A group of Navy SEALs emerged from the ink black ocean on a winter night in early 2019 and crept to a rocky shore in North Korea. They were on a top secret mission so complex and consequential that everything had to go exactly right.
The objective was to plant an electronic device that would let the United States intercept Kim Jong-un’s communications amid high-level nuclear talks with President Trump.
The mission had the potential to provide the United States a stream of valuable intelligence. But it meant putting American commandos on North Korean soil — a move that, if detected, could not only sink negotiations, but could also lead to a hostage crisis or an escalating conflict with a nuclear-armed foe. It was so risky that it required the president’s direct approval.
For the operation, the military chose SEAL Team 6’s Red Squadron — the same unit that killed Osama Bin Laden. SEALs who were more used to quick raids in places like Afghanistan and Iraq would have to survive for hours in frigid seas, slip past security forces on land and perform a precise technical installation. The SEALs rehearsed for months, aware that every move needed to be perfect.
Yet the team faced a serious limitation: It would be going in almost blind. Typically, Special Operations forces have drones overhead during a mission, streaming high-definition video of the target. Often, they can even listen in on enemy communications. In North Korea, though, any drone would be spotted. So the mission would have to rely on satellites and high-altitude spy planes that could provide only low-definition still images after a lag of several minutes.
So they spent months watching how people came and went in the area. They studied fishing patterns and chose a time when boat traffic would be minimal. The intelligence suggested that if SEALs arrived silently in the right location in the dead of a winter night, they would be unlikely to encounter anyone.
But when they reached what they thought was a deserted shore that night, wearing black wet suits and night-vision goggles, the mission swiftly unraveled. A North Korean boat appeared out of the dark. Flashlights from the bow swept over the water. Fearing that they had been spotted, the SEALs opened fire. Within seconds, everyone on the North Korean boat was dead.
Read the story to find out what happened next. The details remain classified and are being reported here for the first time. The Trump administration did not inform key members of Congress who oversee intelligence operations, before or after the mission.
The Times is disclosing it to provide the public with a fuller understanding of the risks taken by the first Trump administration during a critical period of diplomacy toward North Korea — and to provide greater transparency about the elite and secretive commando forces in U.S. Special Operations.
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