Air Force commandos are learning how to fight in Sweden’s frigid forests where ‘nothing works’
“I mean, it's a real steep learning curve."
BY DAVID ROZA | PUBLISHED MAR 31, 2022 9:33 AM
Air Force special operators are some of the toughest in the world: their training pipeline is about two years long and it historically washes out 70 to 80% of candidates. But even these top-tier commandos were humbled by the deep snow and freezing temperatures of a Swedish winter, where several of them trained for two weeks earlier this year.
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Starting in January, 15 airmen from the Kentucky Air National Guard’s 123rd Special Tactics Squadron learned how to survive and fight at the Swedish Subarctic Warfare Center in Grubbnäsudden, near the country’s northern border with Finland and a stone’s throw from the Arctic Circle.
The course was “some of the most challenging and beneficial training I have done in decades, to be quite honest,” said Senior Master Sgt. Sascha Kvale, a combat controller flight chief for the 123rd, in a recent press release.
The gaggle of airmen who showed up in January included combat controllers, experts in air traffic control who deploy with Navy SEALs and Army Special Forces to call in air support; pararescue jumpers (PJs), combat medicine specialists who find and evacuate wounded troops from behind enemy lines; and special reconnaissance airmen, a new career field that specializes in electronic warfare and unmanned aircraft. The group also included support troops and survival, evasion, resistance and escape specialists, who teach other airmen how to stay alive if isolated in hostile territory. Their mission in Sweden: conquer the cold.
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/air-force-special-tactics-arctic-warfare/
