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**The Reaper** · 04-29-2008, 07:47

Special Forces

Five things to know about these guys and the group:

1 To get in, you have to be in either the Army or National Guard, and you have to be a U.S. citizen because of the security clearance, although many Special Forces soldiers have been foreign-born.

2 President Kennedy authorized the Special Forces to wear the green beret.

3 Of the 2,800 soldiers who start the Special Forces process every year, 27 percent earn the beret. However, 45 percent of the National Guard citizen-soldiers make it all the way through.

4 Eighty-one Special Forces soldiers have died in Iraq or Afghanistan since 2001. Three had ties to Tarrant County: Master Sgt. Kelly Hornbeck, Staff Sgt. Eric Caban and Sgt. First Class William Brown.

5 The Ballad of the Green Berets was written by one, Staff Sgt. Barry Sadler, in 1966. It was a No. 1 hit.

CHRIS VAUGHN, 817-390-7547
cvaughn@star-telegram.com

04-29-2008, 07:47	#2
The Reaper Quiet Professional Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Free Pineland Posts: 24,780	(Cont.) Special Forces Five things to know about these guys and the group: 1 To get in, you have to be in either the Army or National Guard, and you have to be a U.S. citizen because of the security clearance, although many Special Forces soldiers have been foreign-born. 2 President Kennedy authorized the Special Forces to wear the green beret. 3 Of the 2,800 soldiers who start the Special Forces process every year, 27 percent earn the beret. However, 45 percent of the National Guard citizen-soldiers make it all the way through. 4 Eighty-one Special Forces soldiers have died in Iraq or Afghanistan since 2001. Three had ties to Tarrant County: Master Sgt. Kelly Hornbeck, Staff Sgt. Eric Caban and Sgt. First Class William Brown. 5 The Ballad of the Green Berets was written by one, Staff Sgt. Barry Sadler, in 1966. It was a No. 1 hit. CHRIS VAUGHN, 817-390-7547 cvaughn@star-telegram.com __________________ "It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat." - President Theodore Roosevelt, 1910 De Oppresso Liber 01/20/2025
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