Chocolates

R5D  Navy Transport

In 1967, my first tour of duty to the ‘nam, this is the type plane that took us all the way from Oceana,VA. to TonSonNhut,Vietnam. We took our Scout Dog “Rinney.”

Derived from the commercial DC-4 airliner, the C-54
Skymaster was a workhorse transport aircraft for both the United States Army and the United States Navy branches of service. Planned as a technologically superior successor to the DC-3 type, the early DC-4 design suffered through growing pains of burgeoning pressurization technology, proving too much to  handle and well ahead of it’s time. As such, the DC-4 design went back to a simplified un-pressurized version that would become the basis for the C-54 for Army use and the R5D for Navy usage.

http://www.militaryfactory.com/aircraft/detail.asp?aircraft_id=110

On my last tour to the ‘nam, I came back to the world in a civilian aircraft. I believe it was TransWorld Airlines. We were packed like sardines in it.

This is the airplane they used at Ft. Benning back in the 50's & 60's
P.I. closing
Islam/ 9-11
Astroworld SEALs Rappallling This park in Houston is HISTORY! Gone!
SEAL Op.Red Wing KIAs
SEAL killed and burned in Iraq by Terrorists
SEALs that captured the terrorist Court Martials
Matthew McCabe SEAL and Parents
Matthew McCabe SEAL and Parents
Jonathan Keefe
Jonathan Keefe
Erasmo "Doc" Riojas USMC
Painted by Durwood Hunter White just before he died

A 45-year Navy career and two stints on ‘Survivor’ means name recognition for Boesch

http://www.stripes.com/articlephoto.asp?section=104&article=69132&photo=1&count=1

 
Erik Slavin / S&S

YOKOSUKA NAVAL BASE, Japan — Several of the chief petty officers eating lunch together on Wednesday already knew of Rudy Boesch, the retired Navy SEAL and two-time alumnus of the TV reality show “Survivor.”

One recalled how Boesch drank unpurified water during “Survivor: All-Stars” and then explained to a concerned competitor that what he drank during two combat tours in Vietnam was a lot worse.

“If I’m not still standing at noon, don’t drink it,” Boesch told the others on the show.

Boesch’s peers at the Chief Petty Officers’ Club on Wednesday said they found his reality-show exploits in 2000 and again in 2004 interesting. But in their eyes, his Navy career dwarfs anything he did on television. Boesch stopped by Yokosuka last week to sign autographs and swap stories with sailors.

Boesch, a retired master chief petty officer, was a special warfare operator before the title existed. He served from 1945 until 1990.

To put that in perspective, Boesch enlisted one month before the World War II Allied victory in Europe and retired the day before Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait.

“He’s a living part of our history,” said Chief Petty Officer Rory Collins, of Santa Fe, N.M. “Forty-five years of service is something to look up to, and I think it inspires the rest of us in this room.”

If Boesch had it his way, he’d still be wearing a uniform.

“I asked the Secretary of the Navy about it a few years back, and he just smiled at me,” said Boesch, 82, in an interview with Stars and Stripes. “Yeah, I wish was still doing it.”

Boesch went to boot camp as a 17-year-old and volunteered for what was described to him only as “secret and hazardous” duty. He was sent to Fort Pierce, Fla., to join the Amphibious Scouts and Raiders, a group organized to assist Chinese fighters in a planned assault, that never materialized, on the Japanese mainland.

In 1951, Boesch completed Underwater Demolition Teams training. That group formed the building blocks of another elite unit that Boesch would be among the first 50 to pioneer — the Navy SEALs.

Boesch went on to set physical and operational standards for the SEALs and earned a Bronze Star while in Vietnam from 1968 to 1970. He retired as the top enlisted adviser to Special Operations Command.

He said the Navy has changed since he retired in two noticeable ways: Everything is far more computerized, and there are a lot more women in uniform.

“It’s just a matter of time until there are women SEALs,” Boesch said. “There are a few women who could probably pass the test. Not many, though.”

About 10 years after retiring, while reading a newspaper at home in Virginia Beach, Va., Boesch saw an advertisement about a challenge.

He barely noticed the part about the money and certainly had no conception of the spotlight he was about to enter following the rise of “Survivor” to the top of the TV ratings in 2000.

After a lifetime spent under the shroud of special operations, everyone suddenly knew who he was.

Shouts of “Hey, Rudy!” came from everywhere. He began hearing it while on vacation in Wyoming. He’d continue hearing it at promotional appearances. He even heard it on a New York City street from a sewer worker who popped out of a manhole to greet him.

Around that time, while he was sitting on a bench in Central Park, a stranger walked up to Boesch.

“ ‘I’ve just gotta shake your hand,’ ” Boesch recalled the stranger saying. “My wife told me it was Donald Trump. I didn’t know the guy.”

Boesch still gets recognized in public, but he said he doesn’t mind it at all. He’d happily sign up for another show for another chance to better his third-place finish during the first season of “Survivor.”

In the meantime, Boesch spends most of his time in Virginia Beach, where he still works out regularly with SEALs at the nearby Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base.

Occasionally, he travels abroad to places like Yokosuka, where his words had an unexpected impact on at least one fellow chief Wednesday.

Chief Petty Officer Gonzales, of Kenedy, Texas, always figured he’d hang up his khakis at the 20-year mark. After listening for a while to Boesch talk about what the Navy meant to him — even after all that TV exposure — Gonzales wasn’t so sure.

“It makes me rethink what I want to do,” Gonzales said. “He reminds you of how good you have it here.”

Kirkus Reviews

An unsentimental personal account of the Vietnam War. With the assistance of magazine writer Riebling, retired SEAL master chief Keith chronicles a tale that’s oddly refreshing in its clear-eyed bluntness. The author and his tough-as-nails team had jobs to do, he writes, carrying out missions protecting friendly villages from Viet Cong attacks; they simply did not have time to let the brutal surroundings affect them.

The narrative opens with the SEALs surrounded by explosions and tracer fire as they wait to be extracted by helicopter. Keith was not consumed by fear, as most people would be. Instead, he reflected on how the red tracer fire was “as beautiful as any Fourth of July fireworks display” and how lucky he felt to be doing a job he loved. The son of a Navy chief and the grandson of two Army veterans, from an early age Keith dreamed of entering the military, and his determination and skill led him to the elite Navy SEALs.

More Reviews and Recommendations

SEaAirLand = SEAL; U.S. Navy

THE "DASH" BETWEEN the YEARS OF MY LIFE

As I approach the end of my life; I hope that people that know me will ask about the “dash” between my birth year: 1931 -“dash”- and my death:  20??  

Will they believe that  I did my best to fight laziness, ignorance, and a  negative attitude.   Only God knows if I achieved my full potential.  I do not consider myself as being ordinary and/or mediocre. 

 It is through God, sacrifice, risk, effort, creativity, work, and the goals I set for myself that I will die feeling that I am a successful man.  The “dash” between 1931 – 20?? was full of ups, downs, and thorns among the many roses.  In leaps and bounds through pain, thirst, and hunger I found the reward of  milk and honey.  God is Good!

 My passion for excellence, honesty, patriotism and a total dedication to my many professions were the stepping stones in becoming a productive American.  I have never looked back in my life and wished that I would have done things differently. 

 I arrived, I achieved, and I will depart earth to go thank my God that the life he gave me was fully lived and nothing was wasted!

Erasmo “Doc” Riojas, an American Patriot!

"My HELL weeks were in Korea, not at BUD/S. Doc Rio"

'Survivor' Rudy Boesch undergoes heart surgery

By LARRY BONKO, The Virginian-Pilot
© August 30, 2006 | Last updated 3:31 PM Aug. 30

http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories/story.cfm?story=110074&ran=57577

Rudy Boesch, the highly decorated former Navy SEAL who became instantly famous on the first “Survivor” reality show six years ago, says he is recuperating nicely after recent open-heart surgery.

Boesch, 78, a fitness nut from Virginia Beach, feels strong enough to do physical therapy. “I started real easy,” Boesch said.

A doctor who was administering a routine stress test saw trouble ahead for Boesch, whose friends and family considered to be pretty much indestructible.

 

He served 45 years in the Navy, retiring in 1990 as a master chief petty officer.

After the stress test, doctors hustled him into surgery for a triple bypass procedure.

Before the test, Boesch experienced no symptoms of heart trouble. He had been playing racquetball with no pain or strain just days before the operation.

“After I took the stress test, the doctor said he found a problem that I better take care of soon. When I asked how soon, he said ‘right now,’ ” recalled Boesch, who finished third on “Survivor: Borneo” to Richard Hatch and Kelly Wiglesworth.

Hatch, the milAlion-dollar winner, is in prison after being convicted in May of income tax evasion. Boesch, who won $85,000 on “Survivor,” made certain that the U.S. Treasury got its share, which he says was darn near half his winnings.

Reach Larry Bonko at (757) 446-2486 or larry.bonko@pilotonline.com.

 

Tuesday, October 16th, 2007

According to reports, veteran Navy SEALS and Army Green Berets are being offered up to $150,000 in bonuses to remain in uniform for a few extra years. This story has made its way up the importance ladder because of the recent Blackwater Security problems.

Recently Blackwater Security, who the US pays to protect diplomats in Iraq, killed 17 Iraqis and have had their license suspended. After this story broke most people were surprised to see that our soldiers were not the only ones with boots on the ground in Iraq.

Blackwater security members get paid significantly more than US commandos. According to Doug Brooks, president of the International Peace Operations Association, “Of the estimated 25,000 security personnel working in Iraq, only about 2,000 are Americans and they earn between $350 to $500 a day.”

The word ‘Blackwater’ has since had a “Watergate” ring to it and what they do is now under the microscope. Are Blackwater Security members mercenaries? Is what they do unethical?

Is getting paid to protect someone unethical?

No it isn’t. They are simply heavily armed bodyguards. Just because they tend to fire their weapons daily does not make what they do unethical. This may be why we are viewing Blackwater different than typical security guards. Typical security guards rarely draw their weapon, while Blackwater commandos have to use their weapons almost daily.

Blackwater is not in Iraq to fight insurgents, they are there to protect certain individuals. There is nothing wrong with that.

The thing that irks me a bit about this is the fact that Special Forces, who carry out much more dangerous assignments than Blackwater, get paid so little to do so. If you knew exactly what these guys do you wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight! Everyday these heroes have to kiss their families goodbye knowing that it may very well be the last time that they see them. And they do it for me and you. These guys should be getting paid a million dollars a year. They display more patriotism and courage than will ever come out of most Americans.

If you ever watch “The Unit” you will begin to understand.

R.D.Russell and Pam
Isabella and R.D. Russell
Class 33, Little Creek VA
Grease Gun .45 cal with silencer
David Riojas Jr., My Nephew
Charlie Bump Bill Garnett Pierre Birtz
Starlight Scope used in 'nam
Saigon Street
SEALs on Tan Dinh Island

The mighty Mekong


At 4,220km, the Mekong is one of the world’s longest rivers. Rising in Tibet, it flows through Xizang and Yunnan in China,and constitutes the boundary between Laos and Myanmar (Burma), and that between Laos and Thailand. Below Phnom Penh, it divides into two, flowing through Cambodia and the Mekong basin to drain into the South China Sea through ‘cuu long’ (nine mouths).

Heavy sedimentation means that the river is navigable by shallow-draft seagoing craft only as far as Kompong Cham in Cambodia. A tributary entering the river at Phnom Penh drains the Tonle Sap, a shallow freshwater lake that acts as a natural reservoir to stabilize the flow of water through the Mekong delta. When the delta outlets are unable to carry off the high volume of floodwater, they back up into Tonle Sap, inundating as much as 10,000 square kilometres. When the flood subsides, the flow reverses and excess water drains to the sea, thus alleviating the devastating floods that reach a height of one to two metres.

However, climatic change and deforestation in Cambodia has increased the flow and overwhelmed the capacity of the Tonle Sap. In recent years, the floods from August to October have been noticeably higher and lasted longer, sometimes leading to considerable loss of life amongst the Mekong’s residents.

The Mekong Delta is a very large pancake-flat flood plain, no more than three metres above sea level at any point and criss-crossed by a maze of canals and rivers. About a billion cubic metres of silt is deposited annually, almost thirteen times that laid down by the Red River, and advances the delta some sixty to eighty metres further into the sea each year. The level of the water is, therefore, a major concern for visitors to the area. About 10,000 square kilometres of the delta are under rice cultivation, making the area one of the largest rice-growing regions in the world. The southern tip, known as the Ca Mau Peninsula (Mui Bai Bung), is covered by dense jungle and mangrove swamps.

 SEAFLOAT AND SOLID ANCHOR

Seafloat was a floating Mobile Advanced Tactical Support Base (MATSB) on the Song Cau Lon in Ca Mau Province at the extreme southern tip of Vietnam. Seafloat is short for Operation Sea Float. The U Minh forest in Cam Mau Province was considered to be a VC stronghold.

THE RIVER
The Song Cau Lon (Song means river in Vietnamese)is a tidal river that had a mouth on either side of the peninsula, so the river was always flowing up to 5 or 10 knots in one direction or the other depending on the tides. There were only a couple of hours of slack water each day. 

This made boat handling difficult in tight situations, and sometimes it was actually difficult to make headway against currents over five knots in speed. It was always muddy and turbid. The mouth on the gulf of Thailand ran into a square bay that was too shallow and had an unmarked channel. 

The other deeper channel to the South China Sea was 22 miles up the Song Cau Lon and down the dangerous Song Bo De. Near the mouth of the Song Bo De the town of Tan An was a favorite landing for Chinese junks running the US Naval blocade in the 60,s.

 

Scramble Seawolves! Part 1
by Tom Phillips, Seawolf 98
Reprinted with permission

The Black Ponies, limited to runways, would operate from a central base, similar to the Army, but would bring to the problem a much faster aircraft and the ability to be dedicated to riverine support from an alert status. They could get to the far reaches of the Delta three times as fast as Army helicopters and almost as fast as the local Seawolves. When they arrived, they brought with them welcomed firepower in the form of 5-inch Zuni rockets and twenty-millimeter guns that was unmatched by any Army aviation we ever saw in the Delta. Heavy artillery for the really big jobs in our little war. They were far more effective than any Air Force or carrier bombers (not that we ever saw any) because of the Black Ponies well-respected pinpoint close air support. They knew the boats, and the Seawolves. We complemented each other nicely. Throughout the Delta, Seawolves and Black Ponies were considered by all commanders to be their own FACs, an acknowledged and approved exception to MACV policy existing at the time, which required FACs to control and direct “gunships”.

By 1971, the Seawolves, Black Ponies, and SEALS were the last remaining Navy combat forces in the Delta. They held the line while U.S. forces withdrew from the Delta.

 

I, "LOL" on the skydiving scene when a SEAL tells another SEAL that was about to jump out of the airplane "be careful out there!" and he answers back, "If i wanted to be careful I would have joined the Coast Guard!" That is SEAL talk!

  http://mac088.nhrc.navy.mil/Pubs/Subject/59.html

NHRC Special Warfare (SEALs) Publications

 Personality Profiles of U.S. Navy  Sea-Air-Land (SEAL) Personnel.

Braun, DE; WK Prusaczyk, HW Goforth Jr., & NC Pratt\

Abstract:
     One hundred thirty-nine U.S. Navy Sea-Air-Land (SEAL) personnel completed
     the NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI). The average profiles were compared to
     adult male norms for five broadly defined domains.
SEALs scored lower in
     neuroticism and agreeableness, average in openness, and higher in
     extraversion and conscientiousness compared to these two populations.
High
     extraversion and conscientiousness scores have been shown to predict job
     performance in other professions.

SEALs seek excitement and dangerous
     environments, but are otherwise stable, calm, and rarely reckless or impulsive.
     Although this average profile may not characterize any individual SEAL, we
     believe this study provides the most comprehensive personality profile of Navy
     SEALs to date.

AD Number: A281-692 

SEALs Psychological Profiles:
[ Doc Riojas told you that we, Navy SEALs, are not suicical ]

From: John R. Rapp  mailto:neptune590 [at] netzero.com
To: ‘Doc Riojas’  docrio45 [at] gmail.com
Sent: Sunday, October 12, 2008 
Subject: Your web site www.sealtwo.org 

Doc Rio, 


I wanted to tell you that SEAL -2 and SEAL – 4 Command Master Chief (Retired) Johnny ‘Guntis’ “JJ” Jaunzems has a ton of photo’s from the old days… You should see if he would donate them to your collection… 

I think it’s a great thing that you have put together an historical clearing house for all this memorable stuff. It is honorable that you have included the N.O.S.G. / N.S.W.G. – UDT / SEAL, BSU, MST, SEAL SUPPORT, BJU artifacts. 

Thank you, 

John R. Rapp – Marine Safety Deputy 
Washtenaw County Sheriff 
855 Augusta Drive 
Rochester Hills, Mi. 48309
 

Webmaster’s NOTE:   John, ask Jauzems to send me some.   Riojas


This email was cleaned by emailStripper, available for free from http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm

FROGS, buy the VIETNAM Magazine Dec. 2008 and read the article about Nguyen Van Kiet’s & Tom Norris’ Amazing Rescue of Bat21 Bravo

—– Original Message —–
From: Kiet Nguyen
To: Kiet Nguyen ; Jari Salo
Sent: Sunday, October 12, 2008
Subject: Vietnam Magazine 


Dear Jari, 

Here is the information that you have asked me.  the Vietnam magazine December 2008 has not been issued now.  Sorry, I can only share with you the copy attachments by this email until I can get the Vietnam magazine from the newstand. You can access more information if you look into www.HistoryNet.com.  You can search there and  know more about the features that will written in the Vietnam magazine that will be on the market in December 2008.

