Joint Special Operations University

and the Strategic Studies Department

The Joint Special Operations University (JSOU) provides its publications 

to contribute toward expanding the body of knowledge about Joint Special Operations. JSOU publications advance the insights and recommendations of national security professionals and Special Operations Forces’ 

students and leaders for consideration by the SOF community and defense leadership. 

JSOU is a subordinate organization of the US Special Operations 

Command (USSOCOM), MacDill Air Force Base, Florida. The mission of 

the Joint Special Operations University is to educate SOF executive, senior 

and intermediate leaders and selected other national and international 

security decision makers, both military and civilian, through teaching, 

outreach, and research in the science and art of joint special operations. 

JSOU provides education to the men and women of Special Operations 

Forces and to those who enable the SOF mission in a joint environment. 

JSOU conducts research through its Strategic Studies Department 

where effort centers upon the USSOCOM mission and these operational 

priorities: 

• Preempting global terrorist and CBRNE threats

• Enhancing homeland security

• Performing unconventional warfare and serving as a conven-

 tional force multiplier in conflict against state adversaries

• Conducting proactive stability operations

• Executing small-scale contingencies

The Strategic Studies Department also provides teaching and curriculum support to Professional Military Education institutions—the staff colleges and war colleges. It advances SOF strategic influence by its interaction in academic, interagency and US military communities.

The JSOU portal is https://jsou.socom.mil.

Joint Special Operations University

Brigadier General Steven J. Hashem

President

Dr. Brian A. Maher

Vice President

Strategic Studies Department

Lieutenant Colonel Michael C. McMahon

Director

James D. Anderson

Director of Research
JSOU Report 05-7

The JSOU Press

Hurlburt Field, Florida

2006

Coast

Guard

SOF

Gary R. Bowen
The views expressed in this publication are entirely those of the author 

and do not necessarily reflect the views, policy or position of the U.S. 

Government, Department of Defense, USSOCOM, or the Joint Special 

Operations University. 

This work was cleared for public release; distribution is unlimited.

*******

Comments about this publication are invited and should be forwarded to Director, Strategic Studies Department, Joint Special Operations 

University, 357 Tully Street, Alison Building, Hurlburt Field, Florida 

32544. Copies of this publication may be obtained by calling JSOU at 

850-884-2763; FAX 850-884-4732. 

*******

This report and other JSOU publications can be found on the SOF Education Gateway at https://jsou.socom.mil/gateway/. Click on “Highlighted Research” to view. The Strategic Studies Department, JSOU is 

currently accepting written works relevant to special operations for potential publication. For more information please contact Mr. Jim Anderson, JSOU Director of Research, at 850-884-1569, DSN 579-1569, 

james.d.anderson@hurlburt.af.mil. Thank you for your interest in the 

JSOU Press. 

ISBN 0-9767393-6-4
iii

Contents

Foreword .................................................................................. v

1. Introduction ......................................................................... 1

A Future Concept ...................................................................2

A Brief History of USSOCOM .................................................5

Emerging Threats ....................................................................6

Coast Guard Transformation ...................................................8

2. Historical Basis and Policy Guidelines ............................... 11

Time to Designate Coast Guard Special Operations Forces ...11

Governing Policies ...............................................................12

Is the Coast Guard a Combat Force? .....................................15

From the First Years of the Republic WWs I & II ....................16

Historical Precedent 

for Coast Guard Participation in Special Operations .............17

The Greenland Patrol ............................................................18

Vietnam ................................................................................19

Current Operational Environment .........................................22

What Prompted the Army and Navy to Establish 

Special Operations Forces, and Do Similar 

Conditions Exist Today for the Coast Guard? .........................24

What Can the Coast Guard Do 

that Existing SOF Cannot? .....................................................25

What Can USSOCOM Do for the Coast Guard? ...................26

How Can the Coast Guard 

Support SOF Operational Priorities? .....................................26

3. Assessing the Role for Coast Guard SOF ............................ 29

The Coast Guard in Special Operations ................................30

Conditions Are Set for a Coast Guard SOF Component .........32

The Value Added for Coast Guard SOF .................................35

How Should USSOCOM Assist? ...........................................40

SOF Core Tasks and Coast Guard SOF ..................................44

4. Designating Coast Guard Special Operations Forces ......... 47

Prevention, Detection, and Response ...................................47

Coast Guard SOF in the Close Fight ......................................50
iv

Is It Someone Else’s Job? .......................................................52

Counterargument: There Is No Money ..................................55

5. Conclusions And Recommendations .................................. 59

A History of Special Operations ............................................59

USSOCOM Can Help ...........................................................60

It’s Time to Designate Coast Guard SOF ................................60

Recommendations for a Coast Guard SOF ............................61

Joining with USSOCOM in the Fight .....................................64

Endnotes ................................................................................ 67

Appendix A. Coast Guard Authorities .................................... 73

Appendix B. Acronyms ........................................................... 77

Appendix C. Glossary ............................................................. 79

Bibliography ........................................................................... 85

About the Author ................................................................... 93
v

Foreword

This paper examines the Coast Guard’s historic participation 

in special operations and posits a requirement for the Coast 

Guard to designate a special operations force today—Coast 

Guard SOF. Lieutenant Commander Bowen advances a timely argument for the formation of additional SOF units, Coast Guard (CG) 

SOF units, at a time when USSOCOM is under pressure to expand 

SOF capabilities. Bowen argues that the Coast Guard has considerable experience fighting terrorists, insurgents, and criminal networks, all of which have the cellular, compartmented structures that 

describe the current threats in the global war on terrorism. These are 

the same threats that US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) 

seeks to thwart by means of its global campaign plan to synchronize 

the counterterrorism efforts of the Department of Defense.

He points out that Title 46 of the US Code 

established the Coast Guard’s Maritime Safety 

and Security Teams to respond to terrorist activity. These teams are a rapid response force 

capable of deployment in response to various 

threats against seaports and waterways, and 

they provide protection for strategic shipping, 

high interest vessels and critical infrastructure. Plus, Coast Guard teams are active on 

the high seas as well. With its maritime assets fully committed, augmentation by properly trained and assimilated CG SOF could advance USSOCOM capabilities in difficult mission areas.

Bowen suggests that forces of a CG SOF component could fill the 

gap he finds in maritime control and interdiction. While we have a 

few highly qualified teams that can do this type of work, many more 

are needed, and they can be made available from the Coast Guard. 

In this paper he writes that maritime security response requires prolific, robust, all-weather, day-night, opposed boarding capabilities 

with highly discriminate use of force to respond immediately to realtime, all-source intelligence. 

Especially useful could be the Coast Guard experience and involvement in Foreign Internal Defense (FID) and the potential that 

CG SOF hold for augmenting USSOCOM’s mission requirement in 

maritime environments around the globe. Indeed, Lieutenant Commander Bowen relates current Coast Guard special purpose force 

... US Code established the Coast 

Guard’s Maritime 

Safety and Security 

Teams to respond 

to terrorist activity.
vi

capabilities to six of the nine SOF Core Tasks—including FID and 

Civil Affairs Operations. 

A Coast Guard SOF component in USSOCOM could potentially 

enhance SOF operations with both tactical maritime and law enforcement capabilities, particularly in the demanding environment 

of homeland defense. One of the conundrums of military support to 

homeland defense operations is the Posse Comitatus stricture that, 

by law and augmenting DoD policy, circumscribes the use of Federal armed forces for domestic police work—search, seizure, arrest 

and the like. But countering radical extremist groups that are intent 

upon killing Americans at home is both a military and a law enforcement concern. Lieutenant Commander Bowen’s paper suggests that 

CG SOF can address both requirements since CG SOF can be at 

once badge-carrying law enforcers and counterterrorist fighters. 

Lieutenant Commander Bowen steps to the front rank of military 

thinkers who approach our most difficult military challenges with 

new ideas and fresh concepts for future operations. The reader will 

agree that his vision for a CG SOF is worth consideration.

Lt Col Michael C. McMahon, USAF

Director, Strategic Studies Department

Joint Special Operations University
1

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

1. Introduction

Due to its complex nature and immense size, the Maritime Domain is particularly susceptible to exploitation and disruption. 

The United States must deploy the full range of its operational 

assets and capabilities to prevent the Maritime Domain from being used by terrorists.1

President George W. Bush

Homeland Security Presidential Directive 13, Maritime Security

I want to emphasize that our analysis of the threats and risks 

will drive the structure, operations, policies, and missions of the 

Department, and not the other way around.2

Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff 

Statement before the House Appropriations 

Homeland Security Subcommittee

2 March 2005

Americans are in a fight for their lives and their way of life. Although the administration has labeled this fight a global war on terrorism (GWOT), terrorism is simply a tactic in the broader scope of insurgency and revolutionary war.3 In testimony before 

Congress, defense analyst Andrew F. Krepinevich defined insurgency 

as “a protracted, multi-phased struggle, whose objective is to overthrow the existing order,” and applied the term to the GWOT.4 This 

definition is broader than the classic definition that applies to a single 

nation-state. According to the State Department, “The global jihadist 

movement—including its most prominent component, Al Qaeda—remains the preeminent terrorist threat to the United States, US interests and US allies.”5 According to General Wayne Downing, former 

commander of the US Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) and 

former Deputy National Security Advisor (to President G. W. Bush) 

for Combating Terrorism, radical-Islamists “are waging a worldwide 

insurgency to reestablish the Caliphate in ‘corrupt’ Muslim nations 

and institute Salafist, extreme-Islamist states [resembling] the Taliban.” 6 These insurgents see Western governments as supporting the 

existing regimes and see Western culture as antithetical to their own, 

and therefore as targets. Whether or not one agrees on the nature 

of the enemy, the era of the nonstate actor has arrived, and radicalIslamists will make further attempts at horrific attacks within the 

United States. 
2

 JSOU Report 05-7

The research suggests two critical ways in which the Coast Guard 

can contribute to the global counterinsurgency: 

• with a credible, kinetic counterterrorism (CT) capability at 

knife-fighting distances in the nation’s Tier One ports

• by using its influence and access abroad, integrated with 

theater special operations command campaigns, to build the 

capacity of foreign forces, deny sanctuary to terrorists, and 

provide early warning on the strength or collapse of maritime 

security forces around the world

Some may counter that the Coast Guard is not the place for special operations, but in point of fact, the Coast Guard has been a place 

for special operations and must be a place for special operations if it 

is to contribute the full weight of its authority, expertise, and capability to help the nation defeat the radical-Islamist insurgency.

A Future Concept

Consider this scenario: at 1900 hours, the duty officer for the Coast 

Guard Captain of the Port in San Francisco receives a weak cellular call from an officer aboard an oil tanker. The caller reports that 

approximately 40 miles offshore, the ship’s Filipino crew has mutinied, seized control of the ship, and killed the officers with automatic 

weapons. The source managed to escape but he knows they will find 

him soon. In fleeing to another part of the ship, he nearly ran into 

another group of crewmen working on some kind of device that he 

had never seen before. He overheard one crewman asking another if 

he was sure they could steer the ship into the bridge, and the man 

responded, “We shall certainly destroy it, if God wills it. And about 30 

minutes later, when the first responders and the media helicopters 

have arrived, the nuclear bomb will explode. God willing, your brothers shall attack the infidels in four cities tonight!”

Via classified situational awareness and intelligence fusion networks, the duty officer feeds this digital audio simultaneously to the 

Coast Guard 11th District command center, the Pacific Area Maritime Intelligence Fusion Center, NORTHCOM, USSOCOM’s Center 

for Special Operations, the National Counterterrorism Center, and 

the national and local FBI Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs). The 

audio correlates to recent intelligence streams and a distress code 

transmitted by the ship’s Global Maritime Distress and Safety System (GMDSS) radio and received at Coast Guard Group San Francisco. The Group’s GMDSS software plots, on the Common Opera-
3

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

tional Picture, the ship’s name, position, course, speed, cargo, and 

the preprogrammed message, “This ship is under attack by armed 

pirates or terrorists.”

Nationally, DHS sets the Homeland Security Advisory System to 

“Code Red/Severe” for the maritime domain and the Coast Guard 

sets Maritime Security Level Three in all Tier One ports. In San Francisco, the FBI assumes Lead Federal Agency (LFA) for CT investigation, and the 11th Coast Guard District Commander assumes LFA 

for maritime security response. Together, they establish a unified 

command post on Coast Guard Island. The FBI commander and 

Coast Guard Captain of the Port decide that a rapid, maritime CT response is required to interdict and defeat the threat as far offshore as 

possible. Via secure computer network, the 11th District command 

center launches the Security Response Team (SRT) and diverts an 

airborne Coast Guard unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) with a mission 

module optimized for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance 

(ISR) to get “eyes on” the target ship.

Within minutes, the ready assault and support elements of Coast 

Guard SRT-2 (San Francisco Bay) “come out of the woodwork” all 

over the city, each with a secure, GPS-enabled cell phone. Because 

of the need for rapid response, the distance, the infamous Bay Area 

traffic, and the need for operational security as well as public discretion, all team members proceed to preplanned 

staging locations for helicopter pickup. The SRT 

carries law enforcement credentials and the SIG 

P229R DAK handgun on their persons and the rest 

of their kit in the hardened trunks of their cars: 

flight suits; dry suits; boots; helmet; encrypted, 

hands-free radio; CBRNE protective mask; integrated body armor, flotation, and tactical vest labeled COAST GUARD; M4 CQBR carbine; and jacketed-hollow-point 

ammunition for both firearms. The team masses at Fort Baker in the 

Marin Headlands, briefs the plan, loads radio codes, and conducts 

a quick rehearsal using the UAV’s live thermal imagery and as-built 

3D animations of the target ship provided by enhanced MDA, which 

allows each squad to rehearse its route through the ship. The SRT 

then disperses into gray fast-boats and gray helicopters for tactical 

movement to the target ship. 

Also confirmed by UAV imagery, there are four armed terrorists 

on deck and two on the bridge—all neutralized from the air by the 

The SRT carries 

law enforcement 

credentials and 

the SIG P229R 

DAK handgun on 

their persons ...
4

 JSOU Report 05-7

security element’s designated marksmen. Simultaneously, the assault elements board the ship using fast-rope and small-boat climbing tactics. With synchronization, shock, and violence of action, the 

first team penetrates to the exact location where three terrorists are 

preparing a stolen nuclear device (as previously phoned in), overwhelms them, and secures the scene for investigators. At this point, 

the SRT has achieved what Rear Admiral Bill McRaven, USN (SEAL) 

calls “relative superiority, a condition that exists when an attacking 

force, generally smaller, gains a decisive advantage over a larger or 

well-defended enemy.”7

Meanwhile, the second team has assumed positive control of the 

ship. The technical team follows on and prepares the nuclear device 

for packaging and removal via special purpose vessel to the end destination. The security element then deploys the vetted and scheduled San Francisco Bar Pilot to safely moor the ship at its scheduled 

berth, resulting in zero disruption of maritime commerce. Total time 

from alert to takedown: less than one hour. Before the target ship 

ever got “danger close” to the US population and port infrastructure, 

the Coast Guard SRT has interdicted an oil tanker and nuclear device under the command of terrorists. They have killed or arrested 

15 terrorists for transfer to the FBI. Scratch one combined maritime 

terrorism and WMD “incident of national significance”8 in San Francisco. Scratch three more in the Ports of Los Angeles/Long Beach, 

Hampton Roads, and New York/New Jersey. The Coast Guard’s Observe-Orient-Decide-Act (OODA) Loop was faster than the terrorists’. 

No search and rescue (SAR) alarm ever sounded, and all SAR assets 

remain in immediate (B-0) standby. 

Compared to the capabilities of today’s Coast Guard, this scenario may seem far-fetched, but—save the domestic scenery—such 

operations are routine for Department of Defense (DoD) special operations forces (SOF). The means to achieve this capability within the 

Coast Guard exist today, but is it necessary? Is this a Coast Guard 

mission? Can the Coast Guard reasonably expect to achieve this capability in its multi-mission (i.e., conventional) forces, or does it lie 

exclusively within the domain of special operations?

A Brief History of USSOCOM

USSOCOM is a service-like combatant command that organizes, 

trains, and equips SOF to meet the needs of the warfighting combatant commanders. US SOF as they exist today have a history of about 
5

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

60 years. Army and Navy SOF trace their roots mostly to World War II. 

President John F. Kennedy significantly expanded SOF in the 1960s 

to counter the communist insurgencies spawning all over the world. 

USSOCOM is the result of a decades-long process triggered by 

the post-Vietnam decay that produced the failed rescue attempt and 

subsequent disaster in Iran at Desert One in April 1980. In an effort to apply the hard lessons learned in the desert, the Army consolidated its SOF under the First Special Operations Command in 

1982, but proved unable to translate this concept into action “at the 

joint level,” and Congress took note. By 1984, growing pressure from 

Congress prompted DoD to form the Joint Special Operations Agency 

(JSOA), but JSOA lacked budgetary, organizational, operational, and 

command authority. DoD and the services opposed pulling SOF out 

from under the services. Thus SOF still languished under the weight 

of conventional forces, whose rigid culture, regulations, and training 

precluded their understanding and appreciation for SOF capabilities. 

In 1986, Congress “shocked” DoD by introducing several bills 

that proposed drastic restructuring for the military, including the 

1986 DoD Reorganization (or Goldwater-Nichols) Act that among 

other things established the Unified Combatant Commands as the 

joint warfighting authorities. Later that year, Nunn-Cohen amended 

Goldwater-Nichols to provide that SOF would be commanded by its 

own four-star combatant commander. It also established the Assistant SECDEF for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict and 

created a new budget line item in Major Force Program 11 (MFP11), which specifically designates funding for SOF operations and 

SOF-peculiar materiel at the DoD level. “Congress clearly intended 

to force [DoD] to face up to the realities of past failures and emerging 

threats.”9 Despite the resistance from DoD and the services, seventeen years after the birth of USSOCOM (as USCINCSOC), and with 

such SOF victories as Operation Earnest Will (against Iran in 1987-

1988), Operation Just Cause, coalition warfare and “SCUD hunting” 

in Operation Desert Storm, Operation Allied Force, the astounding 

Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Iraqi Freedom, and countless lesser-known engagements, it is hard to imagine a US force 

structure without USSOCOM.

Unfortunately, both Goldwater-Nichols and Nunn-Cohen completely overlooked the Coast Guard, and the Coast Guard was happy 

to be overlooked.10 By way of example, there is no reason for the 

Coast Guard ever to be transferred administratively to the Navy in 
6

 JSOU Report 05-7

the wake of Goldwater-Nichols, because the CNO and the Secretary 

of the Navy have no warfighting responsibilities. They organize, train, 

and equip only. Geographic combatant commanders and Commander, USSOCOM fight wars. Therefore Goldwater-Nichols should have 

amended 14 USC 2 to require the Coast Guard to maintain capability and interoperability sufficient to meet the needs of the combatant 

commanders. Similarly, it seems that no one considered the Coast 

Guard’s significant contributions to special operations since before 

World War II. Had the Coast Guard been included in the SOF discussion of the 1980s, and had its special purpose forces been placed 

within the SOF context, the Coast Guard may have been positioned 

to make more significant contributions and, in some cases, possibly 

even prevented some of SOF’s casualties by freeing up Naval Special 

Warfare reinforcements from critical infrastructure protection to direct action missions. 

Emerging Threats

In considering emerging threats, not every battlefield in the global 

counterinsurgency may be found in the desert. Consider the island 

nations of Southeast Asia: Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and The 

Republic of the Philippines. According to Jane’s Intelligence Review, 

considerable evidence suggests that the next batch of 11 September 

terrorists right now is training and refining its skills in this region 

for their next attack on the United States. Indonesia has a newly 

established and still fledgling democratic government, Al Qaeda has 

demonstrated operational capabilities there, and the country faces a 

continuing maritime piracy and terrorism threat from the Free Aceh 

Movement (Gerakin Aceh Merdeka, GAM), which was established in 

the 1970s to compel Indonesia into recognizing Aceh as an independent Islamic state. Malaysia faces Islamist terrorist threats from 

Jemmah Islamiyya (an Al Qaeda ally) and Kumpulan Mujahadeen 

Malaysia (KMM). The Republic of the Philippines has the radical Islamist Abu Sayyaf Group, a close ally of Al Qaeda also conducting an 

active piracy campaign. Citing a January 2004 report by the International Maritime Bureau, Jane’s noted that pirate attacks increased 

from 370 in 2002 to 445 in 2003. In addition, the numbers indicated 

an increase in the incidence of murder and kidnapping by pirates. 

In 2003, 22.5 percent of all reported attacks involved military small 

arms and rocket-propelled grenades. “In the maritime domain, the 

distinction between terrorism and piracy has become blurred both 
7

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

in terms of execution, outcome, and gain. Certain terrorist groups 

have well-honed piracy capabilities and a willingness to use them.”11

While the fundamental aim of piracy is private gain, terrorist organizations may use piracy—like drug trafficking—to support their political objectives.12 A successful, global counterinsurgency will require 

defeating existing terrorist organizations worldwide, denying sanctuary, and improving the capacity of foreign maritime security forces. 

According to Jane’s,

All the pieces are now in place—nautical skills, personnel, weaponry, firepower, motivation, connections, tactical flair, command 

and control acumen, and strategic outlook—to design a maritime 

terrorist operation. Thus, something that may first be dismissed 

as an act of violent piracy in waters distant from US or European shores could evolve into a maritime terrorist attack against a 

critical and densely-populated Eastern Seaboard port-urban area 

complex, a vital Asian trading artery, a Gulf Coast port-located 

refinery, or a 100,000 [gross ton] cruise ship two hours into a 

night passage in the Strait of Florida.13

President Bush and the Congress have enacted similar findings 

into law via the Homeland Security and Maritime Transportation Security Acts. The opening lines of this legislation are essentially laundry lists of homeland security vulnerabilities.

