of “Stolen Valor”, it is simply a case of “Stealing Valor”.

Yeah, there’s a couple of Army Commendation Medal citations at the link, but they’re not really relevant here, unless you’re looking for a reason to like Payne. The thing is, being one of the “nitpickers”, I was actually assigned to a Ranger Battalion and I’ve never called myself a “Ranger”. No I didn’t earn a tab, but because my assignment to the Ranger Battalion ended up being just one of my numerous assignments in my career, I didn’t think that calling myself a Ranger was appropriate.

You can check all of the interviews I’ve ever done and all I’ve ever called myself was “an infantry platoon sergeant” because I’m especially proud of that. So, your experience with what Payne was trying to do might differ from mine, but when someone tells people that he’s a Ranger, he didn’t mean to say that he was “a sergeant in the F Co, 51st Infantry, 519th Military Intelligence Battalion”, he meant for you to understand it as something completely different than the way the Canada Free Press wants you to understand it.

Added 4-22-2016; We finally got a FOIA for Payne after four attempts. Three came back “no service” but I checked around the community and folks remembered him, so we kept going back. No Ranger training, no service in a traditional Ranger unit;

Category: Phony soldiers