USSOCOM

Most SOF Veterans Are Not Ready For Transition Out of Military Pt1

Special Operations Forces are the most highly trained members of the military, both in the United States and among our allies. They are also the most prepared troops to tackle any job, anywhere, anytime… unless it has to do with their own separation from the military.

In a startling “SOF For Life” survey conducted and developed by the Global SOF Foundation and the Honor Foundation, the majority of Special Operations veterans are not properly prepared for their transition to the civilian workforce nor are they receiving the support needed to transition smoothly.

The Global SOF Foundation is a non-profit professional organization for Special Operations Forces and the global moniker is true. They have members across the world and their events are extremely well attended worldwide. The Honor Foundation is an organization founded for Navy SEALs and the Special Operations community whose stated goal is to advance the career goals of this SEAL community for life.

The “SOF For Life” survey began in the late summer of 2016 and up to the present time they have had over 550 responses from SOF and SOF support personnel who have already transitioned from active duty, whether through retirement or separation.

We’ll get to the survey results below, which showed major issues with the soldiers medical benefits, physical health and well-being as well as their mental health. The issues that the respondents have with their financial preparation for separation and their career placement are issues that the SOF For Life program is designed to address.

But first, SpecialOperations.com reached out to Global SOF Foundation President Stu Bradin. We saw the survey, and the results and were more than a bit surprised as the common feeling was that this generation of SOF troops were better positioned for transition than a generation or two before.

Bradin spent over 30 years in the military and about 25 of those were as a Special Forces officer. He began his SF career leading an A-Team in the 7th SFG during Operation Just Cause and led his team at the Pacora River Bridge fighting the Panamanian mechanized/armor unit Battalion 2000. He finished it at USSOCOM as a member of Admiral McRaven’s staff.

Bradin said that the results speak for themselves, that actually the numbers are actually skewed a bit on positive side because the number of officers responding was about 40 percent of the total. “If we were to get an accurate picture of the force, it should be 80-20 in terms of enlisted and officers,” he said.

“Look,” he said. “The majority of the guys are really unprepared to find and keep meaningful employment after they leave the military.” He spoke about the education that many of troops have but added it wasn’t enough. “I’ve spoken with a few guys who’ve gotten their Masters which is excellent, but many of them want to leave the military sector and go to work in a true civilian environment.”

“The problem is, as Special Operations guys, no one has any experience in the civilian world. The only thing they can point to and understand is the leadership aspect…so, what happens then?”

Bradin said the SOF For Life program is working with some companies and SOCOM to give the troops who know they’re getting ready to transition and opportunity to intern with companies prior to separation. They’re still drawing military pay and allowances but away from the flagpole and would work in a civilian job market that is alien to most operators.

Results of the Survey: There were 555 respondents to the survey. The vast majority were in the Army. And currently, coincidentally, 63 percent of deployed SOF personnel are in the Army. The other 6 respondents were foreign SOF personnel. Ninety-nine percent of the respondents were male, where in SOF, isn’t at all surprising.

It is here where Bradin stated the officer ranks were a bit skewed as to the actual force. And the officers here in the survey reflect 43 percent of the total respondents. Where in the actual force the numbers would be closer to 80-20 in favor of NCOs to Officers.

It is here where Bradin stated the officer ranks were a bit skewed as to the actual force. And the officers here in the survey reflect 43 percent of the total respondents.

With 84 percent of the respondents separating between 2004-2016, they served in the time frame of the wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Health Questions: This was an intriguing part of the survey. Forty-nine percent of the respondents agreed with the statement “I am in excellent health” and 31% disagreed with this statement. Another 20% neither agreed or disagreed with the statement “I am in excellent health.” Yet overall, it shows that less than half of the respondents believe their health is excellent which would suggest attention to medical benefits prior to separation would be a top priority for many.

With 49 percent stating I am in excellent health it begged the question then why 89 percent of the respondents reported some level of disability. 52 percent of the respondents indicated they separated with a medical disability rating of 50 percent or greater. Almost 20 percent of the respondents were 90-100 percent disabled and an equal number stated that they did not have any level of disability. Of those that indicated they had no disability at all, 70 percent of them (119 respondents) were badged SOF operators.

If you are separated, retired, or medically retired, what is your level of disability?	Count	%
10-29%	62	11%
30-49%	80	14%
50-69%	91	16%
70-89%	97	17%
90-100%	106	19%
I do not have any level of disability	119	21%
Total	555	100%

Planning And Preparation for Civilian Life: Of the respondents, only 41 percent did any kind of planning for the transition to civilian life. Of those that did do planning, 72 percent 12 months or less.

