Each of us fired tens of thousands of rounds, running scenarios as many as fifty times a day. When we were not in the Kill House, we shot next door in an elaborate cinematic target area. Our room targets become increasingly elaborate—furniture, couches, bookcases—and hidden bad guys were added. Stapled behind the critical areas of each target was a three-by-five index card marking kill areas on the human body. For every bullet we fired that missed a card, we had to buy a case of beer.
We were soon engaging targets in multiple-room scenarios. This required an extemporaneous flow of shooters through the operational area. Room clearance requires precision, an almost Zenlike awareness of the situation, and complete mastery of the weapon. Shooting pairs grouped and split up as the Team surged through hallways and rooms. It is at this, “flow through target” that SEAL Team Six is unmatched. The extreme level of training makes this possible. It is not enough to say that we practiced multiple-room clearance. In one year the operators of SEAL Six fire more bullets than the entire United States Marine Corps. We weren’t just good at multiple-room CQ; there is no one in the world who comes close.
As our skills coalesced, the targets became more varied and elaborate. We trained on airliners, ships, and offshore oil and gas facilities. We practiced on buses and passenger trains.
Our training evolutions became full mission profiles, with the officers of Green Team each responsible for planning and briefing operations under the watchful eye of Court and his minions. In these highly realistic training evolutions, the bad guys continued to be paper silhouettes, but the hostages were real, breathing human beings. Scattered through the targets—just as hostages would be—the volunteers were service members, members of the joint command, and sometimes they were Washington VIPs, secretaries, senators, and representatives. It was our job to penetrate, neutralize the terrorists, secure the hostages, and extract. We trained to do this all using real bullets and live breeching explosives. In Green Team, like in the real world, there was no margin for error.
There was not one operational readiness exam but two dozen. Every combination of insertion and extraction method imaginable was married to differing target sets. A big-city SWAT team has the luxury of jumping on a bus and driving to the target. We were training for operations that would take place in denied areas, an enemy’s backyard. We would have to sneak in and liberate the hostages, and we would have to fight our way out. The training operations reflected this. In eight months we operated in every environment and across every SEAL mission: direct action, reconnaissance and surveillance, operations against infrastructure, counterterrorism, and hostage rescue. Sean, Moose, Rick, and I each planned, briefed, and led half a dozen missions. Failure in a training op was grounds for instant dismissal. Over half of us hung on, and eight months after we’d started, we twelve graduated after a raucous celebration on an offshore oil rig we had just “captured.”
The night of our last op happened to be Traylor Court’s birthday and his last day at the command. In the SEALs, there is one thing you hide from your brothers at all times: the date of your birth, because SEAL Team birthday celebrations are not pleasant. One of the Green Team instructors had leaked that it was Court’s birthday, and we made sure it would be a special event. As soon as the oil platform was in our hands, together with the Green Team instructors, we turned on Court, handcuffed him, and duct-taped him to a chair.
There was a brief trial of the kangaroo variety. Charges of inhumanity, cruelty to tadpoles, impersonating a baboon, and a few other capital offenses were read. Having been found instantly guilty, Court was sentenced to a shot or a shot: After each successive charge, he was allowed to choose between a shot of peppermint schnapps, injected into his mouth from a veterinary syringe, or being shot with one of the wax bullets we used for hostage training. I’m not sure which was worse; the wax bullets were propelled by a .38-caliber pistol cartridge primer, and they hurt like hell. Of course, peppermint schnapps hurts, too. After about a dozen rounds of each, Court was released from bondage, given a pardon signed by King Neptune himself, and carried to the oil platform’s flight deck to be taken back to shore. The dozen shots of schnapps had taken their toll. As we waited for the helicopter, Court had to be twice prevented from demonstrating what he called his Tarzan swan dive from the flight deck. It took half a dozen guys to get him on the helo and strap him into a seat. Court was toast, but we were finished, and when we returned to Virginia, we’d be assigned to operational elements.
Green Team was over. We were Jedi at last.
Well, almost.
* * *
HIGH SPEED, LOW DRAG
THE TRIP FROM GREEN TEAM to the operational side of the house was like a trip to the moon. Although we had been aboard for eight months, we had been cloistered from the rest of the command. We had an idea what to expect operationally—Court and the Green Team cadre had seen to that—but nothing could prepare us for what we would find politically. SEAL Six was the creation of Dick Marcinko, and it still bore the strong imprint of his character. As we reported to our assault-group assignments, the spectre of Demo Dick wandered the passageways like Marley’s ghost.
Under Dick Marcinko, SEAL Team Six was a rigid meritocracy married to the worst sort of personality cult. Marcinko had been a Mustang, and although he was a commander, a senior member of the community, and the captain of the Team, he had little use for officers. Under his tenure, there was a faux sort of equality. Everyone was equal, with those attached longest to Marcinko being more equal than others.
Since the days of Mob Six, Marcinko had kept alive a spirit of devotion to the leader, deliberately marginalizing and undercutting the commissioned officers. He was in the habit of replacing assault-group commanders often, and canning them instantly if they conflicted with the senior chiefs or him. All wires led to Marcinko, patriarch, commanding officer, and burning bush.
To his credit, Marcinko valued operational skill above any other attribute save loyalty, and at Six everybody operated; everybody shot, swam, and jumped, from the captain on down. Failure was not an option, and Marcinko pushed himself as hard as he pushed his operators. Although this system would not tolerate cake-eaters like my buddy Skip, it brokered no dissent. There was one opinion, and that was Marcinko’s. This sort of royal-court organization prompted genuine devotion, but it also brought out the worst portions of cronyism, backstabbing, and flattery.
After Marcinko’s less than graceful departure, Bob Gormly did much to change things, gaining control of the most unruly elements, cutting out deadwood, and curbing a bit of the cowboyism that was rampant under the old regime. He had led SEAL Team Six into Grenada and through the command’s baptism of fire, a turning point for naval special warfare. Six had spectacular successes, leavened by tragedy; before the opening of hostilities, four SEALs were lost conducting an at-sea rendezvous. The loss was made bitter because of its futility. On the ground in Grenada, SEAL Six more than proved its mettle. The rescue of Governor General Schoon and the operation against the transmitter site of Radio Free Grenada are epics in the annals of special warfare. Under Bob Gormly, Six had shown it was worth its salt.
Though Bob Gormly’s stamp was on the command, Marcinko’s legacy clung stubbornly. Following Green Team, Sean, Moose, Rick, and I were sent to different assault groups. Each unit had played a differing role in Grenada, and each had a unique character and ethos. As senior officer, Sean was given charge of an assault group. His task as a walk-on was not easy. He was a nonparticipant in Grenada, so he had an uphill struggle asserting command. But the fight would be well rewarded. Under Sean’s steady leadership, his group would later play a pivotal role in capturing the hijackers of Achille Lauro.
Moose and Rick were assigned to an assault group that called themselves the Pirates. The skull and crossbones was proudly on display in their offices, and the Pirates were perhaps the toughest and most clannish of all the assault groups in SEAL Team Six. They had overthrown several officers but had performed valiantly in Grenada and we
re second to none in operational capability. The Pirates were commanded at the time by an extremely talented and dedicated officer named Bo. He was a former Army ranger and a guy who led by example. Moose and Rick were in good company.
I was detailed to the third assault group, under the command of a hard-bitten gunslinger named Johnny King. Johnny was a fellow Mississippian, but in style and temperament, we could not have been more different. Johnny was from upstate, a little town outside of Tupelo, far from the moderating breezes, French wines and cheeses of the Gulf Coast. He was opinionated, rough around the edges, and he did things his way. The term “bad-ass redneck” might be a bit delicate. As I checked in to the Team, one of my future boat-crew members gave me a heads-up in Spanish: “Es un hombre duro.” He’s a hard man.
