The United States Navy Sea, Air, and Land (SEAL) Teams, commonly known as Navy SEALs, are

the U.S.
Navy's primary special operations force and a component of the Naval Special Warfare Command.
Among the SEALs' main functions are conducting small-unit special operation missions in maritime,
jungle, urban, arctic, mountainous, and desert environments. SEALs are typically ordered to capture or
kill high-level targets, or to gather intelligence behind enemy lines.[7] SEAL team personnel are hand
selected, highly trained, and possess a high degree of proficiency in direct action (DA), and special
reconnaissance (SR), among other tasks like sabotage, demolition, intelligence gathering, and hydro-
graphic reconnaissance, training, and advising friendly militaries or other forces.[8]

Depending on the availability of platforms, threat level, and environment, different methods can be used
for the insertion and extraction of SEALs into a target location. This could include nuclear-powered cruise
missile submarines equipped with dry deck shelters, SDV submarines, surface vessels, surface swimming,
or other vehicles.

All active SEALs are members of the U.S. Navy.[12] The CIA's highly secretive and elite Special Operations
Group (SOG) recruits operators from SEAL Teams,[13] with joint operations going back to the MACV-SOG
during the Vietnam War.[14] This cooperation still exists today, as evidenced by military operations in
Iraq and Afghanistan.[15][16]