Marcus luttrell

 
Hit the deck! Heads down! Incoming!

---

Then a new voice, loud and stentorian. It was pitch dark save for the nonstop flashes of the 
machine guns, but the voice sounded a lot like Instructor Mruk’s to me — 
“Welcome to hell, 
gentlemen.”
For the next couple of minutes there was nothing but gunfire, deafening gunfire. They were 
certainly blanks, otherwise half of us would have been dead, but believe me, they sounded just 
like the real thing, SEAL instructors firing our M43s. The shouting was drowned by the whistles, 
and everything was drowned by the gunfire. 
By now the air in the room was awful, hanging with the smell of cordite, lit only by the muzzle 
flashes. I kept my head well down on the floor as the gunmen moved among us, taking care not 
to let hot spent cartridges land on our skin. 
I sensed a lull. And then a roar, plainly meant for everyone. 
“All of you, out! Move, you guys! 
Move! Move! Move! Let’s go!”
I struggled to my feet and joined the stampede to the door. We rushed out to the grinder, where it 
was absolute bedlam. More gunfire, endless yelling, and then, again, the whistles, and once more 
we all hit the deck in the correct position. In barrels around the grinder’s edge, artillery 
simulators blasted away. I didn’t know where Captain Maguire was, but if he’d been here he’d 
have thought he was back in some foreign battle zone. At least, if he’d shut his eyes, he would 
have. 
Then the instructors opened fire for real, this time with high-pressure hoses aimed straight at us, 
knocking us down if we tried to get up. The place was awash with water, and we couldn’t see a 
thing and we couldn’t hear anything above the small-arms and artillery fire. 
Battlefield whistle drills were conducted in the midst of high-pressure water jets, total chaos, 
deafening explosions, and shouting instructors...
“Crawl to the whistle, men! Crawl to the 
whistle! And keep your goddamned heads down!”
Some of the guys were suffering from mass confusion. One of ’em ran for his life, straight over 
the beach and into the ocean. He was a guy I knew really well, and he’d lost it completely. This 
was a simulated scene from the Normandy beaches, and it did induce a degree of panic, because 
no one knew what was happening or what we were supposed to be doing besides hitting the 
deck. 
The instructors knew this. They understood many of us would be at a low ebb. Not me. I’m 
always up for this kind of stuff, and anyway I knew they weren’t really trying to kill us. But the 
instructors understood this would not be true of everyone, and they moved among us, imploring 
us to quit now while there was still time.
 
“All you gotta do is ring that little bell up there.”
Lying there in the dark and confusion, freezing cold, soaked to the skin, scared to stand up, I told 
one of them he could stick that little bell straight up his ass, and I heard a loud roar of laughter. 
But I never said it again, and I never let on it was me. Until now, that is. See that? Even in the 
chaos, I could still manage the smart-ass remark. 

---

By now we were in a state of maximum disorientation, just trying to stay on the grinder with the 
others. The teamwork mantra had set in. I didn’t want to be by myself. I wanted to be with my 
soaking wet teammates, whatever the hell it was we were supposed to be doing. 
Then I heard a voice announcing we were a man short. Then I heard another voice, sharp and 
demanding. I don’t know who it was, but it was close to me and it sounded like the Biggest 
Bossman, Joe Maguire, with a lot of authority. “What do you mean? A man short? Get a count 
right now.” 
They ordered us to our feet instantly, and we counted off one by one, stopping at fifty-three. We 
were a man short. Holy shit! That’s bad, and very serious. Even I understood that. A party was 
dispatched immediately to the beach, and that’s where they found the missing trainee, splashing 
around out in the surf. 
Someone reported back to the grinder. And I heard our instructor snap, “Send ’em all into the 
surf. We’ll sort ’em out later.” And off we went again, running hard to the beach, away from the 
gunfire, away from this madhouse, into the freezing Pacific in what felt like the middle of the 
night. As so often, we were too wet to worry, too cold to care. 
But when we were finally summoned out of the surf, something new happened. The whistles 
began blasting again, and this meant we had to crawl toward the whistles all over again, but this 
time not on the smooth blacktop. This time on the soft sand. 
In moments we looked like sand beetles groping around the dunes. The whistles kept blowing, 
one blast, then two, and we kept right on crawling, and by now my elbows were really getting 
hot and sore, and my knees were not doing that great either. All four joints felt red-raw. But I 
kept moving. Then the instructors ordered us back into the surf, deep, so we could stay there for 
fifteen minutes, maximum immersion time in water hovering just under sixty degrees. We linked 
arms until we were ordered out to more whistles and more crawling. 
Then they sent us down to the surf for flutter kicks, heads in the waves. Then more whistles, 
more crawling, and back into the water for another fifteen minutes. Right next to me, one of the 
top guys in the class, an officer and a boat-crew leader, great runner, good swimmer, quit 
unconditionally. 
This was a real shaker. Another officer in his crew went running up the beach after him, 
imploring him not to go, telling the attending instructor, on his behalf, the guy did not mean it. 
No, sir. The instructor gave him another chance, told him it wasn’t too late and if he wished he 
could go right back into the water. 
But the man’s mind was made up, closed to all entreaties. He kept walking, and the instructor 
told him to get in the truck right next to the ambulance. Then he asked the guy doing the 
pleading if he wanted to quit too, and we all heard the sharp