[sperry]

I think the biggest issue was that the Navy's best shot was simply to out wait the pirates. The pirates were in a small boat, surrounded, injured (the kid that turned himself in had been stabbed in the hand apparently), cut off from resupply (only getting the food that the Navy gave them), etc. Hell, the Navy was even towing their boat when the sniping went down.

So really, the Navy had nearly all the cards in the waiting game. The only thing they couldn't control, and the biggest risk to playing the waiting game, was if the stress they were putting on the pirates might cause the bad guys to essentially commit suicide by killing the captain out of frustration. And that's what the snipers were for... It was basically dumb luck that when shit went down, all 3 of the pirates were exposed for the shot. But it was years of training that allowed the SEALs to capitalize on that dumb luck.