Robert ONeill - The Way Forward: Master Lifes Toughest Battles and Create Your Lasting Legacy

ROB AND DAKOTA

The M18A1 Claymore mine is a marvel of simple ingenuity. At about eight and a half inches long and almost an inch and a half wide, it rests on four thin metal legs that fold down from the bottom like upside-down scissors. On the top, theres a sight for aiming it, and two detonator wells for the blasting cap or fuse to be inserted. Inside the olive-green case, there are about seven hundred steel bearings packed on top of a one-and-a-half-pound slab of the plastic explosive C4. When a Claymore is detonated, those steel bearings spray out in a fan. That explosion of steel is most effective at 50 meters, but they can hit an enemy at 250 meters away. At some point, every infantryman learns how to use it.

Claymores became part of the U.S. arsenal after World War II. They were developed as a defensive weapon, to be deployed against fast-moving infantry attacking in waves, as U.S. troops experienced in Korea. They require deliberation and purpose to detonate. International law only allows their use with an operator to set them off; they cant be triggered automatically, with a trip wire or pressure plate, to prevent civilians and other innocents being accidentally being maimed or killed. Also unlike conventional mines, theyre directional, which means they can be aimed. To facilitate this, theres a very simple instruction in easy-to-read, raised letters on the front:

FRONT TOWARD ENEMY

In case it isnt obvious, those words are there to make sure that the mine is facing the right direction. With its range of 250 meters, you do not want to be on the wrong side of the Claymore when it is detonated. And so, in very straightforward words that cant be mistaken, the Army makes it almost impossible to make a mistake. But mistakes happen. They always do. So the Claymore is foolproofed in another way. The casing is curved, so that in the dark, its user can roll it against his or her forehead to determine which side is concave and which is convex, and place it accordingly facing forward. And just in case thats not enough, the rear of the case reads:

BACK

The instructions on the Claymore are useful on the battlefield, but theyre also a simple approach to life out of combat. If you follow simple instructions and dont deviate, youll avoid injury to yourself or those you love. Your weapon will face in the right direction. Youll keep your circle safe.

Similarly, this book is not a handbook for war or a guide to the thrill of combat. Its about the other things that happen before, during, and after fighting. Its about what gets you out of conflict unharmed and alive. Its about keeping calm and staying grounded. Its about facing your enemies. Enemies that are flesh and blood, and enemies that are not. Your thoughts. Your doubts. Your boredom. Your regrets.

Theres a reason that the Claymore and its front-facing instructions have a kind of cult following within the armed services and have become a credo for us and thousands of other soldiers, on and off the battlefield. Its name is part of its mythology; its named for the two-handed Scottish Claymore sword, wielded by the inventors Highland ancestors to carve a path through invading enemies. The mine, as it exists today, was used with lethal effectiveness in Vietnam, and Special Forces carry a mini version of it on missions. Our hope is that this book will be as simple and instructive as those raised plastic letters. That this book, like the Claymore sword, will help cleave through the obstacles that stand in front of you. We also hope that humor is just as effective a weapon, and that you can laugh along the way.

ROB

Over the years that I was with the SEAL Teams, I developed some perspectives on how to live life, which is to say, how to avoid being killed over the course of more than four hundred missions. Theyre not complicated, and theyre easy to remember. Keep it simple. Follow the rules. Dont get sloppy. Do the best you can until youre finished, and then move on and dont look back. Face your adversary. Front toward enemy.

I was introduced to Claymores during the land warfare phase of Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL Training (BUD/S). We read about them during classroom training, we had tests on them, and we practiced with them on San Clemente Island, using inert Claymores. The dummy Claymores had blue plastic cases, which made them easy to distinguish from the live versions, which were olive drab.

Before I got my Trident, the Teams sent me off for a thirteen-week course called SEAL Tactical Training, or STT, around April 1997. After three weeks of dive training in Puerto Rico, we spent the rest of the time at Fort A. P. Hill in Northern Virginia. This consisted of all parts of land warfare: map and compass navigation, patrolling, shooting every weapon available to SEALs, as well as explosives training. A master chief named Frank Wagner ran the whole thing. He was a Vietnam vet, and his nickname was Pig. I have no idea why Master Chief Wagner was called Pig, but I do know this: he ran the place exactly how he wanted it.

Early on in the explosives/demolition coursemaybe on the first dayhe brought us into one of the classrooms, where he had us open up Claymores. He demonstrated with a flathead screwdriver how you pry off the cover to look inside. We looked closely at the honeycomb of steel balls, the layer of C4 behind it, the detonator wells, the sight on top. Then he ordered us out to the live range.

The range was the area at the fort where live explosives were set off. Parts were wooded, other parts were open fields and brush. He gathered the forty or fifty dudes there for the course around him in one of the open areas. Then he reached into his pocket and took out a block of C4. He cut it in two, handed one lump to me and another to a second student, and gave us both lighters. Then he told us to set them on fire.

Now, I had worked with Claymores and C4 before, back in BUD/S training. One of the first things you learn about C4 is that its completely harmless without a rapid release of energy, such as a blasting cap. It looks like white Play-Doh and has the consistency of taffy, and its about as dangerous, as long as theres no blasting charge to ignite it. You can cut it, you can pound on it, drop it, mold it into whatever shape you choose and it wont explode. Likewise, everyone knows that if you set C4 on fire, nothing will happen.

So this other dude and I stood there with the C4 in one hand and a lighter in the other, and Pig Wagner ordered us to put the flame to the C4. So I swallowed hard, spun the strike wheel to get a flame, and after a count of three, put the flame to the C4.

Pig Wagner didnt seem like a funny guy. He was kind of a hard-ass, and he didnt mind making us do things that were probably against the rules. We didnt think he had a sense of humor. As it turned out, he very much had a sense of humor. The other thing he had was a wireless detonator in his pocket, which was linked to a receiver connected to a five-pound charge of C4 that he had put on the ground about two hundred yards away, hidden by some trees. When I put the flame to the C4, he pushed the button at the same moment.

That motherfucker blew as loud as an artillery shell. Of course, no one expected this. The more collected guys just whipped their heads toward the trees. Others bolted, thinking the explosion was at their feet. Some hit the ground. Pig Wagner, naturally, thought this was the funniest thing hed seen since the last time he did this to a bunch of new SEAL candidates. He laughed his ass off, then gave us five minutes to go change our shit-stained shorts and get back out on the range.