United States Army Special Forces


The United States Army Special Forces, colloquially known as the "Green Berets" due to their distinctive service headgear, is a branch of the United States Army Special Operations Command.
The core missionset of Special Forces contains five doctrinal missions: unconventional warfare, foreign internal defense, direct action, counterterrorism, and special reconnaissance. The unit emphasizes language, cultural, and training skills in working with foreign troops; recruits are required to learn a foreign language as part of their training and must maintain knowledge of the political, economic, and cultural complexities of the regions in which they are deployed. Other Special Forces missions, known as secondary missions, include combat search and rescue, counter-narcotics, hostage rescue, humanitarian assistance, humanitarian demining, peacekeeping, and manhunts. Other components of the United States Special Operations Command or other U.S. government activities may also specialize in these secondary missions. The Special Forces conduct these missions via five active duty groups, each with a geographic specialization; and two National Guard groups that share multiple geographic areas of responsibility. Many of their operational techniques are classified, but some nonfiction works and doctrinal manuals are available.
Special Forces have a longstanding and close relationship with the Central Intelligence Agency, tracing their lineage back to the agency's predecessors in the OSS and First Special Service Force. The CIA's highly secretive Special Activities Center, and more specifically its Special Operations Group, recruits from U.S. Army Special Forces. Joint CIA–Army Special Forces operations go back to the unit MACV-SOG during the Vietnam War, and were seen as recently as the war in Afghanistan.

Mission

The primary mission of the Army Special Forces is to train and lead unconventional warfare forces, or a clandestine guerrilla force in an occupied nation. The 10th Special Forces Group was the first deployed SF unit, intended to train and lead UW forces behind enemy lines in the event of a Warsaw Pact invasion of Western Europe. As the U.S. became involved in Southeast Asia, it was realized that specialists trained to lead guerrillas could also help defend against hostile guerrillas, so SF acquired the additional mission of Foreign Internal Defense, working with Host Nation forces in a spectrum of counter-guerrilla activities from indirect support to combat command.
Special Forces personnel qualify both in advanced military skills and the regional languages and cultures of defined parts of the world. While they are best known for their unconventional warfare capabilities, they also undertake other missions that include direct action raids, peace operations, counter-proliferation, counter-drug advisory roles, and other strategic missions. As strategic resources, they report either to USSOCOM or to a regional Unified Combatant Command. To enhance their DA capability, specific units were created with a focus on the direct action side of special operations. First known as Commander's In-extremis Force, then Crisis Response Forces, they are now supplanted by Hard-Target Defeat companies which have been renamed Critical Threats Advisory Companies.
SF team members work closely together and rely on one another under isolated circumstances for long periods of time, both during extended deployments and in garrison. SF non-commissioned officers often spend their entire careers in Special Forces, rotating among assignments to detachments, higher staff billets, liaison positions, and instructor duties at the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School. With the creation of USSOCOM, SF commanders have risen to the highest ranks of U.S. Army command, including command of USSOCOM, the Army's chief of staff, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

History

In 1951, Major General Robert A. McClure chose former World War Two OSS member Colonel Aaron Bank as Operations Branch Chief of the Special Operations Division of the Psychological Warfare Staff in the Pentagon. In June 1952 the 10th Special Forces Group was formed under Bank, soon after the establishment of the Psychological Warfare School, which eventually became John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School. The 10th Special Forces Group was then split with the cadre that kept the designation 10th SFG deployed to Bad Tölz, Germany, in September 1953; and again with the establishment of Detachment A in 1956. The remaining part at Fort Bragg formed the 77th Special Forces Group, which in May 1960 was reorganized and designated as today's 7th Special Forces Group.
Since their establishment in 1952, Special Forces soldiers have operated in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, North Vietnam, Guatemala, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Colombia, Panama, Haiti, Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo, 1st Gulf War, Afghanistan, Iraq, the Philippines, Syria, Yemen, Niger and, in a FID role, East Africa.
The Special Forces branch was established as a basic branch of the United States Army on 9 April 1987 by Department of the Army General Order No. 35.

