Inside the Team Room: The Green Berets

Robin Sage Is About Making Rapport or Failing

“Free Pineland!” This refrain will echo through the mountains of North Carolina in the next few weeks. Yes, Robin Sage is set to begin this weekend on the 27th, but in reality it has begun long ago for the prospective Special Forces candidates who are in the final phase in their training that frequently takes more than a year before they parachute into the fictional country of Pineland for the premiere Unconventional Warfare (UW) exercise in the military, Robin Sage.

The country of Pineland encompasses 15 counties in North Carolina including Alamance, Anson, Cabarrus, Chatham, Davidson, Guilford, Hoke, Montgomery, Moore, Randolph, Richmond, Rowan, Scotland, Stanly and Union counties.

This unique unconventional-warfare or UW, training environment allows instructors to stress the candidates’ student A-Teams, assessing their ability to think on their feet and accomplish their team’s assigned missions. The political instability of the area, coupled with working alongside guerrillas who may act (and frequently do) outside of the rules of warfare while engaged in open warfare will put the teams into frequently faced “real-world” situations.

Robin Sage, derives its name from the town of Robbins, N.C., a central area of operations for the exercise, and former Army Colonel Jerry Sage, a World War II veteran and an Office of Strategic Services, or OSS officer who taught unconventional-warfare tactics. Steve McQueen’s character Hilts in the film “The Great Escape” was based off Sage. Sage was an OSS operative, the forerunner of today’s Green Berets.

Normally the team will work with not only the guerrillas, the armed band of the resistance but the auxiliary and the underground, which are key components to the resistance and are both very valuable tools for the prospective SF soldiers.

Special Forces’ bread and butter is the working with and building rapport with indigenous forces. Nearly every other mission that SF is tasked with will have that as a key component. Therefore, language and cross-cultural communications are very important. Robin Sage is the culmination of the entire Special Forces Qualification Course as it prepares the prospective Special Forces operator for a variety of missions and most importantly how to work with indigenous forces.

But herein lies the rub, if you can’t make rapport with guerrillas in Robin Sage, you will not pass go, you will not collect $200, and you will fail this station. It isn’t easy. The soldiers acting as guerrillas are briefed to avoid interaction with the SF students at first and to act distrustful until they prove themselves.

And who is the key component in deciding how and when the team wins over the guerrillas? The “G-Chief” or guerrilla chief. The guerrillas will take their cues from the G-Chief, a retired SF operator who will be a difficult guy to win over, as one would be in the real world. He’s usually a retired and in some cases an active duty SF team sergeant. So, don’t think for a second, you’re going to snow him with some double-talk. If the G-Chief asks you a question, rest assured, he already knows the answer. So choose your words carefully.

This scenario isn’t here for harassment or just to make things harder. The real world is much harder and as an SF soldier, you will find yourself in many of these same types of situations. And there won’t be anyone there to help. If you can’t do it, your mission is done. Of course, the events are sequenced faster than they would be in the real world because of time constraints in the course. But this is a very challenging part of the exercise and it can be a deal breaker for some.

The scenario remains basically the same as it always has, however, the SWC (Special Warfare Center) cadre will tailor to closer fit current events and scenarios that the troops will face in the real world.

The former government of Pineland was a friendly one to the United States. Following a coup that deposed the legitimate government, the SF students work with an eclectic mix of role players and soft skill MOS soldiers to raise and train a guerrilla force that will fight the enemy government troops and attempt to restore the true Pineland government. They’ll teach them the basics of patrolling, raids and ambushes, communications, and medical training.

The enemy soldiers or OPFOR (Opposing Forces) for the exercise are generally members of the 82nd Airborne Division from Ft. Bragg. They provide a good test for the SF candidates to take on. They’re well trained and motivated to make things as interesting as possible. They love to make things tough on SF students..

Other units from Bragg supply the soldiers for the guerrilla force or “G-Force” that the teams will work with. They are frequently what I referred to earlier as soft-skill MOS’ or non-tactical soldiers. Finance clerks, typists, truck drivers, mechanics etc.

They know their own jobs extremely well but as for sleeping on the ground under a poncho hooch, going on an ambush or a raid, doing a recon of a target and moving as a unit tactically thru the Uwharrie Forest, especially at night…not so much. That’s the built-in factor that makes it more difficult. SWC isn’t going to give the student A-Teams a platoon plus of hard-charging airborne infantry types from the Ranger Bn. as a G-Force.

The students are formed into ODAs (Operations Detachment Alpha, popularly known as A-Teams) – along with similar lines with weapons, engineers, medics and communications sergeants as well as a Team sergeant and an Operations and Intelligence Sergeant to real Special Forces A-Teams. Depending on the number of students in the class, the candidate’s detachments may have 3-4 rather than two officers and up to 15 enlisted men.

During their final instruction in Unconventional Warfare prior to infiltration of Pineland, the SF candidates will study guerrilla warfare, sabotage, intelligence, and subversion. The detachment enters “isolation” which is a planning and preparation phase. They conduct mission analysis and plan their infiltration, linkup plan, and subsequent activities.

The isolation facility is locked up tight. No one is allowed in or out without being mission cleared during isolation. The team may be allowed some brief training time out of the facility but it will be strictly controlled. At the end of isolation, the team presents a brief back to the command element to show that they’re ready to complete the mission. It is in no way like the Operations Orders given by conventional units prior to an operation as each team member will take part.

The teams will infiltrate the denied area of Pineland usually by an airborne operation, but sometimes by helicopter or truck movement if the weather does not cooperate. After infiltration, there is always a long foot movement over rough terrain to test navigational skills and moving under a heavy load. The team will have to move hard and fast to make the time arranged to contact the guerrilla band.

Using their contact plan developed while in isolation, the students must affect linkup with the G-Force. Once that has been accomplished, they proceed to establish rapport with the guerrilla band leaders that we referenced above, which was referenced above.

The student A-Teams must assess the overall security of the operational area and the guerilla basecamp, assess the training and support requirements of the resistance, and then… usually, after a brief and awkward ceremony welcoming them to the resistance, proceed with training and employment of the resistance group.

The training requirements are often challenging. In a real-world resistance movement, the guerrillas would no doubt be hardened and used to living on the ground. The guerrillas assigned to the exercise usually have to be taught much of the basics that field soldiers take for granted. Many have never carried a rucksack other than a time or two in basic training. This is a great time to build real rapport with the G-Force. Foot stomp here…. For you aspiring candidates, are you getting the picture here?

In my experience, most of our 45-man G-Force came from one unit, and all were clerk typists, finance clerks and similar MOS’. But their leaders bought in right away, and although were as green and as completely out of their element as their young soldiers, became very willing and motivated participants. It made our job much easier and more enjoyable. One of the young men, had his eyes opened, he eventually re-enlisted to get reclassified and go thru SF. Some of the other student detachments won’t be so fortunate.

As the training progresses with the guerrillas, they’ll be tasked with a few soft DA (Direct Action) targets. Raids, ambushes, and some reconnaissance. The missions get harder as the timing gets accelerated. There will frequently be a couple of missions on-going at any given time. Each of the students will rotate through a leadership position of the team and will be evaluated under the stress of leading a half-trained guerrilla band.

Upon completion of Robin Sage, the students give back to the communities in the area by doing a day of Civic Action work. It may be as simple as cutting and stacking firewood for some of the families, adding a porch or in our case, repairing a roof as well as a host of other activities. Those small gestures of goodwill make for the continuing work the SF community has in the area such a success.

Everything the SF candidates face in Robin Sage will be just the tip of the iceberg that they’ll face in the real world. Special Forces is the premiere UW fighting force in the world. The lessons the soldiers are learning go all the way back to the hard-earned and difficult days of WWII and the OSS. But the first most important step in the Robin Sage UW exercise is the ability to build rapport. Just this week, the film of the 5th SFG “Horse Soldiers” 12 Strong was released in theaters. Watch and get just a glimpse of what you’re facing when linking up with a dedicated guerrilla force. You can be the most badass dude in the world, but if you can’t build rapport, you’ll be a badass somewhere other than SF.

