Seal Team Six

aka Naval Special Warfare Development Group (NSWDG), Dev Group, DEVGRU, MOB Six, MARESFAC

SEAL Team Six is the original name of the U.S. Navy's top-level special operations commando group; it is responsible for counterterrorist operations worldwide. The group is now referred to as the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, or DEVGRU. SEAL Team Six was founded, in part, in response to the failure of Operation Eagle Claw, the April 1980 attempt to rescue hostages in Iran.

Navy SEAL Teams, named for their sea-air-land capabilities, had been involved in clandestine operations and unconventional warfare methods since the early 1960s. By the late 1970s, SEAL Teams One and Two were already engaged in counterterrorism training. SEAL Team Two, in particular, had appointed two platoons, referred to as MOB Six, that were developing more advanced techniques. In the wake of Operation Eagle Claw, the decision was made that, like the Army's Delta Force, only one official naval counterterrorism group was needed. Thus, in October 1980, SEAL Team Six was born. (Much of MOB Six was incorporated into SEAL Team Six.)

SEAL Team Six (ST6), which was named to confuse Soviet intelligence about how many SEAL Teams existed, immediately began to train with the world's top counterterrorist forces, including Germany's Grenzschutzgruppe 9 (GSG-9), Britain's esteemed Special Boat Squadrons (SBS), and France's combat divers. By spring of 1981, ST6 was deemed ready for combat.

At that time, the administration of U.S. president Ronald Reagan had begun to step up governmental support for military special operations groups. In 1983, ST6 was deployed to the U.S. embassy in Beirut to investigate vulnerability to terrorist attack. Ninety days after ST6 reportedly infiltrated and planted “bombs” in the embassy, revealing serious security problems, an actual car bomb destroyed the building. ST6 was deployed for various other actions [Page 326]that year, including the Achille Lauro hijacking and the invasion of Grenada, which involved the evacuation of Governor Sir Paul Scoon. In 1989, ST6, along with Delta Force, helped locate and secure Manuel Noriega in Panama. A year later, ST6 returned to Panama in an unsuccessful attempt to apprehend Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. In the 1990s, the group was apparently part of an aborted plan to shoot down Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's helicopter. ST6 reportedly recovered Jean Bertrand Aristide after the coup in Haiti. In the late 1990s, 65 members of ST6 were deployed to Bosnia to aid in the hunt for war criminals.

U.S. sailors and Marines of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit aboard their hovercraft returning from Afghanistan to the ships of their amphibious group, January 23, 2002

U.S. Department of Defense photograph by USN Chief Photographer's Mate Johnny Bivera [sic].

By the mid-1990s, ST6 was disbanded; U.S. Navy commander Richard Marcinko, founder of ST6, had been convicted of conspiracy. After Marcinko departed, ST6 became the Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU). (For a short time, the group was called MARESFAC.)

Most information about DEVGRU is classified, though the group is thought to have roughly 200 operators, with an additional support staff of 200 to 300. The base, in Dam Neck, Virginia, includes a $25-million armor-plated “kill house,” where much of the close-quarter battle training is conducted. DEVGRU is part of the Joint Special Operations Command and works with other counter-terrorism units, such as Army's Delta Force and the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment.