The Origins and History of The Navy Seals

The American military force is well known around the world, America has the best militaries in the world. America has the best Army, Air Force, Marines, and the Navy Seals. Navy Seals are one of the most unique military branches that the United States has. The Navy Seals are only known for a couple of issues that the United States has had. If the United States did not have the Navy Seals Osama Bin Laden would still be alive and America would not be the best country in the world if it was not for them.

The Navy Seals origin can be traced back to when they were first called Raiders and Scouts, but they were not officially the Navy Seals. The beginning of the Navy Seals started after World War I. Though the Raiders and the Scouts are no longer apart of the military, the Raiders and Scouts were the start of a new branch in the military (Pratt).

At the beginning of the Navy Seals students go through a very intense and important boot camp. No matter how much training one has the instructor will not be able to tell how students will react once they are in the field (Navy). During training many of the men will think about quitting and some will actually quit (Navy). Many students contemplate quitting, the time that they think of quitting the most is when they are sitting down and eating a meal, when they actually have time to think about what happened that day (Navy Seals).

Many of the men that come through training have the mental picture of being like Rambo, running through an open field, shooting a gun and at the end of the mission being able to save a girl (Navy Seals), the Rambo idea is not a realistic thing because one it is a movie, and the second thing is that the training that students go through for 12 months is for learning what kind of person they are and to see if they have what it takes to be a Navy Seal.

The next thing that they work on is the students physical shape, students will need to be in the best physical shape of their life if they want to graduate from Navy Seals training (Navy, Pratt). During the training students will learn how to operate a boat, they will also learn how to go into combat from a helicopter, plane, and by swimming. Students will have to complete these tasks without being noticed by their enemy, during their training the “enemy” is their instructor (Pratt). Training will also include how to calculate diving and how diving into deep waters can affect the body. The most important thing before entering training is to graduate high school, graduating will be the first big step into adult hood and this will be very important to have going into the Navy seals (Seven steps), learning the basics of math, English, and history could mean how fast students learn in the military (seven). There are seven steps to become a Navy Seal, the first thing that a student will need is to be a good team player. If the student does not get along with others and has problems with working as a team then they most likely will not make the cut. The second most important thing to have while going through training is to have outstanding leadership skills, if the student wants to make it through training he will need to make fast rational decisions. The next thing he or she will need is to be well rounded with studying, if the students does not study hard then they will have a hard time during training.

Instructors teach about team work; the whole training process is based on team work. Many of the Navy recruiters will pick athletes because they have a general base on how a team works together. If one person on a football team does not do what they are supposed to do, then the whole play goes to crap (Navy seals). The Navy Seals are all in on the same page when it comes to team work, during training many of the courses that the students have to complete are done with the others in their platoon (Navy seals). The instructors have students work with the rest of the platoon because they want the students to be able to get an idea of why team work is an important thing to have while in the military.

Another big part of being a Navy Seal is to be able to pay attention to detail. Students need to have this skill because some of the training courses deal with hooking up land mines, and underwater mines (Navy Seals). An instructor asked one student to carry a boat motor along on the beach (Navy seals). As a part of training students will have to go through a cold water simulation, which is in the ocean near California. The water that comes down from Alaska runs right by the training camp in California (Navy Seals).

Over the years training has been modified and changed to get the most out of one person, the only thing that has not changed is that training has not gotten any easier. One of the main reason why instructors are so aggressive and intense is so they that only the best will get through. Instructors try to break their students into quitting, this is the only way an instructors will know if the best of the best to graduate and the instructors make sure that the students go through the pain and agony (Navy Seals). If the instructors aren’t intense then the students will not be properly trained (Navy Seals).

Training for the Navy Seals is one of the most exhausting thing that a person could do, even though the job is demanding of the human body people still sign up to protect their country. The transformation the occurs while at the Navy Seals training is unrealistic to when the students first got there (Navy).

After World War I the Navy seals were an idea, the government new that they needed a well-rounded team that could tackle any job that the government had for them (Navy seals). During World War II the government new that they needed their well-rounded squad to be ready when they were called upon. In the summer of 1942 the government had decided that the father of the U.S. Navy Seals was going to be Phil Bucklew, he was a 6’2” 220-pound leader that was ready to take action with the team that the government would give him.

The only issue was that the government didn’t give any troops to Phil Bucklew, so Phil had to do all the searching for volunteers and recruiting for the men that he thought would be the best for his squad, if they could pass the training. That summer Phil Bucklew had gotten 10 volunteers in his squad and started training right away, and of course Bucklew was the commander (The). Training in 1942 for the Navy seals was mainly based on shooting and becoming experts at driving rubber boats and being able to shoot a.50 caliber.

