cqbseal

I dredged up some more of this from the dead files, old floppy disks. Some comments made about political figures are the author's own view and are not endorsed by any government organization or agency.



On my second Christmas holiday break; I was at my grandparent's house for the holidays. My grandfather, a tall, thin man, had served proudly in the Marines during World War II. He had been drafted at age 32. My grandmother, a shorter woman of mixed European descent, was an excellent cook. I had flown home in my cadet dress uniform and had received many comments during the flight. Dad was supposed to be home soon as he was currently involved in a field training exercise or FTX. I had asked my grandfather on numerous occasions about the war as he had been in the Pacific Theater and seen some heavy action. All I could ever get him to say about it was that it was a nightmare and he was glad it was over. Dad finally showed up Christmas day after dinner. He looked tired and worn out from the FTX and still wearing his field uniform. We sat and talked by the fireplace after everyone else had gone to bed. We talked about the sacrifices you had to make, the split second decisions, the camaraderie, the mind numbing tasks. This talk made me more determined to be a professional soldier. He left again just before the New Year and I went back to the academy on the 3rd.



I joined the SEALs without ever really hearing about Naval Special Forces. It was purely by accident or design that I got in. I was just finishing up my A school in Damnet Virginia when I first saw the position listed on the 'Dream Board'. The board was just outside the in-service detailer, basically a military recruiter for those already in the service. I watched as fellow sailors looked at the board, grabbed the postings or just read them and walked off. This particular posting was read a lot and left behind. I had read it until I could almost recite it verbatim. This posting was for an Intelligence Specialist at Special Warfare Group Two, San Diego, California. With two weeks to go until the school was finished, this was one of the few listings left on the board. I walked to the board and yanked it loose and strode determinedly into the detailers office. At the first empty desk I sat down and thrust the paper at the petty officer sitting there. He read it, looked at me and then read it again. He asked over and over if this is what I wanted.


Of course, I said yes. He then went on to explain to me that no one ever really volunteered for this position and the command normally 'volunteered' someone for it. I had my mind set for that job and told him so in no uncertain words. He nodded, shrugged, stood and got coffee, offered me some, smoked a cigarette and then finally started typing my request. He told me he was going to add a waiver so if I got there and didn?t like it I could come back and try for another listing. I was wary of that waiver. Never had I heard of someone getting something like that and I immediately thought bullshit but accepted it anyway as he tucked it into my transfer file.




Clint was watching the Ranger patrol when he spotted a small group of Somali technicals moving on a parallel course to the Rangers. I swung the rifle over and watched them in the scope. To call these technicals a truck would be too kind. Most of them were chopped pickup trucks of various manufacturers that had been mounted with any and all crew served weapons left lying around after the fall of the government. Mogadishu city was broken down into sections with the tribal clans and ex-military forces exerting control over them. Mohammed Adid had been a general in the former government and had one of the largest militia forces. The UN forces had moved into the Mog' and created a neutral area around the Bakara Market. Inside the Market area, it was the Wild West. President Clinton had a woody for this guy because some Pakistani troops had made a mistake and over twenty of them got killed for it. Add to the fact that this was the U.S.'s first foray into a United Nations operation since Korea. Clinton, a really knowledgeable guy in military operations, sent, at the request of another rocket scientist, Anthony Lake, the National Security Advisor, U.S. Army Rangers and Delta Force to get Adid and bring him in. Of course this was after they had put over 15,000 soldiers, sailors and airmen into this theater under the pretext of feeding the people and restoring peace. The problem was they didn't know how to find him. Adid's forces were heavily armed, motivated and financed by illegal narcotics flown in from neighboring countries and the looted government treasury. United Nation forces had tried to broker a cease-fire, but when dealing with a starving population that will do anything for a meal and a bunch of armed, trained personnel who by noon were stoned and high on drugs, it was a losing game.


When dad got transferred to Fort Lewis Washington, mom was ecstatic because her parents didn't live that far from there. During the summer break of my sixth year in the academy, I was able to spend the entire summer home because I had become a mid classman and as they say, rank has its privileges. Dad was finally going to be home more often and not take long deployments. It was during this summer that dad told me that I would no longer be able to attend Randolph Macon. I was crestfallen. This was my chance to become the best of the best and now it was being taken away. I didn't know how to react. I wanted to scream, cry, hit him, I really didn't know what to do. He calmed me down and explained that because this was his last duty station and we wouldn?t be moving from post to post anymore, that it was best for me to get some roots here and enter the public school system. So the family bought a moderate sized piece of acreage and we moved out into the country. The summer flew by, as we were all busy moving in and setting up. My grandparents would be on the other half of the property as they were getting on in years and I think maybe mom and dad wanted them there for when I got home from school. Mom had decided to go back to work as she felt I was old enough to take care of myself, and of course grandpa was there to keep me in line.






We were pulled into the airfield perimeter after an incident that occurred outside our building one morning. Clint, Jimmy Webb, our team chief and myself were pulling bunker duty that morning. It was a bunker in name only. Small, cramped and having only a partial roof, luxurious it wasn't. The three of us, packed into this thing, and being all pretty good size, made for a tight squeeze. Clint was armed with a M203, which is a M16 shortened into what was being called the M4, with a 40mm grenade launcher mounted under the rifle barrel. This weapon was essentially a breech loaded undersize mortar as it fired from the same principle, aim it higher, the further it travels. The M4 even came with flip up sights for use with the grenade launcher. Webb had a M249, which is basically a newer, foreign made version of the Stoner LWMG, which first saw use in the teams during the Vietnam conflict. The 249 is an excellent weapon system as it can use the M16 magazine, linked belts, and large, 30round box or drum magazines. I had left my Barrett inside and was only armed with an M4 and my sidearm. The bunker was too small for the five and half foot long .50-caliber rifle. The bunker did have one of the team's M60E3's, of which I was manning. I had moved it over to one side so Webb could use the other side and put Clint in the middle. Shortly after 10am, a crowd was starting to form at the end of the block. This was still the neutral area so it wasn?t a problem. Our sniper/spotter team on the roof told us about them before we actually saw them. They reported that there were weapons present and also women and children in the crowd.