Best wishes, 

Kiet Nguyen

Webmaster’s NOTE:   Kiet Thank you for keeping me informed.  I shall await the publication of your article in the Vietnam Magazine this coming December 2008.

 

                                     and here it is !

Unsung Hero in the Amazing Rescue of Bat 21 Bravo: Nguyen Van Kiet’s courage and courage .

Go to NAVY LOG: http://www.navylog.org/ to see if you can find any of your shipmates Bio's. Search mine: Erasmo Riojas if you will.
Dick & Jan
donated by Fred Miller
this is a REAL WWII bill

Doc Riojas saw Hank Williams Sr. Perform on a Moonlight cruise on the Potomac River, D.C. when he was stationed at USNH Bethesda MD 1949. Hank boarded the ship from a motorboat when our ship was in Maryland waters, Hank sang three songs using three different guitars; his launch came alongside and he departed. I got my ten bucks worth!

Dr. Riojas
Brian Keith Family

1973 when I was a LT at Underwater Demoltion Team Western Pacific Detachment (UDT WESTPAC).   We shot about a 50 tons of Vietnam retrograde bombs in Subic Bay in 100 feet of water and about 2 miles from the Officer’s Club.  We stood off about 500 yards in a boat and keeping the Filipino fisherman at Bay.

 When the blast occurred the result was about a 200 foot plume of water.  The water turned gray and very blurry with several sharks and other fish floating on the surface.  This evolution had been done the year earlier, hence all the Filipino fishermen looking for some easy fishing.  It looked like a LeMans’ race start!!   

This was a larger shot than the previous year and the windows in the O Club were pulsating from the resultant air shock. We did a similar shot  later and had them open the club doors before we detonated the shot.

  As far as demo work goes it was the highlight of my Navy career.

 Denny Baber

It was an EOD job in which our local frogs assisted CWO2  Woody Woodward. 

BY:   William Bill Rudledge – HAL-3 Vietnam 1969 – 1972

(a kidnapped VC soldier) or SEAL OPS. Oh yes those Navy Painted faces Called SEALs ,they did make it exciting, I am proud to have known them and been part of their operations.This is one of those YOU HAD TO OF BEEN THERE stories.

The SEALS had inserted into an area North West of Solid Anchor at night and we stood by for the inevitable scramble while They did what they do best, Scaring the shit out of the enemy. The VC/NVA were terrified of these Painted Faces for the SEALs took the battle to them using Guerrilla tactics and filled the enemies hearts with terror. We were scrambled just after sunrise, the SEALs had Ambushed a superior number of VC, kicked their butts, had a man wounded and needed a medivec.

[ Taken out of RAch Gia a Seal out on a prisioner capture. ] We arrived on scene and put strikes in the triple canopied jungle where the surviving enemy had escaped to. They were in small clearing but we couldn’t drop in for there were too many tall trees The SEALs used their M 60 and were shooting into the trees about chest high cutting them down.The enemy had came back and were sniping at them. 

The Team was almost out of 60 ammo and we threw down what we had, of which most hung up in the trees They also requested more ammo and to bring out more of their team. We flew back to Solid Anchor and loaded up my bird with 4 more SEALS,a 100 ft line and a couple of 2000 round containers of 60 ammo and went back out. 

We were overloaded and the outside air temp was high when we got back to the area, the trail bird went in and dropped their load of ammo to the Team, then went high to cover us as we came to a hover over the SEALs position, who are again shooting it out with Victor Charles. We start taking fire and hits.I was on the right door and dump the ammo and throw out the line attached to our bird as the Seals exit the bird and rappel down my side through the trees. 

This all happened very quickly but our engine was over heating and if we didn’t get out of there soon we will crash down on top of the SEALs position . I waited as long as I could yelling for them to jump off the line into the trees, we start to go down and I cut the line with the last SEAL about 20 feet off the ground and we pulled up and got out of there cooling down the engine, we came back around and the Door gunners stopped the enemies fire . 

The SEALs finished cutting down the trees and we went in and pulled the wounded man out The Team was extracted and knowing those crazy brave Bastards they were back out again on another operation that afternoon or night.

A Navy Seal, Injured and Alone, Was Saved By Afghans’ Embrace and Comrades’ Valor

              LONE SURVIVOR

U.S.Navy SEAL Marcus Luttrell HM1

14 service members helped rescue Navy Seal Marcus Luttrell  (LONE SURVIVOR) in one of the more remarkable accounts to emerge from Afghanistan. (Courtesy of Josh Appel)

By: Laura Blumenfeld
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, June 11, 2007; Page A01


The blood in his eyes almost blinded him, but the Navy Seal could hear, clattering above the trees in northeast Afghanistan, rescue helicopters.

Hey, he pleaded silently. I’m right here.

Marcus Luttrell, a fierce, 6-foot-5 rancher’s son from Texas, lay in the dirt. His face was shredded, his nose broken, three vertebrae cracked from tumbling down a ravine. A Taliban rocket-propelled grenade had ripped off his pants and riddled him with shrapnel.

As the helicopters approached, Luttrell, a petty officer first class, turned on his radio. Dirt clogged his throat, leaving him unable to speak. He could hear a pilot: “If you’re out there, show yourself.”

It was June 2005. The United States had just suffered its worst loss of life in Afghanistan since the invasion in 2001. Taliban forces had attacked Luttrell’s four-man team on a remote ridge shortly after 1 p.m. on June 28. By day’s end, 19 Americans had died. Now U.S. aircraft scoured the hills for survivors.

There would be only one. Luttrell’s ordeal — described in exclusive interviews with him and 14 men who helped save him — is among the more remarkable accounts to emerge from Afghanistan. It has been a dim and distant war, where after 5 1/2 years about 26,000 U.S. troops remain locked in conflict.

Out of that darkness comes this spark of a story. It is a tale of moral choices and of prejudices transcended. It is also a reminder of how challenging it is to be a smart soldier, and how hard it is to be a good man.

Luttrell had come to Afghanistan “to kill every SOB we could find.” Now he lay bleeding and filthy at the bottom of a gulch, unable to stand. “I could see hunks of metal and rocks sticking out of my legs,” he recalled.

He activated his emergency call beacon, which made a clicking sound. The pilots in the HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopters overhead could hear him.

“Show yourself,” one pilot urged. “We cannot stay much longer.” Their fuel was dwindling as morning light seeped into the sky, making them targets for RPGs and small-arms fire. The helicopters turned back.

As the HH-60s flew to Bagram air base, 80 miles away, one pilot told himself, “That guy’s going to die.”

Luttrell never felt so alone. His legs, numb and naked, reminded him of another loss. He had kept a magazine photograph of a World Trade Center victim in his pants pocket. Luttrell didn’t know the man but carried the picture on missions. He killed in the man’s unknown name.

Now Luttrell’s camouflage pants had been blasted off, and with them, the victim’s picture. Luttrell was feeling lightheaded. His muse for vengeance was gone.

Hunting a Taliban Leader

Luttrell’s mission had begun routinely. As darkness fell on Monday, June 27, his Seal team fast-roped from a Chinook helicopter onto a grassy ridge near the Pakistan border. They were Navy Special Operations forces, among the most elite troops in the military: Lt. Michael P. Murphy and three petty officers — Matthew G. Axelson, Danny P. Dietz and Luttrell. Their mission, code-named Operation Redwing, was to capture or kill Ahmad Shah, a Taliban leader. U.S. intelligence officials believed Shah was close to Osama bin Laden.

Luttrell, 32, is a twin. His brother was also a Seal. Each had half of a trident tattooed across his chest, so that standing together they completed the Seal symbol. They were big, visceral, horse-farm boys raised by a father Luttrell described admiringly as “a hard man.”

“He made sure we knew the world is an unforgiving, relentless place,” Luttrell said. “Anyone who thinks otherwise is totally naive.”

Luttrell, who deployed to Afghanistan in April 2005 after six years in the Navy, including two years in Iraq, welcomed the moral clarity of Kunar province. He would fight in the mountains that cradled bin Laden’s men. It was, he said, “payback time for the World Trade Center. My goal was to double the number of people they killed.”

The four Seals zigzagged all night and through the morning until they reached a wooded slope. An Afghan man wearing a turban suddenly appeared, then a farmer and a teenage boy. Luttrell gave a PowerBar to the boy while the Seals debated whether the Afghans would live or die.

If the Seals killed the unarmed civilians, they would violate military rules of engagement; if they let them go, they risked alerting the Taliban. According to Luttrell, one Seal voted to kill them, one voted to spare them and one abstained. It was up to Luttrell.

Part of his calculus was practical. “I didn’t want to go to jail.” Ultimately, the core of his decision was moral. “A frogman has two personalities. The military guy in me wanted to kill them,” he recalled. And yet: “They just seemed like — people. I’m not a murderer.”

Luttrell, by his account, voted to let the Afghans go. “Not a day goes by that I don’t think about that decision,” he said. “Not a second goes by.”

At 1:20 p.m., about an hour after the Seals released the Afghans, dozens of Taliban members overwhelmed them. The civilians he had spared, Luttrell believed, had betrayed them. At the end of a two-hour firefight, only he remained alive. He has written about it in a book going on sale tomorrow, “Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of Seal Team 10.”

Daniel Murphy, whose son Michael was killed, said he was comforted when “Mike’s admiral said, ‘Don’t think these men went down easy. There were 35 Taliban strewn on the ground.’ “

Before Murphy was shot, he radioed Bagram: “My guys are dying.”

Help came thundering over the ridgeline in a Chinook carrying 16 rescuers. But at 4:05 p.m., as the helicopter approached, the Taliban fighters fired an RPG. No one survived.

“It was deathly quiet,” Luttrell recalled. He crawled away, dragging his legs, leaving a bloody trail. The country song “American Soldier” looped through his mind. Round and round, in dizzying circles, whirled the words “I’ll bear that cross with honor.”

News of a Crash

In southwestern Afghanistan, at the Kandahar air field, Maj. Jeff Peterson, 39, sat in the briefing room with his feet up on the table, watching the puppet movie “Team America: World Police.”

Peterson was a full-time Air Force reservist from Arizona, known as Spanky because he resembles the scamp from “The Little Rascals.” He was passing a six-week stint with other reservists he called “old farts.” In three days they would head home, leaving behind the smell of burning sewage and the sound of giant camel spiders crunching mouse bones.
Someone flipped on the television news. A Chinook had crashed up north.

Peterson flew an HH-60 for the 305th Rescue Squadron. Motto: “Anytime, anywhere.” Their rescues had been minor. “An Afghani kid with a blown-up hand or a soldier with a blown-up knee,” Peterson recalled in an interview at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson.

That was okay with him. Twelve men, including Peterson’s best friend, had died during training in a midair collision in 1998. The accident, he said, “took the wind out of my life sails.” He just wanted to serve and get back to his wife, Penny, and their four small boys.

Peterson is dimply, 5 feet 8, and describes himself with a smile as “an idiot. A full-on, certified idiot.” He almost flunked out of flight school because he kept getting airsick. While the other pilots downed lasagna, he nibbled saltines. He had trouble in survival training because they had to slaughter rabbits: “I didn’t want to kill the bunny.”

Peterson dealt with stress by joking, singing “Mr. Rogers’s Neighborhood” songs on missions: It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.

Now, with the news of the Chinook crash, the tension in the Kandahar briefing room amped up as a call came over the radio. Bagram needed them. Peterson grabbed his helmet and a three-day pack. He asked himself, “What is this about?”


Encounter With a Villager

The Seal wondered whether he was dying — if not from the bullet that had pierced his thigh, then surely of thirst. “I was licking sweat off my arms,” Luttrell recalled. “I tried to drink my urine.”

Crawling through the night, as Spanky Peterson’s HH-60 flew overhead with other search helicopters, he made it to a pool of water. When he lifted his head, he saw an Afghan. He reached for his rifle.

“American!” the villager said, flashing two thumbs-up. “Okay! Okay!”

“You Taliban?” Luttrell asked.

“No Taliban!”

The villager’s friends arrived, carrying AK-47s. They began to argue, apparently determining Luttrell’s fate. “I kept saying to myself, ‘Quit being a little bitch. Stand up and be a man.’ “

But he couldn’t stand. Three men lifted 240 pounds of dead weight and carried Luttrell to the 15-hut village of Sabray. They took his rifle.

What happened next baffled him. Mohammed Gulab, 33, father of six, fed Luttrell warm goat’s milk, washed his wounds and clothed him in what Luttrell called “man jammies.”

“I didn’t trust them,” Luttrell said. “I was confused. They’d reassure me, but hell, it wasn’t in English.”

Hours after his arrival, Taliban fighters appeared and demanded that the villagers surrender the American. They threatened Gulab, Luttrell said, and tried to bribe him. “I was waiting for a good deal to come along and for Gulab to turn me over.

“I’d been in so many villages. I’d be like, ‘Up against the wall, and shut the hell up!’ So I’m like, why would these people be kind to me?” Luttrell said. “I probably killed one of their cousins. And now I’m shot up, and they’re using all the village medical supplies to help me.”

What Luttrell did not understand, he said, was that the people of Sabray were following their own rules of engagement — tribal law. Once they had carried the invalid Seal into their huts, they were committed to defend him. The Taliban fighters seemed to respect that custom, even as they lurked in the hills nearby.

During the day, children would gather around Luttrell’s cot. He touched their noses and said “nose”; the children taught him words in Pashtun. At prayer time, he kneeled as best he could, wincing from shrapnel wounds. A boy said in Arabic, “There is no god but Allah.” Marcus repeated: “La ilaha illa Allah.”

“Once you say that, you become a Muslim — you’re good to go,” he said.

Luttrell offered his own unspoken prayer to Jesus: “Get me out of here.”

On several occasions, he heard helicopters. In one of them was Peterson. Come on, dude, show yourself, Peterson would silently say, looking down into the trees. At dawn, as Peterson flew back from a search, he felt his stomach sink. We failed.

On July 1, with Taliban threats intensifying, Gulab’s father, the village elder, decided to seek help at a Marine outpost five miles down in the valley. Luttrell wrote a note: “This man gave me shelter and food, and must be helped.”

The old man tramped down the mountain.


Preparing a Rescue

At 1 a.m. on July 2, Staff Sgt. Chris Piercecchi, 32, an Air Force pararescue jumper, picked up Gulab’s father at the Marine outpost. He flew with him to Bagram. “He was this wise, older person with a big, old beard,” Piercecchi recalled. Gulab’s father handed over Luttrell’s note and described the Seal’s trident tattoo.

U.S. commanders drew up rescue plans. “It was one of the largest combat search-and-rescue operations since
Vietnam,” said Lt. Col. Steve Butow, who directed the air component from a classified location in Southwest Asia.

Planners first considered sending a Chinook to get Luttrell, while Peterson’s HH-60 would wait five miles away to evacuate casualties. But the smaller HH-60, the planners concluded, could navigate the turns approaching Sabray more easily than a lumbering Chinook.

“Sixties, you got the pickup,” the mission commander said to the HH-60 pilots.

“I was like, ‘Holy cow, dude, how am I not going to screw this up?’ ” Peterson recalled. His chest felt tight. He had never flown in combat. “You want to do your mission, but once you’re out, you’re like, damn, I’d rather be watching the American puppet movie.”

At 10:05 p.m. — five nights after Luttrell’s four-man team had set out — Peterson climbed aboard with his reservist crew: a college student, a doctor, a Border Patrol pilot, a former firefighter and a hard-of-hearing Vietnam vet.

First Lt. Dave Gonzales, 41, Peterson’s copilot, recalled that he felt for his rosary beads. “If you guys are praying guys, make sure you’re praying now,” Gonzales said. Master Sgt. Josh Appel, 39, the doctor, had never asked for God’s help before. His father was Jewish, and his mother was a German Christian: “I don’t even know what god I was talking to.”

They flew for 40 minutes toward the dead-black mountains. Voices from pilots — A-10 attack jets and AC-130 gunships flying cover — droned over five frequencies. Peterson’s crew was quiet, breathing a greasy mix of JP-8 jet fuel fumes and hot rubber.

As they climbed from 1,500 to 7,000 feet, Peterson asked about the engines: “What’s my power?” In thin air, extra weight can be deadly. He didn’t want to dump fuel; they were flying over a village. But he could sense the engines straining through the vibrations in the pedals.

Peterson broke the safety wire on the fuel switch. “Sorry, guys,” he said, looking down at the roofs. He felt bad for the people below, but he needed to lighten the aircraft if he wanted to survive. Five hundred pounds of fuel gushed out. “That’s for Penny and the boys.”

Five minutes before the helicopter reached Sabray, U.S. warplanes — guided by a ground team that had hiked overland — attacked the Taliban fighters ringing the houses. “They started shwacking the bad guys,” Peterson recalled. The clouds lit up from the explosions. The radio warned, “Known enemy 100 meters south of your position.” The back of Peterson’s neck prickled.

At 11:38 p.m., they descended into the landing zone, a ledge on a terraced cliff. The rotors spun up a blinding funnel of dirt. The aircraft wobbled, drifting left toward a wall and then right toward a cliff.