Are the emerging threats of Southeast Asia to become “past failures” before the United States acts decisively? Although the Coast 

Guard’s International Training Division (ITD) has trained host nation forces in Southeast Asia and the Coast Guard Cutter Mellon 

participated in the Southeast Asia Cooperation Against Terrorism 

exercise, Southeast Asia merits considerably more attention.14 Coast 

Guard Maritime Safety and Security Teams (MSSTs), Law Enforcement Detachments (LEDETs), Port Security Units (PSUs), and/or 

Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron (HITRON) also should be 

engaged there regularly, pervasively, and clandestinely if necessary 

to improve those nations’ maritime security forces and vet Coast 

Guard forces in real-world operations for use at home, where their 

success is most important.

There are several factors that point toward using Coast Guard 

special purpose forces in special operations. First is the Principle of 

Unity of Effort. USSOCOM has been directed to “synchronize” all efforts in this counterinsurgency against radical Islamists.15 Therefore 

it would be reckless of the Coast Guard to freelance such operations, 

even though it may be accustomed to doing so in politically sensi-
8

 JSOU Report 05-7

tive areas where large commitments of DoD forces have been unacceptable. Although some overlap in capability exists between Naval 

Special Warfare (NSW) and Coast Guard special purpose forces, the 

forces are not identical. Further, the scarcity of NSW assets dictates 

that they be employed at the high end of their operational spectrum: 

clandestine, deep-penetration missions for direct action, strategic reconnaissance, and joint targeting that require them to use all of their 

specialized skills to the utmost of their capabilities. 

With SEALs and other direct action and strategic reconnaissance 

(DA/SR) SOF decisively engaged in the hunt for Al Qaeda and in counter-proliferation, Coast Guard special purpose forces can conduct—

and for years have conducted—SOF-like missions in the other three 

quadrants of full-spectrum military operations: defense, stability, 

and support. Traditional special operations missions in this respect 

include Security Assistance and Foreign Internal Defense, Counterinsurgency, Counterdrug, and Foreign Humanitarian Assistance to 

name only a few. In much the same way as SF work with indigenous 

ground forces to shape the foreign security environment, Coast Guard 

special purposes forces have long-term relationships with the maritime police and 

other counterdrug forces of Latin America. 

Likewise, they are ideally suited to working 

with host-nation maritime security forces 

to help them establish Maritime Security 

Conditions in their ports; to help them run 

an ongoing, asymmetric, mobile defense of 

their maritime domain; and to support national intelligence requirements in the maritime domain. As a law enforcement agency that 

reinforces state power, the Coast Guard brings with it an inherent 

legitimacy. With Naval Special Warfare focused on direct action and 

strategic reconnaissance missions, USSOCOM has never had a maritime equivalent to the Army Special Forces and Civil Affairs teams that 

build ground force capacity overseas and carry out the increasingly 

decisive work in the civil-military realm. The maritime forces that can 

best perform such missions exist today in the US Coast Guard. 

Coast Guard Transformation

The question of Coast Guard SOF (CG SOF) is an important dimension of the Coast Guard transformation. The transformation to a 

modern and capable maritime force cannot be simply a play for the 

... Coast Guard special 

purposes forces have 

long-term relationships 

with the maritime police 

and other counterdrug 

forces of Latin America.
9

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

Deepwater recapitalization program. Deepwater recapitalization is 

a necessary condition of Coast Guard transformation, but it is not 

sufficient. For their multi-billion-dollar investment in Deepwater, 

Americans have a right to expect more than a newer, sleeker, faster 

version of the U. S. Coast Guard working traditional missions in the 

usual modes of thought. In a 1997 study, the Center for Naval Analysis made this recommendation to the service: “Accept the growing 

divergence in the technological capabilities between high-endurance 

cutters and US Navy vessels of comparable size, and the related need 

to think more broadly about its defense role. That means recognizing that Coast Guard cooperation with DoD is broader than its naval 

mission, and not solely an afloat procedure.”16 Formal command and 

support relationships with USSOCOM would give the Coast Guard a 

second means of ingress into DoD power circles. 

The Coast Guard recognizes that it needs new capabilities to deal 

with emerging threats facing the country, and that some of its forces 

must be exceptionally well trained in select specialized skills. The 

Coast Guard created MSSTs specifically in response to 11 September. HITRON, originally intended and used extensively to counter 

“go-fast” drug smugglers, has since been approved for use in Homeland Security missions. With the help of the Marine Corps Special 

Operations Training Group, the Coast Guard established its Special 

Missions Training Center at Camp Lejeune specifically to train the 

service’s special purpose forces. Yet the Coast Guard process seems 

to want to “reinvent the wheel” by learning all over again what others 

already have figured out. 

Consider vertical insertion (fast-roping), diving, and Deployable 

Pursuit Boats (DPBs)—DoD already has these capabilities, and DoD 

SOF are the best. The Coast Guard has been working on vertical insertion for over five years and has yet to implement a coherent policy 

or a pervasive operational capability. MSSTs, in existence since 2002, 

have been operating on policy waivers, implicit if not explicit. The 

problem generally lies with the myriad of program managers exercising authority over small niches of MSST life.17 In 1999, the Coast 

Guard procured highly complex DPBs (high speed RIBs) which then 

failed to perform well in the Caribbean Sea while chasing “go-fast” 

speed boats smuggling cocaine.18 Meanwhile, USSOCOM in 1997 had 

developed the Naval Special Warfare RIB for high-speed SEAL insertion and extraction. These vessels have the same operational capabilities as DPBs: they can carry a Coast Guard boarding team as 

easily as SEALs, they are about five feet shorter in length, they have 
10

 JSOU Report 05-7

the secure communications and electronic navigation aids needed to 

operate over the horizon, they have better sea-keeping, and a forward 

.50-caliber machine gun mount that works. As a DoD system, the 

NSW-RIB certainly is more easily supported than the DPB. The [NSWRIB] program, which was completed under cost and months ahead of 

schedule while exceeding every performance objective, won the 1998 

Defense Department’s Packard Award for excellence in acquisition. 

Not all of the news is bad. Some of the Coast Guard’s resounding 

successes include the enhanced and original MSSTs, LEDETs, PSUs, 

ITD, Airborne Use of Force, and the over the horizon rigid hull inflatable boat (OTH-RHIB) concept. Taking these forces’ capabilities to 

the next level, however, requires Coast Guard leaders to think anew, 

to drop old prejudices and inhibitions, and to allow such forces to 

operate, train, and develop their capabilities beyond the constraints 

of conventional imaginations. 

While some of these capabilities may occasionally migrate to 

multi-mission forces as they have in DoD, the more specialized Coast 

Guard forces will always be at the forefront in their employment and 

development. If 11 September was a “failure of imagination,” then 

establishing a Coast Guard SOF component offers an immediate, 

direct opportunity to change the old paradigm, which is tempered by 

post-Vietnam, Department of Transportation (DOT)-inspired notions 

of what the Coast Guard is and does.19

To earn a starting position on the varsity national security team, 

the Coast Guard should reorganize its special purpose forces into a 

flag-level Coast Guard special operations command, train and equip 

them to accomplish national special operations and intelligence missions in support of both homeland security and the global counterinsurgency, and build ties between this new command and USSOCOM 

that progress from an interagency relationship to a fully joint and 

subordinate component of USSOCOM. The next chapter describes 

the Coast Guard’s historical connection to some types of special operations and demonstrates that the constitution of CG SOF would 

continue a well-established heritage.
11

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

2. Historical Basis 

 and Policy Guidelines

The sea was, and still is, a grand arena for the pursuit of fighters 

and for decisive battles. Some of the great days of Arab conquests 

were fought at sea, such as Dhat al-Sawari and Dhat al-Salasil—or 

the destruction of the destroyer USS Cole, and the strike against 

the French oil tanker, and others. We ask God to grant us power 

over the necks of the Crusaders and the Apostates, and grant us 

the means to massacre the enemies of The Faith.20

Anonymous author, calling himself 

“The Brother of Him that Obeys God” 17 April 2004 

issue of the Al Qaeda online military magazine 

Mu’askar al-Battar (Al-Battar Training Camp)

Time to Designate Coast Guard Special Operations Forces. 

Strategic leaders have written a considerable body of literature 

that addresses “The US Coast Guard’s National Security Role 

in the 21st Century”21 as well as the impacts of the 11 September 

terrorist attacks on various niches within the national security community, but no one has asked whether or not the Coast Guard—as 

the military, multi-mission, maritime “lead federal agency” for maritime homeland security—ought to integrate its efforts with those of 

USSOCOM, the supported Combatant Commander in the GWOT, 

and if so, then to what degree.

In June 2001, four Coast Guard officers authored an article entitled “The Coast Guard Goes Expeditionary,” published in Proceedings. These officers suggested a similar reorganization of Coast Guard 

special purpose forces (as opposed to multi-mission forces such as 

cutters and stations): Coast Guard Tactical Law Enforcement Teams 

(TACLETs, with their Law Enforcement Detachments (LEDETs)), Port 

Security Units, Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron (HITRON 

and the proposed “HITRON West”), the Special Missions Training 

Center, and the National Strike Force (or elements thereof)—the 

same units considered herein along with the special purpose forces 

created since 11 September 2001 (original and “enhanced” versions 

of the Maritime Safety and Security Teams (MSSTs)). These officers 

suggested that an “Expeditionary Operations Command (EOC)” serve 

as the parent administrative command and act as force provider di-
12

 JSOU Report 05-7

rectly to the supported Coast Guard commander, lead federal agency, 

or regional combatant commander. They did not plug this EOC into 

any higher-echelon organization, DoD or otherwise.22 The similarity 

of approach suggests merit in consolidating the Coast Guard special 

purpose forces under a major command that acts as a forces command, policy shop, doctrine house, standardization authority, and 

budget advocate.

In considering whether to establish Coast Guard SOF, it was necessary to review applicable policies.

Governing Policies

The Department of Defense (DoD) has promulgated two terms that 

define the question in its simplest state:

• Special Operations. Operations conducted in hostile, denied, 

or politically sensitive environments to achieve military, diplomatic, informational, and/or economic objectives employing 

military capabilities for which there is no broad conventional 

force requirement. These operations often require covert, clandestine, or low visibility capabilities. Special operations are applicable across the range of military operations. They can be 

conducted independently or in conjunction with operations of 

conventional forces or other government agencies and may include operations through, with, or by indigenous or surrogate 

forces. Special operations differ from conventional operations 

in degree of physical and political risk, operational techniques, 

mode of employment, independence from friendly support, and 

dependence on detailed operational intelligence and indigenous 

assets. Also called SO.23

• Special Operations Forces. Those Active and Reserve Component 

forces of the Military Services designated by the Secretary of 

Defense and specifically organized, trained, and equipped to 

conduct and support special operations. Also called SOF.24

The issue then, in its simplest state, is whether Coast Guard special purpose forces conduct or could conduct special operations and 

therefore whether such forces ought to be designated as SOF by the 

Secretaries of Defense and Homeland Security. The effects of designating Coast Guard as SOF must be considered within the context 

of national-level policy, which pigeonholes counterterrorism actions 

into homeland security and combating terrorism (overseas).
13

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

The National Strategy for Homeland Security. “The strategic objectives of 

homeland security in order of priority are to: Prevent terrorist attacks 

within the United States; reduce America’s vulnerability to terrorism; 

and minimize the damage and recover from attacks that do occur.” 25

To achieve these goals, the strategy identified “six critical mission 

areas: intelligence and warning, border and transportation security, 

domestic counterterrorism, protecting critical infrastructure, defending against catastrophic terrorism, and emergency preparedness and 

response.” 26 Regarding vulnerability, the strategy says, “Unless we 

act to prevent it, a new wave of terrorism, potentially involving the 

world’s most destructive weapons, looms in America’s future. It is a 

challenge as formidable as any ever faced by our nation.” 27

National Security Presidential Directive Nine (NSPD-9) and The National 

Strategy for Combating Terrorism. NSPD-9 is classified, but the unclassified strategy has four overarching goals: “Defeat Terrorists and 

Their Organizations; deny sponsorship, support, and sanctuary to 

terrorists; diminish the underlying conditions that terrorists seek to 

exploit; and defend US citizens and interests at home and abroad.28

Presidential Decision Directive 39 (PDD-39) and Presidential Decision Directive 62 (PDD-62), signed by President Clinton in 1995 and 1998, 

respectively, established the basic construct for the nation’s existing and best-case operational response to terrorist attacks at the 

close of the twentieth century. Under these policies, the Attorney 

General through the FBI exercised Lead Federal Agency responsibility to manage terrorist incidents.29 Anyone with any involvement in 

the matter over the last 20 years can recite these policies without 

thought or effort. Numerous sources did just that during the course 

of the research for this paper, as if the matter had been comprehensively thought out and required no review in the aftermath of the 

11 September attacks. It is clear, however, that the law and policy 

signed into effect since that date accept that PDD-39 and PDD-62 do 

not fully account for post-11 September realities.

Homeland Security Presidential Directive Five (HSPD-5). HSPD-5, signed 

28 February 2003, established a uniform “national incident management system.” 30 Under HSPD-5, 

The Secretary of Homeland Security is the principal Federal official for domestic incident management. Pursuant to the Homeland Security Act of 2002, the Secretary is responsible for coordinating Federal operations within the United States to prepare for, 

respond to, and recover from terrorist attacks, major disasters, 
14

 JSOU Report 05-7

and other emergencies. The Secretary shall coordinate the Federal Government’s resources utilized in response to or recovery 

from terrorist attacks, major disasters, or other emergencies if 

and when any one of the following four conditions applies: (1) 

a Federal department or agency acting under its own authority 

has requested the assistance of the Secretary; (2) the resources 

of State and local authorities are overwhelmed and Federal assistance has been requested by the appropriate State and local 

authorities; (3) more than one Federal department or agency has 

become substantially involved in responding to the incident; or 

(4) the Secretary has been directed to assume responsibility for 

managing the domestic incident by the President.31

HSPD-5 also specifically states that the Attorney General and 

FBI now lead only the criminal investigative portion of terrorist incident preparation and response.32

National Security Presidential Directive 41 (NSPD-41) / Homeland Security Presidential Directive 13 (HSPD-13). NSPD-41 and HSPD-13 are the 

same document, signed 21 December 2004, governing US maritime 

security policy. The following unclassified excerpts make some of the 

relevant points:

It is the policy of the United States to take all necessary and appropriate actions, consistent with US law, treaties and other international agreements to which the United States is a party, and 

customary international law as determined for the United States 

by the President, to enhance the security of and protect US interests in the Maritime Domain.33

The United States must deploy the full range of its operational assets and capabilities to prevent the Maritime Domain from 

being used by terrorists, criminals, and hostile states to commit 

acts of terrorism and criminal or other unlawful or hostile acts 

against the United States, its people, economy, property, territory, allies, and friends, while recognizing that maritime security 

policies are most effective when the strategic importance of international trade, economic cooperation, and the free flow of commerce are considered appropriately.34

These actions must be undertaken in a manner that facilitates global commerce and preserves the freedom of the seas for 

legitimate military and commercial navigation and other legitimate activities as well as civil liberties and the rights guaranteed 

under the Constitution.35

HSPD-13 directs that the Secretaries of Homeland Security and 

Defense draft and submit within 180 days of 21 December 2004 a 

“National Strategy for Maritime Security” that details “an over-arch-
15

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

ing plan to implement this directive and address all of the components of the Maritime Domain, including domestic, international, 

public, and private components. It shall further incorporate a global, 

cross-discipline approach to the Maritime Domain centered on a layered, defense-in-depth framework that may be adjusted based on the 

threat level.” 36

One of the most important requirements and effects of HSPD-13 

is the development of:

... a comprehensive National Maritime Security Response Plan to 

ensure seamless United States Government response to maritime 

threats against the United States. The plan, at a minimum, shall 

reflect lead agency roles and responsibilities, including recommendations regarding changes to existing policy, including those 

reflected in PDD-39 and PDD-62, in the following areas: 1) maritime security response and counterterrorism operations; 2) maritime interception operations; 3) prevention and detection of, and 

response to, the mining of US ports; 4) detection, interdiction and 

disposition of targeted cargo, people, and vessels; and 5) attacks 

on vessels with US citizens aboard or that affect US interests 

anywhere in the world.37

HSPD-13 has cast aside the assumptions of America’s late-twentieth-century CT response capability, directed a review of government-wide operational capabilities, and accepted that Lead Federal 

Agency designations may change. Given that some DoD SOF have 

important roles in supporting PDD-39 and PDD-62, it seems elemental that if the Coast Guard’s responsibilities were to increase as a 

result of the HSPD-13-directed review, the Coast Guard increasingly 

may be involved in work currently carried out by DoD SOF.

Is the Coast Guard a Combat Force?

Before considering the issue of Coast Guard participation in special 

operations, some may find it necessary to first consider whether the 

Coast Guard participates in combat operations or high-risk law enforcement missions.

In most strategic communications published by the US Coast 

Guard, including every press release from Coast Guard Headquarters, one finds the following statement: “The US Coast Guard is a 

military, maritime, multi-mission service within the Department of 

Homeland Security dedicated to protecting the safety and security 

of America.” Every military member of the Coast Guard carries an 

“Armed Forces of the United States [and] Geneva Conventions Iden-
16

 JSOU Report 05-7

tification Card.” Title 10, US Code, Section 801 defines “military” as 

“any or all of the armed forces.” The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines the adjective “military” as, “of or relating to soldiers, 

arms, or war,” and “armed forces” as, “the combined military, naval, 

and air forces of a nation.” 38 DoD defines “military capability” as “the 

ability to achieve a specified wartime objective (win a war or battle, 

destroy a target set).” 39 Since there is no provision in the English 

language for a military service that does not engage in combat, the 

Coast Guard’s only claim as a “military” organization lies in its readiness and capability to go to war. It has done so in every major war 

the nation has fought.

From the First Years of the Republic to WWs I & II

The Coast Guard was founded in 1790 as a seagoing customs service 

under the Department of the Treasury. The Coast Guard’s military 

character was born in the period when it served as the nation’s only 

navy, between the end of the War of Independence in 1783 and the 

beginning of the Quasi-War with France in 1798. Acts of Congress 

in 1790, 1797, and 1799 indexed Revenue-Marine pay to that of 

the Army and Navy, authorized the use of Revenue Cutters for naval service, and subjected officers and crew to the rules of military 

discipline. As foreign interdiction of US shipping became acute, the 

President and Congress directed the Revenue-Marine to fight the naval battles of the undeclared war with France until a new program of 

battleship construction could be completed. As depicted in Figure 1, 

the Coast Guard again conducted combat operations in the War of 

1812, when it comprised nearly half the US naval fleet.

When war was declared on England in 1812, the United States’ 

small maritime service faced a powerful navy of 600 warships. 

Fig 1. The Defeat of 

the Privateer Dart 

by Dean Ellis. 

From the Coast 

Guard Historian

(online at http://

www.uscg.mil/

community/Art%20

Program/exhibit3/

e30002a.htm). 
17

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

At the outbreak of the war, the United States could only muster 

16 naval vessels and about a dozen cutters for coastal defense. 

The capture of the Dart was one of the most impressive captures 

by a revenue cutter. When the Dart—which had already seized 

between 20 and 30 American ships—arrived in Providence with 

its latest prizes, Captain John Cahoone offered the services of the 

revenue cutter Vigilant to challenge the enemy vessel. After sunset, the sloop Dart was located off the east end of Block Island. 

Vigilant fired one broadside and boarded Dart. [See Figure 1.] Actions such as the Vigilant’s capture carried on the cutter service’s 

military activities throughout the War of 1812 and helped establish the traditions of today’s Coast Guard.40

According to the Coast Guard historian, “augmenting the Navy 

with shallow-draft craft evolved into a continuing wartime responsibility. During the last two centuries, cutters have been used extensively in ‘brown water’ combat.” 41

In World War I, a German U-Boat sank the Cutter Tampa with all 

hands while on ocean convoy escort. Cutters sank U-Boats in World 

War II. Signalman Douglas Munro, USCG, earned the Medal of Honor at Guadalcanal by engaging the enemy with a machine gun while 

placing his landing craft between the enemy position and a group of 

Chesty Puller’s Marines evacuating their overrun position in other 

landing craft of Munro’s group.

Historical Precedent for Coast Participation

in Special Operations

Coast Guard wartime 

service has not been 

limited to “augmenting the navy.” According to the Coast Guard 

Historian, “The Coast 

Guard has traditionally 

performed two roles in 

wartime. The first has 

been to augment the 

Navy with men and cutters. The second has 

been to undertake special missions, for which 

peacetime experiences 

Fig 2. Captain William Cooke Seizes Contraband 

by John Thompson. 

From the Coast Guard Historian (online at http://

www.uscg.mil/community/Art%20Program/exhibit3/e30012a.htm). 
18

 JSOU Report 05-7

have prepared the Service with unique skills.” 42 Figure 2 depicts an 

early direct action mission wherein a LEDET-style force from the 

Cutter Diligence “seizes contraband gold” from the French Privateer 

Francois Henri Hervieux near Brunswick, North Carolina in 1793.43

The Greenland Patrol

The Greenland Patrol is an example of the Coast Guard performing 

both wartime roles in combination—augmenting naval forces with 

cutters and employing Coast Guard expertise in arctic operations. 

