by Couch, Dick
“You have to understand how fast we move when we’re clearing a house,” another SEAL said. “Speed is everything, but we have to move safely. And we have to move as a team. We’re always ready to shoot, but we very seldom need to. The objective during the takedown of a house or residence is usually an individual and, occasionally, the house itself—a bomb factory or a weapons cache. So when we encounter someone, we have to quickly judge if that person poses a threat and meet that threat with the proper amount of force. Every situation is different. I’ve been on operations that involved clearing a large home and a lot of different things are going on. On the first floor, two of the guys have just disarmed a bodyguard and taken him down hard—hard enough that he needs help from the platoon [medical] corpsman. On the second floor, another two guys are trying to soothe a grandmother who thinks the world is coming to an end. And up on the third floor, one of the guys is cuffing and searching the bad guy we came to get while his brother SEAL is trying to calm down the guy’s wife. We’ve been known to crank that dial all the way to the left and all the way to the right on the same operation. Full right is a bullet, and full left is handing out a candy bar. Either way, we have to get it right.”
In the SEALs’ mission to board the Saddam Maru, Close Quarters Training came in very handy. The SEALs boarding the Saddam Maru in the summer of 2001 knew it was going to be a challenge, so they came aboard with a full platoon. The previous day, a Canadian special operations team had boarded this same tanker. They had worked on it for close to forty-five minutes, but they could not crack the armadillo-like deckhouse that had been welded tight and was further strengthened with double-reinforced steel at the normal entry points. This vessel had additional steel plating on various portions of the deck housing, so that no single cut into the bulkheads of the pilot house could provide an access. The tanker’s crew, on later questioning, felt that they were invulnerable—that the counterboarding and entry-denial measures recently installed on the vessel had made them safe from the allied boarding parties. But the Iraqi crew was totally unprepared for the SEALs’ “Yarrow Entry.”
Lieutenant (jg) Sean Yarrow was on his first SEAL deployment. He was big for a Navy SEAL—six-two and two hundred pounds. Yarrow grew up in Pittsburgh and graduated from the Naval Academy in June 1998. He went through BUD/S with Class 222. In June 2001, he found himself deployed with a SEAL platoon in an ARG—an Amphibious Ready Group—on patrol in the Persian Gulf. The ARG was fully engaged in MIO and anti-oil-smuggling operations, and his platoon was doing its share of the boardings. Yarrow was a newly minted SEAL officer trying to contribute to the operations of his platoon. Yarrow, like the other members of his platoon, had training in CQD.
The oil-smuggling game was being played with intensity during the summer of 2001, and at that time the Iraqis had the upper hand. SEAL boarding parties would swoop down upon a tanker carrying contraband oil. The Iraqi master would turn his vessel for the safe haven of friendly territorial waters and the race was on. Could the SEALs crack the steel nut of the tanker pilothouse before the ship made it from international waters to a safe haven?
At that point in time, the SEALs’ method of cracking the secure deckhouse of a tanker was to find a convenient weather-deck hatch, and begin cutting. Usually, they went for one of the pilothouse hatches, which were the closest to the ship control station. No sense in cracking a lower-deck hatch and finding an internal passageway hatch welded shut. After getting aboard and setting up external security, the SEAL breaching team fired up its Quick-Saw, a gas-driven rotary saw with an eighteen-inch diamond-tipped blade for cutting metal, and went to work. As the boarded tanker put its rudder over to run for freedom, the scream of a saw blade biting into metal echoed across the weather decks and into the night. That summer, the Iraqis began welding a secondary level of three-eighths-inch steel and I-beam spacers, which slowed the cutting-and-entering process considerably. This double-steel reinforcement took too long to breach, and the boarding SEALs simply couldn’t get through in the allotted time. Things were leaning in the Iraqis’ favor.
Sean Yarrow’s role in the platoon at that time was that of the assigned third officer, or “third-G.” He had limited tactical duties in the platoon and some administrative responsibilities, but his primary job as a new first-tour officer was to watch and learn. His leadership duties in the platoon were limited. He was a “new guy”—a rookie officer. When the platoon boarded a tanker and set up its security and entry teams, his job was to roam the decks of the ship with a hooligan, a crowbar-like lever arm, and look for an easier way.
