Chapter 1


Five feet ten inches tall. One hundred seventy-five pounds.

That’s the average size of a U.S. Navy SEAL. Not exactly superhero proportions. I’m not here to dispel myths, but the truth is, SEALs for the most part look like ordinary guys. Fit as hell, sure, especially by the end of BUD/S, but not in a larger-than-life way, which I guess only goes to show that the old adage is true: you can’t judge a book by its cover.

There is no “typical” SEAL. We come from all walks of life and from all parts of the country. I knew guys who struggled to get through high school. I knew others who were straight-A college graduates. Most of us were in our late teens or early twenties, full of adolescent energy; others were a decade older, already settled into an adult life that I could barely comprehend. I got to know guys who had been exceptional athletes and who had physiques that appeared to have been chiseled from granite. Most of them didn’t make the cut. I also knew guys who were physically unimpressive and had little in the way of formal athletic training. Most of them fell by the wayside, too. That’s the nature of the SEAL program—doesn’t matter where you are from or what you have accomplished or failed to accomplish before you hit the beach in Coronado, California, for the start of BUD/S. You’re going to get your ass kicked; in all likelihood, you’ll find the experience so miserable that you’ll give up.

That is precisely the way it’s supposed to be. It’s not that the navy wouldn’t like more SEALs—it’s just that process is so relentlessly awful that only 20 percent succeed. The failure rate has remained consistent almost since the program began in the early 1960s, although modern-day SEALs can actually trace their lineage to the underwater demolition teams of World War II and the Korean War. This is by design. The point of BUD/S is not simply to torture the poor souls who are accepted into the training program but to ensure that only the strongest reach the finish line.

There is a method to the madness, and it is simply this: war is hell, and SEALs will venture into the fire in a uniquely dangerous and clandestine manner. They are expected to be physically fit, mentally strong, psychologically resilient, smart, and ferociously devoted to the cause. It’s not about blind patriotism, although SEALs are some of the most patriotic people I have ever known; nor is it about recklessly engaging in combat. Special Operations work is far more technical and precise than that; it requires discipline and diligence as much as it does courage or bloodlust. Indeed, to see a frequently outnumbered SEAL unit moving methodically and efficiently through a darkened building, eliminating one armed combatant after another in search of a high-value target, is to see a team working with machinelike precision. There is no room for the cowboy or the rogue warrior in this scenario. There is only professionalism and 100 percent commitment to the mission.

It’s not mindless execution, either, since the SEAL frequently encounters situations that vary dramatically from what he’d anticipated. You learn to think on your feet and to respond accordingly. It’s a brutal and often bloody job, one with extraordinarily high stakes, and no one pretends otherwise, so it makes sense that BUD/S is designed to eliminate all but the best candidates for this type of service.

There have been only minor changes made to the program over the years, and most of those, in the form of oversight and better medical care, have been instilled primarily for safety reasons. The beatdown is as relentless as it has ever been. Whatever growth there has been in the United States Navy’s Sea, Air, and Land (SEAL) program, it is not a result of BUD/S softening; it is just a function of more people entering the program. In the end, the result is always the same.

Twenty percent graduate.

Eighty percent fail.

What made me arrogant (or stupid) enough to think I’d be one of the 20 percent? I don’t have a good answer for that. Thinking about it now, as a thirty-four-year-old veteran with the wisdom of hindsight, it seems almost crazy. I enlisted in the navy, entered the SEAL program, and … well, I just kept putting one foot in front of the other. There was nothing special about my background. I was an ordinary kid from nowhere, Texas (actually a little town called Lumberton, located about fifteen miles north of Beaumont and a hundred miles east of Houston). But I wouldn’t quit. I knew what I wanted, and what I wanted was to be a Navy SEAL.

I couldn’t have been much more than twelve or thirteen years old when I started thinking about joining the military. And not just any branch of the service—I wanted to be a SEAL. I can’t really explain why I felt this way. A lot of people end up in the military because of lineage—they have close family members who served with distinction—and those that are drawn to Special Operations often have a background in sports or outdoor activities, such as hunting or fishing.

