Navy SEALs: Elite Operators and Their Impact

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Video originally published on February 16, 2025.

In the shadows of modern warfare, a select group of warriors has been shaping the course of history with their bravery, skill, and sacrifice. The Navy SEALs, America's premier naval special operations force, have been at the forefront of the country's most critical and clandestine missions, from the beaches of Normandy to the deserts of North Africa. Established by a visionary president, John F. Kennedy, who recognized the need for a specialized unit that could operate with precision and stealth, the SEALs have evolved into an elite cadre of operators who can infiltrate, gather intelligence, and strike with devastating effect. With their origins dating back to World War II, the SEALs have been forged in the crucible of combat, honing their craft through rigorous training and selection, and collaborating with other special operators, including Delta Force, Army Rangers, and the Central Intelligence Agency's Special Activities Center. As the world continues to change and new threats emerge, the Navy SEALs remain a vital component of America's defense strategy, carrying out covert operations that can change the course of history, and inspiring a new generation of warriors to follow in their footsteps.

Key Takeaways

The Navy SEALs trace their origins to World War II, with the establishment of the Scouts and Raiders in 1942 to conduct reconnaissance and guide amphibious assaults.
President John F. Kennedy formally established the Navy SEALs in 1962, creating teams that could operate in asymmetrical warfare, drawing from the Navy's Underwater Demolition Teams.
During the Vietnam War, SEALs became a favored instrument of the Central Intelligence Agency, killing an estimated 2,000 Vietnamese adversaries at the cost of 48 SEALs.
The SEALs' organizational structure includes eight active SEAL teams and the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, known as SEAL Team Six.
SEAL training includes Hell Week, a five-and-a-half-day ordeal with minimal sleep and extreme physical challenges, including running over 200 miles.
SEALs are trained in various insertion methods, including parachute, submarine, and other mechanisms, and are experts in extraction under adverse circumstances.

Origins of the Navy SEALs: World War II and the Early Years

The genesis of the Navy SEALs can be traced back to the crucible of World War II, a period that saw the United States engaged in amphibious warfare on an unprecedented scale. The nature of the conflict demanded a new breed of warriors capable of operating in both maritime and terrestrial environments. This need gave rise to several specialized units that would ultimately converge to form the Navy SEALs. The Scouts and Raiders, the first such unit, were established in 1942. Comprised of Army and Navy personnel, they were tasked with conducting reconnaissance and guiding amphibious assaults. Their missions took them across North Africa, Italy, Normandy, and southern France in the European theater, as well as to over forty island and beach targets in the Pacific. Additionally, some Scouts and Raiders operated as guerrillas in China, honing their skills in unconventional warfare. Their success underscored the value of specialized reconnaissance units in amphibious operations. Simultaneously, the Naval Combat Demolition Units (NCDUs) were formed to handle the demolition of obstacles on beaches during amphibious landings. Their most famous operation was the Normandy landings on D-Day, where they blew open gaps in German defenses, facilitating the Allied invasion. The rigorous training of the NCDUs, including a grueling selection process, laid the groundwork for what would become known as Hell Week in SEAL training. The Underwater Demolition Teams (UDTs), another critical unit, participated in every major amphibious landing in the Pacific theater. Their missions involved evaluating and destroying underwater obstacles, a secretive role that remained classified until the war's end. The UDTs' expertise in underwater operations was instrumental in the success of amphibious assaults. These three units—the Scouts and Raiders, the NCDUs, and the UDTs—shared a common focus on amphibious operations. Their experiences and successes during World War II highlighted the need for a dedicated naval special operations force. However, it was not until the early 1960s that this vision began to take concrete shape. President John F. Kennedy, recognizing the strategic value of unconventional warfare, played a pivotal role in the establishment of the Navy SEALs. Kennedy's administration was deeply influenced by the experiences of World War II and the emerging Cold War, particularly the need for covert operations and guerrilla warfare. In response, the UDTs were reorganized and expanded, leading to the creation of SEAL Team One in San Diego, California, and SEAL Team Two in Little Creek, Virginia Beach, Virginia, in 1962. These teams were designed to conduct unconventional warfare, counterinsurgency, and special reconnaissance missions. The Vietnam War provided the SEALs with their first major operational test. They conducted a wide range of missions, including direct action, special reconnaissance, and unconventional warfare. Their success in Vietnam cemented their reputation as elite operators and validated the concept of naval special warfare. The SEALs' ability to operate in diverse environments, from dense jungles to coastal waters, demonstrated their versatility and effectiveness. Their exploits during the Vietnam War also attracted significant attention, both within the military and among the general public, laying the groundwork for their future growth and development. The legacy of the Navy SEALs is deeply rooted in the lessons learned during World War II and the early Cold War era. The convergence of the Scouts and Raiders, the NCDUs, and the UDTs into a single, cohesive force was a testament to the evolving nature of warfare. The SEALs' unique blend of skills, honed through rigorous training and real-world operations, has made them one of the most formidable special operations forces in the world. Their impact on modern military strategy and tactics is immeasurable, and their story continues to unfold in the annals of military history.

