<p>Ok I’ll bite… </p>
<p>I think it would be reasonable to say that an Academy grad should be better prepared to deal with a situation such as you describe based the on level of training and requirements to make decisions under stressful situations. They are also have demands placed on them that in some cases can only be resolved by prioritization of choices, they have to be prepared to let something’s go in order to succeed at others. </p>
<p>This scenario would be a very difficult one for even the most seasoned and well-trained of officers, Academy grad or not. It requires them to consider compromising or trading between two very fundamental aspects of who and what they are. They are soldiers on a mission now put in a position to choose between the potential success of that mission and perhaps their own survival with the understanding that in order to secure the success of their mission they may have to compromise a most basic ethical code of conduct. </p>
<p>One thing I hope we all keep in mind is at their level of training they are told and I’m sure believe they can adapt and overcome to most any circumstance or scenario. I don’t think you can do the jobs they are called upon to do without that feeling at some level. Releasing the civilians that they stumbled upon may indeed result in an “almost guarantee of death”, but pulling out your sidearm and pulling the trigger with the muzzle against the head of those civilians is an absolute guarantee of death. Short of finding another way out, securing the civilians in some way to contain them until they had left the area, they had only two choices. If a Seal team believes in their ability to get out of the impossible even if releasing those civilians cut their odds down to 1 in a 100, making the decision not to execute those civilians and not compromise their code of conduct becomes all the more easy to do.</p>