While his SEAL platoon mates attacked a pilothouse door, Yarrow poked and pried at other hatches and portholes, trying to force one of them open. In the course of his duties, he noticed that the center forward-facing window to the pilothouse was not welded shut, as were the others. This single window had to be kept free so that the helmsman could see to steer the ship and was perhaps the only source of ventilation in the pilothouse. However, the window was all but inaccessible. All the forward-facing pilothouse windows were on a sheer metal face that composed the forward bulkhead of the ship’s superstructure. In fact, due to tanker design, these windows were often set in a reverse slope to provide for easier viewing of the forward decking and to assist in conning the ship during docking operations.
But Sean Yarrow had an idea. After an earlier unsuccessful attempt to cut into a different tanker before it passed into Iranian territorial waters, he vowed to give his idea a try the next time out. “Yarrow had a good idea to come in through the front bridge windows,” said Chief Don Latham, the platoon chief petty officer, “but getting over the pilothouse to the front window, often at night, when you don’t have a lot of time, is tricky work. It’s like being a window washer on a high-rise building in a combat situation. And those tankers, even when they’re loaded, can pitch and roll.” The Iraqis had begun welding rebar, then hinged plates, across the window in front of the helm; but in the absence of a periscope, they needed to see out from somewhere in the pilothouse. Basically, there was no way they could weld double plating to a window that they needed to have open at least part of the time. But Sean Yarrow was ready for them. Now when the platoon boarded a ship, both Yarrow and his chief were in rappelling harnesses with two men assigned to belay them. In a series of training exercises, the SEALs had worked out a system of ropes and belay points. While the breaching team began cutting at one of the hatches, Yarrow, armed with a Quick-Saw, would swing down to the vulnerable window and begin to cut at the rebar or the single sheet of steel plating.
“I would sling my weapon and fire up the saw,” Yarrow said. “Chief Latham would be there with his weapon to give security while I did the cutting. We were like a couple of spiders swaying in the wind, but we got the system down so that we always beat the breaching team into the pilothouse. We’d found a way in, and unless the Iraqis came up with something new, we could now win the race. Usually, it took us no more than ten minutes to get inside and take control of a ship.” Chief Don Latham said of Yarrow, “Like the rest of the platoon, I wasn’t so sure about Yarrow’s idea—it seemed a little harebrained when he proposed going in over the front of the pilothouse. But it worked, and it worked every time.”
Now, aboard the Saddam Maru, Yarrow and Latham could see that the pilothouse windows of the ship had a decidedly reverse slope, so they had to work at a difficult angle. The vessel also had both rebar and a single hinged plate on the front pilothouse window. When the Iraqi crewmen on watch heard the SEALs clamoring on the roof of the pilothouse, they immediately bolted the window. The tanker turned and made for the nearest Gulf state’s territorial waters; the clock was ticking. The two SEALs pressed themselves in, close to the face of the superstructure, and broke out their tools.
By this time, Yarrow could hear the whine of the gas engine from the Quick-Saw of the SEAL breaching team at the pilothouse door. Soon the sound of his own saw joined it. For those inside, it would have sounded like dueling chainsaws biting int
o steel. Clamped onto the front of the pilothouse like a couple of insects, the two SEALs were working against the clock, trying to force open the window before the tanker crossed out of international waters. Yarrow sliced through the rebar and then began on the movable plate. He cut an access hole, tossed the saw inside, and then wriggled through the opening. Depending on the situation, the first man through an entry would toss in a flash-bang—a small grenade designed to temporarily blind and stun those inside. Seeing no one, Yarrow made the entry without the fanfare. Chief Latham, still outside, struggled through the opening.
Yarrow moved across the deserted pilothouse to where the other SEALs were still trying to cut through the door. As Yarrow was considering how to force the door open from his side, an Iraqi crewman approached him from behind. The crewman was too close by the time Yarrow turned around, so he couldn’t bring his primary weapon up to bear. It was now Close Quarters Defense time.