During World War II the government new that they needed their well-rounded squad to be ready and the Navy seals new that they could sit back anymore, but there was an issue that hadn’t been thought of, the United states had not landed in enemy ground since Teddy Roosevelt was president in 1898 in Cuba (Navy Seals). The Navy seals knew that they had to take action, but that issue that was thought of did not help their situation (Navy Seals).

While Phil Bucklew was commander the recruiters looked for applicants that had a history in athletics, the reason why the recruiters did this was because you needed to be in top physical shape. Anyone that was in the Navy seals had been to college for sports (The). After the Navy Seals had their unit set and stone the military made a second group of Seals in July 7, 1943 (Navy). The third group was made and stationed in china, the only problem was that they did not have enough troops. Admiral Ernest J. King declared that they needed 120 officers and 900 men to be trained and skilled so they could be able to send more men to different Seal groups (Navy).

The Navy Seals were named after the environment, the sea, air, and land. The new branch that they had come up with would be the most respected and feared (Navy). Many things that the Navy seals did was amazing, they started a new branch in the military.

In 1956 Haiti had many issues with their government. During this time many Presidents have come and gone, until one president who was thought to make things better for the Haitians. This president was Papa Doc, which a nickname that the citizens of Haiti gave him because before becoming a president he was a doctor (Dockery 721). During Papa docs presidency the citizens were not happy, the economy was failing and had been for years and Papa Doc did not have the qualifications to run a country. Papa doc did not have any experience with a military and did not was not qualified to help the economy in any way, he also believed in voodoo which did not help his presidency at all (Dockery 721).

While the Haitian population was in poverty they had no chance of escaping, as things got worse citizens of Haiti started to escape with poor boats to the united states. After Papa Doc died in 1971 his son Baby Doc took over as being the president. The poverty in Haiti had not gotten any better with either of the Docs as dictator, Baby doc was only president for a little while until the military of Haiti over threw him (Dockery 721).

After Baby doc was overthrown the citizens were looking forward the election in 1990. The citizens had elected Jean Bertrand Aristride to becoming the president of Haiti (Dockery 721). During this time the Haitian population was still trying to escape the poverty Bill Clinton decided to send the Navy Seals to help enforce the economic Embargo against Haiti (Dockery 721). This mission was called Support Democracy, during the embargo Haitian people still wanted to escape no matter what the cost was.

The U.S. had 600 ships combined with allied warships. During the first five months the U.S. had 600 ship boarding’s on smuggler boats (Dockery 721). To avoid the U.S. ships, the smugglers had to use smaller ships that would be able to go into shallower water. The smugglers went into shallower water because the big U.S. Navy ships could not go into the water close to the shore (Dockery 722)

On September 30, 1991 the military removed Jean Aristride from office (Dockery 721). After Aristride was removed from the office the United States put an economic Sanction in place against Haiti (Dockery 721). After Haiti and the United States figured out a way to make Haiti economically stable again, the United States then launched a new mission, Restore Democracy.

45 years later on September 11, 2001 people in New York City had witnessed something that seemed impossible (Dockery 726). An American air line 767 flight 11 had been taken over by an unknown person. The plane that was taken over had crashed into the world trade center (Dockery 726). As people watched the building go up in smoke people started to realize that what they were witnessing wasn’t an accident, 11 minutes after the first crash another plane had run into the south World Trade Center (Dockery 726).

The second plane had flown from Boston to New York. As the towers were up in smoke the south tower was the first tower to collapse due to the metal being soft from the heat (Dockery 726). President George W. Bush had given a warning to the Al- Qaeda and followers of Osama Bin Laden (Dockery 727). While president Bush was starting to plan out how he wanted to look for Laden, Osama had enough time to retreat back to the mountains of Afghanistan to hide from the United States.

President Bush formed Operation Enduring Freedom on October 7, 2001. This meant that the United States would send over 100 Navy Seals on the ground and the air force would be sending strikes to Afghanistan to draw out Laden (Dockery 726). The United States had taken out as many of the Al-Qaeda and Taliban members as they could by air strikes (Dockery 726). While the United States had the Navy Seals on the ground already fighting, the Navy Seals were looking for a man that had been wanted for many years before 9/11, after 9/11 Laden became to most wanted man in the world (Dockery 728).