I was soon to learn this outfit had a talent for understatement.
Hard case or not, Johnny King was one of the bravest and best officers I ever served with. Johnny was a stickler, and his assault group was perhaps the most squared-away unit on the Team. Johnny’s world was SEAL Team Six, and his purpose in life was the mission of the Team.
“Boys, we’re here to kill Tangos,” he used to say, “Tango” being the phonetic designator and pejorative for “terrorist.” Twisted by Johnny’s Mississippi drawl, “Tango” became a three-syllable word. The extra syllable seemed to go into some sort of revolving account, because just as often Johnny would cut a syllable out. Like saying “High-why” instead of “Hawaii,” and “Chine-ee” instead of “Chinese.” When he found out I was from Biloxi, he said, “Boy, what happened to the way you talk?”
The other officer in my assault group was Ed Summers. He was from Florida and had been a former Professional Karate Association full-contact kickboxing champion. He was a great guy, extremely direct, even crusty, and one of the best shooters and athletes on the Team. Ed was in special warfare for the long haul, having served as a SEAL platoon commander and SDV pilot before coming to Six. Like Johnny, Ed would have a distinguished and storied career in spec war. After a lengthy stint at Six, he would go on to command my alma mater, SEAL Team Four. On his own, Ed would have been a hard-ass extraordinaire, but in the shadow of Johnny King, he seemed as affable as Mr. Rogers.
The assault group’s chief petty officer was Chuck McGregor. In the olden days at Six, the chiefs were Marcinko’s henchmen. Chuck McGregor was nobody’s toady, and he didn’t look like a chief at all. Chiefs in the navy are usually grizzled and thick about the middle. Chuck looked like a twenty-year-old California surf dude. He was possibly the sole person on the Team who did not philander, blaspheme, drink, or use tobacco. He was a devout Christian, carried a Bible in his briefcase, and often said things like “Darn it.”
As you might imagine, a person like this might be subject to a bit of ribbing. In Chuck’s case, you’d be wrong. Chuck was plank owner, one of the original members of Mob Six, and although his personality and lifestyle might have been anomalous, he was here, quite simply, because he was one of the best operators in naval special warfare. He was the best athlete among a command full of triathletes; he’d climbed El Capitan twice; he’d served in Grenada; and he could outrun, outswim, and outshoot every one of his potential detractors. He was like a Boy Scout among a gang of cutthroats, and he would become one of my closest friends in the command. When we operated together, we used the call sign Chuck Squared.
I settled into the place I had been detailed. “Detailed” is the word, because during my first months on the operational team, I was a boat-crew member, a spear-carrier, and nothing else. Johnny could have cared less that I’d had combat service, and he could hardly have given a shit about my tours in Central America. As in my formal probation following BUD/S, I would have to prove I was worth following before I would be assigned to lead. Johnny seemed to view me as an experimental piece of equipment shipped from some far-off navy laboratory: He decided to plug me in and wait to see if I’d catch fire before he used me for real.
For my first six weeks on-line, I had no authority and little more responsibility in the assault group than to suit up, show up, and shut up. Even as Bob Gormly put the Team back under the chain of command, the meritocracy raged in Johnny King’s outfit. I bristled a bit—I was being paid by the navy to lead, not follow—but I suffered my second probation with good humor. Green Team had taught me that I had a lot to learn.
The command was on a war footing, and the operational tempo was high. In addition to standing by for real-world contingencies, we had a lot of deployments and exercises. When we weren’t on the road or in the bush, we were in the Kill House, shooting. The exercises were hardly a break. The consequences of failing at even a practice mission were still dire, and each evolution was planned, briefed, and executed precisely. Gradually, I was allowed to contribute to the briefing process and then to the planning cycle. I still held no position of authority. In exercises we operated against a variety of targets—ships, airplanes, buildings, and infrastructure targets—sometimes in concert with other units and sometimes on our own. The draft from my Green Team was integrated into boat-crew assignments.
