rotorwash
10-08-05, 02:17
The “Left Behind Guys”, The Beginning of U.S. Special Forces
Authors note: This is the condensed version of the history of the first group of U.S. Army Green Berets. If it seems to lack objectivity it is because I have not been objective since I first walked beneath the entrance sign to Smoke Bomb Hill, the one that said, “Through These Gates Walk the Quietist Men in the World.” I proudly wore the Beret for three years until I left on a medical discharge.
After WWII the U.S. did just like it did after ever war in the past, collected the weapons, took back the uniforms and sent every body home. To the point that when the Berlin crisis erupted, the U.S. Army contribution to fledgling NATO and the defense of Europe was one infantry division and three under strength cavalry regiments facing the potential of a hundred Russian divisions. Needless to say, the pucker factor at the Pentagon went through the roof until the crisis was over and deep breaths were allowed again. But Joe Stalin had gotten everyone’s attention. He had made it obvious that his push for more territory was inevitable, it was only a matter of time. Suddenly, ideas were being considered, no matter how bizarre they had previously been considered by an officer core that had reverted back to spit and polish after the warriors had been pushed aside, a condition also typical of the American Army when a war was over.
One of the ideas advanced was presented by former members of the OSS, individuals normally avoided in the halls of the Pentagon. On the outside chance the idea might be taken seriously, it was suggested that teams of specialists be inserted behind the lines to organize resistance movements after the Russians attacked. As was expected, the idea was laughed into the back of a file cabinet. Then the Russians achieved atomic parity, the North Koreans attacked and intelligence concluded that Stalin would attack the rest of Europe no later then 1954. Suddenly the hilarious plan presented by those strange former OSS types wasn’t funny anymore. Korea provided an opportunity for the conventional soldiers to engage in behind the lines activity, it was generally acknowledged as a serious failure, largely because of a “lack of professionalism, poor planning and lack of coordination” to paraphrase the official sources. Small, elite Ranger companies were formed at the start of the Korean War, but they were squandered when they were committed as conventional units. It was obvious to all but the most rigidly conservative of the military establishment that special ops training must be established before a war starts and should be based around the idea of selecting and training men in special units with unique equipment, doctrine and support. This was not a new idea, and whenever it had been correctly implemented had been successful, yet resistance to the idea would require presidential intervention.
The rebirth of the concept took place in a very illogical place, the Psychological Operations Staff Section of the Pentagon where many of the men from WWII who had seen the success of guerrilla operations firsthand were collected in a brand new Special Warfare Division. These individuals were gathered, many almost secretly, by the energetic chief of the Psy Ops Section, Gen. Robert McClure. The mission of the Special Warfare Division gradually became defined as developing concepts and guerrilla warfare plans for WWIII, an inevitable event in the minds of Western leadership.
Opposition arose among the usual suspects, the G-2 and G-3 Divisions of the Army, but were effectively hamstrung by a receptive Army Chief of Staff and a former psy war soldier who had become a special advisor to the President. More serious opposition arose, however, in a conspiracy of common cause formed secretly by two brand new organizations, the Air Force and the CIA. Many of the old OSS types had migrated to the CIA and were pushing for a civilian agency for conducting special warfare. They were quietly supported by the State Department who had been shunted aside by Secretary of State George C. Marshall who much preferred having military officers in command of occupations (such as MacArthur in Japan) as opposed to civilian diplomats. In the Air Force, the big bang enthusiasts envisioned a very small Army who would simply clean up the pieces and finish off what was left of the enemy after CIA run guerrillas and massive bombing would send them back to the stone age. This plan was focused around five Air Force wings that would drop agents and supplies and would provide communications, as well as conduct psychological warfare. This planning was well underway without the knowledge of the other services or the Joint Chiefs of Staff, so when the Army presented the officially sanctioned plan for Special Warfare, the skeleton fell out of the closet with a resounding crash and sibling rivalry of monster movie proportions erupted in the halls of the Pentagon. But the die was cast, the Air Force wings were clipped and the Army got the go ahead to develop plans for guerrilla warfare. Army Special Forces survived a rough birth, born out of a fear of Russian military strength and bad memories from Korea, was kept alive in spite of serious inter-service rivalry by a handful of dedicated proponents acting as midwives, as one writer put it, “a bastard unloved by everyone except the lunatic fringe.”
