Lt. Michael Murphy& ……

My point… since you didn’t get it the first time… is to stop the second guessing.

It’s not so much second-guessing as examining what was obviously a mission gone terribly wrong and attempting to understand what happened and why. But I can see how that can be seen as Monday-morning quarterbacking.

What the SEALs do so well on a regular basis is to “stay out of the papers.” It is tragic testimony to their quiet effectiveness that we only read about their one spectacular failure, instead of the multitude of their successes.

Whether it’s a reconnaissance or taking out a high-value target, SEALs go in, do the job and leave – and either nobody knows they were ever there, or nobody knows who did the deed, where they came from or where they went.

Aside from the amazing physical and mental training it takes to be a SEAL, another key in their abilty to routinely do the “impossible” comes from their meticulous attention to detail – in mission preparation, immediate action drills and contingency planning.

So Radio Relay is correct that SEALs overcome imperfections: it gives them a crucial edge in the fog of battle. While the other guys are still trying to sort out what’s happening, the SEALs have already shifted gears, seized the initiative and taken decisive action.

Yet it is here that the descriptions in he post above raise an eyebrow.

“On that fateful day in 2005, while conducting a reconnaissance mission in the Hindu Kush, their four man team was accidentally happened upon by three Afghani goat herders.

What ensued was a discussion among the four SEALs about what to do with the three Afghanis. The rules of engagement weren’t specific enough for them to decide whether they should kill, detain, or release the men.”

I read those words twice when I first saw them, and both times my reaction was, “WTF?”

It is hard to believe that a SEAL element’s exacting mission preparation wouldn’t include a contingency for, “What happens if we get spotted by some local stumble-bum?” Yet if the above passage is accurate, that seems to have been the case.

Similarly, it is puzzling that a “debate” seems to have ensued on whether to kill three men whose combatant status evidently consisted of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Equally perplexing is the apparent weight given to concerns about the opinion of the American media.

In short, a lot seems to have gone wrong with this particular mission that led to several of our finest warriors losing their lives, and the apparent nature of what went wrong leads to some hard questions.

I greatly admire Lt. Murphy’s selflessness, valor and coolness under fire that day. He deserves that Medal of Honor. This nation is poorer for his loss and that of his comrades.

As it stands, I’m trusting that the higher-ups in SOCOM are asking and finding answers to the hard questions – so that the rest of us here in the land that Lt. Murphy gave his life to protect can go back to being blissfully ignorant of what other SEALs like him are doing on our behalf, in God-forsaken places around the planet, day in and day out.

“His objective was clear: to make one last valiant attempt to save his two teammates”–former Special Warfare Operator 1st Class (SEAL)…

Just to clarify: SFC Russell (US Army) was NOT a member of SEAL Team 10. He was a member of the QRF/Rescue element that went in to get Lt. Murphy’s SEAL element.

That should be changed to reflect facts.

Otherwise, well done on reporting this event.

Thank you, and all our troops, for making it easier for me and my family to sleep a little better at night.

Your family must be so sad, but so very proud of you, as we all are.

More than 50 page A1 stories on Abu Ghraib, and finally after a couple of weeks, a genuine American hero gets a mention on page B1.

To be totally accurate, Lt. Murphy’s story appeared on page A21, in the U.S. section. To date, 1,621 stories about the incident about Abu Ghraib have appeared in the Times since January 17, 2004. The 912th story was a Reuters article in the World section the same day they ran SFC Paul R. Smith’s Medal of Honor further back, in the U.S., on page A12.

My point… since you didn’t get it the first time… is to stop the second guessing. You were not there, Lt. Murphy’s family was not there. dakine was not there. I was not there. Let’s give Lt. Murphy, the benefit of the doubt. He made the best decision under the circumstances.

And yes, the intentional distortion of military operations by the leftwing press, in favor of the enemy, and in detriment to US Forces, obviously played a part in the ultimate outcome of the mission, which resulted in the loss of this valiant American, Navy SEAL.

May God bless and keep Lt Murphy. May God bless and comfort his family. May God help this nation.

Read the book. You’re doing an awful lot of speculating with no background of the events.

You can call my thinking BS if you want; it doesn’t change the essentials. Once they were discovered, the SEALs’ mission was blown and their options were limited.

To begin with, this was not a combat mission, but a reconaissance. Recon missions deep in enemy territory are productive only as long as the recon element’s presence remains unknown. Once the enemy knows you’re around, two bad things happen: They stop unknowingly giving you actionable intelligence, and start hunting you. At that point, the mission is over.

Unless you want to hang around for enemy reinforcements to arrive and play Rambo with the lives of your men; but dropping SOCOM operators behind enemy lines with guns blazing, not caring about whether they know you’re there or not, is what we have the 75th Ranger Regiment for. That’s not the SEALs mission.

Indeed, returning to my Grenada example above, one of the chief criticisms of that operation was the casual use of SEALs as ersatz light infantry, which not only squandered their specialized training and capabilities but also caused them to incur heavy casualties.

In his circumstances, once his team had been detected Lt. Murphy had a choice: He could abort the mission, or try to continue. Being a SEAL, he had long fangs: for these men mission accomplishment is a quasi-religion, and “imperfections” are something to be overcome if at all posssible.

But Lt. Murphy had to weigh all the factors:

- Regardless of whether they detained or killed the Afghans, how long would it be before those three were missed? Others would no doubt come looking for them, meaning that the area would eventually be crawling with unfriendlies, making both compromise of the team and a firefight engagement for which it was not intended much more likely.

- Or, having been detected but temporarily having contained the loss of their stealth advantage, the SEALs could have chosen to scrub this particular mission and extract before things got further out of control.

Was Lt. Murphy’s recon mission so vital that it warranted continuing despite having lost their secrecy? I wasn’t there, and I haven’t read Marcus Luttrell’s account yet, so I don’t know whether Lt. Murphy chose to try to go on with the mission despite the worsening odds, or whether he and his team were caught trying to extract.

What I do know is that SEALs are a scarce and precious strategic asset, not to be sent into Battle-of-Little-Bighorn style firefights needlessly. I also know that right after Mission Accomplishent, a leader’s next priority is the welfare of his men and the preservation of his command.

All I’m saying is that if in the absence of violating the laws of land warfare it was not feasible for Lt. Murphy’s team to accomplish their recon mission – and events showed that this was not only foreseeable once they were compromised, but actually was the case – then the next priority is to keep your SEALs alive to do what they do best on another day.

Afghan goat-herders may grow on trees; SEALs don’t. In my book, 35-50 dead taliban for 3 dead SEALs is a taliban moral victory.

My only other lingering question is why, when Lt. Murphy was weighing his options, it was the possible adverse media reaction and not the legality or morality of killing the prisoners that appears to have been prominent in his delibertions?