None of this really applied to me. I had a grandfather who had served in the navy and an uncle who had been in the army, but their service did not have a deep or persistent impact on my life; although I spent a fair amount of time with them, it wasn’t like I grew up hearing war stories at the dinner table. Despite being reared in East Texas, I wasn’t much of an outdoorsman, either. I did a little fishing as a kid, but I did not own a rifle and wasn’t an avid hunter. I wasn’t involved with the Cub Scouts or the Boy Scouts. I did some hiking and camping, and I liked being outdoors, but I was hardly an expert on wilderness survival. In middle school, if you’d thrown me down in a remote area, I likely would have sat there crying until someone came to my rescue. I wouldn’t have known how to forage for edible plants or find my way home.

This didn’t change much in high school, either. Although I played some football—because, after all, it was Texas—I wasn’t exceptionally talented. By tenth grade, I’d reached the conclusion that certain things in life were more important than others; at the top of the list, not surprisingly, were girls. If you wanted to have access to girls, you really needed a car. And if you wanted a car, then you needed money to buy the car. I suppose in some families, Mom or Dad provided the car and cash, but that wasn’t the case for me, nor for most of my friends.

I grew up in a trailer park, which might sound worse than it was. It was kind of a nice trailer park, and though my parents split up while I was in school, we all got along reasonably well, and I spent time at both homes. I never thought of myself as poor, but I was certainly aware of the fact that I had less than many other kids at school. It didn’t particularly bother me, and I never felt sorry for myself. It was just the way things were. Both my parents worked, and at the end of the day, there just wasn’t a lot of money left over. I was an only child, so I spent a lot of time by myself, trying to figure things out. For better or worse, I was a bit of a loner. But I was also a self-sufficient kid.

I don’t remember talking to my mother or father about wanting a set of wheels. There was no point. I knew what the answer would be. So instead, I slowly gave up sports and other extracurricular activities in exchange for a job at a local restaurant. And by restaurant, I mean a fried fish place that specialized in catfish—see, southeastern Texas bleeds into western Louisiana; Lumberton is only about an hour from Lake Charles, so I grew up with a bit of bayou culture, as well. Working at a catfish restaurant isn’t the most glamorous job in the world, but I didn’t mind. I’d wash dishes, clean the floors, bus tables … and generally do whatever was asked. I was one of the youngest kids in my peer group to have a job; far from being angry or embarrassed about it, I was proud to be out making my own money so that I didn’t have to ask my parents for things they couldn’t afford.

A lot of people look back on their first job and cringe at the memory. Not me. There was something appealing about showing up for work, being assigned a task, executing it to the best of my ability, and then going home at the end of the shift, knowing I was fifty or sixty bucks closer to buying a car, and proud that I hadn’t screwed anything up along the way. Whatever I was asked to do, I did. And I did it to the best of my ability and without bitching about it. I learned to keep pushing the proverbial mop until the job was done, and I kept my mouth shut—skills that would prove invaluable when I was getting my nuts punched 24-7 during Hell Week at BUD/S, and during much of my time in the navy, for that matter.

I did all right in school, and I had some street smarts, but I wasn’t exactly blessed with great intellect. Similarly, I wasn’t the most athletic kid. But I learned early on that I was a lot more resilient than most people. I could get my ass kicked and come back for more. I could go to a shitty job, day after day, and come home smelling like catfish and grease, night after night, and not whine about how much it sucked.

Well, most of the time, anyway.

By the time I was a junior in high school, I had opted for a work-study program that got me out of the classroom half the day so that I could work more hours and earn more money. I learned a hard lesson when I got fired for not putting in enough effort at one of my jobs, working as a landscaper for the local school district. Totally my fault. I tried to learn from that mistake. When you have a job, you do it. You don’t complain about it, and you don’t ask someone else to do it for you. Try to figure out what you want, and then go after it. If you want something badly enough, you devote every ounce of energy and focus to making it happen. No bullshit. No excuses.

Eventually, when I was close to graduating, I went to work for a company that specialized in the construction and service of cell towers and other high-rise structures. This provided an opportunity to work alongside my father, who also worked for the company, and who got me the job. On the plus side, it was real money—significantly more than I had earned mowing lawns or washing dishes. On the negative side, my father was my boss, which I think is tough for any kid.

I love my dad; we have a close relationship. Still, working for him was not the best experience of my life. But I didn’t let it affect my performance on the job. He was my boss, and you don’t always agree with your boss. That’s another lesson that served me well. Here’s the other thing about that job that proved invaluable: to do it well—or do it all—I had to conquer a significant level of fear. See, I’m terrified of heights. Or, at least, I used to be. Weird, right, considering that SEALs routinely parachute from planes or fast-rope out of a helicopter? Or, as I would discover, spend an inordinate amount of time hiking across the jagged ridgeline of a mountain in some remote Afghanistan province.

