Expansion of SEAL Commandos Disclosed in Navy’s ‘Master Plan’
WASHINGTON — The Navy plans to expand its special warfare SEAL forces by roughly 1,000 men by 1990, and, in the process, has begun construction projects from Puerto Rico to San Clemente Island, Calif., an internal document shows.
Much of the construction involves training facilities, although there are some “operational” projects as well.
The unorthodox commando units are also acquiring new equipment, from fast strike boats to underwater “swimmer delivery vehicles” armed with torpedoes.
Those and other details of the secretive SEAL organization are contained in a censored version of the Navy’s 1986 “Special Warfare Master Plan,” released to a Washington researcher under the Freedom of Information Act.
The master plan covers problems with training programs and confirms, in a brief reference, the existence of a counterterrorism SEAL team that the Navy never acknowledges. It mentions a new effort to improve operations between SEALs and Marines, and suggests--by a reference in the report’s glossary--that some SEAL units can handle nuclear weapons.
The SEAL teams--it stands for the Sea-Air-Land--are the Navy’s arm for conducting unconventional, or guerrilla, warfare.
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