In April, 1952 Col Aaron Bank was assigned to the Psy War Center located on an obscure corner of Fort Bragg, well away from the airborne activities that still focused on the Army dream of big battalions jumping into big wars. It was hoped by the Army brass that Korea was a nightmare, like those created by eating pizza right at bedtime. “Dirty tricks” and behind-the-lines stuff was beneath regular Army types and belonged out there with the untrustworthy long-haired psy war weirdos.
Bank was no stranger to unconventional warfare, he had jumped three times into France and once into Indochina with the OSS. He had been operations chief in the Special Warfare division and knew what was needed and what he wanted. On the 20th 0f June, 1952, the 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne) was formed with ten individuals on the roster. The organization grew slowly, it contained only about 2000 men by 1960 (it still only contains about 4500 men). The career managers at the Pentagon knew little about Special Forces and steered ambitious young regulars away, but Bank, mostly by word of mouth, recruited former OSS and Rangers who were frustrated at the Palace Guard role the Airborne divisions had become. Along with the castoffs and misfits came the freethinkers - the innovators and creative people that chafed at rigid Army discipline, often those with reserve commissions that would never wear stars anyway, and after twenty years would drift over to AID or the CIA.
NCO’s were a different story. Bank had just three requirements, they had to be volunteers at least on their second enlistment, they had to be airborne, and they had to have volunteered for Special Forces. The professional NCO grapevine went to work with one soldier telling a friend who told another friend. Because NCO’s could stay in SF as long as there was a slot for their rank and MOS, many would spend their entire career there, and because Special Forces was so NCO oriented, the primary allegiance was to the detachment. A successful SF soldier must be a team player, and because the detachments maintained their integrity for long periods of time, it was easy to weed out the undesirables and recruit promising prospects. To quote an early SF commander as to the qualities looked for in an NCO, he listed adaptability, able to handle pressure, sought additional responsibility, cooperative, dependable, required a minimum of supervision, able to motivate, has to have ingenuity, self discipline, stamina and tact. Very few of those qualities are taught by the Army. And when those qualities are present in any measure you get self confidence - sometimes bordering on arrogance. As a result Special Forces acquired a reputation as snobs who ridicule less gifted men while having too high a regard for themselves.
In spite of the spit and polish crowd, the quality of Special Forces NCO’s has continued to meet Bank’s expectations. At any one time the Sergeant Major’s Academy has enough qualified students to form several SF detachments. During the Viet Nam War, a number of SF master sergeants were given direct commissions to captain.
Another type of individual, known collectively as the “Lodge boys” made their way into Special Forces but they came from a totally different source. Sponsored by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, S.B. 875 provided foreign nationals U.S. citizenship if they joined the U.S. military. Soon soldiers from every country in Europe and some from Asia began filtering into the SF system. A Czech, Pole or former member of the German Army who might feel out of place in a regular infantry platoon would become a valued member of a detachment, and if the team were inserted into the individual’s home country, they would be a key figure. The fact that most of the foreign nationals coming to SF were multi-lingual was not lost on SF leadership, and before long SF began to take on a singularly Foreign Legion air. Soon another trait that would become a trademark of SF began to surface, the distinctive closed mouth secrecy that surrounded SF operations until the mid 1960's. The reason for this was that many of the Lodge boys had family in Communist occupied countries and a very real fear for their safety caused them to be secretive, a condition that was supported and encouraged by their American team mates.
So international became the detachments that a typical joke around SF told about the sergeant-major who thought he was reading a team roster but was actually reading the line-up for the Notre Dame defense. Regular Army types chafed at the thought that a sleeper could sneak in, but the close relationships on the detachments created an atmosphere where disloyalty would be quickly spotted. An added benefit for the SF program was provided by the Lodge boys because virtually every one was a combat veteran and many had seen service behind enemy lines during WWII. SF had international cross training as close as the next detachment where a former French Legionaire, an Irishman, an Israeli, some ex-British Para’s and a Finn or Russian might be assigned.