Upon successful completion of Robin Sage, it is back to Ft. Bragg where they’ll join the regiment and don the Green Beret for the first time. And then the real training begins.

Free Pineland. DOL

Photo courtesy US Army

Can Special Forces Teach Everything?… Pretty Darned Near

As a member of a Special Operations unit, you can be tasked with damned near anything and probably will. The best indicator of having a skill is the fact that you can teach it to others.

As we wrote here some time ago, “Teaching is An Art in Special Forces”, and some of the best SF NCOs also happen to be the best instructors you’ll find anywhere. As a prospective Special Operations candidate, know that if you graduate, you’ll have to be prepared to teach almost anything to anyone while you’re deployed overseas.

And much of it can be MOS immaterial. Just because you are a Heavy Weapons man on a team, doesn’t mean that you can’t or won’t be assigned to teach about anything under the sun.

In Special Forces, we can and frequently do conduct operations that might not have much to do with your current operation but help United States government assets in fostering goodwill of the host nation thru a variety of subtasks that often center around civic action projects.

While teaching a 6-month counter-narcotics course in a jungle camp in Bolivia, our team was supposed to get a two-week break at Christmas, as the host nation forces would be given block leave to celebrate the holiday in the middle of our course. We were slotted to go back to Panama, enjoy some beach time and head back.

But the Ambassador came calling, he got roped into rebuilding a school that taught elementary students early in the morning, high school in the afternoon and adult education at night. It was completely falling in and the bathrooms were broken with raw sewage on the floors.

The US government thru USAID had about a quarter of the funds to rebuild. We were asked to help. No Christmas leave on the beach after all. The only way we could make it work was to get a ton of labor from the citizens who would volunteer their time. And each of the team guys became a construction foreman, teaching the locals how to do their own small piece of the pie. It got finished under the time limit and under budget. Most had no experience doing it but it got done and done well.

Another time, my partner and I got tasked with teaching basic combat shooting to the wives of the MILGP personnel. There were threats to U.S. personnel in-country and the women had asked for classes to teach them how to defend themselves in the event they were forced to use a weapon to defend themselves or their children.

The only two stipulations from the women were that we treat them like anyone other troops we’d train and that their husbands stay away. We borrowed the combat pistol range in the city and took them for a few days with a ton of range time. The ladies all that telltale callous on their right thumb from loading so many pistol magazines.

Despite their stipulation, we taught them quite differently than we would have our normal host nation troops but the women caught on extremely fast and their shot groups got tighter and tighter. We even had time to teach them double-tapping their targets. At the end of our training, the husbands from the MILGP and the Military Attache’s Offices came out to see the women show off a bit. They took great delight in double-tapping their targets. Thankfully, no one, in our time there, ever had to utilize the training we conducted.

One of the most fun (for us) of our pop-up training activities was teaching a door gunner course for the helicopter machine gunners. Most of them weren’t trained that well and they had little to no refresher training until the operations called for them to do it for real.

We were asked if we were familiar with this, and answered: “of course we are.” We studied up and got a bird and a couple of M-60s for our own train up prior to the class.

We practiced it and had a blast burning up copious amounts of ammo on our own until it came time to teach the class. It lasted all of one day when the host nation shut it down (temporarily) because they needed all hands on deck for a live operation. We’re still waiting for them to kick back in for the training class but we had a blast at least.

One of the most challenging was an all-classroom course. Our Bolivian counterparts had staff officers assigned to all of the top positions, but in reality, never functioned as a staff would in the United States. Our counterpart, a Major in the Bolivian military asked for our assistance in teaching a staff course.

The Army Attache stated (and correctly so) that they needed a CGSC (Command and General Staff Officers’ Course) graduate to teach it. We were firmly in agreement with him there. But the problem was, not many SF NCOs or Warrant Officers have been to CGSC. And of course, with just the two of us there, we were stuck. Would he like to teach it? Of course not.

So we got as much material from the old School of the Americas that we could and taught a senior staff course. They were even surprised at who was teaching it. So while I never attended CGSC…I can say I taught it…kind of.

Anyway, old anecdotes aside, you’ll find your career in Special Operations a very different type of experience from anything you’ll ever encounter anywhere else. Your duties and responsibilities will far outdistance your rank in the U.S. military. It is par for the course.

When hit with a subject that you don’t have much experience with, do the research, study and get it done. Your biggest asset is the ability to sell your expertise to our host nation forces and get them to trust that you’ll get it done.

Every day on nearly every mission can be a very different set of circumstances that can be a rewarding and challenging experience. So, back to the title, “Can Special Forces Teach Everything?”… The short answer is, ABSOLUTELY.

Photo: US Army

Green Beret/Delta Force Operator on Submarine Op with SEALs

If any of our readers of SpecialOperations.com, don’t know who George Hand is or read him on the pages of NEWSREP, you are definitely missing out. George, or Geo as he’s known to the rest of us mere mortals is a badass of epic proportions. How badass is Geo? He’s so badass that he doesn’t feel the need to tell you how badass he is.

Geo will be the first to tell you he isn’t but the people that send HIM Christmas cards every year gives it away. Geo is a natural storyteller whose tales of Delta Selection are outstanding. He has a knack with making the reader feel like he’s right there along with him in all of the deployments that he’s shared with us.

His latest take is a great story of when Geo was in one of the Special Forces groups before going to Delta and getting the opportunity to do a submarine lockout with the Navy SEALs. Always done with a lot of humor, mostly the self-deprecating kind, this is a story not to be missed…Enjoy.

How does a man who is not a Navy SEAL manage to tag along with a SEAL team for a week of submarine operations? Mostly dumb luck is my sterling response. I was a combat diver assigned to a Green Beret A-Team when my boss caught me in his crosshairs with an invitation from West Coast SEAL Team Five to join them for a week of submarine underway operations.

At that point my Green Beret team had only ever done extensive dry dock-side trunk operations—that is, we practiced submarine escape trunk operations but only on boats moored in port. None of us had ever been truly underway at sea. This, as I look back on my career, was the opportunity of a lifetime, and when opportunity knocked I always opened the door. “Never turn anything down but your shirt collar” was a personal policy of mine.

I reported to the SEAL team at NAB Coronado, California. I was there a day early and elected to hang out with them for a full day of their typical shore duty, to include their morning physical training session. I would have to invent a new language to describe how brutal that workout was, for I can’t find words in English to suit it. (Although the German words unglaublich schrecklichkeit fit nicely.)

The ground calisthenics was a real punishment, but the run in the sand of Coronado’s beaches was a great thrill in spite of the constant, ear-splitting sonic booms rendered by the speed of the pace. Much to my personal pride, I managed to remain firmly in the center of the pack—by no means up front where the gazelles lock horns.

After breakfast, lockers filled with Heckler and Koch MP5 submachine guns and SIG Sauer P-226 semi-auto pistols were brought out for cleaning. They had all been exposed to seawater and sand the night before. I was horrified that the weapons had been left for so many hours exposed to salt water, but I was in Rome, so I shut my big fat Roman pie hole and began cleaning.

“Dude, you like, totally don’t have to do this, dude,” one of the SEALs offered in a dude sandwich.

“Dude, I’m like, totally fine with it, dude,” I returned as I broke down a gat. The salty brethren of ST-5 seemed to take a liking to me for helping with weapons cleaning, a detested task in special operations once you have done it 5,000 times.

They even chatted with me. Granted, most of it I didn’t understand, though I did nod often with enthusiasm, throwing in my own occasional “dude.” We cleaned and duded the rest of the afternoon, the scurvy bilge rats “cleaning” on average two to three weapons for everyone I cleaned. I was wearing my non-Roman on my sleeve.

