Modern American Snipers

by Chris Martin

  Following 9/11, Delta and DEVGRU were both given plenty to “eat” and they feasted, racking up respective HVT kills and captures tallying into the hundreds of millions of dollars in terms of the bounties that had been placed on their targets’ heads.

  Additionally, a full decade before 2001, JSOC had mandated joint training exercises between its SMUs, and not just among the snipers. In the early days this was a rocky experience for both sides. But eventually a genuine sense of comfort and familiarity had been fostered between the two—both operationally and professionally.

  “When we started to train together and play nice together, it was definitely us against them,” admitted former DEVGRU sniper Howard Wasdin. “But the big thing is, after we trained with them for a while, we all got better. And after being in combat with them, Delta Force guys actually came to my hospital room and said, ‘Hey man, I wish we bonded more with you guys before the firefight.’ Once you’re in the soup with somebody, you see theirs and they see yours and there’s a mutual respect that’s forged. I think with us being in Somalia with the Delta Force guys, that sharpened the tip of the spear and that was the springboard for how things are today.

  “Is there still going to be sibling and professional rivalry? Of course there is. With any elite team there will be—that’s like two Super Bowl teams playing. But the mutual respect and trust is there and that’s what really matters.”

  This was borne out when DEVGRU lent out a handful of assaulters to serve as substitute Unit operators in 2005 after Delta had been rocked by a rapid series of causalities in Iraq.

  * * *

  One pre-9/11 DEVGRU sniper actually became a post-9/11 member of the Unit.

  In the ’90s, a talented young country boy rose through the ranks to become one of SEAL Team Six’s youngest ever operators. He continued his upward climb through the ranks at Red Squadron and soon became one of the youngest to ever become a sniper with Black Team.

  However, frustrated with the interservice politics, he left SEAL Team Six following just four years and instead went to work for his father’s company.

  Then 9/11 happened.

  He immediately sought out DEVGRU’s Master Chief.

  “Hey, I’m still in great shape and I shoot all the time. I’ll go back through Green Team. I’ll go through selection. I’ll do whatever you want. Just let me back in, I want to contribute.”

  “Up yours. Go back to vanilla teams and work your way back up.”

  Next, he called the Army recruiter.

  “What’s it going to take to get me to Delta?”

  “I don’t know but we’ll find out.”

  He was placed in the Army National Guard for twenty-four hours and then transferred to the Army to go to selection. He made the cut and deployed multiple times as a breacher.

  Down the road, he crossed paths with some old ST6 Teammates while overseas.

  “Damn man, what are you doing?”

  “Hey, I got here any way I could.”

  “Roger that. Good on you.”

  * * *

  When Stanley McChrystal took command of JSOC, he attempted to integrate the units to an even greater degree. However, the respective operators bristled and flatly rejected his early attempts to shape and treat the two as if they were virtual doppelgängers—the same in all but name.

  Leaders with the power to pull the trigger on national-level missions have largely treated the two as interchangeable. They are both viewed as far exceeding the tactical threshold necessary to execute even the most technical and challenging CT taskings. The parsing beyond that might not go much deeper than, “Who’s available?” or “Who’s there already?”

  But what may seem like small nuances to outsiders—irrelevant details—can be considered mission critical gulfs—in talents, in capabilities, and in mind-set—to those more on the inside.

  And it’s obvious that even if the relationship is stronger than it once was, the animosity still smolders (largely) under the surface.

  Unsurprisingly, operators on either side of the equation contend their unit’s superiority is self-evident and that the most-high profile missions are practically their birthright.

  SEAL Team Six was criticized for basking in the spotlight after finally having their “daddy” decide who got to pitch in the big game and being awarded the one op everyone wanted.

  Following suggestions that future missions of the sort should instead go to Delta Force or the Ranger Regiment due to the Army units’ track record of offering a more discreet solution, an anonymous DEVGRU operator struck back in an open letter to SOFREP editor Jack Murphy.

  In the somewhat ironic counter, the active-duty SEAL wrote, “First I will give credit where credit is due. Delta is one of two (the other being DEVGRU) of the most hard core and prolific group of warriors ever assembled in the history of warfare.… That said, let’s break things down to a digestible level. Ask your CAG friends about the highest profile op they’ve done lately … and you’ll hear the crickets chirping loudly. It’s not because they are not talking about it, but because they are not being chosen to do them.

  “And don’t even try and use the excuse that it was only because McRaven was running the show. There have been some other ops (post-Bin Laden) that were way more technical than the Bin Laden op and it was an Army General that chose our Navy element to do it.

  “The real answer is … it was, and still is, OUR time. Period.”

  Not surprisingly, retired Unit sniper John McPhee had a vastly different take.

  The operator opined that the vast differences separating their respective selection and training methodologies, along with the average experience of the units’ respective operators, results in a cavernous separation in terms of capability.

  “I’m only willing to talk because I’m tired of the bullshit training,” McPhee said. “I’m tired of people dying because of ego. Ego has killed more guys than this nation’s enemies. I’m not for or against SEALs—I’m against bad training. SEAL training is based on hazing to be the best you can be. In the Unit, you prove yourself and then they treat you like a man.

  He continued, “To get to a SEAL Team, there’s no selection, no psych evaluation, board selection of any kind. [Without those] you will almost never get the right guy. A couple buddies say you’re good and you’re good.

  “In the Army, you want to be a Ranger, get a Ranger Tab, and go to a battalion, you get selected and evaluated. Rangers that have gone to BUD/S call it pool fitness and say it’s not that hard. After a few years, maybe you want to become a Green Beret, you think they’re cool. So you go to SF selection, get a psych evaluation. It’s the same thing as you move on. By this time, you’ve probably had six years of the most intensive training in the world. It’s a stepped professional system. Four to six selections, evaluations—oral, psych, physical—on the way up. The Army is just more professional.

  “Human nature says if you have two guys who are the same age and have the same natural abilities, the guy with the best training is going to be the one who performs the best.”

  McPhee, who now instructs cutting-edge gunfighting techniques utilizing frame-by-frame video review that would leave NFL teams envious, also claimed that SEAL snipers are years behind their Unit counterparts in terms of tactics and technology (a sentiment supported by another former Delta operator): “SEAL Team snipers only switched to first focal plane sights about two years ago. They’re like a decade behind. They still had that Vietnam mind-set—dial in the DOPE and all that bullshit.”

  Ultimately, results are what matter and McPhee was unconvinced in that area as well.

  “The problem with SEAL Teams is they kill everyone,” he said. “That only creates more problems and makes more enemies. The Unit only kills those who need to be killed.”

  Even the much vaunted Operation Neptune Spear did not escape his harsh judgment. “These guys were running their mouths. It was ego and lies. They high-fived and then raced to see who could make the first million f
rom a book deal or movie. They put us at risk, not just on the battlefield but at home. They put our families at risk. They need to learn to shut the fuck up. They compromised technology to our nations’ enemies because they didn’t plan for total destruction. They could have just asked the pilots, ‘How do I destroy this?’”

  He was particularly critical of the atypical grouping for the operation, which teamed Red Squadron’s most senior men as an “all-star” troop of sorts. While that may have put a great deal of experience on the ground, it also meant they were not a well-oiled, cohesive squad who had run dozens of ops together.

  “If they would have run into any real resistance they would have gotten chewed up,” he said. “You can’t just pick teams and expect everything will be okay. And they broke their only rule—don’t shoot the guy in the face.”

  * * *

  Despite being just a few dozen men strong and deeply classified, DEVGRU’s Red Squadron is perhaps the single-most recognizable symbol of both the triumphs and the sacrifice of the Global War on Terror.

  Even before GWOT, its snipers distinguished themselves with heroism in Mogadishu, Somalia.