From April 1941 until the end of World War II, the Coast Guard-pure 

Task Force 24.8 was tasked “to defend Greenland and specifically 

to prevent German operations in Northeast Greenland.” Then-Commander Edward “Iceberg” Smith, captain of the Cutter Northland, led 

a force of six cutters with their three reconnaissance planes and the 

indigenous Greenland Sledge Patrol, “a contingent of intrepid Eskimos and Danish hunters who spent the war patrolling the coastal 

regions on dog sleds.” In addition to its naval engagements, this task 

force raided clandestine German weather and radio stations ashore, 

captured their operators, and captured a clandestine insertion and 

resupply ship, the Norwegian trawler Buskoe. This incident began 1 

September 1941—three months prior to America’s formal entry into 

Fig 3. USS Northland (USCG) in 

Greenland. 

From the Coast Guard Historian 

(online at http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/

history/h_greenld.html). 

Fig 4. A Coast Guard Landing Team 

Dines On Captured German Rations. 

From the Coast Guard Historian 

(online at http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/

history/h_greenld.html). 
19

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

the war—with a report from the Sledge Patrol “that a suspiciouslooking party of men had landed near the entrance of Franz Joseph 

Fjord.” When Northland boarded the Buskoe on 12 September, the 

boarding team discovered advanced radio equipment, further interrogated the crew, and learned that they had landed a party ashore 

with another radio transmitter. “That night one of the Northland’s officers, LT Leroy McCluskey, went ashore with a party of twelve armed 

men. They found a supposed hunter’s shack and surrounded it while 

McCluskey kicked in the door.” The team captured three Germans 

with their radio and code book.44 Figures 3 through 5 comprise some 

of the record of these actions. 

Vietnam

On 16 April 1965, the US Navy requested Coast Guard assistance in 

Vietnam because it then lacked a brown water capability. At 0700 

on 20 July 1965, the first eight Coast Guard 82-foot patrol boats 

“sailed into Danang Harbor,” having observed “distant flashes of 

artillery fire as they approached the coast of Vietnam.” 45 The first 

elements of Task Force 115, Operation Market Time, had arrived 

for combat duty. Task Force 115, composed of Coast Guard patrol 

boats and Navy swift boats, was assigned coastal interdiction missions to prevent North Vietnam from resupplying the Viet Cong. In 

addition, Navy forces formed Task Force 116, the famous river patrol 

boats (PBRs) of Operation Game Warden, and Task Force 117, the 

Mobile Riverine Force composed of monitor-like troop ships and the 

Army’s 9th Infantry Division.46 In Figure 6, “a Navy swift boat and 

the Coast Guard Cutter Point Banks enter Kanh Rau Canal, a known 

Fig 5. German SOF Captured by Coast Guard Landing 

Team on Greenland. 

From the Coast Guard Historian (online at http://

www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/history/h_greenld.html). 
20

 JSOU Report 05-7

Viet Cong area, to broadcast amnesty programs over loudspeakers 

for the South Vietnamese government.” 47

In his compelling history of Coast Guard operations in Vietnam, 

Captain Alex Larzelere, USCG (ret.)—who as a Lieutenant (O-3) commanded the 82-foot patrol boats Point Comfort and Point Banks in 

Vietnam service—detailed extensive Coast Guard participation in 

special operations. Although the cutters maintained an incredible 

70 percent underway patrol schedule supporting the coastal interdiction missions of Operation Market Time—and were generally the 

only maritime interdiction forces underway offshore in monsoon season—these ambitious fighters spent much of their 30 percent “down 

time” routinely infiltrating and exfiltrating Marine Force Reconnaissance and Army Special Forces units into known Viet Cong (VC) 

strongholds, participating in direct action raids on VC junk bases, 

conducting psychological operations, and providing naval gunfire 

support to both conventional and special operations ground forces 

using their 81mm mortars. Coast Guard patrol boats engaged covert 

enemy trawlers delivering supplies to VC on the beach, were engaged 

by both the trawlers and their receiving parties, and synchronized 

their fires with those of Air Force close air support aircraft. Coast Guard patrol boats earned 

such a reputation for reliable fire support that 

they became the naval gunfire force of choice, 

as reflected in this Marine quoted during operational planning: “Sir, I want Coast Guard 

WPBs. When I say I got guys in trouble and we 

need gunfire at this point, I get it. I don’t get a 

lot of questions about whether I have permisFig 6. A War of 

Persuasion by 

Noel Daggett. 

From the Coast 

Guard Historian (online 

at http://www.uscg.mil/

community/Art%20Program/

exhibit1/e10363a.htm. ) 

Coast Guard patrol 

boats earned such 

a reputation for 

reliable fire support 

that they became 

the naval gunfire 

force of choice ...
21

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

sion from the province chief or how deep the water is or how far can 

I go in.” 48

On 21 September 1965, the Coast Guard patrol boats were painted a dark, “deck gray” to improve their effectiveness at night. That 

same day, planning began for the Special Forces raid at Hon Mot.49

On 26 September 1965, cutters POINT COMFORT and POINT 

GREY embarked a raiding party of thirty-six civilian irregular defense group (CIDG) strikers—Chinese mercenaries serving with 

the Vietnamese Army—their Vietnamese special forces officers, 

and two US Army special forces advisors. In total darkness, the 

two cutters eased in toward shore on 27 September 1965. They 

stopped when soundings got down to six feet under the keel; the 

beach was 200 yards away. At 0500, troops climbed down scramble nets into rafts in complete silence, shoved off, and paddled for 

shore. The cutters slowly backed away, keeping the sound of their 

stern exhausts to seaward. They stood by at 1000 yards offshore 

ready to provide gunfire support.50

When the raiding party made contact, cutters silenced enemy 

positions with seven rounds of 81mm mortar fire. The cutters also 

provided covering fire for the extraction and then direct action mortar fire on the VC junk base.51

The Coast Guard had other significant roles in Vietnam. It provided port security and mission-critical explosive loading details for 

the US Army First Logistical Command in Saigon and elsewhere, 

and members of these units earned combat decorations such as the 

Silver Star and Purple Heart. The Coast Guard installed and maintained the LORAN-C system that allowed for all weather air and marine navigation and fire support.

Coast Guard pilots flew combat search and rescue with the Air 

Force in Southeast Asia, under an inter-service exchange program. Most of the time the pilots were assigned to the 37th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron, at Danang. They flew 

Sikorsky HH-3F “Jolly Green Giants” [and HH-53C “Super Jolly Green Giants” 52] in some of the most dangerous operations 

undertaken during the war [including the NEO-style rescue at 

Quang Tri, 197253]. One Coast Guardsman, LT Jack Rittichier, 

was killed when his helicopter was shot down during an attempt 

to pull an American from enemy-held territory. Some 8,000 

Coast Guardsmen served in Vietnam. Seven lost their lives and 

59 were wounded. Although research is incomplete, it has been 

verified that through 1970, Coast Guardsmen received the following awards: 12 Silver Stars, 13 Legion of Merit medals, 13 Distinguished Flying Crosses, 114 Bronze Stars, 4 Air Medals, 151 
22

 JSOU Report 05-7

Navy Commendation Medals, 27 Army Commendation Medals, 

five Coast Guard Commendation Medals, 43 Navy Achievement 

Medals, 66 Purple Hearts, 53 Vietnamese Navy medals and 15 

Presidential Unit Commendations.54

How is it that such superlative combat skills and an unmatched 

reputation for reliable NGFS have all but disappeared from the service? Quite simply, they were allowed to. All of the Navy boat forces 

generated during Vietnam stayed on after the war and became today’s 

Special Boat Teams. In contrast, most of the Coast Guard material 

in Vietnam was given to the South Vietnamese and subsequently 

captured by the North.55 The Coast Guard apparently made no effort whatsoever to retain the warfighting skills it had developed with 

blood, sweat, and tears over the course of ten years in Vietnam.

Current Operational Environment

In 1993, a two-ship formation air assaulted from Trinidad, Bolivia 

deep into the heart of the Amazon Basin on a raid to find a coca base 

transshipment site, seize contraband, and arrest suspects. The team 

of six inserted beyond hearing distance of the UH-1 helicopters and 

paddled two combat rubber raiding craft down the river to set up for 

the raid on the remote target house. At the house, two teammates—

members of the Bolivian counterdrug forces—gathered further intelligence that the coca base product was hidden in the jungle several 

hundred meters away. At the follow-on raid, two US DEA agents and 

the two Bolivian counterdrug policemen assaulted the second house 

while the two remaining teammates—US Coast Guardsmen of the 

International Maritime Law Enforcement Team—maintained security with the boats. When the assault team 

took fire from the house, the two US Coast 

Guardsmen flanked the house on foot, directed suppressing automatic rifle fire into 

the house, and helped the team secure the 

objective. In the fight, four drug traffickers were seriously wounded, including one 

who sustained a gunshot wound to a lung; 

the Coast Guardsmen provided emergency 

medical aid that saved their lives and thus 

facilitated the justice process for the Bolivian government. The Bolivians took custody of all suspected drug traffickers and coca base, and 

... the two US Coast 

Guardsmen flanked the 

house on foot, directed 

suppressing automatic 

rifle fire into the house, 

and helped the team 

secure the objective.
23

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

the force exfiltrated by helicopter with everything they had brought 

with them.56

In 1998, Commander, Fifth Fleet (N-31CG) organized and conducted the first-ever Maritime Interception Surge Operations designed to tighten UN sanctions enforcement in response to Saddam 

Hussein’s expulsion of UN weapons inspectors. Coast Guard Law 

Enforcement Detachments (LEDETs), embarked on USSOCOM Mark 

V boats and supported by Navy SEAL special reconnaissance, boarded dhows (small freighters typical of the Arabian Gulf) carrying embargoed goods and thus enforced the UN sanctions in the shallowest 

waters of the Northern Arabian Gulf near the outlets of Iraq’s and 

Iran’s Kawr Abd Allah and Shat al Arab waterways.

In 2002, the Naval Special Warfare Command (NSWC) transferred 

tactical control of 13 USSOCOM 179-foot Patrol Coastals (PCs) to the 

US Coast Guard for maritime homeland security operations outside 

the nation’s major ports. “PCs are used for Naval Special Warfare 

maritime operations in low-threat environments. [Their primary] 

purpose is coastal patrol, surveillance, and close-to-shore interdiction operations.” 57

In 2003, the US Coast Guard deployed six cutters, two PSUs, 

and two LEDETs—totaling 1,250 personnel—supporting US Central 

Command’s requirements for unique Coast Guard capabilities in the 

Northern Arabian Gulf. Coast Guard LEDET 403—operating from 

USSOCOM PCs with Naval EOD units—discovered a covert Iraqi 

mine-laying tug before it was able to deploy its mines. The same 

LEDET discovered a hidden Iraqi arms cache along the banks of the 

Kawr Abd Allah waterway. The Coast Guard Cutter Walnut, which 

had deployed with its oil-skimming gear to counter the threat of maritime environmental terrorism, also conducted maritime interception 

operations and reset all buoys into the Iraqi port of Um Qasr such 

that critical humanitarian aid shipments began to flow immediately 

into the liberated southern cities of Iraq.58 According to a former CIA 

Baghdad Chief of Station, at least one Port Security Unit (PSU) has 

conducted combined special operations with Britain’s 22 Special Air 

Service Regiment along the Al Faw Peninsula.59
24

 JSOU Report 05-7

What Prompted the Army and Navy to Establish Special 

Operations Forces, and Do Similar Conditions Exist Today 

for the Coast Guard?

All SOF (even new SOF generated from old SOF) share a common 

thread: Conventional forces resisted the formation of new, specialized forces for new missions of an unconventional nature. Once they 

were generated, SOF generally stagnated for the entire time they were 

controlled by conventional forces. The exceptions are accounted for 

by direct presidential interest in specific SOF to meet specific mission requirements. 

The histories of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), Army Special Forces, Navy SEALs, and USSOCOM in their formative years 

are replete with examples of how, in response to the formation of 

unconventional forces in their midst, commanders of large, conventional forces manifested their lack of appreciation or outright disdain 

for unconventional forces. Admiral Nimitz and General MacArthur 

refused to allow the OSS to operate within their geographic areas 

of responsibility throughout World War II, even though the ranks of 

its special operations division had been filled by soldiers and navy 

divers.60 “One of the most consistent and outspoken opponents of 

OSS was Major General George V. Strong, Chief of Army G-2 (Intelligence),” 61 who obviously had hoped to protect the fiefdom of Army 

Intelligence. 

The histories of these forces also share the advocacy of a corps 

of military “true believers” at the O5-O8 levels allied with powerful 

political figures. For the OSS it was President Franklin D. Roosevelt 

who directed General George C. Marshall to “give [General] Bill Donovan a little elbow room to operate in.” President Eisenhower and 

General McClure established the Army’s Psychological Warfare Center and 10th Special Forces Group in 1952.62 President Kennedy’s 

interest in counterinsurgency warfare paved the way for the “Green 

Beret,” for which Army Special Forces renamed the Psychological 

Warfare Center the JFK Special Warfare Center. President Kennedy 

also motivated the Navy to morph some of its Underwater Demolition 

Teams (UDTs) into Navy SEALs in 1962.63 President Reagan revived 

and expanded Special Forces after their post-Vietnam gutting, again 

for the specific purpose of challenging Communist insurgencies.

In the aftermath of special operations failures at Desert One and 

Grenada, Senators Sam Nunn and William Cohen sponsored the leg-
25

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

islation establishing the US Special Operations Command against 

the counterweight of the Defense Department.64

What Can the Coast Guard Do that Existing SOF Cannot?

The United States Congress has vested the Coast Guard with very 

broad military and law enforcement authority (see Appendix B). 

Prominent among the various statutes is Title 46 of the US Code 

which mandates a Coast Guard counterterrorism capability and specifically addresses Maritime Safety and Security Teams (MSST):

Title 46, US Code, Section 70106 (46 USC § 70106)

— Maritime Safety and Security Teams

(a) IN GENERAL. To enhance the domestic maritime security capability of the United States, the Secretary shall establish such 

maritime safety and security teams as are needed to safeguard 

the public and protect vessels, harbors, ports, facilities, and cargo in waters subject to the jurisdiction of the United States from 

destruction, loss or injury from crime, or sabotage due to terrorist 

activity, and to respond to such activity in accordance with the 

transportation security plans developed under section 70103.

(b) MISSION. Each maritime safety and security team shall be 

trained, equipped, and capable of being employed to: 

(1) deter, protect against, and rapidly respond to threats of 

maritime terrorism;

(2) enforce moving or fixed safety or security zones established 

pursuant to law;

(3) conduct high speed intercepts;

(4) board, search, and seize any article or thing on or at, respectively, a vessel or facility found to present a risk to the 

vessel or facility, or to a port;

(5) rapidly deploy to supplement United States armed forces 

domestically or overseas;

(6) respond to criminal or terrorist acts within a port so as to 

minimize, insofar as possible, the disruption caused by such 

acts;

(7) assist with facility vulnerability assessments required under this chapter; and

(8) carry out other security missions as are assigned to it by 

the Secretary.65

The development of multiple MSST under the operational control—or even combatant command—of USSOCOM will be a significant plus-up.
26

 JSOU Report 05-7

What Can USSOCOM Do for the Coast Guard? 

Nothing has been written specifically on this subject, but much has 

been written on what USSOCOM does for Army, Navy, and Air Force 

SOF. USSOCOM has transformed DoD SOF from the overlooked, 

underfunded, underappreciated forces of the 1970s and 1980s into 

today’s “force of choice.”

Unlike any other combatant commander, USSOCOM has socalled “service-like” Title 10 authorities to develop a Program Objective Memorandum (a DoD budget instrument) and acquire SOF-specific materiel. Whereas the Navy receives its funding through Major 

Force Program Two (MFP-2), and the Air Force via MFP-4, Nunn-Cohen and amplifying “Sense of Congress” legislation authorized MFP11 specifically to remove SOF budgeting from the normal service 

chains of command.66

In his 1992 study at the Naval War College, Captain Bruce Stubbs 

found that Navy admirals on the whole were more inclined to reject 

the Coast Guard’s roles in any form of warfare, while non-Navy combatant commanders were more likely to appreciate Coast Guard contributions across the spectrum of operations.67

How Can the Coast Guard Support SOF Operational Priorities?

The operational priorities of USSOCOM establish the guidelines for 

the employment of scarce SOF resources. They are: preempting global terrorist and CBRNE threats; enhancing homeland security; performing unconventional warfare and serving as a conventional force 

multiplier in conflict against state adversaries; conducting proactive stability operations; and executing small-scale activities. Coast 

Guard SOF elements would have the capability to contribute to all of 

these in some measure, but they would be especially helpful by their 

unique contributions to homeland security.

To be viable, Coast Guard special operations contributions should 

flow naturally from their statutory missions and accumulated expertise. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 specifies five homeland security missions for the Coast Guard:

1. Ports, waterways, and coastal security

2. Defense readiness

3. Drug interdiction

4. Migrant interdiction

5. Other law enforcement, including prevention of foreign fishing vessel incursions
27

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

Because of these missions, the Coast Guard has always worked 

to counter the unconventional, transnational threats posed by nonstate actors. Terrorist organizations, drug and migrant trafficking organizations, and organized crime all follow insurgent organizational 

and operational models. Preparing for this fight at home has made 

the Coast Guard a key asset in stability operations, particularly Security Assistance and Foreign Internal Defense programs around the 

world. Moreover, the Coast Guard’s engagement in these missions 

abroad significantly improves its capabilities to run these missions 

at home by providing its teams with real-world operational expertise 

in a variety of contexts not available in domestic operations.

Coast Guard leaders have identified the five strategic objectives 

of the Maritime Homeland Security Strategy:

1. Prevent terrorist attacks within, and terrorist exploitation 

of, the US Maritime Domain.

2. Reduce America’s vulnerability to terrorism within the US 

Maritime Domain.

3. Protect US population centers, critical infrastructure, maritime borders, ports, coastal approaches, and the boundaries and seams between them.

4. Protect the US Marine Transportation System while preserving the freedom of the Maritime Domain for legitimate 

pursuits.

5. Minimize damage and recover from attacks that may occur 

within the US Maritime Domain as either the lead federal 

agency or a supporting agency.68

To achieve these objectives, Coast Guard leaders further identified six “Maritime Strategy Elements”:

1. Increase Maritime Domain Awareness

2. Conduct Enhanced Maritime Security Operations

3. Close Port Security Gaps

4. Build Critical Security Capabilities

5. Leverage Partnerships to Mitigate Security Risks

6. Ensure Readiness for Homeland Defense Operations.69

Likewise, SOF leaders have written about the impacts of 11 September on their activities. “A sea change occurred on 11 September 

2001, and the importance of SOF to national defense became paramount.”70 Most SOF today are deployed to, are preparing to deploy 

to, or have just returned from Iraq or Afghanistan.71 Members of 
28

 JSOU Report 05-7

Congress have called for a rapid doubling or even tripling of their 

numbers.72 Yet such remarks contradict the essential SOF truths:

1. Humans are more important than hardware.

2. Quality is better than quantity.

3. Special operations forces cannot be mass produced.

4. Competent special operations forces cannot be created after emergencies occur.73

These truths have stood the tests of time. They reflect the lessons 

learned in many successes and failures of special operations over the 

history of warfare. SOF must only be expanded deliberately with care 

for enforcing the same high standards that are their hallmark today. 

In this regard, the advent of CG SOF can make an important contribution now. The following chapter develops a further assessment of 

the potential roles of CG SOF.
29

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

3. Assessing the Role for 

 Coast Guard SOF

If you have no capacity for violence then you are a healthy, productive citizen: a sheep. If you have a capacity for violence and 

no empathy for your fellow citizens, then you have defined an 

aggressive sociopath—a wolf. But what if you have a capacity for 

violence, and a deep love for your fellow citizens? Then you are 

a sheepdog, a warrior, someone who is walking the hero’s path. 

Someone who can walk into the heart of darkness, into the universal human phobia, and walk out unscathed.74

Dave Grossman, Lieutenant Colonel, USA, Retired 

On Combat

Lieutenant Colonel Grossman attributes the sheepdog analogy 

to a Marine veteran of Vietnam. The analogy is useful because 

some Coast Guardsmen need to think long and hard about 

what it is that Coast Guard cuttermen, aircrews, boat crews, and 

boarding teams are called by Congress to do in their maritime security role. The Congress has directed them to detect and suppress violations of US law, protect vessels, ports, and facilities from terrorist 

attack, and “use all force necessary to compel compliance.” 75 Some 

violators are more difficult to suppress than others. Some may need 

to be shot in the face at close range if that is the “force necessary to 

compel compliance.” From a recent film entitled Dirty War, consider 

the fictional but realistic takedown of the second dirty bomb van by 

the Anti-Terrorist Branch (SO13) of London’s Metropolitan Police Service—although an ongoing investigation was too late to interdict the 

first dirty bomb, Scotland Yard identified a second van believed to be 

en route to another target in London. SO13 used London’s security 

camera network to deploy and vector in CT snipers and street-level 

response teams. With the suicide bombers obscured from sniper fire, 

SO13 interdicted the van at street level. A single “civilian” car cut off 

the van and an operator killed the terrorists instantly in a burst of 

automatic weapon fire. The bombers, with their hands on the detonator, expired before they could detonate the second dirty bomb.76

In his essay, “The New Warrior Class Revisited,” Ralph Peters 

closed with this comment: “A healthy state must cultivate a discriminating appetite for killing.” 77 Although such a statement may be 

anathema to a number of good-natured “Coasties” who perhaps have 
30

 JSOU Report 05-7

specialized in rescue or other maritime safety missions, its essence 

is perhaps one of the most important facts that all Coast Guardsmen 

need to accept regardless of their role in the service or their opinion 

of its roles and missions: the elected representatives of the people 

have entrusted the Coast Guard as a service and some members as 

individuals with the authority of the state to mete out violence to 

those who need it. The murderers of 11 September 2001 and others 

since then have demonstrated that there are many in need. 

Those engaged in maritime security missions are sheepdogs (or 

German Shepherd Dogs, if one prefers a stronger motif) under authority to interdict, fight, apprehend, maim, and kill the wolves, using all force necessary to stop attacks and protect the people of the 

United States. For those officers whose careers have focused on more 

happy-go-lucky types of missions, what they need to understand is 

this: “the sheepdogs [who are under authority] prepare life-long for 

the hour of need and they yearn for validation of their training.” 78

When the battle rages, these men and women run toward the sound 

of the guns, not away from them. Such was clearly true of patrol boat 

crews in Vietnam. “The sheep say, ‘Thank God I was not aboard any 

of the hijacked airplanes on September 11th.’ The sheepdogs say, ‘I 

wish I had been on one of those planes. Maybe I could have made a 

difference.” 79 The sheepdogs stand into danger out of their sense of 

duty to protect the flock—and may God bless them for it. 

The Coast Guard in Special Operations

The Coast Guard clearly is a combat force that has gone to war since 

the first days of the republic, but is there a precedent for the Coast 

Guard’s participation in special operations? In addition to its more 

well known role in “[augmenting] the navy with men and cutters,” 80

the Coast Guard has a strong history of contributing to specialized, 

niche missions in which its predominantly peacetime roles give it 

expertise, especially in small-unit, low-intensity conflict. The previous discussion of the Greenland Patrol, Task Force 115 in Vietnam, 

counterdrug operations, MIO surge operations, and CT operations 

seems adequate to answer this question in the affirmative. 

One of the strongest examples in the current context has been 

the Coast Guard’s International Training Division (ITD). In the author’s version of the history of this unit (assembled over the years 

through personal interaction in the field, numerous friends and acquaintances at the unit, and the published articles), ITD began as the 
31

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

Drug Interdiction Assistance Team (DIAT) sometime in the 1980s.81

DIAT made Soldier of Fortune in the early 1990s and this fact alone 

offended some of the more genteel and influential among the officer 

corps. CGHQ changed the unit’s name to the International Maritime 

Law Enforcement Team (IMLET). This name proved almost as offensive and changed again to International Maritime Law Enforcement 

Training Team (IMLETT). In 1996, the name changed once more to 

ITD and that name has survived. The unit’s sole mission since its 

inception has been Foreign Internal Defense. Probably ahead of their 

time, DIAT and IMLET were well known within the Coast Guard for 

their SOF-like operations, including the 1993 coca raid described 

earlier and shown in Figure 7. 

When the name changed to IMLETT with two Ts, CGHQ gave 

strong guidance that the unit constrain its activities to training, although field evaluation of host nation operations also was permitted 

at least as late as 1999.82 The unit conducts most of its deployments 

under the authority and funding of the State and Defense Departments to support host nation Internal Defense and Development 

programs.83

In Bolivia, where a high percentage of the world’s coca is grown, 

the ITD works with the Drug Enforcement Agency and US Special 

Forces to support and train the Diablos Azules (Blue Devils). The USfunded group is a counter-narcotics division of the Bolivian Navy and 

has [maritime law enforcement] authority over thousands of miles of 

navigable waterways. The ITD also established the International Waterways Law Enforcement School in Trinidad, Bolivia, where, each 

Fig 7. Bolivia – 1 Nov 

1992 – A six-man 

boat team composed 

of personnel from the 

USCG, USDEA, and 

Bolivian National Police 

insert by helicopter 

into the Amazon 

Basin for counter-

 drug operations. 

USCG photo by 

PA1 Dave Silva. 
32

 JSOU Report 05-7

year, more than 100 Bolivians and other Latin Americans complete 

an 8-week program in riverine operations and law enforcement. In 

Peru, the ITD is part of a DoD and DEA-led task force. Team members there are assisting the Dinandro, the Anti-Narcotics Division 

of the Peruvian National Police, and the Peruvian Coast Guard with 

the establishment of a joint waterways law enforcement school and 

engineering maintenance facility in Iquitos, Peru. In Panama, the 

ITD works directly with the Coast Guard liaison at the US Embassy. 

ITD members serve as advisers to the Panamanian Servicio Maritima 

Nacional (National Maritime Service), an agency modeled after the 

US Coast Guard. In 1998 alone, the Panamanian force seized more 

than 10,000 pounds of cocaine and 19 speed boats. In Haiti, the ITD 

maintains a year-round presence where the US and Canadian Coast 

Guards have helped Haiti establish a coast guard. Since it formed in 

1996, the Haitian Coast Guard—more than 100 members strong—

has seized 7,315 pounds of cocaine, 6,712 pounds of marijuana and 

six speed boats.

Recently the Coast Guard cashed in ITD’s successful long-term 

deployment program—one that amounts to a core competency—for 

exclusively short-term training missions in more GWOT-friendly 

countries such as Yemen, where it lacks the depth of long-term personal relationships. The last long-term training detachment left Bolivia on 30 September 2004.84

ITD, never more than 45 strong, consistently has been among 

the most selective of Coast Guard units thanks to a degree of extra latitude granted by the CGHQ Office of International Affairs and 

the Coast Guard Personnel Command. Candidates volunteer and 

submit applications that include qualifications, experience, physical fitness scores, and command endorsements. The unit screens 

these applications and enjoys some discretionary say in who is assigned to the unit—more say than most units get. ITD has always 

been serious about physical fitness, advanced tactical training, and 

language proficiency, especially in Spanish. Long-term deployers to 

South America attended at least three months of immersion training 

in Guatemala and generally scored two/two or better on the State 

Department language exam.

Conditions Are Set for a Coast Guard SOF Component

Army SF trace their roots to OSS support for the French Maquis insurgency against the Nazis and Vichy French. Later, when President 
33

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

John F. Kennedy emphasized the need to counter the new threat 

of insurgency and low-intensity conflict as the favorite expansionist tools of Communism, Army SF expanded and the Navy formed 

a new force from its underwater demolition teams: the Navy SEALs. 

Smaller in number, Navy SEALs concentrated on direct action and 

special reconnaissance; as a general rule they did not concentrate on 

organizing, training, and leading host nation (i.e., indigenous) forces. 

When the threat of terrorism arrived in the 1970s, DoD set their CT 

forces at the top of the special operations food chain. FBI did the 

same with its Hostage Rescue Team (HRT). 

Coast Guard special purpose forces are 

engaged daily in many of the same missions 

as DoD SOF using similar constructs of small, 

specialized teams (usually two to nine people) 

operating with zero to minimal support from 

conventional forces. Teams operating in the 

drug source and transit zones have specialized 

cultural and language capabilities, although 

the recent demise of the ITD long-term deployment program threatens serious degradation of that expertise. ITD’s sole mission is FID. 

If, for example, Bolivia or Colombia were to become failed states, 

Coast Guard special purpose forces have strong relationships with 

key security forces in those states based on 20 years of continuous 

FID deployments in six-month intervals, and could even work with 

those forces in a UW context with a modicum of additional training. 

Very little imagination is required to envision the Fuerzas Armadas 

Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) suddenly in charge of most of 

Colombia and “the good guys” taking on the role of insurgents.

LEDETs, MSSTs, and PSUs conduct their own operations, but 

they also conduct a significant amount of FID by training foreign 

forces and operating with them in a “technical assistance” capacity. 

In the author’s two years with LEDET 103 (1996 to 1998), the team 

trained or operated with the counterdrug forces of Mexico, Panama, 

Colombia, Ecuador, and the Cayman Islands—most on multiple occasions—and that is typical of LEDET operations. On one occasion, 

four of the team left the Navy ship in Mazatlan and flew by Mexican 

government aircraft of the Procuraduria General de La Republica 

(PGR) to Manzanillo to conduct a combined, interagency operation 

with two USDEA special agents and perhaps five Mexican officials. In 

order to mitigate risk of convoy ambush on the ground by the drug 

Coast Guard special purpose forces 

are engaged daily 

in many of the 

same missions as 

DoD SOF ...
34

 JSOU Report 05-7

cartel, the Mexican officials had established a change of vehicles at 

a preplanned staging area enroute to the site of the operation. This 

served as a moment of clarity for the author that LEDETs needed 

better training and equipment. The Coast Guardsmen found themselves the only unarmed participants, giving new meaning to the 

phrase, “alone and unafraid.” The teammates worked a hasty contingency plan to avail themselves of someone else’s weapon at the 

onset of hostilities—not the best way to operate. The reality is that 

the Coast Guard has special purpose forces often conducting SOFlike missions in SOF-like conditions without a SOF-like approach to 

organizing, and equipping. 

The multi-mission approach, appropriate for 95 percent of the 

Coast Guard, does not adequately prepare special purpose forces 

for their missions. Multi-mission commanders, likewise, cannot be 

expected to have an intuitive understanding of these forces’ requirements. Historically, the units have been left to fend for themselves, 

sometimes with adequate operations and maintenance funding, generally without sufficient funding or infrastructure to support the necessary additional training. It was exactly this state of neglect among 

SOF and ignorance among the general purpose force commanders 

that led Congress to legislate USSOCOM into existence.

While the Coast Guard arguably could have created a special 

operations command at any time in the last 20 or so years with 

the advent of its various special purpose forces, clearly now, having 

a Congressional mandate specifically to conduct CT operations (46 

USC 70106), such forces must be designated as SOF and organized, 

trained, and equipped as such. The Coast Guard should not wait 

for its own version of Desert One to come to this conclusion. Desert 

One already happened and the lessons are well documented. If DoD 

thought its primary role was homeland security instead of taking 

the fight to the enemy, everyone knows they would assign this mission to Navy SEALs, Army Special Forces, and supporting SOF. The 

enhanced Maritime Safety and Security Team (MSST) capability is 

modeled on some of the most specialized SOF. If FBI or Customs and 

Border Patrol (CBP) were given the mission, they would use career 

law enforcement officers and expand their specially-designated tactical teams (such as Hostage Rescue Teams) to accomplish this mission. That the Coast Guard has not yet fully embraced this model is 

indicative of how senior multi-mission commanders have spent their 

careers; it does not reflect how some Coast Guardsmen have spent 
35

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

their careers since 1982, when the first LEDETs commenced operations. Those officers have only been promoted to about the O-6 level 

at this point in history.

When one considers that much of the Coast Guard—including all 

of the “white-hull,” multi-mission units and all of the special purpose 

forces—exists expressly to mitigate the threats of non-state actors, 

and when one further considers the levels of danger and sophistication posed by non-state actors, there is no longer any place for a 

culture that accepts risk only from the environment and only to pull 

someone out of the water; that rejects risk from intelligent adversaries who would as soon destroy the entire population of the United 

States as explode a bomb on the approach of a Coast Guard boarding team. While existing missions dictate that perhaps 95 percent of 

the Coast Guard can operate at familiar levels of risk, the five percent that make up the special purpose forces must be designated, 

trained, experienced, and truly comfortable operating at the highest 

levels of risk, where perhaps millions of lives may depend on the 

success of a single operation of less than an hour’s duration and the 

DoD “cavalry” may not come. The choice that leaders may be faced 

with is to stop an attack with Coast Guard special purpose forces or 

not to stop it at all.

In sum, the Coast Guard as a service faces the same conditions 

that caused DoD to generate SOF: lawlessness and low-intensity 

conflict undertaken by non-state actors; traffickers in drugs, arms, 

people, and WMD; terrorists of various ilk; regional insurgents such 

as the FARC and the GAM; and global insurgents such as Al Qaeda 

and its allies.

The Value Added for Coast Guard SOF

Coast Guard special purpose forces number approximately 2,000 

active and reserve personnel, over 90 percent of whom are in operations career fields. Most units have only a handful of supporters. 

Most are active component forces; only the Port Security Units are 

in the reserve component. Figure 8 shows a notional Coast Guard 

Special Operations Command. Unit definitions from the Coast Guard 

online fact files are included in the glossary (Appendix C).

The Commander in Chief is the end user of all military and law 

enforcement forces. Very simply, the Coast Guard gives the Commander in Chief more options than DoD can give him alone. The 

Coast Guard has unique military and law enforcement authorities, 
36

 JSOU Report 05-7

unique expertise beyond that of any DoD force in boarding the full 

range of commercial and recreational vessels and discerning the legal from the illegal, and the most experience with maritime drug and 

migrant interdiction operations. Combining Coast Guard strengths 

with the fl exibility and power of SOF gives the President new options across the full range of military and civil operations both within 

and beyond the US territorial jurisdiction. Military special operations 

could more easily transition to law enforcement operations and vice 

versa without any need of the legal shenanigans envisioned by the 

Figure 8. Notional Coast Guard Special Operations Command.
37

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

FBI to avail themselves of national CT forces. In the counterdrug arena, Coast Guard special purpose forces already have demonstrated 

their ability to transition seamlessly between military and civil operational control and maintain the Constitutional safeguards necessary for prosecution in the United States. 

Since federal courts have begun to question the indefinite mass 

storage of detainees at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere, there is every reason to suspect that the courts and the American public will 

demand the criminal prosecution of terrorist suspects caught in or 

near the United States. Given an attack already in progress, Coast 

Guard SOF would thus serve what are likely to be the president’s top 

two priorities with respect to homeland security: to stop terrorist attacks and to arrest for prosecution all surviving terrorists, the latter 

of which also supports the needs of the Attorney General.

SECDHS should strongly support the concepts in this paper because he currently commands none of the national CT forces despite 

being saddled with responsibility to coordinate the federal response 

to terrorist attacks. As a general rule, Coast Guard SOF would work 

for DoD or the State Department while abroad (as they do already), 

and for DHS when conducting homeland security missions.

SECDEF, USSOCOM, and SOF units also gain substantially. The 

Coast Guard can support them by meeting some of the considerable demand for scarce SOF resources. The Coast Guard can give 

SECDEF a SEAL Team not by creating another SEAL Team, but by 

committing Coast Guard SOF under USSOCOM operational control 

where previously a SEAL Team or ODA was the only asset available 

to meet the need, and where the need may be in shortfall due to prioritization of SOF tasking. For example, Coast Guard SOF can perform the “global scout” and stability missions in places like PACOM 

and SOUTHCOM while DoD SOF are concentrated in CENTCOM. To 

an extent this already happens, but Coast Guard special purpose 

forces abroad often work in the interagency mode rather than in 

the joint mode. The interagency has no equivalent of the regional 

combatant commanders and theater special operations commands. 

Therefore, Coast Guard special purpose forces often work directly 

for the country team, often unintegrated with DoD operations in the 

same countries. Aligning Coast Guard special purpose forces with 

USSOCOM would integrate those forces and their operations with 

the theater SOCs and promote unity of effort, one of the six basic 

principles of Military Operations Other Than War.85
38

 JSOU Report 05-7

Unlike conventional component commanders who work in terms 

of brigades and strike groups—thousands of people and billions of 

dollars in assets—theater SOCs are inherently comfortable working 

at the team level. Further, the Coast Guard can augment theater 

SOC staffs with officers who have operational experience with the 

special purpose forces, but who need experience in time-sensitive 

operational planning in order to translate that experience into the 

most effective, time-sensitive, homeland security planning. Every 

staff officer the Coast Guard contributes to the undermanned theater SOC staffs increases staff support to fielded SOF without pulling 

a SEAL, SF, or special tactics officer off the teams to do so.

Some have said that NORTHCOM may need a theater SOC to 

execute its homeland defense missions.86 Since the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict (ASD–SO/LIC) and the Naval Special Warfare Command 

have both declared policies of “focusing on overseas threats,” 87 assigning SOF to a “SOCNORTH” requires a reduction in their overseas 

commitments. And assigning routine homeland security missions to 

existing DoD SOF necessarily invokes issues of Posse Comitatus. The 

Coast Guard can offer DoD an out for both problems. Since it is hard 

to envision the need to infiltrate SOF by minisub into or near the 

United States, USSOCOM could largely meet any future needs that 

NORTHCOM might have for maritime SOF by using Coast Guard 

SOF instead of Naval Special Warfare. This is fully consistent with 

Constitutional principles and the expectation of the public, as well as 

the politically powerful maritime industry, that they not interact with 

SEALs or Special Forces teams on any frequent basis whatsoever.

Since the Navy and Marine Corps have never designated an active component naval special operations aviation capability, there 

is a niche potentially available to Coast Guard Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron (HITRON) flyers. Although the Army’s 160th 

Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR) does some over-water 

aviation, maritime operators working in the maritime environment, 

if given the choice between two equally competent aircrews, are more 

comfortable flying with pilots who are primarily maritime flyers.88

For US Ambassadors and their country teams, affiliating with 

USSOCOM those Coast Guard teams already deployed and conducting security assistance/foreign internal defense, counterdrug, counterterrorism, and counterinsurgency operations best achieves unity 

of command and unity of effort with deployed SOF engaged in the 
39

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

same missions. For USSOCOM and SOF units, Coast Guard special 

operations officers could follow their operational tours with tours 

at theater special operations commands (TSOCs) and joint special 

operations task forces (JSOTFs)—these critically understaffed entities could benefit significantly from the added manpower, and the 

experience Coast Guard officers would gain could not be replaced 

by ten such tours in domestic homeland security planning cells. Finally, USSOCOM and SOF would gain from habitual relationships 

that Coast Guard teams have established in countries around the 

world—some of which have limited or no contact with Defense Department assets. The Coast Guard has better access in some countries and thus can provide additional access for SOF should the need 

arise.

In a general sense, the SOF officers in the CGSC Class of 2005 

have agreed that Coast Guard special purpose forces have the potential to contribute significantly to the SOF community. Commander, 

Special Operations Command Pacific (SOCPAC) recently commented 

that the relocation of Joint Interagency Task Force (JIATF) West with 

PACOM and SOCPAC has great potential for synergistic effects.89 Coast Guard 

special purpose forces have 24 years’ corporate experience in maritime interdiction operations in the JIATF South and 

West Areas of Responsibility (AORs). The 

tactical problems in these AORs—illicit 

trafficking in people, weapons, and drugs over vast bodies of water, 

multiple international boundaries, and small island chains—are so 

similar to the “War on Terror” tactical problems in Southeast Asia 

that SOCOM and SOCPAC should take advantage of Coast Guard expertise. The reality is that most TSOCs have more special operations 

work than SOF to do it, and Coast Guard special purpose forces 

would be using their existing capabilities fully in line with service 

values and traditions to mitigate some of that risk. Integrating these 

capabilities with those of SOF only sweetens the pot for both SOF 

and the Coast Guard.

At the same time, proponents of one government program often encounter resistance from proponents of other government programs competing for scarce resources. Within the SOF community, 

the potential for resistance to designating Coast Guard SOF likely 

will be greater where the Coast Guard fails to educate DoD SOF comCoast Guard special 

purpose forces have 24 

years’ corporate experience in maritime interdiction operations ...
40

 JSOU Report 05-7

manders on what factors make Coast Guard special purpose forces 

inherently unique and therefore a valuable addition to DoD SOF. 

Many within SOF think they have the right formula for success 

and simply need more of it. For example, since user demand for 

160th SOAR support significantly outpaces its capacity,90 Army SOF 

commanders likely would prefer expanding the 160th to designating 

a Coast Guard SOF air component. While the 160th is generally acknowledged as having the best existing rotary wing capability in special operations aviation, Coast Guard pilots bring their own expertise 

in the form of large numbers of operational over-water flying hours, 

much of it in extremely bad weather, and much of it in single-aircraft 

missions. Interdicting 52,600 of the 240,000 pounds of illegal drugs 

seized by the Coast Guard in Fiscal Year 2004,91 HITRON likely flies 

more small boat interdiction missions than anyone on earth. 

An Army soldier may view a Coast Guard LEDET as simply a less 

capable version of a SEAL platoon. Even though LEDETs today lack 

some of the more exotic special warfare capabilities such as joint 

targeting or the SEAL delivery vehicle (and may never have a need for 

such capabilities), LEDETs have much of the ship-boarding expertise along with their own inherent expertise in matters of great importance to special operations: smuggling of people and contraband, 

piracy, legitimate maritime commerce, legal documents, providing 

technical assistance to host nation prosecution efforts, language 

skills (mostly Spanish at present), and cultural understanding. They 

are similar, but not the same. Once the Coast Guard accepts the SOF 

construct and begins to build operators to that standard, then synergies are bound to appear even where today they might not be predicted. The key is to avoid the more tempting, taxonomic approach 

that pigeonholes Coast Guard special purpose forces in terms of DoD 

“equivalents.”

How Should USSOCOM Assist?

What the Coast Guard needs from USSOCOM is an adaptation of 

the special operations ethos for Coast Guard special purpose forces, 

which focuses on the worth of a few mature, highly trained, and discriminate operators who can use soft and kinetic power at the proper 

place and time; facilitates time-sensitive planning; and enables small 

teams to achieve strategic effects beyond their size and capability 

in conventional terms. The Coast Guard will realize these benefits 

in direct proportion to its commitment to contributing the unique 
41

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

expertise, capabilities, authorities, and access of its special purpose 

forces to the special operations fight.