We chugged for a day and a night to get to our rendezvous with our boat, the venerable Sturgeon-class Fast-Attack USS Hawkbill (SSN-666). The number 666 was ominous enough, coupled with the fact that the night before we left I had watched “Das Boot,” a movie about the perils of a Nazi U-Boat during WWII. Yep, I could kick myself in the balls with the best of them.

Onboard the Hawkbill we schlepped metric tons of gear to the torpedo room where we slept and operated for the next week. It was crowded…my God, it was so crowded. It was so crowded in there you had to step outside of the torpedo room just to say, “It’s crowded in there!” And nudity—I have never seen such nudity in my life. The two pasty-faced torpedo room hands from the boat didn’t help, either, sharing their torpedo room humor as I passed by:

“Wow, Chucky…these SEAL fellows got some nice asses,” one of them began with a wry grin.

“I’m not a SEAL; I’m an Army Green Beret!” I protested, “But…thanks…man….”

The climb up to the escape trunk was nuts. We had to stepladder our way up three levels of bunk beds with sailors sleeping in them to get to the escape hatch. There are only enough bunks for roughly half of the crew on a submarine, so half of the crew works while the other half sleeps, a practice called hot-bunking. We pipe-hitters slept on torpedoes under the pining gaze of the pasty-faced torpedo hands.

The trunk was crowded…my God, it was so crowded. At least I thought ahead enough to say, “It’s crowded” before I got in there. Thankfully, everyone was fully-clothed, which was of personal comfort to me. I mean, I appreciate a nice physique as much as the next person, just not from less than two millimeters away.

The trunk was flooded with seawater to just below the level of our noses. One by one we took deep breaths, submerged to pass through the escape hatch, and ascended to the sea surface. At the surface was a small inflatable boat tethered to the submarine. We floated in the water, clinging to the inflatable. I reveled in the glory of the view of the massive boat some 50 feet below us. It was majestic and imposing; I couldn’t seem to take my eyes off of it.

Suddenly an object came into view. One of the divers’ weight belts had come loose and it sank toward the boat. It was a wide nylon strap with a quick-release buckle and lead weights attached. “Bummer,” I thought for the man; it would be difficult for him to sink back to the escape hatch.

I shook my head at the glaring fact that the diver’s dive knife and emergency smoke/flare was attached to the belt. That was a safety violation, as nothing is allowed to be attached to the weight belt: It is the first piece of gear that is to be jettisoned in the event of an emergency. Now the diver had lost his most important emergency equipment to boot—his dive knife and signaling device.

The ensemble struck the hull of the boat. Oh, the captain of the ship was not happy about that and might scrub our dive operations for the day. Ship captains already hated this sort of lock-in/lock-out maneuver because a procedural error could, no shit, sink a boat. The belt scraped along as it slowly slipped down the curved contour of the sub until it fell away to Davy Jone’s Locker.

I knew the poor brother would get a double helping of grief because he had committed a grand blunder and because he had done it in front of an Army puke. I took it with a grain of salt because, even though the team was driven by seasoned leadership, it was jammed with fresh recruits from the most recent graduation of the Navy SEAL’s BUD/S class—junior operators. That element would manifest itself again in mere moments.

All the men were taken back down to the escape trunk one at a time by a safety diver with a twin breathing hose (regulator) attached to SCUBA tanks. He could breathe from one and his passenger could breathe from the other. Our procedure called for each man entering the trunk to hold a regulator outside of the trunk for the next diver to transition to before he crowded into the trunk.

The safety diver passed me the regulator, which I clenched in my teeth. I saw that a hook had come undone on my life vest and struggled to redo it. Without giving a signal to submerge, the safety diver dove down toward the trunk. As both my hands were busy hooking my vest, I was dragged to the trunk by the regulator clasped in my teeth, my ears threatening to explode from the inability to equalize sinus pressure.

Again, without a signal, the diver pulled the regulator from my mouth and left. I was beginning to drift a little south of pleased by now, and furthermore, the last diver had failed to hold out a regulator of the ship’s air for me to breathe. I peered into the hatch to see a forest of thrashing legs. I couldn’t hold my breath any longer and bulldozed my way into the trunk.

When I broke into the air bubble there was loud panicked screaming from the men. The water line had risen too high and the trunk operator’s attempt to blow the water level back down revealed that the air blow pipe was submerged and creating a hurricane of wind, noise, and water spray in the small air space that remained.

To read the complete article, click here:

Photo of SEAL Team 5: US Navy

SFAS Wasn’t All Serious, Some Funny Cadre Anecdotes

When we think about Special Forces Selection and Assessment (SFAS), nothing fun, funny or silly immediately comes to mind. You’ll hear about the horror stories of the ruck marches, the soft sand of nearly every Camp Mackall firebreak, the Star land navigation course and the various conveyances constructed during Team Week.

It is known more for “Embracing the Suck” than it is for the levity of it all. And yet, while a cadre member, certain things stood out that made it very difficult to keep a straight face. I was talking to an old friend not too long ago and we began to talk about some of the crazy stuff that went on out there and contrary to popular belief, the cadre at SFAS in fact, DO have a sense of humor…sometimes.

I have a few funny anecdotes from those days of yore that some of you may find amusing. And many of you will have your own in the future. If so, please share.

Fun With the Sand Man:

Ask anybody who has successfully finished SFAS and they’ll have their own horror stories of the “Sand Man” event during Team Week. The way it worked back then was that the candidate team would ruck to a location where they’d be given the task of evacuating two friendly pilot casualties to friendly lines.

The students would be given several large poles, lashings, and a hammock to be used as a litter. The two “pilots” were nothing more than Nomex flight suits that were filled with sandbags. The weight of each litter had to be well over 300 pounds. Plus, each of the candidates had to carry their rucksacks which had to weigh 45 pounds dry, which meant without food or water.

The candidates were instructed to treat the casualties as you would an actual casualty. That meant, if you were to set the litter down, it had to be eased down and not dropped.

While walking with one group, I was right next to the second litter that one team was carrying. One candidate, audibly said, “F**k this!” and dropped his corner of the litter. Of course, the snowball effect happened immediately. On the corner just in front of the candidate who dropped it, the pole slid off that candidate’s shoulders and slammed into his foot with the force of a sledgehammer.

Candidate #2 yelped in pain and after hopping around for a few seconds, was walking in small circles trying to not show that he was in agony. Of course as a cadre member, while the urge to call Candidate #1 a two-pronged word of which buddy is the first, we’re expected to maintain our composure. “Candidate, would you like to see the medic”, I asked? He shook his head no. “Would like time to take off your boot and treat your foot yourself?” Again he shook his head, obviously thinking that if he took his boot off, it might never get back on. Like we were supposed to, my next question was also by the book, “Do you feel you can continue to train, candidate?” (Our major would have been proud), And he nodded without saying anything. I instructed the team leader to give the team a break in the shade off the dirt road, while I arranged a pickup for Candidate #1 who was done. He quit.

The white pickup arrived with one of our medics, Candidate #1 was unceremoniously put in the back and forgotten. Our medic talked to Candidate #2 who already had a drop or two of blood seeping from his boot. “See me when you get back tonight, candidate,” he said. Again, with a nod. “Yes sergeant,” was all he said. A few moments later the team picked up and moved out. The student team leader had two guys who weren’t under a “Sandman” and they gave Candidate #2 a break first and allowed him to try to get his feet back under him.

I slid up next to him and after a few moments, I asked him if he was good to go. He nodded yes again, and finally said, “I was afraid if I opened my mouth a few minutes ago, the only thing that would’ve come out was me squealing like a little bitch.” And then he looked at me in horror as if he said something wrong. I tried unsuccessfully to stifle a smile and just shook my head.

