Defense: Pentagon plans 65,000 strong special ops force

The Pentagon expects to have a special operations force of about 65,000 troops in place in the next few years, about twice the number that existed before the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001, a defense official said on Friday, Reuters reported.

Michael Vickers, the assistant secretary of defense who oversees special operations and low-intensity warfare, said the total will provide enough Army Green Berets, Navy SEALs and other elite units to confront fully the militant threats that face U.S. interests worldwide.

"Probably early in the next decade, our special operations will be essentially almost twice as large as they were at the beginning of the decade," Vickers told a forum hosted by the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

"By the time we're done ... we will have the elements in place for what we believe is the special operations component of the global war on terrorism."

Special forces, which lead U.S. military efforts against al Qaeda and other militant groups, unveiled an aggressive expansion program in early 2006 and are deployed in about 60 countries.
Trained to fight in small units, often in hostile terrain, the troops are involved in a range of activities from clandestine operations to counterinsurgency training for foreign militaries.

About 15,000 special forces troops, or 30 percent of a current force of 50,000, are considered the operational core. Eighty percent of those are in the Middle East and South Asia, with the bulk in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The operational core would grow by nearly 5,000 under the current expansion, Vickers said.
"This is the largest growth in special operations force history," he added.

Republished permission FOCUS Information Agency

Published by Mike Hitchen, OverallStrategy.com
We're mot good - we're damn good