It was not until a training deployment to Puerto Rico that I would be incorporated into the command structure of the assault group. The trip was a cakewalk: three weeks in Roosevelt Roads, combat-swimmer training, and jungle work on Isla Peros. I was assigned to put the trip together, almost as busywork, and I guess I finally managed to impress somebody. I prepared a week and a half of combat-swimmer training, finding an ex-Liberty ship for us to practice maritime sabotage and ship boarding on, and I put together essentially the same jungle course we’d taught in Honduras. It was like being in the cadre of SEAL Four all over again. Following the trip, Johnny called me into his office one morning after PT. “I’m placing boat crews Four, Five, and Six under you,” he said. “I’m gonna try you out as an assault-element commander. You go tell your guys.”
I thanked him and walked out, not exactly feeling vindicated or even trusted. He’d made it clear that I was on a test-drive, and if he wasn’t happy, I would have a short future as a lieutenant spear-carrier. I rounded up the guys and told them of the reorganization. By accident or design, I’d been put with three of the Spanish speakers, Alex, Hoser, and Luis, as well as two of the surfers. Operationally, we had some depth. Alex was a veteran of the radio-station op and a breaching and demolition expert. Hoser was a veteran of the Chuting Stars, the navy’s parachute team, and was our sky god, air-operations boss. Stick and Coyote were the heavy-weapons guys; Toad was our lead climber; Mike was our engineering and boat expert; and Doc Luke was our resident wiseass-cum-hospital corpsman. Like Alex, Luke was a veteran of the radio-station op and an hombre duro. At our end of the compound, there were more Hawaiian shirts than polo shirts, more reggae than country-and-western, and we all had it in for fried plantains, arroz con pollo, and jungle work. The Rastamen were born. I would command this assault element for three years, under two different group commanders, and serve with the Rastas until the day I left the service.
Although I settled in at once with the Rastamen, it took a slow while to feel like I was part of the Team. Compartmentalization was still part of our lives. I’d see Sean and Moose daily when they were not deployed, but work was not often talked about, even at work. The assault groups had different assignments, and information was kept in separate pipelines. It might seem odd, but if you returned to snowy Virginia in the middle of February with a tropical suntan, no one would ask where you’d been. The entire place was on a need-to-know basis. When we operated together, we were briefed together; when we operated separately, the information was kept separate as well.
The secrecy sometimes approached the ridiculous. Once Ed and I briefed the captain of a ship we were to exercise against. Our orders and our in-house printed business cards said that we were civilian contractors working for the nonexistent equipment-testing unit. In the coordinating briefing, Ed and I described the conduct of our mock attack. Four pairs of swimmers using rebreathers would att
ach simulated magnetic mines to the hull, propellers, and shafts of the destroyer while it was anchored off Mayport, Florida. Two other swim pairs would board the ship and body-snatch (that is, kidnap) two of the ship’s officers. As we described the operation, the captain kept looking at our business cards. The exercise didn’t seem like equipment testing. Finally, he asked Ed, “What command are you guys with?”
Ed answered crisply, “You’re not authorized to ask that question.”
The exercise went off; six mines were planted on the ship while the crew maintained a constant security patrol on deck. Much to the amazement of the captain, his chief engineer and weapons officer were missing at the conclusion of the exercise. They had been grabbed out of their staterooms by our swim pairs, bound, gagged, and spirited over the side. They were returned to him the following morning, dripping wet, grinning, and sworn to secrecy. It was just another night of testing equipment.
While our activities were cloaked to the world at large, we were fairly open with family. Margot had attended an SO (significant other) briefing given by the Team. She knew I was still in the SEALs, and she was told that there were covers in place. She was also cautioned not to make known any of the details of my work, and that under no circumstances, even in the event of my injury or death, was she to speak to the press. She took the warnings in stride, like she took everything else. Margot was a trooper.
Warrior Soul: The Memoir of a Navy SEAL Page 35