Another class with the Sandman stumbled in the Camp Mackall soft sand and they lost their litter. One candidate had the pole whack the hell out of the back of his head. He was out on his feet, but rather than go down and get his bearings, he tried to remain upright and teetered-tottered every which way. He began to stumble toward the second team.

Afraid of another group going down, I tried to lurch forward and grab ahold of him, but his teetering took on a life of its own and we looked like two drunken sailors trying to hold on to a telephone pole. One of the candidates, speaking to his classmate said, “Do you two dance together all the time.” That time everyone laughed…including me.

A few moments later, and we back on the trail, none the worse for wear. And those candidates all were later selected by the way, other than the first one.

Radio GaGa…:

All of our cadre members had radios that were to be on and monitored at all times. Some guys like my old roommate and best bud Dave O. never could be bothered. Our head shed would occasionally radio us for updates and want to know where certain teams were, for what? I don’t know, just to stay informed I would venture. But the other cadre members would keep each other abreast of what was going on and certain NCOs were hilarious in their descriptions of what was going on. None better than Steve S. who was a 5th SFG guy before coming to SWC and the schoolhouse.

So one day, our Major is contacting all the teams to check in and everyone did except Dave O’s group. A few minutes later, our two teams passed each other on the road and I relayed to him that they were looking for him to check in. In typical Dave fashion, he shrugged and said, “he’ll get over it.” So, just about two minutes later, the Major is calling him again…no answer. And I had a brilliant idea. I could imitate my bud’s Cuban-American New York City accent easily and I could get him off the hook.

So I responded on the radio for him and relayed his position. Then the commander commenced chewing my/Dave’s ass for not monitoring the frequency during the day as he ordered… So, I answered as I “knew” my bud would, “No worries…I’m on it,” I said. The commander Major V. asked what in the hell he was doing anyway… In my perfect accent, I answered, “Hey I’m just working here.”

Of course, all the other NCOs knew it wasn’t Dave but me on the radio and the chatter started. No one dimed me out, but everyone was calling in with their own take on how they too were “just working out here.” Major V. was pissed.

So, when we got back, the major and the sergeant major commence to chew Dave out for being a smartass on the radio. Of course, it took them all of about a minute to realize that he didn’t have a clue of what they were talking about. As soon as my group re-entered Camp Mackall, I was called for and got a major ass-chewing and a counseling statement, for “improper and unnecessary radio chatter.” As much as I proclaimed total ignorance of what transpired and gave my best and most sincere innocent look, they didn’t buy it. Dave did monitor his radio for about a day and then went happily back to ignoring it again…

What Are You Doing, Checking His Feet For!”

As I’ve written here in the past, we had one class where the candidates got rained and snowed on for nearly the entire Selection schedule. It was February, and it started as snow but then it was just warm enough for the remainder of the class for it to fall as rain.

The soft sand of Mackall was turned into a muddy quagmire. Standing water was everywhere. The candidates’ feet were wet constantly and they took a beating. By the time that class finished they were walking like a collective group of very old men. It was also the lowest selection rate we had of any class I worked.

So, in the next class, the commander stressed that the medics had to keep a close eye on the candidates’ feet and harp on them that they needed to stress their own foot care so that we didn’t have another fiasco like the February class.

So the next class comes in and we are going thru the normal first week’s gates that the candidates must accomplish. We walked them thru the obstacle course, “Nasty Nick” in the morning just prior to lunch. After lunch, we would have them conduct if for time. There was an SFAS cadre member placed at each obstacle to ensure that the candidates conducted it correctly or marking down their roster numbers if they failed. When the final candidate went thru each obstacle, the cadre would follow behind and we’d roll up at the final obstacle which was the cargo net.

Everything went very smooth, despite having a very large class. We were rolling up on the cargo net as the final two candidates hit the bottom of the net. The cadre gathered on the other side and we waited for them to get down the other side before moving back into the compound. The first candidate maneuvered easily over the top. As the second reached the top, we could see his head and shoulders as he reached over to grab a handhold. Collectively, we all turned to begin walking back into the compound.

Then everything went south. We all heard the candidate say, “SHHHHHHHIIIIITTTT!” as his hand slipped on the net and he tumbled the entire way from the top of the net, some 30-35 feet to the ground. He landed with a thump awkwardly on his upper back and shoulders in the mulch below and bounced a good foot off the ground.

Two medics, the aforementioned Dave O. and another guy rushed over, as this could be a very serious injury. The candidate was stunned and barely moving, having taken a bad fall. Dave was stabilizing his head and neck and telling the candidate to lie still. The other medic began to remove the candidate’s boots.

“What the hell are doing?” Dave asked our other medic whose name escapes me. “I’m checking his feet,” came the laconic reply. “WTF are you checking his feet for, this MFer probably just broke his fucking neck and you’re worried about a blister?” my buddy snapped in his own special kind of way. “Well, the major said…” he began, but Dave cut him off.

“Hey, this schmuck will probably be paralyzed but shit, he don’t got no blisters! Get outta here, I got this.” In case you wondered, Dave’s bedside manner wasn’t the greatest, but as a medic, there were none better. The rest of cadre moved off and had a laugh at this latest insanity that was SFAS. After a few moments of recuperation, the candidate was able to continue with the course albeit with a very sore neck and shoulder region.

CID visits the Cadre Office… Run Away….”

There is never a dull moment in SF. One morning at our building back on Ft. Bragg, we had a large, the largest at that time SFAS class we had up to that point in-processing to begin the course. About 15 of the cadre members were crowded in the front office as we had about 30 mins before we had a formation for the candidates.

As we were talking an unmarked Army CID sedan pulled up in front of the building and two plainclothes MPs got out. You could always spot those guys from a mile away. Driving a white Chrysler K car with military tags, the cops dressing in highly flammable polyester with ties out of the 1960s…you get the idea.

The effect of CID was immediate…everybody began scurrying out of the room, and Steve S. put it perfectly, “I’m not afraid of the cops, but…Run awwwwaaaayyy,” in a Monty Python voice.

The cops entered the office and I was the only cadre member left. The bigger of the two cops spoke, “where’d everybody go?” he asked. “Who?” I said. “I just saw about 15 guys in here when we pulled up and now they’re all gone…are they hiding in the back office,” he asked? Little did he know.

Calling this guy the bigger of the two was the understatement of the year. This huge black dude looked like a football nose tackle. His neck (if you want to call it that) was as big as his head and his hands were the size of catcher’s mitts.

So, he asked if we had a student by the name of so-and-so. I checked off the roster and indeed we did. They asked to speak with him. The Sergeant Major came in and they brought this candidate in and used our Major’s office for a moment with the door closed.

Shortly after, the door opened and the smaller cop came out followed by our candidate who was in cuffs. The huge cop followed with a mitt-sized hand on his shoulder. “We’re taking him with us…he won’t be returning,” the big guy boomed. And as he was walking out, he turned and said, you can tell the other guys they can come out now.”

About a year later, while attending the Warrant Officer Candidate Course at Ft. Rucker, AL, who comes walking in the door. Couldn’t miss him, the biggest candidate they may have ever had at Rucker. His name was Steve Blue (RIP).

He was, in fact, an NFL player for a short time with the Giants as a nose tackle and one of the best guys you’d meet anywhere. He was as funny as he was huge and he became inseparable with the SF guys there.

One night I reminded him of the story and he relayed the rest of it. It seems our candidate was stationed in Korea with the 2nd I.D. He married a Korean girl, got her a dependent I.D. card and such until he was transferred back to the U.S. At Ft. Ord, he married a local girl and got her an I.D. too. You can see where this is going. At Ft. Riley, the genius did it a third time. Alarm bells were ringing in the bean counting world.

So, our erstwhile candidate volunteers for SFAS. CID was alerted and they sent a couple of guys (Blue and his partner) to interview him. I asked Blue, “Did he admit to it?” He replied, “yep in about two seconds.” Steve Blue asked him what was he thinking….the guy responded, “I really did like all of them and didn’t want to lose any of them.” So, naturally, the next question was, “why did you volunteer for SF?” The guy thought he’d be able to hide overseas until the heat blew over. Blue asked the guy, “but wouldn’t you have gotten into more trouble overseas?”

The response, Well, I did hear those Colombian girls make great wives.” Indeed.

Photo: US Army

On St. Patrick’s Day, Get Your Alibis Straight … And Don’t Be on Camera

Ah, St. Patrick’s Day, a day for the celebration of all things Irish, “What’s the craic laddie?” even for those of us who aren’t from there…I used to tell my neighbors from Ireland that my family was from the southern part of Ireland…Sicily.

And there is arguably no place better to spend St. Patrick’s Day in the United States than in Savannah, “the Hostess City of the South.” Savannah is a great place any time of the year, but for St. Patrick’s Day, there is arguably no better place to be. They host one of the largest parades anywhere with at times as many as 300 marching bands, Clydesdale horses and of course the military.

One of the time-honored traditions has been women wearing bright red lipstick rushing out and kissing a Ranger from the 1st Bn as they march past. It wouldn’t uncommon for a baby faced Ranger to have a face full of lipstick by parade’s end. But the Army has no sense of humor and they have asked security people to prevent the women from kissing soldiers in the parade.

Back in the day, when I was in the 7th Special Forces Group, we used to do a big exercise with the Ranger Regiment at Hunter Army Airfield regularly right there in Savannah. We were working out of Saber Hall in a “working isolation” planning the missions, prior to our exercise while the Rangers from the 3rd Battalion were busy practicing their airfield seizures both day and night.

Cold Beer on the Drop Zone? You Betcha:

The trip down there was always an event. Once we flew down in a tanker and got to watch an in-flight refueling of F-16s that look like their coming right in the rear of the aircraft. But for this particular trip, we left Ft. Bragg early on a Saturday morning. While nearly everyone would be airlanded at Hunter, we’d have six people jump into Ft. Stewart so the Air Force would pick up the tab for the plane.

Conditions were perfect, six of us jumped out and we had two vans on the drop zone who whisked out to pick us up right beside the turn-in area, where we landed. We must have had a spot-on jumpmaster (wink). But the best part was, no sooner than you rolled up your chute, the van was there and two young guys, truck drivers from the 7th SFG Support Battalion, grabbed it, and threw it in the van. Then another guy handed you a cold beer and into the van we’d go. We cleared the drop zone in record time.

The best part was there was an Engineer unit from Ft. Stewart waiting to use the DZ for some road grading stuff once we cleared it. Having witnessed many drops I’m sure, they weren’t expecting to see a C-141 drop just six guys and have them get picked up with cold beer right at the landing spot. If all jumps were just like that, my how recruitment would have soared…

An Uneventful St. Patrick’s Day …Until:

Being in working isolation meant that during our time at Hunter AAF, we were able to partake in some of the wonderful nightlife that Savannah has to offer and a good time was had by all. My buddy Tim H. was a platoon sergeant in 1st Bn and after going over and meeting him and some of the guys who worked for him, they informed me of all the good places to go. We ran into some of them later, all great dudes.

Another good bud, Bob F. was a platoon sergeant in the 3rd Ranger Bn. the guys we were working with. They were locked down in tents at Saber Hall, but I made sure that I’d make a pogey run for his boys.

Anyway, St. Patrick’s Day arrives and despite our train up for the exercise, we were excited to partake in fine Irish revelry. I had the duty at Saber Hall that night until 11. There were two of us, a good guy Bill and myself were stuck until 11 but figured there would still be plenty of good times still to be had by then. Our relief, who we’ll call SSG A and SSG J. who was a Support Bn NCO were both with a group of guys who were renting a car, heading down to the beach and then back in Savannah before relieving us.

The day was boring, nothing was really going on, the commander basically shut everything down because of St. Patrick’s Day and was allowing as many guys out as possible. So we made busy work, watched local television and tried to stay awake.

Our Support Bn. had a mess section there and they would make a bunch of hamburgers and hotdogs around 8-9 p.m. for the guys working in isolation to give them an evening snack. They made the usual amount but since no one was really there, most were going to waste. So I asked the mess sergeant for a bunch of buns and he and I made a slew of burgers and dogs and wrapped them in tin foil but my buddy Bob’s Rangers. Fresh off a practice airfield seizure, they attacked those with reckless abandon. They were appreciative, but their company commander was not. He gave me a double ration of shit for interfering with his training…” yeah, yeah, Okay…we’ll never do it again.”

So as the clock is winding down, Bill and I are deciding where we want to go first. It is about 10:30 and we’re waiting for our two guys to be waltzing in at any minute and getting ready to take over. The old man joined us and we put the local news on and of course everything was about St. Patrick’s Day.

Bill and I are looking at each other, not saying a thing, but now we know we’re fucked. Because it is 11 and there is no sign of anyone. The old man turned to us and asked, “Hey aren’t guys supposed to be gone by now?” Not wanting to throw the other guys under the bus, we said that we were, but believed that they’d be along any minute.

The end of the newscast was just before 11:30 and the host said, “We’re going to go live down on River St. with Amy who is taking all of this in.” And they cut to a live shot of absolute chaos with this young woman yelling to be heard over the raucous partying going on…. And they showed two drunk guys, cavorting, dancing and making faces at the camera, right behind “Amy”.

“Isn’t that SSG A. and SSG J.” the old man asked? He started laughing, “Those two are going to have big heads in the morning,” he added. We just nodded, not saying a word. Then reality hit, the old man walked over to the duty sheet and looked at who was supposed to be our relief and came back and sat down.

“Well, let’s have some coffee and wait for them together,” he said. Uh oh… the old man wasn’t happy about that. So we sat and waited… and waited. Finally just before 2 a.m. a rental car full of inebriated 7th SFG guys, whips in the parking lot. Thankfully they had a designated driver, I say thankfully because they were an unsteady lot. When you’ve been drinking all day, you only THINK you’re being quiet as they made their way back to the area.

Here come our two guys, our relief, only about three hours late. When they saw the commander sitting with us they had a “go to Jesus” moment. You had to hand it to the old man, he was cool as a cucumber. “Hey guys, what happened, why are you so late?”

They had this elaborate BS story about driving the rental car on the beach at dusk and getting stuck and spending all night trying to dig it out. It was an awful story as BS stories go but at least they had their details down. The old man was sympathetic and asking all the questions and giving them the impression that he was feeling sorry for them.

When they were finished, he said, “Guys get changed and into uniform and don’t worry about it, those things can happen to anyone… but I have one more question.”

“It was going great and I believed your story 100 percent until I watched you both dancing on River St. and mugging for the t.v. cameras. So, don’t you think if you’re going to elaborate lengths to BS, everyone, you should make sure the next time, you DON’T allow yourselves to get filmed on television?…just asking.”

SSG J. looked at him and said, “Ah …sir, we…. Well I… Shit sir, we fucked up.”

The old man looked at them and said was mad that they screwed us out of having a little bit of fun that he worked into our schedule but more than that, he expected much better from them by not showing up on time and ready to work, which to him was inexcusable. With a wave of dismissal, he told them to get dressed. As they hurried off, the old man turned to us and apologized for us having to stay well beyond our time, like it was his fault. He put on another pot of coffee and told us to take off, he was going to stay with them the rest of the night and make sure that neither one got a minute of sleep until the morning shift came on.

He wasn’t going to hammer them, they were both good guys who just screwed up royally. That’s why he was such a good commander, he could have put the screws to them, which would have easily been within his rights to do so. But he was such a respected officer, just by him telling them he was disappointed in them, hit them much harder than any punishment would have.