Piercecchi lay down, bracing for a crash. Master Sgt. Mike Cusick, 57, the flight engineer who had been a gunner in Vietnam, screamed, “Stop left! Stop right!”

“I’m going to screw up,” Peterson recalled thinking. He thought of his best friend’s wife, how she howled when he told her that her husband, a pilot, had crashed. “Don’t let this happen to Penny.”

Then, suddenly, through the brown cloud, a bush appeared. An orientation point.

Luttrell was crouching with Gulab on the ground, watching them land. The static electricity from the rotors glowed green. “That was the most nervous I’d been,” Luttrell said. “I was waiting for an RPG to blast the helicopter.”

Gulab helped Luttrell limp through the rotor wash. Piercecchi and Appel jumped out and saw two men dressed in billowing Afghan robes.

Appel trained the laser dot of his M4 on Luttrell. “Bad guys or good guys?” Appel recalled wondering. “I hope I don’t have to shoot them.”

Someone shouted: “He’s your precious cargo!”

Piercecchi performed an identity check, based on memorized data: “What’s your dog’s name?”

Luttrell: “Emma!”

Piercecchi: “Favorite superhero?”

“Spiderman!”

Piercecchi shook his hand. “Welcome home.”

Luttrell and Gulab climbed into the helicopter. During the flight, Gulab “was latched onto my knee like a 3-year-old,” Luttrell recalled. When they landed and were separated, Gulab seemed confused. He had refused money and Luttrell’s offer of his watch.

“I put my arms around his neck,” Luttrell recalled, “and said into his ear, ‘I love you, brother.’ ” He never saw Gulab again.


The Lessons

Two years have passed. Peterson, back in Tucson, realizes he may not be “a big idiot” after all. “I feel like I could do anything,” he said.

On a recent evening, he took his boys to a Cub Scout meeting. The theme: “Cub Scouts in Shining Armor.” The den leader said: “A knight of the Round Table was someone who was very noble, who stood up for the right things. Remember what it is to be a knight, okay?”

Peterson’s boys nodded, wearing Burger King crowns that Penny had spray-painted silver.

Peterson had never spoken to Luttrell, neither in the helicopter nor afterward. Last month, the Seal phoned him.

“Hey, buddy,” he said. “This is Marcus Luttrell. Thank you for pulling me off that mountain.”

Peterson whooped.

Such happy moments have been rare for Luttrell. After recuperating, he deployed to Iraq, returning home this spring. His injuries from Afghanistan still require a “narcotic regimen.” He feels tormented by the death of his Seal friends, and he avoids sleeping because they appear in his dreams, shrieking for help.

Three weeks ago, while in New York
, Luttrell visited Ground Zero. On an overcast afternoon, he looked down into the pit. The World Trade Center is his touchstone as a warrior. He had linked Sept. 11 to the people of Afghanistan: “I didn’t go over there with any respect for these people.”

But the villagers of Sabray taught him something, he said.

“In the middle of everything evil, in an evil place, you can find goodness.
Goodness. I’d even call it godliness,” he said.

As Luttrell talked, he walked the perimeter fence. His gait was hulking, if not menacing, his voice angry, engorged with pain. “They protected me like a child. They treated me like I was their eldest son.”

Below Luttrell in the pit, earthmovers were digging; construction workers in orange vests directed a beeping truck. Luttrell kept talking. “They brought their cousins brandishing firearms . . . .” The cranes clanked. “And they brought their uncles, to make sure no Taliban would kill me . . . “

Luttrell kept talking over the banging and the hammering of a place that would rise again.

Graphic

Deadly Day in 2005

On June 28, 2005, four Navy Seals, pinned down in a firefight, radioed for help. A Chinook helicopter, carrying 16 service members, responded but was shot down. All members of the rescue team and three of four Seals on the ground died. Marcus Luttrell alone survived.

NAVY SEALS KILLED ON THE GROUND
Age
Hometown

Petty Officer 2nd Class Matthew G. Axelson 29 Cupertino, Calif.
Petty Officer 2nd Class Danny P. Dietz 25 Littleton, Colo.
Lt. Michael P. Murphy 29 Patchogue, N.Y.


RESCUERS KILLED ON CHINOOK HELICOPTER

160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment
Staff Sgt. Shamus O. Goare 29 Danville, Ohio.
Chief Warrant Officer Corey J. Goodnature 35 Clarks Grove, Minn.
Sgt. Kip A. Jacoby 21 Pompano Beach, Fla.
Sgt. 1st Class Marcus V. Muralles 33 Shelbyville, Ind.
Master Sgt. James W. Ponder III 36 Franklin, Tenn.
Maj. Stephen C. Reich 34 Washington Depot, Conn.
Sgt. 1st Class Michael L. Russell 31 Stafford, Va.
Chief Warrant Officer Chris J. Scherkenbach 40 Jacksonville, Fla.

Navy Seals
Chief Petty Officer Jacques J. Fontan 36 New Orleans
Senior Chief Petty Officer Daniel R. Healy 36 Exeter, N.H.
Lt. Cmdr. Erik S. Kristensen 33 San Diego
Petty Officer 1st Class Jeffery A. Lucas 33 Corbett, Ore.
Lt. Michael M. McGreevy Jr. 30 Portville, N.Y.
Petty Officer 2nd Class Eric S. Patton 22 Boulder City, Nev.
Petty Officer 2nd Class James Suh 28 Deerfield Beach, Fla.
Petty Officer 1st Class Jeffrey S. Taylor 30 Midway, W.Va.
SOURCE: Department of Defense


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn…l?hpid=artslot

Click here to enlarge

snail mailed to me by my USMC, Korean War Homee, Henry “Gutz” Gutierrez. We were in the same Marine Company in Korea, but different platoons. He was assigned to us from his Weapons company. He is alive and doing well considering he nearly lost a leg from wounds received in Korea. Gutz lives in our hometown Laredo TX. with his wife Marta.

This Poem was written by Clarence Ashby Presley, my best friend from Corpsman School until after the Korean War. He died of the complicans of Alzheimer's Disease in Charlottesville, VA.
 SEAL Team Two sent in to Bay of Pigs some of it’s men. The “Boys” went back in to destroy Presidente Noriega’s airplane and boat.

It’s not just an aiplane. Here’s a picture of the dash. This is the third new one I’vehad over the past 10 years. All of them I’ve picked up at the factory in Kansas. I took three days training and 15 flying hours at the Cessna factory to learn the systems on this plane. This one sold for $410,000 and I have a total investment of $450,000 counting the taxes and other stuff I bought for it. I fly it all over the country. It takes about 8 hours from Missouri to Calif, and from Missouri to Florida about 5 hours.

—– Original Message —–
From: Franklin Anderson
To: doc rio
Sent: Thursday, February 26, 2009 

Subject:  Deceased SEAL  members; 

I sent an E-mail earlier and brought up the question of what qualifies for KIA & KIT. I have reviewed the list and thought you might like the article on Walsh and Samuelson. 

As I said previously Doc’s Hetherington and Cline were on a Search mission for a buddy and were killed in a plane crash –I have a clipping in my files to that effect. Richard Coats was in the Phillipines and died of a Heart attack while training for CISM. 

Fredrickson was TAD to the Army for training and died in the Potomac river while on a training mission–their boat over turned and Freddy made it closer to shore than anybody before dying. The instructors had secured before the problem was over. 

Jim Fox from TM 21 was being picked up by the Fulton pickup system and the cable broke at the door of the plane, because there was no emergency cut-off switch—There is film footage of the whole incident. My question that I posed previously is what definition are you; applying to KIA AND KIT. 

I also mentioned Bill Robinson had retired and was selling Real Estate when somebody cut his throat–still unsolved. Please let me know what your parameters are?

 Doc Rio is correct on his statements about Jerry Waters dying in a Parachute Accident and Jerry “Indian” Sweezy dying in ICU in a Shreveport LA Hospital.  I strongly recommend that before the final list is solidified, it be circulated again.

 Franklin

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

How long will euphoria over Obama last?

“Barak the Magic Negro”

The SEABAG

There was a time when everything you owned had to fit in your seabag. Remember those nasty rascals? Fully packed, one of those suckers weighed more than the poor devil hauling it.

The damn things weighed a ton and some idiot with an off-center sense of humor sewed a “carry” handle on it to help you haul it. Hell, you could bolt a handle on a Greyhound bus but it wouldn’t make the damn thing portable.

The Army, Marines and Air Force got footlockers and we got a big ole’ canvas bag.

After you warped your spine jackassing the goofy thing through a bus or train station, sat on it waiting for connecting transportation and made folks mad because it was too damn big to fit in any overhead rack on any bus, train and airplane ever made, the contents looked like hell. All your gear appeared to have come from bums who slept on park benches.

Traveling with a seabag was something left over from the “Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum” sailing ship days. Sailors used to sleep in hammocks. So you stowed your “issue” in a big canvas bag and lashed your hammock to it, hoisted it on your shoulder and in effect moved your entire home and complete inventory of earthly possessions from ship to ship. I wouldn’t say you traveled light because with one strap it was a one-shoulder load that could torque your skeletal frame and bust your ankles. It was like hauling a dead linebacker.

They wasted a lot of time in boot camp telling you how to pack one of the suckers. There was an officially sanctioned method of organization that you forgot after ten minutes on the other side of the gate at Great Lakes or San Diego. You got rid of a lot of issue gear when you went to the SHIP..Did you ever know a tin-can sailor who had a raincoat? A flat hat? One of those nut hugger knit swimsuits? How bout those roll your own neckerchiefs… The ones the girls in a good Naval tailor shop would cut down and sew into a ‘greasy snake’ for two bucks?

Within six months, every fleet sailor was down to one set of dress blues, port and starboard undress blues and whites, a couple of white hats, boots, shoes, assorted kivvies, a peacoat and three sets of bleached out dungarees. The rest of your original issue was either in the pea coat locker, lucky bag or had been reduced to wipedown rags in the engineroom. Underway ships were not ships that allowed a vast accumulation of private gear. Hobos who lived in discarded refrigerator crates could amass greater loads of pack rat crap than fleet sailors. The confines of a canvas-back rack, side locker and a couple of bunk bags did not allow one to live a Donald Trump existence. Space and the going pay scale combined to make us envy the lifestyle of a mud hut Ethiopian. We were the global equivalents of nomadic Mongols without ponies to haul our stuff.

And after the rigid routine of boot camp we learned the skill of random compressed packing… Known by mothers world-wide as ‘cramming’. It is amazing what you can jam into a space no bigger than a breadbox if you pull a watch cap over a boot and push it in with your foot. Of course it looks kinda weird when you pull it out but they never hold fashion shows at sea and wrinkles added character to a salty appearance. There was a four-hundred mile gap between the images on recruiting posters and the actual appearance of sailors at sea. It was not without justifiable reason that we were called the tin-can Navy.

We operated on the premise that if ‘Cleanliness was next to Godliness’, we must be next to the other end of that spectrum… We looked like our clothing had been pressed with a waffle iron and packed by a bulldozer.

But what the hell did they expect from a bunch of jerks who lived in the crew’s hole of a 2250 Gearing/Fletcher can. After a while you got used to it… You got used to everything you owned picking up and retaining that “distinctive” aroma… You got used to old ladies on busses taking a couple of wrinkled nose sniffs of your peacoat then getting up and finding another seat…

Do they still issue seabags? Can you still make five bucks sitting up half the night drawing a ships picture on the side of one of the damn things with black and white marking pens that drive old masters-at-arms into a ‘rig for heart attack’ frenzy? Make their faces red… The veins on their neck bulge out… And yell,” What in God’s name is that all over your seabag?” “Artwork, Chief… It’s like the work of Michelangelo… My ship… Great huh?” “Looks like some damn comic book…”

Here was a man with cobras tattooed on his arms… A skull with a dagger through one eye and a ribbon reading ‘DEATH BEFORE SHORE DUTY’ on his shoulder… Crossed anchors with ‘Subic Bay 1945’ on the other shoulder… An eagle on his chest and a full blown Chinese dragon peeking out between the cheeks of his butt. If anyone was an authority on stuff that looked like a comic book, it had to be this Chief.

Sometimes I look at all the crap stacked in my garage, close my eyes and smile, remembering a time when everything I owned could be crammed into a canvas bag.

SEAMAN J. RUPPENTHAL
Basic Underwater Demolition School (BUD/S)

There were times when I didn’t even want to move anymore, but the other guys had the spark.

We held each other together. If somebody was losing his wind in the boat, someone else would take care of him, and the other four would bring up the stroke.

I’m getting it into my head that the limitations I used to carry were needless. Anybody can make it through here if they want to do it.

Jim "Patches" Watson in White shirt

AFTERBURNER:  http://www.pjtv.com/v/2343
“MSNBC & The Great Liberal Narrative: The Truth About The Tyranny of Political Correctness” was interesting and hope you do too.             Hit “REFRESH” if you have problems with LINK opening.

David Goggins SEAL

 
    Pure USNavy Scuttlebutt

Me and Willy were lollygagging by the scuttlebutt after being aloft to boy butter up the antennas and were just perched on a bollard eyeballing a couple of bilge rats and flangeheads using crescent hammers to pack monkey shit around a fitting on a handybilly.

 All of a sudden the dicksmith started hard-assing one of the deck apes for lifting his pogey bait. The pecker-checker was a sewer pipe sailor and the deckape was a gator. Maybe being blackshoes on a bird farm surrounded by a gaggle of cans didn’t set right with either of those gobs.

The deck ape ran through the nearest hatch and dogged it tight because he knew the penis machinist was going to lay below, catch him between decks and punch him in the snot locker. He’d probably wind up on the binnacle list but Doc would find a way to gundeck the paper or give it the deep six to keep himself above board.

We heard the skivvywaver announce over the bitch box that the breadburners had creamed foreskins on toast and SOS ready on the mess decks so we cut and run to avoid the clusterfuck when the twidgets and cannon cockers knew chow was on.

 We were balls to the wall for the barn and everyone was preparing to hit the beach as soon as we doubled-up and threw the brow over. I had a ditty bag full of fufu juice and after a trip through the rain locker, I was gonna spread on thick for the bar hogs with those sweet bosnias .

 Sure beats the hell out of brown bagging. Might even hit the acey-duecy club and try to hook up with a westpac widow – they’re always leaving snail trails on the dance floor on amateur night.

author unknown

A Question of :  U.S. Navy Enlisted Classification of  HM-8492 “B”

—– Original Message —– 
From: WGRather [at] aol.com 
To: docrio45 [at] gmail.com 
Sent: Tuesday, April 28, 2009 9:28 AM 
Subject:  I received an email with all these email addresses, are you a SEAL?


Rio, 

Thanks for double checking your database.  However, I knew my name would not be on the database list. 


In 1969 the Navy established an alternative 8492 (SpecOpTech) designation as 8492″B”. This was originally for , Navy Beach Jumpers, USMC recon, ANGLICO and Beach Master units. I had already attended Jump school and Scuba school with 3rd Forced Recon in 1964. 

In 1970 I was assigned to Qui Nhon, Naval Advisor Group with   Chief Ron Decker (EOD) but he was later reassigned to Danang and I remained as the EOD advisor. I did go to a VN ‘hell week’ at Cam Ranh Bay. The rational for that, I never knew, but just went as told. 

My primary focus in Qui Nhon was laision with Nha Trang  for support. The job only lasted 7 months and I transferred to ANGLICO, at MACV Hdqt, Saigon. Our base was inside the VN Special Forces Airborne school where we were allowed as many jumps with the students as we wanted. (great duty) I know this is long winded but wanted to let you know the how and why I got my 8492″B” designation. 

Thanks. 

W.Grey Rather



From: doc riojas
Sent: Tuesday, April 28, 2009 1:21 PM
To: Robert Russell
Cc: Steve Robinson
Subject: Have you any knowledge of  SEAL HM’s have an NEC HM-8492 “A” and “B”? 

THis HM claims to have a Spec Ops HM-8492 “B” 
i wonder if it is true, i never heard of us HM’s being “A” and “B” 

I think i will ask BuMed, or BuPers what you say to that? 

rio


—– Original Message —–
From: Steve Robinson
To: ‘doc riojas’ ; ‘Robert Russell’
Sent: Tuesday, April 28, 2009 7:25 PM
Subject: Have you any knowledge of  SEAL HM’s have an NEC HM-8492 “A” and “B”? 

Doc Riojas, 

I’m passing this along to RD Russell to let him have a peek at it. There have been several previous cases where “Beach Jumpers” have tried very hard to cash in on the idea that they are/were “spec ops” types… either the comm/et guys or the medicos attached to their unit. They were NOT “spec ops” and the Navy’s NEC codes were adjusted to correct that impression. One well known case was a Beach Jumper named Silbergeld who had cobbled together a HUGE story of “spec ops” and “liaison” work with ST-1… and managed to get it translated into almost 20 years of full VA disability benefits from “combat wounds”. When his case was turned over to the FBI and they decided to prosecute, intending to obtain full repayment plus fines, Mr. Silbergeld sucked on the business end of his 9mm pistol. 

As you well know, during the Vietnam War, BUMED (USN Bureau of Medicine) stipulated that US Navy Hospital Corpsmen were trained/tasked/required to render medical aid, assistance, and comfort to the injured, and further stipulated that US Navy Hospital Corpsmen were NOT permitted to participate in the UDT/SEAL training which was intended/designed to result in their tasking as aggressors in combat. As a result, medical personnel were taken from the graduates of the Fleet Marine Force training – Navy Hospital Corpsmen who were destined to serve with the USMC – and they were assigned to various UDT/SEAL Teams where their duties DID include going in harm’s way with SEALs in combat. Those medical men ARE LISTED in the SEAL Database and specifically annotated with the word “CORPSMAN”. 

