by Tom Clancy
Santoli, Al, Leading the Way: How Vietnam Veterans Rebuilt the U.S. Military, Ballantine Books, 1993
Scales, Brig. General Robert H., Jr. (USA), Certain Victory: The US Army in the Gulf War, Brassey‘s, 1994
Schmitt, Gary, Silent Warfare—Understanding the World of Intelligence, Brassey’s (US), 1993
Schneider, Wolfgang (Ed.), Taschenbuch der Panzer (Tanks of the World) 7th edition, Bernard & Graefe Verlag, Bonn, Germany, 1990
Serber, Robert, The Los Alamos Primer: The First Lectures on How to Build an Atomic Bomb, University of California Press, 1992
Shaara, Michael, The Killer Angels, Ballantine, 1974
Sidell, Frederick, William C. Patrick III, Thomas R. Dashiell, Jane’s Chem-Bio Handbook, Jane’s Information Group, 1999
Silber, Laura and Alan Little, Yugoslavia: Death of a Nation, Penguin, 1997
Skorzeny, Otto, Skorzeny’s Secret Missions: War Memoirs of the Most Dangerous Man in Europe, Dutton, 1950
Smith, Gordon, Battles of the Falklands War, Ian Allen, 1989
Smith, Peter C., Close Air Support—An Illustrated History, 1914 to the Present, Orion Books, 1990
Sokolski, Henry, Fighting Proliferation: New Concerns for the Nineties, Air University Press, 1996
Staff, US News and World Report, Triumph Without Victory—The Unreported History of the Persian Gulf War, Random House, 1992
Stevenson, William, 90 Minutes at Entebbe, Bantam Books, 1976
Summers, Colonel Harry G. Jr. (Ret.)
A Critical Analysis of the Gulf War, Dell Publishing, 1992
—The New World Strategy, Simon & Schuster, 1995
Sutherland, LTC Ian D. W., USA (Ret.), Special Forces of the United States Army: 1952/1982, R. James Bender Publishing, 1990
Suvorov, Viktor, Spetznaz: The Inside Story of the Soviet Special Forces, Norton, 1987
Swanborough, Gordon and Bowers, Peter
—United States Military Aircraft since 1909, Smithsonian, 1989
United States Navy Aircraft Since 1911, Naval Institute Press, 1990
Thornborough, Anthony, Sky Spies—The Decades of Airborne Reconnaissance, Arms and Armour, 1993
Toffler, Alvin and Heidi, War and Anti-War-Survival at the Dawn of the 21st Century, Little Brown, 1993
Von Hassell, Agostino, Strike Force: US Marine Special Operations, Howell Press, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1991
Wagner, William
Fireflies and Other UAV‘s, Midland Publishing Limited, 1992
—Lightning Bugs and Other Reconnaissance Drones, Aero Publishers, 1982
Waller, Douglas C., The Commandos—The Inside Story of America’s Secret Soldiers, Simon & Schuster, 1994
Warden, Col. John A., III, USAF, The Air Campaign—Planning for Combat, Brassey’s Punishing, 1989
Ware, Lewis B., Low-Intensity Conflict in the Third World, Air University Press, 1988
Watson, Bruce W., Bruce George, MP, Peter Tsouras and B. L. Cyr, Military Lessons of the Gulf War, Greenhill Books, 1991
Watson, Bruce W. and Peter Tsouras Editors, Operation Just Cause, Westview Press, 1991
Wedertz, Bill, Dictionary of Naval Abbreviations, Naval Institute Press, 1977
Weinberg, Gerhard, A World At Arms: A Global History of World War II, Cambridge, 1994
Weinberg, Caspar, Fighting for Peace: Seven Critical Years in the Pentagon, Warner Books, 1990
Weissman, Steve and Herbert Krosney, The Islamic Bomb, Times Books, 1981
Winnefeld, James A. and Johnson, Dana J., Joint Air Operations: Pursuit of Unity in Command and Control 1942—1991, Naval Institute Press, 1993
Woodward, Robert, The Commanders, Simon & Schuster, 1991
Woodward, Sandy (Admiral, RN), One Hundred Days: The Memoirs of the Falklands Battle Group Commander, Naval Institute Press, 1992
Zaloga, Steven J.
