How Army Special Ops can push back against Russian aggression

With an ever-diminishing role in counterterror, special operations troops are in transition, moving back toward a traditional supporting role in a larger effort to deter countries with navies and air forces and other capabilities more on par with the U.S.

Army special operations forces in particular have a role to play in countering Russia, according to an Army Special Operations Command-funded Rand Corp. report released Monday, but they’ll need more concrete direction to be useful going forward. “Although U.S. strategic guidance proclaims that the United States has entered a new era of great-power competition, concepts for succeeding in that competition remain underdeveloped,” according to the report.

So what can Army special operations bring to the fight? By returning to its roots, particularly for Special Forces, Army special operations can work with allies to strengthen their capabilities against foes like Russia, while at the same time giving the U.S. situational awareness of conditions on the ground.

“In conditions of more intensified competition, when the risk of armed conflict is high, ARSOF can help to defend against proxy forces used by U.S. adversaries,” according to the report. “ARSOF can also be used to disrupt adversary operations in denied environments or to impose costs on adversaries, although the most aggressive uses of ARSOF—unconventional warfare intended to overthrow adversary governments—have traditionally been high-risk activities with relatively low rates of success.”

In order to be successful, the authors wrote, Army SOF needs a few things:

• Army doctrine, specifically Multi-Domain Operations, needs to include specific guidance for SOF.
• Special Operations Command and the assistant defense secretary for special operations/low-intensity conflict should do regular reviews of Army SOF activities to make sure they are in line with the change in focus to “strategic competition.”
• SOF should only engage directly with Russia, through unconventional or information warfare, in rare circumstances.
• Special operations troops should be embedded with allies as part of a “long-term political-military strategy,” as their progress tends to be incremental and measured by the successes of those partner nations in their own strategies.

“There may well be specific contexts in which UW and aggressive uses of [operations in the information environment] are appropriate tools for the United States to compel Russia to cease certain activities or to disrupt and degrade its ability to pursue them,” the report found. “But the potential benefits of such instruments must be carefully weighed against the costs, risks, and likelihood of success.”

Article from the Military Times

Passing the Paramilitary Torch from the CIA to Special Operations Command

In the shadowy realm of international competition that falls below the threshold of traditional conflict, the United States continues to struggle to match near-peer competitors like Russia and China. The Russian-led paramilitary invasion of eastern Ukraine that began in mid-2014 has thus far prevented successive U.S.-backed Ukrainian governments from fully consolidating power or joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. In Syria, Russian private paramilitary companies have been crucial in propping up the regime of Bashar al-Assad. Over the last decade, China has built artificial islands and deployed paramilitary naval units to secure its illegal claim to the international waterways of the South China Sea – all without firing a single shot. These examples involved the use of paramilitary activities by America’s adversaries, a form of conflict to which the U.S. government has historically responded with the CIA. In this context, paramilitary activities involve the use of non-conventional or proxy forces to conduct sabotage, ambushes, or other low-visibility combat operations to undermine and contribute to the defeat of an adversary. Photo at right: U.S. Army Special Forces Soldiers with Hamid Karzai during their unconventional warfare campaign that toppled the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, 2001

The CIA’s primacy in matters of paramilitary activities is well-established through existing Congressional legislation and presidential executive orders. However, today the United States faces serious threats from near-peer state adversaries, terrorist groups, and other sub-state actors that should lead its leaders to rethink its organizational and operational approaches to paramilitary activities to optimize both its capabilities and capacity to meet these threats. The U.S. Defense Department, specifically its subordinate U.S. Special Operations Command, is the organization best prepared to assume leadership of the U.S. government’s paramilitary efforts that are critical to supporting its national interests.

One of the major recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Report, delivered in 2004, was that the Defense Department should assume primary responsibility for U.S. government paramilitary activities from the CIA. That commission found that the CIA “relied on operatives without the requisite military training,” resulting in unsatisfactory results. Additionally, the report advised that the United States “cannot afford to build two separate capabilities for carrying out secret military operations, secretly operating standoff missiles, and secretly training foreign military or paramilitary forces.” In response, the Defense Department contracted a study that ultimately determined in 2005 that assuming control of paramilitary operations was inadvisable at that time given the Defense Department’s lack of internal capability, discomfort with existing legal strictures on Title 50 authorities, and concern over potentially increased Congressional oversight that would come with responsibility for paramilitary activities. In the twelve years since that study delivered its findings and recommendations, the Defense Department has developed its own clandestine intelligence and operational paramilitary capabilities. It is now the appropriate time to reassess and appropriately re-task the Department of Defense’s own U.S. Special Operations Command with primary responsibility for paramilitary activities. Historically, the CIA has a very poor track record of success in organizing and leading paramilitary campaigns, often relying on military special operations support. Other forms of covert action include propaganda to undermine confidence in or adherence to hostile governments and political action designed to support domestic parties in opposition to U.S. adversaries. Only a small number of the declassified CIA-led paramilitary campaigns between 1948 and 2001 were deemed “successful”, though propaganda and political covert actions fared better. While the bravery of CIA paramilitary operatives should be lauded and honored, the American people must be ensured that their paramilitary capabilities are better organized to best defend their interests in the future.

Capability

From a capabilities standpoint, U.S. Special Operations Command demonstrates comparable and, in some cases, superior capabilities of immediate applicability to paramilitary activities. Unbeknownst to many is the fact that U.S. Special Operations Command is already trained, equipped, and enabled to execute paramilitary operations. A core mission of U.S. Special Operations Command is “unconventional warfare”, which the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for 2016 defines as “activities conducted to enable a resistance movement or insurgency to coerce, disrupt or overthrow an occupying power or government by operating through or with an underground, auxiliary or guerrilla force in a denied area." Of critical importance, the Defense Department Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms defines a “guerrilla force” as “a group of irregular, predominantly indigenous personnel organized along military lines to conduct military and paramilitary operations in enemy-held, hostile, or denied territory.” Assuming primary responsibility for paramilitary activities will not place additional strain on U.S. Special Operations Command as all of the components of paramilitary operations are already “part and parcel” of their core mission. While the entirety of U.S. Special Operations Command is tasked to conduct unconventional warfare, much of that capability resides in a subordinate element - U.S. Army Special Operations Command. Within this element, the Office of Special Warfare serves as the focal point for U.S. government-sponsored unconventional warfare.

U.S. Special Operations Command regularly demonstrates its ability to conduct “operational preparation of the environment” activities to support counterterrorism and unconventional warfare that seemingly only differ from paramilitary activities in the authorities under which they are executed. Whereas paramilitary activities is conducted under Title 50 of U.S. Code (USC), Operational Preparation of the Environment and other military activities are executed under Title 10 USC. More practically speaking, the CIA conducts paramilitary activities with the intention to effect some sort of fundamental change against a foreign target without the U.S. government’s role ever being clearly evident, while the Defense Department conducts Operational Preparation of the Environment ostensibly in support of traditional military activities that might reasonably demonstrate a U.S. government role at some point. However, the Defense Department now arguably characterizes activities that could easily be described as paramilitary activities as Operational Preparation of the Environment “where the slightest nexus of a theoretical, distant military operation might one day exist.” Consolidation of the covert paramilitary responsibility with existing Operational Preparation of the Environment requirements would not create so much of an additional burden on U.S. Special Operations Command as it would reduce duplication of capability at both the CIA and Defense Department.