Members of the detachments trained at all of the Army schools, then trained at foreign military schools, then trained each other. Weapons men could not only fire and maintain, but they could repair any weapon they might encounter, and if they didn’t have a weapon, there was a good chance they could build it, from zip guns to rocket launchers. Demolitions men could produce explosives and detonators from locally procured materials. They studied hydroelectric plants, factories, transformer stations, and rail yards to find critical points easily knocked out. Nothing was harmless or safe, from a fountain pen to a locomotive. Communications men had to transmit and receive Morse Code at twenty words a minute, and teach every other team member how to do eight words a minute. They had to know radio and antenna theory well enough to transmit and receive 1500 miles on a radio they carried on their back, yet keep the power low enough to avoid detection. Medical specialists received the most intense training culminating in the “dog labs” at Fort Sam Houston. If a team member got appendicitis or a hangnail, there would be no evacuation, only the team medic. And he had to train the other members of the team. Team camaraderie was stretched when it came time to practice shots and IV’s on each other. Team officers, team sergeants and intel sergeants studied the top secret targeting data developed during the war to learn about the geographic areas of operations in Europe, including language and customs of each area, possible locations of guerrilla operations and escape and evasion routes.
Because they were destined for Europe if war broke, the 10th Special Forces spent considerable time away from Fort Bragg training in the German Mountains of Bavaria and soon the mountains around Bad Tolz were dotted with secret little huts made of C-ration cartons where the SF trained. Because SF carried there entire life on their back, it wasn’t long before the standard army backpack was rejected in favor of the large mountain rucksack. The next thing to go was the trade mark jump boots of American airborne troops, replaced by the ugly, heavy “waffle stompers” made by the cobblers in Bavaria. Much to regular Army chagrin, they became a trademark of the 10th Special Forces.
Training of the “A” detachments was simple, any piece of remote terrain was suitable, the more difficult the better. A detachment did not require much in the way of support, they had no organic equipment they didn’t carry on their backs. The Air Force was constantly flying training missions so it wasn’t hard to get an airplane to fly over an area and let twelve guys go out the door. Typical training jumps were made at night into small drop zones. Using smoke jumper equipment developed by the Forest Service, jumps were made into forests with no cleared drop zone at all. A boxcar full of surplus Air Force parachutes and SF wives sewing machines gave Special Forces the opportunity to develop high altitude-low opening (HALO) techniques at the Fort Bragg Sport Parachute Club. Some of these early Special Forces people would form the Army’s Golden Knights Demonstration Parachute Team. Almost all of the early SF were SCUBA trained and soon developed Navy contacts that would allow them to pester a submarine commander into letting them practice “lock in-lock out” techniques-getting in and out while the sub was submerged. Cross country skiing and mountain climbing became specialties of the 10th and would be taught to other SF on the 2000 foot cliffs in the Bavarian Mountains.
After thirteen months of training the 10th reported itself ready for operations. The Joint Chiefs had approved the concepts and plans, so now everyone found themselves just waiting for whatever was next. The “next” occurred in June 1953 with a worker’s revolt in East Berlin that was brutally put down. It was realized that even though internal revolution had not been part of the original concept, it provided the same opportunities for SF to move in and operate successfully supporting the resistance. It also was realized that Fort Bragg was too far removed from Europe for rapid deployment, so in November, 1953, 782 members of the still secret Special Forces stood in formation on the docks at the Army depot at Wilmington, NC wearing uniforms with no markings but name tags. Troops on the ship jeered at the new “recruits” politely silent as they stood at ease. The “recruits” on the dock were all NCO’s and no first enlistments. There were no second lieutenants, and the captains and first lieutenants all had many years in grade, for promotion came slowly in these years. The enlisted men of many of the detachments averaged over thirty years of age and ten years of service, not all of it in the U.S. Army. To the shock of the wise guys on the ship, the “recruits” appeared back on deck after sailing, with stripes of rank, jump wings and medals representing long service and many campaigns.
As 1954 dawned, the 10th was settling in to a former Wermacht officers training center at Bad Tolz, Germany while a new group, the 77th was formed in the old Psy Ops corner of Fort Bragg, Smoke Bomb Hill.
