Red Cell

Photo courtesy of Navy SEALTeams.Com

(continued from page one)

With the required phone warning, the base went on full alert.  To Red Cell's delight, while base security was indeed heightened, it numerous other flaws were becoming apparent to the team.  For example, while Marine and Navy Security teams patrolled along the fence lines and hear the gates, other areas were left vulnerable.  Moreover, advanced motion detectors had been turned on to protect the ordnance facility, however these sensors covered only two sides of the building near the front, leaving the back door wide open. This latter deficiency was exploited by four Red Cell operators, who scaled down the cliff to the back of the building.  The video crew was then moved into position in a similar fashion.

Captured all the while on video, two operators burrowed under the fence and moved to one side of the facility while the others did the same.  A lone sentry was 'killed' with a shot from a silenced pistol (ruled 'dead' by a referee) and adjacent propane tanks were booby-trapped.  The team then picked the lock of the side door, entered unchallenged, and placed 'explosives' near the nuclear weapons preparation area as well as on stockpiled torpedoes.  The team then extracted and concluded the night's activity.

On Day Two, the team focused on both the upper and lower sections of the base.  One element struck at the hospital, communications center, and HQ buildings, with no resistance.  Another element made up of four operators changed into wet suits at a yacht basin approximately one-half mile upriver from the submarine pens.  With civilian work clothes packed into dry bags, they swam down the river to the pens, climbed the pilings, and changed back into their civvies.  From their they were not only able to neutralize the sentries (who were reportedly in a shack drinking coffee), but they were able to plant explosives on the diving planes of one submarine, and actually made entry into a nuclear sub tied up at the pier.  Once inside the submarine, the team was free to roam at will.  They planted demolition charges in the control room, nuclear-reactor compartment, and torpedo room.  Had these been actual explosive devices, of course, the submarine would have been a total loss (not to mention the potential for nuclear fallout).

The exercise proved without question that the installation was highly vulnerable to terrorist infiltration.  In the debriefing that followed, however, what might have proven a golden moment for Red Cell was tarnished when Marcinko chose to conduct his meeting with the senior base commanders in a manner that was needlessly abrasive and unprofessional.  Nonetheless, his team did carry out its mission with expertise and demonstrated an invaluable flair for the unconventional mindset - an invaluable trait for a unit with a mandate as unconventional as was that of Red Cell.

Point Mugu Naval Air Station, California

By Labor Day of 1985, Admiral Lyons, who had been a staunch proponent of Red Cell and Marcinko, was promoted out of his job in Washington to become Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet (CINCPACFLT).  While this was perceived as a step up the ladder for the Admiral, it also removed him from the position that enabled him to protect Marcinko on those increasingly numerous occasions when flag officers phoned to complain about Marcinko's actions and attitudes towards the Navy.  Thus, Red Cell lost its most valuable ally in the Pentagon.  It was at this point that the future of the unit began come into question.

On the Labor Day weekend, however, it was discovered that an opportunity existed to text the security of Air Force One while it was housed at Point Mugu, its home when President Reagan vacationed at the president's ranch some 125 miles to the south.  Thirteen of the team's members traveled to California through circuitous routes and varied times, practicing (to a degree) traveling covertly should the team be called on to perform its covert counterterrorist function in a foreign country.  The team's equipment and the video crew arrived via a Navy jet into nearby Alameda Naval Air Station.

In this exercise, Marcinko gave his team great freedom in planning their own penetrations and actions at the objective.  Point Mugu was a bit different than most Naval bases in that it had a well-trained SWAT team (made up of males and females) that had been formed specifically to respond to unusual threats to the installation and its personnel.  Reconnaisance by car, bicycle and boat found the typical security shortcomings such as poorly secured rear gates and fences and scheduled Marine and Naval Security patrols, 

Perhaps symbolically, it was the failure of main gate guards to stop vehicles as they passed into the base (while Red Cell operators used the distraction to scale nearby fences) that marked the start of the operation.  Having gained access through this manner, the team infiltrated the base to find that the 'alert' base was anything but.  The multi-million dollar F/A-18 Hornet stood in a row, virtually unprotected on the flight line, sentries appeared nonchalant, and all seemed like business as usual.  Of course, these were the very flaws that Red Cell had been tasked to uncover.  With every movement videotaped, the team did just that - uncovered and exposed scores of security shortcomings.

