Using Elite SOF

Don wrote:
Well, I disagree somewhat.  :-)  Regarding 
the Rangers, while their original purpose 
was raiding, if the invasion worked there 
wouldn't be any more raiding.

[Tomb] Really? Wherever there is a LoB, 
there will also be an area behind that (the 
rear area) where raiders that can 
penetrate the LoB can strike. In the 
modern day, heliborne and airborne 
insertions and riverine insertions offer this 
avenue. In the future, add spaceborne. 

  Using elite forces to take targets that 
*had* to be taken, even if they weren't 
hundreds of miles behind enemy lines is 
more or less doctrine, though I guess you 
could argue Pointe du Hoc wrote that role 
into Ranger doctrine. 

[Tomb] Elite forces are sometimes used in 
this role when 1) no one else is likely to 
have the morale/gumption to get the job 
done and 2) the task at hand is worth more 
than the other tasks for which the elite 
forces are trained and better suited. This 
doesn't make this an optimal role for the 
elite force. 

 In addition, I really can't agree with your 
last sentence.	"using them wrong" implies
(to me, I hasten to add) that you had a 
choice and picked the wrong one.

[Tomb] Not at all, in this case. It means 
that, considering their normal mission 
profiles, their training, and their typical kit-
out, they will be best suited for particular 
types of missions. Using them outside that 
envelope opens them up to a greater 
chance for losses and is therefore 
suboptimal in many regards. Now, does 
this mean you'll never do it? Of course not. 
Sometime even combat engineers have to 
pick up a rifle. Or clerks. But that doesn't 
make this the "right use of them" to my 
mind, just necessary. 

  Doing something you must do removes the
possibility of it being either right or wrong;	
it just is[1].

[Tomb] Right or wrong is sort of a poor 
choice. Optimal or Sub-Optimal. Using a 
tool for a job for which it is not well suited 
may work, but it is not the optimal use of 
the tool. If you use a $20,000 electronic 
probe as a hammer, you may drive in a nail 
which matters at the moment, but at some 
point you're then footing a $20K bill for a 
new probe. So the question you have to ask 
is: Does driving this one nail now justify 
the expenditure of a $20K probe? If the 
answer is yes, then you go ahead. But if 
the answer is "maybe", then you run the 
risk of expending your elite troops outside 
of their best-effect type of operation and 
hurting your overall force efficiency and 
efficacy. 

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Thomas Barclay
Co-Creator of http://www.stargrunt.ca 
Stargrunt II and Dirtside II game site

No Battle Plan Survives Contact With Dice.
-- Mark 'Indy' Kochte
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