It was not until shortly AFTER the end of the Vietnam War that BUMED’s official position on this matter began to change. It was decided that US Navy Hospital Corpsmen who were to be assigned to the UDT/SEAL Teams must attend and successfully complete at least a portion of the BUD/S Training course. Thus the first group of FMF Hospital Corpsmen to also complete the 3rd (last) Phase of BUD/S training graduated in April 1976. Within FIVE (5) calendar years, however, ALL CORPSMEN being assigned to the UDT/SEAL Teams were required to be legitimate graduates of the full BUD/S Training course. From that point onward (roughly 1981) any Navy Hospital Corpsman who was tasked/trained for duties as a SEAL Operator (Combatant Swimmer, SEAL) was a full/complete graduate of BUD/S Training and carried the Secondary NEC of 5326. 

With all of this in mind, I am uncertain when the actual term “Special Operations” and the related abbreviation “Spec Ops” came into regular use. You and RD know far more than I about the details of the MEDICAL portion of the NSW house, and I’d have to default to you two for a pronouncement on this guy. 

Steve Robinson


Navy Enlistment Classification Codes (NEC)

HM-8492 Special Operations Technician

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 Related Resources

• Navy NECs
• Joining the Navy
• Rating (Job) Descriptions

Description of NEC: Provides medical services for personnel engaged in direct support of Special Warfare (SEAL) Teams. Performs first aid and minor surgery and renders routine and emergency medical care. Instructs and advises regarding the prevention of illness or injuries and treatments associated with swimming, SCUBA diving and airborne and amphibious operations. Operates the pressure chamber to run pressure and oxygen tolerance tests and treats diving medical disorders. Enters pressure chamber to care for patients suffering from decompression sickness. Performs underwater diving duties as required by military training and operations.

Source ratings: HM
Paygrades Authorized to Hold NEC: E3-E8
Training Course: Course Mandatory
Open to Women: No
SPECIAL NOTES: 1. HM-8492 personnel serve with Special Warfare (SEAL) Teams and receives familiarization in the recognition, handling and detonation of demolitions.
2. Mandatory training K-431-0021, Army Basic Airborne Training or Navy equivalent, Joint Special Operations Forces (SOF) Medic Course. All members must be SEAL qualified.
3. Personnel must hold NEC 5320 or 5326 to be awarded this NEC.


Navy Enlistment Classification Codes (NEC)

HM-8493 Medical Deep Sea Diving Technician

Description of NEC: Assists medical officer in prevention and treatment of illnesses associated with deep sea diving and high-pressure conditions. Operates pressure chamber and submarine-rescue apparatus. Enters pressure chamber to care for patients suffering from decompression sickness. Performs diving and other duties related to underwater rescue.
Source ratings: HM
Paygrades Authorized to Hold NEC: E3-E7
Training Course: Course Mandatory
Open to Women: Yes
SPECIAL NOTES: Must continuously maintain Dive qualifications to retain NEC.

Courtesy: Steve Sagri USArmy Special Forces
Taken from the SEAL VTC
Click on it to enlarge

http://www.metalstorm.com/release/future-weapons-400k.html  Weapon of the Future?  Video worth watching !

submitted by Bill Goines

Click on these small photos to enlarge them.

Eric F. Shellenberger
click on sign above to see video

Funeral For ” Hoot” Andrews

—- Original Message —–
From: marla and james andrews
To: wbruhmuller@comcast.net ; 

VeriSEAL Group ; VeriSEAL Group ; Ty Zellers ; Tom Tarbox ; Tara Andrews ; t.tysterz@verizon.net ; Shaun Chittick ; Sara E Mosley ; Rudy Boesch ; Richard Craighead ; RD Russell ; Pete Carolan ; Patrick Hoskins ; Patrick Hoskins ; Maggie ; Leg Martin ; Larry Bailey ; Kevin Katsarelas ; KERRY CAIN ; Kathie Hoskins ; Jim Wallace ; Jim Cook ; JanosRunner@aol.com ; Jake Rhinebolt ; Jack Saunders ; HStone6606@aol.com ; HERSHEL DAVIS ; Georg Doran ; Evan Hoskins ; Erasmo “Doc” Riojas ; Eddie Otoole ; Drew Bisset ; Doc Martin ; ‘Dee Clark’ ; daug68@aol.com ; Dante Stephensen ; bruseal@comcast.net ; Bob Hightower ; bisset45@aol.com ; Ben Hoskins ; Barbara White ; Amanda Curtis

Subject: Funeral For Hoot Andrews 

The time has come to fulfill Hoot’s last and most fervent wish, that to be buried at Arlington National Cemetary among the honored dead. 

A service will be held 16Jul2009 at 0900 at Old Post Chapel, Arlington National Cemetary with ground interment immediately following. Arlington asks all who attend to be present at least 1/2 hour prior to the service and to provide their own transportation to the chapel and gravesite. 

This date and time was chosen to accommodate those who may wish to attend the SEAL Team 2 Reunion at Little Creek, VA and who may also wish to attend Hoot’s service. 

Please pass this information to anyone I may have left out of this sending. 

Respectively, 

Mrs. James H. “Hoot” Andrews

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03 May 2009    Richard Barcus Vietnam Photo Album

 

 

Kinky Friedman    Poi Dog  Pondering

 

—- Original Message —–
From: Robert Russell
To: Doc Riojas
Sent: Friday, November 02, 2007 

In 2006 the Navy created the Special Warfare Operator rating, which consists entirely of SEALs. The rating’s specialty mark is identical to the Underwater Demolition badge’s original design but in silver. The Navy Warrant Officer device for Special Warfare Technician is also this same design in gold. Retrieved fromhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwater_Demolition_Badge

Teams!

R.D. Russell (SEAL),  UDT/SEAL Archieves       

 

Is BUD/S so easy a Caveman can DO it?   We don’t have this man’s name.  Mr. R.D. Russell is still investigating his status. Does anyone know him?

Chris Haney, USNavy SeaBee, ‘Nam Seastory about SERE


Tuesday, June 9, 2009

Teammates, I received the following email through the folks at the POW Network (they get lots of weird stuff and pass it along to me whenever possible )

Here it is, exactly as transmitted  I  hope maybe someone in the VTC can help this guy.  I’ll ask Doc Riojas to post this on his web site www.sealtwo.org

Steve Robinson, Virtual Team Compound Administrator

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Hello all,  I went thru SERE with 2 SEALs before we went to Vietnam in 67 .

The SERE was at ;  maybe China Lake ?? Somewhere in California . I was a SeaBee but got paired up with 2 SEALs . We broke into a State Prison Honor Farm together the 1st night of training. I have no idea what their names were .

I have long since forgotten. But was wondering if there is a message board for SEALs anywhere I could post the message about that night….find out if they lived thru Vietnam or wherever they went. And just in general have a laugh about that night. If you know of a website like that I would appreciate any info you might have??

Thanks

Chris Haney
chrishaney [at] mindspring.com


—– Original Message —– 
From: Erasmo Riojas 
To: chrishaney [at] mindspring.com 
Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2009 
Subject: your sea story about SERE

your sea story about SERE will be posted on my web site and hopefully somebody remembers these guys. I visited with the SeaBees up in ChuLi on a trip to bum furniture for SpecWarGru Saigon.  The CPO’s had state side commodes and a stateside bar.  You men had it a lot better than us SEALs.

Find me your origional message that went to the SEAL blog if you kept it.  I would like to see it.

Rio


From: chrishaney [at] mindspring.com 
To: Doc Riojas  ,  docrio45 [at] gmail.com
Sent: Tuesday, June 10, 2009 
Subject: your sea story about SERE

Doc,

Let me look for it….I think I sent it from a link on one of the web pages I was reading about “Make Believe Seals & Special Forces Guys” …or the POW web site. 
Yeah…we SeaBees didn’t have it half bad…if we were anywhere we could beg borrow or steal….especially steal from the Air Force……we had pretty nice stuff. I was at 14 Gia Long in DaNang for my 2nd part & didn’t even carry a weapon. My cousin came to visit from Chu Lai & thought he was stateside. I used to tell people it was so safe there ….in downtown DaNang …..because we were surrounded by Viet Cong & NVA ….they didn’t want to blow up or hurt any of their own guys !! 

Thanks,   Chris 


From: chrishaney [at] mindspring.com 
To: Doc Riojas  ,  docrio45 [at] gmail.com
Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2009 
Subject: your sea story about SERE
Doc,
Thanks for the reply 

You have built a great web page. But there must be a mistake. These guys are MUCH older than I am. ha…..Just kidding. It’s amazing how fast life goes by once you get past about 50 . 

I had always wondered what happened to those 2 Seal’s I went thru SERE/POW training with at China Lake. When they let us lose on the range they told us about the state prison   I think either medium security or honor farm.  that was just off range. When they paired me up with these 2 guys they told me 1st thing that was where we were going.

I reminded them they said they would bust us if we got caught anywhere near the place & if I remember right they said. “this is what we’ll be doing for a living, might as well get started now” . We found the place right off. I stayed at the wire. The guard tower & spot light were about 30 yards away . They broke into the galley and stuffed their bloused trousers with food. I kept watch & signaled them when it was clear to come out. They did, we were never caught. 

We evaded the people looking for us till the last day. Turned ourselves in & went thru the POW part. I know as a SEAL that was nothing compared to what those guys probably did afterwards. But as a SeaBee it definitely made me think about how boring my time would be. Ha. 

I went to Adak after that then to NSA DaNang till discharged in 69 . If you ever hear a story like this I’d love to hear what happened to those 2 guys , if they made it . I know one of the other SEALs that was with them had his foot burned when a “Guard”, those guys with the Big Red Star on their hats, came into our camp & kicked over the big pot of hot water/food we were cooking. I thought the SEAL was going to kill the Guard as he had to go for medical & got separated from the other 2 Seals & was going to have to go thru the whole thing all over again.

  I Truly miss those days. Most exciting things I had ever done up to that part of life. 
Thanks for listening & God Bless You guys for everything you did.

  If you ever run across this story please let me know. I’m sure it wasn’t anything compared to these guys lives afterward.

  Take Care, Chris Haney CE2 US Navy SeaBees. 

—– Original Message —–
From: Jim Bracken To:jimcat [at] consolidated.net;
Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 9:11 PM
Subject: Fw: Farewell Luncheon for CAPT Wikul, USN 

Damn . . . I really feel old now. Pete was in my BUD/S Class in 1971 . . . and still hanging. 38 years on active duty. I was 20 and Pete was 17 . . . he came to BUD/S right outta boot camp . . . an E-2 striker . . . made it to O-6 . . . never would have made Admiral, though, because he refused to leave the Teams . . . have to have “Diversity of Command” to aspire to Admiral. Was Skipper of SDV 2 (SEAL Delivery Vehicle – 2) for a few years. 

For all you “Black Shoes”, “Legs”, “Jar-heads”, “Chair-Force” and “Civvie” types, the “Bull Frog” is the current, longest-serving SEAL on active duty. His name is added to the BULL FROG trophy, which he holds until his retirement, at which time he passes it on to new next BULL FROG. 

Congrats, Peter Igor Wikul . . . but, I’ll be sleeping with one eye open for a while. 

bracken Class 52 ec

 

Chuck Pfarrer’s Family Devastated by Katrina

             I am writing to you to ask for donations of household effects and clothing.   Look around in your attic and closets and see if you have  some “extra stuff”  there is nothing too trivial-everything is needed.  Plates, cups, glasess, silverware, toasters, pots and pans, utensils, sheets, blankets, towels, coat hangers -you name it.    Got extras?  We need ’em.


Email from Paul and Sylvia Vaughn (Doc Riojas daughter) in Plano TX

  Dad, 

we took a gift card over today to Mrs. Chuck  Pfarrar.  Paul gave it to Colleen Gammon; she was ecstatic!   Colleen said to thank our Dad VERY MUCH for the gift card.   She was very surprised and happy.  She said Chuck is in Michigan getting treatment for colon cancer.

 

    The kids were playing tackle football in the front yard when we drove up.  Two cars with Mississippi plates were parked out front.  One of the little girls told Paul she was from Biloxi but that her house isn’t there anymore.      

 Colleen said everyday she gets at least one phone call from a SEAL or former SEAL asking what they can do to help.  I noticed she was carrying around a school supply list from the school district.  Paul said she’s tired.  All the women staying there are bunking in one bedroom. 

Paul & Sylvia D. Riojas (Doc Riojas daughter)

Second Email from Paul Vaugh (my son in law):

Her eyes had tears in them. She looked exhausted and gave us hugs. I told her to call me if they need anything. Later, we will drop some Lubys gift certs by. Tons of kids running around. Or maybe McDonalds. 

 Paul Vaughn

—– Original Message —–
From: Kiet Nguyen, LDNN (Vietnamese SEAL) American War Hero, recepient of the U.S. Navy Cross
To: Doc Rio, HMC (SEAL) USN Ret.
Cc: Larry Bailey, Capt (SEAL) USN Ret.
Sent: Sunday, September 25, 2005 10:33 PM
Subject: Re: Thank you very much for all your emails and phone calls about our situation with Rita and to wish us well
 
Hi Doc,
 
We just received a “Thanking Card with Chuck’s family picture.” (Attached picture)
Thuy and I have moved very much about his kind words and picture with whole bunch of little kids make us so emotional.
We only want to “Thanks God” for what we have heard and response by your voice.
Doc, You are the man of our Frog’s community.
God bless you and Lou as well as our brother Chuch and his family.
 
Kiet & Thuy Nguyen
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
  
CHUCK Pfarrer (SEAL) and Family is a Katrina Survivor but lost his home and  everything!
 

Rio
We have a Team Mate & family in trouble. If you can help please do so.

Rio Chuck Pfarrer came through BUD/S class 114 in 1981. He served with the East Coast Teams and was in Beirut when the Marine barracks blew up. He is a member of the UDT/SEAL Association. Pam and I are sending a check made out to “Charles Pfarrer” and let him figure out where it should go. Chuck originaly wrote to Maynard Weyers and Maynard sent it to us to fan out.

Hoo Yah!!!!
RD Russell and Pam

below is his email to Maynard Weyers.

Second Email from RD Russell:

Chuck Pfarrer is also in a battle with Stage three colorectal cancer that had spread into his lymphatic system, millions of cancer cells had metastasized throughout his body. The doctors have removed the main tumor, lymph nodes and 12 inches of his large intestine. He got a secondary infection in the surgical wound and spent 3 weeks in the hospital with a tube in his nose. He has also indured 6 months of Chemo with the side effects of skin lesions, chronic nausea, mental confusion,fatigue, and ulcerating mouth sores.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

to: R.D. Russell,

I have a direct action request, and I wonder if you’d pass it along.  My family’s home town is (was) Biloxi.  We’ve lost three houses and all possessions, but thankfully, we’re all fine.  If you could pass this email along to the frog family, I’d appreciate it.   It’s a chance to contribute DIRECTLY to three refugee families.   

Friends are the riches of the world.   

Thanks,   Chuck Pfarrer.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

From Chuck Pfarrer to Maynard Weyers:

Friends-

Thank you so much for the outpouring of support and the kind offers of help since Katrina destroyed our three family homes in and around Biloxi.  I can update the situation a little now. 

The flooding of New Orleans has been getting the lion’s share of the publicity and the relief efforts, but the damage is much wider.  In Mississippi the cities of Gulfport, Biloxi, Ocean Springs and Pascagoula are destroyed.   Totally destroyed. The damage is worse than Camille (1969) which was previously regarded as the first “super hurricane” of the 20th century. 

Katrina was no lady.  The Gulf Coast of Mississippi is a wasteland of debris and tragedy.

I can tell you with great thankfulness that we lost no one in the family.  Others were not so lucky–  several of our neighbors in Langley Point and Pass Christian tried to shelter in place and were killed.

The family rode out the landfall 15 miles north of I-10 in the home of a friend.   The home was in the lee of a small ridge in the pine woods.  This little bit of shelter certainly saved them.    There was some damage to that house as well, but the structure held.  All came through.

Pat and Joni, Sean and Babs, Katie and James lost their houses and all their possessions.   Mom and Dad’s and Sean’s homes were destroyed down to the foundations on Langley Point in Biloxi.  Katie and James’ place in Pass Christian was also a total loss.   The families got out with little more than the clothing on their backs.

Brother Sean is an officer serving on a research ship of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA);  his ship was docked in Pascagoula.  Following the storm, our family was able to get to the ship and get out the message that they’d survived.  The ship was an oaisis for them— it was the only place for a hundred miles with water and electricity.

All have now evacuated to Dallas and are staying with my sister Colleen.   Six adults and six kids-hard to believe it, but our families join more than 250,000 refugees in the Dallas area alone.  Many hundreds of thousands more people were made homeless.

Needless to say, all of our families are starting over, from scratch.  Pat said to Joni, that after 49 years of marriage she’s starting out as a June Bride. 

I am writing to you to ask for donations of household effects and clothing.   Look around in your attic and closets and see if you have  some “extra stuff”  there is nothing too trivial-everything is needed.  Plates, cups, glasess, silverware, toasters, pots and pans, utensils, sheets, blankets, towels, coat hangers -you name it.    Got extras?  We need ’em.


