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supposedly "Delta" is a mixed service unit, although predominately army. Or at least that's rumor I've seen. I have no info or proof to substantiate it, just some articles I've read and stuff. I'm sure there are mixed service units for specific tasks.I've often wondered why the Bin Laden raid went to the Navy instead of the Army. I knew there was an Admiral in charge at the time so I figured that was why. Sounds like it just came down to personal preference as I'm sure either branch could have gotten it done just as easily.
Otherwise, I wonder why they didn't mix teams and go in with an Army/Navy unit? I guess that'd be overkill and unnecessary, but at the same time, mixed units have been known to take down badguys before, so it makes you wonder why they didn't do that for this too?
The cultures make up a big part of it, in the Navy you basically have the SEALS which are anomalies in the Navy, everyone else basically has a career that revolves around ships and aviation then you have this one group that stands alone not to disparage them but basically the SEALS are a bunch of guys doing what the Marines really should be doing. In the army the spec ops community went from being viewed with suspicion and distrust as "stand alone" groups treated like cowboys to being more integrated into regular operations, the whole story of how SF began and was eventually approved to wear the green beret is a great story of that. The Marines have always had the strangest and in some ways most practical view and approach to special operations, they just treated it like special training for a special mission(s) so basically once you are done as a Force recon Marine you are integrated back into the corps as a whole, the army went from treating spec ops people with contempt (There was a time when if you were SF as an officer you were pretty much resolved to the fact you weren't rising above Colonial) to now being a requirement for higher advancement like chief of staff or Joint chief.
The truth is the Bin Laden raid wasn't anything special from the trigger puller standpoint, what made it special was being so far into potentially hostile territory with minimum support. From the insertion standpoint it was some very good flying and from all the accounts I've read and watched even from the SEALS the army helo pilots were very impressive. So from that standpoint it was Army night stalkers transporting Navy SEALS We also don't really know if there were other elements mixed in from other services. It's very common for air force PJs or CAS to be mixed in with Ranger and SF groups, I'd be surprised if the SEALS didn't sometimes have the same thing, especially since our military has become more reliant on spec ops there's going to be some overlap and mixed personnel due to the limited number of available people to do the work.