To many even within the U.S. government, most of U.S. Special Operations Command’s Operational Preparation of the Environment activities are already virtually indistinguishable from the CIA’s paramilitary activities, as they employ many of the same methodologies to establish and manage human and physical infrastructure in semi-permissive and denied areas to support U.S. strategic objectives. Further highlighting this confused perception, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence has previously argued that, “in categorizing its clandestine activities, the Defense Department frequently labels them as ‘Operational Preparation of the Environment’ to distinguish particular operations as traditional military activities and not as intelligence functions. The committee observes, though, that overuse of the term has made the distinction all but meaningless.” Shifting primacy of responsibility for paramilitary activities from the CIA to U.S. Special Operations Command and consolidating it with the existing Operational Preparation of the Environment mission would serve the dual purpose of maximizing the effectiveness of paramilitary capabilities while also potentially addressing the growing tensions related to the oversight disparity between paramilitary and clandestine activities.

Many naysayers of this proposal will argue that only the CIA has the means to safeguard the secrecy of such paramilitary activity and accomplish the mission with discrete U.S. government presence. This argument is less compelling given the CIA’s demonstrably poor track record in keeping U.S. government participation in paramilitary operations discrete, from the “Bay of Pigs” invasion of Cuba in 1961 to the recent paramilitary operation revealed in the Middle East. By comparison, U.S. Special Operations Command already has forces deployed around the world, accomplishing sensitive missions that largely go unnoticed. Additionally, the Defense Department already executes Special Access Programs that are waived and unacknowledged. Much like CIA paramilitary operations conducted under Presidential Findings, waived and unacknowledged Special Access Programs are “considered to be so sensitive that they are exempt from standard reporting requirements to the Congress” and are only briefed to highly-cleared members of the relevant Congressional committees. The Defense Department already has a well-established track record of ensuring the confidentiality of incredibly sensitive programs, requirements with which the CIA has shown some difficulty.

Capacity

Not surprisingly, the CIA has always relied extensively on Defense Department special operations forces to support its paramilitary activities ever since the National Security Act of 1947 first created the CIA. Every paramilitary operation from Tibet (1953-1972) to the modern era saw large numbers of the Defense Department special operations service members employed by the CIA using its authorities to execute the mission. While the CIA’s actual end strength of paramilitary skills officers is classified, most open-source estimates place its numbers at no more than a couple hundred exemplary Americans whose attentions are split between overseas assignments and headquarters duty at Langley. By comparison, U.S. Special Operations Command has nearly 70,000 total personnel assigned, of which the command already has 13,000 deployed around the world at any given time. As previously discussed, the Office of Special Warfare coordinates the unconventional warfare capabilities of five battalions’ (over 2,000 soldiers) worth of the U.S.’s finest practitioners of the paramilitary arts in support of every geographic combatant command (Africa, Europe, Central and South America, North America, Middle East, and Pacific). These numbers do not account for the tens of thousands of special operations members in other units trained in unconventional warfare. By outright assuming responsibility for all U.S. paramilitary operations, U.S. Special Operations Command will be able to leverage its full capacity to conduct the preparatory undertakings for and execution of successful paramilitary activities, thereby increasing options for U.S. policymakers. Clearly, U.S. Special Operations Command now has a much greater capacity to fulfill current and future paramilitary requirements that will only continue to grow in scale.

Moreover, CIA recruits many of its paramilitary operatives directly from U.S. Special Operations Command, thanks largely to the previously discussed and well-established operational relationship between the CIA and Defense Department special operations forces. Most national security experts believe that there is no way that the U.S. government could even come close to meeting its current capacity needs for paramilitary activities without U.S. Special Operations Command support. As the evolving global security environment will clearly require additional paramilitary capacity, the CIA will find itself further unable to meet those requirements through its own internal mechanisms and become more reliant on U.S. Special Operations Command. As such, transferring primary responsibility for paramilitary activities from the CIA to Defense Department would simply be a recognition that the majority interest in and capacity for paramilitary activities resides in the Defense Department. In turn, U.S. Special Operations Command, with its larger personnel reserves and budgetary appropriations, will provide the U.S. government and American people with a more robust and efficient paramilitary activities capacity when and where it is most needed.

Legality and Oversight

Legally speaking, the Defense Department possesses both the legislative and executive authorities and permissions to assume primary responsibility for paramilitary activities consistent with the recommendations of this article. Legislatively, the National Security Act of 1947, 1991 Intelligence Authorization Act, and Title 50 of USC all previously designated the CIA as the office of primary responsibility for paramilitary activities. However, the Secretary of Defense also possesses Title 50 authorities which are regularly applied to support paramilitary activities and other intelligence activities. President Ronald Reagan’s Executive Order 12333, which President George W. Bush amended with Executive Order 13470, similarly reinforced CIA primacy for paramilitary activities. However, Executive Order 13470 importantly established a specific exceptions for transferring that responsibility to other agencies. The language of Executive Order 13470 clearly states that the President may direct other agencies to lead paramilitary efforts if he or she “determines that another agency is more likely to achieve a particular objective.” Given the arguments previously presented in this article, it is clear that the Defense Department is now the most appropriate agency to lead U.S. government paramilitary activities efforts moving forward.

The consolidation within the Defense Department of covert paramilitary activities and unconventional warfare efforts will ensure better oversight, as all such activities would then require Presidential Findings and the associated reporting to all of the interested Congressional committees. This approach will resolve a long-standing tension between the Congressional defense committees related to the oversight of covert and clandestine activities. The recommendation to consolidate paramilitary activities in the Defense Department previously met resistance from both the Pentagon and CIA for very different reasons that both stemmed from bureaucratic interests. In the case of the Defense Department, there was reluctance to delve deeper into Title 50 missions that brought additional approval and oversight requirements. For the CIA, the prospect of ceding a very important, and suddenly prestigious, mission was also very unattractive. These perspectives resistant to the transfer of paramilitary activity responsibility to the Defense Department appear rooted in arguments that, while maybe valid when the 2005 Defense Department study presented its finding, are no longer the case. What has not changed are the reasons for the 9/11 Commission’s original findings: that CIA has consistently faltered in its execution of paramilitary operations and that the country can ill afford to fund two identical capabilities at the CIA and Defense Department. It is high time to consolidate paramilitary activities at the Defense Department.

To affect the seamless transfer of primacy for paramilitary activities responsibility from the CIA to Defense Department, there are several recommendations that can and should be implemented. The Executive Branch should draft and issue an executive order amending Executive Order 12333 further to transfer primary responsibility for planning and conducting paramilitary activities from the CIA to the Defense Department. Consistent with the existing Executive Order 13470 language, paramilitary activities will still require a Presidential Finding and reserve for the President the authority to designate other agencies to lead paramilitary activities if the conditions warrant. As paramilitary activities already require coordination through the National Security Council and interagency cooperation, this process will remain under the new construct. Except now, the Defense Department will brief the properly-cleared members of the National Security Council and Congressional defense and intelligence committees. The CIA will remain a critical supporting agency for paramilitary activities, but will respond to Defense Department direction on such campaigns.

Congress, for its part, would need to pass the requisite legislation to enable the Defense Department to assume this responsibility through appropriate reorganization, appropriations, and oversight mechanisms. Currently, Title 10 of USC does not specify paramilitary activities as a primary mission for U.S. Special Operations Command, which will require an amendment to Title 10, the invocation of Title 50 by the Secretary of Defense, or the creation of an entirely new legislative authority for U.S. Special Operations Command to exercise its authority as lead department for paramilitary activities. The next NDAA should direct U.S. Special Operations Command, through the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict, to reorganize to facilitate paramilitary activities within the Defense Department. This reorganization might be affected through amendment of the existing reorganization requirements levied in Section 922 of the FY17 NDAA. Section 922 previously directed this office to assume “service-like” responsibility for U.S. Special Operations Command.

