---
title: "From the SAS Ambush by ISIS: What It Means to Be Brave When Paths Cross"
description: "A British SAS unit ambushed by 50 ISIS fighters in Iraq, with ammunition nearly exhausted, fixed bayonets and charged, killing 32 and escaping. This story offers lessons for marketers: confidence is more valuable than gold, and determination even more so; in marketing, as in battle, the brave prevail."
author: "New Distribution"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
telephone: "+8615854817671"
published: "2017-07-04"
language: "en"
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original_source: "https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/aC9MGND0PoX1cvj0THaPVg"
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# From the SAS Ambush by ISIS: What It Means to Be Brave When Paths Cross

> A British SAS unit ambushed by 50 ISIS fighters in Iraq, with ammunition nearly exhausted, fixed bayonets and charged, killing 32 and escaping. This story offers lessons for marketers: confidence is more valuable than gold, and determination even more so; in marketing, as in battle, the brave prevail.

Last night, a piece of news flooded my feed:
Screenshot of British media report
Recently, a small team from the British Army Special Air Service (SAS) was surrounded by 50 members of the extremist group "Islamic State" (IS) near Mosul in northern Iraq. Realizing their ammunition was nearly exhausted, the SAS soldiers charged the IS forces with fixed bayonets, killing 32 IS members, and the entire team successfully retreated.
According to a July 2 report by the British Daily Star, the SAS team was ambushed by 50 IS militants after conducting an intelligence-gathering mission near Mosul. The two sides engaged in a firefight lasting four hours. By evening, the British soldiers had killed 20 IS "holy warriors" but had nearly exhausted all their ammunition.
A source said that after being surrounded, the team members were convinced they would die in battle, but they did not surrender. They decided to fight to the end, killing as many IS terrorists as possible before dying.
The source said: "The SAS team was trapped in a small riverbed. They quickly counted their ammunition and realized they had fewer than 10 bullets left in total." The special forces members knew that if captured, they would face torture and beheading. Rather than die in disgrace, they chose to launch a charge and fight with their backs to the wall.
British Special Forces (file photo)
They fixed bayonets, drew their knives, shook hands in farewell, and then charged at the 30-plus IS terrorists with loud shouts. After firing their remaining bullets, they fought with bayonets.
The report said one SAS officer pushed an IS terrorist's head into a small puddle, pressed his face into the mud, and held it there until he drowned.
Then he picked up a stone and smashed it into the face of another armed thug who was grappling with his comrade.
Another soldier used his assault rifle as a club, killing three IS members, while others stabbed at IS gunmen who tried to capture the British soldiers alive.
The source said the SAS troops fought like "mad warriors." Their only plan was to kill as many terrorists as possible before dying.
"After five minutes of desperate hand-to-hand combat, about 12 IS members were dead or seriously wounded, and the rest fled in panic. Almost all SAS soldiers had two or more gunshot wounds."
The unit then walked five miles to a rendezvous point, where they met Kurdish allies and were taken back to the SAS base. It is understood that two members of the same unit returned to the unit two days later. Two soldiers suffered minor injuries, and all SAS team members survived.
What does this teach marketers?
Marketing is a battle. When paths cross, the brave win!
A truly capable person is one who, without support or resources, still completes the task with solid professional knowledge and unyielding courage.
No matter how powerful the enemy, when faced with an opponent who is unafraid of death, they will consider whether they want to die together.
**Confidence is more valuable than gold, and determination is worth more than confidence!**
Many people complain that their company is terrible, market support is insufficient, and products are poor. But do you know that Huawei was also a terrible company back then, and Ren Zhengfei was also a bandit leader?
**Wu Chunbo, who once worked at Huawei, told a story:**
My family has a military background. My grandfather was in the Eighth Route Army, and my father was in the People's Liberation Army. When I was young, my grandfather often told me stories of his battles. The most classic version was: The company commander gave the order, and the soldiers charged through a hail of bullets. At that time, I was young and suddenly asked: "Why do you charge forward when bullets are flying? What if you get killed? Aren't you afraid of death?"
My grandfather had no theory. Why did he join the army? Because the family was poor, and they said meals were provided, so he joined. "Why did I charge forward? Because I couldn't run backward, so I charged forward. Charging forward brought rewards; running backward meant being shot dead. That was the constraint. If you charged forward and died, you became a martyr, with an honorable title, good treatment for your family, and a pension. If you were lucky enough to survive, there were two outcomes: first, merit and awards; second, promotion and wealth. Ahead were spiritual and material incentives.
Why couldn't he run backward? Because to fight the enemy, you need rifles and cannons, but to deal with your own people, a single pistol is enough. Marketing is like battle: What do you gain by charging forward? What do you lose by running backward?
We see Huawei's glory, but few see its hardships. From 1988 to 1997, Huawei was a terrible company. I joined Huawei in 1995. At that time, Ren Zhengfei, the founder, was like a bandit leader leading a group of poor people to grab grain. First, they grabbed in the village, counting each grab. As they grabbed, they finished the village estates.
Ren Zhengfei led these people into the city. When they entered the city, they were scared half to death because the urban market had been carved up by multinational companies. Old Ren then realized that his group of "earthbound soldiers" would fight against regular troops, and it was impossible to achieve strategic victory. So he proposed a slogan: "Take off straw sandals and put on leather shoes," transforming these earthbound soldiers into a regular army. And that was a difficult process.
In our book, there is a small anecdote: Huawei had no money, and Ren Zhengfei had no money either. As they got some money from grabbing crops in the village, Ren Zhengfei started changing cars. At first, he drove a second-hand Peugeot, taking me for joyrides. Later, he changed to a beautiful BMW. One day, on a street in Shenzhen, he opened the sunroof and turned up the stereo. Then he overtook a car driven by Lou Gerstner. He asked Gerstner, "Have you ever driven a BMW?" Gerstner ignored him. Old Ren asked again, and Gerstner still ignored him. The third time, Gerstner said, "What are you trying to say?" Old Ren said, "Where is the brake in a BMW?"
That was Huawei back then.
If you don't go through the hardships with the company, how can you deserve to enjoy the glory after its success?
Old Na says:
Some say this is the British Special Forces adding drama to themselves after the London terror attacks, to create a legend of the "empire on which the sun never sets" for the public. Others say, "This script is familiar; it's the rhythm of anti-Japanese war dramas." Yes, when we see a certain legend, if we think we can't do it ourselves, we first doubt it. "Fake, how is that possible?" All kinds of arguments appear. That's because no one puts themselves in a desperate situation, and they don't know how great their potential is. It's like the outward-bound training we all despise. But outward-bound training can indeed stimulate people's potential in certain specific environments. Some companies also use outward-bound training to enhance the bond between employees.
Secondly, this news tells us another thing: Every skill you learn in an organization is your capital for survival in the future. Your slacking off today paves the way for your dead end tomorrow. In the early days of FMCG, too many people trained by big companies relied on their company's reputation to secure good benefits when changing jobs. But when they actually went to another company, many exposed their true abilities. **In this twilight of FMCG, if you still hope to enter a big company by luck, to "gild yourself," without learning real skills, then your halo will eventually fade.**
When you are used to the guns and equipment prepared by big companies, and when you go to a small company where none of these modern means exist, can you start over? Can you put down the glory of the past and truly pick up the weapons at hand? Now that the road of FMCG is getting harder, can you put down all your past glories and return to your original firmness? We just want to survive. No matter how complex the world is, remember your original intention. The experience you accumulate is the capital to survive and also the capital to learn new things.
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