The New SEAL book, "No Easy Day."

Esprit de corps and discretion are fundamental to the SEALs. The loyalty and trust these men place in one another are hard-won and form the basis of an extremely close-knit community with bonds that last to the grave. It is unlikely that a member of such a community would write this sort of thing. Even if the writer managed to escape prosecution for publishing a tell-all book about secret missions, (He wouldn’t.) his reputation among the very small special operations fraternity would be absolutely ruined once he was found out and any fellowship with them would come to an immediate end. It is difficult to believe that any member of such a community that places loyalty and honour above their own lives would sacrifice his integrity and his ties to the SEAL community for the potential of a fast profit. You’ll soon be able to find this in the bargain bin next to the unsold copies of Justin Bieber’s biography. As the identities are kept secret whilst they are alive, my guess is that the author writing as Mark Owen was never an operator. The only way to verify his credentials is for him to go public (something he is unlikely to do) or to simply take the word of his co-author. My guess is that “Mark Owen” is actually a composite of the many operators and conventional soldiers the co-author, Kevin Maurer has interviewed and backed up by intensive research into SEAL training and tactics. To his credit, Maurer has worked as an embedded reporter with some units that have seen fierce combat and has written some fairly good military themed books. This could be an accurate account of what probably happened, but I am still a bit sceptical about why a SEAL would be directly involved in Maurer’s latest book.