Next, the appropriations committees should explore additional funding lines to allow U.S. Special Operations Command to assume its new paramilitary activities leadership role and draft required legislative language into the next NDAA. An amendment to Section 1202 of the FY18 NDAA, which authorized funding for “the irregular warfare tools and resources required to impede the progress of near peer advances in the competitive space short of war”, would provide a good starting point from which to expand U.S. Special Operations Command’s paramilitary capabilities. Unfortunately, this line of effort was only funded for $10 million dollars in the FY18 NDAA, far beneath the amount needed given the scale of the challenge posed by these competitors. A considerable increase in funding under Section 1202 would enable U.S. Special Operations Command personnel, who are already on the front lines alongside our international allies and partners in the “shadow war” against China, Russia, and Iran, to better counter these competitors’ destabilizing activities in the South China Sea, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East.

Conclusions

Perhaps the most important change that will be required for U.S. Special Operations Command to assume full responsibility for U.S. government-sponsored paramilitary activities will be one of mindset. After almost two decades of mostly overt and highly kinetic counterterrorism activities conducted in Iraq and Afghanistan, an argument has been made that U.S. Special Operations Command, as an organization, lacks the mindset necessary for successfully executing irregular activities under politically sensitive conditions. In recognition of this criticism, U.S. Army Special Operations Command established its Office of Special Warfare, organized battalions of troops specifically trained to conduct unconventional warfare, and is assuming its role as U.S. Special Operations Command’s focal point for related activities. Similarly, U.S. Special Operations Command’s Joint Special Operations University, which is based at the command’s headquarters on MacDill Air Force Base, now offers a myriad of courses for U.S. Special Operations Command operators, support personnel, and senior leaders that address these shortcomings. The Joint Special Operations University’s most applicable offering, “Special Operations Forces Sensitive Activities in the Contemporary Operational Environment” (previously called “Covert Action and Special Operations Forces Sensitive Activities”), provides instruction that “explores covert action and sensitive military activities as important options for national security practitioners and decision makers”.

The American people deserve the most effective, efficient, and robust paramilitary capabilities that the nation can muster, and the U.S. government should compel the CIA and Defense Department to execute this recommended restructuring. Close collaboration, coordination, and synchronization of efforts will reinforce the importance of interagency integration and demonstrate the wisdom of this undertaking. This logical effort will, ultimately, better enable the U.S. government to fulfill its most sacred duty to the American people – protecting their vital national interests and way of life from those adversaries and competitors who would endeavor to do them harm.

This article was written by Douglas Livermore who works as a contracted government advisor in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, while also serving as a Special Forces officer in the U.S. Army National Guard. In addition to multiple combat deployments to both Iraq and Afghanistan, Doug led special operations elements during contingency operations around the world. He holds a master’s degree from Georgetown University’s Security Studies Program and a bachelor's degree from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. The views expressed in his articles are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy or position of the Department of Defense or the U.S. government.

Article from the Small Wars Journal, 2 September 2019

Special Forces Secretly Help Saudis Combat Threat From Yemen Rebels

For years, the American military has sought to distance itself from a brutal civil war in Yemen, where Saudi-led forces are battling rebels who pose no direct threat to the United States. But late last year, a team of about a dozen Green Berets arrived on Saudi Arabia’s border with Yemen, in a continuing escalation of America’s secret wars.

With virtually no public discussion or debate, the Army commandos are helping locate and destroy caches of ballistic missiles and launch sites that Houthi rebels in Yemen are using to attack Riyadh and other Saudi cities. Details of the Green Beret operation, which has not been previously disclosed, were provided to The New York Times by United States officials and European diplomats. They appear to contradict Pentagon statements that American military assistance to the Saudi-led campaign in Yemen is limited to aircraft refueling, logistics and general intelligence sharing.

There is no indication that the American commandos have crossed into Yemen as part of the secretive mission. But sending American ground forces to the border is a marked escalation of Western assistance to target Houthi fighters who are deep in Yemen.

Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia and a member of the Armed Services Committee, on Thursday called the Green Berets mission a “purposeful blurring of lines between train and equip missions and combat.” He cited the report in The Times and called for a new congressional vote on the authorization for the use of military force — a war powers legislation used by three successive presidents in conflict zones around the world.

Beyond its years as a base for Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Yemen has been convulsed by civil strife since 2014, when the Shiite Muslim rebels from the country’s north stormed the capital, Sana. The Houthis, who are aligned with Iran, ousted the government of President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi, the Americans’ main counterterrorism partner in Yemen.

In 2015, a military coalition led by Saudi Arabia began bombing the Houthis, who have responded by firing missiles into the kingdom. Yet there is no evidence that the Houthis directly threaten the United States; they are an unsophisticated militant group with no operations outside Yemen and have not been classified by the American government as a terrorist group.

The Green Berets, the Army’s Special Forces, deployed to the border in December, weeks after a ballistic missile fired from Yemen sailed close to Riyadh, the Saudi capital. The Saudi military said it intercepted the missile over the city’s international airport — a claim that was cast in doubt by an analysis of photos and videos of the strike. But it was enough for Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to renew a longstanding request that the United States send troops to help the kingdom combat the Houthi threat.

A half-dozen officials — from the United States military, the Trump administration, and European and Arab nations — said the American commandos are training Saudi ground troops to secure their border. They also are working closely with American intelligence analysts in Najran, a city in southern Saudi Arabia that has been repeatedly attacked with rockets, to help locate Houthi missile sites within Yemen.

Along the porous border, the Americans are working with surveillance planes that can gather electronic signals to track the Houthi weapons and their launch sites, according to the officials, all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the mission publicly.

During a meeting on Capitol Hill in March, senators pressed Pentagon officials about the military’s role in the Saudi-led conflict, demanding to know whether American troops were at risk of entering into hostilities against the Houthis. Pentagon officials told the senators what had already been said publicly: that American forces stationed in Saudi Arabia only advised within the kingdom’s borders and were focused mostly on border defense. “We are authorized to help the Saudis defend their border,” Gen. Joseph L. Votel, the head of United States Central Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee on March 13. “We are doing that through intelligence sharing, through logistics support and through military advice that we provide to them.”

On April 17, Robert S. Karem, assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the United States had about 50 military personnel in Saudi Arabia, “largely helping on the ballistic missile threat.” The Green Berets have stepped in to deal with an increasingly difficult problem for the Saudi military. Their presence is the latest example of the expanding relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia under President Trump and Prince Mohammed.

Mr. Trump’s first overseas trip after taking office was to Riyadh, nearly one year ago. By contrast, President Barack Obama regularly criticized Saudi Arabia for civilian casualties inflicted by its bombing campaign in Yemen, and blocked arms sales to the kingdom. In March, as Prince Mohammed met with Mr. Trump and top national security officials in Washington, the State Department approved the sale of an estimated $670 million in anti-tank missiles in an arms package that also included spare parts for American-made tanks and helicopters that Saudi Arabia previously purchased.

“Saudi Arabia is a very wealthy nation, and they’re going to give the United States some of that wealth hopefully, in the form of jobs, in the form of the purchase of the finest military equipment anywhere in the world,” Mr. Trump said at the time. He called Prince Mohammed “more than the crown prince now” and displayed a poster featuring military aircraft worth $12.5 billion that the United States had agreed to sell to Saudi Arabia.

