SEAL Team Six: Memoirs of an Elite Navy SEAL Sniper (6 page)

The prom was coming, but someone had already asked Dee Dee to it. During home economics class, I asked her friend Laura to the prom—our first date. Laura had a nice body and big breasts. After the prom, in the car, we kissed for the first time. Well, she kissed me and I didn’t resist. Because I grew up in a family that didn’t show affection, her interest in me meant a lot.

*   *   *

Thinking back on my teenage years, I can remember my first surveillance op. There’s not a lot to do in Screven, Georgia, so sometimes we had to create our own fun. One Friday night, Greg, Phil, Dan, and I drove down to the river. We found an old suitcase that had fallen off somebody’s car. We opened it. Inside were some clothes. We threw it in the back of Greg’s truck and thought nothing else about it. As we camped near the river, sitting around a campfire drinking beer and roasting wieners, a malnourished, mangy cat approached us. It looked too wild to come near us, but it must’ve been desperate for food. We threw it a piece of wiener, and the cat gulped it down. One of us tried to pick up the feline, and it went berserk—claws and teeth everywhere. That cat was bad. We used the suitcase to set a trap for it, propping the lid open and putting a wiener inside. When the cat went inside to eat, we dropped the top and zipped up the suitcase. We laughed. Hearing the cat go crazy in the suitcase made us laugh harder. The cat kept going until it was exhausted.

I got an idea. “You know how we wanted to open the suitcase? If we put this on the road, someone will stop and open it.” So we took the suitcase to the road and stood it up on the shoulder near a bridge. Then we concealed ourselves nearby, lying flat on a slope that descended from the street. We waited awhile before the first car drove by. It wasn’t a well-traveled road.

Another car came by, and the brake lights flashed. Then it proceeded forward, did a U-turn, and came back. It passed us and did another U-turn, finally stopping next to the suitcase. An overweight black woman stepped out of the car and picked up the suitcase. After she returned to the car and closed the door, we heard excited talk, as if they had dug up a treasure chest. The car moved forward. Suddenly, the brake lights came back on and the car screeched to a halt. Three of the four doors popped open, and three people ran out of the car cussing at the top of their lungs.

We tried not to laugh.

One of the passengers threw the suitcase down the hill.

“Get it out from under the seat!” another yelled.

A third person grabbed a stick and started poking inside the car to get the cat out from under the seat. The cat finally escaped.

We hadn’t expected them to open the suitcase in the car while it was moving, and we hadn’t intended to harm anyone. Fortunately no one was hurt. The incident gave us a story to keep the laughter roaring at night. I’ll bet those people never picked up anything from the side of the road again. It also became my first covert observation operation.

*   *   *

When I graduated from high school, I stood 5'11" tall, and I’d saved up money for a car and Cumberland College in Williamsburg, Kentucky—a Christian school. All the work saving up for a car had been to no avail, because Tammy totaled my blue 1970 Ford LTD before I even left home, so I had to take the bus instead. Before I stepped on the bus, my mother told Dad, “Hug Howard.” Then she told me, “Go hug your daddy.” Leon put his arms out. We did an awkward hug. It was the first time we had ever hugged each other. Then I had a rare hug with my mother. I got on the bus glad to get the hell out of there.

4.

Russian Sub and Green Hero

At the age of twenty, after a year and a half of college, I used up the last of my hard-earned money and couldn’t afford to go back to school. There wasn’t a lot of financial aid available at the time, and I was tired of washing with leftover soap and was weary of searching for lost change on Thursdays so I could enjoy three-hot-dogs-for-a-dollar night at the nearby convenience store. I decided to visit the military recruiters at the shopping mall in Brunswick, Georgia, hoping to join, save enough money, and return to college. A poster of a Search and Rescue (SAR) swimmer in a wetsuit hung outside the navy recruiter’s office. Later, I signed up to do Search and Rescue for the navy.

Before shipping out, I decided to marry Laura.

