Air Force Combat Controllers: The Toughest Job in US Special Operations

Which organization in the US special operations world has the toughest job of them all? Perhaps it’s the Navy SEALs, conducting their risky, global small-unit operations with nothing but themselves, their buddies, and the closest reinforcements thousands of miles away. Perhaps it’s Army Special Forces, launching asymmetrical, unconventional warfare with the help of local insurgents, or the Rangers, elite shock troops responsible for raids and attacks on the most staunchly defended targets in the world.

Or perhaps it’s the Delta Force, going into the heart of enemy territory to either rescue or eliminate high-value targets on opposite sides of a war. But as complex and daring as all those missions are, there’s one special-operations force whose mission simply goes further: the United States Air Force’s Combat Controllers.

Deployed in Ones and Twos: The Combat Controller Mission

Deployed in ones and twos as attaches to those same Rangers, those same Delta Force and SEAL teams, and any other elite American unit headed into the heat of battle, the Combat Controllers have to be able to keep up with every single one of those specialized missions — and they have to do even more. In the most dangerous possible mission environments, the Combat Controllers are responsible for coordinating airstrikes, managing command-and-control, and establishing control over airfields, all while seamlessly integrating into every other mission objective for the units they assist. It’s an incredibly tough job, with such rigorous demands that up to 95% of prospective Combat Controllers will eventually fail the selection and training process.

Those few uber-elite operatives who make it through join the ranks of the Combat Controllers, doing what many consider the toughest job in the entire US military. The force numbers fewer than four hundred troops, yet they are responsible for eight of the eleven Air Force Crosses that have been awarded for operations in Afghanistan since 2001, indicating just how much of an outsize impact those under-four-hundred troops have made.

From World War II Pathfinders to a Modern Force

It’s perhaps a bit ironic that the Air Force, long derided by other US military branches as a bunch of lazy, spoiled pretty-boys, is responsible for producing the absolute units that are Combat Controllers, but the Controllers have been an integral part of the branch for almost as long as it has existed. The Combat Controllers can trace their legacy to the US Army’s pathfinders during World War II, who were responsible for infiltrating enemy lines in advance of a large-scale assault, reporting on the weather and ground conditions, and marking the landing zones where American and Allied troops were expecting to conduct their landings. In Burma, air commandoes pioneered the use of radio to coordinate airstrikes from the ground, and on the European front, early combat control teams learned to establish forward airfields in hostile territory, in order to coordinate resupply operations and troop landings far ahead of where the Germans had expected those troops to be.

When the US Air Force was made its own branch of the military in 1947, its leadership initially attempted to push pathfinders out of the service entirely, believing that they would be made irrelevant by electronic navigation aids. After some inter-service squabbling between the Air Force and the Army, which saw pathfinders almost completely excluded from the Korean War, the Air Force was eventually able to come to terms with the Department of Defense’s expectation that it would keep a unit of pathfinders, eventually incorporating a small group of them into the first modern Combat Control Team. Their leader was Alcide Sylvio Benini, better known as “Bull” Benini, who had survived the Bataan Death March and taken a leading role in the post-war mission to better incorporate pathfinders.

Under Benini’s leadership, these new Combat Controllers developed a dedicated early suite of tactics and procedures, and did the hard work of figuring out exactly what they would need from the military in order to fulfill their mission. Before long, Benini and his team realized that their Combat Controllers would have to be competent not just as paratroopers, but as air traffic controllers, and they figured out quickly that it wouldn’t really make sense to send an entire squad of Combat Controllers to a given location at once. After all, that would just put too many cooks in the kitchen; the last thing a pilot wants to hear from air traffic control, under any circumstances, is a bunch of voices all talking over each other.

Vietnam, Iran, and Grenada: Combat Controllers at War

The Combat Controllers would serve as attaches to other combat units, and though the Army was resistant to accept them at the time, they eventually were talked around to the idea when the Air Force refused to airlift them anywhere, for any reason, unless they got on board with the Combat Controller program. Once they did, the Combat Controllers got to work quickly, assisting the Marines with an intervention in Lebanon in 1958, before making a quick pivot to the Vietnam War, where they were key to ensuring that air operations could take place without putting non-combatants at risk. Often using slapdash methods and collaborating with local forces, the Combat Controllers — and some poorly trained draftees who had been civilian pilots — did their best to coordinate bombing runs early in the war.