The American military’s support for the Saudi campaign against the Houthis is different from the Pentagon’s campaign against other militants in Yemen. Over the past two years, American-backed government troops from Yemen and the United Arab Emirates have expanded a shadowy war in Yemen’s central and southern regions. The effort has targeted more than 3,000 members of the Qaeda affiliate and its tribal confederates, driving them into the rugged, mountainous interior.

Last year, as part of Mr. Trump’s intensified campaign against terrorist organizations, the United States launched more than 130 airstrikes in Yemen, according to United States Central Command. Most of the strikes targeted Qaeda militants; 10 were launched against Islamic State fighters. By comparison, the American military launched 38 strikes in Yemen in 2016; airstrikes have continued this year.

Officials said American support for the Saudi-led coalition against Houthi rebels, a campaign that includes the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Egypt, was initially outlined in a 2015 document known as the Rice memo, named after Susan E. Rice, who was then Mr. Obama’s national security adviser.

The memo detailed military assistance and was intended to keep the United States out of offensive operations against the Houthis, focusing instead on helping the Saudis secure their border. Under the Trump administration, the scope of those guidelines appears to have grown — as evidenced by the addition of American surveillance planes and the Green Beret team.

The Saudi air campaign in 2015 initially was aimed at stockpiles of older Soviet ballistic missiles that were first used in Yemen’s 1994 civil war. The Saudi military reckoned those weapons could fall into Houthi hands. In April 2015, after a month of strikes, the Saudi-led coalition said it had accomplished its goals of destroying the missiles and the equipment used to launch them. But that June, Houthi rebels launched their first salvo of ballistic missiles, aimed at Khamis Mushayt, a Saudi city roughly 60 miles from the Yemen border.

Since then, Houthis have launched dozens of missiles, including shorter-range modified antiaircraft missiles and imported Iranian munitions. The White House and State Department have seized on the attacks to condemn not only the rebels but their Iranian supporters, underscoring the administration’s increasing hard line against Tehran. “Iran destabilizes this entire region,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said during a visit to Riyadh on Sunday. “It supports proxy militias and terrorist groups. It is an arms dealer to the Houthi rebels in Yemen.”

Since 2015, Mr. Karem said, Houthi rebels have launched more than 100 ballistic missiles and many more rockets against major population centers, international airports, military installations and oil infrastructure — all within Saudi Arabia. In the first four months of this year, the Houthis launched more than 30 missiles — roughly on par with the number fired in all of 2017, according to data compiled by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Saudi forces trying to counter weapons from Yemen’s west coast — like the Houthi-held port in Al Hudaydah, where officials in Riyadh believe components of the missiles are shipped — have only two viable options, said Michael Knights, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. The first is to find the missiles where they are stored, which requires an extensive amount of intelligence, Mr. Knights said. The second is far harder: to attack the launch sites, he said. “They have a very difficult problem,” Mr. Knights said.

Houthi rebels could hide mobile missile launchers anywhere from inside culverts to beneath highway overpasses. They are easily moved for hasty launches. Dealing with that problem requires a well-orchestrated system by the Saudi-led coalition, extending from satellites to troops on the ground, to ensure aircraft can find and quickly destroy the missile launchers. “In a mobile-missile environment, that’s a challenge,” Gen. David L. Goldfein, the Air Force chief of staff, said in an interview.

Article from the the New York Times

Lt. Gen. Bennet Sacolick retires

A rainy day in San Francisco set Bennet Sacolick on course to become an Army general, one of the nation's top special operators and a driving force in the nation's counter-terrorism policy. But after 35 years in uniform, including time in command of Delta Force and the U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School, Sacolick only recently took time to reflect on that career.

Lt. Gen. Sacolick, most recently the director for strategic operational planning at the National Counterterrorism Center, retired July 1, 2016. His last act in uniform was speaking to a Special Forces graduation in Fayetteville late last month. Now he and his wife, Joyce, have moved back to Fayetteville for a new chapter in their marriage. Sacolick plans to make up for more than two decades of constant deployments by staying in one place and working on the couple's dream home.

It's a marked change of pace for a man who, for the latter half of his career, has been focused on fighting terrorism across the globe. "I started as a private. I'm a three star general. I did something right. But I was a bad husband," Sacolick said.

Even before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Sacolick said he often was deployed nine months out of the year. After 9/11, he was gone for three of the first four years, serving in either Afghanistan or Iraq. "And she never wavered," he said of his wife. "She always adjusted so well. She's been through a lot. Now this is her time."

Passing the baton. In his speech to roughly 100 new Special Forces soldiers at the Crown Arena on June 23, Sacolick said the nation's counter-terrorism mission was now in their hands. He said they would be well-prepared and better positioned to make an impact in the fight than any other force in the world.

Sacolick would know. A Special Forces soldier for the last 30 years, Sacolick spent 15 years with 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, more commonly known as Delta Force, and that unit's higher headquarters, Joint Special Operations Command. He also served as deputy director for defense at the CIA's Counter Terrorism Center.

In his last assignment, at the National Counterterrorism Center, he helped craft the nation's strategy to combat the Islamic State and wrote several executive orders pertaining to terrorism on behalf of the president. Sacolick said the country is winning the fight against terrorism, but the retired general isn't without concern. He worries the nation - and specifically the military - could suffer from "special operations fatigue," and that the nation's elite forces could become the target in future budget cuts. The country can't accept that, he said. "I'm concerned that (the Department of Defense) doesn't embrace us like it should," Sacolick said. "I hope that's not the case."

The concern springs from a characterization of the threats facing the nation. To Sacolick, terrorism is the most significant threat. But military leaders more often place that threat below Russia, North Korea, China and Iran. "I look at the world through a counterterrorism lens," Sacolick said. And from that vantage point, he said he's less concerned about a North Korean nuclear attack and more worried about an "ISIL inspired knucklehead grabbing an AK-47 at Cross Creek Mall."

The FBI is "really good at keeping America safe at home," he said. But it's the role of special operations to combat terror where it grows, on every corner of the globe. "The threat is as complex and challenging as it's ever been," he said, citing a 10-fold increase in global terrorism in the last decade. "The sky is not falling, but I'm concerned," he said. "The world is more complex, more confrontational and more volatile than it's ever been. But that's the job of special operations - adapt and defeat."

'Accidental General'. Looking back on his career, Sacolick said he was proud of his efforts in helping the nation fight terrorism. But he said his most important responsibility in recent years has been building a new generation of leaders. "It's pretty rewarding," he said. "If there's a legacy, it's the people who worked for you, who you've influenced in some positive way."

Sacolick is quick to thank those who helped him, the former commanders, deputies and brothers in arms. But he'll also readily admit that luck helped propel him through the ranks. If he ever wrote a memoir, he said, it would likely be titled "The Accidental General." That's because there's one area of military service where Sacolick has a horrible record: getting the job he wanted. "Throughout my career, I never got the job I wanted," he said. "I always got a better job."

That luck began Dec. 8, 1980, the day a soaking wet Sacolick was sprinting from business to business in downtown San Francisco. Sacolick was in graduate school, studying to become an actuary. But the tall and lanky young man running through the downpour that day didn't feel good about that decision. "I was frustrated," he said. "I kind of kept waiting for something else."

He found that "something else'' as he ducked into buildings in a futile attempt to keep his suit from being soaked. In a recruiter's office, he came face-to-face with a poster of a soldier holding an alligator. "Go Ranger," the poster read. "I wasn't even sure what a Ranger was, but this San Francisco-based recruiter, whose annual quota was probably only one or two people a year, told me that the Rangers are stationed in Seattle, which sounded great," Sacolick said.

