Near the Iraq border, Kuwait -- Even in a training exercise, the Seabees' Underwater Construction Team 2 sends a message.

"Death from below, Saddam," Petty Officer 2nd Class D.J. Lane of Port Hueneme wrote on the silver duct tape wrapped around a 20-pound bundle of C-4 explosives. "Hoo-Ya, Deep Sea."

The explosives, and their implications, were stuffed in a haversack and detonated about an hour later, blowing a hole the size of a hot tub in the Kuwaiti desert. The Seabees smiled.

"The adrenaline flows when it goes off," said Petty Officer 1st Class Rose Oliveros of Oxnard. "It gives you chills."

The Underwater Construction Team is the SEALS of the Seabees, a specialized diving team that can blast obstructions on both land and under water. But the team concentrates on defense, not offense. It constructs, repairs and maintains waterfront and underwater facilities for the Navy, Marines and Department of Defense.

When there's something in the way of a needed project, such as a coral reef blocking a required harbor passage, the team can blow it up.

The Seabees have about 100 underwater construction technicians, an elite team of divers who have passed rigorous academic and physical tests. The timed tests include a 500-meter swim in combination with push-ups, sit-ups, pull-ups and a run.

The Underwater Construction Team 2, now in Kuwait, is based in Port Hueneme. Its last two deployments were to the Niue Islands, a New Zealand protectorate, and the Arctic. While at the North Pole for three weeks, members made holes in blocks of ice 5 feet thick and dived through them into subzero water.

Sunday's exercise was in preparation for a possible war against Iraq. A diving team convoy drove deep into the Kuwaiti desert to explode haversack bombs and bangalore torpedoes.

In a conflict, the haversacks could be used to destroy mines both in the sand and water, Senior Chief John Green said. The bangalore could be used to blast razor wire so troops and supplies can get through, he said.

The team drove to a vast, empty area of desert and put the bombs together, gingerly handling some of the items while tearing open bricks of C-4 explosives. With the team's knowledge comes confidence, even with deadly explosives.

After the bomb construction, there were dedications. An Iraqi dissident turned U.S. government radio reporter copied Lane's anti-Saddam message onto a second haversack but wrote the message in Arabic.

Petty Officer 1st Class Alexander Semmler wrote on another bomb: "Dedicated to all ex-wives."

The bombs were connected to timed fuses cut to exact lengths. The precision is necessary to make sure the team can clear the detonation area before the bomb blows. Sunday's 6-foot-7/8-inch detonating cord gave the team exactly five minutes to evacuate a 1,393-foot area.

As they moved the bombs, Lane swatted away large, alien-looking insects and noted: "We're a long way from the Anacapa Brewing Company."

The team buried one of the haversacks and put the other on the sand. Torpedoes were placed within coiled razor wire. But the team didn't shut off the engine of its all-terrain Humvee.

"We jump in the vehicle and get out of Dodge," Semmler explained. "If the vehicle fails, you get out and run."

After the fuses were ignited, the team drove to a sand berm. Semmler shouted, "Silence on the range."

And then the countdown: "five, four, three, two, one."

There was a boom with percussion that could be felt a quarter-mile away, an orange flash and a huge puff of brownish smoke that drifted and dissipated into the blue sky. The team waited five minutes before inspecting the damage.

The hole created by the buried haversack was a crater, and the torpedo demolished the razor wire, with tiny pieces of flattened metal spread over 200 yards. Yet the bones of a long-dead camel sat undisturbed between the blast sites.

"Damn, we're good," crowed Semmler. "It accomplished the mission about 100 times better than we needed."