Our program is unique in four ways: what we teach, how we teach it, who teaches it, and who we teach it to.
What we teach is pure SEAL. The lessons are simple, clear and well-defined: They come right out of our basic values. Winning pays. Losing has consequences. Nothing substitutes for preparation. Life isn’t fair and neither is the battlefield. Even the smallest detail matters. We are a brotherhood. Our success depends on our team performance. And we will not fail.
These precepts are driven home constantly as we make new SEALs.
Whether the students know it or not — and mostly, they don’t — these powerful ideas are behind almost everything that happens in training.
A boat race isn’t just a boat race. It’s a way of teaching the culture of winning. A room inspection isn’t just a room inspection. It’s an excuse for the instructors to get all over the students and teach the life-or-death importance of sweating every last detail.
TOUGHNESS TRAINING
“We should remember that one man is much the same as another and that he is best who it trained in the severest school.”
-Thucydides
SELF ACCOUNTABILITY
“Every SEAL must learn to run his own jump. You pack your own chute.”
LOVE OF A CHALLENGE
“The Spartans don’t ask how many are the enemy but where they are.”
-Plutarch
TEAM
“Remember upon the conduct of each depends the fate of all.”
-Alexander the Great
COMPETE
“SEALS never miss a chance to compete. If we don’t have something to compete over — don’t worry, we’ll dream something up. If there SEALs are going on a run, it’s not a run anymore. It’s a race. SEALs get bloody noses during pickup games of Horse.”
THE NEXT BATTLE
Killing Osama Bin Laden… “Mission Complete”
LEADERSHIP
“Ten soldiers wisely led will beat a hundred without a head.”
-Euripides
