 The United States Navy SEAL platoons project power far beyond their small 16 man size. The success of their mission doesn't just rely on weapons or technology, but on the specialized training of the individual SEAL operator. They come from all walks of life, from all across the American landscape. Most have some measure of athletic ability, over a third have college degrees. They all share a common goal. To become a member of the most elite team in the world, the United States Navy SEALs. Each year, 600 to 800 young men attempt the basic underwater demolition SEAL training, or BUDS, at the Naval Special Warfare Center in Coronado, California. But only one third complete the rigorous 25 week transition from sailor to SEAL. This is the story of one such group, Class 224. You get treated like the absolute lowest form on earth, and you really got to find it within yourself to say, you know, I know I can do it, I know I can finish it, I know I can do anything they throw at me. That's where it builds character. You find out if you got it in yourself, if you can just block everything out and just focus on that brass ring, you know, getting through the six months of hell. First phase is really the phase that's going to separate the men from the boys. These guys come here, they really don't know what to expect, so we're going to push them, we're going to push them hard and see what they have. And the guys that want to be here, no matter what we do or say, they want to be a SEAL, they're going to be a SEAL, that's all there is to it. Physically, BUDS is a real butt kicker. Just having the mental fortitude of not only trying to get through the PT sessions, but also getting into the lack of sleep, having instructors on your back, being hurt all the time, all those things start taking a plane during the day and just having the idea of there's nothing that's going to stop me from finishing this training or finishing this evolution. That's what gets through it. I believe that BUDS builds teamwork and character by weeding out the weak, bringing the strong together to survive the training. I don't think any one man can make it alone through BUDS. You guys stay in this position until you guys look at it. Give up! You have to stay here all day. I have to say that out of the courses never blow my expectations. It's one of the best training you can get. Because you've got to think on your feet, you've got to act, you've got to move, you've got to be fast, you've got to be safe. You can really hurt yourself. Who are your loves? Christian in first phase is pretty high. Like I say, it's a really fast-paced phase and these guys are constantly moving and grooving every second of every day except for when they're eating. So the guys, when they hear about SEAL training, well, all you have to do is run, all you have to do is an O-course, things like that. It's not really that big a deal. But once you start putting everything together in the days or endless, that's when guys decide that this really isn't for me. I don't want to be wet. I don't want to be cold. This pace right here is not for me. But that's what's going to happen when they leave here. They go to SEAL team. The pace is just like that. It never ends. It's just about everything at BUDS. It's a timed evolution or it's a race. It builds camaraderie with the guys. They take their boats and they'll race out to the surf. So sometimes the boats will flip over on them because the surf gets so big. It's quite an experience to be paddling in a rubber boat and facing the 8-foot wall of water coming at you. It's just going to destroy you and send you tumbling around. And there's almost like a washing machine effect in the water. What we're looking for from a recruit, number one, he has to have the physical skills to complete the training. Two, he has to have the mental aptitude because we're not just a bunch of knuckle-draggers. You have to have some mental skills as well. 42-10. We don't look for any kind of personality. There's all sorts of different kind of personalities in the teams. But we're looking for a guy that's willing to sacrifice and can work well with others in a teamwork environment. Think the evolutions that cause most problems are the water evolutions. Some of these kids are from Wyoming. It's been places where they haven't even seen the water or at least the surf zone. They're not really too comfortable in the water. And you're doing drown proof where your hands are tied behind your back. Your feet are tied up. They don't like that. Drown proof, I think it's more of a metal thing than a physical evolution. It's all about trying to stay calm and being comfortable in the water. Half of our class failed it the first time they went through. And I think it's just because they have a mental block of the idea of not having control. You just got to have confidence in yourself and saying, you know, I've done this before. I can float on the water. 3,000 guys have done it before I have. You know, why can't I do it? It's a mental thing. Hell Week. The most fretted week of floods. It's the ultimate test of one's physical and mental motivation. Around-the-clock regimen of intensive physical training and harassment with as little as four hours of sleep during the entire week. Let's go. Get your foot up here. All the way up on the rocks. Get all the way up. Hell Week is five and a half days long. The class is divided into boat crews. Teamwork is a key issue during Hell Week. They're up for five days doing various evolutions that stress teamwork, cold, wet conditions again coming to factor. And this is an indicator of what kind of a man is going to come out the other end. You'll never be challenged anywhere the way that you're challenged in Hell Week. I mean, it'll test your soul to the very core of your being. You'll know exactly what your limitations are and what you're capable of doing when you get done with Hell Week. And then not being able to sleep and just, you know, falling asleep standing up. Are you sleeping? Yes. During Hell Week, I found I could fall asleep while I was underneath the boat while running. It's just a week of intense emotion and pain and cold and