  And then one of its own—Neil Roberts—was the first SEAL to die following 9/11, doing so with great bravery under horrifying circumstances.

  Reports indicate that it was Red Squadron that then lit up CNN at the start of the Iraq War, rescuing Jessica Lynch.

  And then Red Squadron’s Black Team snipers demonstrated their remarkable capabilities with a simultaneous triple headshot that again had the world watching on in awe.

  And finally, the squadron was made the centerpiece of what can only be termed the most high-profile and high-priority special operations mission of the century: the cross-border elimination of Osama bin Laden.

  It’s perhaps something of a fluke of fate that so much has fallen Red Squadron’s way, enabling them to rack up multiple missions that have inspired bestselling books and Hollywood blockbusters.

  But these assignments and accolades also seem to lend credence to the reports of DEVGRU’s transformation from a rough-edged hatchet into a finely honed blade. From highly suspect to highly professional. From Marcinko to McRaven.

  However, some special operations sources allege that the squadron adopted an eye-for-an-eye mentality following the brutal killing of Roberts and has been pushing boundaries ever since—a band of skillful yet ruthless heroes/outlaws.

  Even its greatest triumphs have the asterisks—such as the $30,000 in cold cash ransom money that seemingly vanished from the lifeboat in the confusion following the rescue of Captain Richard Phillips.

  And there are reports that ST6 operators ventilated bin Laden’s corpse, unloading more than a hundred rounds into him.

  The raw and relentless nature of an unending war has unsurprisingly pushed many to (and beyond) their breaking point. Home lives have been destroyed and far too many friends and comrades have given all.

  Whether Red Squadron is an out-of-control outlier, an example of wider trends, or merely an innocent victim of inaccurate allegations and genuinely the virtuous champions portrayed by the mainstream media is an intriguing if unanswerable question at this point.

  * * *

  Delta’s recce troop hasn’t escaped the SOF grapevine completely unscathed either.

  Army Special Forces have sometimes found themselves marginalized during the Global War on Terror—brushed aside by JSOC’s long reach and tip-of-the-spear-sharp elbows.

  Despite its sterling start in the early days in Afghanistan in 2001, SF’s unconventional warfare capabilities have not always been as prized as the direct action talents of the Joint Special Operation Command’s special mission units in what has often been a largely kinetic conflict—at least in the headlines.

  There were reports that opportunities to kill or capture Mullah Mohammed Omar and Ayman al-Zawahiri were missed because of JSOC’s refusal to allow nearby SF ODAs to take on the hits, instead insisting they wait for strike teams from Delta Force or DEVGRU to arrive from hours away.

  On another occasion, “one of the most senior Taliban leaders” was located and SF attempted to go in pursuit—but they were never given permission to utilize the helicopters necessary to take up the chase.

  CJSOTF-A has lacked sufficient organic lift aircraft, and the 160th SOAR’s 3rd Battalion—which was specifically stood up to support white SOF—came to be just another asset monopolized by JSOC. The Command’s breakneck OPTEMPO continually tied up all available birds and its national-level priority status trumped all others competing for those assets.

  Even as the wars have shifted, Special Forces has been frustrated by JSOC’s ability to throw its weight around—even in SF’s own arena.

  Delta recce operators have reportedly pushed their way in to claim some of the more fancied FID (foreign internal defense) missions, snatching them away from SF.

  However, with the Unit increasingly stocked with operators who came straight up from the Ranger Regiment, not every one of them has the necessary background or training to execute the mission, at least not at a Special Forces level.

  A former SF soldier explained, “You’ll have Delta recce guys doing FID and it turns into a bit of a mess in some ways. Some of them came from SF but a lot of them came from the Rangers. So some guys have previous experience and understand FID and some guys have not a clue.”

  He continued, “Those guys were doing FID with their element in Afghanistan and, like, six of those recce dudes got fired because they got caught removing firing pins from the Afghanis’ weapons. I guess they didn’t want to get shot in the back or something. So they got canned.