Organizational structure

1st Special Forces Command

Special Forces Groups

In 1957 the two original Special Forces groups were joined by the 1st SFG, stationed in the Far East. Additional groups were formed in 1961 and 1962 after President John F. Kennedy visited the Special Forces at Fort Bragg in 1961. The 5th SFG was activated on 21 September 1961; the 8th SFG on 1 April 1963; the 6th SFG on 1 May 1963; and the 3rd SFG on 5 December 1963. In addition, there have been seven Reserve groups and four National Guard groups. A 4th SFG, 14th SFG, 15th SFG, 18th SFG, 22nd SFG, and 23rd SFG were in existence at some point. Many of these groups were not fully staffed and most were deactivated around 1966.
In the early twenty-first century, Special Forces are divided into five active duty and two Army National Guard Special Forces groups. Each Special Forces Group has a specific regional focus. The Special Forces soldiers assigned to these groups receive intensive language and cultural training for countries within their regional area of responsibility. Due to the increased need for Special Forces soldiers in the war on terror, all groups—including those of the National Guard —have been deployed outside of their areas of operation, particularly to Iraq and Afghanistan. A recently released report showed Special Forces as perhaps the most deployed SOF under USSOCOM, with many soldiers, regardless of group, serving up to 75% of their careers overseas, almost all of which had been to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Until 2014, an SF group has consisted of three battalions, but since the Department of Defense has authorized the 1st Special Forces Command to increase its authorized strength by one third, a fourth battalion was activated in each active component group.
A Special Forces group is historically assigned to a Unified Combatant Command or a theater of operations. The Special Forces Operational Detachment C or C-detachment is responsible for a theater or a major subcomponent, which can provide command and control of up to 18 SFODAs, three SFODB, or a mixture of the two. Subordinate to it is the Special Forces Operational Detachment Bs or B-detachments, which can provide command and control for six SFODAs. Further subordinate, the SFODAs typically raise company- to battalion-sized units when on unconventional warfare missions. They can form six-man "split A" detachments that are often used for special reconnaissance.

Battalion Headquarters Element – SF Operational Detachment-C (SFODC) composition

The SFODC, or "C-Team", is the headquarters element of a Special Forces battalion. As such, it is a command and control unit with operations, training, signals, and logistic support responsibilities to its three subordinate line companies. A lieutenant colonel commands the battalion as well as the C-Team, and the Battalion Command Sergeant Major is the senior NCO of the battalion and the C-Team. There are an additional 20–30 SF personnel who fill key positions in operations, logistics, intelligence, communications, and medical. A Special Forces battalion usually consists of four companies: "A", "B", "C", and Headquarters/Support.

Company Headquarters Element – SF Operational Detachment-B (SFODB) composition

The ODB, or "B-Team", is the headquarters element of a Special Forces company, and it is usually composed of 11–13 soldiers. While the A-team typically conducts direct operations, the purpose of the B-Team is to support the company's A-Teams both in garrison and in the field. The B-Teams are numbered similarly to A-Teams, but the fourth number in the sequence is a 0. For example, ODB 5210 would be 5th Special Forces Group, 2nd Battalion, A Company's ODB.
The ODB is led by an 18A, usually a major, who is the company commander. The CO is assisted by his company executive officer, another 18A, usually a captain. The XO is himself assisted by a company technician, a 180A, generally, a chief warrant officer three, who assists in the direction of the organization, training, intelligence, counter-intelligence, and operations for the company and its detachments. The company commander is assisted by a senior non-commissioned officer, an 18Z, usually a sergeant major. A second 18Z acts as the operations sergeant, usually a master sergeant, who assists the XO and technician in their operational duties. He has an 18F assistant operations sergeant, who is usually a sergeant first class. The company's support comes from an 18D medical sergeant, usually a sergeant first class, and two 18E communications sergeants, usually a sergeant first class and a staff sergeant.
Support positions as part of the ODB/B Team within an SF company are as follows: