Warning beforehand, I ask a ton of questions
I've noticed lately that I enjoy making these type of characters or organizations -- those who perform expert and convert operations in small numbers I guess it's from me liking ninja. Since I don't work in the police or military ::, I often wonder how such tactics work and also why they are made?

I like to derive from real-life examples like the S.W.A.T or the Army Rangers, or examples from my favorite video games like FOXHOUND (Metal gear). um, I don't think S.W.A.T is black op. S.W.A.T is the familiar American special op group that was made to approach urban terrorism? what about other examples?

+ How are the Army Rangers (special) different than infantry soldiers?

+ Are there any real-life Black Op groups?

There is a true Delta Force like in the Chuck Norris movies. The Isrealies have such a force, not sure of its name.

There is tons and tons of information that can be doled out in regards to Special Operations and/or black ops groups, Cirro... You'll likely find more real world info on the various Special Ops groups, though, as Black Ops, per the definition of the term, are just that - 'they never happened', 'they don't exist', etc - buried under mountains of misdirection, misinformation, etc, and never 'directly' alluded to in any way, shape, or form.

When it comes to Special Ops and such, though, you'll find a lot of 'general information' on any number of groups (and, in some places, even references to their tactics, etc). To answer the easiest of the questions that you started this thread with, however, the difference between an Army Ranger and your standard Army grunt is, quite honestly, training, cross training, and more training.

A couple of things to run through Google (or your search engine of choice) in regards to the topic are:

Force Recon (USMC "special forces")

Delta Force (this is where you might get into some more of the Black Ops kind of stuff - "Delta Force" (as it's called) is a 'multi service' special ops group that really doesn't have a name and, officially doesn't exist)

Army Rangers (of course) - Don't forget to also search on stuff like 'Green Berets'.

SAS ('Special Air Services' (thanks Ginafae) if I remember correctly. Basically UK bad-a$$ commandos)

The list goes on and on with the Soviet Spetznaz (sp?), etc, etc, etc... Might also want to take a trip to the local Library and pick up a book called 'Secret Armies' (can't think of the author's name, ATM, but will check into that and post an update ASAP).

Anyhoo... if you've got specific questions, etc, just throw them out there... there's plenty of military folks in our community and, likely, one or more with some law enforcement insight... Heck, I might have a shadowy secret or two, myself...

P.S. Moved to the Common Room... more likely to get noticed as an "open discussion" there.

P.P.S You moved it here while I was trying to move it here, and I moved another topic as a result...Gah! - Grugg

SAS is 'Special Air Service' rather than services...and yes they are uber-hard. From what I know Delta Force was based on the SAS, in as much as it is largely black ops and inter-service to boot.

There's also a SBS in Blighty, which is 'Special Boat Service'. For some reason I always think of them as 5 year old kids sitting in a bath playing with rubber duckies...it might be because they never do anything.

Actually the "Delta Force" as portrayed in the movies starring Chuck is kind of waaaaaay far off... A better representation of the "Delta Force" would be a TV series called "The Unit". Even there, though, take what you see with a grain of salt... as I said earlier Special and especially Black ops units/operations/whatever really heavily on misdirection, disinformation, etc... For RP purposes and such, though, both Chuck's movies and that wonderfully gritty TV series could provide you with some of the insights and info you might be looking for... I especially recommend "The Unit" as it does delve somewhat into training and the wide variety of roles that these hard-charging bullet eaters are placed in.

I read that first post very quickly and tired, and noticed you said convert and thought the whole thing was about religion, I'm not reading too good today.

Good lucking finding "official" information on Black Ops, although there are lots of credible information sources.

I could tell you what they are, but I'd have to kill you.

Haha, oops, I did say "convert".

I meant to say "covert". Ugh. I type and click enter too fast.

Anyways..*Quivers @ Grugg* yeah, BlackOps is crossing in some serious territory. To find something on text about them, I might have to look up wars or info on leaks.

Ugh, I've never seen "the Unit".

SAS and Army Rangers? How is the training different?

I don't think anyone except ex-SAS people would know what their training is like. The names of those serving in it, it's precise number, and the theatre it's serving in is all kept under wraps (much like Delta Force).

You could always do a google search. There's bound to be some military-type who's written something about it.

And I just had a look. There's quite a good wiki page on the SAS. Nothing about training there though.

is available for the USMC's Force Recon, as well, Cirro. This one includes info on "greenside" and "blackside" operations, some info on gear, etc. Grab a look here.

Canada has it's own Spec Ops group known as the JTF2. While details of the group are classified, it was organized in '93 by the CF to handle such things as 'blacklight' missions and terrorist threats.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Task_Force_2
That actually gives alot of details..

Canada is also home to the now famous Camp X.
Camp X was established December 6, 1941 by the British Security Coordination's (BSC) chief, Sir William Stephenson, a Canadian from Winnipeg, Manitoba and a close confidante of Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.[1] The camp was originally designed to link Britain and the United States at a time when the US was forbidden by the Neutrality Act to be directly involved in World War II. After the attack on Pearl Harbor and America's entrance into the war, Camp X opened for the purpose of training Allied agents from the Special Operations Executive, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and American Office of Strategic Services to be dropped behind enemy lines as saboteurs and spies.

Camp X was jointly operated by the BSC and the Government of Canada. The official names of the camp were many: S 25-1-1 by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), Project-J by the Canadian military, and STS-103 (Special Training School 103) by the SOE (Special Operations Executive), a branch of the British intelligence service MI-6.[1]

Camp X trained over five hundred Allied units of which 273 of these graduated and moved on to London for further training. Many secret agents were trained here.[1] The Camp X pupils were schooled in a wide variety of special techniques including silent killing, sabotage, partisan support & recruitment methods for resistance movements, demolition, map reading, skilled use of various weapons, and Morse code.


More on Wikipedia and the like.

It is also speculated that the author of the James bond Novels Ian Flemming a trainee fo that very camp took inspiration from his experiences and of Sir William Stephenson for his books.

http://shadowspear.com/jtf2.htm

...has alot more details on missions and activity.

Thank you everyone

Since when did anything good come out of Winnipeg?

Not that I encourage war or anything...

I've heard of that guy, Sir William Stephenson. One of the most prestigious scholarship awards at the University of Winnipeg is named after him.