Mick, I'm sorry we even have disagreement, but I hope it's professional.

My problem has been the mission creep of many of the special unit operations. I was involved with the planning of the Grenada op and went nuts over the stupid use of the SEALs then, and later in the Panama stupidity of have two SEAL teams tied down trying to secure Noreiga's private jet.

Special units (whether Green Beanies, Super Squids, or Recon Marines) do not take and hold ground. They snoop, poop and vaporize. I did not believe in the Grab or Stab missions then (we were running them in the 'Z) and my long view only confirms it. We develop special ops capability that becomes so specialized, we can almost never use them in the real world. Then, because they start to get rusty due to no "action" to test their skills, we develop actions which are EASILY handed by less special units, commit them to actions which were never comptemplated during the unit-concept planning stages, and wonder why they screw the pooch.

I would ask you to take the time to research the use and history of SEALs in Viet Nam, Grenada, and "Just Cause" in a realistic and detached way, comparing losses and gains and the even more ethereal "perceived gains". Also read "Black Hawk Down" about the Rangers in Somalia. At the conclusion of these actions, I didn't write the medal citations, I wrote the AAR's (After Action Reports) and they were sickening.

Finally, I have to clear up two points from my earlier post. In addition to the carrier pilots, I should have included the Riverine forces, the Chaplains, and God love 'em, the Navy Corpsman which no Marine in his right mind would forget (don't go there... ).

Secondly, in reference to the Medal of Honor. I attempted to write up a young Marine who ended up with one leg off from an RPG, who held his position on a forward ridge LP, and after running out of ammo, ended up killing two armed NVA with ROCKS, yet his medal was down graded because the "Navy hadn't met it's quota, and we (Marines) have too many". I read Kerry's citation; there is no comparison...