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George Hand

When the ‘Spooge’ replaced flashbangs in Delta Force

“Spooge” somehow became the nickname for the cans of spray adhesive we used to stick paper targets, bull’s eyes, and the like to a target silhouette downrange. It simply was the quickest and most convenient way to quickly attach paper to cardboard and get on to the business of sending maximum rounds down range on almost a daily basis. In Delta, time is a valued commodity.

Spooge. That is simply the entry-level name as it was handed down to us trainees by the brothers of the training cadre. Why… I don’t even remember it ever being called anything different. If anyone had ever asked me for a can of spray adhesive, I would have blinked at them blankly. It was simply spooge; spooge is simply what it was — it was SPOOGE!

(A typical flash-bang grenade used by Law Enforcement; no fragmentation, just extreme loud noise and flash. Flash-Bangs are categorized as non-lethal riot control devices.)

Spooge was for sticking paper to cardboard. For attaching cardboard to a wooden target we prefered slat roofing tacks. Roofing tacks are a short nail with a very flat and wide head. It happened that when our Delta brother, Cuz, was hurriedly attaching a fresh target paper he noted his target backing and pulling apart from the wooden target slat.


(Just… a roofing tack)

Not wanting to lose the time to run the 150 meters back to the target shed to retrieve a proper hammer, Cuz decided that the spooge can already in his hand was of sufficient character to serve to pound in the tack. Within a few smacks on the roof tack with the bottom edge of the can it burst, completely engulfing his head and face — Warning: Contents under pressure!

Cuz’s ballistic eye protection was glued to his face, and his hair was covered. He staggered around blindly and calling out:

“Little help… a little help over here… aww, Jesus Mary and Joseph!”

We quickly engage in the attempt to pull his eye protection away from his face so he could see again, a ponderous and painful process.

The urge to laugh at the spectacle was non-existent; there would be plenty of time to laugh once we made sure Cuz was okay. That it was shocking was an understatement.

“Well, guys… that’s why we wear this safety equipment, you know?” he recited flatly, mimicking certain redundant preaching that was certain to result from the incident.

“Cuz, I think you better just head on straight home from here and see about getting that spooge out of your hair; there’s not much else you can accomplish here… unless you want to finish hammering that nail with a fresh can…” our Troop Sergeant joked, “Somebody go get Cuz another spooge can — HAMMER TIME, aha!”

“AH-HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA… yeah I get it, man… funny! I’m not going to hammer with any more spooge cans… just a regular Bob Hope, yooz.”


(Bob Hope, comedian, actor, USO entertainer for countless U.S. soldiers stations overseas.)

As fortune would have it, Mrs Cuz was a hairdresser and knew just how to work the glue from out of Cuz’s hair and off his face. She did a remarkable job; when Cuz returned to work the next day there was not so much of a hint of the adhesive in his hair, a vision that I found truly extraordinary.

For sure I endure the nagging and pining need for a cartoon to portray the event. As bizarre as it was, it was sure to be a cinch to find the humor in a can of target spooge that blew up in Cuz’s face like a… a flash-bang grenade. There it was; the vision in my head of spooge cans replacing bangers in a tactical building entry, the bad guys glued to the walls, floors, and fixtures. I stuck a fork in it *cuz* it was done.

Soon enough I felt Cuz’s eye on me for a time, then he finally approached me when I was alone; I felt I already knew what was coming and was right:

“Yo Geo… this isn’t going to find its way into the cartoon book, is it?”

Oh, the shame! Yet again a man was missing the glory of being immortalized in the Unit cartoon book. I had to remind him; I had to remind them all that they WANTED to be in the cartoon book for the balance of time, though it might not be a glorious thing that they recognized immediately.

(The featured cartoon courtesy of the author.)

A flash-bang is a concussion grenade that does not produce primary fragmentation, only extreme sound and blinding flash that serves to stun an enemy momentarily upon a room entry. Depicted is a team preparing to enter a room of unknown threat posture, substituting the flash-bang preparation drill with a can of “explosive” spray adhesive. “Lid’s off!” replaces the usual “Pin’s out!” referring to the flash-bang’s safety pin whose removal is the last step before throwing the grenade. In the final scene, the threat is neutralized by the exploding can of “spooge” rendering the threat stuck to walls, floors, and other incapacitating postures.)

I had to explain to Cuz the same way I had to explain it to every candidate:

Just because you got hurt or injured or humiliated due to an unfortunate blunder committed while on the job… do NOT think you should get a pass for that from the unit cartoonist. That will not happen — “If you dance you’re going to have to pay the band, and if you have to pay the band you might as well make sure it plays your favorite tune!”

Recall if you will that the cartoonist has a measure of reputation to maintain with his public. The fact that you make the cartoon book is purely a business decision, one entirely devoid of any emotion or sympathy. It’s a cold, impersonal, heartless business decision — forgive me, Cuz! I am the cartoonist; I am the band — PAY UP!

By Almighty God and with honor,
geo sends

 

Feature image courtesy of the U.S. Marine Corps

Complacency Kills: Lessons from a Delta Force breacher

“THERE’S A FREAKIN’ FENCE OUT THERE. A CHAIN-LINK FENCE!” came the holler from our man in the doorway of the building we were in. That fence was blocking our route to a field just outside, to where our exfiltration help was already inbound. I already knew what was coming next as the assault team leader looked at me. I nodded and started for the door when he called out, “Geo, cut it!” I was carrying what we called a Python Charge or Fence-Cutter. It was really just a great general-purpose explosive charge, powerful as hell, and was a shaped charge, meaning it was a wicked cutting charge that focused all of its burn energy in a concentrated direction. It could cut through all kinds of metal and was perfect for blasting through a chain-link fence. In fact, the measurements of the charge were approximately eight feet long—specifically designed with a fence in mind.

