Kibbee also hopes SOF-TEC can help the service’s special operators break away from “the Afghan village scenario” and use the region’s 2 million acres of training land, which includes access to population centers like El Paso and Las Cruces, New Mexico, for low-visibility training events. That will let “three to four” times more troops train at a time, said Gronowski. Kibbee called the area “the perfect storm for a training center.”Īnd the focus on special operations-specific training, Unbehagen said, will allow the Army’s elite troops to hit training objectives that might not be possible when SOF are attached to conventional combat training center rotations as supporting forces. When you factor in existing technology testing infrastructure at White Sands, Unbehagen explained, that makes the area the perfect location for everything from experimentation, to testing and fielding new weapons, to full-scale realistic military training scenarios. I have to figure out how am I going to hide my heat signature? How am I going to hide my electromagnetic signature?”Īccording to Kibbee, the Fort Bliss area has also long been home to Army SOF pre-mission training exercises, meaning that the new training center has a head start on relationships with local, state and federal agencies, as well as equipment and infrastructure already in place. “In Fort Bragg, I can camouflage to try to hide from being seen by guys on the ground,” explained Chief Warrant Officer 5 Scott Gronowski, 1st Special Forces Command’s top warrant officer.

That allows for training opportunities that haven’t been achieved at scale before. Gregg Kibbee, a senior operations NCO for the command, in the podcast. That’s because the military directs and manages the airspace over the installation, explained Sgt.

Spec ops training