 For this issue, Mr. Henry Fonda. He wears the uniform of the special forces. And he used the word special in describing him as no mistake, as you'll see during the next half hour. He's a mature, dedicated, and skillful professional. And his line of work is demanding. It takes in the full scope of unconventional or guerrilla operations. Special warfare involves three types of activity. Unconventional warfare, psychological warfare, and counterinsurgency operations. And this last includes the complete range of military, political, economic, and sociological action. New emphasis is being placed on unconventional warfare. And the reason isn't hard to see. Today, the threat of war takes three forms. General nuclear war, conventional war, and guerrilla or unconventional war. Fortunately, the world has never yet seen a general nuclear war. Conventional warfare, the regular forces of two or more nations in combat, but without using nuclear weapons, we know all too well. But at the moment, no such traditional war is going on. Unconventional warfare is a different story. In a number of key spots around the world, intense guerrilla operations are underway right now. And it makes little difference to the people of a country whether they lose their freedom to an invading army of regulars or through the action of guerrilla forces sponsored by an outside power. Special forces as such are something fairly recent in American history, but our experience with this kind of operation goes back to our beginnings as a nation. Matter of fact, if you've got a nickel that's old enough, you can take a close-up look at one of the greatest guerrilla fighters the world has ever known. The American Indian taught us some painful lessons in this department. Of necessity, we learned them well. To live and move where the going was wild, to move fast and undetected, to become a part of the terrain, strike with stealth and silence and be gone before the enemy's conventional forces could react. In revolutionary times, Francis Merian's Will of the Wisp raiding earned him a title which has endured, the Swamp Fox. During the Civil War, General Morgan's Confederate guerrillas silently destroyed hundreds of miles of railway tracks, essential avenues of supply for Union forces, doing effective damage far beyond forces ten times their number. During World War I, Lawrence of Arabia organized Arab guerrilla forces and led them to a successful defeat of the Turkish army. And throughout World War II, the Axis armies faced determined and effective opposition everywhere, as partisans in Russia, France, Greece, Yugoslavia, Italy, Poland and elsewhere, snarl communications, ambushed patrols, and cut supply lines. In France, the legendary Machi was built up even while under the heel of occupation troops. And when the time came, its men were ready and organized for action. From D-Day on, these guerrilla forces were worth 15 divisions to the Allied effort according to the Supreme Commander, General Dwight D. Eisenhower. In the Philippines, Japanese forces faced wiry and elusive guerrilla groups, which operated from jungle and mountain, harassing the enemy and sending out a constant stream of intelligence information to our forces in the Pacific. Since World War II, guerrilla operations have flared up in dozens of places around the world. Recent headlines have spotlighted such areas as Laos, Vietnam and, of course, Cuba. We have to be able to meet this kind of threat and to help others to meet it. And we intend to. A prime answer is this man and many others like him. The men of the special forces. This is their story. If you come at it from the air, Fort Bragg, North Carolina, looks much like any other army reservation in the southeastern United States. A sprawl of buildings surrounded by thousands of acres of pine woods, hills, swamps and streams. But Fort Bragg is different. It's different because here, the seventh special forces group of the first special forces has its headquarters. And here, the most demanding military training establishment in the world operates. The U.S. Army's Special Warfare Center. These soldiers are different, too. You have to look closely to see it, perhaps. But in the next few minutes, we will see that the difference is there. These are among the most able and most highly motivated men bearing arms in the world today. At the Special Warfare Center, they have occasion to work closely with men from the armed forces of other nations of the free world. They're faced by communist guerrilla activity as a dangerous reality and an ever-present threat. Here, they learn what they can do about it. To begin with, every special forces soldier must be airborne qualified. Before he can even begin his intensive specialized training, he must have won the right to wear the wings and canopy insignia of the paratrooper in itself an item not lightly acquired. There's no special age limit for men of the special forces, without perfect physical condition and deep reserves of endurance. No man can meet the demands this assignment will place upon him. The nature of the work calls for a close working acquaintance with dozens of foreign weapons, as well as a perfect knowledge of every light weapon used by our own armed forces. Every lesson must be learned well. Each man must know his specialty inside out, because when the time comes, he must himself function as a highly able teacher Always, formal instruction is followed by intensive practical application. At the firing range, he works with weapons common to the Far East, South America, Europe. His fingers become familiar with the ammunition used by each. He gets the feel of the weapons in his hands, stamps their individual characteristics indelibly in his thinking, pace for himself what they can do. He learns by doing. Second, required skill as communications. Every man of a special forces team must be able to assemble and use the components of portable long range transmitter receivers. And the communications specialist must be able to repair and maintain the equipment, even build a set from parts available. In all skills, the men are cross trained. This means that a man must be expert in his particular specialty and competent to handle the job of others as well. So the communications specialist must be able to send and receive 18 words per minute in Morse code. But every man must be capable of at least five words per minute. Special forces work is a risky business and no one man can be indispensable. The gorilla's life is limited to the isolation of wild terrain. He can't live and operate within walking distance of a supermarket. So he fends for himself with traps like these providing rabbits, wild pig and other small animals for food. Traps too can act as silent deadly sentries, patiently awaiting the approach of hostile men. First aid is another of the basic skills which special forces carries far beyond its ordinary meaning. The special forces medic carries a kit which provides surgical tools and even a basic set of dental instruments. Through weeks of work with army doctors, the special forces medic acquires almost as much practical knowledge as did the country doctor of 25 years ago. He learns to set a broken bone, care for a gunshot wound, remove an appendix, treat