The Python was a linear-shaped charge (LSC) embedded in a long foam strip with a heavy rubber band on top and a wire hook on the bottom. I carried it on my kit, rolled up into a flat disk. I dashed outside with a man covering me as I worked. I whipped the Python to unroll it. I hooked the rubber retainer over the top wires of the fence, and pulling it taught, I hooked the wire hook into a loop low on the fence.

At that moment I thought I heard Major Horton from “Band of Brothers” call out to me, “WHAT IS THE GODDAMNED PROBLEM, MR. SOBEL?”

To which I would reply, “A FENCE, SIR… A… A CHAIN-LINK FENCE!

Major Horton: “AWW, THAT DOG JUST AIN’T GONNA HUNT!”

Different strengths of linear-shaped charge set in flexible foam molds.

The tension of the rubber band helped greatly to slap the Python up against the fence. I did a final check to make sure the Python was facing the right way, because that would certainly suck when I fired it from a few feet away if it were facing me rather than the fence. I grabbed the firing system, an M-60 Fuse Igniter attached to a Nonel shock tube detonator.

M-60 fuse igniters: Just pull the ring outward to fire.

Three seconds was all the delay I had programmed into the firing system. I popped the M-60, announced “BURNING!,” took one large step behind the python, and squatted with my back to the charge and fingers in my ears like a little kid lighting a Black Cat firecracker. I could hear the thump thump thump of Black Hawk helicopter blades approaching when the Python let off an ear-splitting CRACK and a wicked-rude shockwave that pushed me forward onto my hands.

Positive that the sneaky rat bastard Mike Tyson had snaked up and clocked me a good one, I twisted back and gave a gander at the fence. What fence? It was blown open from north to south. You could have driven a Ford Fusion through it without scratching the paint…not that it would have been a big deal with a Ford Fusion. I mean come on. OK, a Lamborghini, then. You could have driven a Lamborghini untouched through the hole the Python left in that fence!

I crouched by the opening, letting my team pass through to the exfil chopper. Each man gave me a “good job” slap to the shoulder as they ran by. A litter team jogged by with the asshat terrorist we had come to remove from leadership. He was strapped down tight, all beat the hell up, and looking totally disenchanted with his current state of affairs. Plus, he had crapped his pants. Every person we ever nabbed crapped their pants. Even general officers. They all crapped their pants.

“Last man!” I was told by the last assaulter to run by. My turn. I raced off to take a seat on the helo. I thanked the creator that we had a decently short flight, because even in a banshee-howling Black Hawk with both the doors removed, I could still smell that clown’s shit pants from where he lay strapped to the litter. I had to grin.

That was a good time. Everything went well—very well. To flip that coin, though, we all know that some of our best-laid plans may take a southern excursion of their own at times. Such was the case with Moses Bentley and the Bentley Blaster (BB) charge he had created on his own.

The BB charge was, in my opinion, more of what we called a “trash shot.” That is, it was just a wad of all of the explosive tailings, odds and ends, left over from making explosive charges. Pieces that wouldn’t really fit into another charge. We would typically take the trash shots downrange and blow them up once a month. I have used the term trash shot to describe a good number of people in my day, too. Perhaps some have used it to describe me?

The next mission called for explosive entry through an exterior door. Think of the front door to your house. It is probably the most no-nonsense, strongest door in your house. All interior doors are likely much lighter and weaker. Moses was the breacher for this target. He was hell-bent on using his BB charge, and use it he did.

We two, Moses and I, crept to the front door while the rest of the team stacked up just around the near corner. I had Moses’ back while he worked, just like my mate had my back at the Python. Moses fired the charge but did an odd thing: Rather than back away from the charge, he turned around quickly and ran around the corner.

The delay on the firing system was five seconds. I cleared the corner with the team as the charge detonated. MY GOD…it was so loud! I thought. I was stunned and flipped around 180 degrees. My ears rang like the Notre Dame Cathedral, and I wasn’t completely clear what I was even doing or even where I was.

An assault team in a stack just around the nearest corner from the blast of the breach point.

As colors slowly returned to my sight I could see now that the front door had not blown up. We had blown up. When Moses turned after firing the charge, his holstered M1911 had hooked the charge, stripping it off the door, dragged it back to the assault team stack, and…BOOOOM!

Moses was upside down, with his body slumped against the wall and his head anchored into the ground, neck bent at an impossible angle. You simply could never have manually placed a human in such a bizarre and morbid pose. Well, maybe if you were Jeffrey Dahmer.

The man behind Moses lay face down with his uniform trousers completely shredded, his bare legs bleeding from a hundred tiny holes. He was getting up slowly. I ran to him and grabbed his shoulder. He looked up at me with a horrified expression.

“Cos!” I said his name. His face changed completely and he grinned and shook his head a bit, exclaiming, “Whew…I’d hate to see what that door looks like now. WHEW!”

Moses had just come-to from his upside-down unconscious state and immediately got into a pissing match with our team leader, Daddy-Mac. “Well, Mos is OK. That’s what he normally does: argue!” Mos would be fine, but he was certainly NOT fine. He was badly burned, with black and red on his pelvis and legs. Some flesh was blown away and he had holes in both legs. His sidearm was destroyed and likely saved his life.

I could see his junk—which was completely disgusting—where his kit and clothes were blown away, and I was vicariously glad for him that he was still intact. He was out of action for weeks but came in occasionally to argue, because that’s what Mos did: argue.

Moses Bentley’s slightly damaged assault uniform.

An in-house investigation performed by The Unit’s master breacher gigged Mos for two faults: The first was the unauthorized use of a non-standard explosive charge, the Bentley Blaster; the second was his failure to follow egress procedure after firing the charge. Remember, he turned 180 degrees and hooked the charge with his pistol. If he had just backed away from the charge once he’d fired it, none of the carnage would have occurred.

The Unit could have let him go for that but didn’t. I’m thankful for that. Mos took his medicine from the master breacher like a man, but only after one hell of a long, drawn-out argument with the guy. Because that’s just what Master Sergeant Moses Bentley did. He argued.

By almighty God and with honor,
Geo sends

From a cartoon book maintained by the author depicting various events in a humorous manner. Depicted here is Moses Bentley himself acting as the explosive door charge.

 

Ongoing selection in Delta: The first thing you know

(Dedicated to Recon6)

Riiiingggg… riiiingggg… riiiingggg… (this is a sound that phones made in the day, back before we could we could select Poison by Bell Biv Devoe as a ring tone)

Jesus H. Christ, it’s only 0230… and oh-no, there can be only one good reason my home phone is ringing at this hour. I fumbled the phone receiver to my ear upside down.

“Hello, this is geo”

Nothing. I felt the phone cord on top, flipped the receiver around and tried again.

“Hello, this is geo”

“Master Sergeant Hand, what’s the first thing you know?” quizzed the remote voice.

Oh geez… well phuk me runnin’ in the rain in Rio, I thought as I was suddenly wide awake.

“Ol’ Jed’s a millionaire” I replied weakly. And without another word the connection terminated. Time to make the donuts, me thought to meself, and I left the bedroom to collect my go-to-work kit: a heavy nylon day-and-half-pack, a kit bag presumptuously designed, when packed thoughtfully, to maintain you operationally for some 36 hours.

Mine was black and heavy-duty with all sorts of modifications on it. It was hardly more than just a pile of zippers and velcro. In it no two items were ever in contact; every item was isolated in its own compartment. Ridiculous? Yes, absolutely. But once oriented in my mind, I could feel my way through it in the dark to any single item.

I envisioned my bag configured like a RAM board on a computer, with every byte of memory in its own cell, waiting to be called out by motherboard. Once used and no longer needed, the byte was sent back on its residence address line to stand by in its cell until further needed.

A song played in my head, one that would terminate and stay resident in my brain for an agonizing most of the day:

Come and listen to a story ‘bout a man named Jed
Poor mountaineer barely kept his family fed
Then one day he was shootin’ at some food
When up from the ground came a bubblin’ crude
(Oil that is, black gold, Texas tea)

The phone exchange had been a bonafide used in the day to notify an individual to report immediately to the Staff Duty dest for further instructions. It was any fool’s guess what the reason could be. I could find myself peeling potatoes in the mess hall kitchen or have a seat on the next Space Shuttle. The only guarantee is that it would be a mystery… until it was completely over.

Well the first thing you know ol’ Jed’s a millionaire
The kin folks said: “Jed, move away from there”
They said: “Californi is the place you oughta be”
So he loaded up the truck and he moved to Beverly
(Hills that is, swimmin’ pools, movie stars)

I cruised the back forest roads toward the Unit. I was in no hurry. The stage was completely black, save that which my high beams compromised. I just wanted to take my time to see absolutely nothing. But what are the chances my next instructions include catching a flight out-of-state, or even out of the country? Knowing the Unit, they would barely give me enough time to catch the flight. Suddenly I was very much in a hurry, as my gas pedal sank to the floor.

At the Unit, I parked in the usual squadron designated area, but in the best spot closest to the building, since there was nobody there. I turned to give the cars another visual, to see who else’s car might be parked there, and somehow involved in this same operation.

Excluding the cars whose owners I already knew were TDY, I recognized Paul’s car was already there. Hmmm, I wonder where Paul is heading this morning. I would indeed run into Paul under the most unanticipated circumstances.

I fast-paced it down the long spine of the building to the Staff Duty office, all the while wondering what I would be doing next: herding goats in Scotland, screaming out bids on Wall street, teaching spelling to a class of first graders, driving a phony UPS truck, lighting candles at the Vatican?

My answers made me grin because they reminded me of one of those silly tests they give you that is supposed to gauge what type personality you have. I think they are officially titled the “Utter Waste of Time Battery” by institutes of higher learning:

Which would you MOST like to do (circle one)
1. Host a Tupperware party
2. Try to fit a cue ball in your mouth
3. Be in a play about Moses
4. Smash bottles against a school building

Which one would you LEAST like to do (circle one)
1. Be cross gendered and torn by the dilemma that you want to use the mens’ room but know for
a fact that the womens’ rooms will be cleaner
2. Take a pottery class with estranged housewives
3. Pass out towels at a gay bath house
4. Smash bottles against a school building

I always just answered ‘B’ to every question, because it’s not like those tests were ever going to mean anything to anyone ever. I just wrote, “I’m an ass” under my name and turned them in… because I’m an ass. I accept that and freely admit it. Sometimes I get up in the middle of the night and type it out 500 times just to remind myself that I am not guilty of any pretense.