Although we were pretty pissed at the time, we quickly got over it but ensured we reminded them of them mugging on television whenever it suited our purpose. In today’s world of Facebook Live, Instagram and whatever else, that crap would have been everywhere. But the lesson remains, everyone will screw up at one time or another. Just don’t be on camera.

“St. Patrick… one of the few saints whose feast day presents the opportunity to get determinedly whacked and make a fool of oneself all under the guise of acting Irish.” – Charles M. Madigan

Photo: Savannah River St. on St. Patrick’s Day – YouTube.com

Remembering Sterling Hayden, Actor, OSS Operative

Today is the birthday of Sterling Hayden, he would have been 103 years old today. Most people when they hear his name think of the crooked cop, Captain McCloskey in “The Godfather”. Working with a rival faction of Mafiosi, Hayden met his end when Michael Corleone shot him in a restaurant. He was also outstanding as Colonel Jack D. Ripper in Stanley Kubrick’s “Dr. Strangelove” which is a classic.

But before those roles, Hayden was an operative in the OSS (Office of Strategic Services), during World War II. OSS was the forerunner of the modern-day CIA and the U.S. Army Special Forces (Green Berets). He completed two overseas deployments working with Partisans in Italy and Yugoslavia.

Early Life:

Hayden was born in Montclair, NJ on March 26, 1916. His father died when he was just nine and his mother remarried. His stepfather, moved the family around the East Coast trying to stay one step ahead of his creditors.

By the time Hayden was 16, he quit school for good. He went to see and quickly learned the hard lessons of sailing. By the time he was just 22, he’d earned his master’s license, and was given the command of a square rigger, the Florence C. Robinson, which he sailed from Gloucester, Massachusetts to Tahiti.

He spoke about his voyage to the Adventurer’s Club of New York and some of the pictures of this young sea captain taken at a race in Gloucester, were published and Hollywood immediately came calling. They offered the young captain a seven-year contract paying him $250 a week, no small amount in those days.

He had made a couple of films and then once the United States entered WWII, he enlisted in the Army.

WWII Service:

Hayden joined the Army and was assigned to the O.S.S. General Donovan sent him to Commando training in Scotland. After completing a course there, he moved on to parachute training, also with the Brits. On his tenth and final jump, Hayden shattered his ankle and injured his back. His injuries were thought to be serious enough to be separated from the service. The Army discharged him and he went back to sailing ships for a short time. But that wasn’t the end of his service.

As soon as he was healed up, Hayden enlisted in the Marine Corps, using a pseudonym, John Hamilton. There, while excelling in boot camp he was selected for Officer’s Candidate School. After his commissioning, General Donovan somehow found out who 2LT Hamilton really was and had him assigned back to OSS. After lounging around Cairo waiting for an assignment, he was sent to Bari, Italy.

OSS had set up a smuggling operation using ships to provide food, weapons and other support to partisans fighting in Yugoslavia. Hayden, never one to mince words, described that operation as the first time he’d met OSS operatives who were actually doing a job. But the British Navy was hampering operations, something the Americans felt the British were trying to ensure they failed.

After being forced to move their operation further down the coast at Monopoli, the American commander was called to Cairo. Hayden/Hamilton went to Yugoslavia in his place, his motor quit and he paddled back to the mainland. He hooked up with Tito’s Communist partisans.

Hayden recalled “We hooked up with about thirty of the toughest bastards on earth. None of them had had a bath in years. All had been in the thick of the fighting and marching all up and down Bosnia and Croatia. They would only take one cigarette at a time, which they passed around in circles.”

The year he spent with Tito’s men left an indelible mark on him. “the crews of planes would leave their shoes, anything they could spare, with the Partisans . . . We knew they were Communists, we knew they had commissars, but there was very little discussion of that.”

Hayden was involved in several close calls during combat operations where one evaluation report said that he had a “reckless disregard of his own life.” His men were attacked by Stuka dive-bombers, he captured a German E-boat, their version of the American PT boats, they were ambushed by the Germans where his jeep driver was shot. He arranged for a rescue of 26 downed American airmen, including 11 nurses who were forced down in German-held Albania by engine trouble.

He was awarded the Silver Star and the Bronze Arrowhead for parachuting into Yugoslavia. He received a commendation from Tito who also awarded him an Order of Merit. His affinity for Tito’s men and fighting beside them made him briefly join the American Communist Party.

House Un-American Activities Committee Testimony:

Hayden’s brief fling with the Communist Party got him on the radar with the FBI and J.Edgar Hoover. After the Communist unions in Hollywood tried to take over the remaining ones, the Red Scare took place in Hollywood and Washington.

He was called to testify and the FBI threatened him with losing his children and even jail time if he didn’t cooperate. Hayden “named names” and later would regret having cooperated. In his autobiography, he wrote:

“I don’t think you have the foggiest notion of the contempt I have had for myself since the day I did that thing.”

He maintained a very lucrative career as a “B” action movie star but he never liked being in the films and did so only enough to finance his seagoing adventures. He considered himself more of a sailor or writer rather than an actor.

Sydney Pollack, the film director put a mention of Hayden and his OSS service in one of his films. In his film “Three Days of the Condor” (1975), two veteran CIA officers were reminiscing about their past exploits. Higgins (Cliff Robertson) asked Mr. Wabash, (played by John Houseman) “You served with Col. Donovan in the OSS, didn’t you, sir?” Wabash replies, “I sailed the Adriatic with a movie star at the helm. It doesn’t seem like much of a war now, but it was.”

Hayden died of prostate cancer in Sausalito, California in 1986, he was 70.

In our own favorite film role, as Colonel Jack D. Ripper, here he tells Peter Sellers (who played three roles) about why he launched a nuclear attack on the Soviets.

Silver Star Citation:

The President of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress July 9, 1918, takes pleasure in presenting the Silver Star (Army Award) to Captain John Hamilton (AKA: Sterling Hayden) (MCSN: 0-22085), United States Marine Corps, for gallantry in action while serving with the Office of Strategic Services in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations from 24 December 1943 to 2 January 1944. Captain Hamilton displayed great courage in making hazardous sea voyage in enemy-infested waters and reconnaissance’s through enemy-held areas. His conduct reflected great credit upon himself and the United States Armed Forces. General Orders: Headquarters, Mediterranean Theater of Operations, General Orders No. 145 (July 31, 1946)

Photos: OSS Archives/IMDB

USASOC Takes Top Honors in 2019 Sniper Competition

Two sniper teams from the U.S. Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) took home the top honors in the 10th Annual USASOC International Sniper Competition.

This year’s event had 21 teams from allied countries around the world, shooting, moving and communicating thru a series of intense events that were intended to simulate combat as closely as possible and push the competitors’ tactical sniper skills to the max.

The two USASOC teams won the top two honors while a Marine Corps team finished in third place.

Every year the Sniper Competition changes slightly as instructors from the US Army JFK Special Warfare Center Sniper Committee designs the events to challenge the two-man sniper teams in their ability to work together as a team and test their speed and accuracy in various types of environments, with the stresses of combat added in.

.“This year we wanted to focus on bringing guys in who may shoot competitively on the side but the core tasks would revolve around a real-world application,” said Master Sgt. Josh, a Special Forces Sniper Course instructor identified only by his first name and rank for security reasons.

Snipers engage targets while wearing night vision.

“We used sounds, artillery simulators, and bunkers to induce chaos and make them think through things.”

Teams competed with sniper systems of 7.62 and 5.56mm, carbines and pistols of various calibers. Several of the sniper rifle systems used in the competition are owned by the soldiers.

The competition was held at Ft. Bragg, NC where it was started back in 2009 by the JFK Special Warfare Center and School’s Sniper Committee, which hosted the competition. The school’s sniper course is used by all of Army Special Operations, including Special Forces and Rangers.