Historically, the Coast Guard–Navy relationship served as the 

only real avenue of approach into DoD power circles. Although the 

Coast Guard’s relationship today with Navy flag officers seems to be 

healthy by virtue of the continuing “National Fleet” concept, the Navy 

frankly has a spotty track record in supporting the Coast Guard’s role 

in the joint force. Historically the Navy has bought major weapons 

systems on major cutters, but there has been some hesitation to renew this commitment via Deepwater. The Navy only requested Coast 

Guard participation in Vietnam because it lacked the coastal patrol 

capability necessary to deny sea lines of communication between 

North Vietnam and the Viet Cong.92 The Navy helped to prevent the 

use of Coast Guard patrol boats in Desert Storm and influenced USSOCOM’s decision to buy the 170’ Patrol Coastals.93 Although Navy 

admirals on other occasions (such as Operation Iraqi Freedom) have 

sung the Coast Guard’s praises, the overall record indicates that, 

of all flag and general officers, Navy admirals historically have constrained Coast Guard options in the joint force more than the general 

officers of other services.94 Intuitively, it seems that the Coast Guard 

would be wise to nurture symbiotic relationships with other power 

players in DoD. Recall that the Center for Naval Analyses made such 

a recommendation in 1997.95 Title 14 USC 2 and the Coast Guard’s 

subservience to the Navy are pre-Goldwater-Nichols vestiges. The 

Navy and Coast Guard should be natural allies with non-redundant 

forces, and Coast Guard multi-mission forces are likely to work for 

a Navy-manned maritime component command in any sizeable joint 

task force. However, if 14 USC 2 were reworked to reflect the realities 

of the joint force, the Coast Guard should be able to secure its own 

funding for its own major weapons systems that meet the needs of all 

shades of combatant commanders. The Navy-Coast Guard relationship thus far has largely manifested itself along the lines of conventional force relationships. USSOCOM possessing its own service-like 

characteristics, seems like a wise choice precisely because it is both 

unconventional and extra-naval.

By contributing its special purpose forces to USSOCOM as the 

supported combatant commander in the global counterinsurgency, 

the Coast Guard would gain a critical ally within DoD that understands the key contributions made by small, specialized teams. Conventional land and naval forces dwarf the Coast Guard, and even 
42

 JSOU Report 05-7

more so its specialized teams. Yet USSOCOM, which commands 

roughly 46,000 people, is very similar in size to the Coast Guard. 

With such an ally as USSOCOM, the Coast Guard could solidify its 

combat roles (both in conventional and special operations) and gain 

a powerful advocate within DoD to help out when the Navy is less 

inclined to do so.

Another critical requirement is training. By means of an agreement signed 10 May 2005, the Coast Guard and USSOCOM already 

have recognized the untapped potential in this form of interaction. 

Rather than reinventing the wheel as it is prone to do, the Coast 

Guard has recognized that SOF have learned some lessons the hard 

way and have created the best training available for certain types 

of operations. USSOCOM has authorized direct liaison between its 

Service Component Commands and the Coast Guard to support the 

training of maritime security forces.96 A second-order effect will likely 

be the education of both Coast Guard and SOF officers on each other’s roles and missions.

Further along the commitment continuum, the Coast Guard as 

a full joint partner in USSOCOM could gain access to Major Force 

Program 11 (MFP-11) funding, which funds all SOF-specific training 

and equipment. Not only is this funding stream important, but so 

is the highly qualified Special Operations Acquisition and Logistics 

Center (SOAL). This is a specialized logistics staff dedicated to the 

rapid fielding of equipment that meets the unique needs of special 

operators. Examples of Coast Guard equipment that could fall within 

MFP-11—and therefore external to the Coast Guard budget—include 

all HITRON materiel, all MSST and SRT materiel or modifications 

beyond the service-adopted standard platforms, all PSU materiel, all 

vertical insertion (fast-roping) materiel, the TACLET/MSST canine 

programs, and the considerably greater ammunition allowances and 

associated ranges and shoot houses. If the Coast Guard had designated SOF, MFP-11 would fund all overseas operations of Coast 

Guard SOF where USSOCOM or the theater SOCs had operational control. The Coast Guard would continue to pay the personnel 

and administrative costs for its designated SOF, but SOCOM would 

equip, train, and operate them as SOF.

MFP-11 funding comes with a string: the Coast Guard must be 

willing to assign operational control of designated SOF to USSOCOM 

like the Army, Navy, and Air Force already have. SOCOM is not going 

to fund these teams at any significant level without the authority to 
43

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

assign them as necessary to execute SOCOM missions, particularly 

the global counterinsurgency. Since Coast Guard and SOCOM objectives abroad have abundant overlap, this should not be an insurmountable obstacle. Much of what these Coast Guard forces do overseas is Foreign Internal Defense (FID), a USSOCOM-identified core 

task for SOF. Whether FID addresses a counterterrorism or counterdrug threat is immaterial. Together, counterterrorism, counterdrug, 

and their FID derivatives probably account for 90 percent or more of 

the activity of Coast Guard special purpose forces overseas. If SOCOM would not agree to provide Coast Guard SOF to JIATF South 

and JIATF West for counterdrug operations (which themselves are 

FID supporting the global counterinsurgency when the work is conducted as technical assistance to host nation forces), then surely 

the Coast Guard and USSOCOM could agree on a fixed-percentage 

force apportionment between SOCOM and nonSOCOM missions, and fund these teams at an 

equivalent percentage. Each commander can pay 

for his own operations; equipment and facilities 

can be funded according to the fixed-percentage 

agreement. Thus, even on a percentage basis, 

MFP-11 could provide funds in the millions of dollars that the Coast 

Guard would not have to budget for or, historically, not budget for.

Working for the TSOCs also would give Coast Guard special purpose forces something they have never had: responsive theater logistics support including the intra-theater airlift that Air Force special 

operators provide for USSOCOM in its service-like capacity. The increased survivability inherent in being “plugged in,” “on the grid,” 

and party to SOF personnel recovery plans should be obvious, and 

this is capability that the Coast Guard by itself could never replicate. 

This makes long-term deployments in remote regions considerably 

more palatable from a risk management perspective.

Importantly, by affiliating some of its forces with USSOCOM and 

conducting some of its overseas activities under the auspices of the 

theater SOCs and their JSOTFs, Coast Guard SOF would become 

truly formidable in the execution of their domestic homeland security duties. Coast Guard officers would gain valuable expertise in 

planning and executing asymmetric, unconventional operations with 

the best special operators in the world, and then could exert leadership in planning for such events as the G8 Summit or Olympics in 

the United States. 

... MFP-11 could 

provide funds in 

the millions of 

dollars ...
44

 JSOU Report 05-7

SOF Core Tasks and Coast Guard SOF

The Coast Guard is a natural choice for the shaping operations in 

the global counterinsurgency, which the United States neglects at 

its own great peril. Much of DoD SOF has been redirected from the 

shaping zone to the decisive, or kinetic zone. One could even argue 

that these descriptors are reversed. Since DoD SOF and conventional forces have been challenged to kill or capture (indefinitely) the 

current generation of radical-Islamist insurgents, no leader should 

expect that America can kill or capture its way to a better future. 

For those already radicalized, that may be the only solution, but if 

the next generation is allowed to grow up in the absence of effective governmental institutions, food, water, sanitation, and economic 

activity, there may be too many of them. Thus, helping foreign governments establish their own effectiveness and legitimacy—preconditions of economic prosperity—is likely much more decisive than 

killing current enemies. These factors have made the Civil Affairs 

teams decisive in post-Taliban Afghanistan.97

The Coast Guard currently operates in the shaping zone by training foreign Coast Guards; combating the trafficking of human beings, drugs, weapons, and other contraband; and enforcing public 

safety on the water in places like the Horn of Africa, where on 17 

March 2005, the Cutter Munro assaulted a Thai fishing vessel and 

detained three Somali hijackers armed with automatic weapons and 

demanding $800,000 ransom for the ship’s officers they held hostage.98 However, the Coast Guard is severely hampering its effectiveness by avoiding the risk and expense of operating in the special 

operations context. Many countries—including Arab countries, Indonesia, and Malaysia—want help but do not want the brand recognition and resultant political upheaval that comes with overt US 

assistance. The Coast Guard should think beyond mere port security 

to how such operations and access can be exploited to further benefit 

the nation.

The Coast Guard gets away with much under the guise of interagency, but these examples clearly are special operations that 

should be coordinated with and supported by the TSOCs if for no 

other reason than risk mitigation (e.g., command and control and 

egress plans), but probably also for funding and unity of effort. The 

Coast Guard can field the ultimate low-profile SOF because they 

number so incredibly few in comparison to even DoD SOF.
45

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

SOF power in the shaping zone depends on credible kinetic power 

in decisive operations. Coast Guard forces must walk the walk with 

their host nation counterparts or the whole thing is a sham. Effective 

relationships are built only on prolonged interaction under the stress 

of operational conditions. Coast Guard kinetic power is derived of its 

people, its platforms, its small arms and larger ordnance, its C4ISR 

assets, the will to use them, and its popular and legal mandates to 

use force against those who would violate the law and threaten public safety.

For this reason, the Coast Guard must reassess its decision regarding long-term FID deployments. While it likely is more appropriate for operational units such as LEDETs, MSSTs, and PSUs to execute the operations that ITD and its predecessors pioneered (under 

the auspices and with the support of theater SOCs), the Coast Guard 

desperately needs to continue long-term FID deployments because 

they provide critical tactical skills and experience for its people. Although ITD’s 45 members are barely 1/1000th the total active duty 

force, at least 22 percent of the first-generation MSST commanding 

officers had ITD experience. That pool of experience will shrink by 

22 percent unless long-term FID deployments are reinstated immediately. 

Some may counter that MSSTs will grow this experience and they 

may, but they will not learn these skills in New York Harbor. Anyone 

who thinks that expelling boaters from established security zones 

compares with fighting narco-guerrillas does not understand the 

nonstate actors who threaten the free world. Yet fighting narco-guerrillas is very similar to fighting terrorists. Fighting pirates in Africa 

and Southeast Asia is very similar to fighting terrorists. Some percentage of Coast Guard special purpose forces should be deployed 

constantly overseas in support of special operations and intelligence 

collection. The place for Coast Guard maritime security forces to 

learn their trade—to really learn it against intelligent and hostile 

adversaries—is overseas. When they do it in the United States, they 

need to get it right the first time. That is how overseas deployments 

help the Coast Guard in its homeland security role.

For the global counterinsurgency, the long-term deployment program sets conditions, denies sanctuary, deters terrorists, reassures 

allies, provides early warning; and maintains the personal relationships that are critical for access into the region as it begins to inflame. 

With DoD committed decisively to CENTCOM, the Coast Guard is 
46

 JSOU Report 05-7

missing key opportunities to mitigate risk for the US government 

in the maritime domains of South America, Africa, and Southeast 

Asia.

Table 1 relates the Coast Guard special purpose forces’ current 

soft and kinetic capabilities to the SOF core tasks.

– Source of Core Task list: LTC William D. Andersen, USAF, USSOCOM (SOCC) message to Joint Special Operations University (SOED-F), 29 August 2005: the current 

SOF Core Tasks were confirmed in two Board of Directors meetings at USSOCOM 

in February and April 2005, adding the Synchronize task to the list.

Arguably, elements of the Coast Guard’s special purpose forces 

could also contribute to some facets of special reconnaissance missions in accordance with their unique capabilities, and they could 

be useful in assisting USSOCOM to synchronize the DoD effort in 

the Global War on Terrorism. But it is clear that a Coast Guard SOF 

component of USSOCOM could make significant contributions in 

mission areas attendant to the SOF Core Tasks. Thus in the following chapter, the argument is further advanced that now is the time to 

develop a special operations force within the Coast Guard.

SOF Core Tasks Coast Guard Capabilities

Counter Proliferation (CP) •

Counterterrorism (CT) •

Special Reconnaissance (SR)

Direct Action (DA) •

Unconventional Warfare (UW) •

Foreign Internal Defense (FID) •

Civil Affairs Operations (CAO)* •

Information & Psychological Operations 

(IO & PSYOP)

Synchronize DoD Efforts in 

the Global War on Terrorism

*in the context of maritime issues such as civilian port authorities, mariner licensing, 

and fisheries management, which military CA forces totally lack.

Table 1. Coast Guard Capabilities 

that Can Contribute to the SOF Core Tasks.
47

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

4. Designating Coast Guard 

 Special Operations Forces

Perhaps one of the most telling indicators supporting the designation of Coast Guard SOF is the recent debate between Captain Bruce Stubbs, USCG (retired) and Vice Admiral Terry 

Cross, USCG, both respected Coast Guard leaders. Captain Stubbs 

argued that the multi-mission construct is too expensive and precludes the specialization necessary for an effective CT capability. The 

Coast Guard, he wrote, should focus on CT operations and, presumably, out-source non-homeland security missions. Vice Admiral 

Cross countered that it was exactly the multi-mission construct that 

enabled the Coast Guard to turn on a dime and assume lead agency authority and responsibility for maritime homeland security. He 

wrote further that the nation certainly could not afford two deepwater programs. Meanwhile, the same problem continues: these leaders regard the Coast Guard as one block in the same way that other 

Service leaders viewed their Services each as one block—before Congress carved out a chunk of each Service called SOF. The reality is 

this: both leaders are right and both objectives can be achieved using 

the SOF construct for a small percentage of Coast Guard forces.

Prevention, Detection, and Response

It should be obvious that the object of Maritime Domain Awareness 

cannot be merely to watch the attack as it unfolds. Having knowledge of an attack 30-60 minutes ahead of the news networks, while 

laudable, cannot define success for the government in achieving its 

principle objectives: “to insure domestic tranquility, provide for the 

common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” 99 Security expert Bruce 

Schneier labeled Chapters 11 and 12 of his book, Beyond Fear, respectively, “Detection Works Where Prevention Fails” and “Detection 

is Useless without Response.” One analogy he uses is the common 

safe. The safe is a preventative barrier. The alarm provides detection, 

and guards or police make up the response force. Federal security 

requirements reinforce this “triad” of systems, as Schneier calls it, 

by requiring the use and regular exercise of each of the three components to safeguard weapons, cash, and classified material.
48

 JSOU Report 05-7

In tackling the issues of Maritime Homeland Security to date, 

DHS has placed considerable efforts on prevention—systems that 

run in the background to deny terrorists their “avenues of approach” 

and “freedom of maneuver” in Army parlance. Examples include US 

visit and other passport and visa initiatives; Customs and Border 

Protection’s (CBP’s) Container Security Initiative and Customs-Trade 

Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT); the Transportation Security 

Administration’s improvements in commercial airline baggage and 

personnel screening as well as airport and cockpit physical security; 

and the Coast Guard’s 96-hour Notice of Arrival (NOA), National and 

Inland Rivers Vessel Movement Centers, and permanent security 

zones around critical infrastructure.100 Likewise, Congress and the 

President have directed and resourced CIA and FBI to improve detection by stepping up HUMINT collection, intelligence sharing, and the 

integration of criminal databases and terrorist watch lists. The Coast 

Guard has established a headquarters office dedicated to improving 

Maritime Domain Awareness (i.e. detection). Some of these measures 

combine some functions of prevention and detection, but none of 

them is a SEAL Platoon or a SWAT Team taking down terrorists.

DHS has implemented at least two triad-based systems—the 

department’s color-coded Homeland Security Advisory System and 

the Coast Guard’s Maritime Security Conditions—but the increased 

presence of basic patrol officers on foot, mounted, and afloat to match 

increases in the threat posture brings with it only a modest increase 

in response capabilities: one cop watching a bridge or one boatcrew 

observing infiltration into a port facility might stop that part of a terrorist operation, but neither would likely stop the larger group or interdict its operations. In many scenarios of imminent or in-progress 

attacks, arguably, the best response function such officers can serve 

is as reconnaissance for a more powerful response force.

In the area of Maritime Security Response, the successes to date 

include the establishment of 14 Maritime Safety and Security Teams 

(including one “enhanced” version) in the nation’s critical ports and 

a modest improvement in response boats at multi-mission Coast 

Guard boat stations. However, it is important to note that much of 

the collective wisdom in Coast Guard Headquarters sees the MSST as 

predominantly a preventive measure: if terrorists see the bright-orange boats with the mean-looking machine guns, hopefully that will 

dissuade them from hitting the particular target the boat is sitting in 

front of, and so the MSST should never have to fire a shot in anger. 
49

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

To their credit, MSSTs take their response mission very seriously. 

Having the will to use force is every bit as important as having the 

means. There are two major factors, however, that make the MSST 

an inherently limited Maritime Security Response asset. The fi rst 

cannot be overcome: the MSSTs are absolutely necessary in protecting critical infrastructure and high-value naval and military assets. 

This mission—predominantly boat against boat with a limited human against human role—makes them most effective in preventing 

or interdicting USS COLE-type attacks and in boarding merchants in 

compliant and non-compliant modes. In the spate of MSST commissioning ceremonies since 2001, DHS, the Coast Guard, and members of Congress have frequently referred to MSSTs as “maritime 

SWAT teams.” 101 This capability provides a critical layer of (mostly 

defensive) security, but fi ve terrorists on deck fi ring automatic weapons or rocket-propelled grenades changes the equation entirely. That 

revelation, learned by the FBI in Waco, is what prompted the Bureau 

to stratify its SWAT capabilities into basic SWAT, enhanced SWAT, 

and the Hostage Rescue Team as depicted in Figure 9. 

Figure 9. FBI Tactical Assets. 

Source: 1997 GAO/NSIAD-97-254 Combating Terrorism
50

 JSOU Report 05-7

So too would armed opposition to the initial boarding seriously 

threaten the successful outcome of an MSST operation employing 

only noncompliant tactics, techniques, and procedures. What is lacking in most major seaports is that additional layer of security that 

can be provided only by a fi rehouse-style force-in-being capable of 

responding to terrorist attacks regardless of the level of resistance—

up to and including the capability to conduct an opposed boarding at 

night to render safe special nuclear materials. Figure 10 shows how 

the Coast Guard might stratify its emerging homeland security capabilities in terms of CT response capability, including both the FBI 

methodology and the DoD concept of habitual relationships.

Figure 10. Notional Coast Guard Stratifi cation for CT Resourcing.

Coast Guard SOF in the Close Fight

Most of the preceding analysis has dealt with Coast Guard SOF in 

the deep fi ght. With Naval Special Warfare protecting us predominantly over the horizon, there is a clear need for maritime SOF in the 

homeland, and this is where Coast Guard SOF would predominantly 

fulfi ll their kinetic use of force roles. On 21 December 2004, President G. W. Bush signed Homeland Security Presidential Directive 

13, which requires the Secretaries of Defense and Homeland Security to conduct a comprehensive review of maritime security and to 
51

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

draft a “National Strategy for Maritime Security.” The president has 

recognized that existing policies and capabilities are not adequate 

to counter today’s threats. HSPD-13 in fact invites the Secretaries 

to recommend appropriate changes to the lead federal agency (LFA) 

assignments outlined in the existing national CT policies as delineated in Presidential Decision Directives 39 and 62.102 With statutory maritime law enforcement authority dating back to 1790, port 

security authority dating back to 1917, maritime CT authority from 

2002, and the preponderance of operational air and maritime security forces in the homeland and the ability to command and control 

them, the Coast Guard should be assigned LFA for Maritime Security 

Response and properly resourced to execute the mission.

The Enhanced MSST, or Security Response Team (SRT), comes 

very close to that desired layer of SOF response capability the nation 

requires to protect itself at knife-fighting distances on last-minute 

intelligence. Not yet even an officially recognized unit, SRT-1 has 

been a success. The unit concept received broad support from the 

interagency at the National Security Council. The Coast Guard hired 

contractors with critical experience on the national CT forces to train 

this new unit. By the time SRT-1 had deployed for its third National 

Special Security Event, the Republican National Convention, SRT-1 

had earned the trust and respect of the US Secret Service CounterAssault Team (CAT). SRT-1 has provided operational support to the 

Secret Service with several critical capabilities, not least of which 

is inner-perimeter protection for the principles, including the president, with CAT in contingency evacuation plans.103

The SRT concept has upset the apple cart at Coast Guard Headquarters in Washington, D.C., which is very comfortable with existing structures and budget authorities. The SRT concept embodies a 

new type of unit that requires cross-program authority in order to 

effectively execute its missions. To work, SRT requires new Coast 

Guard policies in manning, aviation and boat force risk tolerance, 

weapons, and training that probably are not appropriate for multimission forces. 

In order to meet both SRT’s need for dedicated aviation and the 

need for aviation safety oversight and training, the Coast Guard 

should establish a special operations aviation command. This was 

one of the key recommendations of the Holloway Commission following Desert One and resulted in establishment of the 160th Special 

Operations Aviation Regiment of the US Army.
52

 JSOU Report 05-7

The SRT concept runs counter to the sensibilities of many members who have worked hard to shape the Coast Guard’s image as a 

lifesaving service, despite the fact that 95 percent of the Coast Guard 

will carry on as they do today even if the Coast Guard creates an 

official SOF capability. Interestingly, Los Angeles SWAT considers 

itself a lifesaving unit and so do DoD SOF. The motto of Army Special 

Forces is “De Oppresso Liber,” which translates, “To Free the Oppressed.” SOF personnel volunteered for SOF in order to make the 

world a better place. Had the Coast Guard the opportunity to kill the 

11 September terrorists in order to save 3,000 lives, would it have 

done so? The Coast Guardsmen who delivered the Marines on Iwo 

Jima would have. The Coast Guardsmen who pounded Viet Cong 

junks with Army Special Forces would have. This business of lifesaving is a matter of perspective—and vision.

