There are very few military units around the world that can claim to be as good as the United States Navy Sea, Air and Land forces. Known with fear, respect, admiration and affection around the globe, the Navy SEALS provide a special operations force that few wish to confront or defy. Physically fit, tactically superior and dedicated to achieving their objective, Navy SEALS training provides this elite fighting team with every tool necessary to succeed.Imagine then, if you can, taking the very best graduates from the Navy SEALS training and giving them an additional 30-weeks of even more rigorous, demanding training in areas of underwater combat, parachuting, boat handling, SCUBA diving, weapons, warfare and reconnaissance. This, ladies and gentlemen, is BUDS training.
BUDS Training Isn’t For Babies
BUDS training is Basic Underwater Demolition training. As such, it is even more physically demanding, more precise and even more brutal than Navy SEAL training. The individuals who volunteer for this program of personal perfection and tremendous teamwork very often fail before they finish. Approximately 75% of BUDS training candidates never graduate. This program demands excellence in everything and its graduates deliver.
BUDS training candidates are required to be male U.S. citizens aged 18-28, enlisted or officers of the U.S. Navy or Coast Guard, Navy SEAL training graduates with excellent vision, ASVAB scores or no prior drug use or criminal record. These young men are the cream of the American crop. Unlike any other military training program, BUDS training requires officers and enlisted men to train together, ensuring the precise and accurate team behavior required to achieve nearly impossible ends.
Training, Training And More Training
The BUDS training program follows the Navy SEAL training and begins with three weeks of indoctrination and Physical Training Rehabilitation and Remediation (PTRR), followed by 7 weeks of a Basic Conditioning Phase. During this time, candidates are taught to handle themselves with excellence in the areas of small boat management, weapons and demolition, counter-terrorism tactics, foreign internal defense reconnaissance, basic diving physics and techniques and unconventional land warfare.
Candidates are constantly working on their mental and physical fitness. Swimming, running, calisthenics and obstacle course works are daily routines. Sleep is not. In addition to rigorous physical training, candidates of the BUDS training program are learning how to work as a member of a precise military machine that uses water competency, mental acumen and teamwork to accomplish whatever task is set before them. For those who reach the end, Hell Week is their reward: 132 hours of non-stop, bone-crushing exhaustion as they demonstrate their abilities as leaders, followers and indispensible members of this elite team.
By Land, Sea Or Air, BUDS Are There
The next phase of BUDS training is an 8-week diving course. Candidates acquire SCUBA certification and gain skills in water combat. Imagine playing Marco Polo with someone who wanted to kill you. Underwater techniques are developed and honed to an edge that has no equal. Teammates work together to save each other from expulsion and exhaustion. All the while, the physical training demands continue to increase. This is followed by 9-weeks of land warfare training which includes weapons and marksmanship, demolition, navigation, patrolling techniques, rappelling, explosives and tactical skills training. Candidates then receive 3-weeks of parachute training, all while demanding more and more from themselves and each other as they perfect their skills as maritime warriors.
Clearly, BUDS and Navy SEAL training is only for those who possess more dedication, determination and physical perseverance than most people would ever consider possible. Navy SEALS and BUDS graduates are the best there is. They defend freedom. They fight oppression. They rescue victims and they punish terrorists. The American nation is forever in their debt.
Photo courtesy of K38 Rescue
