6 Mar 2018

Fueling the SOF human weapon system

Special Tactics operators function as state-of-the-art human weapon systems and are force multipliers integrating airpower onto the battlefield. Dozens of different factors play into their ability to project forces, but there’s one area that can be easily overlooked: nutrition.

22 Feb 2018

Vietnam veteran talks long-term resilience to ST Airmen

The attack left him without his left arm, left eye and inflicted serious wounds to his right hand and legs. Marine Corps 1st Lt. Clebe McClary had given up, he was borderline unrecognizable and waiting to die in a hospital. That’s when Billy Casper, a professional golfer who was visiting wounded warriors at the hospital in Japan, showed up at McClary’s bedside.

13 Feb 2018

SOST members earn Bronze Star Medals

The brightly lit, inviting atrium of UAB Hospital is a far cry from the two room, concrete-walled farmhouse in the Middle East where the United States Air Force Special Operations Surgical Team, based out of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, deployed in 2016. During their four-month tour at that casualty collection point, the team performed the deeds that brought their families, scores of UAB well-wishers, and senior officers from the Air Force Special Operations Command, to the atrium for a medal ceremony on Feb. 13.

23 Jan 2018

Recon Marines, Special Tactics groom joint ground leaders

The police officers rush into the compound, weapons drawn, shouting orders at the men inside the building to surrender. Shots ring out, spent rounds discharge and the police retreat, leaving one officer behind with a gunshot wound. The insurgents drag him through the courtyard for all to see and execute him. Buried in the thick brush on a hill, a

19 Jan 2018

Silver Star awarded for Mosul offensive

The steel enforced car bomb barreled relentlessly toward the joint special operations team … it seemingly came from nowhere.

15 Dec 2017

Finding the way: Special Tactics chief awarded Silver Star

Their mission was to act as a blockade for a NATO ground operation tasked with clearing an insurgent safe haven. But what began as an ancillary tasking, ended with one Airman decimating the majority of enemy forces and saving his team from devastation. Chief Master Sgt. Michael West, a Special Tactics operator with the 24th Special Operations Wing,

4 Dec 2017

ST surveys airfields to gain operational advantage

Special Tactics Airmen from Air Force Special Operations Command conducted multiple airfield surveys with their Afghan Air Force counterparts in Faryab province this week. Airfield surveys are executed prior to the arrival of special operations and conventional aircraft to traditional airfields and field landing strips.

17 Oct 2017

SECAF awards Air Force Cross, 10 medals to Air Commandos

The team was trapped, outnumbered and bombarded by grenades and machine gun fire from elevated positions. Bullets ricocheted around them.Ordnance from circling, friendly aircraft exploded meters from their position, shaking the ground, as smoke from an exploded cache smothered the village.Their mission was originally to kill or capture high value

22 Sep 2017

“Lead from the front”: Special Tactics general officer retires

27 years of service. 13 assignments. Countless deployments with joint special operations units and even a stint at Harvard University.On Sept. 8, Brig. Gen. Robert Armfield, vice director of plans and programs for U.S. Central Command, retired from the Air Force surrounded by hundreds of teammates, friends and family at Hurlburt Field, Fla. “I

31 Aug 2017

Special Tactics saves lives in Hurricane Harvey aftermath

To assist in rescue efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, 38 Special Tactics Airmen were deployed to Southeast Texas to provide critical disaster relief.Special Tactics Airmen with the 123rd and 125th Air National Guard Special Tactics Squadrons are exercising their personnel rescue and global access capabilities to provide critical relief