—Inside the Blue Berets: A Combat History of Soviet & Russian Airborne Forces, 1930—1995; Presidio Press; 1995
—Red Trust—Attack on the Central Front, Soviet Tactics and Capabilities in the 1990’s, Presidio Press, 1989
Zurick, Tim (Cpt, USAR), Army Dictionary and Desk Reference, Stackpole, 1992
Pamphlets and Manuals:
A Short History of Support to Special Operations, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, 1995
Close Air Support and Close-in Fire Support, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1992
FM 100-5, Operation, June 1993, US Army, 1993
FM 101—10-1/1 Staff Officers’ Field Manual, Organizational, Technical and Logistical Data (Volume 1), Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1987
FMFM 0-9 Field Firing for the M16A2 Rifle, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1995
FMFM 5-40, Offensive Air Support, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1992
FMFM 5-42 Deep Air Support, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1993
FMFM 5-60, Control of Aircraft and Missiles, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1993
FMFM 6-18 Techniques and Procedures for Fire Support Coordination, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1992
FMFM 6-8, Supporting Arms Observer, Spotter and Controller, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1994
FMFM 6-9, Marine Artillery Support, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1993
FMFM 7-32, Raid Operations, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1993
FMFRP 0-55, Desert Water Supply, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1990
FMFRP 0-59, The Environment and Its Effects on Materiel, Personnel and Operations with Special Emphasis on the Middle East, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1990
FMFRP 12-18, Mao Tse-tung on Guerrilla Warfare (Reprint of 1961 Edition, Translated by Brig. General Samuel B. Griffith), Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1989
FMFRP 12-33, The Defense of Duffer’s Drift, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1991
FMFRP 12-46 Advanced Base Operations in Micronesia (Reprint of Unpublished 1921 Manuscript), Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1992
FMFRP 4-34 Battlefield Damage Assessment and Repair, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1993
Former Yugoslavia Handbook, Department of Defense, 1993
General Design and Construction Criteria for Kuwait, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1990
GPS: A Guide to the Next Utility, Trimble Navigation, 1989
Joint Pub 0-2, Unified Action Armed Forces, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1995
Joint Pub 1-01.1, Compendium of Joint Publications, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1995
Joint Pub 3-02.2, Joint Doctrine for Amphibious Embarkation, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1993
Joint Pub 3-05.5, Joint Special Operations Targeting and Mission Planning Procedures, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1993
Joint Pub 5-0, Doctrine for Planning Joint Operations, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1995
Joint Pub 6-0, Doctrine for Command, Control, Communications and Computer (C4) Systems Supports to Joint Operations, Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1995
Ranger Handbook, Desert, Ranger Training Brigade, 1992
Remote Sensing Field Guide, Desert, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1990
Sine Pari, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, 1995
Small Wars Manual (Reprint of 1940 Edition), Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1987
Space Log-1993, TRW, 1994
Standing Up the MACOM: The U.S. Army Special Operations Command 1987-92, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, 1995
To Free From Oppression, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, 1995
United State Special Operations Command History, U.S. Army Special Operations Command, 1998
Worldwide Geographic Location Codes, U.S. General Services Administration, 1987
Magazines:
Air and Space Smithsonian, Smithsonian Institute
Air Forces Monthly, Key Publishing, Ltd.
Air International, Expediters of the Printed Word, Ltd.
Airpower Journal, United States Air Force
Aviation Week and Space Technology, McGraw Hill Publications
Command: Military History, Strategy & Anal
ysis, XTR Corporation
Joint Forces Quarterly, National Defense University
KORUS, IMC
Naval History, United States Naval Institute
Naval War College Review, U.S. Naval War College
Military Heritage, Sovereign Media
Military Review, U.S. Army
Proceedings, United States Naval Institute
Sine Pari, U.S. Special Operations Command
The Economist, The Economist
The Hook, The Tailhook Association
The Rucksack, U.S. Army Special Operations Command
U.S. News and World Report, U.S. News and World Report
World Airpower Journal, Aerospace Publishing Ltd., Airtime Publishing, Inc.
Videotapes:
America’s Commandos, Hoagie Films
ArmyTACMS, Loral Vought Systems
C-17 the 2nd Year, McDonnell Douglas-Teleproductions
CIA—The Secret Files Parts 1-4, A&E Home Video, 1992
Fighting Men: The Green Berets, Sunwood Entertainment Company
Hercules and Beyond, Lockheed Aeronautical Systems Company
Hercules Multi-Mission Aircraft, Lockheed Aeronautical Systems Company
Heroes of the Storm, Media Center
It’s About Performance, Sight & Sound Media
Joint Stars, Grumman
Joint Stars One System Multiple Missions, Grumman
Predator Presentation & 2 MPV Shots, Loral Aeronutronic
The Canadian Forces in the Persian Gulf, DGPA-Director General Public Affairs
War in the Gulf Video Series-1-4, Video Ordinance Ino., 1991
Wings over the Gulf-Volume 1, 2 and 3, Discovery Communications Inc., 1991
CD-ROMs:
Army Experiment Six: Training the Forces of Army XXI, US Army, TRADOC
DESERT STORM: The War in the Persian Gulf, Warner New Media, 1991
EADTB Demonstration Suite, Raytheon, 1999
Encarta 96 Encyclopedia, Microsoft, 1996
Infopedia, Future Vision Multimedia, 1995
Warplanes: Modern Fighting Aircraft, Maris, 1994
WINGS (4 CD set), Discovery Communications, 1995
World Factbook 1995 Edition, Wayzata, 1995
1 Despite the unrealistic portrayal of Vietnam, it is something of a SF tradition that any Special Forces unit on a mission or training exercise has a copy of this movie in their traveling video library. SF soldiers respect the image of the Duke, and often show the movie to their foreign hosts.
2 It appears that several overzealous reporters and producers from Time and CNN attempted to take the story of Operation Tailwind and fabricate a story that would gain them publicity and disgrace the Special Forces. When the truth came out and the story backfired, all concerned suffered appropriate professional punishment and disgrace, including firing for those most involved.
3 Though the Marine Corps was formed in 1775, their acknowledged mission of amphibious assaults from the sea only dates from 1942. Though they have a history of raids and operations from the sea that dates back 225 years, their formal mission of amphibious warfare was only conceived in the 1920s and implemented during World War II.
4 Title 10 of the U.S. Code lays out the requirements for personnel serving in various kinds of units. As of 1999, Title 10 restricts women from serving in frontline combat infantry units—the core of SOF forces today.
5 I should note that Douglas MacArthur hated unconventional units, including the American OSS and the British SOE, SAS, and SBS, and did all he could to keep them out of his territory.
6 The British SAS dates from the Second World War, when it served in North Africa against the units of Erwin Rommel’s Afrika Korps. Originally designed as a long-range reconnaissance and raiding force by its founder, Major David Sterling, it has evolved today into perhaps the world’s finest such unit. Man-for-man, it continues to be among the busiest and best-trained SOF forces, with capabilities in counterterrorism, reconnaissance, raiding, and other aspects of unconventional warfare.
7 One of the primary shortcomings of Operation Eagle Claw, as it was called, was that all the services had to operate jointly to covertly transport the strike force to its target in Iran. The lack of long-range helicopters with in-flight refueling capabilities proved to be the most obvious of many weak links in the capabilities of America’s SOF community.
8 One of the few SOF supporters was an Undersecretary of Defense, Noel Koch, who single-handedly kept elements of the community alive during the early years of the Reagan administration. Today, Koch is celebrated as one of the founding fathers of USSOCOM.
9 “Black” units and programs are so secret that they are denied publicly, and do not appear in the funding documents submitted annually to Congress. Examples of such programs include the development of the U-2 and SR-71 spy planes, the F-117 Nighthawk stealth fighter, and the founding of the Delta Force.
10 Senator Sam Nunn (D-Georgia) was chairman of the Senate Armed Services committee prior to his retirement, and Senator William Cohen (R-Maine) would become the Secretary of Defense in 1997.