The Birth of the Modern SEALs: Vietnam War and the Creation of the Naval Special Warfare Command

All of them prioritized training their troops in unconventional, high-risk, or otherwise challenging mechanisms of warfighting, and all of them had become used to operating as the tip of the spear, with minimal real-time support during their operations. Many of their personnel had spent time in two of the three units or, perhaps, all of them, picking up a variety of skills as they went. And while the conclusion of World War II meant that each of these special units was either disbanded or slimmed down considerably, many of their members had no intention of ending their military service at that time. Many of them would pick up experience with the Underwater Demolition Teams during the Korean War, running missions to insert and exfiltrate spies, conduct demolition raids onshore, and more. All through the 1950s, although many veterans of the World War II special amphibious units would leave service, others would work their way up through the ranks, and some would pick up exceptionally valuable experience during secretive operations that are little-known even today. But the birth of the Navy SEALs came during the early years of the Vietnam War, courtesy of one President John F. Kennedy. In the same address as he announced America’s plan to put a man on the moon, he announced a flood of funding to American special operations and unconventional warfare capabilities, in a process that had actually begun years earlier. The US Navy, in particular, wanted to create teams that could operate in asymmetrical fashion to deal with adversarial insurgent and guerrilla groups, from the land, sea, and air, drawing exclusively from the Navy’s own pre-existing Underwater Demolition Teams. Given the formal name of the Navy Sea, Air, and Land Teams, shortening to SEAL, the original two teams started up their training operations on each of America’s coasts, some of them in San Diego, California, and the others in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Trained in everything from complex amphibious demolition operations, to covert parachute insertion, to hand-to-hand combat, the first-generation SEALs would pick up early experience in Cuba, before diving headfirst into the hellscape that was the Vietnam War. Before long, the SEALs were a favored instrument of war for America’s Central Intelligence Agency, who valued the SEALs for not only their combat prowess, but a level of tactical versatility well beyond what most of America’s covert military assets were capable of. In time, they became one of America’s most precise offensive weapons against the North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong, capable of taking the fight to the enemy in a period where most American troops were sitting ducks once they strayed too far from their bases. Over the entire Vietnam War, the SEALs were estimated to have killed upward of two thousand Vietnamese adversaries, at a cost of just forty-eight of their own. Now, we’ll circle back to some of the SEALs’ operations, their most famous missions, and that sort of thing, in just a little while—but before we do, we’re going to fast forward to the modern day, and take a closer look at just what the Navy SEALs have become. Their numbers are hazy, for obvious reasons of operational security, but any given time, there are estimated to be between 2,400 and 2,800 SEALs in active duty. Not all of them will be attached to SEAL teams at any given time; some will be in training, or will have moved on to other roles and responsibilities that take them out of the direct line of fire. Those who are part of a SEAL Team, are split among eight known, current teams, numbered one through five, seven, eight, and ten. That’s in addition to the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, unofficially known as SEAL Team Six, who we’ll be talking about on their own shortly. There can be more SEAL teams at a given time, and two worldwide SEAL teams, Team 17 and Team 18, account for the organization’s handful of reservists.

Training and Selection: The Rigorous Path to Becoming a Navy SEAL

The mission role of the SEAL Teams is kept intentionally broad by the US Navy, in a reflection of their status as the Navy’s highest-qualified experts to deal with a wide range of sudden or unconventional threats. SEALs are meant to be experts in traveling to and infiltrating enemy territory far afield, arriving by parachute, submarine, or a wide variety of other insertion mechanisms. They’re well-trained in extraction, getting wounded troops, intelligence sources, foreign military hardware, and more, out of danger under adverse circumstances. They’re trained in the capture and, as necessary, assassination of high-value adversaries, and they’re well-equipped to perform a range of reconnaissance missions, often deep behind enemy lines and without any real support outside their own small unit. They’re experts in underwater demolition, against both man-made and natural targets, and they’re able to seamlessly carry out missions of sabotage and other direct action, often in areas where the combined might of an enemy’s firepower is multiple orders of magnitude greater than their own. They train to operate in environments from the high Arctic to the open Sahara, from tropical rainforests to barren mountaintops, with priority to areas where amphibious operations are going to be particularly useful. Within each SEAL Team, individual operators will specialize in anything from demolitions, to sniper marksmanship, to land navigation, to close-quarters combat, and more, but every SEAL Team member, regardless of their areas of chosen expertise, is meant to be a sufficiently high-level operator in all areas that they could be dropped into the middle of a dangerous, unforeseen combat environment and reasonably expect to succeed. SEAL Teams deploy worldwide, with the exception of Teams 3 and 10, both of which deploy to the Middle East. Deployments last six months each and take place every two years, with the intervening eighteen months spent on extensive personnel training, as well as opportunities for leave. Then, there’s SEAL Team Six, more properly known as DEVGRU, although we’ll be referring to them by their unofficial title today. SEAL Team Six stands alongside the very best of America’s special operations teams, including Delta Force, the Regimental Reconnaissance Company of the Army Rangers, and a tiny handful of other units. Together, they and SEAL Team Six are America’s so-called Special Mission Units, often referred to as Tier 1 units, although it’s a misconception that the tier system ranks units in terms of pure skill. In reality, back when that system was in use, it was mostly a budgetary thing. In any case, the members of SEAL Team Six are equipped to carry out every mission role of the SEALs and more, with additional specializations in counterterrorism, hostage rescue, direct action against high-value targets, and reconnaissance operations deep behind enemy lines. The full extent of their mission role is classified, but they’re thought to be able to proactively attack and disrupt large-scale terror organizations, carry out targeted assassinations, and even deal with weapons of mass destruction in the field. Their members are widely sought-after as some of the most talented special operators in the world, and they frequently move on from the SEALs to the Special Activities Center of the CIA, where even more secretive missions take place. Training and Recruitment. Now, it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who’s spent any length of time in an American social-media environment, but the selection and training practices of the Navy SEALs are nothing short of legend across much of the world. Well over a year long, notoriously rigorous, and known for its capacity to break both the body and mind, SEAL training is meant to weed out everybody except the very best of the best, with less than one in four people who start down the SEAL pipeline, ultimately able to succeed. Given the intensity of the process and the extreme, often life-threatening nature of both SEAL training and the active-duty role, the training process is entirely voluntary for both enlisted and officer SEAL trainees, who will train alongside each other for the bulk of their education.