Authors note: This is the condensed version of the history of the first group of U.S. Army Green Berets. If it seems to lack objectivity it is because I have not been objective since I first walked beneath the entrance sign to Smoke Bomb Hill, the one that said, “Through These Gates Walk the Quietist Men in the World.” I proudly wore the Beret for three years until I left on a medical discharge.
After WWII the U.S. did just like it did after ever war in the past, collected the weapons, took back the uniforms and sent every body home. To the point that when the Berlin crisis erupted, the U.S. Army contribution to fledgling NATO and the defense of Europe was one infantry division and three under strength cavalry regiments facing the potential of a hundred Russian divisions. Needless to say, the pucker factor at the Pentagon went through the roof until the crisis was over and deep breaths were allowed again. But Joe Stalin had gotten everyone’s attention. He had made it obvious that his push for more territory was inevitable, it was only a matter of time. Suddenly, ideas were being considered, no matter how bizarre they had previously been considered by an officer core that had reverted back to spit and polish after the warriors had been pushed aside, a condition also typical of the American Army when a war was over.
One of the ideas advanced was presented by former members of the OSS, individuals normally avoided in the halls of the Pentagon. On the outside chance the idea might be taken seriously, it was suggested that teams of specialists be inserted behind the lines to organize resistance movements after the Russians attacked. As was expected, the idea was laughed into the back of a file cabinet. Then the Russians achieved atomic parity, the North Koreans attacked and intelligence concluded that Stalin would attack the rest of Europe no later then 1954. Suddenly the hilarious plan presented by those strange former OSS types wasn’t funny anymore. Korea provided an opportunity for the conventional soldiers to engage in behind the lines activity, it was generally acknowledged as a serious failure, largely because of a “lack of professionalism, poor planning and lack of coordination” to paraphrase the official sources. Small, elite Ranger companies were formed at the start of the Korean War, but they were squandered when they were committed as conventional units. It was obvious to all but the most rigidly conservative of the military establishment that special ops training must be established before a war starts and should be based around the idea of selecting and training men in special units with unique equipment, doctrine and support. This was not a new idea, and whenever it had been correctly implemented had been successful, yet resistance to the idea would require presidential intervention.
The rebirth of the concept took place in a very illogical place, the Psychological Operations Staff Section of the Pentagon where many of the men from WWII who had seen the success of guerrilla operations firsthand were collected in a brand new Special Warfare Division. These individuals were gathered, many almost secretly, by the energetic chief of the Psy Ops Section, Gen. Robert McClure. The mission of the Special Warfare Division gradually became defined as developing concepts and guerrilla warfare plans for WWIII, an inevitable event in the minds of Western leadership.
Opposition arose among the usual suspects, the G-2 and G-3 Divisions of the Army, but were effectively hamstrung by a receptive Army Chief of Staff and a former psy war soldier who had become a special advisor to the President. More serious opposition arose, however, in a conspiracy of common cause formed secretly by two brand new organizations, the Air Force and the CIA. Many of the old OSS types had migrated to the CIA and were pushing for a civilian agency for conducting special warfare. They were quietly supported by the State Department who had been shunted aside by Secretary of State George C. Marshall who much preferred having military officers in command of occupations (such as MacArthur in Japan) as opposed to civilian diplomats. In the Air Force, the big bang enthusiasts envisioned a very small Army who would simply clean up the pieces and finish off what was left of the enemy after CIA run guerrillas and massive bombing would send them back to the stone age. This plan was focused around five Air Force wings that would drop agents and supplies and would provide communications, as well as conduct psychological warfare. This planning was well underway without the knowledge of the other services or the Joint Chiefs of Staff, so when the Army presented the officially sanctioned plan for Special Warfare, the skeleton fell out of the closet with a resounding crash and sibling rivalry of monster movie proportions erupted in the halls of the Pentagon. But the die was cast, the Air Force wings were clipped and the Army got the go ahead to develop plans for guerrilla warfare. Army Special Forces survived a rough birth, born out of a fear of Russian military strength and bad memories from Korea, was kept alive in spite of serious inter-service rivalry by a handful of dedicated proponents acting as midwives, as one writer put it, “a bastard unloved by everyone except the lunatic fringe.”