Second hand clothing is also needed.  Anything that doesn’t  fit us will be passed along to other needy families.  The kids are 1 boy, aged 11,  1 girl age 9, 1 girl age 4, 1 boy aged 6, and 1 boy aged 3.   You name it.  Shoes, socks, shorts, pants and dresses, winter coats to t-shirts— we need it all.

Box up your stuff and send it to:

                Pfarrer Family
                % Colleen Gammon     (she is Chuck’s sister)
                8013 Mineral Springs Ct.
                Plano, TX  75025
                (469) 633 0405
                (972) 335 7225

Thank you so much.  I promise, the time you spend looking in closets will be greatly appreciated by us.  Again, no item is too “odd”–  we’ve lost three households worth of stuff.     

Friends are the riches of the world.   Thank you for helping us.  

FITH!

Chuck Pfarrer

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

There is a time when doing the talk is not enough!   

Pam and I are sending a check made out to “Charles Pfarrer” and let him figure out where it should go.

Pam and RD Russell in Colorado

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

to my  SEAL Email list: 


 Hopefully you will also send it to all your friends and teamates.

I have also sent this info to my civilian friends and my relatives with instructions that any donation, no matter how small will be significant to Chuck and his family.    I have also asked them to buy Chuck’s book.

Our prayers for the Pfarrer’s and all of the Katrina survivors.     We sent a Walmart Gift Card.

“Doc” Riojas      Pearland TX

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Doc 

I sent 50# clothing Friday and have another box with children’s cloths, games, & appliances going tomorrow or Tuesday.  Our son in Memphis is working on a box as well. Will also send gift card so they can buy something special for themselves. 

BIll Daugherty  and Cindy in Okahoma

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Thanks Doc! 

It is very good advise of your to help Chuck Pfarrer.

I have discuss with my LDNN members to send help for Chuck’s family.  I have mentioned one other email is: Chuck is in cancer treatment at Michigan hospital.  That is more worried some for his wife and the kids too.
May God bless Chuck and his family.
 
Kiet Nguyen LDNN in California
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Warrior Soul : The Memoir of a Navy SEAL (Hardcover)
by Chuck Pfarrer “IT WAS A FRIDAY NIGHT, and Gate 14 at Norfolk International was not crowded…”

From Publishers Weekly
Pfarrer, a former Navy SEAL assault element commander and now a Hollywood screenwriter (The Jackal; Navy SEALS; Darkman, etc.), looks back on his time in the special forces in this adrenaline rush of a memoir that grabs readers from the first page (in which he readies for his final-and nearly fatal-jump). Writing with the efficient clarity and brawn of one of the U.S. military’s most special operators, Pfarrer describes the rigorous, nearly sadistic SEAL training that propelled him toward covert operations in the 1980s and early 1990s. 
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Bellaire man recounts life as a Navy SEAL in book

Bellaire author and former Navy SEAL Chuck Pfarrer.

By TOM CARR
Record-Eagle staff writer

http://www.record-eagle.com/2004/jan/25npeopl.htm

   BELLAIRE — Don’t let the Rambo-like picture on the front of Chuck Pfarrer’s book “Warrior Soul: The Memoir of a Navy SEAL” fool you.

   Sure, the book — 332 pages, Random House — is a real-life adventure of one man’s experience as an elite fighter for the military.

   It includes his harrowing mission in Beirut, Lebanon in 1983 during seven months of street fighting and the bombing of the U.S. Marine headquarters there. It also includes his part in surrounding an Egyptian airliner carrying the hijackers of the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro in 1985.

   One part he hopes will set it apart from other military memoirs is the tale of his inner struggle. He tells how being emotionally distant served him in his career, but it also wrecked a series of relationships.

   “Now, there’s a whole shelf at Border’s with this kind of book,” said Pfarrer, 46, from his Bellaire home, where he lives with his wife, Stacey Truesdell, who had summered here all her life.

   “The difference is the emotional candor that I think sets this one apart, or at least I hope it does,” he added.

   Still, there is plenty of action in the book.

   “People read this kind of book for sort of an adventure and the life is somewhat of an adventure,” he said.

   Pfarrer was attending California State University at Northridge and studying to be a psychologist when a devastating break-up with a girlfriend made him reassess his life.

   “I would spend the rest of my life trying to convince rich white ladies not to be afraid of spiders,” he wrote.

   “There has to be more to living,” he continued, and thought of his father’s seven stars on his Vietnam service ribbon. After grueling training, he embarked on a terrifying mission in Lebanon and a moral dilemma when one of his men wanted to remain aboard a ship rather than go ashore where the danger was, saying he didn’t want to orphan his children.

   Pfarrer was torn.

   “Cowardice disgusted me because I feared it in myself,” Pfarrer wrote.

   Yet it wasn’t that simple.

   “We both knew he was simply meat, cannon food, a walking bull’s eye,” he wrote. “I knew that I could have been more forgiving to a man who had simply been broken. But I was not because I was slowly being broken myself.”

   He also writes of the day-to-day concerns of standing out in Central America or other places where not everyone welcomes American soldiers.

   “To be obviously a ‘norteamericano’ was to be a target,” he wrote.

   When going to a restaurant in Central America, he would give a kid three cigarettes to watch his car, with the promise of the rest of the pack when he returned. He’d also give the same to a second kid as payment to watch the first kid.

   “I’m pretty sure this works, because I have never been car-bombed or ambushed as I returned to my vehicle,” he wrote.

   Pfarrer said it takes some special traits to become a Navy SEAL, and they don’t need to be a “national caliber athlete.”

   “It’s more mental and spiritual than anything,” he said. “If you’ve just won an iron-man triathlon, it doesn’t matter. They’ll push you beyond what you can normally do.”

   He also said the Hollywood version of the elite forces focuses more on the physical than anything else.

   “The profession tends to be more intellectual than people think,” he said.

   Pfarrer is proud of his service as he looks back, though he realizes that what made him a good soldier did not necessarily make him a good mate.

   Some of Pfarrer’s inner struggles have been resolved. He said he is finally in a good and lasting relationship.

   But because of the struggle to get there, he would also have mixed feelings about his son taking the same path.

   “These are the smartest, bravest, best men I’ve ever worked with,” he said. “That said, I have a 5-year-old son. Would I want him to be a SEAL? I’m not sure.

   “But I wouldn’t stop him.”

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Suzanne Brockmann’s Hot Target Bash

Tampa, Florida, Saturday, January 15, 2005

Reported by Helen

                                                            http://themysticcastle.com/Newsletters/fanfest1.htm

http://themysticcastle.com/Newsletters/fanfest1.htm

 
William Davis
John Ferguson
Robert Kaminski
Robert Darakjy LeapFrog
SEAL LeapFrog William Davis

This Lifeboat is on display at the UDT-SEAL Museum in Ft. Pierce Fl.

Dave Castro SEAL Trainer
Dana de Coster
Chris Cassidy SEAL astronauat
Pres. Nixon at VN Embassy
FIVE Navy Crosses !

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Erasmo "Doc" Riojas Roots, Dolores Texas

Nic Walsh was in Seal Team One

He made 2 tours to RVN. One as as Platoon XO and one as Platoon CO. I believe he was a grad from West Point and requested inter-service transfer in order to attend BUDS. He received a head wound in RVN and was medically retired. Nic decided to become a Doctor but due to his injury, had to obtain a special waiver to attend medical school. He was allowed the waiver but could not specialize in a field that had any surgery requirements. 

Nic became a bone and mussel specialist. He is considered one of the top in his field in the world and is on a long term International Council for that specialty. He is a Professor and Chairman of the Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation department of one of the top medical schools and hospitals in the US (UTHSC) and has served as chair of the American Board of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. He also is responsible for the Pain Clinic, Physical Medicine and Rehab portion for the Audy Murphy VA hospital and is heading up the implementation of the new Poly Trauma Center at that facility. 

As a note, he has taken a personal interest in our wounded teammates who end up at any of the facilities in this area over the last many years. 

Nic was an excellent SEAL operator and OIC in RVN and has carried that same spirit onto the medical profession. 

I am never surprised at the accomplishments in both the Military and civilian careers of our Teammates. No matter what the challenge, given the opportunity, the majority of our Teammates will rise far above the norm. 

Jim McCracken 
ST-1 WC 56/57

 

Richard "Rogue Warrior" Marcinko

Magazine offers treasure-trove of WWII data

By Roxanne Moore Saucier
BDN Staff

http://www.bangordailynews.com:80/detail/111552.html go here for the whole story.

“I still remember the last World War I veteran I interviewed — 104-year-old Everett McKenney of Waterville and Farmingdale.

Lewis K. Ellis, the son of Benjamin and Frances (Sanborn) Ellis of Brewer, trained to be a pilot, but with several others was demoted for flying “out of range” during training.

Consequently, Ellis was assigned to underwater demolition team No. 30, a duty he loved. Now he is recognized as one of the founding members of the Navy SEALS.”

R.D.says: “He  is on the list as being in UDT-30 as an officer.”

 

—– Original Message —–
From: Harry Humphries   hhgsgi [@] hotmail.com
To: American Contractors; Erasmo “Doc” Riojas  docrio45 [at] gmail.com
Sent: Friday, March 27, 2009

Professor Butler D. Shaffer teaches at Southwestern University School of Law, LA, California. For the past two years he has been presenting his students with a much-needed voting exercise, one that ought to be performed in every campus across our nations. These days, students do their share to undermine intellectual and other freedoms. Studentsespecially those on the Left, who are the cloned majoritylike to think of themselves as gritty revolutionaries. With their fealty to politically correct repressive speech codes, and campus-based, Kenneth Starr-like inquisitions, our youngsters promote rather than quell institutionalized violence.

On the first day of class, and without any introductory ado, Prof. Shaffer proceeds to hand each of his students the following ballot. It reads: “It’s time to elect the leader of a great nation, and you have been presented with the following candidates:

CANDIDATE “A”: A well known critic of government, this man has been involved in tax protest movements, and has openly advocated secession, armed rebellion against the existing national government, and even the overthrow of that government. He is a known member of a militia group that was involved in a shootout with law enforcement authorities. He opposes the gun control efforts of the present government as well as the restrictions it imposes on open immigration into this country. He is a businessman who has earned his fortune from such businesses as alcohol, tobacco, retailing and smuggling.

CANDIDATE “B”: A decorated army war veteran, this man is an avowed nonsmoker and dedicated public health advocate. His public health interests include the fostering of medical research and his dedication to eliminating cancer. He opposes the use of animals in conducting such research. He has supported restrictions on the use of asbestos, pesticides, and radiation, and favours government determined occupational health and safety standards, as well as the promotion of such foods as whole-grain bread and soybeans. He is an advocate of government gun-control measures. An ardent opponent of tobacco, he has supported increased restrictions on both the use of and advertising of tobacco products. Such advertising restrictions include: [1] not allowing tobacco use to be portrayed as harmless or a sign of masculinity; [2] not allowing such advertising to be directed at women; [3] not drawing attention to the low nicotine content of tobacco products; and [4] limitations as to where such advertisements may be made. This man is a champion of environmental and conservationist programs, and believes in the importance of sending troops into foreign countries in order to maintain order therein.

After introducing the candidates, Prof. Shaffer asks the students to select the candidate for whom they would vote. For two years in a row, members of four classes gave Candidate “A” 47 votes. Candidate “B” got a whopping 141 votes. Put proportionally: Candidate “B” received 75 percent of the student-vote, while candidate “A” got 25 percent of their ballots.

After collecting the ballots, our Professor informs the students that Candidate “A” is a composite of the American Founding Fathers, among whom were Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Sam Adams, John Hancock, and Patrick Henry.

Candidate “B” is Adolph Hitler.

There is an interesting postscript to one of these classes.

While delivering a lecture in constitutional law, Professor Shaffer was expounding on the Schechter case, where the Supreme Court struck down the New Deal’s National Industrial Recovery Act. The New Deal was President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s plan to replace traditional American laissez faire with a government-regulated economy, inspired to a large degree by the socialist countries of Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany (yes, both were principally socialist. But, as Ludwig von Mises pointed out, Hitler demoted his entrepreneurs, while Stalin liquidated them).

Roosevelt had unconstitutionally arrogated to himself the unfettered right to enact laws for governing trade and industry throughout the country. Like his contemporaries in governmental anti-trust departments, Roosevelt deployed codes for “fair competition” in order to seize the property of citizens, often bankrupting them.

Prof. Shaffer also informs the students how popular state collectivism was throughout the world: Stalin, Hitler, Mussolini, Franco and Roosevelt being the better-known examples, and howhush, hushHitler and Mussolini had been revered by renowned people the world over, including Gandhi and Churchill.

At this point, one of the students pipes up: “I don’t see how you can say that,” he intones, “How could a man like Adolph Hitler have been popular with so many people?”

“You tell me,” Professor Shaffer responded, leaning over the podium for impact. “Just two weeks ago 75 percent of you in this class voted for him”.

The lecture hall grows dead silent as the professor pauses to let the point sink in.

©2000 By Ilana Mercer

The Calgary Herald

November 23

Harry Humphries,
President, Global Studies Group
www.gsgi.biz

Click on photo to enlarge it

—– Original Message —–
From: Thomas Blais
To: doc rio Cc: Newlhaus [at] aol.com ; James Cook
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2009 5:41 PM
Subject:
Navy SEAL Invents Revolutionary Healthcare Device 


Dear Rio,

Thank you for sending this information to me. Of what I know regarding Anatomy & Physiology this tells me that much of what I have read concerning, ” The Answer . ”   http://www.theanswer2009.com/site.php       makes sense.  As you advise I will forward this information to ,  Dr. Stewart M. Kerr SEAL, current stationed at PNH Orthopedics. Hopefully, it will be of value concerning the enhancement of my current rehabilitation, and perhaps help other SEALs in the future as well. I certainly hope so.  

Did you know Chet Langworthy, Chief Hospital Corpsman, First Class Diver of UDT 21?  He saved my life at the afore mentioned fall.  Much later, Chet worked along side Doctor Lambertson in the development of the Pure Oxygen based  ” Hyperbaric Chamber ” concept.

Take care brother. You, Lou Lou and family stay well, be happy. 

   Tomas’

 

An Earlier Tale of SEALs & Piracy

  1. L. Crossland
    CAPT USN (Ret.)

  In the early 80’s, when Norm Ott was commanding officer of the East Coast’s Naval Special Warfare reserve unit, groups of us could find our way down to Det Caribe (Roosevelt Roads).  He known for inspiring initiative among his subordinates and in that unit, it took very little to transform initiative into action

In one instance, Tom Iwaszczuk (a New Jersey resident, a forgivable failing as failings go) and Mike Shortell (who had such a heightened sense of OpSec that he refused to maintain a telephone number), two fine reservists from a fine unit constituted one of these groups. The high point was the time off in between, the weekend. Policy was you could check out a Sea Fox or Special Warfare Craft, Light (SWCL)  and go to St. Thomas . They brought with them a Sea Fox coxswain whose identity is lost to history.  This was good because as lower level petty officers they could not afford to get a room in St. Thomas . They simply tied up at the sea wall and slept on the boat.

During this one trip they tied up behind a Coast Guard cutter, not a full sized cutter like the Gallatin , just a 30′ to 40′ boat, cutter CG41302 to be exact. At the end of the day the Coast Guard just went ashore and DID NOT leave a watch on their boat.

This seemed remiss, but the Coast Guard is after all only the Coast Guard.

In the earliest hours of Sunday morning, Mike Shortell or perhaps Tom Iwaszczuk, woke up. Something was not right. Whoever it was shuffled around the Sea Fox and then looked forward.

The Coast Guard cutter was being towed away by a local in a fishing skiff with an outboard.  At some distance out, was a larger boat with its engine running.

This gentlemen, was what reserves were all about. They went to general quarters, cast off all lines, whipped the covers of the guns, and executed a very fancy buttonhook manuever and the local found himself looking down the barrel of a .50 cal.

“Mon, don’t mean nothin’. Don’t shoot, mon.”

In the end, the cutter was recovered, the local was turned over to the authorities, and all reservists were awarded NAM ‘s.  As commanding officer of reserve SEAL Team Two, I had the privilege of presenting one of these awards three years later.

I always envied Tom Iwaszczuk. I could see him in uniform some day, dandling his grandson on his knee…

“What’s that one for Grandpa?”

“Arrr, pirates. Pirates in the Caribbean .”

To my knowledge those were the first medals awarded to SEALs for action against pirates. Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow hadn’t even been invented yet.

And so there is nothing quite new under the sun.

 

John Wayne Marcum Scholarship Fund

Make donations out to:
Flushing Moose Lodge
7044 N. Elms Rd. Flushing, MI 48433
Please include “JWM Scholarship” on the memo line if writing a check

Robert W. Shouse Jr.   

This is what Gene Fraley was constructing. It went BOOM! in his hand.

KVH

 USN SEAL Team TWO , Det Alpha , 7th Platoon . 1968-1972
 
Vypadá to dobře!

 

Members of our club are interested in the military history, mainly era of the Vietnam War.  Our unit attending local SEAL Vietnam re-enactment events.  We have decided to portray members of the Navy SEAL 2, respectively  Detachment  Alpha , 7th Platoon. We are all friends which form our Vietnam Reenacting Community.
we are very pleasure that Mr. Erasmo “DOC” Riojas  former Navy SEAL 2  is our friend.

for info write Michael:   widowmakers502pir [at] yahoo.com 
in Czechoslovakia     

Abortion and Two Historic Parallels
(Some thoughts about Right and Wrong)

Hart Bezner, Ph.D.

