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Navy SEAL candidates during Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training in Coronado, California, January 23, 2018. US (Photo by Abe McNatt, U.S. Navy)
Recently, Rear Adm. H. Wyman Howard III, the top SEAL officer and a former commander of SEAL Team Six, testified in Congress and highlighted Naval Special Warfare Command’s strategic shift from counterterrorism operations to great-power competition against near-peer competitors, such as Russia and China.
A Sea Change
SEAL Qualification Training Class 336 at their graduation ceremony, April 15, 2020. (Photo by MCS 1st Class Anthony W. Walker/U.S. Navy)
Following his testimony, Howard told the Associated Press that Naval Special Warfare Command is looking to slash 30 percent of its SEAL platoons but increase the number of operators in each of the remaining platoons.
US Navy SEALs are training to fight on land and water in a strategic location near Russia msn.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from msn.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Chinese Navy Special Forces, or “Jiaolong Commando,” repel onto a ship during an exercise. (CGTN/Twitter)
Since the early 2000s, the PLA has undergone a drastic modernization and professionalization process, transitioning from a mainly conscript force to a smaller, mostly volunteer military, though conscription remains as a policy.
The new force’s main aim is to fight short wars against regional adversaries while having a technological advantage.
Chinese special-operations units, and the PLA as a whole, have gained from that modernization and learned from the example provided by Western special operations units over the past 60 years, but Chinese forces are still untested in combat.