SFC Dillard Johnson; the deadliest soldier
A couple of you have sent links to the New York Post article Sgt. 1st Class Dillard Johnson is the deadliest US soldier on record – with 2,746 kills, so I guess that if I don’t write something, my inbox is going to fill up about him. There was an SFC Dillard J. Johnson in C 3/7 Cav by a similar name. According to the DoD website, he did indeed (or someone with that name) earn a Silver Star. The name at the DoD’s website is “SSG Dillard (No Middle Name) Johnson”, though. I’ve already written the author of the article, Mr. Buiso, how he confirmed the number of “kills” SFC Johnson has;
With 2,746 confirmed kills, Sgt. 1st Class Dillard Johnson is the deadliest American soldier on record — and maybe the most humble.
As a commander of a Bradley Fighting Vehicle nicknamed “Carnivore,” Johnson, 48, helped lead the ground assault during Operation Iraqi Freedom, overwhelming the enemy with a relentless show of military might that left a trail of dead in his wake.
Johnson was obliged to report confirmed kills to his superiors, cataloging the dead in a green journal that revealed the astonishing tally — which only began to come light as he and co-writer James Tarr were researching his exploits for his memoir, also titled “Carnivore.”
I’m not trashing anyone, or calling anyone a liar in the absence of evidence to the contrary, but I’d sure like to see this “green journal”. I’ve never heard of a tally of “kills” cataloged in the name of individual soldiers and I can’t imagine that anyone would participate in such a grisly practice.
He counted the dead by tallying rifles — and human heads — among the mangled or charred wreckage left behind by the Carnivore.
In his second tour, in 2005, he took up sniping, logging 121 kills, his longest from 821 yards, a skill that was honed hunting in Kentucky. His total is second only to the late Chris Kyle, the Navy SEAL who had 160 kills.
It might be true, who am I to question it – I wasn’t there, but members of a sister unit are questioning it in my emails, so…I have to think there’s something weak in the story. But, let’s sit and wait this one out and see what we can shake loose in the public forum.
Category: Who knows
We didn’t do JRTC in 2002. We did it before Bosnia and then again in 2004. If you remember, we did both NTC AND JRTC that year in 2004. Can’t ever forget that.
I lost it in the 120s but I wanted to say…
LOUD NOISES!!
Anyone want to test SFC Dillard’s theory of material resistance to electrical currents with a Gerber multitool, a Swiss Army knife, or my Aldi camper’s multitool?
No?
Yeah, didn’t think so.
@130–Uh, yeah, NO. Again, the arc flash alone would be enough to kill night vision and be as bright as any flare, the sound (of copper/steel going directly from solid to gaseous state) would be heard for quite a distance in open air, to say nothing of this guy’s face looking like Wile E. Coyote when he blows himself up in the Roadrunner cartoons.
Worst I ever personally did was get on the wrong polarity of a 48 volt DC PLC terminal with an alligator clip and 16-gauge wire (not fused–dumbass me.) It was indoors, but it sounded like a shotgun blast, vaporized the clip and most of the wire, and my hand felt like an M-80 had gone off in it.
So yeah, not buying that story.
I bet he was a HUGE mean-mugger while doing the WPPS/WPS thing. Too cool to scan in.
Just saw him interviewed. Oh, man. He did not improve my skepticism. At all.
OWB, got a link?
Here is the link to the FOX NEWS this morning. http://video.foxnews.com/v/2504190742001/true-stories-from-one-of-americas-deadliest-soldiers/?playlist_id=930909787001
Also @James, 1 Troop out of 3-7CAV did goto JRTC in Aug of 2002, that is when the roll of DET-CORD came up missing from the Engineer Unit that there with them. I remember all of this because I had just PCS’s from Fort Polk and arrived before the Troop came back to Fort Stewart. I was standing at the Staff Duty desk when then LTC Ferrell now (GEN Ferrell) got the phone call from the Troop Commander at the Staff Duty desk, that is when I met LTC Ferrell for the first time.
@His Driver, you were a PRIVATE back then and were doing as you were told. Question I have is your defending a person that PROFITED from everything that 3-7CAV did in Soldier of Fortune Magazine articles he WROTE. Did he GIVE you any of that MONEY he got from it????? Just like this BOOK, is he gonna give you any of the ROYALTIES from it??? I remember seeing ALL the checks he got from Soldier of Fortune and he was BRAGGING about how much money he made from it.
Dillard Johnson is a GLORY HOUND and will take credit for anything and everything that 3rd Squadron, 7th US Cavalry did. I should know I was there and saw everything this he did.
Its interesting he got CAUGHT wearing unauthorized medals in ANCOC and KICKED OUT. How is someone suppose to lead Soldiers when he cannot even do the RIGHT thing. How is that a Leader of Soldier’s making sure they do the right thing and hold them accountable, when he LIES about medals he did not EARN. Just goes to show he will LIE about anything just to make himself LOOK better than everyone else.
“Soldier of Fortune” magazine, huh? IMO, that rag is full of embellishments.
Got to be mostly bs but got to give him props for advertising his book
I can say that I know him personally, and do not believe any of it. He had a nickname of Shady McGrady. BTW he was in Bragg at least from 1998 to 2001.
There were rumors that he tried to doctor his jump log to earn master wings before he left Bragg.
He did get kicked out of ANCOC for wearing an award that was not in his records.
Funny how the news as well as SOF eat this stuff up with listening to others that have called him out.
Is it Crazy Horse or Charley Horse? He refers to both
The question I haven’t seen asked or answered yet is: What was SFC Johnson’s gunner doing while his BC was murdering the entire population of Iraq? Taking a nap? Playing “Rock You Like A Hurricane” through an MP3 player wired to the intercom? Touching up his BC’s balls with a fresh coat of Brasso?
I was a Bradley gunner (11M) for a few years and I can’t figure out how this BC got 2,700+ kills. His job is to direct the driver and gunner, not engage targets himself. His commander’s handstation will override the gunner’s handstation, but the most I’ve seen a BC do is override me so he can slew over to the general direction of the target he spotted with his head out of the BC’s hatch, so I can pick it up in low mag and zoom in.
For that matter, the High Mag / Low Mag switch is on the opposite side of the turret. How did he operate it from his side? Did his gunner just sit there, switching back and forth from low mag to high mag for him? That would have gotten frustrating for me. Or did he not bother putting his face into the sight and just start hipshooting the 25mm and coax? I’m sure that would have been effective.
Does this guy even mention his Bradley crew? Did they do anything besides refill the ready boxes with 7000 rounds of DU?
I’m sure he was there. I’m not at all sure about what he says he did.
@ #157: The link posted in #158 is the interview I saw. (Thanks, Recon Scout, for the assist.) Well, until watching this, had only seen the last half of the interview. Seeing the first half did not improve my opinion either.
Got a very bad feeling about this. It’s just not going to end well for anyone I fear. Maybe he can claim diminished mental capacity due to the meds he is taking?
So one time, back in ’04, we raided a building complex of a suspected arms dealer in the Tikrit area. We found about 400 weapons of various sorts, and at least 10 artillery shells. By my count, and the count employed by this knucklehead, I must have AT LEAST 500 confirmed kills. Right?
Man, my bullshit meter is spiking.
I was a 35F(now 94F) in the Army, 11 weeks of basic electronics theory. AC/DC circuits and all that jazz, my degree is in robotics and automation, once again first two semesters AC and DC theory and circuit building. 220VAC running through a power line would have melted that knife like butter, there is no way on gods green earth that he would have chopped through a power line and only had two little notches on the blade. None, zip, zilch, no fucking way. I have melted screwdrivers, the head of a hammer, and many pieces of metal working with electronics either by accident or just because I wanted to see what would happen, and I can tell you this that is the biggest load of horse malarkey I have ever read.
I would say check out Grant Thompson’s page on youtube his metal melter is running 800 amps and melts metal like its nothing.