11 Because the USMC had encouraged special operations development, and had invested heavily in their own SOF capabilities, it was excepted from the Nunn-Cohen legislation and retained control of its Force Reconnaissance teams, as well as various SWAT teams and other units. Today, these are located within the seven Marine Expeditionary Unit, Special Operations Capable—MEU (SOC)—forces deployed worldwide. For more information on MEU (SOC)s and Marine Corps doctrine, see: Marine: A Guided Tour of a Marine Expeditionary Unit (Berkley Books, 1996).
12 The term “ranger” has a dual meaning in the U.S. Army. For most Army personnel, Ranger training is an advanced course, which can be taken by virtually anyone in any branch of the service. The Ranger course is a physically and mentally arduous school, which is designed to toughen a soldier, and give him advanced training in combat skills, field craft, and small unit leadership. It is a tough course, with an extremely high dropout rate. Most of the men I know who wear the Ranger tab on their uniforms will tell you it was the roughest training they ever survived! The 75th Ranger Regiment is a formation composed exclusively of jump-qualified personnel who have also completed the Ranger training course. As such, they are an elite light regiment of shock troops, with few equals in the world.
13 General Shelton’s father was given a 4-F (medically unsuitable) status during the Second World War; but his brothers were all able to serve with honor during the conflict.
14 Project Delta was a unique SF reconnaissance unit formed and initially headed by Major Charles “Chargin’ Charlie” Beckwith, and based upon his own experiences during a tour with the British Special Air Service. Though wounded while extracting several SF soldiers from behind enemy lines, Beckwith survived and used his Project Delta to design and stand up the Army’s antiterrorist (Detachment Delta or Delta Force) in the late 1970s. Project Delta teams, along with other special SF units, provided much of the muscle to the clandestine Military Assistance Command—Studies and Operations Group (MACV-SOG) in the 1960s, as America’s commitment to South Vietnam grew.
15 A Viet Cong invention, Pungi Sticks—sharpened sticks about the diameter of a finger—were designed to maim enemy soldiers walking through heavy ground cover or rice paddies. The sticks were grouped into fields or belts around terrain that was to be denied to an enemy, or emplaced in hidden holes that a soldier could stumble into. Both sides used Pungi Sticks as a defensive or ambush measure.
16 General Edward Burba was one of a handful of senior officers, like Don Starry and Fred Franks, who helped hold the Army together in the 1970s and rebuild it in the 1980s. Such officers helped get the Army ready to fight the battles that would come with the end of the Cold War. For more on this, see my book with General Fred Franks, Into the Storm (Putnam, 1998).
17 -18 FOB Cobra was a huge logistics and operations base that was established over a hundred miles into Iraq at the start of the ground war in February 1990
. Completed in a matter of hours, the move to FOB Cobra remains the largest and most difficult airmobile operation of all time.
18 Task Force Normandy was assigned to take out a pair of Iraqi radar sites (Objectives Oklahoma and Nebraska) that might have detected Allied strike aircraft headed into Baghdad and western Iraq. For more on the mission and on AH- 64 Apaches, see Armored Cav (Berkley Books, 1994).
19 To support the planned invasion of Haiti, the Navy removed their aircraft from a pair of Atlantic Fleet carriers and loaded aboard helicopters from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment and the aviation brigade of the 10th Mountain Division. Though controversial at the time, the operation was highly successful, and remains an option today.
20 Fort Bragg is home of the XVIII Airborne Corps and the 82nd Airborne Division, and SOF is headquartered there.
21 The total Special Forces community numbers approximately 10,000. These days, about 1,000 leave that community every year, while something like five to six hundred replacements are now being trained every year. This deficit has been gradually slowed through better retention, but it still leaves ODAs as much as 25% to 33% under strength.
22 -24 Warrant officers’ MOS codes always have an “0” added.
23 A number of foreign exchange military personnel are also recruited for Special Forces training. These soldiers (normally officers) are picked by their home governments, and training is provided by the U.S. government. They tend to be well-qualified for the SF trade, since a failure during training would reflect poorly upon their home country, military service, and government.
24 Along with women, the Army will not allow the recruitment into Special Forces of military doctors or aviators. Since an impressive investment has already been lavished upon them, they are far too valuable to risk in an SF environment.