Category: Expert Analysis

The Special Forces Small Unit Tactics portion of the SFQC (Special Forces Qualification Course) is a 13-week program that will provide SF candidates in the SFQC the basic-level tactical combat skills required to successfully operate on a Special Forces A-Team (ODA). The candidates will learn advanced marksmanship, small-unit tactics; mounted operations, Special Forces common tasks, […]

Today, with companies like SpaceX, Blue Horizon, and Boeing working tirelessly to find ways to reach the stars for less money, it’s become a commonly accepted truth that the space shuttle, while ambitious and an incredible feat of engineering, was never the economic answer to maintaining an orbital presence. The shuttle program was an immense […]

For the past twenty years, the United States’ space fairing organization NASA has maintained a continuous presence on the surface and in orbit above Mars.  Rovers and satellite telescopes traverse the barren expanse of the Red Planet in search of answers about the formation of our solar system, the environment of other planets, and perhaps […]

The Marine Corps has a unique way of incorporating its history into every bit of training you undergo.  Marines are not only expected to leave recruit training in peak physical condition, they’re expected to be able to recite to you, verbatim, important elements of the ever-growing story of the Corps — something that sticks with […]

I sat in the back of a van that bounced into a remote training base in Northern Syria. Like many of my Kurdish hosts, I was technically in the country illegally after being smuggled in from adjacent Kurdistan. It was 2014 and the war was young, none of us knowing how much bloodshed was still […]

The United States isn’t the only nation with a massive new aircraft carrier setting out to sea, as this week saw the launch of the HMS Queen Elizabeth, Britain’s largest warship ever built, and its only aircraft carrier since retiring the much smaller HMS Illustrious in 2014. The British Navy calls its new ship, named […]

China officially launched the first of a new type of domestically built destroyer on Wednesday.  The 10,000 ton warship is the latest addition to China’s rapidly expanding military. The new destroyer, the first in a class China has dubbed “Type 055,” is said to be a significant leap forward in terms of technology employed by […]

It seems international media and human rights organizations have suddenly “discovered” the crisis in Yemen. After more than two years of horrific war and civilian massacres carried out by the Saudi-led alliance, even CNN has found a conscience, recently publishing The images Saudi Arabia doesn’t want you to see and “Yemen is silent, forgotten… even a purposely […]

Most of what we write here at SpecialOperations.com deals with the training side of the house. What you’ll need to do to pass the Selection and Assessment courses. But today we’ll leap ahead to the second phase of the Special Forces Qualification Course or SFQC for Special Forces students and talk about SERE training. Since […]

Bullet path, from 0 to 1000yds,of a 175gr HPBT Sierra Mach King bullet,fired at 2700fps of muzzle velocity. We started off this long range shooting series with an introduction to some important terminology. Now we’re ready to apply those terms. Let’s start with an introduction on a key external ballistics concept that directly relates to […]

With tensions on the rise in the skies above Syria and Europe, Russia and the United States would seem destined to return to the days of proxy wars and continuous posturing… and one can hope nothing more.  The United States clearly boasts the largest and most powerful military in the world, and the two nations […]

From Hugo Chavez to Vladimir Putin, it appears that Oliver Stone has yet to meet an authoritarian hiding behind left cover that he isn’t in love with.  In 2014, Stone produced “Mi Amigo Hugo” to glorify the Venezuelan dictator and received mostly jeers, many seeing Stone as a useful idiot in the machinations of Chavez […]