Had the great pleasure to work with Crazy Johnson. For a short guy he had some tall tales. While I can’t speak for anything he did in the military, I do know he was a rather big joke around mancamp. After reading his articles and hearing enough of his stories we started calling him “The Lion of Baghdad”. Someone was on the money earlier when they called him a brown-noser… couldn’t be closer to the truth.
I just hope he left out his stories about Daytona Bike Week in his memoirs.
155 – He was always mean mugging, and it very ferocious looking with his hardcore mustache.
I would like to this joker’s DD-214. I was the door gunner on the USS Enterprise with over 1/2 million confirmed alien kills and can’t wait to deploy to OIF XXII and OEF XXIV after my PTSD heals. ARE YOU KIDDING ME????
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Dillard-Johnson-is-a-FRAUD/169158559923260?fref=ts
Add this page!!!!!
Well, i tried to defend the mans honor, however after reading parts of the book, he recounted some stories that never happened. I feel like a jerk for trying to defend him now. The guy even lied about a situation with me, I guess I jumped the gun on defending him and I regret it. What a blind moron I am.
@169 What you are is an example of why this blog exists.
@169, One of us!! One of us!! One of us!!
OK, I’ve read all the input from people who were THERE, and I’m going to call this fellow a self-serving, self-aggrandizing blowhard who should save his tall tales for the action/adventure fiction set — and even then, he has to be able to get the reader to suspend disbelief.
However, if I run into him, I’ll be happy to take him to the nearest farm that has hotwire fencing and loan him my camper’s multitool, which has wire cutters in it, so that he can give me an up-close and personal demo on wire-cutting on a live wire.
I’ll just stand back 50 feet.
Here’s statistics for you:
In WWII, the top tank ace of all time, followed by a very well renowned tank ace were:
Kurt Knispel: 168 tanks destroyed; and
Michael Wittmann: 138 tanks & 132 Anti Tank guns destroyed. Okay so far? Follow me:
Assuming that every tank above had a five man crew, and every AT gun had a four man crew;
AND Assuming every equipment kill killed EVERY member of its associated crew;
This leaves Kurt Knispel (the top tank ace of all time) with only 840 “kills”, and Michael Wittmann with 1218 “kills”. [This would be a large over-estimate, but each of these two legends still wouldn’t even come close to HALF of what this Johnson is claiming.]
This guy is full of $#it.
His Driver: don’t feel too bad, youngster. There are so many dishonest tools out there that we all get taken in at least once.
We’ve just seen enough of those dishonest tools here at TAH to have a fairly well-tuned BS filter.
@170, your statement is vague.
@ 175-Driver, While I wouldn’t presume to speak for her, I took her message as saying that his blog has brought “light” and info to you of which you were unaware. That and a “Welcome to the fold”. i believe she will verify this as being the case.
“his” should have been “this”
Shit-I thought that @170 was Ex-PH2 (whom I believe to be a woman warrior). I hope to shit PintoNag is, or I’m going to take a beating!
The easiest way to deal with this is to contact the secretary of the Army and ask them to confirm or deny the accounts. It is now against the law to profit from military award lies. I do know he did get a Silver Star and also was in Desert Storm with a scout platoon in 197 inf brigade but that’s the extent of it. I’m sure the Dept of the Army hotlines are buzzing and it’s just a matter of time.
Here’s one of my experiences with metal and electricity, I was just an E3 “Joe” in Korea from 92-93, and I was trying to clean some corrosion from the battery terminals of my 5 ton Truck using a Leatherman multitool I still have. Yes, I made the wrong move, and it arced, all 24 VDC going through the multitool, making a nice loud *POP!* as it gracefully vaporized the screwdriver tip and left a nice little “scar” on the casing that looks like a welder arced his rod on it. A Gerber vs. much higher voltage AC current? I call “BULLSHIT” on that as well!!
It took 169 posts for one of Dillard Johnson’s supporters to come over, and yet, Paul Wickre is still digging in his (high) heels with a combined count of somewhere around 2000 posts. Further proof that the average GI is way smarter than Paul Wickre.
@178 – USMCBrit1, I am, indeed, of the female persuasion.