“Good morning geo” my fellow A squadron brother greeted shyly, playing the game.

“Top o the marnin’ to yeh laddie Patrick!” I returned Gaelic-ly, but thoroughly devoid of any enthusiasm.

Patrick dialed a five-digit number, so I knew he was calling inside the building.
“Principal has arrived,” Pat said over the phone and hung up.

So as to avoid an awkward stare down, I turned my back and pretended to read the commanders policies on issues that mattered to nobody hanging on the billboard in the hall, as I whistled the tune to the Beverly Hillbillies softly. The tune drew eventual cackles of laughter from Patrick and his runner.

“Hey geo” came the voice of our Operations Officer rounding the corner from the spine into the Staff Duty office. He handed me a large envelope with his left hand and extended his right for a hardy handshake of good luck. Without another word he broke gaze and marched out, leaving me to finish the final chorus of Beverly Hillbillies before I bolted back down the spine to my team room.

In the team room, I ripped open the envelope and sorted through the various papers until I found it… an airline ticket. All I wanted to know was what time the flight was. There it was. I had plenty of time. I sat now and sorted through the papers in order, taking in all instructions carefully. I was going to Seattle.

Reading through my instructions, I had time and was able to adjust my kit to accommodate the small piece of the mission as I thought I understood it. Well, this was just a transport leg. This tells me nothing really, except that it’s going to rain on me. I mean, I don’t know if this is a real-world mission that is going to take me overseas for some heinous act of insanity, or if I will be required to smash bottles against a school building.

Preferring the latter, I begrudgingly stuffed a light rain parka in my day bag. I raced through a mental inventory of everything I had in my bag, for fear that I might accidentally leave something in there that would trip the TSA inspectors. I mean, they always raised a brow at my menacing-looking kit and ran it through twice for X-rays… I just didn’t want anything that might get the Bomb Squad alerted, and my day bag blown in place.

Say… this mission sounds like a job for ‘The Shirt’! The Shirt was an ordinary shirt hanging in my locker that had $20.00 bills meticulously folded and sewn into the seams. Only me and my team bro Sam Foster knew about the shirt, and we vowed that whoever got called out on such a mission would be welcome to take the shirt. The missing shirt would also be a way that we communicated to each other that one of us was gone, and why.

The shirt was my first go at failsafe-ing a mystery mission call out. A second attempt, and after much thought, I took to taking several $100.00 bills, painstakingly folding them lengthwise until they gave the appearance of needles. I sewed those into the much narrower seams of my day-and-a-half bag.

If that were not enough, I awoke one night with a sudden epiphany. Yes, yes of course… a child could understand it, a child could! In my agonizing over the best way to failsafe a mystery deployment, I pieced together bits of leaked scenarios and rumors from guys who had been on them. In this particular night, in my sleep, it dawned on me that everything could be taken from me… everything that is, except my SHOES!

You see, the single common denominator in every leaked story and rumor was the fact that you had to walk constantly every day for many miles. For that reason I felt very strongly that they could not possibly take my shoes away! I would soon enough find out that I hit that nail right smack on its steel head.

The next day I pulled threads from the tongues of my hiking shoes, the ones I wore only to and from work, ones that I would be certain to take with me on such a mission. With the threads carefully pulled, I parted the material of the tongues and inserted $100.00 bills in each, ensuring I restitched the threads back in the holes they came from. They looked a flawless product.

Cruising easy to the city airport I wiggled my toes in my most valuable hiking shoes, and gave myself a reassuring nod in my rearview mirror. “High adventure” said I to anyone that would listen. “High adventure, be it potato peelings or Earth’s orbit, it invariably will be high adventure.”

geo sends

Photos courtesy of MeTV.com, SpilnoTV.com, and Wired.com

 

Stories from Delta Force Selection: When not to dance

se·lect
/səˈlekt/
verb
1.
carefully choose as being the best or most suitable: “he has been selected to take part”

Every one of us inherently wants to be selected. “Oh…PICK ME, PICK ME!” We bustled on the school playground forming up for games. Doesn’t it seem like you can hardly just go participate in a thing anymore without being selected first? “The specially selected elite,” “select cuts of meat,” “they were selected on the basis of their superior ability.” Most of us want to be selected for something, but until what? Until there is nothing higher to be selected for?

Selection for me during my adult years began with the (no kidding) Army infantry. Mind you, selection was a requirement to get into the military in my day of the between-wars, go-nowhere, do-nothing Army, in a day where a pulse and arched feet meant a checkmark in the selection box. I was nonetheless selected by the Army and did my victory dance out in the parking lot of my recruiter station.

Regular Army ground infantry soldiers patrol the streets of Ramadi, Iraq.

There wasn’t much selecting going on in the Army for the next two years of my enlistment. Most of the selecting entailed guard duty, garbage management, bodily excretions disposal on bivouac, and other heavenly, exalted tasks. And yet, “They chose…ME! I was the chosen one, the one selected!”

I heard the paratroopers were selecting men; theirs was a selection I originally forewent due to my monumental fear of heights. But after two years of serving in the regular “leg” infantry, I was ready to jump even without a parachute just to extract myself from my hateful environment.

I tried out for and was selected to become Airborne easily enough, save a broken pinky finger knuckle I got when I punched myself in the face upon landing from a 250 jump training tower at Ft. Benning, Georgia.

“KEEP THOSE ELBOWS TUCKED IN TIGHT, LEG…YOU ALMOST PUNCHED YO’SELF IN THE FACE, LEEEG!” Blared the ground cadre over a loudspeaker.

“Yeah, well the joke’s on you, asshat…because I DID punch myself in the face. HA!” I sure told them. Boxer’s fracture notwithstanding, the Airborne selected me and I ushered in a personalized styling of my victory dance there in the red clay of Georgia.

Parachute training conducted from the 250 practice towers at Ft. Benning, Georgia

I then went the way of the Green Berets and their nearly three-month-long selection course. I mean, three months is three months; it’s even hard to sit on a sofa eating bonbons for three months. I passed the Green Beret’s selection course and was proud enough to jig-up my victory dance in the pine forests of Ft. Bragg, North Carolina.

Special Force operators conducting a rural, cross-country land navigation exercise.

To my dismay, the GBs were not nearly what I had expected them to be. I think the fact that I was on a combat dive team was a saving grace that enabled me to remain in the GBs for so long as I did. It was, in spite of everything, a team of the very best men the regiment had to offer. The fact remained, though: I was afraid to find myself in combat with the GBs of the day.

I was ready, then, to be selected by the next great band of brothers. But alas, I had a great handicap blocking that path. I doubted, quite frankly, that I could perform on a level that would even remotely catch the attention of the Delta Force.

Bros of mine (in civilian clothes) protect Commanding General Norman Schwarzkopf during the First Gulf War.

I was not being overly humble. I tell you, truly, my resolve was largely devoid of all emotion; it was simply a mathematical equation that I calculated in earnest, and its dividend demonstrated that I was not capable of performing to their standard. If I attended their selection, it would be a mere percent of probability that if Delta looked for me in a specific place and time in the West Virginia wooded mountains, they would actually find me.

“The greatest failure is the failure to try,” said a genius once, so I tried.

Getting into long-distance marching shape where I lived at the time in Key West, Florida was a problem. The only long distances out there were along major roads and highways. The only elevations to “climb” there were about three feet above sea level, and the occasional hump bridges over water flows. I took to climbing fire escapes on the tallest buildings I could find.

Cartoon made by the author, depicting himself before and after a long march along the highway in preparation for the Delta Force Selection and Assessment course, and his friends’ waxing and waning confidence in his ability to pass.

I garnered unwanted attention as well, me rucking along the highways as I did daily. In a Safeway grocery store of all places, a tormented person just had to approach and ask, “It’s you. You’re him. You’re the guy I see every day racing up and down the highway with a backpack on. Why do you do it?”

“Oh, no big deal, really. I just got my license suspended for a DUI.”

My own A Squadron in the Iraqi desert, hunting for SCUD missiles. No officers were present during this operation—only non-commissioned soldiers.

Creative? Maybe, but it served me well. I made my way to the Delta Force Selection and Assessment course in West “By God” Virginia. I recall the last remark my mentor James N. Sudderth (KIA) said to me as he convinced me to try out for selection. I’d lamented that my body couldn’t physically handle it. “It’s OK if your body can’t make it, George, because it’s an out-of-body experience. Just go!”

So I just went. James was, of course, correct in much the same way that he was correct about most things regarding life—both in and out of the Army. Now he’s gone and I miss his mentorship. As I have often said and will say again, “If you no longer have a mentor, then you’d best get busy being one to somebody.”

I remember the day well, as it was the last day of selection. The last of 30 days of nonstop humping miles and miles of mountainous, forested terrain. On this last day, we had already dragged off the last few centimeters of our dicks in the dirt. For that we were awarded this fine opportunity to hump five or six times the distance we had ever humped before on any previous day. Sounded legit. This was no time to dance; it was time to pay the band.

I remember the day but not the exact hour when my body collapsed in complete failure on a muddy trail. A river ran through it, right down the middle of it—the entire unending length. I closed my eyes there where I lay in it. How hard I had tried to avoid it for so long, to keep my feet dry for some 10 miles or so. Now I lay in it squarely and hoped it would wash my body down that murderous mountain into some tranquil meadow.

Then I saw him. He was just below me at a full gallop. I had somehow taken to a lofty point just above and behind him, watching him run, and my, how he did run. He ran right down the middle of the river on the trail. He was strong and sure-footed, fast as a strong wind by my estimate. I wanted to cheer him on loudly, for he had kept on in the fight where I had just failed.

His strength and speed were a thing I marveled at. I didn’t hang on bitterness for my own personal failure; I had done my best and hit my wall, but I still had pride and sympathy for those who still had blood in their hearts. He was my hero for that; he could never die. “GO, MAN, GO! KEEP IT UP, POUR IT ON!” I was just so, so damned proud of him, whoever he was.

Later, I lay on my back with my head on my rucksack as a pillow, my boots and socks at my side, my bare feet near a blazing fire. Next to me, left and right and all around the fire, like spokes of a wagon wheel, were my brothers who had also made it through the course. There were more men around that fire than had ever passed the selection course in the history of Delta.

We had sandwiches of bologna and cheese in one hand, and a cup of hot “Long Walker” in another, gifting us a mild whiskey buzz. We looked at each other with wry grins but said nothing, the looks saying it all. It had, after all, been an out-of-body experience for each brother. It took us all a hot minute to crawl back into our destroyed bodies.

I thought of my victory dance and judged it a good thing to defer to a later time. Looking back, I realize that, in all the frantic fast-train of life in Delta, I never actually took the time to do that dance. But all in all, if I had actually done that dance back then, it wouldn’t have been an act of audacity, but of foolish arrogance.

By almighty God and with honor,
Geo sends

 

 

Feature image courtesy of YouTube

Former Delta Force operator: Why the 1911 is still my favorite sidearm

I’m a gunslinger by background, or at least I fancy myself the sort. I still wear my pistols low these days, just not quite as low as in the day. l live, nonetheless, today as I have always lived—by the sword. And you know what living by the sword means. That’s right, it means being unable to sleep at night because of the loud, late parties the sword is always throwing.

Why I like the 1911 for taking care of business

Now, in the day, we often jokingly referred to any 9mm pistol as a ‘sub-caliber device’, we pompous barbarians, the gunslingers of Delta Force. Our primary choice for a secondary (backup) firearm was the M-1911 .45 caliber blazer, legacy of the venerable John Moses Browning.

Never in modern history of U.S. ordnance have weapons remained in DOD arsenals for so many consecutive years without major modification or attempt to compromise the weapon’s intended ballistic capabilities as those introduced by John M. Browning.

I am put in mind of world-renowned small-arms expert Larry Allen Vickers of Vicker’s Tactical as he admonished a class he was giving on the operation and maintenance of the revered M2HB heavy machine gun:

Men, if John Moses Browning were to walk through this door right now…well, first of all we’d shit ourselves because Browning has been dead for over a hundred years…but then he’d say ‘do you men have and clue at all what you are doing?’”

There was no option to train with another caliber of pistol in the Delta training course for new operators; this was standard issue and would be mastered to successfully pass the five-month course. Mind you, the 1911s in the unit are not issued as they are unpacked from depot; they are meticulously modified by The Unit’s armorers to recognized match-grade standards:

  • Sights of choice, typically Low-Light BoMar or comparable class
  • Trigger pull eased to two pounds
  • Flared magazine well for faster magazine changes
  • Ambidextrous thumb safety, slide lock, mag release
  • Extended slide lock and mag release to aid in speed of reloads as felt through combat contact gloves
  • Aggressive checkering in key locations to enhance purchase
  • Pistol grips of choice to enhance purchase
  • Modified buffer
  • Modified feed ramp

Yes, the M-1911 is the pistol of choice in Delta, where there is never any guilt of pretense for its killing/stopping power. Yea though it be a beast to control, the pay-forward of the gat is rewarding.

The effects of the .45 jacketed metal slug can be likened to one of two basic classes of explosives, that is a low explosive versus a high explosive (takes a deep breath as he attempts to explain it without losing his audience):

High explosives such as C4 ‘plastic explosive’ expand (explode) at a very high rate of 26,000 feet per second (FPS). It burns fast and hot and has tremendous cutting potential against metal and the like. I compare it to the M4 assault rifle’s cartridge that sails along at over 3,000 FPS. It is supersonic, tends to penetrate very easily, and when passing through the human body, renders a high-velocity rifle cartridge wound.

The much lower velocity .45 Automatic Colt Pistol (ACP) cartridge, at 825 FPS, is well under the realm of supersonic, doesn’t impart the same acute cutting properties, but delivers devastating knockdown power. This round can be compared to the low expanding velocity of dynamite, TNT, and ammonium nitrate. These create more of a pushing, fracturing force that is ideal for moving large volumes of earth—such as in mining operations.

How ‘slow’ does the ACP round travel? I can tell you that, in my experience, the round moves slow enough to see with the naked eye.

“Bull crap!” you bellow out at my reckless and ingenuous suggestion.

I stand before you today a man solemn and grim in my claims. You can, in fact, under many conditions, see the .45 ACP fly through the air from behind the gun. Even from a flanking observation point, you can glimpse the shiny copper jacket as it crosses a dark background. From behind the pistol, a well-seasoned shooter can actually see the bullet arc up slightly and slap the paper of the target downrange.

An even more seasoned shooter (I have never seen this) can detect tiny specks of brass where they explode out of the chamber when the weapon cycles its reload phase. I felt inadequate when my brother, Samuel Booth Foster, explained how he was aware of the ephemeral specks of brass. But that comes from a brother who could watch a spinning ceiling fan and fix his gaze on a single turning blade.

“Incredible that you can do that, Sam!”

“Weak genetics that you can’t do it, George.”

“I love you too, Sam.”

Over my years in Delta, I maintained a cartoon book, a book of quotable quotations, and a Delta sayings and ‘non-sayings’ book. The lattermost book was made up of two parts filled with things you never hear in Delta, and then things you only hear in Delta. Those include the following:

Things you only hear in Delta

“Hey, has anyone seen our machine gun lately?”

“Well, I don’t have my parachute altimeter…I guess that’s the same thing as having turned it in.”

“Ft. Bragg is getting an allocation of nine of the new Javelin anti-tank rockets. Our cut is…nine.”

“The post military police (MP) were bitching that we were using up way too much of Ft. Bragg’s allocation of .45 ACP. The MPs now carry Berettas.”

“We’re going to work through lunch and dinner so we can get off early tonight (and then never actually get off early or get lunch/dinner).”

Things you never hear in Delta

“We’re using blanks and practice grenades on the objective tonight.”

“I’m sorry, Sergeant. You can have either the mash potatoes or corn; you can’t have two starches.”

“Cease fire!”

“Clothing issue facility rejected my canteen cup again. Still dirty somehow…”

“Fall in!”

“You need to get that mop trimmed, stand a little closer to your razor, and get that lid in travel lock, Mister!”

“Get your hands out of your pockets!”

“In cadence, EXERCISE one-two-three ONE one-two-three TWO…”

“Hey, my pistol doesn’t work.”

That last one—“my pistol doesn’t work”—yeah…what actually does that mean anyway? OK, so I’m just going to be an elitist ass and say that my gat was where it was at. I had the same two 1911s for my entire 10 years in the unit. Students graduating to squadrons carried all of their weapons and kit from training branch to squadron—there was no ‘training only’ pool of anything there. Everything was live, full caliber, no nonsense, and ready to go to war.

img_2644
Author with first Special Forces Group (Airborne) during range fire in AK, with his M-1911

Reliability: The only malfunctions I experienced with either of my pistols were intentionally induced for the sake of practice. Every time I pulled the trigger, it went BANG, and a hole nearly a half inch in diameter opened up somewhere bad.

Durability: I once had my pistol come out of its holster and fall five stories onto concrete. It did NOT discharge on collision, though there was a round chambered (of course). I fired it for a week after, then decided I should get a technical inspection (TI) of my pistols, as I had never had one done. I mean when do these gats ever wear out? The inspection revealed a hairline stress crack in the lower, not associated with the five-story fall, and a sloppy ejector (not extractor) that was associated with the fall. My lower was swapped out with a Caspian or Kimber lower, the ejector (not extractor) was re-seated, and I was out on Pat McNamara-style blaze ops the same day.

img_2646
Author left and Senior Engineer Sergeant Dave Royer on range fire with M-1911 in AK.

Accuracy: Don’t get me started. What can I really say, right? I mean a match-grade gat, match ammo…how many excuses are left for not hitting your target? Yes, typically we did our combat pistol training at 25 meters. But on occasion, such as when world champions Jerry Barnhart and Rob Leatham came to train us, they would have us move back to 50 meters and try some outside-the-box drills. We would eventually move back to 100 meters or more, watching the shiny bullet arc up slightly, then rudely spank the steel target plate.

It’s amazing how far away the ACP can still be accurate, how high above the head of the target you have to hold off, and how long the slow-moving ACP takes to get to its target. Just when you think you have missed, CLANG!

Satisfaction: Immeasurable. There is a peace of mind unmatched knowing that you have one of the most powerful handguns in the world for the last 100 years holstered at your side. One that you know can come out very fast, is sure to send rounds down range every time, and has unprecedented knockdown power.

I’m a gunslinging man, yes I am. I wear my pistols low these days, just not as low as in the day. That’s how I fancy myself.

Lest I die in jest, I remain,
Geo sends

(This piece is dedicated to Mr. Rob Garrett)

 

Delta Force’s James Nelson Sudderth – Conan the Barbarian

Prologue:There a two men who I credit, or blame, for bringing me to the Delta Force from my state of uncertainty and lack of self-confidence: James Nelson Sudderth and Matthew Loren Rierson. Both are departed. Both deliberately approached me and asked me to come to Delta Force.

First it was Matt who asked me ‘when I was coming’, coaxing the gears in my head to turn and engage. From that I felt a distinct lean forward that I merely nursed for about a year. Then came James, who TOLD me with a knife hand to my chest to come. That’s how James conveyed messages of all sort, with knife hand to chest. The lean forward became a jog ahead, and then a run. I ran right into the Delta Force, never looking back, no longer just Jenny on the block.

Forward:
I’m an SOF Combat Diver by trade, or at least I fancy myself one. I was assigned to the Combat Dive Academy as a Senior Instructor/Writer from 1989 to 1991. One of the courses we offered to the SOF community in the day was titled the Waterborne Infiltration Course (WIC). I attended the very first pilot course of WIC as a student. It was quickly and unaffectionately nicked: ’Ranger School on Water’.

WIC was six weeks of, grueling, finning, Zodiac-driving, Klepper kayak-paddling, over-the-horizon navigating, ass-whipping training on every tactical aspect of SOF waterborne operations, with the exception of underwater events! Underwater operations were a completely different animal, and required a specially select man to perform them.

special-forces-dive-team
Special Forces in the WIC course; long range navigation and infiltration with a Zodiac F-470 Combat Rubber Raiding Craft (CRRC)

WIC only ran for several iterations, and then it was dropped from the Key West curriculum for ‘lack of support by the Special Forces Groups’. That is a polite way of saying guys didn’t want to come to the WIC because it was just plain TOO HARD!

I could go on about how much harder the pilot WIC I attended was, as it was executed to find out how much was too much for us mere mortals… but this essay is not about me; it is about a man that I only ever imagined I was as good as.

Helocast operations; Special Forces troops cast from the back of a CH-47 helicopter as it flies ~10 MPH, and ~10ft above the surface of the water.

Meet James Sudderth:
WIC students occupied the tarmac adjacent to the dive academy equipped with hoses and brushes, vigorously washing and rinsing salt water from Zodiac F-470 Combat Rubber Raiding Craft, and other personal and team equipment. These men had been dropped by CH-47 helos some 16 nautical miles from the shore of key west the night before.

At that distance you are ‘beyond the splash line’ or Over the Horizon (OTH); that is, you have traveled so far from shore that you can no longer see land due to the curvature of the Earth’s round service. With no visual reference, these men had to perform instrument approach back to shore using compass, and route calculations that they had done in prior mission planning, to defeat Mama Nature’s tides, waves, and ocean currents.

The men worked brilliantly on their post mission stand down. Some shirts off, some on, some in shorts, some combat fatigues, some sandals, mostly barefoot. I looked down at the bare foot of one senior student, who I recognized very early on as being an irresistible leader, and powerhouse participant in all aspects of the training. His foot had a big toe, a little toe, but was missing his middle toes; it looked like it was rendering a perpetual Vulcan salute—live long and prosper.

“Sergeant First Class…” I barked, and the student looked up at me: “Yes Sergeant?”

“You appear to be out of uniform, Sergeant.”

“How so, Sergeant?”

“Your foot…” I continued: “You are missing several of your digits; you are of course aware that you are required to report to training daily with ALL of your equipment?” I joked.

The student grin an obligatory grin, one that is frankly forced, but offered as a gesture of respect, though he was sick of hearing jokes about his missing toes. I was immediately regretted my pallid attempt at humor, but the damage was done. I’ll wake up in the middle of the night thinking of that one, dumbass!

Another Instructor who happened to be in earshot, Chuck “Chuckles” S., sidestepped and leaned in to say: “Hey, that Delta’s James Sudderth, lost his toes in a chopper crash rescuing Kurt Muse from Modelo Prison in Panama. If you want to go ahead and just open your mouth a little wider, I’ll shove your foot in for ya.”

Little Bird Helicopter
The MH-6 Little Bird helo wreckage that took James’s toes

Have you ever been walking along in public and suddenly tripped over your own feet, and tried to do that cool-guy recovery? You look back behind you at the imaginary thing that ‘made’ you trip, with a pissed-off and pensive glare? You do that not for yourself, rather for those that saw you, so they will understand that you actually had a Fred-Astaire-kind-of cool going on… but then some villain piece of unconscionable shit made you trip in front of all these nice people.

Well I didn’t do any of that. I kicked off my shoes and grabbed a hose and starting squirting down UDT Vests, paddles, and whatever.

“Hey, James… sorry that that last remark; sometimes it’s like my mouth is falling down the stairs.”

“Heh-heh… yeah, don’t worry about it.” And so it went.

Over the years it had been suggested to me time and again: “You should try out for Delta; you need to go to Delta…” Perhaps, but I wasn’t by far guilty of any pretense. I wasn’t fraught with typical excuses: “Well, I’ve got a bone in my leg, I just don’t want to live in Fayetteville, this trick knee of mine, allergy to sloped hills, my wife, my ankle, my toe… MY ASS!” I did not go, for my one lone survivor reason: I did not believe that I could make it.

At the end of every course at the academy, the students and instructors get together and treat themselves to an end-of-course party. Everyone migrates back to Sergeants’ and officers’ status, and just have a jolly ol’ time for a few hours over a cookout and brew-ha-has.

Invitation to try out for Delta Force Selection
“James Nelson Sudderth is headed my way with a beer in his hand, coming right at me so I’ll step aside. Da-fuq, he intentionally turned and is still coming right at me. There is going to be a collision if he does not alter his course! And with James, well, you can bet there are going to be some knife-hand pointing to the chest.

“Sergeant Hand I need to talk to you.” Just call me George, and sure.” James nudged me to walk about to the other side of the building where there was privacy.

“It’s that shit I said about his foot… aw man, I knew it!! He’s going to twist me like Chubby Checker!”

And so James began: “George, you need to try out for Delta. Now, listen to me…” and he wiped the beer from his mouth, walked a quick two steps away to set his beer down on the academy building’s front porch, and then closed back with me. I totally got it, he was distancing the beer from the conversations in a it’s-not-the-beer-talking gesture, demonstrating his attempt at honesty.

“I tried to follow the Unit’s published train up guide lines, and I am not capable of carrying the loads over the distances and times it indicates, James.”

“George forget about that paper; you really, you just have to go and try out.”

“How can I when I can’t pass the entry-level standards??”

“You can do it George, if you just go and try. Trust me, it is an-out-of body experience; your body won’t be able to do it, but your mind will.”

I was nodding my head and pursing my lips, and thinking about how I met Delta’s Matthew Rierson, with whom I attended the basic dive CDQC with years ago. “When are you coming over, George?” Matt matter of factly asked me, and expected and answer, but never got one.

Still nodding I finally: “I’m going to do it. But just one question…”

“Send it.” James challenged

“At the end of selection, do we really have to live lift a 200 pound caldron of red-hot coals with just our forearms branding them with a lion and a dragon?”

“James flash a genuine grin, and kept his face pointed toward me so I could keep seeing his grin as he retrieved his beer. “Yes, yes you do, mother fucker, but you WILL do it!”

Kung Fu's Challenge

We walked back about the building to join the brothers in the throes of rejoice for their accomplished six weeks of smoke on the water. James walked with his arm over my shoulder, like a big brother. James was three months younger than I was.

I trained for selection my fist time, grossly over doing it, and wrecked myself; I had to wave off West “BY GOD” Virginia for the time. I regrouped and refit, and trained my second time for selection, and by God I made it through the course my first time around, flaming cauldron, scary tattoos and all… ok, no Kwai Chang Caine test of manhood. But it was definitely time for me to leave the temple and hang my hat down the spine.

Geo sends

TEAM 1985
James Nelson Sudderth (far right) hunting drug cartel kingpins in South America

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