Many military service members take career assessments at some point prior to separation. Forty-four percent of the respondents to the survey indicated that the career assessments they took prior to separation did not leave them better prepared to begin a new professional career. Only 23% of the respondents agreed with the statement “the career assessments I have taken prior to separation from military service have better prepared me to begin a new professional career.

Because of the nature of the military, 66 percent of the members in the survey said, that they’d be willing to move 100 miles or more to secure the job of their choice.

In another surprising revelation, only 59 percent of the respondents reported having a professional resume done before departing the military. With no professional feedback on their most important document, their work history and this is particularly important when translating military skills to the civilian workplace.

Only half of the respondents reported that they’d built a professional network that would help them secure job opportunities in the civilian marketplace.

Sixty-two percent of the respondents indicated that they had “developed interviewing skills that would allow them to translate their military knowledge, skills, and experiences so that non-military professionals could understand and appreciate what I could offer.” This left 38 percent who indicated they had not developed effective interviewing skills.

When we return with Part II, we’ll look at some of the financial planning and more importantly what is out there for transitional troops to help ease the transition for the troops into the civilian workforce.

Photo: DOD

Military Satellite Launched by Space X Appears Lost

A military satellite launched at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station by Elon Musk’s Space Exploration Technologies Corp. apparently failed and crashed into the sea. The second stage of the rocket was the cause of the malfunction and represents a big setback in the company’s rocket program.

The mission — referred to by the code name Zuma — took off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida Sunday on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. But the U.S. Strategic Command, which monitors more than 23,000 man-made objects in space, said it is not tracking any new satellites following the launch.
“We have nothing to add to the satellite catalog at this time,” Navy Captain Brook DeWalt, a spokesman for the command, said in an email when asked if the new satellite was in orbit.
A U.S. official and two congressional aides familiar with the launch said on condition of anonymity that the second-stage booster section of the Falcon 9 failed. The satellite was lost, one of the aides said, and the other said both the satellite and second-stage rocket fell into the ocean.
It’s also possible that the Zuma satellite failed to properly separate, meaning the fault may not have been with the launch system, according to discussions on SpaceX’s twitter feed. Commentary during a webcast of the launch appeared to confirm that the fairings housing the payload were successfully deployed.
Tim Paynter, a spokesman for Northrop Grumman Corp., which was commissioned by the Defense Department to choose the launch contractor, said “we cannot comment on classified missions.” Army Lieutenant Colonel Jamie Davis, the Pentagon spokesman for space policy, referred questions to SpaceX.

The SpaceX launch had been setback several times in the past few weeks, notably for the weather and storm that bracketed the East Coast last week. The company is due to make 30 launches this year, up from 18, a year ago.

SpaceX competes with United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin for military launches.

To read the entire article from Bloomberg, click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Trump In a Teleconference With the Troops, “We’re Winning”

President Donald Trump conducted a teleconference with troops deployed which was supposed to be a Christmas greeting but it turned into a cheerleading video with the President telling the troops how well they have been doing in the war on terrorism as well as thanking the families of the troops. To top it off, the president said, “We’re winning.”

Military representatives on the call included Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Paul Goossen in Qatar, Marine Colonel Christopher Gideons in Kuwait, Navy Commander Timothy LaBenz aboard the USS Sampson in 5th Fleet OPS Underway, Coast Guard Captain Matthew Wadleigh in Guantanamo Bay and Army Colonel Charles Lombardo in Kuwait, according to a White House pool report.
The call came a few days after Vice President Pence made a surprise visit to Afghanistan to meet with U.S. troops and Afghan leaders. He told soldiers that “victory is closer than ever before.”
Trump is spending Christmas at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. He wished soldiers a “very, very merry Christmas,” adding that the country is saying “Merry Christmas, again, very, very proudly.”
Trump specifically praised the Coast Guard for its work following hurricanes in Florida, Texas and Puerto Rico.
“What a job you’ve done. The Coast Guard saved thousands and thousands of lives, almost it’s unbelievable when I look at the charts, I saw the number of lives you saved,” he said.

The president then took a question and answer session from the troops that was private as the press was not allowed to attend or see the back and forth.

To read the entire article from The Hill click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Pence Makes Surprise Visit to Afghanistan, Vows “To See it Through”

Vice President Mike Pence made an unannounced trip to Afghanistan to meet its leaders and US troops but the true purpose was to assure Afghan leaders that the US was going to stay in Afghanistan for the long haul and the commitment for the Afghan people was strong.

