Relentless Strike: The Secret History of Joint Special Operations Command. By Sean Naylor. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2015 (original) (raw)
Related papers
Retaining a Precarious Value as Special Operations Goes Mainstream
The Joint Special Operations University (JSOU) provides its publications to contribute toward expanding the body of knowledge about joint special operations. JSOU publications advance the insights and recommendations of national security professionals and the Special Operations Forces (SOF) students and leaders for consideration by the SOF community and defense leadership.
Journal of Conflict Studies, 1998
This is an outstanding account of the struggles by which US special forces acquired unprecedented size, broad missions, and eminence within the Department of Defense, following near demise after the Vietnam War. It is a much less satisfying description of what unconventional warfare is, and how it can be employed to advantage in our time. The author's emphasis may well reflect the US military establishment's powerful tendency to be guided by internal factors more than by what it is to accomplish. Hence the book is longest on how we got what we have, modest on what we've got, and sketchy on what it's all good for.
Afghanistan, Counterinsurgency, and the indirect approach / Thomas H. Henriksen
2010
The Joint Special Operations University (JSOU) provides its publications to contribute toward expanding the body of knowledge about joint special operations. JSOU publications advance the insights and recommendations of national security professionals and the Special Operations Forces (SOF) students and leaders for consideration by the SOF community and defense leadership. JSOU is the educational component of the United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), MacDill Air Force Base, Florida. The JSOU mission is to educate SOF executive, senior, and intermediate leaders and selected other national and international security decision makers, both military and civilian, through teaching, outreach, and research in the science and art of joint special operations. JSOU provides education to the men and women of SOF and to those who enable the SOF mission in a joint and interagency environment. JSOU conducts research through its Strategic Studies Department where effort centers upon the USSOCOM and United States SOF missions: USSOCOM mission. USSOCOM provides fully capable and enabled SOF to defend the nation's interests in an environment characterized by irregular warfare. USSOF mission. USSOF conducts special operations to prepare the operational environment, prevent crisis, and respond with speed, aggression, and lethality to achieve tactical through strategic effect.
Special Operation Forces in an Era of Great Power Competition (Pre-Publication Draft)
Special Operations: Out of the Shadows, 2020
Despite the words of former US Secretary of Defense James Mattis in the 2018 National Defense Strategy, who warned that the future would be one of great power competition, not everyone is convinced. Speaking later that year at the Association of the US Army conference, Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) commander General Stephen Townsend said that he believed the "future of war will be a hybrid threat." He went on to add: "There'll be everything from tanks and missiles and fighter-bombers down to criminal gangs, terrorists, suicide bombers and guerrilla cells.. .. We're going to have to do all of that, the full spectrum of conflict" (Naylor 2018). Preparing for future great power war that may never happen is prudent defense planning, but for most nations, whose armed forces must respond to an ever-growing list of existing and near-term threats such as those outlined by General Townsend, preparing for great power war may be a luxury they cannot afford. In this concluding chapter, we look to the future of special operations and special operations research, focusing on the role of special operations forces (SOF) in an era of great power competition. As China and Russia continue to counter Western and US interests globally, and national and regional threats to peace and stability continue apace, the role of SOF might be more important than ever. But such a move will not go uncountered by competitors of the United States. Whatever the role of special operations in the future, one thing is for certain: they will be a critical contribution to the ability of all major global player to protect their interests and project their power globally.
The Next Generation of ‘Special Operations’?
What has this book told us about "special operations"? The vocabulary and con-cepts of special operations forces have been shaped by the United States and, to a lesser extent, the United Kingdom as the major players in this exclusive game. The authors of this collection, five of them American, have focussed largely on what are sometimes described as the "kinetic" aspects of special operations: fast-moving, high-energy, exciting and adventurous missions for small, specially selected and highly trained groups of mature young men. Civil affairs, psycho-logical operations, advice to foreign military forces, and other applications are less glamorous and slower-paced but are included in the missions assigned to US SOF. These are doctrinal and organizational constructs, however, that need not constrain those outside the American military community. Numbering about 47,000, the US SOF community is larger than the armies of many of the countries that have to structure them...
The Changing Nature of Warfare, the Factors Mediating Future Conflict, and Implications for SOF
2006
The Joint Special Operations University (JSOU) provides its publications to contribute toward expanding the body of knowledge about Joint Special Operations. JSOU publications advance the insights and recommendations of national security professionals and Special Operations Forces' students and leaders for consideration by the SOF community and defense leadership. JSOU is a subordinate organization of the US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), MacDill Air Force Base, Florida. The mission of the Joint Special Operations University is to educate SOF executive, senior and intermediate leaders and selected other national and international security decision makers, both military and civilian, through teaching, outreach, and research in the science and art of joint special operations. JSOU provides education to the men and women of Special Operations Forces and to those who enable the SOF mission in a joint environment. JSOU conducts research through its Strategic Studies Department where effort centers upon the USSOCOM mission and these operational priorities: • Preempting global terrorist and CBRNE threats The views expressed in this publication are entirely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views, policy or position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, USSOCOM, or the Joint Special Operations University.