Inside SEAL Team Six(18)

I saw a group of four very fit guys covered from head to toe in camouflage and riding a rubber Zodiac boat over high surf. The narrator said, “These elite commandos are defined by their extreme fitness and training and what instructors call the ‘fire in the gut.’”

I learned that the acronym SEAL comes from sea, air, and land, and that SEALs worked in small units and trained to perform the most difficult military tasks under any type of circumstance, in any type of environment—from deserts to frozen mountain peaks, jungles, and urban areas.

I was fascinated. I’d loved pushing myself since I was a kid, and I said to myself, That’s the job for me!

Over the next few days I soaked up as much info about the SEALs as I could. From a book at the base library I found out that the SEALs had been created in the early 1960s when President Kennedy was looking for small units to resist the Vietcong in the jungles, coasts, and rivers of Vietnam.

Developed as a more versatile, state-of-the-art-of-war version of the Navy’s underwater demolition teams (UDTs), which had blown up bridges and tunnels during the amphibious phases of the Korean War, the SEALs quickly distinguished themselves by going behind enemy lines, raiding enemy camps, sabotaging supplies, cutting off enemy communications, and destroying stored ammunitions.

And I learned that their training was brutal—the toughest of any military force in the world.

All Navy SEALs have to graduate from a BUD/S selection and training course. I went to my commanding officer a few days later and said, “Sir, I respectfully request permission for orders to BUD/S.”

He read me the requirements. The candidate:



Has to be an active-duty member of the U.S. Navy

Has to be a man twenty-eight years or younger with good vision

Has to be a U.S. citizen

Has to pass the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery



Check, check, check, check.

“Is that all?” I asked.

“You also have to pass a stringent physical screening test.”

“I’m ready, sir.”

A couple days later, I swam five hundred yards in fewer than 12.5 minutes; completed forty-two push-ups in under two minutes and fifty sit-ups in under two minutes; and did six pulls-ups. Then I had to run one and a half miles in boots and long pants. (Of course, these were Navy standards, and the SEALs wanted a lot more than that. Also, the standards in the 1970s were a bit different than they are today.)

Piece of cake. Now I had the score qualifying me for BUD/S noted in my new service record. Boy, was I proud!

I said, “All right, sir, I’m ready to join.”

“Not so fast, recruit.”

“Why not, sir?”

He said, “You think the SEALs want brand-new recruits with only eight weeks of training? You’ve got to go to corpsman school first.”

The Navy recruiter in New Haven—a real charming character who called himself Diamond Jim Brady—had told me that my aptitude test showed that I had the ability to be a corpsman.

“What’s a corpsman?” I had asked.

“It’s basically the Navy’s version of a medic. You’ll get to work with some pretty nurses, and you’ll get a chance to take care of people.”

So after basic training, I went to corpsman school, where I learned how to run sick call, stop bleeding, administer CPR, and give medications.

After completing two months of hospital corpsman training, I asked about joining the SEALs again. This time I was told that I needed at least a year of experience on a ship or at command or clinic first.

The Navy assigned me to the Naval Regional Medical Center in Newport, Rhode Island. It was an old brick hospital built at the turn of the century; seeing it today, you’d think it was the setting for the movie Shutter Island. And it reeked of mildew and disinfectant.

But Newport was gorgeous, had great places to run, and was near where my parents lived. So, all in all, it wasn’t a bad assignment.

I did rotations in the ER and OR—where I administered to all the young Marines who got into fights and accidents on the weekends—and in the ARS (alcohol rehab service), where I developed a friendship with a young drug addict named Ron. When Ron was told he was being released, he protested loudly, because he didn’t think he was ready.

I tried to calm him down by telling him that he’d be okay, he’d make new friends, and I’d come visit him. When that didn’t work, I went to the counselors to see if I could get them to change their minds.

But when I went back to look for Ron, I couldn’t find him. I searched his room, the rec rooms, the cafeteria, the halls.

Then I noticed that a door to a room that was normally left open had been closed. I turned the knob, but it was locked. After I knocked and got no answer, I kicked the door in, only to discover that the bathroom door was locked too.