Preface
When I was Ten Years Old I received an annotated copy of Treasure Island, a grocery store promotion as I recall. Through this small gift my interest in sea roving, in pirates adn privateers and Spanish galleons, was made permanent. The sea had already had me: I was born in Key West, and my father serving in the U.S. Navy, I was already fascinated with all things maritime. I soon discovred Exquemelin's Buccanners of America, Sabatini's Captain Blood, then Rogers's and Dampier's journals, and quite accidentally Henry Pitman's tale of rebellion, escape, and buccaneers, untouched for years deep within a university library. I immediately recognized Sabatini's inspiration.
Between fact and fiction will always be some distance. But as my interest in both literature and history grew, I found the fournals of rovers and mariners as exciting as anything told in a tale, revealing a world long gone, only hinted at or profoundly and inaccurately exaggerated. Soon, I wanted to test the waters, to find the common ground between truth and image. Perhaps I did this unconsciously, for I had other reasons for becomming a naval officer and volunteering for Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training. Family tradition, the lure of adventure, and the allure of the sea had as much to do with my decision.
Besides the obvious parallels of the sea rover's practice and my own profession - raiding on or from the sea, boarding ships by stealth, landing silently on beaches at night, moving through jungles - I quickly noticed those parallels of tactical principals and mentality. We emphasized suprise, and we were trained to make quick sudden assalts and exfiltrations. Planning and intelligence were vital, as was accurate and overwhelming small arms fire. Leaders led from the front, not the rear. We improvised; we adapted; we worked as one. Teamwork was everything. In this special world all must lead by example, all must pull their weight, all must stand together. It was a hazardous profession of arms and ships, of high risk and high gain, and at its center lay the sea with all its perils and wonders. For us, only greed was absent, replaced by duty.
Yet it is the crews themselves who stand out, those of the SEAL platoons and Teams. In character, motivation, perservance, attitude, loyalty, willful independence, and even in their cursing, irreverence, and gallows humor, they are exactly as were thei rsea-roving forbears. They are shaped by their environment, by tactics and the sea. What historians explain by social forces and patterns, I experienced simply out of a sense of duty and maritime adventure. I know the rovers of the past by thei rwritten word, but I know they exist today from my service with them.
Many have contributed to the making of this book, directly or indirectly, over the years. My parents have always stood by me, and I thank them for thei rlove and support in everything. My mother has always don whatever she could and more to help, adn my father was the first sea-going adventurer I ever knew of.
I thank my daughters for thei rlove and support as well, and especially for their patience during the last four weeks of writing and editing. Our schedules wer ethe most hectic we've ever known together, yet neither of the complained. Instead, they used their rapier wit (usually on me) to keep us going.
My fencing masters gave me my first real introduction to tactics. They have not only my great thanks but my enduring friendship, respect and admiration, for both are gentlemen, scholars, swordsmen, and humanitarians: Dr. Francis Zold and Dr. Eugene Hamori. Sadly, Dr. Zold passed away in 2004, a few weeks shy of his hundredth birthday.
Certainly my experience as a Navy SEAL influenced the writing of this book, and I thank all with whom I served, for I learned from them all. I'd particularly like the thank the students and instructors of BUD/S classes 120 and 121, the crews of SEAL Team THREE and SEAL Delivery Vehicle Team ONE, and the training cell of SEAL Team ONE.
(Whole bunch of thanks to other friends and publishers goes here. Edited out of this for length)
Alexander Exquemelin, buccanne surgeon and writer, wrote that we should not judge people by thei rappearance, but by thei spirit. The salient characteristic of the best of all I've known, in the SEAL Teams or out, is spirit, an indomitable will in teh best and worst of circumstances. Looking beyond the ethics and morality of warfare, this was also the salient characteristic of many sea rovers, most of whole names are lost to history forever.
(probably loaded with typos.... mine, not in the book)