Is It Someone Else’s Job?

Even when there is agreement on the need for enhanced maritime 

security response capabilities, there may not be agreement on where 

to put the resources. People tend to default to FBI, for example. Although the FBI has enjoyed brand recognition as the LFA for counterterrorism, FBI has no sustained presence in the maritime domain. 

There are but three entities in the federal government that have any 

considerable maritime security presence: the Navy, the Coast Guard, 

and the Air and Maritime Operations (AMO) wing of DHS Customs 

and Border Protection (CBP). A final option might be the states (some 

of which have state or municipal marine patrols), but doing so prevents commanders from surging the capability for national and regional requirements, degrades integration into national CT planning, 

and prevents the teams from engaging in overseas combat operations, which is the only true indicator, short of an attack on the 

homeland, that this force will work when called on.

Clearly, DoD possesses the best existing capability in the US government to conduct opposed boardings and to render safe special 

nuclear material. Some of this capability is even arrayed to support 

domestic homeland security. Nonetheless, DoD has been very careful to emphasize that their focus is on overseas threats and that 

law enforcement agencies should focus on homeland security.104 It 

seems clear that the converse of this statement is this: DoD would 

rather not be saddled with requirements to stage its best capabilities throughout the United States to respond to imminent homeland 
53

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

security threats. DoD special operations and technical assistance 

forces are either forward-deployed around the world taking the fight 

to the enemy, have just returned from that mission, or are preparing 

for their next mission in that fight. If the answer to high-end homeland security needs is DoD, then most of their capability would have 

to be redeployed from overseas assignments to support homeland 

security. Few in federal government support such a strategy. In accordance with DoD’s history and expressed desires, their strength 

lies in the “forward regions.”105 How many simultaneous homeland 

security incidents would overwhelm the existing, inward-focused capability? Once this capability is committed, there is no further strategic reserve for any follow-on events. The Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense, Mr. T. K. Custer, put it this 

way: in the “forward regions,” where DoD is the predominant force 

best positioned to respond, DoD—via the conventional navy or naval special warfare—should take the lead and respond. In the “approaches” to the homeland, where there is a more even mix of DoD 

and Coast Guard assets, the “firstest with the mostest” rule should 

apply. Finally, in the homeland itself, where the Coast Guard has 

the strongest maritime presence of any government entity, there the 

Coast Guard should have the LFA responsibility for maritime security response. The policy also should allow the rare exception where, 

even in the homeland or the forward regions, a non-LFA asset should 

respond if it is best positioned and able to respond in time to make 

a difference. “If Al Qaeda succeeds in attacking us, it will not be because we tripped over our own interpretation of law and policy.”106

The notion that the FBI should have the lead for maritime counterterrorism is fraught with inconsistency. Combined with current 

national policy, that would make the US Coast Guard the LFA for 

maritime homeland security except in really dangerous scenarios, 

at which point the civilian-manned FBI would step in. The factors 

favoring FBI are its brand recognition; its singular focus on security, 

law enforcement, and intelligence operations; and its assertiveness 

in using its authority and capability. Conversely, the extent to which 

the Coast Guard lacks these qualities is the single greatest risk factor to implementing a successful Coast Guard SOF or CT capability. 

Fortunately, this factor is really the only one that favors FBI and 

disfavors the Coast Guard, and the latter’s emerging advanced law 

enforcement competency program may well balance the scales. In an 

interesting comment on federalism, the Constitution delegated most 
54

 JSOU Report 05-7

land-based police power to the states. According to its own website, 

the FBI, not formed until 1908, has always been first an investigative vice a “cops on the beat” type of agency, whereas in the maritime 

domain, the Coast Guard has since 1790 functioned as a patrolling, 

federal, maritime, police power using “all necessary force to compel 

compliance.” Any who doubt this fact should read up on the Coast 

Guard’s battles with Jean Lafitte and his merry band of pirates in the 

Gulf of Mexico during the first half of the nineteenth century.107

These facts notwithstanding, the FBI has continually pursued 

greater kinetic police power, including air and maritime capabilities. 

Witness the bank robbery squads, the field division SWAT Teams, 

the regional “enhanced” or “super” SWAT teams, and the Hostage 

Rescue Team complete with helicopters and rigid-hull inflatable 

boats. PDD-39 in fact assigned FBI the LFA responsibilities for CT 

in international waters, apparently based on the Hostage Rescue 

Team (HRT), a single unit of 91 special agents in Quantico, Virginia 

on a four-hour recall.108 Interestingly enough, HRT is listed as an 

“investigative program.” Consider for a moment the FBI’s capability 

to field a “sustained maritime presence” from zero to hundreds or 

even thousands of miles offshore.109 Next consider their capability to 

command and control such a force. Finally, consider the expertise 

of the average FBI special agent in maritime affairs. As phenomenal 

an investigative agency as the FBI is, it may be time to say they have 

enough on their plate. Were Congress to press them into maritime 

security service, the FBI would mount an impressive campaign to 

acquire maritime resources: boats (or even ships), aircraft, sensors, 

command and control systems, and logistics systems—something 

that looks an awful lot like the existing Coast Guard and its Deepwater recapitalization program. The federal government already has 

a maritime law enforcement agency, and that agency is the Coast 

Guard. All that remains is for the Coast Guard senior leadership 

to step up to the plate, acknowledge the service’s responsibility as 

the nation’s primary maritime law enforcement agency, and accept 

whatever risks that entails. Failing this, there may well be a maritime 

division of the FBI in the nation’s future, and the likelihood is high 

that Coast Guard maritime law enforcement officers would flock to 

man it.

The remaining alternative among existing federal agencies is the 

Air and Maritime Operations Division (AMO) of CBP. In the author’s 

experience, its maritime enforcement officers are first investigative 
55

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

agents who must also work a day shift and turn over cases for prosecution. Their boats, among the “coolest” and fastest on the water, are 

predominantly short-range, short-duration assets that are used to 

support casework, not to dominate the maritime domain; their command and control capability is quite limited; and the agency has never mounted a large, synchronized operation in the maritime domain 

without Coast Guard or JIATF assistance. Finally, one must admit 

that the AMO never would have been born had the Coast Guard 

remained in the Treasury Department alongside US Customs during the early years of the drug war. Properly resourced and properly 

emphasizing maritime law enforcement, the Coast Guard would have 

developed an AMO-like capability in the 1980s under Treasury leadership. As Secretary Chertoff conducts his department-wide review of 

organizations and operations, AMO’s boat forces and maritime patrol 

aircraft may be vulnerable considering Coast Guard preeminence in 

the maritime domain.

Maritime security response and consequence management operations likely will require dispersed, simultaneous, and sustained 

operations on the scale of the Mariel Boatlift or Exxon Valdez response operations. Only the Coast Guard can mount such operations in the homeland on a moment’s notice. To be more effective, 

the Coast Guard simply needs LFA authority for maritime security 

response and correlating, full-spectrum capabilities.

Counterargument: There Is No Money

No discussion of this sort is complete absent fiscal considerations. 

In general, homeland security funding has increased insignificantly 

compared to the need, and the scale of Coast Guard SOF is very 

small. According to Steven Flynn, “new federal outlays for homeland security” since 11 September 2001 amount to four percent of 

the defense budget—not exactly an indicator that the government is 

serious about homeland security.110 Considering the apportionment 

of federal spending shown in figure 7, that means four percent of a 

defense budget today that is less than 50 percent of what it was in 

1962 as a percentage of spending.

In fiscal year 2005, defense appropriations totaled $391 billion 

while homeland security appropriations totaled $40.7 billion.111 Can 

DHS imagine a budget even 25 percent of DoD’s budget? Can Coast 

Guard admirals imagine a 50 percent increase in manpower? CIA 

leaders can.112 For the Coast Guard, that would equal 20,000 ad-
56

 JSOU Report 05-7

ditional active duty members. Fortunately, most of the forces considered herein already exist. While some programs such as SRTs, 

HITRONs, and LEDETs may require expansion to do their jobs effectively, the same is true whether or not they are designated as SOF. If 

formed today, the Coast Guard SOC would own about 2900 people 

already on the payroll. The expansions proposed herein likely would 

add another 500 to 600 people, depending on the troop-to-task analysis. Since most of the people are paid for, the main perceived drawback with designated SOF may be that their training and equipment 

could be more expensive per person than that of the multi-mission 

forces because of the greater emphasis on building cohesive teams 

of more mature and capable operators focused on specifi c missions. 

Such arguments fail to account for the high systems costs of Coast 

Guard multi-mission units—standard boats, aircraft, and major cutters in particular—and the years of training invested into the typical 

coxswain, offi cer of the deck, engineer offi cer, or aviator. 

The operator is always the most important system in SOF. This 

drives the requirement for closed-loop personnel assignment policies, 

which adds some expense. MFP-11 theoretically could offset much 

of the operational cost of Coast Guard SOF. The Coast Guard should 

further engage USSOCOM in areas of mutual interest precisely because the potential for additional funding could be signifi cant.

Another fi scal issue is the reality of political will. Although the 

Security Response Team (SRT) is expensive due to its dedicated air 

and boat forces, the SRT is also the only unit in the Coast Guard that 

has the potential to conduct national-level missions such as counterterrorism against a WMD threat. That is a mission that captures 

Figure 11. Composition of Federal Spending by Budget Function.

Source: http://www.gao.gov/cghome/hscek/img2.html 
57

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

the attention of national decision makers and the public in a way 

that Deepwater likely never will, because it operates primarily far 

offshore, where there is a dearth of American citizens. However critically important Deepwater recapitalization is for the Coast Guard, 

the program is simply a tough sell. On the other hand, ask the Congressional delegations from the powerful coastal states whether their 

major cities and ports—New York-New Jersey, Hampton Roads, Los 

Angeles-Long Beach, San Francisco, Seattle, and others—ought to 

have pre-positioned, maritime CT units that can stop simultaneous 

nuclear attacks and they will form a coalition to ensure each other’s 

needs are met. General Downing has said that the nation needs more 

of this capability than what it has in DoD. He also said that if the 

Coast Guard were to take on this mission, it would have “real power 

and a real budget.” 113 Find the money for a robust SRT capability, 

make the Coast Guard a critical asset in national-level missions, and 

the Coast Guard will have more breathing space and allies for programs like Deepwater and Rescue21.

A final fiscal comment regards the relationship of CT capability 

to what GAO calls “results-oriented government” arising from the 

Government Performance and Results Act of 1993.114 In short, there 

is none. In an interview, Kathy Kraninger, former Assistant to the 

Secretary of Homeland Security for Policy and now on the staff of the 

Senate Homeland Security Governmental Affairs Committee, mentioned that some people in government have questioned whether the 

original, much less enhanced, MSSTs have been worth their cost. 

While understandable, this is a flawed criticism. Military operations 

are not business operations. The United States and its allies spent 

billions of dollars on nuclear munitions to win the Cold War but never engaged in nuclear warfare. Few doubt the free world would have 

survived without them. How many did the country actually need? 

It is impossible to measure. Similarly, the United States rarely has 

used unconventional warfare to overthrow hostile regimes, yet incalculable was its value in toppling the Taliban in less than 60 days and 

accomplishing what the Soviet Union failed to do in 10 years. 

When Al Qaeda launches a spectacular maritime attack against 

the United States, the millions of people at risk in the coastal communities (or their survivors) are going to ask, “Mr. President, Honorable Senator, where were you on maritime security? We all knew this 

would happen. You were supposed to protect us. What did you do 

to keep my family alive?” Midwest farmers will ask, “Mr. President, 
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Honorable Senator, how can it be that we cannot ship our grain to 

market? What happened to the ports?” Retailers large and small will 

ask, “Mr. President, Honorable Senator, how can it be that we have 

nothing to sell? What happened to the ports?” New England and California power companies will ask, “Mr. President, Honorable Senator, 

how can it be that we have no fuel for winter? What happened to 

the ports?” Not least, the combatant commanders will ask, “Admiral 

Commandant, how can it be that the retaliatory ground forces are 

barricaded in garrison? What happened to the strategic seaports of 

embarkation?” 

This is the fundamental problem of the insurance buyer: if the 

consequences of the catastrophic event are unacceptable, then whatever its likelihood, the wise insure against it. Few appreciate the 

value of insurance when the bill is due; far fewer can afford to face 

disaster uninsured. So what is to be made of all this? The following 

chapter provides this author’s conclusions and recommendations for 

a CG SOF organization.
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5. Conclusions 

 and Recommendations

The Coast Guard has always been a combat force. The Coast 

Guard’s status as an armed force depends on its continued 

mandate, will, and capability to go to war. In the fullness of 

time, historians may conclude that the DOT and post-Vietnam era 

fostered elements of culture anomalous to the great heritage of the 

service.

A History of Special Operations

The historical record demonstrates that small, deployed Coast Guard 

units have participated in special operations at least as far back as 

the run-up to World War II, which is about the time the United States 

established its first official special operations units. Coast Guard 

units have sought out opportunities to participate, they have been 

tasked to do so by higher headquarters, and they have supported, 

at a minimum, requests for supporting and direct action roles in the 

operations of US Army Special Forces, US Navy SEALs, and US Marine Corps Force Reconnaissance units.

Coast Guard special purpose forces have critical authority, expertise, and capabilities to contribute to the SOF community and 

national intelligence collection effort across the continuum of operations. Coast Guard operators and marine safety personnel add 

a unique layer of analysis and interpretation for planning and executing operations and intelligence gathering. The new warfighting 

paradigm for the non-state actor holds that finding the enemy is 

harder than fixing him, destroying him, or removing him from the 

battlefield. The Coast Guard’s core competencies since 1790 have 

included discerning legitimate from illegitimate activities among civilians on the water, and affecting both activities through a variety 

of lethal and nonlethal means using inherently legitimate state powers of law, regulation, search, seizure, and violence. The organizations currently conducting operations in the covert and clandestine 

realms do not have the same access or visibility on maritime issues 

that the Coast Guard has, and moreover, they cannot expect to have 

it without Coast Guard help. From the strategic to the tactical level, 

the Coast Guard can help these organizations fill in some of their 
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“unknown unknowns,” as Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld 

calls them.

USSOCOM Can Help

USSOCOM and SOF can help Coast Guard special purpose forces 

by sharing its training resources, acquisition expertise, and imbuing 

Coast Guard teams with the special operations ethos. Should the 

Coast Guard commit its special purpose forces to the global counterinsurgency under USSOCOM operational control, USSOCOM could 

fund these forces’ SOF-specific requirements and thus remove that 

burden from the Coast Guard budget.

The data in Table 1 suggest that existing Coast Guard special 

purpose forces have existing capabilities in the SOF essential tasks 

of CT, CP, DA (concentrated on ship boardings, small-boat interdictions, and combined beach, boat, and air interdictions), FID, and 

maritime aspects of civil affairs (as yet a nonexistent capability in the 

joint force). Additionally, UW might be considered low-hanging fruit. 

Recall the contingency scenario involving a future FARC overpowering the legitimate government of Colombia. Coast Guard special purpose forces already conduct independent FID to such a degree that, 

with modest additional training in supporting insurgency, they could 

easily exploit existing relationships and access to conduct successful 

UW. So much of what SOF do can be summarized as using low-profile forces to stabilize the ungoverned space in the world. There has 

been a tremendous convergence in the military and law enforcement 

disciplines since the end of the Cold War. In a nutshell, Coast Guard 

special purpose forces are specialists against the nonstate actor.

It’s Time to Designate Coast Guard SOF

Service history supports designating Coast Guard SOF, emerging 

threats demand Coast Guard SOF, and Coast Guard SOF would be 

fully consistent with law and policy. The term “peacetime” is a term 

not altogether applicable in today’s operational environment because 

the level of chaos and instability around the world necessitates 

commitment of conventional and SOF in continuing, simultaneous 

theaters for conflicts of lesser intensity than general war. However, 

many of the Coast Guard’s core missions—counterdrug operations, 

counterterrorism operations, building foreign Coast Guards (and 

thus respect for legitimate authority), and even general law enforcement where the host nation lacks an effective capability—are ex-
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actly the type of operations to which DoD committed SOF before 11 

September 2001, and exactly the type of operations that have made 

them the force of choice since then. That the threat from terrorism 

is so acute does not invalidate the need for stability and support operations—rather it underscores the need and makes it more urgent. 

By selecting, assessing, and training some individuals to the special 

operations standard, and by designating, organizing, training, and 

equipping some Coast Guard units as SOF, the Coast Guard makes 

itself more relevant to the future by contributing across the full spectrum of capabilities.

At a time when DoD SOF expect full engagement around the 

world in kill or capture missions, someone must attend to setting 

the conditions for peace, prosperity, self-determination, and human 

dignity to take root and flourish, thus denying the global insurgency 

their “sea in which to swim.” Places like Indonesia and Spain have 

been more amenable to US assistance when it does not come with 

a US flag, large naval blockades, and 24x7 media coverage. Again, 

the need to operate in denied, politically sensitive or even “politically 

denied” areas demands the use of SOF. How much more effective the 

US Coast Guard would be if some of its forces were free to operate 

out of uniform in nonstandard, foreign-made boats in foreign ports.

The situation whereby the Coast Guard is best able to defend 

the nation against the maritime spectaculars is also that in which 

the Coast Guard is most relevant to the joint force, where the Coast 

Guard offers a full spectrum of capabilities useful in both conventional and special operations.

To summarize the conclusions of this paper, it is time for Coast 

Guard law enforcement to come of age, for the Coast Guard to acknowledge its military past and reinvigorate that heritage. It should 

reject the budgeting and cultural failings of the Department of Transportation era and move ahead with confidence in its fighting force.

Recommendations for a Coast Guard SOF 

The foregoing conclusions invite a number of recommendations outlined below. It is recognized that Congressional legislation may come 

into play, particularly if the Department of Homeland Security continues to evolve in terms of policy and organization. 
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Policy 

The Secretary of Homeland Security should sign an agreement with 

the Secretary of Defense, backed by legislation if required, having the 

following components:

• SOF Designation. The Secretaries of Homeland Security and 

Defense designate Coast Guard forces assigned to the newly 

formed Coast Guard Special Operations Command as SOF.

• Service Component Command. The Secretary of Defense should 

designate the Coast Guard Special Operations Command as a 

service component command of US Special Operations Command. All command and support relationships are carried out 

in accordance with 10 USC 167.

• Command and Control. The Secretaries establish the command 

arrangements by which DoD and DHS exercise levels of command and control of CG SOF operating within military and law 

enforcement domains.

• Coast Guard augmentation of Naval Special Warfare Elements. 

USSOCOM should develop protocols to augment SEAL Teams 

and Special Boat Teams with Coast Guard SOF in the way 

that Air Force combat controllers augment Special Forces Operational Detachments. This recognizes that Naval Special 

Warfare assets will always have the best available collection of 

capabilities for getting to a maritime-accessible target, the desirability in some cases of prosecuting terrorists in the United 

States or foreign countries consistent with legal principles, and 

the need for some SEAL capabilities to filter back into Coast 

Guard SOF. A successful NSW augmentation program would 

give the president and the attorney general additional options 

to exercise maritime law enforcement authority under Titles 

14, 18, or 46, US Code.

Reorganization

The Coast Guard will need to effect several organizing actions to meet 

the need for an effective SOF capability:

• Headquarters Staff. Permanently reestablish staff directorates 

within Coast Guard headquarters to direct policy and planning for Coast Guard SOF. This should include provisions for 

Offices of Special Boat Forces and Special Aviation Forces. 

Assigned personnel should have professional experience with 

an Enhanced Maritime Safety and Security Team (EMSST), 
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Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

Maritime Safety and Security Team (MSST), Port Security Unit 

(PSU), and/or Tactical Law Enforcement Team (TACLET) unit 

at both the detachment and command level.

• Coast Guard Special Operations Command. Designate a Commander of a new Coast Guard Special Operations Command—

as a Major Command. Until it has a command relationship 

with USSOCOM, this command should report to the Assistant 

Commandant for Operations. It should establish to full operating capability as rapidly as possible the Enhanced Maritime Safety and Security Teams, also called Security Response 

Teams, (EMSST/SRT). 

• Special Operations Group. Reprogram each EMSST/SRT as a 

Special Operations Group.

• Special Operations Aviation Command. The Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron should be reprogrammed as the Coast 

Guard Special Operations Aviation Command (SOAC) and airframes and paint schemes particular to their mission should 

be procured. SOAC should be a force provider for Special Operations Groups and other commands requiring full spectrum 

Airborne Use of Force capabilities. 

• Forward-based Aviation Detachments. SOAC numbered special 

aviation detachments should be forward-based at Coast Guard 

Air Stations near, and share customer-focused relationships 

with, their supported Special Operations Group. Collocation 

with Coast Guard Air Stations should be designed to maximize 

economy, efficiency, and effectiveness of aviation logistics support and flight safety oversight.

• Special Boat Force. Establish Special Boat Forces as subordinate commands of Special Operations Groups, with Commanding Officers or Officers in Charge who are screened for 

command of SOF.

