Michael Thornton Interview (page: 2 / 9) Medal of Honor	Print Interview

Mike Thornton had decided in advance that he was going into the Navy. Were you going to let the draft board decide for you?

Thomas Norris: No. I had set my goal. If I had to go in, I wanted to fly airplanes, and I wanted to fly for the Navy. I wanted to fly off the carriers. I thought that was the neatest thing going. I had never even been in an airplane but I used to go out to the airport to watch the planes come in and take off. I had no opportunity to get into one but I was fascinated by airplanes and I even knew what plane I wanted to fly.

You had to take a written examination in order to become a pilot and join a flight officers program, which I passed. Then you had to take a physical examination and part of the physical examination was an eye exam. Well, I couldn't pass the eye exam, which was very upsetting to me because I had set a goal. This is what I wanted to do and now they're telling me, "Sorry, you're not going to be able to do it because you can't pass this exam."

So I got an ophthalmologist and worked on my vision. I had problems with depth perception. Not as bad as I have now but I did have a problem with it then, and I had it corrected to the point where I could pass the eye exam with the ophthalmologist but I couldn't pass it for the military. I went to Andrews Air Force Base, tried to pass it there, could not. I went to Quantico Marine Corps Base where their medical facility was, trying to pass it there, could not. And I went to the Naval Hospital, Bethesda, and tried to pass it there, could not.

I had a very close friend who had gone through the Navy flight program and was now an instructor. I talked to him and he said, "Tom, if you really want to do this, go in as a Naval Flight Officer, NFO." It's the back seater, the navigator for the program. "When you get down to Pensacola, take the eye exam. I know you'll pass it."

So that's what I did. I took a chance because I wanted to fly. I did what he said. I went to Pensacola. You go into indoctrination training and you're under the control of Marines, which is an eye opener for anybody. Marine drill instructors is a totally different experience than I'd ever before. Talk about discipline! The first thing they do is take you in for your physical examination. They lined us all up and off we went to the medical facility.

I'm standing in line behind all these other students and they're holding up this little box that has three sticks on it and we have to tell them which one's forward or which one's back. I'm listening to the kids in front of me and they're all rattling off the same thing so I sat there and I rattled off the same thing. I don't know whether I saw it or not. But I asked the guy how I did and he gave me a thumbs up and I went a mile high! You couldn't hurt me the rest of that day no matter what, I passed that exam. So to me that was just the greatest thing.

To make a long story short, they didn't accept that. I had to go in for a full eye exam with a naval ophthalmologist. To this day I don't know whether I passed that exam or not. They dilated my eyes. I had to sit there for a long time waiting for that to take effect and I was talking to this doctor. He was a lieutenant commander, I guess, and I'm just a young kid. I'm not even commissioned yet --I'm just a student. I think he took a liking to me. To this day I don't know whether I passed that exam or not, but he passed me.

I was transferred into the pilot program and I went through a great deal of the training, but finally my depth perception caught up to me. It's a little bit different to try and land on a runway that doesn't move than it is to land on a carrier deck. So I was washed out of the program. I had never failed in something that I wanted to do, and I was devastated.

So I was faced with a commitment to the Navy, and I didn't particularly want to go aboard a ship. I had read in Reader's Digest an article about the Navy SEAL teams.

Mr. Thornton, how did you come to know about the program?

Michael Thornton: I heard about the program when I started training. I didn't know anything about it. Everybody said, "Man, you want to be a SEAL." I said, "No, I want to be a Navy frogman." "No, no, you want to be a SEAL." So you went through training and at every step you heard more and more about SEAL team. Some of the instructors like Vince Olivera had been in the SEAL team. Some of the instructors had been in the SEAL team, and these guys looked like mountains of steel.

And as I got farther into it, they're talking. "Yeah, you still do the diving. Yeah, you still do the parachute jumping, but in the SEAL you do a lot more land operations." And that kind of clicked. That's more what I was brought up with, playing in the woods. They're talking about Vietnam, the jungles, and I said, "That sounds more exciting."

What were they looking for?

Michael Thornton: I really don't know. I guess everybody has a little bit of leadership. I was never afraid to step out and make a decision. It might have been the wrong decision. As Tommy knows, I'm not afraid to tell somebody if I think they're wrong, as long as I know that I'm right. I would always try to make sure that I was right and then I'd voice my opinion.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. Your first eight weeks of training you go through a lot of physical -- I mean, harassing, harassing, harassing, harassment. Just everybody telling you you're worthless and you're not this. Doing push-ups, calisthenics, running. I mean, you don't go anywhere. You run everywhere, you know. You're the lowest animal in the world, you know, and you're right underneath a cockroach, you know, as far as they're -- and that's the way they treated you.

[ Key to Success ] Preparation

Why did they do that? What were they trying to bring out?

Michael Thornton: They grew you to be physically strong, but they want to see how mentally strong you would be and that's the whole thing. What type of mental pressures can you take when you are in combat getting shot at? How are you going to accept mental strain when you see your buddy shot. When you get hit yourself, how do you react and how do you focus? Well, you still focus on the inner you. You've got to use that fear in a positive way. You focus that fear towards the objective. The objective is to get the enemy before the enemy gets you.

Thomas Norris: What they're looking for is the character and the drive of a person that they're putting through training. They've got a lot of kids. They've got big kids, football players, muscular people and they've got little people like I am. But they're looking for the heart and the determination and a mind set that says, "I'm not going to give up. I'm going to push beyond what I think I can do because I need to do that." They want to see you push 110-120 percent beyond what you think you can do and they drive you to that. They can break anybody. Somewhere in training they're probably going to pick on you and it's going to be your day.

Training is tough for everybody always. It's a strenuous program. It's tough on your mind. It's tough on your body. But what they're looking for is those folks that aren't going to give up, those folks that are going to keep driving. They want to instill also as part of that drive a responsibility for team membership. You never give up your team buddy. You never give up your team. You get each person through. If one of your team members quits, you do everything you can to try and ensure that he won't, but if he does then you take up that slack and you never leave anybody behind. You're always helping each other.

They want to see that drive. They want somebody that's not going to give up. If you're going to give up, it doesn't matter how big or how strong you are. You're no use to them. They know where you're going. They know in combat you're going to be outnumbered every time and they can't have somebody there that says, "Gosh, I can't do this."

There was one instance where the naval personnel said, "You're just not passing enough people. We're putting classes through with 100 people and you're graduating 10." But they realized there was a reason we did what we did, in order to get the type of people that we needed for that program.

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