The U.S. Army Special Forces
by Krysta CardinaleThe origins of the U.S. Army Special Forces can be traced back to a warm October day in 1961, when then President John F. Kennedy visited Fort Bragg, North Carolina to see a newly created small, elite cadre of special operations forces. As the President drove by, green berets of every variety were taken from their hiding places and placed on freshly shaved heads, becoming a symbol of brotherhood for the U.S. Army Special Forces, otherwise known as the Green Berets.
President Kennedy, steeped in Camelot, was not only interested in the glamour surrounding the U.S. Special Forces, but in what this fighting group could do to enhance the supremacy of the free world. Kennedy intended to use the U.S. Special Forces as a spearhead to defend his vision of Super Power foreign policy—a steel bolt to strike swiftly and silently on the third world battlefields where the cold war was heating up. In the late 1950’s and early 1960’s the Cold War was nowhere hotter than in Southeast Asia.
U.S. Special Forces Training
First, in order to create the perfect super soldier who could help implement Kennedy’s policy, those selected to be members of the special operations forces were sent to Ranger School, where they trained to be skilled paratroopers. Since the dark days before America’s entry into World War II, this was the toughest training any American fighting man could face. Endless physical conditioning, hard discipline and the danger of jumping out of a perfectly good airplane became the furnace that tempered the steel that would be the sword of American foreign policy in the Third World.
The special operations forces training process began at what was called a Q course—a mixture of classroom training and field activity wherein the U.S. Army Special Forces candidates were divided into A Teams consisting of demolitions, communications and language experts, as well as medics. Members of each team were also cross-trained in a number of jobs vital to completing the team’s missions, which would take place many miles behind enemy lines. In the Vietnam era A-Team, each soldier also had to be an expert marksman
After a week of primary instruction, the A-Teams moved into the field for two weeks of hands-training for deployment into enemy country. The U.S. Army Special Forces A-Teams were specifically schooled in how to contact indigenous people and turn them into guerrillas capable of blowing up bridges and communications centers, as well as setting up ambushes. They were also trained in developing civil affairs work aimed at winning the hearts and minds of the people. As a result, the old concept of a U.S. Special Forces warrior as a fire breathing commando was being rethought; the new special operations forces warrior had to be politically and psychologically sensitive to the environment where he would operate.
Vietnam Special Forces in Action
By late 1960, it had become apparent that the Viet Cong insurgency in South Vietnam was growing at an increasing rate. The Viet Cong were battle hardened veterans. Some had fought this type of war on the same ground against the Japanese and the French Colonial Army. For the U.S. forces, this was going to be a very different war. But there was one group of U.S. warriors ready for the coming fight. The obvious choice for the counter-insurgency warriors, were somewhat insurgent themselves, the Vietnam Special Forces known as the Green Berets.
Just months after President Kennedy’s visit to Fort Bragg, the special operations forces were in Vietnam to implement a CIA plan to stem the Viet Cong tide in the Central Highlands of Vietnam. The program was called the Civilian Irregular Defense Group or CIDG Program. The goal of this operation was to deny the Viet Cong access to food, supplies, recruits and intelligence. Specifically they hoped to block the North Vietnamese Army, NVA, from access to Vietnam from the Ho Chi Minh Trail
In November 1961, two Vietnam Special Forces A-Teams were deployed. The A-Teams established a base and began to win the trust of the local villagers. They then helped the villagers prepare a defense system against the local VC cadre and NVA forces The Vietnam Special forces also recruited and trained local men to form a strike force. This force would provide reinforcements to area villages under attack, patrol trails in the area and set ambushes for the Viet Cong.
Once the U.S. Army Special Forces had established an effective strike force, they would begin to organize and train village defenses. These groups received basic training in weapons handling and were taught to defend and fortify their homes. They fought only when their villages were under attack. Each village was provided with a radio that would allow the townspeople to contact the special operations forces and the local strike force.
The results were remarkable. Although the VC and NVA insurgents fought hard, the U.S. Army Special Forces and the villagers were able to establish a base of operations near a strategic branch of the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The success of the A-Teams was so extraordinary that by April, 1962, forty villages in Dac Lac Province were under the protection of the CIDG Program. By May, 1962, eight more teams were ordered by the CIA. By July, the CIA was so pleased with the success of the Vietnam Special Forces that the Agency requested sixteen more teams for deployment.
The Communists feared and respected the Vietnam Special Forces to such an extent that they resorted to offering bounties to villagers and guerrilla fighters who could stop them. But sadly, the powers in Washington could not stand their own success. They were about to order a change to Special Operations Forces in Vietnam that would alter the shadow warrior’s mission and the very nature or the war.
By late 1962, the U.S. reached an agreement with the Communists to stabilize the situation in Laos. The agreement ended any hope of cutting the Ho Chi Minh Trail and gave free access to supplies to Communist forces in the South for the next decade; supplies that would be used to end of the lives of 55,000 Americans.