While the Navy Seals were looking for Osama Bin Laden they had searched through three miles of caves, they found tourist maps of New York City and weapons (Dockery 728). Even though the Navy Seals had top notch training they were prepared for the weather and mountains of Afghanistan, some of the mountains reached the sky as high as 6,500 feet in elevation. The Navy Seals were on a “boots on the ground” mission which meant that they were prepared for face to face war (Dockery 728). The first Navy seal to die during the hunt for Osama Bin Laden was Neil Roberts, His helicopter was shot down when he was trying to land. Neil Roberts jumped from his helicopter trying to give all the fight that he had to find Osama Bin Laden (Dockery 729). After Neil Roberts death the government had been investigating whether he can earn a Medal of Honor (Dockery 729).

In 1991 the nation of Somalia had decided that they did want to follow the 21-year-old dictator, they later threw the dictator out of office. The nation never found a replacement for Siad Barre which cause the warlords to form across the country (Dockery 715-716). The warlords would with other clans to survive against other big warlords. The warlords would do anything to build their status up as a warlord, this meant that they would destroy farms and steal food from anyone who had food (Dockery 716), 100,000 people died due to starvation caused by the warlords (Dockery 716).

In the United States President George W. Bush declared Operation Relief, which meant that he was going to send troops over to Somalia to get things under control (Dockery 716). With the mission set in place the Navy Seals did not have most pleasant mission, the Navy Seals were sent to Somalia to secure a landing spot for the boats. The water that the military had to go through was highly contaminated with sewage and other unknown contents (Dockery 716). Many Navy seals got sick from this mission due to having contaminated water and the bad smell. While the Navy Seals were there they had the go ahead to shoot down any war lords that they came across because they were such a burden (Dockery 716).

Once the Marines had shown up the Navy Seals were ordered to set up snipers along the bank of the Harbor, they had to do this because the warlords would come and fire at the Marines while they had to dive underneath the sewage to make sure the landing spot was satisfactory for the boats (Dockery 716). As the fire fell the United States Commander came to the conclusion that if they wanted the fighting to stop they would have to eliminate the warlord leader (Dockery 719).

While the decision was being made a Navy Seal sniper had spotted a warlord gun runner hiding behind a rock with an RPG-7, the Navy Seal knew that the RPG-7 would cause to much damage for the whole squad to make it out alive. The Navy Seal decided to make a quick decision to load a 700 grain bullet into the M88.50 cal. The Navy Seal shot and luckily hit the gunrunner behind the rock wall (Dockery 720).

On October 3rd a commander was shot in the back of Humvee while traveling to a new location for a mission, the commander was shot in the hip but a knife that he was wearing had stopped the bullet. The bullet shattered the knife and was pushed into the skin of the commander (Dockery 720). The commander was not in a life threatening condition. As they got to their new mission they received more gun fire, 18 Americans had died, 70 of the American soldiers were badly injured, and 1000 of the Somalian troops were killed or injured (Dockery 720).

On November 1, 1963 South Vietnam was attacked by guerillas from North Vietnam. The leader of South Vietnam was Diem; he was later killed by the attacks by North Vietnam (Dockery 332). The attacks started because North Vietnam was a communist country and the south was not and the north did not like that (Dockery). A few weeks after Diem was assassinated, president John f. Kennedy was assassinated (Dockery 332).

The Viet. Cong tried to get to the south before the United States could send back up to south Vietnam (Dockery 332). The United States was sending the Navy Seals into South Vietnam as fast as they could because the Viet. Cong was getting more men by the day, Viet. Cong was getting weapons and other materials to go to war with South Vietnam and the United States (Dockery 332). The Navy Seals had finally arrived in South Vietnam, the United states started to bomb the north as soon as the seals got there, this mission was called Ho Chi Minh Trail (Dockery 332). The Viet. Cong knew that they would not be able to take on South Vietnam and the United States. The Viet. Cong had to move fast to beat America to South Vietnam. The United States was on the way when the Viet. Cong was receiving more men and weapons to go to war, America knew that if they wanted South Vietnam be free from dictatorship they would have to give a well put together plan to be the Viet. Cong.

While the Navy Seals were in Vietnam they realized that they were not prepared for the harsh conditions of Vietnam. The troops that america had sent over to Vietnam were not well trained in their enemies land, but the Navy Seals were trained to adapt fast and think quick on their feet. During the Vietnam war the Americans did know who was on the Americans side because the North and the South look very similar. The Navy Seals had to pay attention to detail very closely because the Viet. Cong would put mines all over the ground.

America is the best country in the world, no other country wants to be an enemy of America for four good reasons. The first reason is that no other country has a Navy Seals team like America, America has the best Army that cannot be competed with. The Marine teams that are set up in America are the best marines that anyone has seen, and the Air Force is so advanced that we have already beat. The military forces that america has will forever be the best. They will remain the best because they have a nation that realizes what they do for our country is unbelievable. Another reason why they will remain the best is that they trust every single person that is in the military no matter what race, gender, or beliefs.