SEAL Teams and Units: An Overview of the Organizational Structure

The Navy SEALs, established by President John F. Kennedy in 1962, have evolved into a formidable and highly specialized force within the United States military. The organizational structure of the SEALs is designed to maximize their effectiveness in various operational environments, from the depths of the ocean to the heart of enemy territory. This structure is composed of several key components, including SEAL teams, special units, and task forces, each with its unique role and capabilities. At the core of the SEALs' organizational structure are the SEAL teams. There are eight active SEAL teams, designated as SEAL Team 1 through SEAL Team 8. These teams are divided based on their deployment regions: even-numbered teams are based in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and are tasked with Western Pacific and Indian Ocean deployments, while odd-numbered teams are stationed in Coronado, San Diego, California, focusing on Eastern Pacific and Atlantic deployments. Each SEAL team consists of approximately 200 personnel, organized into multiple platoons, with each platoon comprising around 16 operators. This structure allows for flexibility and scalability, enabling the SEALs to adapt to a wide range of missions, from direct action and special reconnaissance to unconventional warfare and foreign internal defense. In addition to the standard SEAL teams, there are several specialized units within the SEAL community. One of the most well-known is the Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU), often referred to as SEAL Team Six. Originally formed in 1980 to combat terrorism, DEVGRU has since become the U.S. Navy's premier special mission unit, conducting high-risk operations that require a high degree of precision and secrecy. DEVGRU operators undergo rigorous selection and training processes, ensuring that only the most elite individuals are part of this elite unit. The unit's operations are often conducted in conjunction with other special operations forces, such as the Army's Delta Force and the CIA's Special Activities Center, to achieve strategic objectives. Another specialized unit is the Special Warfare Combatant-craft Crewmen (SWCC), who operate and maintain specialized naval combatant craft. SWCC operators work closely with SEAL teams, providing insertion, extraction, and tactical mobility support. Their expertise in maritime operations complements the SEALs' capabilities, enabling joint missions that leverage the strengths of both units. The SWCC community is organized into several detachments, each specializing in different types of craft and mission profiles. The SEALs' organizational structure also includes the Naval Special Warfare Group (NSWG), which serves as the administrative and operational headquarters for all SEAL teams and units. The NSWG is responsible for overseeing training, equipment, and personnel management, ensuring that the SEALs remain at the forefront of special operations capabilities. The NSWG is further divided into regional commands, each aligned with a specific geographic area of responsibility, allowing for more effective coordination and deployment of SEAL assets. Throughout their history, the SEALs have proven their adaptability and effectiveness in various conflicts, from the Vietnam War to the Global War on Terror. Their organizational structure, characterized by specialized teams and units, enables them to tackle a wide range of missions, from counter-terrorism and hostage rescue to unconventional warfare and special reconnaissance. As the geopolitical landscape continues to evolve, the SEALs' ability to adapt and innovate will be crucial in maintaining their status as one of the world's most elite special operations forces.