In April, 1952 Col Aaron Bank was assigned to the Psy War Center located on an obscure corner of Fort Bragg, well away from the airborne activities that still focused on the Army dream of big battalions jumping into big wars. It was hoped by the Army brass that Korea was a nightmare, like those created by eating pizza right at bedtime. “Dirty tricks” and behind-the-lines stuff was beneath regular Army types and belonged out there with the untrustworthy long-haired psy war weirdos.
Bank was no stranger to unconventional warfare, he had jumped three times into France and once into Indochina with the OSS. He had been operations chief in the Special Warfare division and knew what was needed and what he wanted. On the 20th 0f June, 1952, the 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne) was formed with ten individuals on the roster. The organization grew slowly, it contained only about 2000 men by 1960 (it still only contains about 4500 men). The career managers at the Pentagon knew little about Special Forces and steered ambitious young regulars away, but Bank, mostly by word of mouth, recruited former OSS and Rangers who were frustrated at the Palace Guard role the Airborne divisions had become. Along with the castoffs and misfits came the freethinkers - the innovators and creative people that chafed at rigid Army discipline, often those with reserve commissions that would never wear stars anyway, and after twenty years would drift over to AID or the CIA.
NCO’s were a different story. Bank had just three requirements, they had to be volunteers at least on their second enlistment, they had to be airborne, and they had to have volunteered for Special Forces. The professional NCO grapevine went to work with one soldier telling a friend who told another friend. Because NCO’s could stay in SF as long as there was a slot for their rank and MOS, many would spend their entire career there, and because Special Forces was so NCO oriented, the primary allegiance was to the detachment. A successful SF soldier must be a team player, and because the detachments maintained their integrity for long periods of time, it was easy to weed out the undesirables and recruit promising prospects. To quote an early SF commander as to the qualities looked for in an NCO, he listed adaptability, able to handle pressure, sought additional responsibility, cooperative, dependable, required a minimum of supervision, able to motivate, has to have ingenuity, self discipline, stamina and tact. Very few of those qualities are taught by the Army. And when those qualities are present in any measure you get self confidence - sometimes bordering on arrogance. As a result Special Forces acquired a reputation as snobs who ridicule less gifted men while having too high a regard for themselves.
In spite of the spit and polish crowd, the quality of Special Forces NCO’s has continued to meet Bank’s expectations. At any one time the Sergeant Major’s Academy has enough qualified students to form several SF detachments. During the Viet Nam War, a number of SF master sergeants were given direct commissions to captain.
Another type of individual, known collectively as the “Lodge boys” made their way into Special Forces but they came from a totally different source. Sponsored by Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, S.B. 875 provided foreign nationals U.S. citizenship if they joined the U.S. military. Soon soldiers from every country in Europe and some from Asia began filtering into the SF system. A Czech, Pole or former member of the German Army who might feel out of place in a regular infantry platoon would become a valued member of a detachment, and if the team were inserted into the individual’s home country, they would be a key figure. The fact that most of the foreign nationals coming to SF were multi-lingual was not lost on SF leadership, and before long SF began to take on a singularly Foreign Legion air. Soon another trait that would become a trademark of SF began to surface, the distinctive closed mouth secrecy that surrounded SF operations until the mid 1960's. The reason for this was that many of the Lodge boys had family in Communist occupied countries and a very real fear for their safety caused them to be secretive, a condition that was supported and encouraged by their American team mates.
So international became the detachments that a typical joke around SF told about the sergeant-major who thought he was reading a team roster but was actually reading the line-up for the Notre Dame defense. Regular Army types chafed at the thought that a sleeper could sneak in, but the close relationships on the detachments created an atmosphere where disloyalty would be quickly spotted. An added benefit for the SF program was provided by the Lodge boys because virtually every one was a combat veteran and many had seen service behind enemy lines during WWII. SF had international cross training as close as the next detachment where a former French Legionaire, an Irishman, an Israeli, some ex-British Para’s and a Finn or Russian might be assigned.