Pence whisked into Afghanistan on a military flight early Thursday. He then flew by helicopter to Kabul, where he met President Ashraf Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah at the presidential palace.

Pence told the leaders he hoped his presence there was tangible evidence that the United States was “here to see this through.”
In a reversal of his campaign call for a swift withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan, Trump in August pledged a stepped-up military campaign against Taliban insurgents and signaled the United States would send more troops to fight in what is the longest war in its history.
At the end of August, there were some 11,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan and more have since arrived.
Ghani expressed gratitude to the U.S. government and said Afghanistan’s partnership with the United States was cemented in sacrifice.
Pence told reporters the strategy of increased troops on the ground and greater authorities for military leaders was paying dividends.

Pence told Afghan officials that President Trump’s campaign will see it through for stability for Afghanistan and the defeat of the Taliban but deferred to the press to President Trump when asked if the US will commit more troops.

To read the entire article from Reuters click here:

Photo courtesy: Wikipedia

US Special Operations Troops Train To Capture Korean Nukes

The U.S. is reportedly conducting training to enter North Korean territory with the objective of “infiltrating” and “removing weapons of mass destruction,” according to foreign military sources.

The recently finished military exercise conducted with South Korean forces called Warrior Strike IX, shows a military unit conducting training with night-vision equipment, armored vehicles, and full-face protective gear, including gas masks. However, the pictures that were made public look more like conventional troops than SOF.

According to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, which quoted anonymous military sources, the combined exercise was designed to simulate “infiltrating North Korea and removing weapons of mass destruction in case of conflict.” An Army spokesperson stationed in South Korea declined to comment.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has suggested repeatedly that one of his main goals in Korea was to avoid sending U.S. forces into North Korean territory. But he also seemed to concede last week that is a scenario that might need to be addressed.
On Dec. 13, State Department Spokesperson Heather Nauert reiterated to reporters what Tillerson has described as the four things he won’t do when it comes to North Korea – a list he calls the “four no’s.”
“We are not seeking the collapse of the North Korean regime. We are not seeking regime change. We are not seeking the accelerated reunification of the Korean Peninsula. And we are not seeking an excuse to send our military north of the [border with South Korea],” according to Nauert.
John Bolton, a former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. and a Fox News contributor …sees when it comes to North Korea’s nuclear arsenal is to convince China to support a regime change in Pyongyang.
“We’re either going to have to kind of play it using military force, or accept that North Korea will be the nuclear arms sale center of the world – to Iran, to terrorist groups, to other third-world countries that have nuclear aspirations,” Bolton said. “That is not a future I look forward to,” he added.

North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un has become terrified about an assassination plot and is now paranoid about his security according to the report. So, he’s bought in totally that the U.S. and South Korea are serious about regime change.

To read the entire article from Fox News: click here:

Photo courtesy: US Army

Taliban Attack NATO Convoy, Kills 14 Afghan Soldiers in Separate Attacks

Taliban insurgents, in a series of attacks, stormed isolated police outposts around the provincial capital of Lashkargah, killing at least 14 Afghan troops and injured several others in a pre-dawn attack in southern Helmand province. Afghan officials claim to have beaten back the attack and inflicted serious casualties on the attackers.
Taliban sources later claimed that the death toll of government troops was much higher. They frequently attack police outposts as those are considered “soft targets” where the number of troops is smaller and the troops are far less trained than some of their contemporaries in the Afghan Special Forces.
Later, a suicide bomber in neighboring Kandahar province detonated his explosives-laden vehicle near a NATO convoy.
Provincial police spokesman, Matiullah Helal, told VOA, the blast killed a woman passerby and wounded five other civilians, but did not harm any foreign troops.

There are about 300 US Marines in Helmand province training and assisting the Afghan police and army forces. The area is a hotspot due to the opium fields that blanket the area. The Taliban use the opium trade to earn money to fund operations.

The woman civilian killed in the blast of the convoy died when her house, near the ambush, collapsed from the blast on top of her.

To read the entire article from Voice of America, click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Pentagon Doubts Russian Withdrawal From Syria Claim

The Pentagon isn’t buying into the claims by Russian President Vladimir Putin that the Russian are pulling a “significant part” of their troops from Syria after their mission in the war-torn country has been completed.

Putin visited the country on Monday and it is estimated to have 10,000 active duty troops and private contractors currently in Syria. But his message of “mission accomplished” is being met with a healthy dose of skepticism in Washington.