But as the demands of the conflict evolved, so did the Combat Controllers, and before long, they were able to fluently manage airlifts, sneak into enemy territory, and coordinate strikes on Communist positions and supply lines. As the war went on, the Combat Controllers grew more and more important, especially as the US military tried to pay closer attention to their rules of engagement in Southeast Asia and minimize collateral damage. They also began to adopt a role as so-called butterflies, in which Combat Controllers, dressed in civilian clothing and given false identification, would fly in small scout planes and call in airstrikes while flying low over enemy territory.

After the war in Vietnam ended, Major John Carney Jr. was instrumental in guiding US forces to an airstrip in Iran where they staged the failed Operation Eagle Claw, meant to rescue 52 embassy staff held during the Iran Hostage Crisis. Despite Carney Jr.’s best efforts, the mission went catastrophically poorly due to weather and technical issues, but Carney Jr. himself had been successful in rigging the target airfield for a landing. A few years later, Combat Controllers laid the groundwork for an invasion of Grenada, leading the way for Army Rangers to take an unfinished airport in advance of a mass landing of American troops.

Since that time, Combat Controllers have been on the front lines in Iraq and Afghanistan, where then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld claimed that 85% of airstrikes had been coordinated by Combat Controllers. They coordinated the complete relief effort in Haiti after an earthquake, using only hand radios to direct thousands of flights, and they were deployed to Iraq to coordinate coalition airstrikes during the US-led air campaign against the Islamic State.

Structure, Modus Operandi, and the Requirement to Keep Up

Combat Controllers are unlike other special-operations teams, in that it’s rare for them to deploy in dedicated units filled with other Combat Controllers. Instead, they tend to accompany other special-operations units on a wide range of operations, meaning that their presence isn’t as much determined by a type of mission, but whether there’s expected to be a need for their expertise. This means that the first, and perhaps most major requirement for a Combat Controller, is to be able to keep up.

If they’re joining Navy SEALs whose job is to swim underwater into a cove in a hostile nation, clear the area of local guards, find and eliminate the nearest military outpost, and then set up a landing zone for an anticipated wave of paratroopers, then that Combat Controller has to be able to combat-dive, move seamlessly with the Navy SEALs in their own small-unit procedures, and keep themselves safe in a firefight. It’s the same idea with all the other groups the Combat Controllers might be attached to; they have to be able to do their own job, while also being competent enough in every other mission area that there’s no risk of them getting in the way of the other parts of their operation — and ideally, they shouldn’t just be dead weight, but an actively helpful presence in those other mission roles as well. On some missions, they accompany ground troops who are expecting help from an airstrike — say, raiding an ISIS stronghold in Syria, while waiting on a couple of A-10s to light up the area with rockets and cannon fire.

During those missions, a Combat Controller wouldn’t just be telling support aircraft where to strike, but coordinating their actions and directing them around the battlefield from a grounded vantage point. In other scenarios, a Combat Controller might be deployed in advance of a large-scale attack from the air, either using paratroopers, for whom the Combat Controller would be clearing out and then marking a safe and secure drop site, or using aircraft that are expected to land or hover long enough to drop the troops they carry. In some cases, the role of a Combat Controller in that operation might be to find an empty clearing in the middle of a forest, where a few helicopters can fly low enough to get their troops to the ground.

In others, that same Combat Controller and backup from, say, an Army Ranger platoon might take over an entire enemy airfield, equipped only with their rifles and other small arms, thus clearing the way for the United States’ massive cargo planes to land — with guidance from the Combat Controller, of course. Combat Controllers can also deploy with small units far afield in enemy territory, marking locations to be surveilled by aircraft above. They can be sent to aid allied nations and their own Air Forces, which might be struggling to coordinate combat operations on the level that a Combat Controller is capable of.

