Posted: 6/22/2004 3:15:12 PM EDT
| There was a thing on the Discovery Channel a few nights ago on Robin Sage, the final test to earn the Green Beret. After watching this, I got curious and wen't on the internet and started researching the training for Special Forces. The training I found was PLDC (Primary Leadership Development Course), BNCOC (Basic Non-Commissioned Officers Course), SOPC (Special Operations Preparatory Course), SFAS (Special Forces Assessment and Selection), and SFQC (Special Forces Qualification Course). But my question is, where in all of this do the soon-to-be operators learn the combat part of the job? E.g. CQB, Patrolling, Ambushing, counter-ambushing, Direct Action, etc. I can find lots of information on combat training for other SPECOP units like the Navy SEALS, but not for Army SF. |
Part of the reason for there being a lack of this type of training in the published files is up until a few years ago, all Army SF candidates had to be on their second enlistment to be consitered for the 'Q' course. Most of the students are comming from combat arms MOS's and have at least three years of time in their skills. Most of what you mentioned is standard training for these troops, and SF school enhances what they already know. |
| As I recall, nearly as many SF troops come from noncombat arms Mos's, and when you factor in MOS's like Arty, Aviation, and Combat Engineers, the actual number of "infantry" type trainees is less than half, this was how it was told to me several years ago. As I recall the SFQC is about eighteen months, and the trainees are given training on every thing from basic medicine to properly tying thier shoes. then they go to language schools, specialty schools. I actually was sent to serve as a geurilla for Robin Sage excercises a few times, it is definately a learning experience. It is almost scary how dedicated most of those trainees are, not to mention disciplined (of course if they weren't, they would have been washed out long before that phase of training). As I recall the average training schedule for those students the entire course is about fourteen hours a day, and there are several points in the training where the students are expected to operate for days at a time with little or no sleep at all. |
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Actually we did our MOS qualification during Phase II of the Q course. I went with 18B. |
Phase I of the Q-course covers basic individual skills. During this time soldiers in process are trained on common skill for CMF 18, skill level three. Training is 40 days long and is taught at the Camp Rowe Training Facility. The training covered during this phase includes land navigation (cross country) and small unit tactics. This phase culminates with a special operations overview. We did not get into the advanced Special Forces skills until after the Qcourse and language training. Over the years I went through (MFF) Military Free Fall, (SOTIC) Special Operations Target Interdiction Course, (SOT) Special Operation Training,(SFARTAETC) Special Forces Advanced Reconnaissance, Target Analysis, and Explotation Techniques Course. I was going to go through SCUBA training, but I was asked to join up with anouther Army Spec Ops group, so I did. But, the SF stuff was quality training, alot of it highly classified, but if you have some questions I will answer any questions that do not cross classified boundries. Chris |
Thanks SF_Chris!! So all Army SF guys trained in stuff like CQB and Direct Action then? Another dumb, very noobish question: As a fighting/combat force, how would Army SF compare to Navy SEALS or USMC Force Recon? And, what kind of hand-to-hand combat training do Army SF guys go through? Thanks for even reading my noob questions lol.  BTW- what is CMF 18? |
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Back in the late 60's they had at the JFK Center for Special Warefare, also know as the Insitute for Military Assistance, a SF Officers Course which was an overview of SF operations. I guess they don't have this now. Is PsyOps now part of this? We were all up on Smoke Bomb Hill at Bragg but it was different back then. |
I think over here in leg-land we get confused and figgured the MOS stuff was part of the advanced skills. |
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Most of the training these gentlemen do is not published, but put into what they call "training circulars" or "training pamphlets". That's so that there's nothing that can be handed over as a set-in-stone practice for how they work. It's usually nothing more than a sheaf of paper with a staple through it. More often than not, it's not even that though. But that's the beauty, the Army just takes the ones that volunteered (at least three times at this point) and let's them go out and do what they come up with as a team. Then, they operate as a team. Everything they do is a refinement of standard infantry tactics, however... where the infantry is a generalized force, these guys are a little more specialized in what they do. Hence the name. They teach them how to be creative, or simply hone their creative skills and then show them how to focus their skills like a magnifying glass on a task. For the most part, formal training in any part of the armed forces is verbal, visual, then hands-on. I don't think it's seriously very different than how anyone else is taught, it's just they get to learn so many cool things that the rest of us don't. |