Reflexively, Yarrow gave the Iraqi a hand-strike to the sternum and the man went down, conscious but stunned. Chief Latham, who was even bigger than Yarrow, was still trying to get through the opening and could not assist him. Yarrow slung his MPS submachine gun and, with his knife, began to cut at the ropes that secured the hatch. Enter a second Iraqi. Yarrow quickly drew his SIG Sauer 9 mm sidearm and ordered the man to lie on the deck. He appeared to be unarmed, but he kept coming. Yarrow gave him a barrel strike with the pistol and the second Iraqi went down. He had nearly cut through all the ropes at the pilothouse door and Chief Latham was almost through the window access when a third Iraqi came at him. Another barrel strike and he, too, joined his friends on the floor.
“The Iraqis do that sometimes,” Yarrow said. “They have orders to fight to the death, but they really aren’t going to do that. So they have to do something, show some physical resistance. If they have a gun or a knife, then they’re in serious trouble. Usually, they just need to be hit and put down, and their honor is intact. Normally, we do everything in pairs or as a team, which is a lot safer. But this time I was alone. When I look back on it, it was just like a drill at CQD training.”
“It was a scene out of the movies,” Latham said, recalling the incident. “By the time I got into the pilothouse, Mr. Yarrow was standing there, pistol in one hand, knife in the other, and a pile of Iraqis on the deck. It took only a few more minutes to get the rest of the platoon in and we owned the ship.” The sortie of the Saddam Maru was the beginning of the end of the Iraqi oil-smuggling operations. The route their tankers had to follow required that they be in international waters for at least part of the journey. With the “Yarrow Entry,” the SEALs were now consistently boarding and stopping these tankers. The Yarrow Entry was passed down to new platoons coming into theater and became part of SEAL platoon predeployment training.
This challenging and largely successful SEAL mission came to an end on September 11, 2001. On that day, the history of the United States and the Navy SEALs entered an entirely new era.
Photo Insert C
SEALs emerge from the water during tactical warfare training, 1986. The SEAL in the foreground is armed with an M-16A1 rifle, the standard of the day, equipped with an M203 grenade launcher. (National Archives)
Final resting place of one of four SEALs who died in Grenada operations, 1983. (U.S. Navy)
Panama, 1989: four Navy SEALs died in the operation to disable dictator Manuel Noriega’s getaway Learjet. The damage is from rocket and small-arms fire by the SEALs. (SEAL Museum)
Members of SEAL Team Four aboard ship prior to the Panama operation. (U.S. Navy)
Everybody inside, outside! A squad of SEALs on a HALO—high altitude, low opening—training jump leave the rear of a C-130. (U.S. Navy)
From the sea. A squad of SEALs emerge from the water, still breathing on their Underwater Breathing Apparatus. (U.S. Navy)
SEALs leapfrog ashore. A SEAL fire team crosses the shoreline, two moving, two covering. (U.S. Navy)
A Special Boat Team RHIB, having delivered its SEALs to the side of a target, breaks away. (U.S. Navy)
A Special Boat Team gunner engages a training target with a twin .50 caliber mount. (U.S. Navy)
Two Special Boat Team 82-foot MK V Special Operation Craft. (U.S. Navy)
A Navy MK V Special Operation Craft, a 50-ton, high-speed boat, is squeezed into a C-5 Galaxy aircraft from the 349th Air Mobility Wing, California, 1999. (National Archives/U.S. Air Force)
GOPLAT entry. A SEAL fast ropes onto an gas/oil platform as part of a VBSS exercise. (U.S. Navy)
An MH-53J Pave Low delivers SEALs to a target. (U.S. Navy)
VBSS—vertical boarding search and seizure. A SEAL squad fast ropes from an H-60 onto a target ship. (U.S. Navy)
In January 2002, an American special operations element led by Navy SEALs entered a key al-Qaeda strongpoint at the Zhawar Kili cave complex in Afghanistan. They discovered thousands of crates of ammunition and explosives, and millions of pounds of ordnance, along with training facilities, jail cells, and safe-house accommodations. (U.S. Navy)
A SEAL platoon operating in Iraq pauses for a photo amid a collection of captured weapons and photos of Saddam Hussein and his son Uday. (Courtesy of Michael Branch)
SEALs inspecting a shipping container at Iraq’s Mina Al Bakr Oil Terminal (MABOT) at the outset of the invasion of Iraq. Their quick action helped to prevent an environmental disaster. (U.S. Navy)
Navy SEALs Matthew G. Axelson, Daniel R. Healy, James Suh, Marcus Luttrell, Eric S. Patton, and Michael P. Murphy in Afghanistan. With the exception of Luttrell, all were killed on June 28, 2005, while supporting Operation Red Wings. (U.S. Navy)
SEAL Team Three, Charlie Platoon, in Ramadi, Iraq. The unobscured faces are, from left, Marc Lee, Ryan Job, and Chris Kyle: all fallen SEALs. Marc Lee was the first Navy SEAL to be killed in Iraq. (U.S. Navy)
The very affable and very brave petty officer Michael Monsoor, on patrol and at work in Iraq, 2006. (U.S. Navy)
Adm. William H. McRaven takes command of U.S. Special Operations Command, Aug. 8, 2011. McRaven assumed command from Adm. Eric T. Olson and was the ninth commander of USSOCOM. (Photo by Mike Bottoms, USSOCOM Public Affairs)
The aftermath of OPERATION NEPTUNE SPEAR, 2011. (U.S. Department of Defense)
In a now all-too-familiar ritual, a SEAL senior chief petty officer pounds his SEAL Trident into the coffin lid of a fallen brother—in this case that of Special Warfare Operator 3rd Class Denis Miranda, killed in action in Afghanistan, September 2010. (U.S. Navy)
A new cycle starts as the next generation of Navy SEALs begin their journey. Here BUD/S trainees crawl through the cold surge and surf toward to their SEAL instructor. They will become Navy SEALs, but first they must become Navy frogmen. (U.S. Navy)
CHAPTER 7
TERROR AND DESTINY: MIDEAST AND ANTITERROR OPERATIONS
SEPTEMBER 11, 2001 – TODAY
THE MISSIONS:
Support regional and global operations against the Taliban and al-Qaeda, the Iraqi military, terrorism, and piracy
On September 11, 2001, the U.S. Navy SEALs’ phones started ringing off the hook, and they’ve been busy ever since.
“When we got word of the attack on America, we couldn’t believe it,” said SEAL Randy Lowery, officer in charge of the SEAL platoon in Bahrain. “We were shocked, angry, and we wanted to get our guns into the fight. But where and who? That took a while to sort out. The only thing we knew was that the training exercises were over; from now on it was going to be real world. Half the platoon was in Kuwait and the other half was in Bahrain. The first thing we did was get the guys back from Kuwait and get our gear together. That didn’t take long, as we pretty much keep up to speed while on deployment, but there’s always something to do. Now there was a clear reason to do it. For those first few days we sat at the unit in Bahrain, checked our gear, and watched those Twin Towers come down again and again on the TV replays.”
On 9/11, Navy SEAL Bob Schoultz was working inside the Pentagon on assignment a
s senior military assistant to the assistant secretary of defense for special operations. “I was where every good team guy needs to be when the caca hits the fan, I was in the gym working out,” he quipped. “I did not know an airplane had hit the Pentagon. I heard the fire alarm siren go off. I thought it was a drill, so I casually got dressed and I went outside. I stepped out and I saw twenty-five thousand of my closest friends leaving the building, going down to the river. What the hell happened? They said, ‘we think an airplane hit the building.’ I thought, ‘I’ve got to find my boss, he needs me now.’ So I fought my way back into the Pentagon, and I actually was sitting right there with the secretary of defense and my boss while they were trying to figure out what the heck was going on. There were still numerous airplanes that weren’t responding to IFF [identification, friend or foe] and [we didn’t know] how many more airplanes were going to come in and were going to hit what.”
Chris Osman recalled his feelings when his SEAL platoon was selected to deploy overseas several days after the attacks. “We were one of two platoons in a high state of predeployment readiness. You’re happy that you’re going but you feel bad for the guys in the other platoon. And I remember leaving and I was like, ‘Oh man. Sorry you didn’t get picked.’ And one guy looked at me and he’s like, ‘Screw you, dude.’ We were allowed to go home for one night. We basically got about seven or eight hours off to go home and say goodbye to our families. And then we filled out last will and testaments. We filled out life insurance paperwork. We filled out power of attorneys for all of our families. So, it was the real deal.”
