Re: How much parachute training in U.S. military?

Thomas Schoene wrote:

> Brian Bunin wrote:
> > In article <1116159448.373260.224390@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
> > jacklinthicum@xxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
> >> With the Air Cavalry concept the delivery of troops to a battlefield
> >> seemed to eliminate the need for parachutes and parachute training. I
> >> realize the Special Ops people all are parachute trained, often as a
> >> means of weeding out rather than preparing, but how many regular
> >> forces
> >> get parachute traing? Aviators used to be
> >> given at least ground training. Anything more?
> >>
> >
> > A HALO drop from a Black Ops Transport can put a team down somewhere
> > that
> > helicopters can't go........
> >
> > For that matter, didn't the 82d take the main airport in Kabul by
> > airdrop?
> > ISTR that they were only reinforced by planes landing AFTER they
> > secured the
> > airport.
>
> No. The 82nd arrived in June 2002, well after the initial entry into
> Afghanistan. (Northern Allaince troops captured Kabul in November 2001).
> They simply air-landed at an already secure airfield. There was one
> small-scale airborne op, a 70-man drop into northern Afghanistan, but
> nothing large scale.
>
> The 173rd Airborne Brigade (a separate brigade based in Italy) did jump into
> northern Iraq, securing an airfield through which a small amount of heavy
> armor was landed. The 82nd came in after the invasion to hep secure
> Baghdad, but again they were air-landed rather than dropped.

Of course, IIRR that airfield had been in Peshmerga hands for years and had been
used for some time to bring in supplies and special forces, so the 173rd's drop
seems to have been more for PR purposes than any need to do so. It was
certainly controlled by the Kurds and SF at the time the drop was made, and
there's no obvious reason why they couldn't have just landed them using C-130s
or even C-17s. Iraqi forces were nowhere near it.

Guy
.

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