You know, I have to admit, such a thing never even crossed my mind. Someone should run this by Travis McGee. And he could probably peel back the onion better than anyone else here.
Hell Seymore Hersh has a theory that Osama was captured early on… and the “kill” was when we finally decided to execute him. Not my theory but he has actually out out a book to that effect.
See 37.
Way back in time, SEALs did NOT get tattoos, for example. If you already had an USN anchor tat on your arm, okay. But NO MORE.
Why? They were a covert/clandestine group. We did not have name tags sewn on our camo uniforms. Tats were just blowing your cover. Okay, I have an old USN anchor tat? Okay, I used to be in the Navy. That was IT.
NOBODY wrote books about their VN era experiences, because the tactics were so easy to defeat if you understood them. It would be like a ninja writing a book, “Ten Rules of Ninjas, and How To Catch and Kill Them in the Act.”
It was just...not...done. PERIOD.
Somewhere it got off the tracks. Now, sleeve tats are the norm. And guys get into NavSpecWar PLANNING how to profit off it. And if giving away the trade secrets = $$$, but might ruin future missions and get SEALs killed, WHO CARES??
R. O. fits into that category, BIG TIME.