Covert Operations and Notable Missions: A Look at SEALs in Action

Across the five-and-a-half-day ordeal that is Hell Week, trainees will get a total of maybe four hours of sleep, not per night, but in aggregate—as they are subjected to a physical training regime that goes above and beyond nearly any other on Earth. SEAL candidates will run over two hundred miles, 320 kilometers, over those five and a half days, with over twenty hours of each day alternating between physical training, and miserable stretches forced to lie in the sand as freezing ocean waves break over their backs. All the while, SEAL instructors don’t just berate their trainees; they invite, permit, and at times, even coax them to quit, offering hot coffee, good food, and sweet, blessed sleep to anybody who will give their three rings to that little bell. Hypothermia and hallucinations are not uncommon, trainees routinely need to be shaken awake from their four hot, quantity-unlimited meals a day, and there have been trainee deaths during this phase, including one in early 2022 due to acute pneumonia shortly after finishing. Although the precise rate of passage from Hell Week is unknown, estimates range anywhere from three in ten dropouts, on the generous end, to more than seven out of ten on the high end—just in the span of a week, and just including SEAL candidates who already made it to the Hell Week ordeal. Those who make it through Hell Week, however, have satisfied several key criteria for their eventual inclusion among the ranks of the SEALs. They’ve proven that they can keep a clear head under extreme duress, without sleep, in brutal cold, much as operators will have to do as part of their most extreme and challenging missions. They’ve proven that their body is physically able to handle the rigors of what they’ve been through, without any medical emergency so severe that they’d have to be pulled from the program. They’ve proven to their fellow SEALs that they can be trusted to endure and push through when people are depending on them, and they’ve proven to themselves that they can survive one of the most difficult experiences a person can voluntarily undergo, even as every physical and mental instinct was begging them to give up. After finally reaching the conclusion of Hell Week, candidates will often sleep for upwards of twenty hours straight, nearly comatose during that time. They’ll sleep, eat, and hydrate themselves back into something vaguely resembling a human being, replenishing after an experience that typically shaves off anywhere from ten to thirty pounds from the bodies of those who complete it. They’ve got to be ready to go again on Monday morning, but once they return, their situation is different. They’ll still lay in the surf, complete their runs, and do more push-ups than any person should have to do, but it’ll be at a significantly reduced rate for a little while, as candidates are sent to a classroom to learn about hydrographic charts. Unfortunately for these trainees, however, Hell Week and all it entails are still just Phase One. From the first phase, trainees move into Phase Two, a seven-week deep-dive, pun intended, into the practice of basic combat swimming. During this period, SEAL candidates learn to be even more comfortable in the water than they were forced to be during Hell Week, learning two separate kinds of SCUBA diving, the basics of dive medicine, various underwater survival skills, and combat SCUBA. By the end of the seven-week course, SEAL candidates are able to fully function as combat divers, qualifying to move on by completing several long-distance surface and underwater swims: a timed swim of two miles, and non-timed swims of three and a half miles and five and a half miles, respectively. It’s this phase that grants SEALs the repertoire of skills that separates them from every other Special Operations element of the US military, including a full combat-diving competency that they maintain alongside the skills of a high-level special operator on land. And it’s Phase 3 of BUD/S, where those land-based skills come into focus. Unlike most sailors of the US Navy, SEALs have to be fully competent in all manner of land combat and navigation, in order to actually be of any use once they get out of the water in their amphibious role.

Interagency Cooperation and Collaboration: SEALs and Other Special Operators

For the first two weeks of the land warfare phase, trainees are often in classrooms, learning to handle various weapons and use a compass and map, while they spend the remainder of their time engaged in small-unit tactical drills, basic practical assignments, and, of course, physical conditioning. Then, they ship out to San Clemente Island off the California coast, a 57-square-mile island that’s entirely under the control of the US Navy. Over five weeks, trainees engage in continual exercises with minimal sleep, often working with live explosives and ammunition, and trying to meet the highest physical benchmarks yet, while enduring the harshest punishments from their instructors. The sheer challenge of this portion of Phase 3 is often regarded as being second only to Hell Week. Finish Phase 3, and a SEAL candidate has officially made it through BUD/S…but their work is nowhere near finished yet. Candidates will then move on to static-line and parachute drop training in San Diego, in an accelerated three-week program that will ultimately see them parachuting in at night, with combat equipment, from about ten thousand feet. Then, they pass to SEAL Qualification Training, and engage in all the various sorts of practical training they’ll need in order to keep up with SEAL units in the field. During this time, trainees will perfect everything from their marksmanship, to their small-unit tactics, to their close-quarters and unarmed combat, to their medical skills. They’ll attend cold-weather training in Kodiak, Alaska, and attend SERE school, Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape training, meant to help them endure and survive in the event that they’re captured by adversary forces. It’s here, at the conclusion of SEAL Qualification Training, that a Navy SEAL Candidate finally becomes a Navy SEAL. They’re awarded the SEAL Trident, assigned immediately to a team, and sent to join their new comrades in arms wherever they may be stationed. There’s still a good deal more training left ahead of them, starting with Individual Specialty Training, where individual SEALs will be sent off to gain core competencies via a wide range of formal and informal training programs. Some of those programs, as listed by the US Navy, are the SEAL Sniper Course or the Marine Scout Sniper Course, Advanced Special Operations, Advanced Demolition, High-Threat Protective Security, Combat Medic school, Surreptitious Entry school, drone school, and language school, among others. Then, SEALs will head to their Unit Training Level, another six months to add even more new combat skills, including urban warfare, work with rotary and fixed-wing aircraft, and maritime interdiction, among other things. Then, they’ll go to Task Group Level Training, where they learn to integrate with all the various specialized teams and groups that work in the periphery to the SEAL teams: everybody from Special Boat Teams to linguists to cryptologists and even more past that. Eventually, after what will ultimately be another year to eighteen months of training, SEALs will ship out on their first deployment, and finally reap the rewards of a journey that will have consumed years of their lives—all for the privilege of doing even more trying, and more dangerous work out in the field. Operations and Operational Future. Ever since the Vietnam era, Navy SEALs have earned their world-renowned reputation with an incredible range and volume of missions, a high proportion of which are still kept secret today. Luckily for us in the public domain, however, a fair number of those operations are publicly catalogued, and we can take a look at some of them here. Before we do, just a quick note on sourcing; unlike most of the American special-operations community, the Navy SEALs have built one hell of a reputation for their many written works, their many podcasts, and a range of other public storytelling about their exploits, some of which is dubious in its accuracy, and most of which can’t be externally verified without help from the American Department of Defense.