Doc Riojas’ question:   A lesson from the past,  Will Obama demand what the Reich Commissar asked Holland’s Medical Professionals to report?

“To show that the medical profession cannot be forced to kill we only need to recall an event in occupied Holland.  On December 19, 1941, the Reich Commissar of the Netherlands Territories issued an order requiring all doctors to report incurably ill patients.  The physicians of Holland rejected this order unanimously.  When the Reich Commissar threatened to withdraw their licenses, they returned their licenses and removed their shingles, but continued to see their patients secretly.  They refused, however, to issue birth or death certificates.  The commissar, Seiss-Inquart, retraced his steps and attempted to gain their cooperation in a more friendly manner, but the Dutch physicians still refused.  He then arrested 100 of the doctors and shipped them off to the concentration camps, but the remaining ones remained more adamant than ever, and quietly provided for the widows and orphans.  Thus it came about that not a single euthanasia nor non-therapeutic sterilization was participated in by any Dutch physician.  They were truly outstanding in not taking even the smallest step to compromise their ethical foundation.  They acted unanimously and they won out in the end.  They should be a model to our own physicians who feel they can’t refuse when requested to kill.  Since the war, however, things have also degenerated badly in the Netherlands and the memory of the heroic Dutch physicians who resisted so valiantly is now dishonored by their successors.”

Excerpt from here:    http://homepage.mac.com/hart.bezner/historic_parallels.html

 

—– Original Message —–
From: info [at] udtseal.org
To: doc rio
Sent: Sunday, October 11, 2009 5:10 AM
Subject: LCDR Alford J. Ashton    
            

 

 LCDR (SEAL/EOD) Alford J. Ashton USN (Ret)  Class 35 (East Coast)  It is with great sadness that the UDT-SEAL Association informs the membership of the passing  LCDR Alford J. Ashton – Class 35, US Navy Retired  

 LCDR Al Ashton passed away Saturday October 10, 2009 at 1513 after a long battle with cancer. He was surrounded by his loving wife Faye and his family at the time of his death. He will be fondly remembered by his many friends and teammates from his career in the Navy with UDT-21, SEAL Team 1, SEAL Team 2, and the EOD Community.    

He was born and grew up in Pittsburgh PA where he graduated from Allegheny High School in 1963. Through his Navy career Al received his Bachelor of Science degree from New York State University in Albany NY.   

 He graduated from BUD/S training in 1965 (Class 35) and went on to serve in various assignments under Naval Special Warfare including duties with UDT-21, SEAL Team 1, SEAL Team 2, Inshore Undersea Warfare Group Two, and various assignments within the EOD Group 2. Other assignments were OINC of EOD DET’s (including Beirut Lebanon); awarded the “Battle E” for efficiency at EODGRU 2, Cecil Field FL. He was lead inspector on the inspection team for both SEAL/EOD MINEWARCOM based out of Charleston Naval Station, Charleston SC. His last military command was at JUSMAGTHAI in Bangkok, Thailand where he retired from active duty. After retirement Al was ready to take on new challenges in the EOD civilian community. His first civilian employment was with EODT Inc., where he contributed significantly through his work ethics which was instrumental in helping establish one of the most respected and successful companies in the Explosive Ordnance Disposal arena. These new responsibilities took him to the Middle East numerous times and all over the United States as needed.  

 He was one of the most decorated SEAL’s in the teams during the Vietnam era having completed three tours. He was wounded twice during those tours one of which was very serious. Some thought he would never recover fully….as we all know he proved them wrong! He was awarded 2 purple hearts. Al repeatedly demonstrated bravery and heroism, receiving 35 awards and citations. The highest award he received was the Navy Marine Corps Medal. He was cited for having saved the life of the pilot of a helo in which he was a passenger that crashed in the Gulf Of Thailand. He received a total of 5 Bronze Stars with Combat V’s along with numerous other awards. He is among the few SPECWAR Officers to receive certification as SURFACE Warfare Qualified. Al also attained Navy Diving Salvage Officer designation after being commissioned and assigned to the USS Hoist.  

 Al Ashton’s reputation as an exceptional and accomplished athlete was widely known throughout the Navy and in both SEAL/EOD communities. He participated in a host of athletic events ranging from world competition (US Olympic Bobsled Team 1980; All Navy (football, volleyball & softball) to having won Athlete of the Year at the Naval Amphibious Base, Norfolk, Va. (1977,’78,’79).  

 Al Ashton is survived by his wife Alice Faye Ashton, (Hartselle, Al), four children: David Ashton Pensacola FL; Kim Ashton Wise (Larry) Smithfield RI; Michelle Ashton Fetzer (Stan) Pittsburgh PA; and Keri Ashton Fike (Caleb) Hartselle AL; two sisters Patti Ashton Stelter Tampa FL; Nancy Ashton Hilliard Pittsburgh PA, and six grandchildren.   Al was a lifetime member of the UDT/SEAL Association Inc. and the National Navy UDT/SEAL Museum.   A Military Honors funeral service will be held at First Baptist Church, Decatur AL and arrangements in will be made with Shelton Funeral Home, Beltline Road in Decatur Alabama. Final information, times, and dates on all services will be available and sent out by us later this week. We will provide this as soon as we receive the information. An “At Sea” Memorial Service will be held at the National Navy UDT/SEAL Museum Muster at Ft Pierce FL on Sunday November 8, 2009.       

 

DETAILS
 
Time: 1100 (11:00 AM)  Wednesday, October 14, 2009 at First Baptist Church 
Location:
First Baptist Church;   123 Church Street;   PO Box 1667 – NE;   Decatur, AL 35602;   Phone:   256-353-0423;   Fax: 256-353-0469
Funeral Home:
Shelton Funeral Home;   2105 Beltline Road;   Decatur, AL 35602;   Phone:   256-353-1620
Flowers:
Send to:  Shelton Funeral Home
Cards or Notes of concern:
Faye Ashton;    288 Bolds Bridge Road;    Hartselle, AL   35640
Closest Airport:
Huntsville Airport   (HSV)
A Burial at Sea Service: will be held at the UDT/SEAL Muster in Fort Pierce, FL on November 8, 2009. 

 

Ryan Job (SEAL) W.I.A. in Iraq dies after surgery

     http://www.komonews.com/news/61479967.html
also go to the below LINK and scroll about 1/2 page  

https://www.sealtwo.org/page15.htm

LT. Dan B. Cnossen (SEAL)Guest Book 22 Nov 2009

   Mi Vida Loca – Copyright ©1998 – All Right Reserved email: el_ticitl [at] yahoo.com  Webmaster:  E. “Doc” Riojas

New Footage of release of Captain Phillips by US Navy SEALs

Mark Slaughter’s Computer Cleaning Software 100% Bug Free !

  Senator Bob Kerry

   Texas Gov. Rick Perry  & Erasmo “Doc” Riojas

—– Original Message —–
From: Bull  Devine
Sent: Thursday, November 26, 2009 1:00 PM
Subject: The “Frog” Community has lost a great one 

Thanksgiving 2009: John F. Callahan Jr. UDT/R (West) Class#19, UDT-11, UDT-21, ST-2( Plank owning first CO), Chart House Restaurants executive, (“The Callahan Cut”), Passed away this morning from complications of liver failure in Peru Vermont where he had been staying with his daughter, son in law and grand sons since his wife Michelle passed away December of last year. 

In January of this year John underwent surgery for cancer of the liver. His health had been up and down since but he was well enough that it allowed John to spend time with both his children (Chad and Monica Callahan NY, Colleen and Mike Bunker VT) and their families. Services are pending.. 

We will miss the Big Guy…Team Mate and Pal……..Tad Devine, Class 20

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

—– Original Message —–
From: Franklin Anderson
To: Doc Rio
Sent: Thursday, November 26, 2009 8:02 PM
Subject: RE: First ST-2 CO dies 

Doc – Thanks for putting the info on John Callahan out—One small mistake—He never was in Team 21. I was XO of Team Eleven, and Cdr Thede was on leave to go to Vietnam, and recommended me to be the CO of Team 2. I said– I have just been married a week and only XO since I relieved Bob Terry in August. I recommended John Callahan and Mack Boynton bought off on it. When John Left SEAL TEAM TWO, He came back and relieved me as XO of Team Eleven and I went to Vietnam and replace Roy Boehm. John, then got out of the Navy and went into business with Buzz Bent in the Chart House. Have a Happy Thanksgiving – Franklin

—–Original Message—–
From: Doc Riojas
Sent: Thursday, November 26, 2009 7:53 PM
To: Franklin Anderson
Subject:  May I  share this information with the men? 

Thank you, may I tell all the guys , mi Capitan? 

Rio

—– Original Message —–
From: Franklin Anderson
To: Doc Rio Sent: Thursday, November 26, 2009 11:41 PM
Subject: Re: May I  share this information with the men? 

I think it would be appropriate — John and I worked very close. He was my assistance Platoon CDR and on another WEST PAC DET of which I was the OIC, John was my second. Not only was John a Good Officer, he was a loving Husband and Father — A Great Loss –

  Franklin

 

—– Original Message —–  from:  Dennis McCormack Class 23
From: DKMSEAL [at] aol.com
To: BullDevine [at] aol.com ; Sent: Saturday, November 28, 2009 1:17 PM
Subject: Re: The “Frog” Community has lost a great one 


Tad & Friends, 

I came across this quote in the Parade section of the Sunday paper years ago, and used it when talking about another friend of ours who preceded us in that last leg of our life’s journey, and believe it is equally applicable when defining the life of our friend and teammate John Callahan. I was most fortunate to have spoken to John several times a few months back, and he definitely was determined to live his life to the full each and every moment. 

” It takes so much to be a full human being, that there are very few who have the enlightenment or courage to pay the price — One has to abandon altogether the search for security and reach out to the risk of living and loving with both arms. One has to embrace the world like a lover. One has to accept pain as a condition of existence. One has to court doubt and darkness as the cost of knowing. One needs a will stubborn in conflict, but apt always to total acceptance of every consequence of living and dying—Anonymous. “

How more appropriate would it be than to include a prayer for John written by our honorary SEAL, Navy chaplain, Father McMahon, a man known to many of us: 

” Dear Father in Heaven, if I may respectfully say so, sometimes you are a strange God. Though You love all mankind, it seems You have special preferences, too. You seem to love those men who can stand alone, who face impossible odds, who challenge every bully and every tyrant — those men who know the heat of loneliness of a Calvary. Possibly You cherish men of this stamp because You recognize the marks of your only Son in them. Since this unique group of men known as SEALS know Calvary and suffering, teach them now the mystery of the Resurrection – that they are indestructible, that they will live forever because of their deep faith in You. And when they do come to Heaven, may I respectfully warm You, dear Father, they also know how to celebrate. So please be ready for them (John) when they (he) insert(s) under your pearly gates. “

HOOYAH to a fantastic true gentleman who now lives forever, 

Dennis McCormack Class 23

Doc Riojas, 

Thought you would enjoy this: 

Just remembered another John Callahan story, as well as other SEALs I’ll talk about in a minute, who were present on that 1962 European trip I told you about when several members of Seal Team ONE joined forces with members of Seal Team TWO. Rusty Campbell, Lloyd Cobb and I were from ST-1. Maybe a few others from the West coast, but can’t remember. We received a Special Forces brief at an air force base intelligence building outside of Paris, France, then on to Bergen, Norway, and I was with a group who parachuted into Greece for combined op with Greek commandoes.

  Some of the team went into Turkey, if I remember correctly. We were joined in Bergen by John Callahan, and we operated with the Norwegian Frogman, which required swimming in the fjords, where the water was damn near freezing. I would have worn 2 wet suits if I had them. Guess who just dived in with no wet suit? You guessed it, the big guy himself, barrel-chested John Callahan and, being the excellent swimmer that he was, left most of us in his wake, freezing our balls off and John seemingly to not notice the cold water. John was indeed a man for the proverbial all seasons and impressed all of us, Norwegians and Americans alike, as he definitely stood in a class physically all by himself. 

Our trip to Greece was an interesting one to say the least. We left from France on an Air Force C-130, with a Special Forces jumpmaster, who asked if I was going to carry the radio equipment? He also asked if I had night jump experience, which I told him I had, which was not quite accurate, but figured since I closed my eyes on all jumps, that was no different from jumping at night. Well, there I was all loaded up with radio equipment and I am at the end of the jump stick. Green light comes on and jumpers are moving rapidly towards the side door, and swish, out goes the stick, but I have not yet tried to move and, when I did, discovered that I could not walk right with all of the equipment tied around my legs. So, there I am hopping like a rabbit to the door, with the jumpmaster laughing his ass off, shaking his head that I was not going to make it, but I did, and talk about a quick opening!! 

Great time, not! But then, any time you land in one piece it is a great jump, right? Well, not always. We were jumping into a dry lake bed, which we did, but what we were not told was that there were huge boulders on the outskirts of the lake where I was to land, twisting my knee for a 2nd time since I was introduced to the fine art of parachuting, the 1st being at Ft. Benning. As I recall, the chutes we were using then were quite antiquated compared to what we have today, and the term “steerable” chute was a misnomer at best, at least that was my experience. By the way, this was our 2nd attempt at jumping, as we flew in the night before and DZ was not lighted properly so we were taken to a German military base to spend the night before jumping the following night. German guards with machine guns escorted us to our quarters. Just like something out of a James Bond movie. 

On our Greece trip I was the crypto guy and had to check in with a carrier off the coast of Greece, and Rusty Campbell was senior to me, but had the duty of cranking the generator so I could send Morse Code using the Diana One-time pads, remember those? Well, the longer I would hold down on the key, Rusty had to crank all the more harder. He would get angry and could not figure out why he was the one doing all the work and all I did was push the key. Rusty and I see each other at Old Frogs meetings and reunions, and he still remembers that in great detail. We laugh about that to this day. I told you about Swede being there and remembered others from ST-2 as well: As I recall, some of the others on that trip include: Ens. Petersen, Benschwall (sp), Awalzachuck (sp), who we affectionately called “alphabet” because we could not spell his name, and obviously still can’t, Jim Tipton, Swede Thornblom, Ron Fox, Stan Janecka (sp), and several others, who definitely knew the meaning of party, And party we did wherever we went.

  Ron Fox had just broken up with his girlfriend and we were in a cabaret in Paris, and fixed him up with a singer and a few cocktails to drown his sorrows. Believe she had a wooden leg. Really, not joking. She could drink all of us under the table; must have used that wooden leg. Ha-Ha! I had told you in another e-mail that I received orders to report to Little Creek, while I was on leave in Pittsburgh before heading back to Coronado, and when I landed in Norfolk I was met by Swede and friends at the airport and they took me to a home where a weekend party was going on. Wish I could remember more, but do remember having a great time. They picked me up in a jeep much like the SEALs were portrayed in some scenes in the movie Navy Seals.

  Roy Bohem decided that he liked me and wanted me transferred to ST-2 from ST-1, which was not to happen, as within a few days the entire Seal Team ONE, minus our detachment working with ST-2 in Vietnam, was at Little Creek as we joined forces with Seal Team TWO and plans were made to counter the Cuban Missile Crisis. Everything was compartmentalized and we were not to know the entire war plan, but after a few beers together we were able to identify who was going in on the submarine, who was with part of the main attack force, and who was going in to blow up bridges as a diversionary force, an obviously expendable team, at least that is how we interpreted it, as I was one of those folks on that demolition team. As you know, JFK called off everything, and our asses were saved for another day.

  Many of the CIA folks who were involved with the Bay of Pigs, as well as the Cuban Missile Crisis were later to come to work with us in Coronado, helping us outfit the Swift boats, and then met up with many of them in Vietnam in 1964, when they were involved with us operationally on OP34A, but that’s another story for another time. I would ask that all readers of this please excuse any of the embellishing liberties I have taken, as they were made to protect the innocent. Ha-Ha! Actually, I left out the really good stuff! 

Dennis McCormack, RM1(DV) 
UDT-12 1959-62   ST-1 1962-65 Plankowner   TAD ST-2 1962

 

Letter to Admiral Eric T. Olson USN 

From: Richard Fradenburgh [mailto:froggsr12 [at] yahoo.com]
Sent: Thursday, November 26, 2009 12:33 PM
To: Joe Rodregious &; TIP AMMEN; RICK ANDERSON; John C; BOB CHANDLER; PETE COOPER; HOMER EDMONSON; Fradenburgh Family; Katie A Fradenburgh; JUDY GAFFNEY; GARY JANNEY; KAITLIN LAMB; DON LUDLOW; Sean Lynch; JACK MEAD; PAT MITOLO; Katie Shay; JOHNNY STAMPS; RANDY STUBBS; DALE WOLF; WONDA WSTOLARSKI; FRED; Rob and Sherry

Subject: Three Heros who are getting the governments shaft 

I thought you might like to see what I sent to USSOCOM on Thanksgiving morning. This really has me up in arms, please forward this to anyone you think might also be a little hot over how out great government is treating our troops. 
Doc Rio and John Roat, please pass this on your huge e-mail list see that everyone gets this one. 

                Make me thankful: Don’t enlist! or re-enlist !

 

A tribute to Dave Laconte: a husband, father, son, friend and Patriot. He died in Afganistan fighting for his country. I will miss you buddy.

