The War that Change the World of Warfare

The onslaught of World War Two would change the world of warfare as we know it in. War has already gone from large units marching to one another and repeatedly opening fire to trench warfare. Where people would dig in and fight in open fields full of land mines, traps, barb wire, and the dead, as bullets whizzed by and tanks roll passed to a new war one fought in city’s house to house, in open fields, and on beach heads. The next evolution into this modern war was the advent of Naval Special warfare units. They would get there start in World War Two as underwater mine and obstacle disposal units but the lessons they learned in World War Two would shape the world of war and Naval Special Warfare today. These men are the for fathers of units such as Navy SEALs, SWCC and MARSOC that have taken on a new form and role from building on these units in WWII such as Naval Special Service Unit No. 1(Frogmen), Navy Combat Demolition Units (NCDU’s), Navy Scouts and Raiders, Underwater Demolition Teams (UDT’s)and the start of Naval Special Warfare.

Naval Special Service unit, No1 very little is known about this top secret forerunner to all other naval special warfare including Naval Combat Demolition Units (NCDU). During the think up of what the unit would need to be able to do, they determined that the requirements and the mission would put the sailors in hazardous conditions to perform even more hazardous tasks including underwater reconnaissance and other amphibious operations. They were finally official established on July 7, 1943 and began official training in Cairns Base learning Navigation, raft work martial arts, jungle survival, and underwater recognizance.

The origins of Naval Special Warfare can be traced back to the Scouts an...

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...ke Team 4, this team also trained on Maui until May, when they would go on to work with the second marine division in an operation in Saipan, where they took detailed surveys of the reefs, and used a string weight method of determining the depth of the water that would be used for the rest of the war.

Bibliography

Primary sources

Critchell, Brad. Mine Warfare, Washington D.C: navy and marine corps WWII commemorative committee, navy office of information, 1994

Cunningham, Chet. The Frogmen of World War II: An Oral History of U.S. Navy’s Underwater demolition Teams, Pocket Star, 2005

Secondary sources

Couch Dick. The Forerunners: World War II Frogmen,

Donovan, Sandra. U.S. Naval Special Warfare Forces: Lerner publications co. 2005

SEAL/SWCC web page history section http://www.sealswcc.com/navy-seals-history.html#.UuewSxDnbIU