Operations

The Coast Guard should consider key operational actions that must 

be implemented rapidly if it is to meet the challenge of combating 

terrorism:

• Commit to the Fight. The Coast Guard should engage US Pacific Command (and Special Operations Command Pacific) to 

commit cutters, aircraft, LEDETs, PSUs, and/or MSSTs to the 

fight in the Pacific Theater to counter the global insurgency. 
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It should engage USSOCOM and Theater Special Operations 

Commands now to explore where they may have needs that 

can be met by existing Coast Guard special purpose forces. It 

should get in the fight.

• Global Scouts. The Coast Guard should task its LEDETs to 

carry on Long-term Deployment and Operational Evaluation 

programs in Haiti and South America, and expand the program into Southeast Asia. These missions align with the SOF 

concept of “global scouts,” which are forces that keep their 

fingers on the pulse of their regions, provide early warning, 

and act decisively when called on to secure the nation’s interests around the world. No mission is purely counterdrug 

or counterterror. Lawlessness, like the cockroach, thrives in 

the absence of authority. With the Seventh SF Group, Navy 

SEALs, and ITD refocusing on other regions, one can almost 

hear the rush of air brought on by the sudden depressurization of South America. Everywhere the Coast Guard can improve stability is one less place the likes of Al Qaeda are free 

to operate. Internally, the Coast Guard cannot afford to shut 

down this key proving ground for officer and enlisted alike in 

conducting tactical operations. The Coast Guard must generate enough budget support for the LEDETs to carry on these 

missions and maintain average deployment days at 185 per 

year. It must find the money.

Joining with USSOCOM in the Fight

The Commandant of the Coast Guard should sign an agreement with 

Commander, US Special Operations Command, ICW the Joint Staff, 

concerning command relationships, operations and support. Under 

this agreement:

• Forces For Planning and Operations. USSOCOM should be able 

to request Coast Guard SOF for worldwide deployment at any 

time via the established Request for Forces process. Such forces will be apportioned for planning to Theater Special Operations Command and allocated to Joint Special Operations Task 

Forces as established in plans and orders.

• Liaison. The Coast Guard establishes permanent staffs or liaison officers at USSOCOM and components and at the Theater 

SOCs. Coast Guard special operations staff personnel support 

standing and ad-hoc Joint Special Operations Task Forces 
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during major operations, whether or not the Coast Guard has 

participating SOF. The three primary functions of this recommendation are to build personal relationships within the SOF 

community, to give something back to the SOF community of 

immediate and lasting value, and for Coast Guard SOF officers 

to learn the arts of deliberate and time-sensitive operational 

planning.

• Naval Special Warfare Command. Cooperation with USSOCOM 

will authorize Naval Special Warfare Command and its Naval 

Special Warfare Development Group support of Coast Guard 

EMSST training, test and evaluation, research, and development. An exchange program should authorize small numbers 

of Coast Guard EMSST personnel to work in a temporary duty 

(TAD/TDY) status with NavSpecWarCom and vice versa in such 

roles as might be approved by the commanders.

• SOAL Support. A support relationship with the Special Operations Acquisition and Logistics Center should be established. 

Initial acquisition efforts would be funded by the Coast Guard, 

but procured by SOAL.

These recommendations are advanced for consideration to our 

civilian, naval and military leaders trusting that these ideas will advance our efforts to counter the scourge of terrorism. The strategic 

and operational concepts provided here fully consider the dedication 

and potential of hard-working Coast Guard operators at home and 

overseas who risk their lives every day in the defense of our country. 

They enjoin our leaders to assure we are “Always Ready.” Semper 

Paratus. 
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Endnotes

 1. US President, National Security Presidential Directive NSPD-41 / Homeland Security Presidential Directive HSPD-13, Maritime Security Policy, (21 December 2004, 

accessed 27 March 2005); Available from http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nspd/

nspd41.pdf.

 2. Michael Chertoff, Statement before the House Appropriations Homeland Security Sub-Committee (2 March 2005; accessed 10 March 2005); Available from 

http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/interapp/testimony/testimony_0032.xml. 

 3. Dr. Tom Marks, National Defense University, lecture for US Army Command 

and General Staff College (CGSC) SOF Core Curriculum, A577: Foreign Internal 

Defense and Unconventional Warfare, 28 April 2005.

 4. Andrew F. Krepinevich, Are We Winning In Iraq?, testimony before United States 

House of Representatives Committee on Armed Services, 17 March 2005.

 5. US Department of State, Country Reports on Terrorism 2004 (Washington, DC: 

April 2005, accessed 1 June 2005), Chapter Three; Available from http://www.

state.gov/documents/organization/45318.pdf. 

 6. General Wayne A. Downing, USA (ret.), lecture to CGSC Elective, A576 SOF Regional Case Studies, 15 April 2005; and Wayne A. Downing, e-mail to author, 1 

May 2005.

 7. William H. McRaven, Spec Ops: Case Studies in Special Operations Warfare (Novato, CA: Presidio, 1995), 4.

 8. US Department of Homeland Security, National Response Plan (Washington, DC: 

December 2004, accessed 1 June 2005); 4, Available from http://www.dhs.gov/

dhspublic/interapp/editorial/editorial_0566.xml. 

 9. US Special Operations Command, United States Special Operations Command 

15th Anniversary History, (MacDill AFB, FL: 16 April 2002, accessed 22 September 2004); 1-5, Available from http://www.socom.mil/Docs/15th_aniversary_history.pdf.

 10. Paul A. Yost, electronic interview by author, 24 February 2005.

 11. Rupert Herbert-Burns and Lauren Zucker, “Drawing the Line Between Piracy 

and Maritime Terrorism,” Jane’s Intelligence Review (1 September 2004; accessed 14 October 2004), Available from www.janes.com.

 12. Ibid.

 13. Ibid.

 14. Ron Pailliotet and Chris Phelan, “Around the World: Sharing our values and experiences with foreign maritime services, the Coast Guard’s International Training Division is making a difference...” [website] (26 October 1999, accessed 14 

May 2005); Available from http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/cb/OCT99/ITT.html; 

Marianna O’Leary. “A Long Way From Home.” Photo in AP Preserver [online digital imagery database] (Washington, DC: US Coast Guard, 21 October 2004, accessed 14 November 2004); identifier no. 041020-C-1330O-006 (FR); Available 

from http://cgvi.uscg.mil/. 

 15. Bryan D. Brown, Lecture to CGSC SOF Track. 21 April 2005.

 16. W. Seth Carus and Thomas J. Hirschfeld. “Coast Guard Future Direction Study: 

Capstone Support Analysis.” Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1997.
68

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 17. Lee Alexander (CO, Joint Special Missions Training Center), interview by author, 

Camp Lejeune, NC, 26 January 2005. Also, Gerard Williams and Eric Grabins 

(XO and Direct Action Team Leader, Coast Guard Security Response Team One), 

focus group by author, Chesapeake, VA, 25 January 2005.

 18. DPBs suffered transmission failures, a forward M240 mount that was too heavy 

for the boat to handle properly, and at least one case of swamping.

 19. Paul Wolfowitz, “Were We Asleep?” Memo to Donald Rumsfeld (18 September 

2001), quoted in The National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United 

States, The 9/11 Commission Report (New York: W.W. Norton, 2004), 353.

 20. “The Brother of Him that Obeys God” (pseudonym), Stephen Ulph and Christopher Heffelfinger, translators, “Anti-Ship Warfare and Molotov Cocktails at the 

Siege of Acre, 1190,” The Terrorism Monitor 2, No. 9 (6 May 2004; accessed 18 

November 2004), 1-4; Available from http://www.jamestown.org.

 21. Specifically, “The US Coast Guard’s National Security Role in the 21st Century” 

is a paper written by Captain Bruce Stubbs, USCG, for the Naval War College. 

Admirals Collins and Loy (current and former commandants) and RADM Patrick 

Stillman also have contributed several articles on this theme.

 22. Wayne Gibson, Tom Vitullo, Joe DiRenzo, and Craig Peterson, “Coast Guard 

Goes Expeditionary,” Proceedings, 53-57, June 2001, UMI-Proquest, Document 

ID: 73461599; available from http://proquest.umi.com/; Internet; accessed 15 

November 2004.

 23. US Department of Defense, Joint Publication 1-0, Department of Defense Dictionary 

of Military and Associated Terms, (12 April 2001 as amended through 30 November 2004, accessed 24 April 2005); Available from http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/

jel/new_pubs/jp1_02.pdf 

 24. Ibid.

 25. US President, National Strategy for Homeland Security, (Washington, DC: 2003), 

vii.

 26. Ibid., viii.

 27. Ibid., vii.

 28. US President, National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, (Washington, DC: 

2003), iii.

 29. Federation of American Scientists, Presidential Decision Directives [PDD] Clinton 

Administration 1993-2000. [website] (undated, accessed 3 June 2005); Available 

from http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/pdd/index.html. 

 30. US President, Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD-5, Management 

of Domestic Incidents, (28 February 2003, accessed 3 June 2005); Available from 

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/02/print/20030228-9.html

 31. Ibid.

 32. Ibid.

 33. US President, National Security Presidential Directive NSPD-41/Homeland Security Presidential Directive HSPD-13, Maritime Security Policy, (21 December 

1998, accessed 27 March 2005), 2-3; Available from http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nspd/nspd41.pdf. 

 34. Ibid., 2.

 35. Ibid., 3.

 36. Ibid., 5.
69

Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

 37. Ibid., 7.

 38. Merriam-Webster, Inc., Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary (2005, accessed 13 

Feb 2005); Available from http://www.webster.com. 

 39. US Department of Defense, DoD Dictionary of Military Terms (30 November 

2004, accessed 13 Feb 2005); Available from http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/

doddict/. 

 40. Dean Ellis, The Defeat of the Privateer Dart, object ID 88218, Available from 

http://www.uscg.mil/community/Art%20Program/exhibit3/e30002a.htm. 

 41. US Coast Guard, US Coast Guard: A Historical Overview (April 2003, accessed 13 Feb 2005); Available from http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/history/

h_USCGhistory.html. 

 42. Ibid.

 43. John Thompson, Captain William Cooke Seizes Contraband, object ID 88229, 

Available from http://www.uscg.mil/community/Art%20Program/exhibit3/

e30012a.htm.

 44. Ibid; John A. Tilley, The Coast Guard & the Greenland Patrol (June 2000, accessed 13 Feb 2005); Available from http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/history/h_

greenld.html. 

 45. Alex Larzelere, The Coast Guard at War: Vietnam, 1965-1975, (Annapolis, MD: 

Naval Institute Press, 1997); 28.

 46. Thomas J. Cutler, Brown Water, Black Berets (Annapolis, MD: US Naval Institute 

Press, 1988); 137-266.

 47. Noel Daggett, A War of Persuasion, Object ID 87587, Available from http://

www.uscg.mil/community/Art%20Program/exhibit1/e10363a.htm

 48. Larzelere, 43.

 49. Ibid., 54.

 50. Ibid., 55.

 51. Ibid., 55-56.

 52. Ibid., 146.

 53. Ibid., 148-149.

 54. Robert Scheina, The Coast Guard at War [website] (Washington, DC: Jan 1999, 

accessed 14 Feb 2005); Available from http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/history/

h_CGatwar.html.

 55. Larzelere, 225-279.

 56. US Coast Guard, “Jungle Operations: International Drug War Takes CG’s IMLET 

to South America,” Commandant’s Bulletin (Feb 1993), 2-5.

 57. US Coast Guard, Atlantic Area Public Affairs, “13 Navy Patrol Craft (PCs) Reassigned to Coast Guard For Homeland Security,” (Portsmouth, VA: 2 January 

2002, accessed 14 November 2004); Available from http://www.uscg.mil/d5/

news/2002/r004_02.html

 58. Peter Capelloti, “Operation Iraqi Freedom and the US Coast Guard: Interviewee 

DC3 Nathan Bruckenthall, USCG LEDET 403, TACLET South,” Operation Iraqi 

Freedom Documentation Project/US Coast Guard Oral History Program, (Washington, DC: US Coast Guard, 25 April 2003, accessed 17 October 2004); Available from http://www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/history/WEBORALHISTORY/IF_DC3_

Bruckenthal.html; Thomas H. Collins, “Change and Continuity: The US Coast 

Guard Today,” Naval War College Review 57, no. 2 (March 2004): 8-26; Thomas 
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Collins, “State of the Coast Guard Address,” (Speech presented to the National 

Press Club, Washington, DC, 25 March 2004), http://www.uscg.mil/Commandant/speeches_Collins/SOCG2004.doc, accessed 14 November 2004.

 59. Former CIA Baghdad Chief of Station, interview by author, US Army Command 

and General Staff College, 7 April 2005. Attributed with permission.

 60. Alfred H. Paddock, “Psychological and Unconventional Warfare, 1941-1952: 

Origins of a Special Warfare Capability for the United States Army,” US Army 

War College Individual Study Project, Carlisle, PA: USAWC, November 1979, 53; 

Available from http://www.fas.org/man/eprint/; Internet; accessed 9 November 

2004.

 61. Ibid., 51.

 62. Ibid., 51-53.

 63. Kevin Dockery, Navy SEALs: A Complete History from World War II to the Present. (New York: Berkley Books, 2004); 202-207.

 64. USSOCOM, 15th Anniversary History.

 65. US Congress, Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002 (Washington, DC: 

Congress, 2002); Available from http://www.tsa.gov/interweb/assetlibrary/

MTSA.pdf.

 66. USSOCOM, 15th Anniversary History, 14.

 67. Bruce B. Stubbs, “The US Coast Guard’s National Security Role in the TwentyFirst Century,” Center for Naval Warfare Studies Monograph. Newport, RI: NWC, 

June 1992.

 68. US Coast Guard, Maritime Strategy for Homeland Security (Washington, DC: 

2002, accessed September 2004); available http://www.uscg.mil/news/reportsandbudget/Maritime_strategy/USCG_Maritme_Strategy.pdf.

 69. Ibid.

 70. USSOCOM, 15th Anniversary History, 18.

 71. US Army CGSC, SOF Track, 2004-2005.

 72. Tom Breen, “The ‘in-demand’ force,” Armed Forces Journal (January 2005), 26-

28.

 73. Ibid., 18.

 74. Dave Grossman and Loren W. Christensen, On Combat: The Psychology and 

Physiology of Deadly Conflict in War and Peace, (Belleville, Illinois: PPCT Research Publications, 2004), 177.

 75. 14 USC 89

 76. Daniel Percival, director, Dirty War (Warner Home Video, 2005), DVD; United 

Kingdom. Metropolitan Police Service. Anti-Terrorist Branch. [website] (undated, 

accessed 16 May 2005); Available from http://www.met.police.uk/terrorism/index.htm

 77. Ralph Peters, “The New Warrior Class Revisited,”ed. Robert J. Bunker, Beyond 

Baghdad (Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 2003), 59.

 78. David Grossman, lecture to CGSC SOF Track, 17 December 2004.

 79. Ibid.

 80. US Coast Guard, Office of the Historian, “US Coast Guard: A Historical Overview,” [website] (April 2003, accessed 15 January 2005); Available from http://

www.uscg.mil/hq/g-cp/history/h_USCGhistory.html.
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Bowen: Coast Guard SOF

 81. This date is also supported by the author’s electronic interview with ADM Paul A. 

Yost, USCG (ret.), 26 February 2005.

 82. Pailliotet and Phelan.

 83. Ibid.

 84. Matthew Creelman, interview by author, Yorktown, VA, 25 January 2005.

 85. US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Publication 3-07: Military Operations Other Than War 

(16 June 1995, accessed 30 April 2005), viii; Available from http://www.dtic.mil/

doctrine/jel/new_pubs/jp3_07.pdf.

 86. Otis W. McGregor, “Command and Control of Special Operations Forces Missions in the US Northern Command Area of Responsibility,” Master’s Paper, NPS, 

March 2005; and CGSC SOF Track course, “Theater SOCs,” 31 March 2005.

 87. T. K. Custer, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense, telephone interview by author, CGSC, 17 March 2005; David McCracken, Office of 

the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict, interview by author, Pentagon, 25 January 2005; Commander Bill Wilson, 

Naval Special Warfare Command, interview by author, CGSC, 17 March 2005.

 88. US Army pilot associated with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, 

conversation with author, CGSC, 20 April 2005. Also, Bill Wilson, lecture to 

CGSC SOF Track and interview by author, 17 March 2005.

 89. David Fridovich (Commander, Special Operations Command—Pacific), videotele-conference with SOF Track, CGSC, 9 May 2005.

 90. US Army, CGSC SOF Track, December 2004-May 2005. The need to increase 

SOAR capacity was a recurring theme throughout the year.

 91. US Coast Guard, “Coast Guard Crew Has Smugglers in their Sights,” [website] (12 October 2004, accessed 14 May 2005); Available from http://www.

d7publicaffairs.com/; US Department of Homeland Security, Office of the Press 

Secretary, “27 Tons of Cocaine Seized From Two Vessels In Pacific,” [website] 

(27 September 2004, accessed 14 May 2005); Available from http://www.dhs.

gov/dhspublic/display?content=4046.

 92. Larzelere, 13-14.

 93. Paul A. Yost, interview by author, 24 February 2005.

 94. Stubbs, xxx.

 95. W. Seth Carus and Thomas J. Hirschfeld, Coast Guard Future Direction Study: 

Capstone Support Analysis, Alexandria, VA: Center for Naval Analyses, 1997.

 96. Bryan D. Brown (Commander, US Special Operations Command), lecture to 

CGSC SOF Track, 21 April 2005, and e-mail to author, 10 May 2005.

 97. COL Walter Herd, former Commander of CJSOTF—Afghanistan, lecture to CGSC 

SOF Track, 17 February 2005.

 98. US Fifth Fleet Public Affairs, “Coalition Maritime Forces Intercept Hijacked Vessel,” 

[website] (Bahrain, 18 March 2005); Available from http://www.news.navy.mil/

search/display.asp?story_id=17550 

 99. US Constitution, Preamble, [website] (17 September 1787, accessed 24 April 

2005); Available from http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/preamble/. 

 100. CRS Report, Maritime Security: Overview of Issues (9 August 2004).

 101. Tom Ridge, Remarks to the National Association of Counties (Washington, DC: 3 

March 2003), Available from http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/display?theme=44
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&content=490&print=true; US Coast Guard, Since September [website] (Miami, FL: 4 June 2003, accessed 1 June 2005), Available from http://www.

uscg.mil/d7/d7m/since_september_11.htm; Patty Murray, Murray Helps 

Commission Marine “SWAT Team” for Puget Sound Security [website] (Seattle, WA: 3 July 2002, accessed 1 June 2005), Available from http://murray.

senate.gov/news.cfm?id=189075; Charles Schumer, Schumer Launches New 

Coast Guard “SWAT Team” For New York [website] (New York, NY: 12 September 2003), Available from http://schumer.senate.gov/SchumerWebsite/

pressroom/press_releases/PR02026.html. 

 102. Ibid., 4-5.

 103. Gerard Williams and Eric Grabins, focus group with the author, 26 January 

2005.

 104. T. K. Custer, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense, telephone interview by author, CGSC, 17 March 2005; David McCracken, Office of 

the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low Intensity Conflict, interview by author, Pentagon, 25 January 2005; Commander Bill Wilson, 

Naval Special Warfare Command, interview by author, CGSC, 17 March 2005.

 105. Custer.

 106. Ibid.

 107. Irving H. King, The Coast Guard under Sail: the US Revenue Cutter Service 

1789-1865 (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute, 1989); Irving Crump, Our United 

States Coast Guard Academy, (New York: Dodd, Mead, & Co., 1961).

 108. US Federal Bureau of Investigation, “Investigative Programs:

Critical Incident Response Group,” [website] (undated, accessed 24 April 2005); 

Available from http://www.fbi. gov/ hq/isd/cirg/tact.htm.

 109. Custer.

 110. Steven Flynn, America the Vulnerable: How Our Government is Failing to Protect 

Us from Terrorism (New York: HarperCollins, 2004), 2.

 111. US President, “President Signs Defense Bill” [website] (5 August 2004, accessed 

1 June 2005); Available from http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/

2004/08/20040805-3.html; US Department of Homeland Security, “Fact Sheet: Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act of 2005” [website] (18 October 2004, 

accessed 1 June 2005); Available from http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/interapp/

press_release/press_release_0541.xml. 

 112. US President, Memorandum for the Director of Central Intelligence (23 November 

2004, accessed 1 June 2005); Available from http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/

releases/2004/11/20041123-5.html. 

 113. Wayne A. Downing, lecture to CGSC SOF Track, 15 April 2005.

 114. US General Accounting Office, Results-Oriented Government (Washington, DC: 

March 2004, accessed 1 June 2005); Available from http://www.gao.gov/new.items/

d0438.pdf. 
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Appendix A. 

Coast Guard Authorities

Note: The terms Treasury Department and Secretary of the Treasury

as used here are no longer useful distinctions since both the Coast 

Guard and Customs (as reorganized) exist within the Department 

of Homeland Security. SECDHS can delegate relevant Customs 

authorities to the Commandant of the Coast Guard. Access to the 

United States Code is available at http://www.findlaw.com.

Title 14, US Code, Section 1 (14 USC § 1)

Establishment of Coast Guard

The Coast Guard as established January 28, 1915, shall be a military service and a branch of the armed forces of the United States at 

all times. The Coast Guard shall be a service in the Department of 

Homeland Security, except when operating as a service in the Navy.