For some reason, though, none of those SEAL-related tasks affected me quite as acutely as working on a tower, a hundred feet in the open air and broad daylight. With skydiving, the ride up is the worst part. Once you reach a certain altitude, it’s no big deal: you just step out into the sky and let your gear do its job. There is no time to think or fret about the multiple ways in which things can go wrong. It’s almost surreal. One minute you’re sitting in the back of a plane, the next you are, quite literally, flying. In Special Operations, more often than not, you jump at night, anyway. But even in the daytime, skydiving is far less intimidating (to me, anyway) than a simple climbing exercise. From ten thousand feet, the earth doesn’t even look real. It’s just an enormous tapestry laid out before you, waiting to reach up and cradle you as you float gently to the ground.

But climbing? Hand over fist, for long stretches of time, with a hard and real view of the ground right there in front of you?

That will mess with your head in a whole different way.

Again, this is another of those things that makes it so hard to predict who is cut out for BUD/S and who isn’t. Just as you never know how someone will react to battle until the first shots are fired, it’s virtually impossible to know who will wilt under the relentless pressure of and exhaustion of BUD/S and who will find the inner strength to endure. The loudest and most arrogant guys are often the first to call it quits—not a surprise, because all that bluster just masks a lot of insecurity. Conversely, some of the quietest guys find a way to keep going, without complaint.

A lot of people who are afraid of heights wouldn’t even think about becoming a SEAL. An innate sense of self-preservation, combined with a desire to avoid embarrassment at all costs, would squash that dream before it even started. I figured it was an obstacle to overcome, but one that was hardly insurmountable. Every day, I showed up to work with my father and scaled up the bones of a tower or derrick, butterflies rumbling in my stomach. For the better part of eight hours, percolating in the South Texas heat and humidity, I’d push through my fear and anxiety. I wouldn’t say I ever got comfortable in that environment, but after a while I did become somewhat desensitized. By simply adhering to the routine and facing my fears every single day, I was able to cope with something I found extremely discomforting. I hated the job and the anxiety it provoked, but I liked the money, and I knew on some level that the experience would prove beneficial if I ever got a chance to enter the SEAL training program.

Most of this happened on a subconscious level. I was only seventeen years old and just trying to save some money before getting out of town. Looking back now, though, I can see how much I learned from that job and how it helped me to prepare for the challenges that lay ahead.

* * *

I graduated from high school in the spring of 2002. By that time, I had already enlisted in the U.S. Navy. Although I was a senior in high school on September 11, 2001, and thus a prime candidate to be instantly provoked into service by the sight of the Twin Towers crumbling to the ground, that wasn’t really the case. Don’t get me wrong—I was filled with anger and sadness by what happened on 9/11, and it contributed to my wanting to get out there and help find the people responsible for the attack and contribute in any way possible to making sure that it never happened again. It’s just that I had already decided that I was not only going to enter the military, I would also become a Navy SEAL. I knew that if I hung around my little town, and especially my neighborhood, I’d likely not amount to much. There was a significant drug scene among the kids in our trailer park, and it would have been easy to get sucked into it if I had stuck around. I had no interest in college, so my options were limited.

I also had no burning desire to simply serve in the navy. I want to be honest about that. There is nothing wrong with traditional military service. It’s vital to the American way of life and the freedom we value. But for me, as a seventeen-year-old kid itching to leave Texas and do something special with my life, and no real plan for making it happen?

For me, it was the SEALs or nothing.

The thing is, to become a SEAL, you have to start by enlisting in the navy. I did that many months before graduating from high school, with grudging cooperation from my parents. See, you can’t enlist in the military at the age of seventeen unless your parents sign the appropriate consent forms. My mom naturally had some reservations, if only because she questioned whether I knew what I was getting myself into, and because, after all, our country had just been attacked by terrorists, and at that time, no one had any idea what the ensuing military response entailed. My father, however, was into it; he was proud as hell that I wanted to be a SEAL. That’s the way I presented it to my parents. Not, “I want to enlist in the navy,” but rather, “I’m going to be a SEAL.” Not because it sounded better but because it was what I believed.