They might be sent to aid in counter-terrorist operations, or be asked to direct air traffic during search and rescue operations, or manage large-scale humanitarian efforts in disaster zones where proper air control no longer exists.

Equipment: Radios, Rifles, ATAK, and Motorcycles

In terms of their equipment, Combat Controllers are, of course, armed, with M4 rifles and sniper weapons that are typically fitted out with specialized optical equipment and other attachments. Not only does this allow each Combat Controller to optimize their gear for what, in many ways, is often a solo mission, but it also lets them condense their overall gear requirements — say, bringing specialized scopes on their weapon, and using those scopes to evaluate a potential site for an airfield. They do much the same thing by carrying grenade launchers into battle — sometimes to fire at enemies, and sometimes to launch smoke grenades to mark targets or landing sites.

Just as important, if not more so, is the Combat Controller’s two radios — one to talk with aircrew, in one ear, and one to talk to their ground team in the other. This is a highly specialized, and often very confusing task to need to master, but it places them exactly where they’re supposed to be — as the main conduit of information in order to coordinate a battle, solve problems as they emerge, and direct the overall tactics of a combined air-and-ground operation. On other missions, Combat Controllers might carry heavier, longer-range radios when they’re expecting to dig in and provide air traffic control.

Also in the Combat Controller arsenal is a smartphone-based live-mapping app called ATAK, the Android Tactical Assault Kit, which allows them to coordinate friendly and enemy movements on a grid system overlaid with an accurate map of the surroundings. These applications can be shared with command centers and other operational units in real time, and they’ve been used to great effect during the liberation of Mosul and elsewhere. Combat Controllers also carry laser range finders to measure distances on the fly, allowing them to quickly calculate the suitability of a potential landing site or drop zone, and specialized night-vision goggles allow them not just to see at night, but to communicate with aircraft using infrared tools.

At the same time, they are afforded video downlinks in order to see live-streamed footage from the aircraft above them. Combat Controllers will often get a motorcycle, which is designed to parachute down to the ground alongside them before being used in the heat of battle. When considering that Combat Controllers are often marking entire improvised airfields or seizing them with the help of ground troops in order to allow large planes to land, it should be no surprise that a motorbike comes in extremely handy in order to travel around an area that might be hundreds of meters long.

These motorcycles can be minibikes, or dirt bikes for rough terrain, and typically, they’re equipped with small engines that ensure that the bike can balance with not just a Combat Controller, but a hundred-pound gear bag on it as well. And if the motorbike doesn’t fit a mission, the Combat Controllers get all-terrain four-wheelers, too.

Recruitment and Training: A 95% Washout Rate

To become a Combat Controller is one of the single most difficult things that a member of the US military can hope to achieve. With an overall washout rate that can be as high as 95%, and only a few hundred Combat Controllers in active service at a given time, it is an exceptionally exclusive club, and one that’s exclusive for a good reason. With the responsibilities that a Combat Controller is entrusted with, competence in that role requires effort and ability that would make a person truly exceptional in most walks of life.

After attending Basic Training, a hopeful Combat Control recruit must attend the Special Warfare Assessment and Selection process, located at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas. On day one, they must finish a 500-meter swim in under eleven minutes, forty-two seconds; perform a mile-and-a-half run in ten minutes, ten seconds; and perform eight pull-ups, forty-eight sit-ups, and forty-eight push-ups. Those that can’t are shown the door immediately, and those who pass will be made to wish they’d failed out.

Over the length of a four-week course, these recruits will spend two and a half weeks performing field exercises and training continuously, often deprived of sleep, and made to demonstrate continual competency in the water and during serious physical exercises. After that, they’ll be rigorously tested, interviewed, and assessed, with candidates only moving on if they can cleanly hit the attributes that the Air Force is after. All the while, they’re watched by a team of psychologists and subject-matter experts, looking for any indicator that a recruit may not pass muster.

The psychologists are also looking for recruits with a very specific personality: ones who can blend in well with other special-operations forces, and go with the flow not just in terms of gathering abilities and certifications, but in terms of following along with operators they might not have met until they’re out in the field together. Seventy-five percent of people who start this phase don’t make it through. After that comes a preparation course to get recruits ready for the real hard work, Special Warfare Combat Dive School.