  “And then in Libya, a SF guy said, ‘Can you believe these fuckin’ guys? They can’t even use a compass. They don’t know how to read a map. What the fuck?’ Yeah, I know that. No shit. It’s a completely different mind-set and these guys just don’t have that experience.

  “These recce guys definitely do some pretty hard-core stuff behind enemy lines. But I think they also get swiped into all sorts of other different stuff.”

  15

  End of the Beginning

  By 2011, the Joint Special Operations Command’s terrorist network disassembly line was decelerating in Afghanistan as it had before in Iraq, but for different reasons.

  With the successful assassination of Osama bin Laden and the latter-day impotence of the central al-Qaeda organization, conditions were ripened for America to declare victory—accurate or not—and remove itself completely from an intractable situation. Instead, it remained heavily engaged in Afghanistan, gradually drawing down its forces. The endgame remains murky and the means to achieve it even murkier.

  In 2012, after more than a decade of the heaviest SOF usage in military history, the nation’s black and white SOF were put under a unified command structure—Special Operations Joint Task Force–Afghanistan (SOJTF-A)—to better coordinate their operations in country.

  The SOJTF-A commander also was placed in charge of NATO Special Operations Component Command–Afghanistan (NSOCC-A), further streamlining the hydra-like effort.

  However, that effort had become progressively stymied. The rules of engagement (ROE) were made restrictive to the point of handcuffing assault teams. Worse still, they were known to, and actively manipulated by, the insurgents.

  Mission approvals were no longer instantaneous nor did they necessarily drive the next or the one after that. And those stealthy takedowns in which DEVGRU SEALs slinked into compounds while their targets slept were ruled out altogether. “Tactical call-outs” had evolved naturally in Iraq due to the extreme danger associated with suicide bombers and booby-trapped homes. However, they were forced upon even Tier 1 assets in Afghanistan.

  Perhaps most frustratingly, Afghanistan’s president Hamid Karzai demanded an end to night raids—further handicapping the powerful tools JSOC had pioneered.

  The nation’s (and SOF’s) relationship with Karzai had been an interesting one to say the least. Fluid almost by natu
re, it grew increasingly antagonistic in the later years of his presidency.

  Shortly after 9/11, Karzai was hand-selected by the United States to lead the new regime following the defeat of the Taliban. He was ushered back into Afghanistan and watched over by Army Special Forces ODA-574 and CIA Special Activities Division Paramilitary Officers as the first wave of the invasion rippled throughout the country.

  Installed as the nation’s leader before 2001 was even out, Karzai’s life was spared when a DEVGRU VIP Security Detail element foiled a close-up assassination attempt on the then-interim president with overwhelming force.

  However, as the war steamrolled forward and JSOC implemented the rapid-pace CT system it had developed in Iraq, civilian casualties—particularly those linked to special operations raids—had become a fracturing point. While the United States placed immense value on JSOC’s ability to surgically target its enemies, the practices by which it did were considered invasive by the local populace and Karzai played on those sentiments.

  There is no doubt that JSOC’s raids resulted in civilian casualties. The sheer number of raids—missions that are inherently violent and chaotic—practically demands that be the case. The real question is if those numbers were being minimized to an “acceptable” degree.

  There is also no doubt that the genuine statistics were less than those claimed by the Taliban and related groups, who imagined, inflated, or created civilian death tolls as central strategies in their propaganda campaigns.

  And Karzai too treated the claims—even dubious ones—as political grist to further his standing and leverage.

  By the time Karzai was set to leave office following thirteen years in power, he offered no thanks to the United States—which had paid for Afghanistan’s continued development with $100 billion in aid and two thousand lives. Rather he claimed the U.S. had no desire for peace in Afghanistan and warned his successors to be cautious in their dealings with the West, perhaps one final attempt to publicly cut any strings in the eyes of those who viewed him as a puppet.