Of the more noteworthy actions taken by Red Cell:

However, while the 13-man team proved quite capable of causing massive disruption to base personnel, facilities, and services, the most notable event occurred when Red Cell operators stole a weapons carrier, loaded it with 500-pound dummy bombs (covered with a tarp), and drove it to the Bachelor Officer's Quarter's parking lot where it remained unchecked all weekend.  On the third day, they drove the weapons carrier to the far section of the field near Air Force One.  They climbed out, activated the 'explosives' and walked away.  This action would have completely destroyed the Boeing 707 and killed anyone in the blast area had the explosives been authentic.

Photo courtesy of Navy SEALTeams.Com

Conclusions

In time, however, Red Cell was to be shut down over a variety of complaints, spearheaded by a lawsuit initiated by a base worked who claimed to have been abused by Red Cell's overzealous operators.

To be sure, opinions of Cdr. Marcinko's command style vary widely depending on who you are talking to.  The purpose of this essay, however, is not to provide a biographical essay of Marcinko, nor to delve into the well-documented inter-SEAL debates on Marcinko's personality, but rather to focus on Red Cell itself as an apparatus in the war against terrorism.  Out of necessity, some references are made to the former aspect of this, but only in an effort to establish the mindset of the commanding officer of the team and how it related to the mindsets of those on the team and their actions.

Commander Norm Carley, who had an impressive career in the Teams including CO of SEAL Team TWO, UDT 21; exchange duty with German SEALs (Kampfschwimmers), and was once executive officer of SEAL Team SIX.  Carley spent approximately three months at Naval Operations while Marcinko was putting together Red Cell and interacted with him frequently during this time.  Having experienced Marcinko in a variety of commands and environments, his high opinion of Marcinko as a leader did not seem to change, even at this volatile time in Marcinko's career.  Carley wrote: 

"I learned more from Dick than from anyone I ever worked for.  The lessons were positive and negative...A lot of people have opinions about him, but not many of them have seen all the facets associated with him...I've never seen anyone motivate troops like that."

(Author's note: As mentioned previously, this quote is included here to provide the opinion of a respected fellow SEAL officer at the time of Red Cell's formation and insight into the command mentality of the unit.)

Another, entirely different opinion was expressed by a retired SEAL officer regarding Marcinko and Red Cell, which perhaps best sums up both the unit and its commanding officer: 

"When you get right down to it, the concept is/was brilliant. Bedside manner is what killed it. After Dick left RC, Capt. Tom Tarbox took over. Tom is a great guy. He did well turning Red Cell around. In the end though the Navy killed it. My understanding from the bubble-head admiral who headed the IG team was that too much had happened. Grabbing the breasts of the CO's wife on the left coast sent more than starch on the whites of every senior officer concerned. It went to, 'kill the name-remove the shame' type of thing. Given the Navy's usual gutlessness it came as no surprise. I understand it has re-emerged elsewhere. On another note, one of the items discussed was the whole attitude of the command. Once the evening's festivities were concluded, all concerned would muster early next AM to brief the base CO on what had occurred. Dick would show up in flip-flops and shorts, half drunk and scratching his balls to the tune of guess what I did to you last evening. Would have gone much better he in uniform with his key people (OIC, Chief, JAG and a couple of over-head slides). The CO's got their noses way out of joint and eventually it went to the top. Sad fact is that Dick's guys did some great penetrations, but the value of the lessons got lost in 'the cult of personality'." (AI)

Bibliography

(RW) Richard Marcinko, Rogue Warrior (New York: Pocket Books, 1992)

(RT) Richard Marcinko, The Real Team (New York: Pocket Books, 1999)

(AI) Author interview, conducted 06 April 2000.