Marcus luttrell

 
 

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3
 
 
A School for Warriors
 
It was pitch dark, and he was wearing sunglasses, wraparound, shiny black...“Most of 
you aren’t going to be here in a couple of months,” said Instructor Reno...“If you guys don’t start 
pulling together as a team, none of you will be here.” 
The six SEALs from Bahrain landed in Bagram, in northeast Afghanistan, shortly after 
first light. I realize I have just spent two entire chapters essentially pointing out what a 
momentous event that was, our arrival to work with the elite mountain troops of the U.S. Army. 
It has occurred to me that you might be wondering why we thought we were so goddamned 
superior to everyone else, why we felt entitled to our own private brand of arrogance. 
Not wishing to be haunted by anyone’s doubts about me and my teammates, I propose to explain 
right now, before we get moving, precisely why we felt this way about the world. It’s not some 
form of premature triumph, and it would be absurd to call it mere confidence. That would be like 
calling the Pacific wet. 
It’s a higher form of consciousness, and I do not mean that to be pretentious. It’s been 
said that only the very rich understand the difference between themselves and the poor, and only 
the truly brilliant understand the difference between themselves and the relatively dumb. 
Well, only men who have gone through what we went through can understand the difference 
between us and the rest. In the military, even the rest understand what it takes to scale the heights 
of combat excellence. And in my case, it started inauspiciously. Way down on the ranch, with 
Mom in tears, refusing to leave the house to see me go. March 7, 1999. I was twenty-three. 
To say that I was not making amazing headway in my hometown would be an understatement. 
The reputation Morgan and I had was not assisting either of us. There were always guys showing 
up wondering how tough we really were. I guess my dad considered it a matter of time before 
one of us was faced with a low-flying pugilist and either hurt someone badly or got badly hurt 
himself. And so I decided to get out of town and join the U.S. Navy SEALs. Morgan thought it 
was a great idea, and he introduced me to a recruiting officer in a nearby town, Petty Officer 
First Class Beau Walsh. He steered me down to the military enlistment processing station in 
Houston; that’s navy recruitment. 
Naturally, I told them immediately there was no need for me to attend boot camp. I was 
already way too advanced for that. Yessir, I’ll go straight to Coronado, where the big dogs eat. 
That’s what I’m all about, I’m a half-trained SEAL already. 
They sent me directly to boot camp. I signed the papers and prepared to report for duty in 
a few days. As I left the ranch, it was not a real ceremony of departure, but everyone was there, 
including Beau Walsh and Billy Shelton. As previously stated, Mom caved in and retreated to 
the house, unable to witness the departure of her baby. That was me. 

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My destination was more than a thousand miles to the north, Navy Recruit Training 
Command (RTC) in Great Lakes, Illinois. And I can truthfully say, it was where I spent the most 
miserable eight weeks of my entire life. I had never even seen snow, and I arrived in the middle 
of the worst blizzard that boot camp had seen in eleven years. It was like sending a Zulu to the 
North Pole. 
That wind and snow came howling in across Lake Michigan, blasting its way onto the 
western shore where we were situated, thirty-five miles north of Chicago. Right on the water. I 
could not believe the sheer misery of that freezing weather. The camp was a gigantic place, with 
hundreds of recruits trying to make that miraculous transformation from civilian to U.S. Navy 
sailor. It was a drastic metamorphosis, both mental and physical, and it would have been difficult 
enough in fine weather. But in that ice, snow, and wind, Jesus. Words fail me. 
I’d never needed winter clothes, and I had none. I remember being extremely pleased 
when the navy issued everyone the right gear — thick socks, boots, dark blue trousers, shirts, 
sweaters, and coats. They told us how to fold and store everything, showed us how to make our 
bunks every morning. Without missing a beat, they put us straight into physical training, running, 
working out, marching, drilling, and many classes. 
I didn’t have much trouble, and I excelled in the swimming pool. The requirements were 
to enter the water feetfirst from a minimum height of five feet, remain afloat for five minutes, 
and then swim fifty yards using any stroke. I could have done that in my sleep, especially 
without having to worry about the occasional alligator or water moccasin. 
The running would not have been that bad in decent weather, but the campus was 
absolutely frigid, and the wind off the lake was cutting. A penguin would have had trouble out 
there. We ran through snow, marched through snow, and made our way to classes through snow. 
In that first week, while we were trying to avoid freezing to death, they instilled in us three 
words which have been with me ever since.