The Lasting Impact of the Navy SEALs: Implications and Consequences of their Operations

So, rather than relying on those sources whilst robbing SEALs of stories that are theirs to tell, we’re going to stick to the basics—but there are abundant resources out there, if you’d like to learn more. In the post-Vietnam era, the successes of the SEALs are many, and they trace back to just about every large-scale military engagement America has been part of since that time. During the Iran-Iraq War, SEALs conducted frequent interdiction and seizure operations against Iranian mine-laying boats, while during the invasion of Panama in 1989, the SEALs destroyed President Manuel Noriega’s private jet, his personal gunboat, and a major airfield. During Operation Desert Shield, they took several oil platforms and faked a major amphibious assault, using a team of just seven men to set off explosives and make the Iraqi military believe an invasion was coming. In Somalia, SEAL snipers would take part of the Battle of Mogadishu, while in Afghanistan, they’d run a wide range of reconnaissance, sabotage, and covert infiltration missions in al-Qaeda territory, often alongside other elite American operators. Starting in 2010, they engaged in a range of counterterror operations, captures, assassinations, and rescues, including one particularly famous operation on May the second, 2011, when members of SEAL Team Six killed al-Qaeda leader and 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden. In Iraq, the SEALs seized a range of targets corresponding to the country’s lucrative oil industry, ands prevented the destruction of a critical dam that could have flooded the city of Baghdad. SEAL snipers played a critical role in the Second Battle of Fallujah, and racked up a tremendous amount of experience during counterinsurgent operations across the span of the American Iraq intervention. They’d see action in the Philippines, across Africa, and alongside the Kurdish Peshmerga in operations against the Islamic State insurgency. That’s not to say that the work of the SEALs has been easy. During America’s 1983 invasion of Grenada, SEAL operators ran into major trouble due to a range of simultaneous causal factors, losing four team members to drowning after airborne water insertion, and spending a night pinned down in the country’s Governor’s Mansion before being extracted by Marines. Another SEAL unit during that same operation was forced to flee the island under fire from Grenadian and Cuban troops after a long attempt to defend their position, only being rescued hours later from the open sea. The airfield seizure in Panama that we mentioned before, would come at the expense of four SEALs dead and thirteen wounded—after the SEALs had voiced concerns that airfield seizures were more the purview of the Army Rangers than themselves. They’d take significant losses in Afghanistan, in a range of battles and skirmishes, owing to their role as the tip of the spear in highly dangerous environments. One such instance, the events known as Operation Red Wings, would lead to the deaths of eleven SEALs as well as eight Army Night Stalkers, who we’ve covered in a separate Special Operators episode if you’re interested. Twenty-three more SEALs would be killed when their heavy-lift Chinook helicopter was shot down while trying to assist a group of Army Rangers under fire. In all, over 140 Navy SEALs have died in combat or on duty since 1962, according to the website Veteran Tributes. Unfortunately for their families and communities, the circumstances behind many of those SEALs’ deaths remains classified, and probably will for quite a while. In the years to come, the SEALs are likely to be at the bleeding edge of American military operations around the world, exactly as they’ve been over the last few decades. But as they continue to work in that role, they’ll have to deal with a rapidly changing battlefield and geopolitical environment, as tactical trends shift toward the widespread use of drone technology, and new battle lines in eastern Europe and the Indo-Pacific seem at risk of drawing American special operators into the fray.

Legacy and Evolution: The Future of the Navy SEALs in an Changing World

The legacy of the Navy SEALs is indelibly etched in the annals of American military history, tracing back to their inception under President John F. Kennedy in 1962. Originally conceived to conduct unconventional warfare and counter-guerrilla operations, the SEALs have evolved into a global force, operating in diverse theaters from the jungles of Vietnam to the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan. Their adaptability and versatility have been crucial in responding to the shifting landscape of global threats, from the Cold War era to the contemporary fight against terrorism. Today, the SEALs remain at the forefront of America's special operations capabilities, conducting missions in hotspots such as Syria, Yemen, and sub-Saharan Africa, even in times of relative peace. The SEALs' operational prowess is unparalleled, with units like DEVGRU (formerly SEAL Team Six) and the Regimental Reconnaissance Company executing some of the most daring and high-stakes missions. DEVGRU, in particular, gained international acclaim for its role in Operation Neptune Spear, the mission that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden in 2011. This operation underscored the SEALs' ability to operate in hostile environments with precision and stealth, a capability that sets them apart from other elite units like the Army Rangers and Delta Force. However, the SEALs face significant internal challenges that threaten to undermine their reputation and effectiveness. Recent reports have highlighted a "corrupt element" within the organization, involving allegations of lawlessness, drug use, and physical abuse. High-profile cases, such as the controversies surrounding Eddie Gallagher and the strangulation of Special Forces soldier Logan Melgar, have cast a shadow over the SEALs' storied history. These incidents, coupled with criticisms of the brutal selection process that has resulted in multiple deaths and injuries, indicate a need for reform within the ranks. The SEALs' selection course, known as Hell Week, has been particularly contentious, with critics arguing that its extreme nature leads to unnecessary risks and harm. Since 1953, at least 11 men have died during this grueling training, raising questions about the balance between toughness and safety. Despite these challenges, the SEALs' unique capabilities and proven track record ensure their continued relevance in the U.S. military. They operate in a niche that few other units can fill, conducting missions that require a high degree of specialization and expertise. Their results in the field, from counterterrorism operations to hostage rescues, speak volumes about their effectiveness. As the global security landscape continues to evolve, the SEALs will need to adapt, addressing internal issues while maintaining their operational edge. This will involve not only toughening up the selection process but also ensuring that the values of integrity and discipline are upheld throughout the organization. Looking ahead, the SEALs will likely play a crucial role in future conflicts, whether in large-scale engagements or low-intensity operations. Their ability to operate in diverse environments, from urban jungles to remote deserts, makes them an invaluable asset. As they continue to evolve, the SEALs must also engage with the civilian world, addressing criticisms and maintaining transparency. This will be essential in preserving their legacy and ensuring that they remain a symbol of American military excellence. Whether in San Diego, California, or Virginia Beach, Virginia, the SEALs' training grounds will continue to produce elite operators ready to face the challenges of an ever-changing world. Their history, from the beaches of Normandy during World War II to the streets of Iraq, is a testament to their adaptability and resilience. As they confront the challenges of the 21st century, the SEALs will need to draw on this rich legacy, ensuring that they remain at the cutting edge of special operations and counterterrorism.

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Jackson Reed

Jackson Reed creates and presents analysis focused on military doctrine, strategic competition, and conflict dynamics.

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