Title 14, US Code, Section 3 (14 USC § 3)

Relationship to Navy Department

Upon the declaration of war or when the President directs, the Coast 

Guard shall operate as a service in the Navy, and shall so continue 

until the President, by Executive order, transfers the Coast Guard 

back to the Department of Homeland Security. While operating as a 

service in the Navy, the Coast Guard shall be subject to the orders 

of the Secretary of the Navy who may order changes in Coast Guard 

operations to render them uniform, to the extent he deems advisable, 

with Navy operations.

Title 14, US Code, Section 89 (14 USC § 89)

Law Enforcement

(a) The Coast Guard may make inquiries, examinations, inspections, 

searches, seizures, and arrests upon the high seas and waters over 

which the United States has jurisdiction, for the prevention, detection, and suppression of violations of laws of the United States. For 

such purposes, commissioned, warrant, and petty officers may at any 

time go on board of any vessel subject to the jurisdiction, or to the 

operation of any law, of the United States, address inquiries to those 

on board, examine the ship’s documents and papers, and examine, 

inspect, and search the vessel and use all necessary force to compel 

compliance. When from such inquiries, examination, inspection, or 

search it appears that a breach of the laws of the United States rendering a person liable to arrest is being, or has been committed, by 
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any person, such person shall be arrested or, if escaping to shore, 

shall be immediately pursued and arrested on shore, or other lawful and appropriate action shall be taken; or, if it shall appear that 

a breach of the laws of the United States has been committed so as 

to render such vessel, or the merchandise, or any part thereof, on 

board of, or brought into the United States by, such vessel, liable to 

forfeiture, or so as to render such vessel liable to a fine or penalty 

and if necessary to secure such fine or penalty, such vessel or such 

merchandise, or both, shall be seized.

(b) The officers of the Coast Guard insofar as they are engaged, pursuant to the authority contained in this section, in enforcing any law 

of the United States shall:

(1) be deemed to be acting as agents of the particular executive 

department or independent establishment charged with the 

administration of the particular law; and

(2) be subject to all the rules and regulations promulgated by 

such department or independent establishment with respect 

to the enforcement of that law.

Title 14, US Code, Section 143 (14 USC § 143) 

Treasury Department

Commissioned, warrant, and petty officers of the Coast Guard are 

deemed to be officers of the customs and when so acting shall, insofar as performance of the duties relating to customs laws are concerned, be subject to regulations issued by the Secretary of the Treasury governing officers of the customs. 

Title 19, US Code, Section 1589a (19 USC § 1589a)

Enforcement Authority of Customs Officers

Subject to the direction of the Secretary of [Homeland Security], an 

officer of the customs may:

(1) carry a firearm;

(2) execute and serve any order, warrant, subpoena, summons, or 

other process issued under the authority of the United States;

(3) make an arrest without a warrant for any offense against the 

United States committed in the officer’s presence or for a felony, cognizable under the laws of the United States committed outside the officer’s presence if the officer has reasonable 

grounds to believe that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing a felony; and

(4) perform any other law enforcement duty that the Secretary of 

[Homeland Security] may designate.
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Title 46, US Code, Section 70106 (46USC § 70106)

Maritime Sarety and Security Teams

(a) In General. To enhance the domestic maritime security capabilty 

of the United Staes teh Secretay shall establish such maritime safety 

and security teams aas are needed to safeguard the public and protect vessels, harbors, ports, facilities, and cargo in waters subject to 

teh jurisdiction of the United States from destruction, loss or injury 

from crime, or sabotage due to terrorist activity, and to respond to 

such activity in accordance with the transportation security plans 

developed under section 70103. 

(b) Mission. Each maritime safety and security team shall be trained, 

equipped, and capable of being employed to: 

(1) deter, protect against, and rapidly respond to threats of maritime terrorism; 

(2) enforce moving or fixed safety or security zones established 

pursuant to law; 

(3) conduct high speed intercepts; 

(4) board, search, and seize any article of thing on or at, respectively, a vessel or facility found to present a risk to the vessel 

or facility, or to a port; 

(5) rapidly deploy to supplement United States armed forces domestically or overseas; 

(6) respond to criminal of terrorist acts within a port so as to 

minimize, insofar as possible, the disruption caused by such 

acts;

(7) assist with facility vulnerability assessments required under 

this chapter; and

(8) carry out other security missions as are assigned to it by the 

Secretary. 
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Appendix B. Acronyms

AMO ..............Air and Maritime Operations (Division of Customs and Border 

 Protection)

CBP ...............Customs and Border Protection (DHS Directorate of Border and 

 Transportation Security)

CBRNE ..........Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, or (High-Yield) Explosive

CGHQ ...........Coast Guard Headquarters

COTP .............Captain of the Port (Coast Guard)

CT .................Counterterrorism

DA .................Direct Action

DHS ..............Department of Homeland Security

DPB ...............Deployable Pursuit Boat

EMSST ..........Enhanced Maritime Safety and Security Team (Coast Guard, also 

 called SRT)

FARC .............Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia

FBI ................Federal Bureau of Investigation

GAM ..............Gerakin Aceh Merdeka

GWOT ...........Global War on Terrorism

HITRON .........Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron (Coast Guard)

HRT ..............Hostage Rescue Team

ISR ................Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance

ITD ................International Training Division (Coast Guard)

JSOA .............Joint Special Operations Agency

JSOC ............Joint Special Operations Command

LEDET ..........Law Enforcement Detachment (Coast Guard)

LOC ...............Lines of Communication

MIFC .............Maritime Intelligence Fusion Center (Coast Guard)

MSST ............Maritime Safety and Security Team (Coast Guard)

NEO ..............Noncombatant Evacuation Operation

NSSE .............National Special Security Event

NSW ..............Naval Special Warfare

NSWC ...........Naval Special Warfare Command

ODA ..............Operational Detachment—Alpha (Special Forces)

OSS ...............Office of Strategic Services

OTH-RHIB .....Over-The-Horizon Rigid Hull Inflatable Boat

PSU ...............Port Security Unit

RHIB .............Rigid Hull Inflatable Boat (Coast Guard parlance)

RIB ................Rigid Inflatable Boat (Navy parlance)

SF .................Special Forces (Army)

SOC ..............Special Operations Command

SOF ...............Special Operations Forces

SRT ...............Security Response Team (Coast Guard, also called EMSST)
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SWAT ............Special Weapons and Tactics

TACLET .........(Coast Guard) Tactical Law Enforcement Team

UAV ...............Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

UN .................United Nations

UNCLOS ........UN Convention on the Law of the Sea

USASOC ........United States Army Special Operations Command

USCG ............United States Coast Guard

USDEA ..........United States Drug Enforcement Administration

USSOCOM ....US Special Operations Command

WMD .............Weapons of Mass Destruction
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Appendix C. Glossary

Civil Affairs. Designated Active and Reserve component forces and units organized, 

trained, and equipped specifically to conduct civil affairs activities and to support 

civil-military operations. Also called CA. (JP 1-02)

Civil Affairs Activities. Activities performed or supported by civil affairs that (1) enhance 

the relationship between military forces and civil authorities in areas where military forces are present; and (2) involve application of civil affairs functional specialty skills, in areas normally the responsibility of civil government, to enhance 

conduct of civil-military operations. (JP 1-02)

Clandestine Operation. An operation sponsored or conducted by governmental departments or agencies in such a way as to assure secrecy or concealment. A clandestine operation differs from a covert operation in that emphasis is placed on 

concealment of the operation rather than on concealment of the identity of the 

sponsor. In special operations, an activity may be both covert and clandestine 

and may focus equally on operational considerations and intelligence-related activities. See also covert operation. (JP 3-05.1)

Coast Guard Special Purpose Forces. The author uses this term to describe collectively 

the Coast Guard EMSST/SRT, TACLETs, LEDETs, MSSTs, PSUs, ITD, SMTC, 

HITRON, and National Strike Force. Special purpose forces differ from Coast 

Guard multi-mission units in that they are organized, trained, and equipped to 

accomplish a much narrower mission set than Coast Guard cutters, boat stations and air stations, and most focus on the maritime security role.

Combat Search And Rescue. A specific task performed by rescue forces to effect the 

recovery of distressed personnel during war or military operations other than 

war. Also called CSAR. (JP 1-02)

Counterterrorism. Operations that include the offensive measures taken to prevent, 

deter, preempt, and respond to terrorism. Also called CT. (JP 1-02)

Covert Operation. An operation that is so planned and executed as to conceal the identity of or permit plausible denial by the sponsor. A covert operation differs from 

a clandestine operation in that emphasis is placed on concealment of identity of 

sponsor rather than on concealment of the operation. (JP 1-02)

Danger Close. In close air support, artillery, mortar, and naval gunfire support fires, it 

is the term included in the method of engagement segment of a call for fire which 

indicates that friendly forces are within close proximity of the target. The close 

proximity distance is determined by the weapon and munition fired.

Enhanced Maritime Safety And Security Team. Coast Guard EMSSTs support the Lead 

Federal Agency, Combatant Commander, or Coast Guard Incident Commander 

by providing a rapid-response, direct-action team for opposed boardings in ports 

and the maritime approaches. Also called EMSST, Security Response Team, or 

SRT. (SRT focus group)

Foreign Internal Defense. Participation by civilian and military agencies of a government in any of the action programs taken by another government or other designated organization to free and protect its society from subversion, lawlessness, 

and insurgency. Also called FID. (JP 3-05)
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Homeland Defense. Protection of US sovereignty, territory, domestic population, and 

critical defense infrastructure against external threats and aggression. The Department of Defense is responsible for homeland defense. (Strategy for Homeland 

Defense and Civil Support)

Homeland Security. A concerted national effort to prevent terrorist attacks within the 

United States, reduce America’s vulnerability to terrorism, and minimize the 

damage and recover from attacks that do occur. The Department of Homeland 

Security is the lead federal agency for homeland security. (National Strategy for 

Homeland Security)

Intelligence Preparation of the Battlespace. An analytical methodology employed to 

reduce uncertainties concerning the enemy, environment, and terrain for all 

types of operations. Intelligence preparation of the battlespace builds an extensive database for each potential area in which a unit may be required to operate. 

The database is then analyzed in detail to determine the impact of the enemy, 

environment, and terrain on operations and presents it in graphic form. Intelligence preparation of the battlespace is a continuing process. Also called IPB. 

(JP 1-02)

Law Enforcement Detachment. The Coast Guard officially established the LEDET program in 1982. The first LEDETs operated directly under Groups and Districts, 

where they served as law enforcement specialists, conducting training and local 

operations. In 1986, Public Law (P.L.) 99-570 specifically authorized the establishment of billets for active duty USCG personnel to carry out drug interdiction 

operations from naval surface vessels provided by DoD. Since Posse Comitatus 

strictly prohibits DoD personnel from directly engaging in law enforcement activities, LEDETs were tasked with operating aboard USN ships to investigate 

contacts and conduct boardings in accordance with USCG policy and directives. 

In accordance with P.L. 99-570, LEDETs were to deploy on US Navy (USN) “ships 

of opportunity”, transiting or operating in areas frequently used by illegal drug 

traffickers. In 1988, P.L. 100-456 made it a requirement that USCG law enforcement personnel be assigned to each appropriate USN surface vessel that transits 

a drug interdiction area. The 1989 National Defense Authorization Act designated the DoD as the lead agency of the Federal Government for the detection 

and monitoring of aerial and maritime trafficking of illegal drugs into the United 

States or any of its Commonwealths, Territories, or Possessions. In turn, the 

Coast Guard was designated the lead agency for the interdiction and apprehension of illegal drug traffickers on the high seas. In order to meet these statutory 

responsibilities, the DoD deploys surface assets to drug interdiction areas, making ships available for direct support of USCG law enforcement operations (GOPL via www.uscg.mil). Coast Guard LEDETs are subordinate units of TACLETs. 

Standing LEDETs number seven to nine people, but ad hoc teams may be formed 

with two or more people. LEDETs also conduct maritime interdiction operations 

pursuant to UN resolutions, foreign internal defense, and any other mission that 

requires specialized maritime law enforcement skills. Also called LEDET.

Line of Communications. A route, either land, water, and/or air, that connects an 

operating military force with a base of operations and along which supplies and 

military forces move. Also called LOC. (JP 1-02)

Maritime Domain. All areas and things of, on, under, relating to, adjacent to, or bordering on a sea, ocean, or other navigable waterway, including all maritime re-
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lated activities, infrastructure, people, cargo, and vessels and other conveyances. 

(NSPD-41/HSPD-13)

Maritime Domain Awareness. The effective understanding of anything associated with 

the global maritime domain that could impact the security, safety, economy, or 

environment of the United States. Also called MDA. (HSPD-13/NSPD-41)

Maritime Safety and Security Team. MSSTs were created in direct response to the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, and are a part of the Department of Homeland 

Security’s layered strategy directed at protecting our seaports and waterways. 

MSSTs provide waterborne and shoreside antiterrorism force protection for strategic shipping, high interest vessels and critical infrastructure. MSSTs are a 

quick response force capable of rapid, nationwide deployment via air, ground or 

sea transportation in response to changing threat conditions and evolving Maritime Homeland Security (MHS) mission requirements. Multi-mission capability 

facilitates augmentation for other selected Coast Guard missions. MSST personnel receive training in advanced boat tactics and antiterrorism force protection 

at the Special Missions Training Center located at Camp Lejeune, NC (www.uscg.

mil).

Naval Coastal Warfare. Coastal sea control, harbor defense, and port security, executed 

both in coastal areas outside the United States in support of national policy and 

in the United States as part of this Nation’s defense. Also called NCW. (JP 3-10)

Naval Special Warfare. A designated naval warfare specialty that conducts operations 

in the coastal, riverine, and maritime environments. Naval special warfare emphasizes small, flexible, mobile units operating under, on, and from the sea. 

These operations are characterized by stealth, speed, and precise, violent application of force. Also called NSW. (JP 3-05)

Naval Special Warfare Forces. Those Active and Reserve Component Navy forces designated by the Secretary of Defense that are specifically organized, trained, and 

equipped to conduct and support special operations. Also called NSW forces or 

NAVSOF. (JP 3-05.2)

Port Security Unit. Coast Guard Port Security Units (PSUs) are [company-sized] Coast 

Guard units staffed primarily with selected reservists. They provide waterborne 

and limited land-based protection for shipping and critical port facilities both 

INCONUS and in theater. PSUs can deploy within 24 hours and establish operations within 96 hours after initial call-up. Each PSU has transportable boats 

equipped with dual outboard motors, and support equipment to ensure mobility 

and sustainability for up to 30 days. Every PSU is staffed by a combination of reserve and active duty personnel. PSUs require specialized training not available 

elsewhere in the Coast Guard. Coast Guard Reservists assigned to Port Security 

Units must complete a Basic Skills Course at the Special Missions Training Center in Camp Lejeune, NC. In addition to their most recent support of homeland 

security operations around the country, PSUs were deployed to the Persian Gulf 

during Operation Desert Storm in 1990, to Haiti during Operation Uphold Democracy in 1994, back to the Middle East to provide vital force protection for US 

Navy assets following the attack on the USS Cole in 2000, and again to protect 

Iraqi critical infrastructure and other operations in support of Operation Iraqi 

Freedom 2003 to the present (G-OPD via www.uscg.mil).

Posse Comitatus Act (18 USC 1385). A Reconstruction-era criminal law proscribing 

use of Army (later, Air Force) to “execute the laws” except where expressly au-
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thorized by Constitution or Congress. Limit on use of military for civilian law enforcement also applies to Navy by regulation. In December 1981, additional laws 

were enacted (codified 10 USC 371-78) clarifying permissible military assistance 

to civilian law enforcement agencies—including the Coast Guard—especially in 

combating drug smuggling into the United States. Posse Comitatus clarifications 

emphasize supportive and technical assistance (e.g., use of facilities, vessels, aircraft, intelligence, tech aid, surveillance, etc.) while generally prohibiting direct 

participation of DoD personnel in law enforcement (e.g., search, seizure, and 

arrests). For example, Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachments (LEDETs) 

serve aboard Navy vessels and perform the actual boardings of interdicted suspect drug smuggling vessels and, if needed, arrest their crews). Positive results 

have been realized especially from Navy ship/aircraft involvement (G-OPL via 

www.uscg.mil).

Security Assistance. Group of programs authorized by the Foreign Assistance Act of 

1961, as amended, and the Arms Export Control Act of 1976, as amended, or 

other related statutes by which the United States provides defense articles, military training, and other defense-related services by grant, loan, credit, or cash 

sales in furtherance of national policies and objectives. Also called SA (JP 1-02).

Security Response Team (SRT). Coast Guard SRTs support the Combatant Commander, Lead Federal Agency, or Coast Guard Incident Commander by providing a 

rapid-response, direct-action team for opposed boardings in ports and the maritime approaches. Also known as Enhanced Maritime Safety and Security Team 

or EMSST.

Service Component Command. A command consisting of the Service component commander and all those Service forces, such as individuals, units, detachments, 

organizations, and installations under that command, including the support 

forces that have been assigned to a combatant command or further assigned to 

a subordinate unified command or joint task force. (JP 0-2)

Special Boat Team. US Navy forces organized, trained, and equipped to conduct or support special operations with patrol boats or other combatant craft. Also called 

SBT. (JP 1-02)

Special Forces. US Army forces organized, trained, and equipped to conduct special 

operations with an emphasis on unconventional warfare capabilities. Also called 

SF. (JP 1-02)

Special Mission Unit. A generic term to represent a group of operations and support 

personnel from designated organizations that is task-organized to perform highly 

classified activities. Also called SMU. (JP 3-05.1)

Special Nuclear Material. Defined by Title I of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 as plutonium, uranium-233, or uranium enriched in the isotopes uranium-233 or uranium-235 (http://www.nrc.gov/materials/sp-nucmaterials.html). 

Special Operations. Operations conducted in hostile, denied, or politically sensitive 

environments to achieve military, diplomatic, informational, and/or economic 

objectives employing military capabilities for which there is no broad conventional force requirement. These operations often require covert, clandestine, or 

low visibility capabilities. Special operations are applicable across the range of 

military operations. They can be conducted independently or in conjunction with 

operations of conventional forces or other government agencies and may include 
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operations through, with, or by indigenous or surrogate forces. Special operations differ from conventional operations in degree of physical and political risk, 

operational techniques, mode of employment, independence from friendly support, and dependence on detailed operational intelligence and indigenous assets. 

Also called SO. (JP 3-05)

Special Operations Command. A subordinate unified or other joint command established by a joint force commander to plan, coordinate, conduct, and support 

joint special operations within the joint force commander’s assigned operational 

area. Also called SOC. See also special operations. (JP 3-05)

Special Operations Forces. Those Active and Reserve Component forces of the Military Services designated by the Secretary of Defense and specifically organized, 

trained, and equipped to conduct and support special operations. Also called 

SOF. (JP 1-02)

Tactical Law Enforcement Team (TACLET). Coast Guard TACLETs as organized today 

are the command and support elements responsible for six to nine standing 

LEDETs. TACLETs report to either the Atlantic or Pacific Area Commander (3-

star).

Terrorism. The calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to 

inculcate fear; intended to coerce or intimidate governments or societies in the 

pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological. (JP 1-02)

Unconventional Warfare. A broad spectrum of military and paramilitary operations, 

normally of long duration, predominantly conducted through, with, or by indigenous or surrogate forces who are organized, trained, equipped, supported, and 

directed in varying degrees by an external source. It includes, but is not limited 

to, guerrilla warfare, subversion, sabotage, intelligence activities, and unconventional assisted recovery. Also called UW (JP 3-05).

Unconventional Warfare Forces. US forces having an existing unconventional warfare 

capability.

Weapons Of Mass Destruction. Weapons that are capable of a high order of destruction and/or of being used in such a manner as to destroy large numbers of 

people. Weapons of mass destruction can be high explosives or nuclear, biological, chemical, and radiological weapons, but exclude the means of transporting 

or propelling the weapon where such means is a separable and divisible part of 

the weapon. Also called WMD. (JP 1-02)
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About the Author

Lieutenant Commander Gary R.

“Russ” Bowen has qualifi cations in tactical law enforcement and boat force operations. A 

former-enlisted Marine, his commissioned assignments have included the US Coast Guard Cutter 

STEADFAST, Pacifi c Area Tactical 

Law Enforcement Team, the Maritime Law Enforcement Academy, 

and Coast Guard Group, Mobile, 

Alabama.

As team leader of Law Enforcement Detachment 103, he deployed 

for counterdrug operations in North, 

Central, and South America. LCDR 

Bowen also deployed to the Northern Arabian Gulf to enforce UN sanctions against Iraq, working with 

both Navy surface combatants and Naval Special Warfare. 

LCDR Bowen has experience with interagency operations in the 

Southwest Border High-Intensity Drug Traffi cking Area and, most 

recently, at Hurricane Katrina Joint Field Offi ce Baton Rouge. 

He holds a Bachelor of Science from the US Coast Guard Academy and a Master of Military Art and Science from the US Army 

Command and General Staff College (CGSC). LCDR Bowen was the 

fi rst Coast Guard offi cer to complete the Special Operations Track at 

CGSC and this year became the fi rst Coast Guard student to attend 

the US Army School of Advanced Military Studies. Following graduation, LCDR Bowen will report to U.S. Coast Guard Headquarters, Offi ce of Counterterrorism and Special Missions, in Washington, D.C.

LCDR Bowen on board USS HURRICANE (PC-3) off the southwest 

coast of Mexico in 1996 on the 

occasion of his fi rst drug seizure, a 

modest 100 pounds of marijuana. 
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