Go see Members Gallery. Lots of people have their picture posted there. Devilish handsome guys in that grouping. Jonn is down toward the end. It keeps growing.
@179 – Stolen Valor got overturned. It’s a freedom of speech issue. The best way to counter it is to expose it as false and have everyone exercise their freedom of association and not deal with this guy.
@2 – True, the AP ready box only holds so many, and completely expending takes the weapon out of commission temporarily, but that’s why you shouldn’t tape over the low ammo sensor (like you would in gunnery), and have dismounts throw more rounds on the end of the string. This is still a ridiculous claim, but there are better reloading techniques. That keep you from having to labor through a lot of it.
@182-EX-PH2, I think it was the recipes that tipped me off-not your attitude/fortitude!
@ His Driver: Thank you for manning up and realizing that you are among friends and fellow warriors here. While we all make mistakes, it really is what you do about it that defines one’s character. You seem to fit right in around here.
Wow this one is growing fast…I wonder if he will qualify for next year’s stolen valor tourney. I had so many Rebel Scum kills when we landed on Hoth I lost count, so I am calling BS on this guys headcount. That was a one day operation with a two day mop up and the extraction, so I am not buying his BS.
Endor? We don’t talk about that shit…goddamn teddy bears.
@186, you know he is also claiming a Corellian Blood Stripe, right? Hahaha, no. NERD!
That son of a bitch! My Dad didn’t make both landings on Genosha and I didn’t operate as cannon fodder for Darth Vader just so some somma beech can claim this crap!
He is about to appear on Fox News after this commercial break.
watching him on fox, it’s damage control. now instead of all his kills being “sniping” he says it was a mix of M14, M4 and 203 “kills”. he also gave credit to “half” of the kills in the invasion to his gunner.
@ 183: There is a new Stolen Valor law. Signed a few weeks ago. What he is doing counts under that act, or so it would seem.
@191-OWB, My understanding of the new law (basic-very basic) is that to prosecute an assbag, it has to be proven that the intent is monetary gain??!! This will capture some of the posers, but it seems that the vast majority are in it for personal aggrandizement. I guess it’ll continue to be a fact that Jonn and company will be responsible for showing up these remaining head cheese growths!
@191 – Thank you for pointing this out, I hadn’t realized it was signed. I’m confused though on reading it. It seems really broad and no different than any other kind of fraud. I’m probably in the minority, but I don’t really care about these laws, and think we probably achieve more as veterans by simply pointing things out and letting people make up their mind. Sadly, sometimes they still don’t, like the good ‘ol Senator from CT.
His wild stories and profiting from them don’t violate Stolen Valor, they just make him look like an ass. The only thing that might trip him up is the claim to 4 Purple Hearts, which several people have noted do not appear on the webpage. I trust the staff here at TAH have fired off a FOIA and if his records come back devoid of any PHs, well, who knows. I’ve also noticed that everyone that has posted here that says they have served with him have made no mentions of him ever being wounded. So right now I’m skeptical to say the least about his 4PH claims.
There is a quizzical mention in the Amazon book reviews of an m203 fired into a steel door by him that may have wounded him… Just observing here…
Anyone up for a snipe hunt?
@196-Ex-PH2, I hear they taste just like chicken!
I was in 3/7 when he was kicked out of ANCOC, he was in Apache at the time and I was the acting 1SG. The CSM called me in and chewed my butt over it. In addition this guy flipped a track on MPRC at Rodriguez range in Korea when we were in 4/7 together. He was in B Troop I was in C Troop. He finished his night run for Table VIII. When he got to the end of the course road his driver couldn’t see and just kept driving. Johnson was not out of the turret like he should have been so the track went off the course road and flipped over. Needless to say the SCO was not a happy camper because it shut down all aerial and ground gunnery until the safety investigation was done and the Brad was recovered.
all the 5 star ratings reviews on Amazon sound like paid glowing reviews
The guys at SOCNET and Lightfighter are onto him… he’s fucked. Ole’ CJ is about to finally get put in his fucking place on a Wall of Shame the whole Nation will see.