Until that point, Sacolick said he had never considered military service, but within a few months, he was a 25-year-old private in basic training. His first assignment came with the 2nd Ranger Battalion at Fort Lewis, Washington. There, he was selected to attend Officer Candidate School, and, once commissioned in 1982, moved to Italy to serve with the 509th Airborne Battalion Combat Team.

Sacolick's next assignment was the captain's career course, but the young officer was committed to leaving the service and returning to school. Instead, he met Fayetteville native Ed Reeder, another man destined to become an Army general. Sacolick may have been thinking of going back to school, but Reeder was dreaming of joining Special Forces.

Last year, Reeder retired as an Army major general, having most recently led NATO special operations in Afghanistan. But as a young officer, Reeder proved to be one of Special Forces' greatest recruiters as he convinced Sacolick to join him amid promises of language school, scuba school and action overseas. Soon, the two friends were serving together in South America with the 7th Special Forces Group.

Sacolick deployed with an Operational Detachment-Alpha, or A-team, to support counter narcotics missions in Peru, Colombia and El Salvador. But more importantly, he found what makes Special Forces so special. "There was not one special thing about us, but together as a 12-man team we did the most amazing things," Sacolick said.

Invasion changes plans. Sacolick was serving in Panama with 7th Group when his career was next shaped by happenstance. At the time, he wanted to join the Foreign Area Officer program, becoming a defense attache in Colombia and attending graduate school at UCLA en route.

In the days leading up to Operation Just Cause, he learned he was accepted into the program and mailed his acceptance letter and matriculation fee. But the American invasion of Panama would change those plans. "My battalion was already there," Sacolick said. "We weren't the invaders, we were kind of the invadees."

In the chaos, he said the Green Berets found themselves caught between opposing American forces, Army on one side and Marines on the other, who "fired up anything that moved." "It felt like all of Panama City was on fire - buildings were burning all over the place," he said.

Sacolick later realized that one of those buildings was the post office, which went up in smoke along with the paperwork for his new position. So instead of heading back to school, Sacolick moved back to Fort Bragg. He thought he would teach at the school where he would later command, the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School. But that, too, wasn't meant to be.

Two nights after reporting to Fort Bragg, an officer Sacolick had never heard of called him with a job offer. The next day, Sacolick had a job interview in the officer's Fayetteville home. "I didn't know what I was interviewing for," he recalled. But within a week, Sacolick had joined what is arguably the most secretive organization in the Army.

Delta Force and Mogadishu. As assistant operations officer for Delta Force, Sacolick was the elite organization's most junior officer. But he wouldn't stay that way. Over 15 years, Sacolick rose through the ranks, eventually serving as the commanding officer and a task force commander leading the organization in Iraq.

In between, Sacolick deployed with the unit as part of Operation Desert Storm, where it was charged with hunting down Saddam Hussein's scud missiles, and to Somalia, where he helped plan the mission that led to the famed Battle of Mogadishu.

The events of that battle, depicted in the book and movie "Black Hawk Down," are now the stuff of Army legend. And on that Oct. 3, 1993, mission, Sacolick - who was promoted to major in Somalia - was to be the ground force commander. But days before the mission, Sacolick was called back to the United States. His father had died, Sacolick said. And it wouldn't be until days after the ill-fated mission that Sacolick would return to embrace his colleagues. "It was an exceptional group of people," Sacolick said. "I believe Delta enjoys such a great reputation because of its focus on character. It's not about shooting, it's all about building and maintaining good character."

In the 1990s, Delta Force underwent a transformation of sorts, Sacolick said, all aimed at preventing another "Black Hawk Down." The Battle of Mogadishu, "revolutionized how we did business," he said. Operators received better equipment, better body armor, and developed new tactics aimed at ensuring the force would never again be overwhelmed. "Something like that can destroy you," Sacolick said. "It made us better."

At the same time, the nation had an aversion to using the force after Somalia, he said. Leaders preferred to keep boots off the ground, relying instead on airstrikes. But if the Battle of Mogadishu helped propel special operations forward in the 1990s, it was the Sept. 11 attacks that has defined it ever since.

Sacolick was chief of current operations for Joint Special Operations Command when the attacks occurred. At the time, he was flying into Bosnia as part of a training exercise with other special operators. The men weren't sure at first if the news of the attack on the Twin Towers was part of the training scenario. The exercise was soon canceled, and Sacolick and his men waited for what would come next. "We all just sat there, kind of numb," he said. "We were all thinking worst case."

Afghanistan and terrorism. Like it did for many soldiers, Sept. 11 proved to be career defining for Sacolick. And it all started, Sacolick said, about a month after the attacks in New York, Pennsylvania and Washington. "By mid-October, we were gone," Sacolick recalled. At first, the soldiers deployed to Qatar, he said. From there, they pushed into southern Afghanistan. At the time, no one was thinking the war in Afghanistan would become the nation's longest, or that special operations forces would carry so much of the load. "We had that mind-set that we'd go in, transition to conventional operations and pull out," Sacolick said.

That wasn't to be the case, but Sacolick did return home in January 2002, not of his own accord, but because of a battle with Hodgkin's disease. Before falling ill, he believed he would be the next Delta Force commander. The cancer could have derailed Sacolick's career. "I kind of thought that was it," he said. But instead of giving up, he fought. After surgery, Sacolick underwent seven months of chemotherapy.

Most of 2002 is a blur, he said, but by the end of it, Sacolick was again healthy and cleared by doctors to command a month before the Army was set to make its decision. In 2003, Sacolick was preparing to take command of Delta, but first had to report to the Army's War College. He planned to attend the year-long course before returning to Fort Bragg to assume command.

But as they often did in Sacolick's career, plans changed again. "It was a shock," he said. "I was there 10 days before I was called back to Fort Bragg." As Delta Force leaders were planning their part of the Iraq invasion, the then commander suffered an aneurysm, Sacolick said. Army leaders gave him 30 days to assume command and lead the organization into war. "It was like a whirlwind" he said. "I inherited an organization in combat. I moved back in and, a month later, I'm in Baghdad."

That was April 2003, Sacolick said. But it also would be the beginning of yet another transformation for the unit. Delta, and JSOC as a whole, perfected its mission in Iraq, Sacolick said, moving away from "tracking people by moving pins on a map," to using unmanned aerial vehicles, like the MQ-1 Predator, to help "find, fix and finish."

"I like to believe that the things (Joint Special Operations Command) does so well started right there," Sacolick said.

Article from The Fayetteville Observer

Special Operations - Worldwide

From an article on the Washington Post titled "This is where American Special Operations forces are helping advise U.S allies". These are primarily Army Special Forces units in a training and advisory role.

U.S. Special Operations forces have been quietly deployed around the world since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in an effort to shore up U.S. allies embroiled in their own conflicts. While not secret, the missions — known often by some variation of “train, advise and assist” — have served as an extension of America’s larger wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Instead of large deployments of troops, U.S. Special Operations forces instead embed with local militaries to help bolster their capabilities and often accompany them on missions that serve both their government’s interests and those of the United States.

Below is a list of countries where the Pentagon has acknowledged the presence of U.S.-led “advise, assist and accompany” missions in recent years and a brief description of operations in those countries. This list is not exhaustive.

Somalia and Kenya. Since December 2013, the United States has maintained a small contingent of U.S. troops in Somalia and Kenya to help advise local forces and to support the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), according to the U.S. Africa Command. AMISOM is composed of peacekeepers from a consortium of African countries, and they have have been targeted by al-Shabab, an al-Qaeda-aligned group operating predominantly in Somalia. U.S. Special Operations forces have conducted raids against al-Shabab, along with its Somali allies, and U.S. aircraft regularly carry out airstrikes in the region.

Uganda. After a 2012 campaign to stop Joseph Kony, the warlord and commander of the brutal Lord’s Resistance Army, the Pentagon deployed a detachment of U.S. Special Operations forces, including Army Green Berets, and drones to help local forces, including Ugandan troops, to locate Kony in the neighboring Central African Republic.

Tunisia. Little is publicly known about U.S. forces in Tunisia, other than that there is a small contingent of Special Operations forces there — probably from Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command — helping its Tunisian counterparts to develop their ability to counter extremist groups within and near their borders.

Mauritania. While the United States gave Mauritania two advanced surveillance aircraft in 2014 to help counter al-Qaeda’s affiliate in the region, known as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, little is known about the “train, advise and assist” mission there. It probably resembles U.S. involvement in other African countries: a small Special Operations detachment working with its local counterparts.

Niger. After the kidnapping of more than 200 schoolgirls by the militant group Boko Haram in nearby Nigeria in 2014, the United States deployed a small tranche of Special Operations forces to help build up the militaries of countries such as Niger, Nigeria and Chad. The United States and France also have flown drones out of Niger’s capital in an effort to gather intelligence on Boko Haram. U.S. and French forces cooperated across West Africa after France intervened in Mali in 2012, following a revolt there.

Mali. In 2013, a handful of U.S. Special Operations forces deployed to Mali to help assist French forces fighting there and coordinate military aircraft in the region. It is unclear whether U.S. forces are still in Mali; however, at least one Special Operations soldier was present in the country’s capital when al-Qaeda militants opened fire in a local hotel and took more than 130 people hostage in November 2015.

Philippines. The United States has helped train and assist Philippine forces since 2001. A continually rotating force of Special Operations troops has helped the Philippine government fight the Abu Sayyaf Group, an Islamist group. U.S. forces are barred from participating in direct combat; instead, they help Philippine troops locate Abu Sayyaf havens. U.S. forces have also conducted information campaigns and civil affairs projects to build local opposition to the group.

Colombia. There has been consistent U.S. involvement in Latin America since the start of the “War on Drugs” in the 1980s. Elements from the Joint Special Operations Command and the CIA both helped take down one of Colombia’s most notorious drug lords, Pablo Escobar, in the early 1990s. In recent years, Special Operations forces have helped the Colombian military with intelligence and advanced military equipment as it has fought FARC rebels. In late 2015, the Colombian government struck a cease-fire with the rebel group and it is unclear whether U.S. forces continue to aid Colombian troops.

U.S. Special Operations forces are also engaged on more traditional battlefields:

Iraq. American troops have been in Iraq since the 2003 invasion. Although the majority of U.S. troops pulled out in 2011, a small element of Special Operations forces advised some parts of the Iraqi military until the Islamic State overran the city of Mosul in the summer of 2014. Since then, the United States has pledged air support and a limited number of advisers to help the Iraqis fight the Islamic State. U.S. troops and U.S. Special Operations forces are training units from the Iraqi military and helping them call in airstrikes. The Pentagon has gone to great lengths to keep U.S. forces off the front lines; however, a Delta Force soldier accompanying Iraqi Kurds was killed on a raid in northern Iraq in 2015 and a U.S. Marine, stationed at an American fire base, died after coming under rocket fire last month.

Syria. In December, President Obama announced that a small contingent of U.S. Special Operations forces would enter Syria to help train, advise and assist Syrian forces known as the Syrian Democratic Forces and the Syrian Arab Coalition. Both are amorphous groups of “moderate” Syrian rebels and Syrian Kurds. While the White House said the contingent would only consist of 50 troops, it is unclear how many are there now. In February, U.S. Special Operations forces helped Syrian opposition forces retake the town of al-Shaddadi from the Islamic State in northeastern Syria.

Afghanistan. The United States’ first foray into Afghanistan in the weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks involved CIA paramilitary units and U.S. Special Operations forces, advising and assisting parts of the Northern Alliance, which was fighting the Taliban. As the war dragged on, U.S. forces continued to advise and assist the newly formed Afghan Security Forces and local police. Currently, roughly 9,000 U.S. troops remain in Afghanistan, following an end to U.S. combat operations in November 2014. The troops that remain are advising the Afghan military and its commandos. In the country’s restive south, a U.S. Green Beret was recently killed while accompanying his Afghan counterparts on a mission to help retake parts of the city of Marjah.

Senior Special Forces troops reap reward of retention bonuses

Critical Skills Retention Bonuses are retention incentives for senior NCOs and warrant officers in high-priority MOSs who are nearing 20 years of service, or who already are eligible for retirement. Under law, soldiers may not receive a CSRB of more than $200,000. Currently the Army does not authorize CSRB payments in excess of $150,000.

Bonuses generally are tax-free if paid in a combat zone. However, soldiers may not receive more than $200,000 in total bonus payments over their career from the CSRB and Selective Retention Bonus program. Budget projections indicate that during the coming year, the Army will spend about $20 million on these programs, with a bulk of that spending going to Special Forces soldiers.

Warrant Officer CSRB. Bonuses of $18,000 to $150,000 are targeted at military occupational specialty 180A Special Forces warrants in grades CW2 and CW3 who have 19 to 23 years of active service and who are fully eligible for continued service. Officer must obligate themselves for at least two years, and cannot exceed 25 years of service.

Bonus amounts are payable at an officer’s option in a lump sum or in installments as follows: $150,000 for six years, $75,000 for five years, $50,000 for four years, $30,000 for three years and $18,000 for two years.

Enlisted soldiers who are serving a Selective Re-enlistment Bonus or CSRB extension, and who are appointed as an 180A warrant officer, will not be required to repay previously awarded bonus payments to qualify for the CRSB, but they will be required to complete the remaining portion of the service extension associated with the previous bonus.

Senior NCO Critical Skills Bonuses. This retention program is targeted at Special Forces soldiers in the ranks of promotable sergeant first class and above who have 19 to 23 years of active federal service, and who agree to service extensions of 24 months to 72 months.

Lump sum bonuses range from $18,000 to $150,000, based on a soldier’s specialty and length of service extension. The biggest bonuses go to soldiers with proficiency in a foreign language. For details, consult MilPer Message 15-332, dated Oct. 22, 2015.

Story from the Army Times

Army Special Forces Veterans Among Those Targeted in Cyberattack

U.S. Army Special Forces veterans and possibly their family members were among the millions of Americans whose personal data was stolen this year in cyberattacks on the Office of Personnel Management.

Letters have been going out for at least three weeks to veterans of the elite force, letting them know that their Social Security numbers and other information provided for prior background investigations were stolen, according to a retired Special Forces master sergeant who provided Military.com with a copy of the letter on condition of anonymity.

"It's disgusting that we risk our lives to defend this nation and that the government cannot defend our most sensitive records or our families records," the retired senior noncommissioned officer said. U.S. intelligence officials say the hacks were carried out by China.

In response to Military.com's request for comment, OPM provided a link to its original announcement and guidance on the breach. The office in June announced it had discovered two hacks affecting some 21.5 million Americans, including military personnel and veterans.

OPM Acting Director Beth Cobert, who on Nov. 10 was nominated by President Obama for a four-year term as the agency's permanent director, revealed in the recent letter to the retired Special Forces master sergeant that her own information had been hacked.

"As someone whose information was also taken, I share your concern and frustration and want you to know we are working hard to help those impacted by this incident," she said.

Because of the breach, the federal government is going to provide everyone whose data was stolen, as well as their minor children, with identify theft protection, including credit monitoring, identity theft insurance and identity restoration services for three years.

She said the identify protection services have already been put in place.

Government officials at the time said the second of two hacks targeted military records, including sensitive information provided by intelligence and military personnel for security clearances. The forms believed taken at the time included Standard Form 86, which require applicants to detail sensitive personal information about mental illnesses, drug and alcohol use, past arrests and bankruptcies, The Associated Press reported.

In the letter given to Military.com, OPM stated, "If you applied for a position or submitted a background investigation form, the information in our records may include your name, Social Security number, address, date and place of birth, residency, educational and employment history, personal foreign travel history, information about immediate family as well as business and personal acquaintances and other information used to conduct and adjudicate your background."

For family members listed on a spouse or co-habitant's form, the information available to hackers would include name, Social Security number, address, date, place of birth and, in some cases, citizenship information, according to the letter.

The names of contacts and relatives potentially expose any foreign relatives of U.S. intelligence employees to coercion, the AP reported.

Article from Military.com

"Ex"-Green Beret Mathew Golsteyn Likely to Receive a General Discharge

"Ex"-Green Beret Mathew Golsteyn should receive general discharge An Army board of inquiry has recommended a general discharge for a decorated former Green Beret, finding no clear evidence the soldier violated the rules of engagement while deployed to Afghanistan in 2010.

Maj. Mathew Golsteyn, accused by the Army of illegally killing an unarmed, suspected bomb-maker, would retain most of his retirement benefit under a recommended general discharge under honorable conditions. While cleared of a law of armed conflict violation, the board did determine his conduct was unbecoming.

The government had sought an other-than-honorable discharge. Golsteyn's lawyer Phillip Stackhouse called the Army's ruling "deficient" and said Golsteyn would appeal. The government, he said, did not specify or work to substantiate any unbecoming behavior separate from the alleged law of armed conflict violation. In other words, the board made two different decisions for the same alleged conduct.

"It makes no sense. It's a defective finding." Stackhouse told Army Times. "They nicked him for conduct unbecoming with no specific findings."

The board members, Col. Stuart Goldsmith, Lt. Col. Angela Greenewald and Lt. Col. James Bekurs , were not required to explain their decision. Capt. Jason McKenna, a judge advocate who presented the government's case, deferred to Army Special Forces Command (Airborne).

Army Secretary John McHugh, who already stripped Golsteyn of a Silver Star and his Special Forces Tab, will decide whether to accept the board of inquiry's recommendation. Regulations dictate he can only act more favorably to Golsteyn than the general discharge prescribed by the panel, Stackhouse said.

Army Times sought a response from McHugh and received the following from Army spokesman Lt. Col. Ben Garrett:

"The results of the Board of Inquiry will be reviewed by the General Officer Show Cause Authority and the Army Review Boards Agency. As such, it would be inappropriate to comment on the results of the Board or the substance of the evidence considered by the Board," Garrett said.

Stackhouse said the appeal will be filed after the full transcript of the hearing is assembled, which could take over a month. In the meantime, he said, Golsteyn's discharge will proceed in parallel to the medical board process in determining the specifics of retirement benefits.

Stackhouse said Golsteyn remains unavailable for interviews, but did say that his client felt betrayed by the Army over the past few years.

"It's very fair to say he feels betrayed. We talked about that today. I also think that he feels vindicated by the testimony that has been presented: that there was witness after witness after witness after witness that testified to his moral courage, his decision-making and his character," Stackhouse said.

All along, Stackhouse and other Golsteyn supporters have maintained the Army investigation failed to find any corroboration of the allegation, which stemmed from Golsteyn's video-taped polygraph during a 2011 job interview with the CIA.

No physical evidence was found in the Army investigation (of which the Army Times acquired a redacted version). Golsteyn allegedly admitted in the videotaped interview with the CIA that he shot, buried, dug up and burned the body of the victim after the victim identified and threatened an Afghan informant.

However, tests of multiple burn pits came up negative for human remains, according to the investigation. Witnesses also provided no corroboration to the allegation, and most also effused praise for Golsteyn's character and capabilities. One member of the task force commanded by Golsteyn said: "Myself and pretty much anyone on our team would walk through fire for him." In the most negative statement, the investigator documented a major saying "Maj. Golsteyn was Type-A personality and could be very aggressive at times," though he knew nothing of any criminal or negligent activity.

Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., a McHugh critic and Golsteyn advocate, said in a statement that the hearing indicated troubling Army investigative procedures from "an investigator who intentionally misrepresented the body of evidence to gain certain access, to information that was incorrectly referenced and transcribed in the investigation, to a last minute decision to admit evidence that was earlier determined to be inadmissible." He said he intended to continue to pursue the restoration of Golsteyn's awards "through any and all means available."

Stackhouse expects his client will receive a high disability rating, with issues ranging from post-traumatic stress, traumatic brain injury, back issues and a heart issue stemming from Special Forces training. He noted that while Golsteyn's Special Forces tab was stripped, he remained a Special Forces officer, as the Army never transferred him to a different branch.

Article from Army Times

http://www.armytimes.com/story/military/crime/2015/06/29/board-ex-green-beret-mathew-golsteyn-should-receive-general-discharge/29477523/

LTG Tovo to Lead US Army Special Operations Command

Army Special Operations will welcome a new leader this week in a ceremony on Fort Bragg. Lt. Gen. Charles T. Cleveland will relinquish command of the U.S. Army Special Operations Command to Lt. Gen. Kenneth E. Tovo on Wednesday, officials said.

The U.S. Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) is the immediate higher headquarters for: the U.S. Army Special Forces Command (USASFC); U.S. Army John F Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School (USAJFKSWC&S); the 75th Infantry Regiment (Ranger); the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR); Military Information Support Operations Command; the 95th Civil Affairs Brigade; and, the Special Operations Sustainment Brigade.      

Cleveland had led the three-star command since July 2012. He will retire, ending a 37-year career, officials said. Tovo was most recently the military deputy commander for U.S. Southern Command in Miami. The Fort Bragg-based command overseas the nation's Special Forces, Rangers and other elite units, including civil affairs and psychological operations forces.

Tovo is a 1983 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point who began his career on Fort Bragg with the 82nd Airborne Division. After completing the Special Forces Qualification Course, also on Fort Bragg, he became a Green Beret and served as detachment, company, battalion and group commander within the 10th Special Forces Group.

Other local assignments include serving as plans officer for the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, commonly known as Delta Force, and as chief of staff for USASOC. Tovo deployed during the first Gulf War, for refugee relief operations in Northern Iraq, noncombatant evacuation operations in Sierra Leone, peacekeeping operations in Bosnia on two occasions, five tours in Iraq and one tour in Afghanistan. The latter deployment was as commander of the Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan and NATO Training Mission-Afghanistan.

Cleveland was commissioned in 1978, after graduating from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Before assuming command of USASOC, he was commanding general of Special Operations Command Central at MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, from 2008 to 2011 and commanding general of Special Operations Command South from 2005 to 2008.

Previously, Cleveland served as chief of staff and acting deputy commanding general of USASOC and held numerous positions within the 10th Special Forces Group. At the helm of USASOC, he maneuvered the command through a time of growing threats and tightening purse strings.

