Mustang Report # 5

"Nitty Gritty" as defined in Webster's New World Dictionary of
the English Language © 1974, means "the actual, basic facts, elements,
issues, etc."



In this introduction I will discuss some of what falls within that definition.
The reader should understand that what is basic to a Special Forces officer,
Warrant Officer or Noncommissioned officer would boggle the mind of a
conventional military man and rightfully so. The man you see wearing the Green
Beret is already a three time volunteer: first to join the US Army, second to
earn the parachute badge and third to participate in a training program that
rejects more than it graduates before he can be assigned to a Special Forces
unit as a fully qualified Green Beret. Most will then volunteer many times
during their careers in this elite organization of "can-do" warriors
so as to be a part of a TOP SECRET operation that is inherently dangerous - as
is especially true in an independent operation. My book Expendable Elite
is about such an independent mission, revealing the hard-to-believe or even
comprehend fact that the greatest threat to their very existence may come from
those who sent them, should they be declared necessarily expendable - no longer
needed and perhaps a security risk should they be allowed to live and tell.



When a nation has available to it Special Operations Force volunteers eminently
qualified to move quickly to any trouble spot in the world and engage in
unconventional warfare (whether it be direct involvement in active combat and
its many collateral missions of civic action, psychological warfare and
possibly military government operations, deployed as a counter-terrorist unit
or dispatched on special missions involving the training of indigenous forces)
that nation will be called on to help those less fortunate countries who find
themselves in a highly explosive, inextricable and immediate defensive need or
a long term incipient insurgency situation.



You will be introduced to certain aspects of Special Forces training and
involvement later in this series. In Part 6 — Blow the ASWAN High Dam
I will explore special demolitions and discuss the contingency mission on the
books in 1964 that called for the insertion of my all-volunteer team of eight
Green Berets carrying a man portable atomic demolition device we would employ
to destroy critical power transmission facilities at the ASWAN High Dam then
under construction in Egypt. Should you be skeptical that such a device exists,
consult Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) Publication 1 dated 1 September 1964 which contains the
unclassified definition of the SADM (Special Atomic Demolition Munition)
devices. At that time I was told they were stored at Seneca Army Depot in
upstate New York.



Special testing of unconventional warfare items at Natick Laboratories near
Boston, Massachusetts, coupled with what I thought to be some interesting
dialogue between a Mafia Don, myself and an SF Master Sergeant, during which an
unusual job was offered, are discussed in Part 7 — An Offer from the Don.
My book Expendable Elite will give you an appreciation for and
whet your appetite for greater exposure to the extremely important role that a
team of Green Berets plays in a counterinsurgency situation that has to do with
the vital nature of civic action.



Part 9 — Civic Action: The Building of Loyalty will acquaint you
with the who, what, when, where, why and how of that area of consuming interest
and you will understand why 60% of the efforts of my SF team were devoted to
the Civic Action program with the goal of "Winning the Hearts and Minds of
the People" being a primary activity and one of the major factors of our
area (An Phu District) being the mostr secure area in South Vietnam when me and
my team left in August 1966..



You will get a glimpse of what takes place in the war of words and deeds in Part
10, Psychological Warfare Operations and be exposed to the extremely
wide-ranging and technically demanding activities involved in a Special Forces'
medic's duty performance in Part 13 wherein
you will be introduced to the Dog Lab at Fort Bragg. It will also make you
proud of what the Green Beret Medics have accomplished and what they went
through physically, mentally and emotionally to earn their MOS.



One serious but little reported aspect of command and control involved in the
employment of Special Forces, particularly those teams dispatched as an
"independent" operation, is the lack of continuing jurisdiction and
the adverse effect the abuse of power can have on mission, men and people they
were sent to help and our nation's credibility. In my book Expendable
Elite You will learn of a few instances that will not only leave an
indelible mark in your psyche, but hopefully will inspire you to help in any
way you can to let our government know that we must act honorably and establish
those controls, namely the checks and balances needed to assure that is the
case.



To me the lack within the military of spiritual direction and adherence
to the Christian principles this nation was founded on is our real Achilles
Heel. If we do not pull ourselves together as a nation and again inculcate
Christian values in the home, the schools, the workplace, courts, government, and
the military establishment we will someday live under Communist rule.



When I first joined the Army as a raw recruit, along with my first military
clothing, boots, towels and dog tags I was issued a pocket-sized New Testament
with an olive drab cover at Fort Devens, Massachusetts
in June 1952. Our American Army was a God-fearing Army in those days and we
soon learned from the "old-timers" that if God had not been behind us
and against Emperor Hirohito and Adolf Hitler we would have lost the war. The odds
against us winning, as worldly numbers reflected at the time, would cause you
to wonder how we won! I was sure happy to be a part of that God fearing Army
and knew in my heart that we could defeat any adversary who went against our
nation and our God.



I am pleased to share with the readers what was printed on the back cover of my
Army-issue Special Forces Handbook, the one I carried with me to South
Vietnam in December 1965. Published by the
Commandant of the Special Warfare
School on 1 January 1965, it stated boldly on the cover
page:

"The material contained herein reflects doctrine as currently taught at
the Special Warfare
School and is derived
from material intended for school use, prepared for resident instruction at the
Special Warfare
School."

That doctrinal handbook included:

SPECIAL FORCES PRAYER

Almighty GOD, who art the Author of Liberty
and the Champion of the oppressed, hear our prayer:

We, the men of Special Forces, acknowledge our dependence upon Thee in the
preservation of human freedom.

Go with us as we seek to defend the defenseless and to free the enslaved.

May we ever remember that our nation, whose motto is "In God we Trust",
expects that we shall acquit ourselves with honor, that we may never bring
shame upon our faith, our families, or our fellow men.

Grant us wisdom from Thy mind, courage from Thine heart, strength from Thine
arm, and protection from Thine Hand. It is for Thee that we do battle, and to
Thee belongs this victor's crown.

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power and glory forever, AMEN.

I was honored to command Special Forces Detachment A-424 from the end of
December 1965 through the first of
August 1966. Team members who served with me in An Phu during that
period of time exemplified the very finest in Special Forces, each one
embodying the principles of that Special Forces Prayer in the conduct of their
day-to-day functions, whether it be combat, civic action, psychological warfare
or helping to build stronger ties between the Buddhist Hoa Haos and the Central
Government in Saigon. I can say, without compunction that we who were Special
Forces Team A-424 never misused or wrought harm to the people who trusted us to
be their friends and fellow defenders of freedom. We were there to assist them
in maintaining what was important to them as a people and we never abused the
power that was ours to use for good or bad, staying the straight and narrow
course of a just direction in all that we did. Living the words of that prayer
and using them as our mental road map to success made it possible for us to be
continually victorious in the many battles we fought against a vastly superior
enemy force in both numbers and weapons. Perhaps even more spectacular as a
vivid frame of reference is what our sticking by what we know to be right
allowed us to remain loyal and steadfast to our Hoa Hao fighters and families
and to survive the wrath of the CIA when (as told in Expendable Elite), they
dispatched an ARVN Regiment to attack our camp in June 1966, wanting to destroy
us in retribution for what I did to unilaterally abort their plan to
assassinate the Crown Prince of Cambodia.

The Propensity to Abuse Power

Forthcoming articles in The Mustang Report Series will inform
and alert the reader based on what I personally experienced or was made acutely
aware of by sources I considered honorable and credible, of the danger that is
inherent within any military or civilian organization or political entity when
the individual in command possesses independent and unbridled authority and
does not follow law and order.



Understanding the need for higher level scrutiny in any such instance, I wrote
President George W. Bush on 25 September 2001, just two weeks following the
Trade Center disaster, to offer him insight based on my experiences. In that
letter I stated my case strongly, telling President Bush, "Why I write you
is that, having served as a Special Forces officer in Vietnam, Thailand, CONUS
and as part of worldwide contingency plans, I have experienced some of what we
would otherwise call terrorist tactics under the Flag of the U.S.A. I believe
that we as a nation, even as we condemn the terrorists and move forward with
all available assets, particularly the Special Forces, to find and punish the
enemy we must take immediate and aggressive action internally to cease and
desist from similar type activities we have in the past and may otherwise -in
the future engage in that are outside the scope of lawful execution of orders
inherent in a declared war. We must also establish those absolute controls
needed to insure that our nation's response to terrorist attacks or other acts
of war against this nation is legitimate and measured to preclude the abuse of
the power that too often is fostered in a climate of conflict among those in
positions of power who control the many weapons of mass destruction."' I
went on to delineate specific examples of actual or attempted abuses of power I
had personal knowledge of.



Though the "meat" of what I had written to him and what I had
referred him to had been previously used as part of what I had submitted to his
father, then President George H.W. Bush, to convince him of the need to demand
an investigation that would (and did successfully) clear former ARVN Lieutenant
General Quang Van Dang of allegations and heinous innuendoes that had been
perpetrated by the CIA against Dang for his having come to the rescue of me and
my men when the CIA's dispatch of an ARVN Regiment to attack my camp in
retribution for my unilateral aborting of the Sihanouk assassination plot, the
current President Bush did not so much as respond specifically to this author.



There is much more to come to you of the truth and nothing but the truth.

Keep watching!

©2007 LTC Daniel Marvin, United
States Army Special Forces (Retired)