Candidates are made to demonstrate even greater competency in and under the water, and some 30% of the people who graduated the last step are not expected to graduate this one. Then, trainees will spend three weeks learning to parachute and perform static-line airdrops, and after that, it’s on to a three-week survival course known as SERE: Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape. This grueling course, a mainstay of American special operations, is meant to teach students how to survive being captured by an enemy or stranded by themselves in hostile territory — a very real possibility, if they are to become Combat Controllers.

If a recruit can make it past that battery of courses, they’ll head to the Combat Control Operator Course in Mississippi, where they’ll spend fifteen and a half weeks learning all the requisite skills for the Combat Controller role. This includes everything from aircraft recognition, to radar procedure, to air traffic control policies. And after that, for another thirteen weeks, they’ll handle the combat side of being a Combat Controller: small-unit tactical training, land navigation, assaults, demolitions, fire support, parachuting, and more.

Make it out of this course, forty-two weeks after starting the Combat Controller journey, and they’ll finally be awarded their apprentice-level certification as a Combat Controller, earning their right to wear the scarlet beret of their team. But getting one’s apprentice-level certification is just the beginning, if a young Combat Controller wants to become a combat-ready member of the team. Next comes between twelve and fifteen months of advanced training at the Special Tactics Training Squadron, in Florida, where Combat Controllers learn alongside para-rescuemen and special reconnaissance troops in four key areas: water, ground, employment, and full-mission profile.

These courses are even more demanding than the ones that came before, both physically and mentally, and trainees also take a five-week free-fall parachuting course, and a six-week combat diving program. At the end of all this, some two years or more after starting, one out of every ten, fifteen, or even twenty recruits can say they emerged victorious. From there, they head over to Air Force Special Operations Command, where the real work can finally begin.

Rhyner, Travis, and Chapman: Combat Controllers Under Fire

When it comes to renowned Combat Controllers, there is no better place to start than Senior Airman Zachary Rhyner, who was part of a helicopter infiltration in Afghanistan’s Nuristan Province in 2008. Accompanied by a team of Special Forces operatives, Rhyner was tasked with the capture of high-value insurgents in a small village. However, he and his team were trapped in an ambush while stuck on nearly vertical terrain, pinned down and wounded almost immediately.

But despite his injuries, Rhyner not only laid down covering fire personally with his rifle while his comrades got to safety, but he then got straight to work directing close air support on their position. The planes Rhyner directed would drop a total of nine Hellfire missiles, over 160 rockets, twelve 500-pound bombs, a one-ton bomb, and well over four thousand rounds of cannon fire, distributed between eight fighter planes and four attack helicopters over a total of fifty attack runs. The battle took some six and a half hours, in which Rhyner had to repeatedly call in airstrikes within 100 meters of his own position, in a battle that would see twenty Silver Stars and two Medals of Honor awarded to his compatriots from the Army.

Rhyner received the Air Force Cross, the first living recipient during the War on Terror. Then there is the story of Chief Master Sergeant Tony Travis, who was dispatched to Port-au-Prince, Haiti, almost immediately after the country was devastated by an earthquake in 2010. Travis was among the first people to arrive and help with the relief effort; for an island nation like Haiti, competent air-traffic control would be essential to bring supplies that would only arrive quickly if they came by air.

The Port-au-Prince Airport had been left with only one usable runway, and a tower that couldn’t be occupied. The airport was overfilled with grounded aircraft, and there were far too many Haitians located elsewhere in the country who couldn’t make it to the capital. But within a half-hour of his arrival, Travis had set up his team’s best attempt at an air-traffic control operation, and established a timetable in which planes could take off and land every five minutes.

On top of that, Travis coordinated deliveries to four remote drop zones, providing tens of thousands of packaged meals and bottles of water. Travis’ operation would see four million pounds of supplies brought to Haiti, and for his work, he’d be honored as one of TIME Magazine’s Top 100 people of 2010. Master Sergeant John Chapman, who posthumously received the Medal of Honor for his acts in 2002, during the Battle of Takur Ghar, is a final example of a Combat Controller in action, not just directing fire but leading a combined team of Special Operations forces from across the US military.

The battle, which took place atop a mountain of the same name in Afghanistan, saw Chapman and a team of Navy SEALs and Army Rangers attempt to stake out an observation post from which they could direct fire on enemy targets. During their insertion onto the mountain, the helicopter carrying Chapman was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, and after a controlled crash landing, Chapman was instrumental in leading his team on the ground, fighting uphill while attempting to rescue a missing teammate, and being critically wounded in the process. But despite those injuries, Chapman continued fighting for well over an hour, saving multiple lives, allowing the rest of his team to evacuate, and even engaging an enemy in direct hand-to-hand combat before succumbing to his wounds.

Chapman never got a chance to direct the kind of large-scale air operations he had expected to, but he fought to the last nonetheless.

First There: The Enduring Impact of Combat Controllers

If a Combat Controller’s operation is successful, the public should never hear about it. One can only imagine what incredible feats the Combat Controllers have accomplished, but by looking at how well they held up when things went catastrophically sideways, it is possible to extrapolate that their work in more ideal conditions must be truly seamless. In the years and decades ahead, it’s impossible to say which far-flung corners of the world will demand a Combat Controller’s attention next. But whatever comes, whatever adversaries demand their very particular set of skills, the USAF Combat Controllers will continue to live up to their motto: “First There”, on the bleeding edge of US special operations, doing the work that nobody else could do.

Frequently Asked Questions

What makes the Combat Controller mission uniquely demanding compared to other special-operations units?

Combat Controllers must be capable of doing their own job — coordinating airstrikes, managing command-and-control, and establishing control over airfields — while fully keeping up with every other special-operations unit they are attached to. If they are deployed with Navy SEALs, they must combat-dive; if with Rangers, they must perform raids. They serve as the main conduit of information in a combined air-and-ground operation, talking to aircrew in one ear and their ground team in the other, often while under fire.

How difficult is Combat Controller training, and how long does it take?

The washout rate reaches as high as 95%, making it one of the most exclusive processes in the US military. From the initial Special Warfare Assessment and Selection at Lackland Air Force Base through dive school, parachuting, SERE, the Combat Control Operator Course, and advanced training at the Special Tactics Training Squadron in Florida, the full pipeline takes more than two years. Only roughly one in ten to twenty recruits who start eventually earn their scarlet beret and reach Air Force Special Operations Command.

How did Senior Airman Zachary Rhyner demonstrate the Combat Controller role under the worst possible conditions?

In 2008 in Afghanistan’s Nuristan Province, Rhyner’s team was ambushed on nearly vertical terrain and wounded almost immediately. Despite his own injuries, he coordinated close air support for six and a half hours, directing nine Hellfire missiles, over 160 rockets, twelve 500-pound bombs, a one-ton bomb, and more than 4,000 cannon rounds across fifty attack runs, repeatedly calling strikes within 100 meters of his own position. He received the Air Force Cross, the first living recipient during the War on Terror.

What was the Battle of Takur Ghar, and how did Master Sergeant John Chapman earn the Medal of Honor?

During the 2002 Battle of Takur Ghar in Afghanistan, Chapman and a team of Navy SEALs and Army Rangers attempted to establish an observation post when their helicopter was hit by an RPG. After a controlled crash landing, Chapman led his team uphill under fire, was critically wounded, continued fighting for over an hour, and engaged an enemy in direct hand-to-hand combat before succumbing to his wounds. He posthumously received the Medal of Honor for saving multiple lives and allowing the rest of his team to evacuate.

How did Combat Controllers demonstrate their value outside of combat, as in Haiti?

After the 2010 Haiti earthquake, Chief Master Sergeant Tony Travis arrived at Port-au-Prince Airport and within 30 minutes established air-traffic control using only hand radios, despite a damaged tower and a runway clogged with grounded aircraft. He set up a timetable allowing takeoffs and landings every five minutes and coordinated deliveries to four remote drop zones. His operation brought four million pounds of supplies to Haiti, earning him recognition as one of TIME Magazine’s Top 100 people of 2010.

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