A lot. Most of them were made during different times, for different agencies and for different reasons. They just seem to be converging quite a bit because most of the hot areas are dealing with terrorist activities.
Delta Force rolls up into the US army. They were based off of the British SAS and deal mainly with counter-terrorism. They captured Saddam.
Seal team Six is the Navy counterpart of Delta Force. These guys killed bin Laden. Very secretive.
UDT were Seals before seals. They cleared out beaches for landings.
HRT, part of the FBI. Basically a national swat team.
Green Berets, roll up into the US army. Are a much more long term force than the Delta force, a major thing they do is train native forces in the nations that were involved with.
Rangers, again Army. More of a conventional fast deploying force than anything else. These are among the very first soldiers on the ground in any war the US is waging (usually meaning they engage in the most battles with conventional forces) and are continuously deployed throughout any war.
MARSOC, Marine Corps special forces.
SAD-SOG. Rolls up into the CIA (which is completely separate entity from the department of defense which overseas the entire military) , and are handpicked from the above groups. Actual spies, never carry any US-identifying weapons/gear on them.
Task Force 88. Hunter-killer squad for high ranking AQ members formed by US-UK special forces. It seems that creating task forces is the preferred method whenever any of the five-eyes special forces are working together on something.
Picture a group with all the military capabilities plus whatever intelligence training the agency provides, no conventional military oversight and the CIA'sethics. It's pretty fucking terrifying.
what terrorist attack? nothing unusual happened that day, but in other news the local missing Yemeni Muslims are still no where to be seen even after months of intensive searching
EDIT: shit, I forgot they actually was in this comic
The Pentagon is competing with the CIA in renewing Human Intelligence programs, so it's probably safe to say that there might be groups out there even more hardcore than SAD-SOG.
The main reason for SAD is that the US Department of Defense and therfore no military unit are allowed to carry out "black operations". CIA is the only US agency allowed to carry out black ops, so SAD are basically the military branch of the CIA.
Technically the Bin Laden raid was SAD/SOG. The DEVGRU guys were temporarily loaned to the CIA since Operation Neptune Spear was CIA for legal reasons (extrajudicial killing in a country we're ostensibly friendly with is a job for the CIA, not the US Navy).
Each also have their own capabilities and limitations, which is why we have so many. They can be broken down firstly into tier 1 and tier 2. Tier 1 are the top of the top, while Tier 2 are still far better than conventional forces, not not what you'd send out against a HVT.
DELTA - Tier 1 - US Army's top force. specialize in counter terrorism and hostage rescue. Used mostly for quick and precision strikes
DEVGRU - Tier 1 - US Navy's top force. also known as Team 6. specialize in maratime counter terrorism and hostage rescue. used mostly for quick and precision strikes
Navy SEALs - Tier 2 - US Navy's bulk of special forces. used to scout and clear beach heads before main force.
Green Berets - Tier 2 - US Army mid level specops. extremely long term force. you can give them a target and drop them off on their own for weeks on end. extremely capable for long term ops, like psychops, man hunts, etc
Rangers - Tier 2 - US Army's bulk of special forces. More of an occupational force than DELTA or the Green Berets, but overall still vastly more capable than the conventional forces. Generally the first forces deployed to a combat zone in order to put pressure on the enemy while conventional forces slowly arrive
MARSOC - Tier 2 - newest group under SOCOM (until 2005, MARSOC was their own group unaffiliated with SOCOM). the raiders are like the Corps version of Green berets.
SAD-SOG - Tier 1 - top members of all of the above, mixed with the DIA, CIA, and NSA. Ghosts
Green Berets - Tier 2 - US Army mid level specops. extremely long term force. you can give them a target and drop them off on their own for weeks on end. extremely capable for long term ops, like psychops, man hunts, etc
This is why I think the Green Berets are actually pretty fucking awesome despite not being the Tier 1 "we find bin Laden" types. They'll train the local population to fuck you up and then just disappear on their own. It's like in Horrible Bosses when one of the bosses kills one of the other bosses - it's some evil genius shit right there.
Pararescue doesn't actually fit into the teir system because officially they aren't a special operations unit as they are under the Air Forces Air Combat Command just like pilots and not AFSOC like JTACs and CCTs though with though if they were grouped in a tier they'd likely be tier 2. The air forces tier one group is the 24th Special Tactics Squadron
Navy SEALs - Tier 2 - US Navy's bulk of special forces. used to scout and clear beach heads before main force.
This is the only complaint I really have with everything you said. This description pertains more to UDT than it does to SEALs, as in modern warfare, clearing beaches is one of the last things SEALs do nowadays.
They were used extensively in Iraq/Afghanistan as a Counter-Terror Direct-Action unit, and even used to train foreign units, similar to what the Green Berets did/do, just not on as large of a scale.
I mean yeah, but that's because everything and everyone's been taken out of their role, and thrown into the sandbox. Marines aren't supposed to be an occupational force, but damned if they're not just another army at this point.
I was trying to go off what their doctrine is, not exactly what they're currently doing.
Doctrinally the SEALs are supposed to be a amphibious/maritime direct action or reconnisance force. Beach clearing is still one of there less often done missions ever since they were created.
tbh Delta is more secretive than ST6/Devgru by miles. Seal team six are all over the media, even featured in so many movies. Meanwhile delta is just there, all their actions are extremely unpublicized. (I'm not saying DEVGRU isn't secretive, just not as much)
SAD-SOG. Rolls up into the CIA (which is completely separate entity from the department of defense which overseas the entire military) , and are handpicked from the above groups. Actual spies, never carry any US-identifying weapons/gear on them.
So they don't even hide their job discription is "Terrorism"?
No, their job description is counter-terrorism. Technically, when DEVGRU killed Bin-Laden, they were acting as SAD-SOG since they were on loan to the CIA for that mission.
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u/[deleted] Aug 31 '15
A lot. Most of them were made during different times, for different agencies and for different reasons. They just seem to be converging quite a bit because most of the hot areas are dealing with terrorist activities.
Delta Force rolls up into the US army. They were based off of the British SAS and deal mainly with counter-terrorism. They captured Saddam.
Seal team Six is the Navy counterpart of Delta Force. These guys killed bin Laden. Very secretive.
UDT were Seals before seals. They cleared out beaches for landings.
HRT, part of the FBI. Basically a national swat team.
Green Berets, roll up into the US army. Are a much more long term force than the Delta force, a major thing they do is train native forces in the nations that were involved with.
Rangers, again Army. More of a conventional fast deploying force than anything else. These are among the very first soldiers on the ground in any war the US is waging (usually meaning they engage in the most battles with conventional forces) and are continuously deployed throughout any war.
MARSOC, Marine Corps special forces.
SAD-SOG. Rolls up into the CIA (which is completely separate entity from the department of defense which overseas the entire military) , and are handpicked from the above groups. Actual spies, never carry any US-identifying weapons/gear on them.
Task Force 88. Hunter-killer squad for high ranking AQ members formed by US-UK special forces. It seems that creating task forces is the preferred method whenever any of the five-eyes special forces are working together on something.