Exclusive: The Trouble with Task Unit Bruiser

Jocko Willink, a Navy SEAL officer turned author and podcaster, has threatened to sue me over this story about allegations of civilian killings by his men in Iraq.

This undated photo of an Iraqi man appears to have been captured through a SEAL sniper scope in Ramadi, Iraq, in 2006. It’s unclear why this photo was taken or what happened to the target (Source: SEAL Team Three, Charlie Platoon deployment video)

The trouble began, Marine Capt. Ryan Thornton said, with the arrival of a new group of Navy SEALs in the spring of 2006.

Thornton had deployed to Ramadi earlier that year as the executive officer of India Company, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marines. His mission, like that of many others at the time, was not only to fight al-Qaida in Iraq but also to forge fragile alliances with local sheiks—men whose loyalty was essential to any hope of restoring stability to the capital of Anbar Province.

Instead of routing out insurgents block-by-block as Coalition forces had done in Fallujah, commanders in Ramadi wanted to make the local civilian leaders allies in the fight against the terrorists in their midst.

The city of 400,000 on the banks of the Euphrates was…