During a March speech at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, Cleveland said he was faced with tough choices in 2013, when the command, like others in the military, was hit with deep cuts from sequestration. Cleveland was commanding 30,000 soldiers, with plans to add 12,000 more at the time, but those plans had to change to address the roughly $260 million that was cut from USASOC's budget.

"The growth had to come to an end," Cleveland said. "We were faced with a bill . The only thing I had to pay that with was people. We had to stop growing." But Cleveland said he used the cuts to help transform the command to better serve the nation in the wake of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Under his plans, Army special operations units became more self-sustaining and leaders took extra steps to better communicate the unique skills the command's elite forces could offer. That includes direct action against enemies, but also working alongside indigenous forces, fostering cooperation and increasing military and civil capabilities. "Those are the twin sides of the special operations community," he said.

Under Cleveland's command, USASOC outlined the various overlapping missions and, for the first time, wrote doctrine to better spell out to other Army leaders how its unconventional warfare fits into the Army's core competencies.

In the face of ever-changing threats, special operations soldiers are more important than ever, Cleveland told students at UNC. He said special operations forces presented a "new way of fighting" that he compared to the rise of air power during World War II.

"We have a requirement to build, maintain and then deploy a global network of land power capabilities. Not only ours but those of our allies, friendly nations and surrogate forces," he said. "We're not fighting the way we did back then. Waiting for large scale combat . We can't afford to wait that long."

Article by Drew Brooks of the Fayetteville Observer.

Green Berets pay tribute to JFK at Arlington National Cemetery

The eternal flame flickered and the sun hit the grave of President John F. Kennedy as just more than 30 Green Berets lined the area around the gravesite. The U.S. Army Special Forces Command (Airborne) held a wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery on Oct. 21 in honor of John F. Kennedy’s vision and support of the Green Berets.

Though the Special Forces existed before JFK took the presidential oath, it was JFK who authorized the cap as the official headgear of the U.S. Army Special Forces. “The challenge of this old but new form of operations is a real one and I know that you and the members of your Command will carry on for us and the free world in a manner which is both worthy and inspiring. I am sure the Green Beret will be a mark of distinction in the trying times ahead,” Kennedy wrote to Gen. William Yarborough at Fort Bragg in October 1961.

At the ceremony Tuesday, Secretary of the Army John McHugh laid the wreath at Kennedy’s gravesite along with Brig. Gen. Darsie Rogers and a nephew of Kennedy, William Kennedy Smith. There were several Green Berets and Special Forces in the audience as well as some who earned the Medal of Honor during Vietnam: Melvin Morris, Bennie Adkins and Roger Donlon.

 Pictured at left is MOH Recipient Bernie Adkins and BG Darsie Rogers, Commander of Special Forces Command.

Kennedy visited Yarborough and toured Fort Bragg shortly before he wrote that letter to him in 1961, when he presented the Special Forces with the Green Beret. Among the soldiers who spoke with him in 1961 was Clair Aldrich. Aldrich, who was in attendance Tuesday, was at Kennedy’s funeral in 1963. He said it was the saddest day of his life. “The man, you could just look at him and see confidence," Aldrich said. The second saddest day for Aldrich was when he watched the assassination in Dallas over the television.

The Green Berets expanded their force under JFK by adding four additional groups on active duty and four new groups in the National Guard and the Army Reserve, according to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library.

“The Green Beret is again becoming a symbol of excellence, a badge of courage, a mark of distinction in the fight for freedom,” Kennedy wrote to the U.S. Army in 1962.

When Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, his family requested the Green Berets participate in the Honor Guard at his funeral.

“(Kennedy) got behind the Green Berets. They are a very highly trained group of people who travel all over the world helping other countries into their freedom process. He was the kind of guy that from his Second World War experience, he just made us so proud that he was behind us. We knew we had a president that was backing us up,” Aldrich said. “His death was just a terrible thing.”

“JFK, what he did in World War II, it just gave us the thrust we needed to go out there and be as much like him as we could. As for how I feel about it today, it makes me so dog-gone proud to come up here and participate in something like this. It’s unbelievable,” Aldrich added.

Article from Stars and Stripes

General worries US special forces ‘fraying’

An article from The Hill on the Lt Gen Votel's, the USSOCOM Commander nominee, concerning the operational stress that Special Operations has over pro-longed operations the past 13 years. Again, the press confuses Special Forces (Green Berets) with the larger Special Operations Community which includes Navy SEALS and Marine Corps Special Operations; Army Rangers, PSYOPS and Civil Affairs; Army and Air Force Special Operations Aviation units.

The Obama administration’s nominee to lead the U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) on Thursday expressed concerns about the physical and mental health of the troops he could soon command. Army Lt. Gen. Joseph Votel told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the 67,000 special operators force could be “fraying” after being “operationally active for a long time.”

However, the troops “remain effective in the tasks” assigned to them and can continue offering “unique solutions to challenging problems,” he added during his confirmation hearing. Special Operations Command has taken a prominent role in military operations ever since the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. The command has been at the forefront in carrying out counterterrorism operations in both Afghanistan and Iraq and has also helped train the special forces in those countries.

Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) noted SOCOM operators have being going “flat out for more than a decade now ... at mach speed.”

Votel said the operational pressure put on troops is “not exclusive” to SOCOM but that the increased secrecy about their activities is unique to them because they can’t discuss the dangers with family or friends.

Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) also voiced concern about "exhausting" troops and told Votel that "in a future of unconventional, non-state forces, your people are going to be the point of the spear." Votel said he would aim for SOCOM to be effective with a "light touch" and rely on the capabilities and resources of the military branches.

The three-star general also said the command has enough troops and would be able to continue its mission in Afghanistan as the U.S. role there transitions from combat to an advisory capacity. After December, a force of 9,800 U.S. troops will remain in Afghanistan. That force will eventually draw down to half of that by the end of 2015, and then to several hundred by the end of 2016.

About 2,000 of those troops will be from SOCOM and about 980 will be focused on counterterrorism operations in the country, Votel told lawmakers.

DIA Honors COL Nick Rowe

The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) in Charlottesville dedicated a building today to a former prisoner of war, and Army Special Forces colonel who gave the ultimate sacrifice for his country.

Alex Rowe didn't have the chance to get to know his father, but he certainly knows his father's legacy. “It gives you chills,” says Rowe. “While I was sitting there I said wow that my dad they are talking about.”

On Friday, the DIA dedicated a building at Rivanna Station in Charlottesville in honor of Alex's father, Colonel James Nicholas Rowe, who was killed on duty in 1989. Colonel Rowe was a captured by the Viet Cong in 1963, and was brutally tortured as a prisoner of war for five years. “He attempted escape three times," Lt. General Michael Flynn said. "The fourth time, basically when he was being taken to where he was going to be executed he managed to escape.”

Col. Rowe used his experience as a POW to help the Army create a survival course for service members who risk capture. Today the DIA and the facility that will bare Rowe's name helps locate service members who are POWs or MIA (missing in action). “We have the mission to look at every piece of intelligence that is out there to try and bring them back home,” said Lt. General Flynn. "What they do in their daily lives try to protect our solider and try to make sure they can survive while they are in captivity, that’s incredible,” says Alex Rowe.

Although Alex was only 2-years-old was his father was killed while serving in the Philippines, he says hearing stories about his father helps bring him to life. “The man that I knew for two years was just dad to me, but for them and for the United States he was so much more.” The SERE Course Colonel Rowe helped create has be taught to more than 100,000 service men and women over the past 30 years.

Alittle bit of Nick Rowe in the video below.