More of Pentagon's secret hunt units sent to Afghanistan

[Chiron]

WASHINGTON
The Pentagon has increased its use of the military's most elite special operations teams in Afghanistan, more than doubling the number of the highly trained teams assigned to hunt down Taliban leaders, according to senior officials.

The secretive buildup reflects the view of the Obama administration and senior military leaders that the U.S. has only a limited amount of time to degrade the capabilities of the Taliban. U.S. forces are in the midst of an overall increase that will add 30,000 troops this year and plan to begin reducing the force in mid-2011.

Operations aimed at Taliban leaders have intensified as the military also gears up for an expected offensive this summer in Kandahar, the southern Afghan city that is the Taliban's spiritual heartland. Afghan President Hamid Karzai wants to negotiate with the Taliban, and U.S. and allied forces are trying to lure rank-and-file fighters away from extremist leaders. By hunting Taliban leaders, the specialized units hope to increase pressure on foot soldiers to switch sides.

Full story

[FloridaMP]

wish they would prioritize ANP development this much.

[hobbit]

Some of our young generals need to crack open a dusty history book or two and look up "The Phoenix Program".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Ac ... s_Division" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If you want to skip the preliminaries, just scroll down to "Vietnam & Laos" for a synopsis.

BTW There's been a lot of chit chat here lately about 75th RR history. How many are aware that when LRRP companies in Vietnam became part of the 75th Ranger Regiment, their operational rolls were expanded to include a closer kinship with the CIA and cross-border missions? The types of missions they conducted took on an expanded roll as well. In short, there was more than semantics involved in one's metamorphosis from "LRRP" to "Ranger".

[Ranger Bill]

Some of our young generals need to crack open a dusty history book or two and look up "The Phoenix Program".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Ac ... s_Division" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If you want to skip the preliminaries, just scroll down to "Vietnam & Laos" for a synopsis.

BTW There's been a lot of chit chat here lately about 75th RR history. How many are aware that when LRRP companies in Vietnam became part of the 75th Ranger Regiment, their operational rolls were expanded to include a closer kinship with the CIA and cross-border missions? The types of missions they conducted took on an expanded roll as well. In short, there was more than semantics involved in one's metamorphosis from "LRRP" to "Ranger".

At that time, operrational control of K Company changed from the G-2 to the G-3. I think that took place for a lot units.

[K.Ingraham]

Hobbit, it looks to me as if the present authorities have indeed grasped the fundimental principle behind Pheonix.

[RangerX]

This is one of the only advantages I can think of in a Democratic administration. They seem to have a tendency to use covert action more than conventional means to achieve the tasks at hand.

[McD]

Some of our young generals need to crack open a dusty history book or two and look up "The Phoenix Program".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Ac ... s_Division" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If you want to skip the preliminaries, just scroll down to "Vietnam & Laos" for a synopsis.

BTW There's been a lot of chit chat here lately about 75th RR history. How many are aware that when LRRP companies in Vietnam became part of the 75th Ranger Regiment, their operational rolls were expanded to include a closer kinship with the CIA and cross-border missions? The types of missions they conducted took on an expanded roll as well. In short, there was more than semantics involved in one's metamorphosis from "LRRP" to "Ranger".

I have chatted at length with a 75th RRA member who participated in the Phoenix program. It got the attention of the bad guys