Teams were representing the following units:

USASOC

1st, 3rd, 7th, 10th, 19th, and 20th Special Forces Group (Airborne)

2nd Marine Raider Battalion, U.S. Marine Corps

Marine Corps Special Operations Forces Advanced Sniper Course

Marine Corps Scout Sniper

Naval Special Warfare

Unites States Coast Guard

1st Premier Regiment de Parachutistes d’Infanterie de Marine, France

Kommando Spezialkräfte, Germany

Army Ranger Wing, Ireland

9th Paratroopers Assault Regiment, Italy

International Special Training Center

The winners:

1st place: USASOC

2nd place: USASOC

3rd place: Marine Corps Scout Sniper

The competition was more than just accuracy and distance shooting, but being able to conduct a series of timed challenges that were constructed to mirror real-world missions as well as stress the relationships and communication skills of competitors. One event had the shooter encounter targets with one hand, cuffed behind his back.

A sniper engages targets with a hand, cuffed to his kit

“When guys get put on the clock they go faster. There’s more pressure,” said a Special Forces Sniper Course instructor with the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School in an interview with the Fayetteville Observer last year. “You have plenty of time to build a durable and steady position. But they rush it and then they start missing.”

“Guys do better when they’re laughing and joking,” the instructor said.

At last year’s event, sniper teams had to move from one firing location to another, engaging targets 12×16 inches in size, 600 meters away while being timed. They had six minutes to engage as many targets as possible.

As the spotter picked out targets, he also relayed to the shooter how to adjust his shots. The shooter would have to pick up the targets while in the prone position while peering thru the reticle of his rifle.

The teams would be taken to a range that required that they navigate around or over numerous obstacles, buildings, and mock vehicles. Each of the targets was marked by a symbol and a color denoting the type of weapon that should be used — pistol, carbine or sniper rifle.

In another event to test the communication and teamwork of the sniper team, the troops would be placed on a raised platform with several different levels that recreate the top of a building. There, the shooter nor the spotter could not see every target from a single position. So, they had to split up to guide each other to a position where they could engage their targets. Added into the equation was that before the event, an instructor would be shown a card by the instructors. They then had to find that symbol in the target area and engage it with the appropriate weapon. That event was designed to get the teams to hurry and distracted, moving faster than they needed to. If a team engaged the wrong target, points were deducted from their overall score.

The old saying “slow is smooth and smooth is fast” was apt at that event. The teams that slowed down and identified the targets were the ones who fared the best.

There was also a physical challenge event. Designed to test the team while carrying a typical combat load, moving and shooting. The team had to run uphill with a 90-pound kettlebell. They would then take turns firing at targets before moving on with their kettlebell a to the next position.

The competition included day and night shooting and would change from open areas to an urban environment. All of which special operators will encounter in any operation in today’s mission environment.

Congratulations to the USASOC teams and all of those who participated.

Photos: DVIDS

“I Can Put That Range Fire Out…” Tales of the Green Beret

It is amazing sometimes to think back on some of the good funny, ridiculous, and at times unbelievable stories from your time under a Green Beret. And as always, SF stories like fishing tales, as you grow older, get better with age.

Now I am not saying that any of these stories are BS, but let’s just say, that time is a wonderful thing. The passage of time makes the fish bigger, the girls prettier, and the stories so much better. ‘Nuff’ said.

So, just a few months ago, I was on the phone with Danny C. my old A-Team leader from way, way back in the day. When I say way back, that isn’t an exaggeration. Danny was an outstanding officer, a great Team Leader, and an even better man. During a deployment to Honduras during the 80s….(I told you it was way back), Danny was injured during our deployment and would be forced to spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair.

But that has never stopped him from living a very active lifestyle, Danny’s gone skiing at Aspen, skydiving and 100 other things that I never find the time to do anymore. We were talking on the phone that night, Danny had just sent me a gift in the mail and he was making sure I got it.

We began to talk about that last deployment before he got hurt and some of the stuff that went down and some of the fun we had training with the Honduran Infantry guys and then later the Airborne Battalion located at Tamara, in the mountains.

The drop zone was right next to the highway and due to the prevailing winds, our Chinooks would drop us on the other side of the highway and you’d drift perfectly right over the DZ. Which always made drivers on the highway nervous to see paratroopers drifting across the road before hitting the hard ground of the DZ.

We spoke about the classified but very low-tech project we were working on with Pack Animals and other interesting tidbits that made us fondly remember the days of yore. But that got my own mind going and after I hung up I remembered another funny story from that deployment.

We had moved further up in the mountains with 6th Infantry Battalion (Centaurs) at Ojo de Agua. They were located in the mountains and had a large base for the Contras at the time. There were enough GP Medium tents where a battalion could refit and rest there.

They also had a large shooting range built on several of the rolling hills on the base. We were doing a range day with our Honduran counterparts using M-60 and M249 (SAW) machineguns. When we had first arrived the weather had been cold, raw and rainy. But about a week later, it had dried out and was hot and sticky. And a stiff wind had dried everything out to where it was like tinder.

We were high up on a hill shooting at targets located about 300-400 meters away. The Honduran kids, not used to having this much ammo were having a ball, blazing away at the silhouettes with reckless abandon. Those “6-to-9” round bursts we discussed in training were quickly forgotten.

Giving the pack animals a drink while crossing a river, Central America in the mid-1980s.

One of the tracer rounds from the SAW started a range fire on top of the hill. Our Hondo allies had a pickup truck, an old beat-up piece of junk that looked like it would fall apart at any minute, loaded with soldiers who raced down there and quickly put the fire out.

After lunch, we had a second group of guys firing, their mortar section, who were beginning to get the U.S. 60mm mortars. We did some crew training with them and their crew drills were pretty good. They had a few old Soviet 82mm mortars, from god knows where. They looked like antiques. Firing those looked like an iffy proposition. They used US 81mm mortar rounds, which we didn’t have any.

I never fired a US round thru that Soviet system (I started as a heavy weapons guy), but one of our other guys had. He said it was a weird sound when dropping the round. Instead of that metallic sliding, sucking sound, it was a click, clickety-click, sound as the slightly smaller American round would ever so slightly bounce down the tube. Although you could fire those, Luis A. said, they weren’t the most accurate…no kidding.

So, after doing some crew drill on the 60mm M224 mortar, the mortar guys got their turn on the machine guns. After a few moments, one tracer round hit in front of one target and bounced backward about 10-20 meters and started a small fire in the grass. It was burning in a small neat circle.

Danny was reaching for the radio to tell the Hondos in the beat-up truck to put out the fire when one of the other guys spoke up. “I can put that range fire out, sir,” Bruce P. said. Bruce was a big, huge guy who was loaned to us from the 2nd Ranger Bn. for this deployment. He was also the Weapons Plt. Sgt. in the Batt.

The Hondurans were in awe of his size, he was easily double their diminutive height and scared shitless of him. Bruce had a very typical Ranger haircut, where he was buzzed on the sides. In the Honduran army, they only did that to the criminals, “ Los Castigados” in their terminology.

He grabbed the smaller M8 baseplate for the 60mm mortar, he put a round in the tube and lined up his range estimation. Giving himself a bit of windage, he pulled the trigger and we all waited a few seconds for the round to go down range. Bruce grabbed another round and was preparing to fire again when the mortar landed with that flat sounding explosion. It landed squarely on the fire, which was no more than 3-4 meters wide at that point.

The results were electric. The Americans whooped, “Good shot bro,” while the Honduran mortar section sat there dumbstruck with their mouth’s literally wide open. It was a shot in a million. “Holy shit,” Bruce said to Danny. “I’ve never hit one on the first shot before.” Castillo laughed.