To my father, this represented a goal, and a noble one at that. I’m sure he was happy to see that I had found some purpose in life. I hadn’t been a problematic kid growing up. I managed to mostly avoid trouble through sports and school when I was younger and by working a lot of hours when I was older. Still, I had some friends who liked to raise a bit of hell, and I had a couple of little run-ins with the law when I was in high school. Very minor stuff related to underage drinking, but still, it was the kind of thing that a parent might find troublesome. My father was happy to see that I had some ambition, and I think he liked the idea of his son becoming a part of Special Operations at a time when the country was in the early stages of a sweeping wave of patriotism. Whether he thought I had any chance at achieving this goal is another matter. He certainly never conveyed any doubt to me. Not that it would have mattered. I believed with every fiber of my being that I was going to succeed. I attribute that primarily to being young and naïve. I’d read all the books about SEAL training. I’d seen the movies and documentaries. I knew, on some level, what was involved—the level of pain and degradation.

But like any epic journey, you have to see it—and live it—to believe it.

My mother was far less enthusiastic, or even accepting, than my father. Not a big surprise, I guess. Forget about the SEALs—she could not see past the inherent risk of enlisting in any branch of the military during such a volatile period in history. She was simply a mother worried about harm coming to her son. Practically speaking, though, there wasn’t much she could do to stop me. If she wouldn’t sign the forms when I was seventeen, then I would have just waited until after graduation when I turned eighteen and enlisted, anyway. Any opposition my parents might have presented was pointless, and they knew it.

At the end of the summer, I left for basic training in Chicago. It was the first time I had traveled any great distance on my own, so a bit of homesickness might have been expected. But I really wasn’t homesick. Some guys sign up for the military with a couple of buddies. Not me. I went entirely on my own, and as I flew out of Houston, I mainly just felt excitement about starting a new life. But it didn’t take long for my plans to go off course. In fact, it happened almost as soon as I arrived at boot camp, when I was pulled aside by an instructor who had reviewed my enlistment credentials and seemed surprised by my intention to enter SEAL training.

“You’re supposed to be going to submarine school,” he said.

“That’s right, Chief,” I responded. “And then I’m going to BUD/S.”

He shook his head. “Well, that’s not going to happen.”

Here’s the thing about the enlistment process: it is conducted by recruiters who are shrewd and experienced. Navy recruiters—and, I presume, recruiters from every branch of the armed services—are adept at telling young men and women exactly what they want to hear at a stage in their lives when they are both immature and easily influenced. In every sense of the word, the meeting between adolescent recruit and adult recruiter is a mismatch. Which is fine. Navy recruiters have a job to do, and that job entails filling the ranks with eager young bodies. It’s not like it took a lot of convincing to get me to sign on the dotted line. I walked into the recruiting office ready to sign up and fight for my country. I just wanted someone to point me in the right direction. There was, however, one stipulation: I wanted to be a SEAL. If that path wasn’t an option, I would have walked right back out the door.

The recruiter had assured me that I would get a shot at my dream. More than that, he could not promise.

As part of the recruiting process, I had to choose what technical training school, known as Class A school, I wanted to attend after basic training. Typically, a new sailor goes from boot camp to A school, and then on to another school for more specialized training that will prepare him for the job he is expected to do. I had made it clear from the outset that I wanted to be a SEAL, so, if all worked out, my path would be different. After graduating from A school, I’d be able to apply for BUD/S. That’s the way it worked. The recruiter explained the various A school options. I didn’t feel strongly about any of the schools; I was totally focused on the step after A school: BUD/S. (This, in fact, is true of a lot of recruits, regardless of whether they have any interest in BUD/S—they simply choose the shortest A school to get it over with as quickly as possible.) When the recruiter suggested submarine school, which came with a $5,000 signing bonus, and assured me this would not interfere with my plans to become a SEAL, I shrugged and said, “Sure, why not? I could use the money.”

Imagine my surprise when I got to boot camp and discovered that this was not the case. Now, I don’t want to accuse anyone of lying or even misrepresenting the facts. I was seventeen years old and perhaps not the most patient or discerning young man. Maybe I should have done more due diligence. Then again, you hear about this sort of thing happening in all branches of the military—recruiters shading the truth a bit to fill classes and steer recruits to where they are needed the most. Regardless, there I was, at the Recruit Training Command, Great Lakes on the western shore of Lake Michigan, just outside of Chicago, a newly minted recruit who viewed basic training as just a stopover on the way to becoming a SEAL.


Copyright © 2020 by Willard Chesney