I’m cooking and ready to serve the New Year dishes. How and where are you going to spend the New year? Tomoko Mimori.         My NOTE:  Tomokosan was our interpreter at the inba-gun, Chiba, Medical Center in Japan.  She helped us a lot with Roy Dean Matthews admission to the hospital.      Doc Riojas webmaster

—– Original Message —–
From: “Extreme SEAL Experience”  info  [at] extremesealexperience.com
To: “Doc Rio”
Sent: Saturday, January 02, 2010 7:24 PM
Subject: Re: Senior Chief Don Shipley 

 Doc Riojas,

In addition to EVERYTHING else I’m into, I’ve started a new “Web-cast” show on Mon, Wed, and Friday. Turning BIG fast, I spend a couple hours running my yap and answering SEAL questions to an audience of young hopefuls. 

Better than that… I call and interview by speaker phone BUD/S Instructors, Snipers, Officers and SEALs young and old as EVERYONE has a story and tips to pass along to the young guys… 

Steve Robinson has been on a few times about his days in the Teams and we entertain guys with phony SEAL stories.

Ken Garrett, Class Zero, CAPTIVATED the guys for an hour about Korea and one guys sent a link to your site with Kens picture so everyone could see who was talking. 

Last night, I spent an hour on the site speaking with Bill Bruhmuller and he BLEW THEM AWAY. I spoke with Bill before the show and asked if that was his picture I remembered so well at Team TWO of him and a dog at an award ceremony… Yep… Bill and Prince receiving Purple Hearts.

I found that picture on our site before the show, printed it and held it up to the camera so everyone could see who was speaking.

In the end, Doc… Guys POUND your site during the show and I’d like to get you on one night… Perhaps Wednesday at 1915 EST if you’d be up for it.

Outside of that, Doc;  I’d be happy to include your link on my site and you can add anything I wrote on VTC on yours. 

Most exciting for me, Doc… Is that I have the Largest and Only “ALL SEAL” Channel on You Tube. I’ve made all the videos myself except for a few like “Someone Special” and “Men with Green Faces” that I put up. 

Videos that help guys by answering SEAL questions; I make a video of each course I do, and SEAL videos from all my Team pictures and all my friends Team pictures they lend me… 

82 videos in all, I average 4000+ views a day and 1,300,000 views total and growing each day. That traffic gets funneled to my site and YouTube is the number 1 reason I’ve done so well. 

I’ll include a few videos and a link to my channel… Have a look, Doc.

If you’d consider it, Doc… I would use your pictures on sealtwo.org and link those videos to our sites.

Too much history, those pictures are incredible, and I’d do a great job for the Teams with them.

Respectfully, Don Shipley 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRsGhSrRcK8 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emWvabAArmY 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qH7AiATSTs 

http://www.youtube.com/user/Buds131 

EXTREMESEALEXPERIENCE.COM

Steve, and Teamates,

I have written Doc Riojas that I’d be happy to include www.sealtwo.org link on my site.  I also gave him my permission to add anything I wrote on the VTC on his pages. Most all that information is given on my web site.


What About me?: My first Commanding Officer on a Frigate in Japan suggested I become a SEAL at Captains Mast if I liked fighting so much… If the number of “Captains Mast’s” for Bar Fights are an indicator of how great a SEAL I was, then I was probably the finest SEAL to ever wear a Trident…

I met my wife on my second ship, the USS McKee (Love Boat) at Point Loma  while I was teaching a deck seamanship class.  We married and I transferred to ACU-1 in Coronado, saw the guys going through BUD/S, and the rest is history…

BUD/S Class 131, SEAL Team ONE, SEAL Team TWO, I retired in 2003 as an E-8 with 24-years and deployed with Blackwater a few times…

My wife picked me up after Hell Week and told me she was pregnant. My Son entered BUD/S at 17-years old, and turned 19, 22, and recently 24-years old on Combat Tours in Iraq as a SEAL.
He’s also a much better SEAL than I ever was and he’s never had a Mast…

I used the Blackwater money to invest in Real Estate and have done very well, but it’s boring painting, putting in carpet, and evicting old ladies, so I fell back on my SEAL days and created EXTREME SEAL EXPERIENCE.

Ohhh, I can hear some of you guys cringe at that one, but I would have been one of the NICE BUD/S Instructors that the Classes look forward to seeing each day and not the NASTY Instructors the classes dreaded seeing come over the berm…

I HATE seeing guys fail in any form and for any reason, but I do understand that not everybody can become a SEAL… That being said though, being encouraging and trying to find the best in each man is what I do, and I’ll let someone else crush the life out of them at BUD/S if they choose to go that route.

I was asked to run the first SEA Cadet SEAL Training Course in 1992. Boy Scouts in the Navy, they came to Little Creek for a couple weeks for an ass-beating and some cool training… Very successful program, many guys did well in BUD/S after attending and the Navy made it a regular program each year until a few years ago.
I ran the program 6 times when I wasn’t deployed.

Much of that training was conducted on my property in Chesapeake, VA during those years and I loved doing it.

EXTREME SEAL is pretty simple stuff in concept. I take a pile of charming SEALs as Instructors and run the guys through a couple weeks of Training during the spring, summer and fall months…

I met a bit of resistance early from a few SEALs for what they considered as my “Pimping the Trident” by running these courses. I guess some guys feel that retired SEALs should just fade away and work at a small town Police Force somewhere and never again mention they were ever SEALs.

That attitude didn’t last long when guys saw I was serious and that the Training we were providing was BAD-ASS and extremely helpful…

The classes are a 50/50 mix of young aspiring SEALs and older guys looking for some adrenaline. Guys have attended from Russia, South Africa, Europe and all 50 States.

Guys start with “Hell Night,” a 24-hour simulation of Hell Week, but it’s really not… I don’t remember doing a cool operation in Hell Week, learning some Hand 2 Hand, or casting out of a Helo, but we do it here.
Guys start with the PRT Test at 0800 and get a team-building beating until lunch. An hour to eat a great homemade lunch and we break them in two groups for OTB Training and Hand 2 Hand for the afternoon. Finishing at 1700, we break out the logs and WAKE THEM UP for a hour before supper…
Camouflage and concealment, stealth and stalking practical, they plan a night mission “Prisoner Snatch,”
and launch the Zodiacs at sunset.
A mile paddle up the Northwest River to their target, they assault before midnight and after the debrief we POUND them until 0430 and they paddle back and secure from Hell Night with a Helo Cast at sunrise.

A small taste of Hell Week, it’s enough to slowly teach them to “not quit” as the day gets progressively harder. Very tough running it as a SEAL; make it too hard and guys fail; make it too easy and no justice is done. The biggest hurdle is to NOT hurt anyone, as wrecking someone’s chances of going to BUD/S by blowing a guys knee or shoulder is a BAD THING and I don’t want WARCOM calling me…

We’ve taught them about SEAL attitudes and mentality by them watching us conduct training, and shown them a bit of what they can expect at BUD/S. The rest of the course is TOUGH as we teach them Survival, Rappelling, and Shooting to name a few skills. They conduct endless operations and night patrols while assaulting the finest training targets, with the best OPFOR that few SEALs have ever seen.

The typical response from new instructors seeing the targets for the first time is “DAMN… most of the targets we hit in training were manned by the chicks in Admin.”

The training is conducted with Airsoft Weapons, and they REALLY hurt when guys get hit…

“All SEALs, All the Time,” I’m VERY particular about who instructs at my course, and we dispel myths, we answer questions, and we give each man an inside look and a small taste into BUD/S and SEAL Team that they can get nowhere else.
In the end… Guys can make a more informed decision to attend BUD/S in the first place and are better prepared for the rigors…
Just like all of us though, it’s up to the individual man to keep the boat up during Hell Week and not quit. Some will, most won’t…

I’m the owner, I’m the secretary, I answer all the phone calls, all the emails, run the ranges, take all the pictures, make all the videos. My wife and daughter do all the cooking, all the laundry, and all the nursing.
A small family business, guys who attend are a face and a name to us, and not a number…
Expanding faster than I can handle it sometimes, we will never put more than 20 guys through a course at a time, but the expansion is coming from incredible sponsorships and ever increasing training areas.

Zodiac Boats hooked us up with a half dozen F-470’s for 1500 bucks total. SOG Knives sent a few thousand bucks worth of multi-tools and fixed blade knives. Weapons get donated, Nike sent a truck load of stuff, and the list goes on…

We also spend a huge amount of time sponsoring young men with Cancer during the courses and others with major health problems and severe injuries. I WILL NEVER tell anyone that they can’t do my course; If they say they can do it, I’ll make sure they succeed.

Very hard explaining what I do and why I do it, to the audience of men on this site that I respect so highly. I don’t take criticism very well and I wear my heart on my sleeve. I do these courses to better men no matter their background and no matter what they want to do in life.

We better them through adversity and guys have a great time here.

An enormous responsibility to SPECWAR and all you guys for the reputation you’ve carved, it’s not one I take lightly and I’ve seen other courses that use the word “SEAL” that are little more than a mindless-beating that make us all look stupid.

This ain’t BUD/S Training… It’s a confidence-building course and I invite any of you guys to stop by and see what we do here anytime…

You take a group of veteran SEALs as Instructors, throw in a few thousand acres of rivers and swamps, find a couple Helo pilots who will allow you to live-fire shoot from their Birds, build a huge rappel tower, and let things happen…
That’s all I do, and every cent goes into building better training, paying leases, instructors, and sponsoring a few young men who are down on their luck…

One thing’s for sure… I ain’t buying vacation property in Aruba with what’s left over…

No matter who you are, or what you did as a SEAL, being a member of this group of Bad-Asses of the VTC is humbling. Always a new guy to someone, I kinda feel like I’m Day-One, Week-One of BUD/S again being around so much SPECWAR experience.

Perhaps Steve should put me on Probation for six-months before I earn my Cyber SEALs Trident…

Have a look at… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pYeGvGKkAU

Happy New Year Teammates… Fire in the Hole…

Donald Wayne Shipley Jr.

—– Original Message —–
From: Joe DeFloria
To: Alan Routh ; Bruce Russell ; Bruce Dyer ; Dan Potts ; Dante ; David Del Giudice ; Doc Rio ; Don Tyson ; Frank Anderson ; Frank Toms ; Gary Parrott ; John Roberts ; mike Baumgart ; Ron Bell ; ‘Terry Fowler’ ; Tom Marshall
Sent: Wednesday, December 09, 2009 8:16 PM
Subject:  Navy SEALs 

Symptoms of Corrupting Sickness

source:    http://whatbubbaknows.net/blog1.php/2009/12/08/symptoms-of-corruption

Navy SEAL Mathew McCabe, 24

By Bubba on Dec 8, 2009 | In American Patriots, Troop Support, Our Fallen Heroes, Tea Party

It would be interesting to create a poll with these two photos and have people guess what’s happening. I suspect that most would never assume anything close to the real story. It appears to be a joyous homecoming, a reuniting of mother and son. 

The truth is not so heart warming.

The lady in the picture is the mother of an American that was ambushed in Fallujah, Iraq. Her son was murdered. His body was dragged around in the streets of the city, then burned and hung from the upper trusses of a bridge. The murderers gathered to celebrate and have their photos taken with the trophy.

The young sailor in the picture is one of the Navy SEALs that later captured the leader of the band of terrorist butchers and brought him to justice. 

If the story ended there, it would still be an acceptable feel-good, good-guys-win story. Unfortunately, that’s not the case – this Navy SEAL is facing criminal charges. Because, somewhere along the timeline of his capture, the terrorist murderer suffered a school-yard fat lip, his captors are now being charged with nothing short of war crimes and facing discharge and imprisonment. 

So, instead of celebration of justice served and heroes honored, these photos record betrayal, compounded mourning and the effects of a corrupting sickness. 

From WAVY.com: SEALs assault case goes to court 

NORFOLK, Va. – “It’s been very stressful,” said Navy SEAL Mathew McCabe, 24, moments after his arraignment in military court at Naval Station Norfolk Monday on charges that he allegedly mistreated an Iraqi detainee. 

The mother of slain Blackwater guard Jerry Zovko drove from Ohio to give each of the accused SEALs a blessed rosary and lend them her support. “These young SEALs are in this situation because they caught the mastermind behind the death of my son, and not only my son and his co-workers but also the marines who went into Fallujah after their death,” said Donna Zovko. “I am very proud of these young SEALs and thankful to them. They did not do anything wrong.” 

May I ramble a bit? Think out loud, so to speak? I’m trying to make some sense of this. 

What title can I give to the mentality of a people that send their best to defend the whole and then betray them? To what shall I attribute the attitude of a people that habitually prosecute their heroes while defending their enemies? What creates a culture that allows people to vilify and isolate their most noble and deify their most corrupt? 

I perceive more symptoms of a sickness, a corruption of the nation’s heart and soul. I am tempted to label it ‘liberalism’ or ‘progressivism’, but those too are just symptoms of the infection. But this is nothing new, I recognized these symptoms four decades ago in the shameful treatment of our warriors returning from Vietnam, in the acceptance of Marines bombed in Beirut, in the ho-hum yawn of media coverage of Mogadishu (Black Hawk Down), in the return to mental numbness after 9/11, prosecution of the Marines of Hadith, assault of recruiters across the country, anti-war protesters at the gates of Walter Reed Army Hospital …. 

This sickness, this infection has gone untreated for far too long. Americans are a tolerant bunch. We’ve patiently waited for the ingrates among us to grow up and develop a sense of pride and awe in the greatness of America. It’s not happening. 

I’m tired of waiting. I’m fresh out of tolerance. There comes a time when the treatment for an infection cannot be postponed any longer, lest the patient die. 

Through history how many nations have habitually betrayed their defenders and survived? 

Donna and I left our home at 4:00am, Monday morning and drove to Norfolk. We were in the company of four other patriots from the Raleigh area: Don Gray of Military Appreciation Day and NC Gathering of Eagles. Patrick Holbrook, NC Gathering of Eagles. Russell Pope, NCFreedom.us and Randy Dye, Randy’s Right Blog and NCFreedom.us 

We joined a hundred or more others at Gate 5 of the Norfolk Naval Base to demonstrate support for Navy SEAL Mathew McCabe. 

Above: I met the SEAL’s father, Marty McCabe. 

After the arraignment hearings, McCabe came out to meet his supporters.    Here are my photos. Thanks to Pat, Don, Randy and Russ for riding with us. Thanks to Russ and Randy for photos.  And Thank You Mathew McCabe for your service to our country.

The mother of slain Blackwater guard Jerry Zovko drove from Ohio to give each of the accused SEALs a blessed rosary and lend them her support. “These young SEALs are in this situation because they caught the mastermind behind the death of my son, and not only my son and his co-workers but also the marines who went into Fallujah after their death,” said Donna Zovko. “I am very proud of these young SEALs and thankful to them. They did not do anything wrong.”

Above: McCabe and Jim Deihl, Gathering of Eagles 

 

MSGT Roy Benavidez, MOH , from El Campo Texas

Pentaerythritol tetranitrate

Pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN, also known as corpent, pentrite, or rarely and primarily in German as nitropenta or pentrit) is one of the most powerful high explosives known, with a relative effectiveness factor (R.E. factor) of 1.66.

Relative effectiveness factor or R.E. factor is a measurement of an explosive’s power for military demolitions purposes. It is used to compare an explosive’s effectiveness relative to TNT by weight only. This enables engineers to substitute one explosive for another when they are calculating blasting equations that are designed for TNT. For example, if a timber cutting charge requires 1 kg of TNT to work, it would take 0.6 kg of PETN or 1.25 kg of AN/FO (or AN/FO, for ammonium nitrate / fuel oil) to have the same effect.

An explosive material, also called an explosive, is a substance that contains a great amount of stored energy that can produce an explosion, a sudden expansion of the material after initiation, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, and pressure.

Explosive materials may be categorized by the speed at which they expand. Materials that detonate (explode faster than the speed of sound) are said to be high explosives and materials that deflagrate are said to be low explosives. Explosives may also be categorized by their sensitivity. Sensitive materials that can be initiated by a relatively small amount of heat or pressure are primary explosives and materials that are relatively insensitive are secondary explosives.

In December 2001, PETN was the explosive used by Richard Reid in his unsuccessful attempt to blow up American Airlines Flight 63 from Paris to Miami. He had intended to use the solid triacetone triperoxide (TATP) as a detonator.

On 28 August 2009, PETN was used in an attempt to murder the Saudi Arabian Deputy Minister of Interior Prince Muhammad bin Nayef by a Saudi suicide-bomber (Abdullah Hassan al Asiri) linked to an Al Qaeda cell based in Yemen. The target survived and the bomber died in the blast. The PETN was hidden in his anal cavity.

On 25 December 2009, PETN was found in the possession of Abdulfarouk Umar Muttalab, a 23-year-old Nigerian with Al Qaeda links. According to US law enforcement officials, he had attempted to blow up Northwest Airlines Flight 253, while approaching Detroit from Amsterdam.  Muttalab had apparently tried to detonate PETN sewn into his underwear, by adding a liquid from a syringe.  However his attempt failed and resulted in him catching on fire.

The USS BEGOR—UDT Connection

By Barry McCabe, Ensign, UDT-21, 1945
A platoon of UDT-21 aboard USS BEGOR, August 1945. Sea story author, Ensign Barry McCabe is at right with camera strap over his shoulder.