But Pentagon spokesman Major Adrian Rankine-Galloway said such declarations were not necessarily reflected by action.
“Russian comments about removal of their forces do not often correspond with actual troop reductions, and do not affect US priorities in Syria,” he said. A US official told AFP that Putin was likely to carry out a “token withdrawal” of some aircraft, then follow up by demanding the United States pulls its forces out of Syria. The US military last week said it would stay in Syria, where it is fighting the Islamic State group, as long as necessary to ensure the jihadists don’t return.
The “coalition will continue to operate in Syria in support of local forces on the ground to complete the military defeat of ISIS and stabilize liberated territory, in turn allowing for displaced Syrians and refugees to return,” Rankine-Galloway said.

The Syrian civil war against the government of President Assad started off as simply protests against the strongman’s totalitarian regime. But soon escalated into civil war. With the addition of the Islamic State, trying to set up a “caliphate” inside Syria, the US became involved, supporting peshmerga units in 2015.

To read the entire article from The Al-Monitor click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Richard Gatling Applies for a Patent on His Gatling Gun, December, 1862

The Gatling gun is one of the most iconic early rapid-firing guns, a forerunner to the machine gun that revolutionized warfare. Gatling’s spring loaded, hand-cranked weapon was first used by Union forces during the American Civil War in the early 1860s, but it didn’t see widespread use by US forces until after the war.

Dr. Richard Gatling designed the weapon he said, in a hope to reduce the size of armies, and by showing how futile combat is, the number of combat deaths would decrease.

Gatling was born in Hertford County, North Carolina in 1818, he was an inventor who came up with a screw propeller for steamboats, and then after teaching school for a brief time invented the rice-sowing machine and a wheat drill which aided in the planting of wheat. Both of these inventions were lauded for their innovation in helping the farming industry.

When he was in his late 20s an attack of smallpox got Gatling interested in medicine. He graduated Ohio Medical College as an MD but his passion lay in inventing and not being a doctor.

When the Civil War began, he was living in Indianapolis, Indiana. He invented the Gatling Gun in 1861 and began the Gatling Gun Company a year later.

The Gatling gun’s operation centered on a cyclic multi-barrel design which aided in the cooling and integrate the firing/reloading sequence. Each barrel fired a single shot when the hand crank reached a certain point in the firing cycle, then eject the spent cartridge, load a new round, and, in the process, allowed the barrel to cool somewhat. This configuration allowed higher rates of fire to be achieved without the barrels overheating.

This design, although massive updated and improved, is in theory what the multi-barrel miniguns of today were based on, including the M-134 minigun and M-61 Vulcan.

Gatling’s rapid-fire gun used multiple rotating barrels turned by a gunner using a hand crank, and firing loose metal cartridge ammunition using a gravity feed system from a hopper. The weapon didn’t use links or a belt which is what later models of machine guns would be utilizing and are still used today.

The use of multiple barrels was a brilliant idea to limit the weapon from overheating, a rotating mechanism, and the gravity-feed reloading system, which allowed a new gunner to reach an unheard of high rate of fire for the time of 200 rounds per minute.

031023-N-6967M-234
One member of Special Boat Team 22 (SBT-22) lays down cover fire with a minigun during a practice narrow river beach extraction.
Photo by PH1 Shane T. McCoy

Basic Design: (from Wiki) The Gatling gun operated by a hand-crank mechanism, with six barrels revolving around a central shaft (although some models had as many as ten). Each barrel fires once per revolution at about the same position. The barrels, a carrier, and a lock cylinder were separate and all mounted on a solid plate revolving around a central shaft, mounted on an oblong fixed frame. Turning the crank rotated the shaft. The carrier was grooved and the lock cylinder was drilled with holes corresponding to the barrels.

The casing was partitioned, and through this opening, the barrel shaft was journaled. In front of the casing was a cam with spiral surfaces. The cam imparted a reciprocating motion to the locks when the gun rotated. Also in the casing was a cocking ring with projections to cock and fire the gun. Each barrel had a single lock, working in the lock cylinder on a line with the barrel. The lock cylinder was encased and joined to the frame. Early models had a fibrous matting stuffed in among the barrels, which could be soaked with water to cool the barrels down. Later models eliminated the matting-filled barrels as being unnecessary.

Cartridges, held in a hopper, dropped individually into the grooves of the carrier. The lock was simultaneously forced by the cam to move forward and load the cartridge, and when the cam was at its highest point, the cocking ring freed the lock and fired the cartridge. After the cartridge was fired the continuing action of the cam drew back the lock bringing with it the spent cartridge which then dropped to the ground.