a serious burn. And of course every man is cross-trained in basic first aid. At Fort Bragg, the potential special forces soldier learns to blow up just about anything with just about anything. A prime function of unconventional forces is to disrupt lines of communication and supply. Here the student learns just how much of which kind of explosive placed exactly where will do the job. He learns too to make a deadly weapon of hands, feet, elbows, fingers. Instruction in judo and karate is very thorough. As you will have gathered, these are determined aggressive soldiers. But if you're looking for a bunch of wild men who go around breaking up the furniture on Saturday night, you'll be disappointed. Three M's characterize the special forces man, maturity, motivation, military. Emotional maturity is a must, and lack of it will wash a man out fast. And without deep motivation, or to say it a more familiar way, dedication to the job, none of these men would be here. They are soldiers with a purpose. As one officer aptly understated it, American citizens interested in doing something for their country. Their work in doing something for their country will take them to places where knowledge of the local language is essential. A total of 19 different languages is taught at the Special Warfare Center, ranging from Chinese to Czech, from Spanish to Vietnamese. Every man learns at least one of them. All the training, all the work is directed toward this moment. This is where an actual assignment begins for a special forces team. The isolation area, where they will be briefed in detail about their mission. They will leave behind them in the isolation area all personal items, anything which might serve to identify them. Security precautions are a familiar and accepted part of their work. Here they will stay until they move out, without fanfare, unnoticed, to their destination. Security is an important word in the vocabulary of this Special Forces man. He understands the necessities involved and accepts them without losing his sense of humor. For example, a popular poster at the Special Warfare Center featured the familiar face of Groucho Marx, with an eight-word slogan, say the secret word, and get 20 years. Besides the main training operation at Fort Bragg, there are Special Forces centers located in the far east and in continental Europe. From these three areas, men can be sent to wherever their skill and dedication are needed. In the meantime, that skill is kept sharp by the constant pressure of realistic and detailed training missions. You're going to get a look at one of these now. The Alps. Beautiful but a cruelly rugged place to conduct military operations. In other words, perfect training country. In a small valley near the Swiss border lies the German town of Bad Tolst. And here is the United States Army's Flint Cassin, headquarters of the 10th Special Forces group in Europe. Training missions are frequent, rugged, and realistic. And each of them begins as with an actual operation, with a highly precise and detailed briefing. Here the leader of a Special Forces team outlines the job ahead. Air drop into a remote valley, ski cross country to rendezvous at an isolated partisan headquarters, and help partisan forces in the demolition of an important railway bridge deep in the mountains. Other United States soldiers will act as partisans and as aggressor forces. At dawn on the preselected day the team is ready for airlift. Parachutes on and equipment checked. Much painstaking planning and rehearsal are behind them. From this moment, things must move with speed and precision. We are at the drop zone in an hour. At the drop zone, a reception committee of friendly partisans awaits the drop. These men are few, but they are highly important. Consider this bit of arithmetic. Skillfully directed guerrillas can tie down conventional troops 10 times their number. And a single Special Forces team can organize, train, and direct a force of 1,500 guerrillas. It is possible for the men leaving this aircraft to be the means of immobilizing 15,000 trained enemy troops. The reception committee works swiftly for their assembly. There is only slight danger of hostile observation in this high mountain-locked valley, but every moment of time between now and the demolition of the objective is spoken for. With the reception committee leading, the team is soon under cover of the woods and on its way to the partisan camp. Partisan headquarters at the moment have abandoned woodcutters hut several miles from the valley and still higher in the mountains. There is a cordial welcome for the men of the team and for the supplies they brought with them, especially the much needed explosives. Just now, however, there is little time for socializing. The schedule is pressing. Much remains to be done. According to plan, members of the Special Forces team go along with the Rating Party to advise and aid the partisan leader and his men in the demolition of the bridge. This will be a typical guerrilla operation. Interdiction is the military word for it and it is the guerrillas stalking trade. Its meaning is simple. Cut communications and supply lines. Destroy personnel and equipment. Come from nowhere, strike and disappear to strike again another time and place. This is high country, beautiful country. It can also be dangerous country. Within a few hundred meters of the bridge, the men remove their skis and place them so they face back along the escape route. Movement from partisan headquarters has taken longer than estimated and longer than allowed by the time schedule. Only 15 minutes remain to line up the operation, strike and get out. The bridge is there as described. The sentries patrolling it are from a command post just up the hill beyond the bridge. From this moment, the entire operation will have to be virtually soundless. One group will have to get in close and take out the sentries without rousing attention in the nearby command post. A second group will work into positions near the bridge from which they can move quickly to set their demolitions charges as soon as the sentries have been silenced. Time is running out. If the schedule laid down by the command of Bad Tolts is to be met, less than five minutes remain. Following military procedure, the guerrilla forces men act as advisors and observers, but will take no part in the action itself except in extreme emergency. The security troops at the enemy command post will train tracking dogs and the aggressor team begins pursuit over terrain they know well. For the guerrilla force, the problem now is to gain as much lead as possible on the aggressor troops. But he makes good time widening its lead as each mile draws the men trailing them deeper into unfamiliar territory. Only the chase is abandoned. Even the most determined hunter may hesitate to follow a mountain cat into its home thicket. The mission is over. All objectives accomplished. Who are these men? They're soldiers. Soldiers who know that the only guarantee of freedom today or at any time is in the willingness and ability of individual men to do whatever must be done, wherever it must be done to preserve that freedom. This willingness and this ability is what makes of these men the special forces.