Look at them,” he said. “They are going to kneel and ask you to bring to bring back the sun any minute.” We all cracked up. The Hondos sat there mesmerized for a few more seconds. “Hijo de puta! Their Lieutenant yelled. He turned with a big grin and began to bark at his troops. We all cracked up. Bruce who at that time, had a very limited Spanish vocabulary, asked Danny what they said.

“Basically, he is telling them that until they can learn to shoot like that, he’s going to shave all their heads.”

Bruce again tried to tell us that he’d never hit anything like that on the first shot. Danny told him to act as he did it all the time. Bruce played along and set down the tube and told the Hondos, “Eso fue fácil” (that was easy), after asking Danny how to say it. Again, they stopped to gawk at the blown out fire down below.

After that, every time Bruce walked thru the compound, the Honduran kids would salute him like he was a field grade officer. Not long after we returned from that deployment, Bruce joined SF and went thru the SFQC as an 18E and later became an officer…and a very good one.

Just another great day in the 7th SFG.

Photos of Honduran Anti-Tank Company and Pack Animal training: Author,

Special Forces and Entrepreneurship Can Make the Most of Any Bad Situation

“How the hell am I going to fill 1000 sandbags…and how did get myself into this mess?”

Sometimes life throws her curveballs at you and you have to do your best to sit back in the box and hit it the opposite way. And in doing so, you can take a bad situation and definitely make the most out of it.

Back in the day, the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua was a thorn in the side of the United States, especially the White House under President Reagan. And the U.S. was worried that the Sandinistas would be trying to spread their revolution (with outside help) to their neighboring countries.

And it was justified, with on-going bloody civil wars going on in El Salvador and Guatemala, Honduras had a latent insurgency issue and later we learned that the Nicaraguan government was preparing to aid that along.

While U.S. troop strength allowed in El Salvador was severely restricted and very few SOF troops allowed in Guatemala due to political issues, no such issue existed in Honduras at the time. And the U.S. always had a steady stream of conventional and SOF troops there.

Combat engineers were always building and improving roads, there was a slew of medical and dental units there helping the people. The U.S. constructed an airbase (Soto Cano) in Palmerola that is still in use today. And there were always a ton of 7th Special Forces Group troops on the ground. It always seemed like there was at least a company-sized element of six Special Forces A-Teams and a B-Team in the country at any given time. Many SF guys from that era would have half a dozen deployments to “Hondo” alone at that time, never mind deployments elsewhere.

This one deployment our Group decided to run had several teams from 2nd Bn., 7th SFG working with local Honduran units and our commander wanted to run several base station communication sites from the country, instead of back from Ft. Bragg. So, a bunch of SF radio operators (18E) from 1st Bn. were tasked to augment the Group’s Support Bn, and the Signal CO. to work in the base stations during this deployment.

Author and a high-speed, low drag supply vehicle in Honduras back in the day

We were starting one such base station in La Ceiba at the Honduran air base where they based their fighter aircraft (obsolescent Super Mystere) and then moving it after a few weeks up into the mountains, closer to the Nicaraguan border. So, during the time in La Ceiba, these SF radio operators would fall under the command of the Support Bn Staff. It was not a marriage made in heaven.

The sergeant major was… to put it simply a “Rick” with a silent P. He had a “do as I say and not as I do” attitude and was used to bullying the younger support guys…and girls. They had a gazillion rules that the A-Team guys never had to deal with in past deployments and it was soon apparent that heads were going to bump.

He instituted a “pass” system and a curfew with going downtown for everyone, except himself and his cronies. That didn’t fly with the SF guys. “Hey, that doesn’t apply to us, right?” LOL.

Well, after sampling some of the local nightlife in downtown La Ceiba and hanging out with a number of British schoolteachers from Belize, we arrived back at the base well after the established curfew. One of his little cronies made sure to rat us out…the little cockroach. However, we did beat the SGM back. Imagine that.

The next morning, he was going to make a big deal out of it and called us all in and said, we could be restricted to the base from our remainder of the time there (just a few more days thankfully) or fill sandbags for the Honduran base defenses. Most guys said screw it, they’d remain on base. Another guy and I opted for sandbag detail. Anything to get the hell away from those people.

So, we got a driver, a deuce and a half and 1000 sandbags. We told the driver to pack as many shovels as he had, which got a strange look but he grabbed about a dozen. The driver drove us to the far side of the base where there was a pit of clay that was as hard-packed as granite. “This is where our guys have been filling them,” he said. We laughed and told him we weren’t going to spend one minute there. Directing him out the back gate, we headed back down the highway in the opposite direction of town. After passing by some pineapple fields, we told him to take a dirt road to the right. After passing thru more fields and over a tiny bridge, we ended up on this tiny beach with the best bar you’d ever seen there.

On an earlier trip, one of the scuba team guys had shown this place. It had a fantastic place to dive and the bar was open on three sides that emptied right out on the sand. The driver couldn’t believe it. Nursing hangovers we ordered the hair of the dog from the young girl behind the bar while my partner spoke to her quietly in the corner. Then pulling a hammock out of my ruck, I strung it up between two poles on the open part of the bar and reclined with an ice cold Port Royal while my bud nursed a Salva Vida.

“What are you guys doing,” the driver asked? “Well, we’re going to chill out, catch about a 20-minute power nap and wait for the cavalry to arrive,” we said. About the time that the first beer was gone, the cavalry arrived.

Kids from the nearby village came flocking in, thinking the gringos were going scuba diving again and offering the use of their small boats and their services for whatever we needed.

We explained what we wanted to do, and they quickly agreed, we’d give them each two (2) MREs that we weren’t going to eat anyway. The two oldest kids were going to be foremen and oversee the entire operation. We gave them a five-minute class on how to properly fill sandbags. And just like in Selection, on how full they had to be. The two “foremen” would get five bucks each.

After watching this slew of kids quickly filling up the sandbags for a few quick iterations, my bud and I retired back to the cool shadow of the bar and the hammocks. “Yes, I’ll have another beer, thank you very much.”

In less than an hour, we had 250 sandbags filled. They were loaded on the deuce-and-a-half and we sent the driver back with strict orders to use the rear gate and bring back more cases of MREs. And most importantly, not to breathe a word of this to anyone.

Around noon the kids wanted to take a break for lunch. They planned on eating their MREs. We can do better, we said. The girl at the bar had already been forewarned and we arranged chicken sandwiches and a few burgers for all of them. We sat in the shade of the bar and got those kids sodas. Afterward, it time for a dip in the ocean. Punishment details are hell.

By 2 to 2:30 all of our sandbags were full, in truth, we didn’t have 1000, because they’d thought we wouldn’t be able to fill a 1/10th of those. Our driver asked if we should head back. “Hell no,” we answered. It was time for some MTT. He asked what that meant. “Max Tanning Time”, we answered. So until about four, we laid out in the sun, swam a bit more and bought the kids a coke. There were about half again as many MREs as promised and we said the heck with it. We told them to spread those out evenly as well. It was money well spent. We thought about scrawling on the side of the truck, “7th SFG Sand and Gravel”, but thought better or it. We used UW principles to beat the Pogues at their own game.

We headed back with the final load of sandbags, arriving back at the base where we unloaded the last of the sandbags into the huge pile that the guys had made. Our “pal” the sergeant-major strolled up and gave us a sneer like, “I guess I showed you!” and then glanced at the pile and knew something was up. We jumped down from the truck and smiled a “fuck you very much” look and headed for the showers, ice cold water that could wake the dead.

That weekend our C-130 came in to get us thankfully out of there. And not a moment too soon, but not entirely home free. We moved our base station gear to a B-Team that was famously known as “The Plantation”…ask any of the oldtimers what that was all about.

Little did we know that this was just the beginning. But that is a story for another time.

Photo of Golosón International Airport, La Ceiba (1987): Wikipedia