Don Mann - 25 Jun

Portions of this text have been redacted at the request of the US Department of Defense.

Copyright 2019 by Don Mann and Lance Burton

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Brian Peterson

ISBN: 978-1-5107-1655-1

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-1656-8

Printed in the United States of America

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Theodore Roosevelt

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am very grateful to the very talented and professional staff that supported our efforts in writing this book. Thank you Jay Cassell, our publisher and my good friend at Skyhorse Publishing, James OShea Wade, our exceptional editor and military historian, and Joseph Craig, our editorial director, for your hard work, expertise, and advice.

My sincere appreciation goes out to Lance Burton for the countless hours he devoted to research and writing this book and to Joan Stobbs, who conducted extensive research in selecting the photos and obtaining photo permissions and provided her professional and caring guidance throughout the process.

Finally, I salute all of the courageous men and woman in the SEAL community, past and present who inspired me to write this book.

Don D. Mann

PREFACE

When tasked with the formidable challenge of writing about the history of a unit as decorated as the Navy SEALs, of whom story after story of countless acts of heroism and valor are now etched into the minds of people all over the world, it becomes a matter of not just telling the story but also of something much more important: honoring the legacy of the men who have given their last full measure of devotion to the cause of freedom.

However, we also felt it necessary to attempt a slightly different style of book while still achieving our objective. Libraries are stacked full of history and textbooks that provide endless streams of facts, all of which are important, but do not always provide the full story of those facts. Moreover, it has been said that the victors of war write the histories, and therefore are perpetually written with an agenda of glamorizing their own side. With this book we have one agenda and one agenda onlyto honor the men of the U.S. Navy SEALs by telling some of their stories in order to ensure that they will never be forgotten.

This is a narrative history; stories based on either direct experiences or exhaustive research. In order to make the narrative as readable as possible, as specified in the books notes, a few operations and action scenes were created to show how and why certain types of operations and actions played out. The men (and one woman) in those scenarios are not actual people but are representative of the types of SEALs or personnel who would be playing their parts in a particular situation. The symbol of a trident will be inserted at the start and end of these passages.

Each chapter gives an overview of the events during a particular era of the SEALs followed by narratives based upon direct experience or exhaustive research of historical accounts. In almost all cases we have changed the names of the men to preserve the SEAL tradition of selfless anonymity, but also have taken a small amount of literary license in the retelling. Our hope is that this mixture of styles will not only cover the genesis of the Teams, but also provide some inspiring stories that highlight the kind of missions the men have undertaken over the years.

This book is not encyclopedic in scope or intent but focuses on memorable events in SEAL historyand the men who made them memorable by their courage, skill, and discipline, which have become the hallmark of the SEAL Teams.

In writing this history we particularly had in mind the families of these brave warriors as well as those who aspire to become one of Americas best. This has been written for the families so that they may pass on the tales of what their loved ones have sacrificed and for Americans considering becoming SEALs so that they may begin to grasp the reality of what they are facing should they be successful. Also for the potential student, we have chosen to include a section on the current training pipeline along with a brief narrative highlighting some of the experiences faced going through Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL Training (BUD/S). There is no special secret to becoming a Navy SEAL beyond this: you must have a burning desire to earn the title beyond anything else in your life and be willing to die before you would quit.

Train hard to prepare, harder than you ever have in your life, but never forget that it is the inner fire and desire to become a SEAL that will push you past all boundaries and allow you to persevere during those moments when you are beyond cold, beyond tired, and have been wet and sandy hour after hour with no end in sight. Remember that in order for our citizens to remain able to live free there must be those brave souls who answer the call and be willing to fight to preserve it. You could be part of that next generation.

We would also like to honor and thank the families of these men who hold down the fort and provide the support for the men who live much of their life away from those they love, both in training and in war, which allows them to maintain the absolute focus and razor edge required to do the work they are called upon to do every day.

Hooya,

Don Mann and Lance Burton

INTRODUCTION

A book about the combat history of the Navy SEALs is essentially one about the evolution of warfare. Since the dawn of civilization there has existed a special class of individual who is called upon to defend those with whom he loves and lives. As society has developed, each era of history has seen peoples and nations take a divergent path, often leading to conflict. At the core of such conflict are very fundamental elements of what it means to be humanwe all have basic needs and desires, some as foundational as the need for food and water, and others as complicated as what bloodlines make up our ancestors or what religious or philosophical premises we hold dear. However, in each case, when conflict arises someone must take on the role of defender. In this way, the U.S. Navy SEALs are the result of thousands of years of lessons learned on the bloody battlefields of history.