As World War II closed, I was aboard USS BEGOR with Underwater Demolition Team (UDT) 21. My team was tasked with locating and destroying Japanese armament, suicide boats and miniature submarines in the area around Yokosuka, the main Japanese naval base on Tokyo Bay, in September 1945.

The suicide boats were about 20-feet long, with wooden hulls, and powered by gasoline engines, many by American-made Gray Marine six-cylinder engines of about 70-80 horsepower.  The boats did not have a reverse gear (for obvious reasons)!

http://www.ussbegor.org/seaStories.htm

Dozens of the boats were stored in caves on top of dollies that ran on railroad-type tracks, to enable the Japanese to quickly run them into the water.  We found none that were loaded with explosives, but, if the US invasion became imminent, explosives would have been loaded quickly. Each boat would have carried two depth charges, 260 pounds apiece, which were released by hand or on impact with their targets.  The boats were usually painted green. See related photos on the Photo Gallery page.

I and other UDT 21 officers were involved with supervising the teams in the destruction of these suicide weapons. We tried burning the boats in the caves, but they were so damp they wouldn’t burn, even with gasoline being poured on them. Obviously, we tried to blow them up close to where we found them, but after doing it once, we decided it presented too much danger to the villages, because the boats were right where the people lived. We finally towed them out into the water and sometimes cut holes in their hulls with axes to sink them.

As for the midget subs, they had to be towed out and sunk.  As with the suicide boats, Japanese laborers provided most of the muscle for moving the boats from storage to the water, with UDT members supervising. I can’t recall the subs’ length, but they were extremely small, as you can see from the related photos on the Photo Gallery page.  They were perhaps about 4′ in diameter.

When people question the use of the atomic Bombs, which ended the war, I tell them even though it was catastrophic, I along with a million American troops probably wouldn’t be alive today [had the war been fought to its conclusion through invasion and conventional warfare].  I was amazed that, once the Emperor told the people the war was over, they immediately gave up their arms and were remarkably friendly.  Otherwise, men, women and children would have fought to their deaths.

(Barry McCabe lives in Westport, CT)


Comment on Barry McCabe’s sea story by the BEGOR website team

We thank Barry for his story and the accompanying photos on the Photo Gallery page, all of which were taken by him. USS BEGOR’s  crewmembers are honored and privileged to have worked with the effective and courageous men of the Underwater Demolition Teams over the years. For more information on the history of UDT and that program’s evolution into the Navy SEAL program, go to http://www.seal.navy.mil

Barry is not resting on his laurels. Here is a Spring 2005 email communication from him:

“FYI, for the past 10 years I’ve been working closely with a Captain in the SEAL Reserves in a very successful program physically testing and mentoring young SEAL candidates at the Merchant Marine Academy in NY. That’s the primary reason my attention these days is more focused on the SEALs. To give you an idea of our program’s success, of all the men across the country who enter the demanding 6-month program in Coronado, called BUD/S (Basic Underwater Demolition SEALs), about 80% fail. Of all the men we have tested and recommended for BUD/S, 70% make it and only 30% fail. It’s truly rewarding working with these young men.”

That is dedication! Our BEGOR ballcaps are off to you, Barry!

 

This video of the two fighters, one dancing around doing all his Karate stuff reminds me of an incident that happened when I had a detachment at Kwajalein Islands. 

We were laying Nike Zeus Missile range cables.  There was a short based Black Shoe individual who was pestering Ted Mathison (SN at the time.)  He would say Frogs aren’t tough, I’m a black belt and dancing around shadow boxing and also doing Karate moves. 

Finally TED got fed up, got up and  and punched that guy once and that was the end of it.  K.O., one punch!  We never had any more problems with that idiot for the rest of the deployment.       

Seastory by:  Franklin Anderson 

 

Email from a Marine in Iraq

Rio,   You may enjoy this. Good reading and good information…………. FITH  Bill Garnett 
24 Feb 2010
This email from a Marine in Iraq . No politics here; just a grunt with a bird’s eye view opinion: 


US Weapons: 

1) The M-16 rifle: 
Thumbs down. Chronic jamming problems with the talcum powder like sand over there. The sand is everywhere. Jordan says you feel filthy 2 minutes after coming out of the shower. The M-4 carbine version is more popular because it’s lighter and shorter, but it has jamming problems also. They lack the ability to mount the various optical gun sights and weapons lights on the pica tinny rails, but the weapon itself is not great in a desert environment. They all hate the 5.56mm (.223) round. Poor penetration on the cinderblock structure common over there and even torso hits can’t be reliably counted on to put the enemy down. 

Fun fact: Random autopsies on dead insurgents show a high level of opiate use. 

2) The M243 SAW (squad assault weapon): 

.223 cal. Drum fed light machine gun. Big thumbs down. Universally considered a piece of shit. Chronic jamming problems, most of which require partial disassembly (that’s fun in the middle of a firefight). 

3) The M9 Beretta 9mm: 

Mixed bag. Good gun, performs well in desert environment; but they all hate the 9mm cartridge. The use of handguns for self-defense is actually fairly common. Same old story on the 9mm: Bad guys hit multiple times and still in the fight. 

4) Mossberg 12ga. Military shotgun: 

Works well, used frequently for clearing houses to good effect. 

5) The M240 Machine Gun: 

7.62 NATO (.308) cal. belt fed machine gun, developed to replace the old M-60 (what a beautiful weapon that was!!) Thumbs up. Accurate, reliable, and the 7.62 round puts ’em down. 

Originally developed as a vehicle mounted weapon, more and more are being dismounted and taken into the field by infantry. The 7..62 round chews up the structure over there. 

6) The M2 50 cal heavy machine gun: 

Thumbs way, way up. “Ma Deuce” is still worth her considerable weight in gold. The ultimate fight stopper – puts their dicks in the dirt very time. The most coveted weapon in-theater. 

7) The .45 pistol: 
Thumbs up. Still the best pistol around out there. Everybody authorized to carry a sidearm is trying to get their hands on one. With few exceptions, can reliably be expected to put ’em down with a torso hit. The special ops guys (who are doing most of the pistol work) use the HK military model 

and supposedly love it. The old government model .45’s are being re-issued en masse. 

8) The M-14: 

Thumbs up. They are being re-issued in bulk, mostly in a modified version to special ops guys. Modifications include lightweight Kevlar stocks and low power red dot or ACOG sights. Very reliable in the sandy environment, and they love the 7.62 round. 

9) The Barrett .50 cal sniper rifle: 

Thumbs way up. Spectacular range and accuracy and hits like a freight train. Used frequently to take out vehicle suicide bombers (we actually stop a lot of them) and barricaded enemy. It is definitely here to stay. 

10) The M24 sniper rifle: 

Thumbs up. Mostly in .308 but some in 300 win mag. Heavily modified Remington 700’s. Great performance. Snipers have been used heavily to great effect. Rumor has it a marine sniper on his third tour in Anbar province has actually exceeded Carlos Hathcock’s record for confirmed kills with OVER 100. 

11) The new body armor: 


Thumbs up. Relatively light at approx. 6 lbs. and can reliably be expected to soak up small shrapnel and even will stop an AK-47 round. The bad news: Hot as shit to wear, almost unbearable in the summer heat (which averages over 120 degrees). Also, the enemy now goes for head shots whenever possible. All the bullshit about the “old” body armor making our guys vulnerable to the IED’s was a non-starter. The IED explosions are enormous and body armor doesn’t make any difference at all in most cases. 


12) Night Vision and Infrared Equipment: 

Thumbs way up. Spectacular performance. Our guys see in the dark and own the night, period. Very little enemy action after evening prayers. More and more enemy being whacked at night during movement by our hunter-killer teams. We’ve all seen the videos. 

13) Lights: 

Thumbs up. Most of the weapon mounted and personal lights are Sure fire’s, and the troops love ’em. Invaluable for night urban operations. Jordan carried a $34 Surefire G2 on a neck lanyard and loved it. I cant help but notice that most of the good fighting weapons and ordnance are 50 or more years old!! With all our technology, it’s the WWII and Vietnam era weapons that everybody wants!! The infantry fighting is frequent, up close and brutal. No quarter is given or shown. 

Bad guy weapons: 

1) Mostly AK47’s.       The entire country is an arsenal. Works better in the desert than the M16 and the .308 Russian round kills reliably. PKM belt fed light machine guns are also common and effective. Luckily, the enemy mostly shoots like shit. Undisciplined “spray and pray” type fire. However, they are seeing more and more precision weapons, especially sniper rifles. ( Iran, again) 

2) The RPG: 

Probably the infantry weapon most feared by our guys. Simple, reliable and as common as dogs shit. The enemy responded to our up-armored Humvees by aiming at the windshields, often at point blank range. Still killing a lot of our guys. 

3) The IED: 

The biggest killer of all. Can be anything from old Soviet anti-armor mines to jury rigged artillery shells. A lot found in Jordan ‘s area were in abandoned cars. The enemy would take 2 or 3 155 mm artillery shells and wire them together. Most were detonated by cell phone and the explosions are enormous. You’re not safe in any vehicle, even an M1 tank. Driving is by far the most dangerous thing our guys do over there. Lately, they are much more sophisticated “shape charges” (Iranian) specifically designed to penetrate armor. Fact: Most of the ready made IED’s are supplied by Iran, who is also providing terrorists (Hezbollah types) to train the insurgents in their use and tactics. That’s why the attacks have been so deadly lately. Their concealment methods are ingenious, the latest being shape charges, in Styrofoam containers spray painted to look like the cinderblocks that litter all Iraqi roads. We find about 40% before they detonate, and the bomb disposal guys are unsung heroes of this war. 

4) Mortars and rockets: 

Very prevalent. The soviet era 122mm rockets (with an 18km range) are becoming more prevalent. One of Jordan ‘s NCO’s lost a leg to one. These weapons cause a lot of damage “inside the wire”. Jordan ‘s base was hit almost daily his entire time there by mortar and rocket fire, often at night to disrupt sleep patterns and cause fatigue (It did). More of a psychological weapon than anything else. The enemy mortar teams would jump out of vehicles, fire a few rounds, and then haul ass in a matter of seconds. 

Fun fact: 

Captured enemy have apparently marveled at the marksmanship of our guys and how hard they fight. They are apparently told in Jihad school that the Americans rely solely on technology, and can be easily beaten in close quarters combat for their lack of toughness. Let’s just say they know better now. 

Bad guy technology: 

Simple yet effective. Most communication is by cell and satellite phones and also by email on laptops. They use handheld GPS units for navigation and “Google Earth” for overhead views of our positions. Their weapons are good, if not fancy, and prevalent. Their explosives and bomb technology is TOP OF THE LINE. Night vision is rare. They are very careless with their equipment and the captured GPS units and laptops are treasure troves of Intel when captured. 

Who are the bad guys? Most of the carnage is caused by the Zarqawi Al Qaeda group. They operate mostly in Anbar province (Fallujah and Ramadi). These are mostly “foreigners”, non-Iraqi Sunni Arab Jihadists from all over the Muslim world (and Europe ). Most enter Iraq through Syria (with, of course, the knowledge and complicity of the Syrian govt.), and then travel down the “rat line” which is the trail of towns along the Euphrates River that we’ve been hitting hard for the last few months. 

Some are virtually untrained young Jihadists that often end up as suicide bombers or in various “sacrifice squads”. Most, however, are hard core terrorists from all the usual suspects (Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas etc.). These are the guys running around murdering civilians an masse and cutting heads off. 

The Chechens (many of whom are Caucasian) are supposedly the most ruthless and the best fighters. They have been fighting the Russians for years. In the Baghdad area and south, most of the insurgents are Iranian inspired (and led) Iraqi Shiites. The Iranian Shiia have been very adept at infiltrating the Iraqi local govt.’s, the police forces and the Army. They have had a massive spy and agitator network there since the Iran-Iraq war in the early 80’s. Most of the Saddam loyalists were killed, captured, or gave up long ago. 

Bad Guy Tactics: When they are engaged on an infantry level they get their asses kicked every time! Brave, but stupid. Suicidal Banzai-type charges were very common earlier in the war and still occur. They will literally sacrifice 8-10 man teams in suicide squads by sending them screaming and firing AK’s and RPG’s directly at our bases just to probe the defenses. They get mowed down like grass every time (see the M2 and M240 above). Jordan ‘s base was hit like this often. 

When engaged, they have a tendency to flee to the same building, probably for what they think will be a glorious last stand. Instead, we call in air and that’s the end of that more often than not. These hole-ups are referred to as Alpha Whiskey Romeo’s (Allah’s Waiting Room). We have the laser guided ground-air thing down to a science. The fast mover’s, mostly Marine F-18’s, are taking an ever increasing toll on the enemy. When caught out in the open, the helicopter gunships and AC-130 Spectre Gunships cut them to ribbons with cannon and rocket fire, especially at night. Interestingly, artillery is hardly used at all. 

Fun facts: 

The enemy death toll is supposedly between 45-50 thousand. That is why we’re seeing less and less infantry attacks and more IED, suicide bomber shit. The new strategy is just simple: attrition. 

The insurgent tactic most frustrating is their use of civilian non-combatants as cover. They know we do all we can to avoid civilian casualties and therefore schools, hospitals and especially Mosques are locations where they meet, stage for attacks, cache weapons, and ammo and flee to when engaged. They have absolutely no regard whatsoever for inflicting civilian casualties. They will terrorize locals and murder without hesitation anyone believed to be sympathetic to the Americans or the new Iraqi govt. Kidnapping of family members, especially children, is common to influence people they are trying to influence but can’t reach, such as local govt. officials, clerics, tribal leaders, etc.. 

The first thing our guys are told is “don’t get captured”. They know that if captured they will be tortured and beheaded on the internet. Zarqawi openly offers bounties for anyone who brings him a live American serviceman. This motivates the criminal element who otherwise don’t give a shit about the war. A lot of the beheading victims were actually kidnapped by common criminals and sold to Zarqawi. 

As such, for our guys, every fight is to the death. Surrender is not an option. The Iraqi’s are a mixed bag.. Some fight well; others aren’t worth a damn. Most do okay with American support. Finding leaders is hard, but they are getting better. 

It is widely viewed that Zarqawi’s use of suicide bombers, en masse, against the civilian population was a serious tactical mistake. Many Iraqi’s were galvanized and the caliber of recruits in the Army and the police forces went right up, along with their motivation. It also led to an exponential increase in good intel because the Iraqi’s are sick of the insurgent attacks against civilians. The Kurds are solidly pro-American and fearless fighters. 

Morale: 

According to Jordan , morale among our guys is very high. They not only believe that they are winning, but that they are winning decisively. They are stunned and dismayed by what they see in the American press, whom they almost universally view as against them. The embedded reporters are despised and distrusted. They are inflicting casualties at a rate of 20-1 and then see shit like “Are we losing in Iraq ” on TV and the print media.

For the most part, they are satisfied with their equipment, food, and leadership. Bottom line though, and they all say this, is that there are not enough guys there to drive the final stake through the heart of the insurgency, primarily because there aren’t enough troops in-theater to shut down the borders with Iran and Syria. The Iranians and the Syrians just can’t stand the thought of Iraq being an American ally (with, of course, permanent US bases there).

Anyway, that’s it, hope you found it interesting.                FITH  Bill Garnett

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Adm Mullen at BUD/s
Erasmo "Doc" Riojas
Silver Strand Training Map

GOOD TO GO  the book

from: Sterling Skeoch-Allison <sseoallis [at] gmail.com>
to: docrio45 [at] gmail.com 
date: Fri, Feb 26, 2010 at 9:59 PM
subject: Information the book “Good to Go “

Dear Doctor Riojas, 

I am a high school student in Canada. I am reading the book “Good to Go” for a novel study. While I was searching for information on it I came across and website saying that every thing about Charles Watson was untrue. 

Then I came across your website and I knew you were also in the story and that you were in 7th platoon with Harry and Charles. I was wondering if you could verify that everything in the story was true? 

Sincerly , 
Sterling Skeoch-Allison 



On: Sat, Feb 27, 2010 at 11:10 AM,
Erasmo Riojas
wrote to: Mr. Sterling, 

Thank you for your email and visiting www.sealtwo.org. 

As you probably know, because Harry Constance called Charlie Watson “Chicken Charlie”, the publisher was sued. 

Mr. Watson retired from the US Navy and became a lawyer. FYI, they settled out of court and the publisher paid off  less than they were asking in compensation. 

Sterling, there is so much good stuff in that book about our Navy Adventure that concentrating on something negative is not worth the ink you will use to write it. 

Go here  https://www.sealtwo.org/chocolates.htm  and read the reviews on the book written by Tom Keith SEAL WARRIOR, Death in the Dark Vietnam. It contains a lot of true life history of US Navy SEALs, and may be a better reference book for you to present to your teacher at your school. 

About the book “Good to Go”, as I remember 40 years ago, it is probably 99% true about our adventure in the war games Vietnam with the “Less than magnificent” 7th SEAL platoon , Team TWO. The human brain is so complex that each person sees events from a different perspective. I can vouch for Harry that most of what he wrote is true, except the part about calling Mr. Watson “Chicken Charlie.” I personally never called him that. 

I hope I have been of some help to you and I want to wish you the very best in your pursuit of knowledge and your talent as a writer. God help you accomplish all your dreams and keep you at peace with everyone, especially God. 
Please feel free to write me. I am turning 79 this year and my brain is not as sharp as it once was.

Thank you very much, Take Care,

Erasmo “Doc” Riojas   aka:  Doc Rio

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