The seventh in a series of books by Tom Clancy offering in-depth "tours" of the U.S. military, Special Forces surveys the soldiers who "are perhaps America's most professional and capable warriors." Who are they? They are the men--and only men, for women are not allowed to become SF soldiers--who are "specially selected, specially trained, specially equipped, and given special missions and support." The Army Special Forces--known to much of the public as Green Berets--are often the first troops on the scene in a crisis. They're also incredibly versatile: "If you're looking for a Sylvester Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger, don't expect to find them in today's Army Special Forces." That's because specialized missions--involving anything from psychological operations meant to undermine enemy morale to guerilla warfare in remote jungles--require flexibility. "Specialized missions (paradoxically) require a broad range of general capabilities and skills," which means SF soldiers, "while physically fit, tend to be more balanced (like triathletes) than specialized (like marathoners and weightlifters)."

Clancy and his coauthor, John Gresham, describe how SF soldiers are recruited, trained, and assigned. There are plenty of interesting notes about SF culture: They don't especially like being called "Green Berets," for instance, even though most units carry a copy of the John Wayne movie The Green Berets in their traveling video libraries. They are typically in their 30s, divorced and remarried, intelligent, interested in the news, and able to speak more than one language. There are also lots of details on weaponry, chronicles of training missions, and plenty of maps and pictures. The book ends with a fictionalized account of an SF mission in 2005 and 2006.

Special Forces is replete with Clancy's tough-guy prose: "The overall media presentation of the Army Special Forces has generally been one of contrived crap." And the book is essentially a celebration of a premier fighting force, rather than a critical treatment of it. But this is not necessarily a weakness. Special Forces will appeal to anybody interested in the modern military, and it may bring civilians closer than they'll ever come to these important troops. --John J. Miller


From Publishers Weekly
His now legendary reputation in military circles gives Clancy as complete access to events and sources as any civilian can expect. This is the seventh in Clancy's series investigating key institutions of the contemporary U.S. armed forces (Armored Cav; Fighter Wing; etc.), and the most comprehensive overview of the U.S. Army Special Forces available to general readers. Clancy, writing with regular series collaborator John Gresham, begins with a softball-tossing interview of Gen. Hugh Shelton--books like Clancy's are not written by antagonizing four-star generals--and the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman establishes Special Forces evolution from the "snake eaters" of the Vietnam era to the "quiet professionals" described in the rest of Clancy's mostly first-person narrative. The first person is a big selling point here; discussions of equipment, "extreme" training and what Special Forces detachments actually do in peace, war and the gray areas in between are based on Clancy's own reportage often enough to maintain the "guided tour" conceit. Special Forces are shown training Venezuelan internal security forces, acting as coordinators for fire-support missions in Kuwait, cooperating with conventional U.S. units and, in a near-future scenario, defeating a nuclear-tipped terrorist revolution in Indonesia. Clancy's language slips into jargon often enough to confuse the target audience of interested generalists, and others may be disturbed by the implications of a military instrument able to do the things described here. But despite the drawbacks, Clancy remains a consummate storyteller, and this book is no exception to his oeuvre. (Feb.)Forecast: Pluses: It's a book by Tom Clancy in a series that regularly debuts on paperback bestseller lists. Minuses: It's not really a start-to-finish narrative, but a collection of field notes, albeit highly detailed and often compelling ones. Nitpick: the repeated phrase from title to subtitle reads badly.Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.


From Booklist
The seventh and ostensibly last of Clancy's portraits of U.S. combat specialities covers the special forces, who do not care to be called Green Berets. The book covers recruitment and training of personnel, who are more often broadly educated professionals than Rambo types; equipment, which includes an exotic mixture of high, low, and no tech components; and the variety of missions special forces execute. The latter encompass glamorous covert operations abroad (e.g., in Kuwait) and complex training exercises at home to help train other U.S. forces in counterinsurgency warfare. The book ends in the series' customary style, with a tightly written near-future scenario, this one laid in Indonesia. Over the years this series seems to have been determining how the revolution in compact electronics has affected everything military, which means that in it Clancy has produced one of the more significant as well as readable bodies of popular military studies. A fit shelf mate for its six predecessors. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description
They are sent to the world's hot spots-on covert missions fraught with danger. They are called on to perform at the peak of their physical and mental capabilities, primed for combat and surveillance, yet ready to pitch in with disaster relief operations. They are the Army's Special Forces Groups. Now follow Tom Clancy as he delves into the training and tools, missions and mindset of these elite operatives.

Special Forces includes:

• The making of Special Forces personnel: recruitment and training
• A rare look at actual Special Forces Group deployment exercises
• Tools of the trade: weapons, communications and sensor equipment, survival gear
• Roles and missions: a mini-novel illustrates a probable scenario of Special Forces intervention
• Exclusive photographs, illustrations and diagrams

Plus: an interview with General Hugh Shelton, USA, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (and the former Commander-in-Chief of the U.S. Special Operations Command-USSOCOM)


About the Author
Tom Clancy is the author of ten novels, most recently The Bear and the Tiger, and is the co-creator of the Op-Center, Power Plays, and Net Force series. In addition to his military nonfiction library, he is the author of The Commanders series, including Every Man a Tiger and Into the Storm.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

They are sent to the world's hot spots -- on covert missions fraught with danger. They are called on to perform at the peak of their physical and mental capabilities, primed for combat and surveillance, yet ready to pitch in with disaster relief operations. They are the Army's Special Forces Groups. Now, #1 bestselling author Tom Clancy brings his flair for military fiction to the real thing -- and takes you closer than any civilian has ever been to the operatives on whom our national security depends.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly