Navy Seals Disciplined For Revealing Secrets As Consultants On Video Game

Hugh Pickens writes "CBS reports that seven active duty members of SEAL Team Six, best known for killing Osama bin Laden, have been disciplined for revealing secrets working as paid consultants on a video game, Medal of Honor: Warfighter. The game does not recreate the bin Laden raid, but it does portray realistic missions, such as an attack on a pirates' den in Somalia. Electronic Arts boasts that real commandos, both active duty and retired, help make its games as realistic as possible. EA says Medal of Honor Warfighter was 'written by actual U.S. Tier 1 Operators while deployed overseas,' and that it 'features a dotted line to real world events and provides players a view into globally recognized threats and situations letting them experience the action as it might have unfolded.' It is unclear what secrets members of SEAL Team Six gave away, but while serving as consultants for the game, they used classified material which had been given to them by the Navy and also violated the unwritten code that SEALs are silent warriors who shun the spotlight. 'We do not tolerate deviations from the policies that govern who we are and what we do as Sailors in the United States Navy,' says Deputy Commander of Naval Special Warfare, Rear Admiral Garry Bonelli. 'The non-judicial punishment decisions made today send a clear message throughout our Force that we are and will be held to a high standard of accountability.'"

Comments

Can't buy PR like that!

[Anonymous Coward]

And the EA PR team just shared a collective orgasm. They must already be trying different font settings to display "So real, Navy Seals were disciplined for it!" on the game cover.

I've never really understood

[IceNinjaNine]

this whole "rock star" mentality with the SEALS. If I were that good.. fucking "Jedi" good.. I'd want to remain invisible. Due to compromised identitities, I view it as a matter of time before the bad guys start putting things together and whacking the families of operators as retribution. If I were those guys I'd develop a major case of STFU and teach everybody in my family how to handle a weapon. Of course, for every Mark Owen there are probably five guys wishing he'd shut up.

A quote:

Retired Army Col. Ken Allard, a career intelligence officer, described Delta Force members as "quiet professionals. Silence is security."

Read more about it here.

Re:Good!

[dywolf]

it may seem like common sense, but that's after years of work creating it, during which some men probably died before it was figured out. Hell we make revisions to tactics after nearly every big engagement. It's called an After Action Report, and everything, every little stinking thing, is written about and analyzed.

And while it may seem common sense to us, it frequently isnt to many combatants around the world. the majority of the taliban and iraqi insurgents have no training whatsoever, and those that do have very little discipline. many many of them emply spray and pray tactics, full of bravado and give em hell, but little thought, little planning, no tactical sensibilities, etc.

Re:slap on the wrist

[Dishevel]

What they want to keep secret are the ways in which they do things.
Surprise, they like it. Confusion, they encourage it. These are things that help keep them alive.
In football you of course do not want the opposing team to know what play you are panning on doing next.
But it is also damaging to have the opposing team have your play book.
The seals were giving out pages of the Seal playbook for a fucking video game. I play games. I like em.
Really though. Giving out pages of the Seal playbook so that a fucking video game can be a little better should be punished. Heavily.