8. He Didn't Enlist Because He Saw The 1998 Embassy Attack
Not long after the end of his rodeo days, the film depicts Chris Kyle witnessing the horrific attacks on the United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Seeing the carnage and the wreckage unfold on television, he's suitably moved to enlist in the Navy SEALs. Whilst this is chronologically accurate with the time Kyle decided to serve his country, the events of 1998 had nothing to do with his desire to do so. Kyle writes in his book that he'd always planned to one day join the military and become a soldier. After originally being turned down in 1996 because of his rodeo injuries, he was approached by a Navy recruiter who told him they'd now be willing to accept him into the program. The film at this point has Kyle as a grizzly and well-prepared 30 year old when, in reality, Kyle would only have been 24-25 at the time he enlisted.
WhatCulture's Managing Editor and Chief Reporter | Previously seen in Vice, Esquire, FourFourTwo, Sabotage Times, Loaded, The Set Pieces, and Mundial Magazine