By 1893, the Gatling was adapted to take the new .30 Army smokeless cartridge. The new M1893 guns featured six barrels, later increased to ten barrels, and were capable of a maximum (initial) rate of fire of 800–900 rounds per minute, though 600 rpm was recommended for continuous fire. Dr. Gatling later used examples of the M1893 powered by electric motor and belt to drive the crank. Tests demonstrated the electric Gatling could fire bursts of up to 1,500 rpm.

Civil War Use: The Gatling gun was not accepted for use by the Army during the early years of the war. However, in 1864, several Union commanders purchased 12 Gatling guns out of their own pocket to use during the heavy fighting in and around Petersburg. The guns were placed in the trenches in support of the Union troops sieging Petersburg between June 1864 until the city fell in April 1865. The Gatling Gun was finally accepted into the US Army in 1866.

Later Use: The Army used Gatling Guns during the Indian wars in the west, although one commander, George Armstrong Custer, decided against bringing his Gatling Guns in the operation against the Sioux in 1876 at the Little Big Horn. His unit, the 7th Cavalry was wiped out.

The British adopted the Gatling Gun and used it to great effect in Africa against the Zulu tribesmen. The Imperial Russian Army used them against mounted mass attacks of Turkish cavalry.

The Americans used them during the Spanish-American War in Cuba. They served as support weapons during the charge up San Juan Hill.

Photos: Wikipedia

Pentagon to Indefinitely Delay a Ban on Cluster Munitions

The Pentagon’s plan to ban the use of older types of cluster bombs due to take effect on Jan. 1, 2019, has been delayed indefinitely. US officials are stating that safety improvements in munitions technology, in particular, because of a large number of bombs that failed to explode hasn’t advanced enough to replace older stockpiles.

Cluster bombs can be dropped by air or fired by artillery, and they scatter tiny bomblets across a wide area but are prone many times with the failure to explode. That can make them a deadly side effect long after the conflict and poses a danger to civilians.

The U.S. military had hoped to transition to cluster munitions that explode at least 99 percent of time, greatly reducing the risks.
“Although the Department seeks to field a new generation of more highly reliable munitions, we cannot risk mission failure or accept the potential of increased military and civilian casualties by forfeiting the best available capabilities,” the Pentagon memo says.
Disclosure of the new policy met sharp criticism from Congress and human rights groups.
Senator Patrick Leahy, a Democrat who has helped lead efforts to restrict use of cluster bombs, said the Pentagon was, in effect, “perpetuating use of an indiscriminate weapon that has been shown to have high failure rates.”
Senator Dianne Feinstein called the move “unbelievable.”

The Pentagon has stated that they haven’t used cluster munitions in several years and is working on new technology that will result in a 99 percent rate of explosion when dropped as well as a built-in safety device that will render the bomblets inert after 15 minutes of being dropped.

To read the entire article from Reuters click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

U.S. To Cut Off Weapons Shipments to Syrian Kurdish SDF

After doing the lion’s share of the fighting in capturing the Syrian city of Raqqa, the Kurds are getting bad news. President Trump announced that the US will no longer be arming the Syrian Kurds in a phone call to the Turkish President.

That move is another blow for the Kurdish people who have been doing the majority of the fighting in clearing the Islamic State from large areas of Syria. But it is good news for the Turkish government who view the Kurds as terrorists.

In a phone call Friday with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Trump said he’d “given clear instructions” that the Kurds receive no more weapons — “and that this nonsense should have ended a long time ago,” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. The White House confirmed the move in a cryptic statement about the phone call that said Trump had informed the Turks of “pending adjustments to the military support provided to our partners on the ground in Syria.”
The move could help ease strained tensions between the U.S. and Turkey, two NATO allies that have been sharply at odds about how best to wage the fight against Islamic State. Turkey considers the Kurdish Syrian fighters, known by the initials YPG, to be terrorists because of their affiliation to outlawed Kurdish rebels that have waged a three decade-long insurgency in Turkey. Yet the U.S. chose to partner with the YPG in Syria anyway, arguing that the battle-hardened Kurds were the most effective fighting force available.
Cavusoglu, who said he was in the room with Erdogan during Trump’s call, quoted the U.S. president as saying he had given instructions to U.S. generals and to national security advisor H.R. McMaster that “no weapons would be issued.”
“Of course, we were very happy with this,” Cavusoglu said.

It appears that both the Pentagon and Kurds were caught by surprise by this announcement by the President. The US has been arming, training, and advising the Kurds, who comprise the SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces). There are several hundred US Special Operations troops currently embedded with the SDF in Syria.

To read the entire article from the Los Angeles Times click here:

Photo courtesy: Wikipedia