Temporary Archive: Suzanne Brockmann's Message Board

experience, but I have had to deal with it in Teams and Platoons. There are several interesting psychological twists that occurr, not to everyone, while becoming a SEAL and then going into combat. It is not exclusive to SEALs---"the bus" was interviewed prior to the super bowl and he said something like "I am just going to concentrate on playing and hope I don't get sick" so here is a future Hall of Famer essentially out of his element on the football field--most people who go to BUDS have a dream of becoming a SEAL--if they make it, they have achieved their dream--so now they are ready for emotional let down #1---everybody in the Teams made it through BUDS--it is just the start of the dream. So here you are, a young new guy (I was never a young new guy)just through BUDS and some 40 year old dude out shoots you, kicks your ass in hand to hand and beats you by twenty minutes in a monstermash---it can be quite humbling--now, you fast forward to combat and as a new guy you simply don't have the years of experience in the simple stuff--like fighting and the complex stuff--like --well, the complexity of the battle field--again, very easy to get overwhelmed. So in Walters case he was new young and in combat with some pretty seasoned guys, and it was overwhelming--he still did his job but in awe. Another way to think of it, is you get your Trident and you are a SEAL--but I think it takes a few years of wearing the Trident before you really believe it--that I guess was my experience---it is a long hard trip and the learning never stops.
Nothing is like combat--so though you might have a good or bad training exercise and even though you have certainly been in dangerous spots , the first time you are really going up an enemy, everything changes. It is cliche, but I don't know of anyone who hasn't been more concerned with not letting their buddies down than of living or dying--it becomes very simple and, for kids that were worrying about how to pin a corsage on their date without touching her breast in front of her father 8 months ago--and now are faced with the awesome responsibility of not letting their buddies down---it is very stressful