Chosen Soldier - Dick Couch [119]
“We grade each student in three areas,” Instructor Mike Burke tells me as his students gear up. Burke is a retired Special Forces medic and a licensed physician’s assistant. Like most 18 Delta instructors, he’s a wealth of battlefield casualty knowledge and experience. “The first is their initial assessment of the patient, and it is an under-fire assessment. The student medic must conduct immediate lifesaving measures to control bleeding and restore breathing. Once those measures are addressed, he has to move his victim to cover and relative safety for more in-depth assessment. When out of immediate danger, the medic conducts what we call a rapid assessment. This is also a graded evolution. It’s a head-to-foot inspection followed by field treatment to stabilize the patient. Treatment might include tourniquets, splints, braces, IVs, morphine, and the like. Then he has to rig the patient for casualty evacuation. Before transportation, the student medic has to fill out a form 1380. The 1380 tells the field hospital of the care given to date, the field diagnosis, meds—that kind of information.” One of the students appears at Burke’s elbow.
“We’re all ready, Mister Burke.”
“Well, then, let’s go to work.” Burke turns to a student with the aid bag. All of them are in battle dress. “OK, medic. We’re under ineffective fire, and there’s an enemy force probing our position that could make an assault at any time. You’ve got a wounded teammate up there. Let’s get him.”
Burke clicks his stopwatch and motions for me to follow. We trail the student squad up a shallow rise and some thirty meters into the woods. There, a wounded soldier lies moaning. And he looks wounded. His face is blue, and he’s having trouble breathing. There is a large gash in his thigh that is literally squirting blood. And there is a bullet wound in his chest.
“Hey, buddy, how you doing?” The student medic shouts to him as he drops his rifle to the ground and slings his aid bag from his shoulder. “Talk to me, man, tell me where it hurts.” The medic tends to the wounded man while the other three students take firing positions where they can provide security for the medic but still observe the treatment. The student checks his patient’s airway and applies a tourniquet to the spurting wound, all the while talking to his patient, asking him about his condition.
The wounded student has just come from the moulage tent where his face was tinted blue-white, the bullet holes were applied with a Magic Marker, and a rubber leg gash was glued to his thigh. A bottle of fake blood is taped under his armpit and connected to the wound by a thin tube, allowing him to pulse with arterial bleeding. Instructor Burke also has a squirt bottle of stage blood to keep the wound blood-soaked. This guy’s in bad shape.
PHOTO INSERT
WELCOME TO FORT BRAGG. A Pre-SFAS cadre sergeant makes a careful appraisal of a newly arrived Special Forces candidate.
THE CATERPILLAR. Pre-SFAS students link up, boots on shoulders, for collective push-ups during physical training on day one of the preparation course.
NAVIGATION PRACTICAL. A Special Forces soldier must be able to navigate with a map, a compass, and a protractor anywhere, anytime. Student Number 78 plots his course.
HOME FREE. Just in from navigation practical, Pre-SFAS student Number 70 catches a few winks in the base-camp area.
STAND AND DELIVER. Student Number 8 reports to the Pre-SFAS phase review board to determine if he will be allowed to move on to SFAS and Special Forces selection.
LOG TEAMWORK. Special Forces candidates in SFAS work together to manage their section of a telephone pole. Proper handling of the logs requires teamwork.
CHECKING IN. An SFAS candidate checks in with a point sitter on the land navigation course. When logged in, he will get a new set of coordinates and be off to his next point.
CONGRATULATIONS. First Sergeant Billy Sarno congratulates Private First Class Roberto Pantella on reaching the last point of the Star, the navigation final exam.
DUCT