misery. And sometimes you thought it couldn't get any worse. But it did. The guys who went away, the only thing I can say about them is that they just decided it wasn't going to be part of their life. You have to want it. Because if you don't or you're not sure and you just come to try to find out you won't be around. Second phase is the dive phase portion of Bud's. It also builds teamwork but it starts to incorporate a much greater learning process for the guys going through. The majority of the evolutions that cause the students the most problem is the water work. If a guy isn't comfortable in the water then he's not really cut out to be a frogman. He's got to keep his head about him when he's in the water if something goes wrong with his dive rig or something like that. So a lot of the pool work is very stressful. You've got to be mentally in the game to make it through those evolutions. The men are subjected to continual calculated harassment by their instructors to see if they follow procedures taught in the classroom. Students are tumbled around and their mouthpiece is torn from their mouths simulating the effects of a strong ocean surge. Students are taught two types of scuba. Open circuit using compressed air bottles and closed circuit using specialized oxygen recirculation equipment. San Diego Bay turns into a combat training area for practicing underwater navigation. The men are learning to use a specialized breathing apparatus the Drager Lar 5. It's a closed circuit underwater breathing apparatus designed for use in clandestine military operations in shallow water where concealment of telltale exhaust bubbles is essential. The Rock, San Clemente Island where the windy northern tip of the island is Bud's country. It's at this modern compound that class 224 will spend their final four weeks of training. Out here it's the ideal training ground for them. We have weapons ranges, demo ranges and a lot of good terrain for them to patrol in. On the windswept Mesa overlooking the camp is the rifle range. It's here that the men will spend day after day of basic weapons training and maneuvering drills. A lot of guys come here who've never shot a rifle before at a really basic level, just target shooting. Third phase is designed to finally teach these guys how to be seals. We have to start off with basic rifle drills and everything in third phase is a gradual progression. You're so broken down from the first five months of Bud's that it doesn't matter what they do to try to build you up nothing works, you just hurt, you just go on. When you guys get out into teams you're going to be asked to do things as simple as possible, but here we're proving to you that maybe it's not impossible with a little bit of planning and preparation. I think by far the toughest part is the daily grind. I don't think any individual day or any individual evolution is that hard. It's maybe a 14 mile run or a five mile swim but in a couple hours it's over. It's just the day to day grind and they say it gets easier after Hell Week but I think the easiest part of Bud's is Hell Week in prior because at Post Hell Week a lot more is expected of you and you just go day to day. You have so much to teach you. I think the toughest part of the whole thing is just staying motivated for six months. Six months is a long time to do this every day day in and day out and it doesn't get any easier. During tactics week on San Clemente Island we teach him a lot of different classes reconnaissance patrol over the beach, prisoner handling, raids, ambush. It's all part of learning the tactics, tools that we use, tools that we need as seals to do our job. They're right now doing it in the daytime. We never do any kind of operation in the daytime in the seal teams but they've got to learn it so we need to be able to watch them and see what they're doing and make sure that they're doing it right. Out on this beach out here we're going to be doing an obstacle load. We've got a bunch of obstacles underneath the water out there at about 10, 12 feet. We're going to be taking out, swimming out, satchel charges filled with C4 explosives. We're going to be setting them down, mounting them on the obstacles of the cells. This is, of course, the simulator. Blowing them up for an invasion force coming in that they might tear out the bottom of a landing craft. This is what the original UDTs, their main purpose, their main job besides reconnaissance. Each one of these blocks is one and a quarter pound to C4 and this yellow stuff you see is the front here at the top of it. This decor, this is what we use to tie into the trunk line. It's going to be run to each one of the obstacles that are out in the water behind me. We tie in with a right angle knot into the trunk line so that when they detonate it from the shore up here it all goes off at once. I think the biggest thing about it is for us, for all of us here it's our last great evolution of buds. Very few ever get to where you are today. You only graduate from buds training once. It marks the completion of the toughest military training in the world. In a society where mediocrity is too often the standard and too often rewarded, there is intense fascination with men who detest mediocrity, who refuse to define themselves in conventional terms and who seek to transcend traditionally recognized human capabilities. This is exactly the type of person buds is meant to find. The man who will find a way to complete each and every task to the best of his ability. The man who will adapt and overcome any and all obstacles. I feel good. It's like a huge weight lifted off his shoulders. I mean obviously everybody says, you know, this is the first step. There's a lot to come. This is a big step. I feel on top of the world today. It's the arduous training and it's just... I can't even describe how I feel. There's some parts of training where you feel like you can't make it through one more day, but you press on hour to hour, minute to minute, and eventually you get to this point. The person who wants to be here and ends up becoming a seal is the person who wants to be down inside and if he doubts that at all, then just doesn't belong.