Originally published in MilitaryWeek.com, 24 May 05

Beyond the DropZone

W. Thomas Smith Jr.

"PhDs with guns"
Linda Robinson's "Masters of Chaos: The Secret History of the Special Forces"

Few Americans had ever heard of Special Forces before the release of the Vietnam-era movie, The Green Berets (1968), starring John Wayne. But by 1982, when First Blood – starring Sylvester Stallone as a former Special Forces soldier on a payback rampage – was released, almost every American schoolboy had at some point fancied himself a member of the U.S. Army's vaunted Green Berets.

Countless books and articles have since been written about the Army's Special Forces, but U.S. News & World Report senior writer Linda Robinson goes beyond the surface bravado and imagery, instead offering a comprehensive inside look at the dangerous training, the heart-stopping operations (many previously classified), and the Templar's souls of the men who wear the silver dagger and crossed-arrows.

In her book, Masters of Chaos: The Secret History of the Special Forces, Robinson draws on myriad interviews, official documents, archival materials, and her own experiences as an "embedded" journalist. She removes the proverbial veil from the faces of those currently involved in the dark side of U.S. military operations. She paints them as everyday husbands and dads, equally at home behind a lawnmower as they are a Heckler and Koch MP5 submachine-gun. She then points to their special skills as a critical component in the war on terror. "The only way that a nimble and elusive adversary can be defeated is if elite soldiers are able to exercise initiative and creativity," Robinson says.

U.S. Army special operations forces – which today includes Rangers (essentially, special light-infantry), Special Forces (also known as Green Berets), super-secret Delta Force operators (primarily drawn from Special Forces units), and aviation, psychological operations, and civil affairs elements – have existed in some fashion as a part of the American armed forces since 1675. Then Captain Benjamin Church led a group of Colonial Rangers against American Indian forces during King Philip's War, a brief but bloody conflict that spread across much of New England.

For the next 300 years, America experimented with the employment of irregular fighters. The operational importance of such forces was ratcheted-up during World War II. That importance increased dramatically during the early days of the Vietnam War, and to an almost exponentially greater degree since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

Affectionately known as "snake eaters" because of their ability to live off the land, Special Forces soldiers are extraordinary men (women are not permitted to join special operations forces in any branch of the military) who are trained and equipped to conduct special military operations which the average soldier is not normally trained or equipped to carry out. In most cases, Special Forces soldiers are in their late twenties and early thirties. The consensus among military experts is that men operating in a special warfare environment need to be at least that old to have the military experience and the emotional and intellectual maturity required for unconventional missions. That said, with the war on terror increasing the demand for special operatives in the field, younger men are indeed appearing in the ranks. But no matter the age, all special operations warriors must be in far better physical condition than the average soldier in his early twenties.

Many Special Forces soldiers are college educated. They are trained to handle a variety of weapons and sophisticated navigational aids. They are capable of operating at night, in poor weather conditions, independently of large regular units, and deep behind the enemy's lines – arriving at their objectives on foot, by land-vehicle, helicopter, SCUBA tank, or parachute.

Special Forces men also have to be able to work and play well with others. Literally. "Southerners, who have a long martial tradition, might have a hidden advantage" in that regard, says Robinson. "They seemed innately suited, with their talking skills, charm, and good-old-boy routines that were invaluable aids in the diplomacy that the job required." After all, unconventional warfare, according to Robinson is "equal parts diplomacy and combat." Special Forces combatants operate as both independent fighters and military advisors, each of whom specialize in a particular area of expertise (i.e. medicine, communications, weapons). As advisors, they are tasked with training resistance or guerrilla troops in foreign countries. In nearly all cases, they must be able to speak at least one language other than English; and they are trained for a variety of missions such as direct action, guerilla operations, special reconnaissance, and counter-terrorism.

Robinson's book details the rigors of Special Forces training – considered in many instances to be more challenging than the operations themselves.

"Soldiers had weeks and months to take the measure of each other in the brambles and tar pits and creeks," she writes. "After they were pushed to their limits physically, they would be sent to the classroom to absorb massive amounts of information and be tested on it." In this way, Special Forces instructors, she says, would not only gauge the candidate's ability to master the classroom information, but evaluate their ability to do so under conditions of extreme stress and fatigue.

According to Robinson, "There were also team tests that required collaboration – loners would fail. Not even Samson could move a ton of equipment alone with four wheels and two poles, which was one of the challenges posed."

Officers and enlisted men train together. "Distinctions of rank mattered less than whether you could pull your weight," says Robinson.

Upon completing the approximately one-year of "try-outs," the newly graduated Special Forces soldier dons his green beret. It is a coveted award, but unlike the public perception gleaned from pop culture, it is not a title. Post-Vietnam Special Forces "did not like to call themselves Green Berets," says Robinson. "They preferred to say they earned the green beret or wore the green beret."

Robinson's descriptions of Special Forces missions are as dramatic and colorful as the operations themselves. In one instance, she details the hair-raising helicopter extraction of an isolated Special Forces team in Iraq, in the dead of night. As the chopper thunders back toward the Kuwaiti border, an exhausted team leader – Lt. Col. Chris Conner – shouts to the pilot, "I will buy you a beer anytime, anywhere, on demand, for the rest of your life."

In another instance, Robinson describes the close-quarters training and re-training received by Special Forces operatives as a "series of highly precise procedures for moving in groups, covering each other, discriminating among targets, and delivering lethal blows in hand-to-hand combat. It was a kind of mortal ballet to be performed only by professionals."

Robinson writes about dark missions with a deft touch, and her position to do so is somewhat unique: A reporter "embedded" with special operations forces during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003, she also was granted special access by the Army to conduct a series of interviews with Special Forces soldiers which led her to Afghanistan, numerous visits to military bases around the United States, and a return-trip to Iraq. Earlier research involving Special Forces began with a 2001 Nieman fellowship at Harvard and led to a South American jaunt where she watched Special Forces troopers operating in Colombia.

Robinson's book is both compelling and revealing. For the first time, light is shed on unknown or little-known operations in the war on terror: Hunting Osama bin Laden and his Al Queda lieutenants in the mountains of Tora Bora. Conducting the longest special reconnaissance mission in Special Forces history. And developing the intelligence used in the rescue of Private Jessica Lynch.

The attack on Sargat – a major international terrorist training camp in Iraq, just over the Iranian border – is also covered in great detail. The camp was operated by Ansar al-Islam, a group that had received funding from, among others, Abu Musab al Zarqawi (the notorious headsman of Fallujah). And Robinson suggests through the voices of the American soldiers on the ground that it is indeed "more than plausible" that Al Queda terrorists trained there.

"He [the Special Forces team sergeant] believed, given the heavy fortifications, ample weaponry, and quality of the fighters, that his team had just invaded the world's largest existing terrorist training camp since the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan," writes Robinson. "This was no way-station, in his view. It was remote yet in the heart of the region, so radicals could wreak havoc all over the Middle East. It provided a backdoor escape [from Iraq] through Iran – a country virtually sealed off to the western world."

And to think, some still question our motivations for invading Iraq.

— W. Thomas Smith Jr., a former U.S. Marine infantry leader, parachutist, and shipboard counterterrorism instructor, writes about military/defense issues and has covered conflict in the Balkans and on the West Bank. He is an award-winning author of four books, the co-author of two, and his articles have appeared in USA Today, George, U.S. News & World Report, BusinessWeek, National Review Online, CBS News, The Washington Times, and many others.

W. Thomas Smith Jr. can be reached at wthomassmithjr@yahoo.com.

© 2005 W. Thomas Smith Jr.

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