Wow where to begin
USMC-Some of the finest SF soldiers I have ever worked with have been former(oop's once a marine always one) marines. Here in my corner of OEF(4th tour, fresh of a recon mission), the marines have always out shined their army counter parts. By design marines understand small battles/warfare and have done a great job of adjusting to the GWOT or at least here they have. As I have stated in other post, the "Q" has put in the magic stuff in the water and continue to push out some of the finest in the world at "getting it". So I have full trust that it will hold true if/when the marines send their boys through the "Q"(my understanding is that the 400 man unit will go through the "Q"). Hats off to the great job the instructors are doing.
Is there a need for additional SF right now? Well depends who you ask. For myself, my team and other teams in this group, the answer would be hell yes, I would love to share the biscuts and gravy(having said that I had to fight a SWC assignment to get back here again). But as I send guys to schools during our TDY trip to the states, all I hear about is the number of guys that are disguntial because they haven't been to the big dance yet. We can do better at cross leveling work load and this will also keep the force strong with proven combat vets.
Ground true for the fathers of SF(old guys), instructors or men that are just out of the loop. The SF world you think you know are quickly becoming a thing of the past. And the only people we can blame is??? That's right team daddies. More and more I read, observe and witness the destruction of the foundation of SF. First I blame the TS, second the flow of money(GWOT dollars), the surge of new kids, and the command. I will try and paint the picture that I see around me, without pushing opsec.
First example the team sergeant: The SFAUC generation, you see a ton of door kicking bleed over onto ruck teams(oops GMV teams now). Being able to shot, move and communicate is the basic standard that my team lives by(it also is the basics for any indig force too) and if you can do it in an urban invoirment(sp) you can do it anywhere. So my team does spend a good chunk of time working those skill sets, but it is only a stepping stone to the end-state. During any ITC train up all I hear is "my team needs more flat range time" or " shooting schools". Stuff along these lines is the normal now days. Again not saying it is wrong but it is just another stone in the pond. Bottom line most guys nowadays want to be door kickers. We aready have a unit for that, I don't think we need 5 more groups worth. Go to selection if that is you steady gig. I have done a ton of unilateral DA stuff here and it is a great time, but I all so know that it is not going to win the war in the long run, the HN will decide that. I see a lot of miss use of the HN, with the man use being the first line of defense for catching IED, or in earliy days the beleive was that if you have HN in your mounted patrol package or even better on your truck the enemy will not shot you. Just the facts I heard it all!!
Dollars; state of the art this or we need that or if we had this we could do that, I hear this crap all the time. As I look in my ruck(yes some teams still use them, even though we have trucks), I think I said this in another post but VIKING(memeber) was spending he hard earned combat pay to buy a new ruck, a couple of guys from our company said why waste your money, we've never that far from our trucks to need a ruck muchless a new one. Back to my ruck, it's right beside me freshly repacked from a mission. let's see, water, chow, NOD's, radio, bino's, ammo, map marker, recon log, signal stuff and a poncho. Well that's it, better check the packing list to make sure I'm forgetting some peice of hightech stuff, nope NOT MUCH HAS CHANGE IN THE LAST 40 YEARS. I watched a team leave a state side range after the day shoot, because they had NVG's, but didn't have peq-2 issued yet(long story), why waste the time the TS said. We hell how did we ever fight a war at night prior to lasers or NVG's.
Command; I once heard a team tasked to place a BP ISO a large op, the team replied that it would take a couple of hours to get the package in place, because it will be slow moving at night, for the HN doesn't have NVG's, higher reply was why are you taking HN? Team reply, that's what SF does, higher's reply not here, HN is for force pro only!!!!!(not my COC)
I know a lot of you men are throwing the BS flag, but I'm telling you it is true. It is not every team or even most, but it is growing. There are a few of us old school guys that are fighting the flow, but only time will tell.
So as you can see some of the special has been lost along the way, I think that if the proper training is conducted marines would be a great addition to the force.