My mom had one request. “Talk to Brother Ron first.”

I knew our preacher didn’t like Laura. I knew he didn’t agree with her Mormon religion. “No, Mom, I won’t do that. I’m not going to talk to Brother Ron. I love her, and I’m marrying her.”

Leon came into my room and with both hands pushed both of my shoulders, knocking me back a few steps. That was his big way of asserting dominance. If I looked at him or stepped forward, he would interpret that as a sign of aggression. I had learned to lower my head and stay back. “If you can’t listen to your mom about this one thing, you pack up and get the hell out of my house!”

I couldn’t believe my ears.

“Yeah, I saw you just look at me,” Dad said. “You want to try me? Go ahead and try me. I’ll go through you like a dose of salts.” Epsom salts were used for constipation, and that was the South Georgia way of saying, “I’ll go through you like crap through a goose.” He had just threatened me for the last time.

I packed everything I could fit into a small suitcase, walked out the door, and headed down the street to a pay phone. After I called Laura’s house, her parents sent her to pick me up.

Laura’s family acted much different from my family. The kids and the parents
talked.
They had conversations. The parents were nice to the kids. Her father even told them good morning. That blew me away. They were loving and affectionate. I loved what their family had as much as I loved Laura.

Her parents let me live with them until I could get a temporary construction job and a small apartment. Months after I left my home, Laura and I married in her church on April 16, 1983. My parents grudgingly attended the small wedding. We lived in a town where it would’ve reflected poorly on them if they hadn’t come. After Laura and I exchanged vows, my dad gave me a hundred-dollar bill and shook my hand without saying anything—no “Congratulations” or “Go to hell.” Needless to say, my parents didn’t stay for cake.

French kissing and lovemaking came naturally for me. Doing things like telling her I loved her and holding her hand were difficult. I was switched on or off—there was no in-between. I lacked a role model for being a husband and father. Dad never put his arm around my mother or held her hand. Maybe he did when I wasn’t around, but I never saw it. Most of their conversation had only been about work or us kids.

*   *   *

On November 6, 1983, I arrived at navy boot camp in Orlando, Florida. Two days later, we all had fresh buzz cuts and smelled like denim. At lights-out, I told the guy in the bunk below me, “Hey, today was my birthday.”

“Yeah, man. Happy birthday.” He didn’t give a crap. No one did. It was a bit of a reality check.

The lack of discipline and respect among the recruits amazed me. So many got in trouble for forgetting to say “Yes, sir” or “No, sir.” I was raised to never forget my manners and never forget attention to detail. The guys doing extra duty—push-ups, stripping and waxing the floor—looked like morons.
Making your bed and folding your underwear isn’t rocket science.
I was raised to make my bed and fold my underwear.

The company commander and I developed a bond—he’d had the same Search and Rescue job as an air crewman that I wanted. He put me in charge of half the barracks. After finishing almost four weeks of boot camp, a quarter of the recruits were still having problems. I couldn’t understand it.

Anyone who got in serious trouble had to go to Intensive Training (IT). I told my company commander, “I want to go to IT to get in shape for my Search and Rescue physical screening test, sir.” I don’t remember what the exact SAR requirements were then, but today’s candidates must swim 500 yards in 13 minutes, run 1.5 miles in 12.5 minutes, do 35 push-ups in 2 minutes, perform 50 sit-ups in 2 minutes, and do 2 pull-ups. If I failed the test, I would miss my big reason for joining the navy—Search and Rescue.

My company commander looked at me like I had a mushroom growing out of my head. “Wasdin, do you know what they do at IT?”

“The guys that got in trouble told me they do a lot of exercise.”

He laughed.

After evening chow, I arrived at IT and found out why he was laughing. IT busted my rump. We did push-ups, sit-ups, drills holding rifles over our heads, and much more. I looked to the left and to the right—the men on either side of me were crying.
This is tough, but why are you crying?
I’d experienced much worse. Sweat and tears covered the gym floor. I sweat, but I didn’t cry. The people who ran IT didn’t know I had volunteered for it. After showing up there for an hour nearly every evening seven, eight, nine times, they wanted to break me of my evil ways. I never told them any different. When I left boot camp, they must’ve thought,
Wasdin was the biggest screwup who ever came through here.

I took the Search and Rescue screening test. At the pool, I saw a guy with an unfamiliar insignia on his chest. At the time, I didn’t know he was a Navy SEAL, and I didn’t know what a SEAL was. Most people didn’t. The IT may have helped me prepare for the Search and Rescue test—if not physically, mentally. I passed. Even so, I was only 70 percent confident that I would be accepted to aircrew school.
My fate lies in the hands of the navy. What job will they make me do if I don’t pass this?

Toward the end of the three-month navy boot camp, my air crewman company commander gave me a smile and orders to attend aircrew school. “I’ll see you in the fleet,” he said. I’d passed. That was the best day of my life. Laura came out to Florida to see me at boot camp graduation, staying the weekend. I had to remain in uniform even when we were off base. While we were eating dinner in a restaurant, a couple gave us tickets to Disney World—and picked up my check on the way out. The next day, we explored the Magic Kingdom.

*   *   *

There would be no married housing where Laura could stay with me while I attended aircrew school in Pensacola, Florida. At aircrew school, I got to wear flight suits, learned how to deploy the rescue raft out of an aircraft, ran the obstacle course, and boxed in the navy “smoker” matches. Toward the end of the six-week-long school, I attended a week of survival training. The instructors simulated our aircraft being shot down, and we had to survive: tie knots, cross a river, and build a tent out of a parachute, with only minimal food like broth and apples. During the last three days of the survival training, we only ate what we could find and were willing to put in our mouths. I wasn’t ready to eat grub worms yet.

My first boxing match was the night after returning from survival training. I told the coach, “I’ve been out in the woods three days without eating. You think I’ll be OK?”

“Hell, yeah. This jarhead has been cleaning our clocks. We need you to go in there and fight him.”

Thanks a lot, pal.

My friends Todd Mock and Bobby Powell came to watch and provide moral support.

Todd stood in my corner. I told him, “Wish I had more time to get ready for this fight.”

“Just hit him more than he hits you.”

Great advice.

The smokers were three three-minute rounds. Not a lot of pacing, just dumping everything you’ve got into every round. In the first round, I felt the marine and I fought about evenly. In the second round, I didn’t react quickly enough and got caught a couple of times.
He’s outclassing me.
My arms felt weak. The 16-ounce gloves felt like 40 pounds.

In the third round I went to touch gloves with him, a silent courtesy that boxers show each other at the beginning of the last round. I put my right hand out, and he sucker-punched me. It hurt. Oh, did it hurt. Knocked me down on my knee. I stood up but had to take an eight-count.

I wasn’t Rocky—I was scared of getting hit again. After the eight-count, I came out whaling on the marine with everything I had, scared to death he was going to hurt me again. In the end, I won the fight. The navy fans went wild. I sat on the stool in my corner, exhausted. Looking at Todd, I said, “You and Bobby are going to have to help me get out.”

They literally carried me to the parking lot and put me in a car. After helping take off my gloves, they changed me into some sweats and drove me to a Wendy’s, where we ate. Later, they took me to the barracks and tucked me into bed.

The next morning, I thought something was wrong with me. My face had puffed up, and one eye had swollen shut. The other eye had partially closed.
What happened?
I was sick for three or four days. Fortunately, it was near the end of aircrew school, and I graduated on time.

In spite of the separation, Laura and I wrote each other letters, and I called her. She came out to visit me for the weekend following graduation. Our relationship seemed fine.

After aircrew school, Todd, Bobby, and I moved down the street and started twelve weeks of Search and Rescue school. The place was intimidating: names on the wall, gigantic indoor pool, mock door of an H-3 helicopter, and SAR instructors in their shorts and blue T-shirts.