Members of the detachments trained at all of the Army schools, then trained at foreign military schools, then trained each other. Weapons men could not only fire and maintain, but they could repair any weapon they might encounter, and if they didn’t have a weapon, there was a good chance they could build it, from zip guns to rocket launchers. Demolitions men could produce explosives and detonators from locally procured materials. They studied hydroelectric plants, factories, transformer stations, and rail yards to find critical points easily knocked out. Nothing was harmless or safe, from a fountain pen to a locomotive. Communications men had to transmit and receive Morse Code at twenty words a minute, and teach every other team member how to do eight words a minute. They had to know radio and antenna theory well enough to transmit and receive 1500 miles on a radio they carried on their back, yet keep the power low enough to avoid detection. Medical specialists received the most intense training culminating in the “dog labs” at Fort Sam Houston. If a team member got appendicitis or a hangnail, there would be no evacuation, only the team medic. And he had to train the other members of the team. Team camaraderie was stretched when it came time to practice shots and IV’s on each other. Team officers, team sergeants and intel sergeants studied the top secret targeting data developed during the war to learn about the geographic areas of operations in Europe, including language and customs of each area, possible locations of guerrilla operations and escape and evasion routes.
Because they were destined for Europe if war broke, the 10th Special Forces spent considerable time away from Fort Bragg training in the German Mountains of Bavaria and soon the mountains around Bad Tolz were dotted with secret little huts made of C-ration cartons where the SF trained. Because SF carried there entire life on their back, it wasn’t long before the standard army backpack was rejected in favor of the large mountain rucksack. The next thing to go was the trade mark jump boots of American airborne troops, replaced by the ugly, heavy “waffle stompers” made by the cobblers in Bavaria. Much to regular Army chagrin, they became a trademark of the 10th Special Forces.
Training of the “A” detachments was simple, any piece of remote terrain was suitable, the more difficult the better. A detachment did not require much in the way of support, they had no organic equipment they didn’t carry on their backs. The Air Force was constantly flying training missions so it wasn’t hard to get an airplane to fly over an area and let twelve guys go out the door. Typical training jumps were made at night into small drop zones. Using smoke jumper equipment developed by the Forest Service, jumps were made into forests with no cleared drop zone at all. A boxcar full of surplus Air Force parachutes and SF wives sewing machines gave Special Forces the opportunity to develop high altitude-low opening (HALO) techniques at the Fort Bragg Sport Parachute Club. Some of these early Special Forces people would form the Army’s Golden Knights Demonstration Parachute Team. Almost all of the early SF were SCUBA trained and soon developed Navy contacts that would allow them to pester a submarine commander into letting them practice “lock in-lock out” techniques-getting in and out while the sub was submerged. Cross country skiing and mountain climbing became specialties of the 10th and would be taught to other SF on the 2000 foot cliffs in the Bavarian Mountains.
After thirteen months of training the 10th reported itself ready for operations. The Joint Chiefs had approved the concepts and plans, so now everyone found themselves just waiting for whatever was next. The “next” occurred in June 1953 with a worker’s revolt in East Berlin that was brutally put down. It was realized that even though internal revolution had not been part of the original concept, it provided the same opportunities for SF to move in and operate successfully supporting the resistance. It also was realized that Fort Bragg was too far removed from Europe for rapid deployment, so in November, 1953, 782 members of the still secret Special Forces stood in formation on the docks at the Army depot at Wilmington, NC wearing uniforms with no markings but name tags. Troops on the ship jeered at the new “recruits” politely silent as they stood at ease. The “recruits” on the dock were all NCO’s and no first enlistments. There were no second lieutenants, and the captains and first lieutenants all had many years in grade, for promotion came slowly in these years. The enlisted men of many of the detachments averaged over thirty years of age and ten years of service, not all of it in the U.S. Army. To the shock of the wise guys on the ship, the “recruits” appeared back on deck after sailing, with stripes of rank, jump wings and medals representing long service and many campaigns.
As 1954 dawned, the 10th was settling in to a former Wermacht officers training center at Bad Tolz, Germany while a new group, the 77th was formed in the old Psy Ops corner of Fort Bragg, Smoke Bomb Hill.