Bob Keller, former US Army Special Forces and Delta Force operator, rates 10 Army special operations scenes in movies and TV, such as "Black Hawk Down," for realism.
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00After watching this movie as a kid, you're thinking, I'm going to be shooting missiles
00:08off of motorcycles.
00:10I wish that was true.
00:12Not happening.
00:13I'm Bob Keller.
00:14I've spent 23 plus years in the Army Special Operations community.
00:18I started out in Ranger Battalion, went to Special Forces, and then ended up at a place
00:22called The Unit.
00:23I'm currently the owner of Gamma Resolutions, where I provide training instruction.
00:28Today we'll be looking at Army Special Operations TV and movie scenes and judging how realistic
00:34they really are.
00:3515-45 assault force Delta will infiltrate the target building.
00:39Down at target.
00:41Pretty much legit.
00:43I cocked down and I was actually depicting an actual mission that went down in Mogadishu.
00:50They're going in to actually grab an HVI, which is a high value individual.
00:54The Unit doing HVIs, that is what we do.
00:58For The Unit, I would say if people don't know what it is, it's the next step up.
01:03You want more.
01:05You want more assaults.
01:06You want to be better at hostage rescue.
01:09That is where you go.
01:10One minute.
01:11Uniform, 6-4, ready for extraction.
01:12Over.
01:13Roger that.
01:14There's the car.
01:15Let's move out.
01:20Working together, absolutely.
01:21We would use the Ranger Battalion when we went in to do missions for our blocking positions.
01:27Do we do that all the time?
01:29It's very seldom that there's a mission that big that we would use the Ranger Battalion
01:32with us.
01:33But it has happened, yeah.
01:34And it happened in this movie.
01:36The 160th, the pilots and their helicopters, that is something that we only use those guys.
01:43So that's 100% legit in this scene.
01:48Uniform, get down.
01:50Secure.
01:51Let's move out.
01:52Everybody out.
01:53Let's go.
01:54Halo, 6-4.
01:55Green light.
01:56Ready for extraction.
01:57Over.
01:58Going in, 100% that is, I would say, the speed that we're doing it and how we would do it
02:04in that situation.
02:05And when it comes to clearing rooms, there's never a textbook way to do it.
02:11So that scene, 100% legit going in.
02:14The only thing I would, that caught my ear, they call it extraction.
02:20Like we say ex-fill.
02:21But I guess if you're extracting someone, it would make sense.
02:2740 guys with RPGs.
02:30Moving up on your side, now.
02:34So 100% possibility, and it happened.
02:38You're hanging around an area that populated and the guys actually have RPGs, or any kind
02:43of missile system, good chance one of your helicopters is getting shot down, right?
02:47Especially when you're circling overhead.
02:48I've never been shot down on target or going to target in-fill or ex-fill, but I have had
02:54multiple times RPGs coming up at us.
02:58Just we got lucky.
02:59They didn't hit.
03:00It sucks.
03:01It's an eerie feeling.
03:02There's like nothing you can do.
03:03Shagard and Cordner are on the deck.
03:04Over.
03:05Roger.
03:06Friendlies!
03:07Pulling them out.
03:08Cover.
03:10Them getting dropped off and going out on themselves to help the pilot, 100% legit that
03:18did happen.
03:20Would I do that?
03:23100%.
03:24Every single person that I worked with at the unit, without a doubt, would be making
03:28that same call.
03:30No question.
03:31Even though that might not be exactly how it went down, they did a really good job.
03:35They used all the right advisors.
03:38They actually had guys from the unit that were there telling them what to do.
03:43That's a big deal.
03:44With watching fingers, watching how guns are handled, I would give it a solid nine.
03:57You just know what he said, besides drop on.
03:59It's pretty stupid.
04:00That was the Special Forces team linked up or had been with the Afghanis.
04:05Based off one of the first teams that was actually in Afghanistan at the start of the
04:09war.
04:10Badger 1-7, this is Alpha 5-9-5.
04:12We need to drop on enemy position.
04:14Roger.
04:15Drop when ready.
04:19I'm calling in the aircraft and it would have been way more lenient back then at the beginning
04:24of the war.
04:25We hadn't been to war for a long time.
04:27How they did it, you can't say that wouldn't happen back then.
04:31Because some of the calls were off on that scene.
04:35But yes, absolutely, an SF team will call their own air support in.
04:40Say again.
04:41Eight, three, nine, six, four, five, seven.
04:46Okay, definitely got to stop.
04:48He sends a seven-digit grid or a seven-digit coordinate, which those don't exist.
04:54It's either four, six, eight, or ten.
04:56All he gives is seven numbers.
04:58That could be anywhere in the world, right?
05:02So that's totally off.
05:11Shooting from the hip on horses.
05:14Good luck making shots doing that.
05:16Every movie, special ops, going fully auto.
05:20No one goes fully auto.
05:22Especially at the unit.
05:25Just not a thing.
05:26So they did have horseback, 100%.
05:28They were on horseback for a lot of their, I wouldn't say missions,
05:31but being over there because that's how they got around.
05:34Being trained on horseback, that's going to be a typical thing
05:36that you do every single day.
05:38Why go down there and fight on horses face-to-face with the guys?
05:42They had the upper ground to begin with, so why go down there?
05:48The Special Forces, in the special operations community,
05:53is supposed to be a force multiplier.
05:56Their true job is to go overseas and train your host nation
06:01so they can do ops on their own.
06:03I only did one deployment with Special Forces,
06:05and it was awesome because we did the true SF mission.
06:10We were actually a force multiplier.
06:12For one, they're going to sex it up a little bit.
06:14For one, they're going to sex it up a little bit
06:16from what the book was or what the actual story was.
06:19I mean, it's a movie. You've got to make it entertaining.
06:22They'll give it a solid 7.
06:26Mexican Federal Police will meet you at the border.
06:29Delta's Team 1 will be the lead vehicle.
06:31Everyone stay in this lane.
06:32Our agents at the border are waving traffic through
06:34to get us over as quickly as they can.
06:36Unrealistic. Not going to happen.
06:38Or shouldn't happen.
06:40Because if it does, you sucked at planning.
06:42Yeah, so they were going in to extradite
06:45one of the drug lord's brother to get him out
06:47to bring him back to the United States.
06:49Could it happen? Yes.
06:50I mean, there's things that happen at the unit
06:52that you might not know about, but I can't actually say yes.
06:55I know of this happening.
06:57But if you did have unit guys on that op,
06:59they wouldn't be going out on those vehicles.
07:01You're probably going to go across the desert.
07:03You're not going to cross the border where everyone's at.
07:05Like, why not get them in a helicopter and then fly out, right?
07:09Move.
07:16Well, 100%.
07:18You get a gun pointed at you.
07:20If you don't engage, you die.
07:22So, I mean, there is no other answer.
07:24But if they're, like, special ops guy or special ops guys
07:27or ex-special ops guys, those are easy shots.
07:30That is not endangering any other person.
07:33Then there would be nothing wrong with how they approach the vehicle.
07:36I actually thought flow was pretty good coming up,
07:39almost in an L shape going up the vehicle.
07:42So many different ways you can do that.
07:50Finger on the trigger, holding the gun.
07:53Not good.
07:55Just typical in all the movies, right?
07:58Like, just what is so wrong about the movies is the weapons handling,
08:02which his is on the trigger right there.
08:05And he's not pulling the trigger or he's not engaging.
08:07Finger should always be off the trigger.
08:09So when she saw the guy in the rear-view mirror, awesome.
08:12The thing I liked about that, like, the very beginning of her
08:17holding the gun, both hands on the gun, not a bad grip.
08:20Finger wasn't on the trigger.
08:22She actually readjusted in the seat to make that shot.
08:25That was 100% what you should do, both hands stay on the gun,
08:28readjust in the seat to actually make the shot.
08:30Range clear! Range clear!
08:32Clear!
08:34And that's just kind of another one of those movie bloopers type thing.
08:39Every other lane is still stuck.
08:41They make the shots, kill the guys, then they get in the truck,
08:44all of a sudden the lane's free and they're totally fine.
08:46They just take off. That, not too bad.
08:49Getting in the vehicle at the end there, you want to get going, right?
08:53I mean, you want to go as fast as you can, get out of the situation.
08:57And you can still get guns up when you're in the back seat, no big deal.
09:00So it's a judgment call. I wouldn't say it's right or wrong.
09:03Because they get stuck at the border in traffic.
09:06Because of that, straight up no-go.
09:08But because it's kind of cool, it's a movie, everything put together,
09:11I would say I'd give it a 7.
09:15We'll get your house back for you.
09:17Mission's a go, Colonel.
09:21So this is supposed to be the unit coming in on these gunships
09:26and they're going to save the White House.
09:28I mean, you can never say never.
09:30We're not supposed to do missions in the United States.
09:32Anything military, it's the whole apostate coup d'etat, right?
09:36That would be one situation, the White House is down,
09:39you should probably come to the best guys at Hossa Rescue.
09:42I can't say what happened. Should it happen? Heck yeah.
09:46Drop to 1-0 feet. Falcon 2, drop me to 10 feet.
09:50Would you actually come in on helicopters for a mission like that?
09:54That's all situation-dependent.
09:56I'm probably not going to infill from the air on a mission like that.
10:00And then flying through the streets, how cool is that?
10:02They're masking that they're actually coming in,
10:04is the reason why they're doing that.
10:06Would you actually pick that route? Probably not.
10:08I mean, you could do a false insertion or have them there as a distraction.
10:12I mean, there's tunnels going into the White House,
10:14there's other ways to get into the White House
10:17that you would have privy to if this was going down.
10:20DC, there is total gridlock through...
10:22Oh my God! U.S. Special Forces are flying over us!
10:25It's funny that the reporter, as they're flying over,
10:27she's saying, oh, it's Special Forces coming over.
10:30How the heck does she know that?
10:32It doesn't say Special Forces on the helicopter,
10:35but it's the movie thing.
10:39They've got missile lock! Advance in maneuvers!
10:45And that's another thing, too.
10:46You would have done the research before going.
10:48You would know that these guys have any kind of heat-seeking missiles,
10:51so you'd be like, all right, coming in on helicopters,
10:55that's out of the equation.
10:57We're not using air assets to do this.
11:00But it looks cool, and why not?
11:02This one's kind of janky. I'd give it a four.
11:05I remember when I was with Special Forces.
11:08Instincts to kill without feeling.
11:13I mean, classic movie. I loved this as a kid.
11:16This is one of the reasons why I probably went in the military.
11:18So the guy's kind of losing it because of what he's seen
11:21and what he's had to do in his time being an SF guy.
11:26Do I relate to that? Not even close.
11:29Can that happen to someone? Absolutely.
11:32I mean, some people relate to war differently.
11:36This is Captain Willard, and he is part of the MACV SOG,
11:40and he was sent to go find the colonel.
11:43They got to do some really cool stuff.
11:45Are they sending those guys to do assassinations on Americans?
11:48Americans highly doubt it, so I would call no.
11:51That's a straight-up movie thing.
11:57Coming Out of the Water, that's like another movie thing.
12:00It's like the coolest thing, right?
12:02But if you were coming up a stream or coming up a river,
12:04could it have happened? Yes.
12:06And he's camoed up. He's got his face camoed. Absolutely.
12:09If you're in the jungle and you don't want to be seen,
12:12you want to have the right camouflage on.
12:15You don't want any white showing.
12:17And going at night, 100%.
12:19You want to do everything at night.
12:21Unconventional warfare and doing stuff other than just shooting?
12:26Absolutely. That's what those guys did.
12:28This is just basing the scene, not the whole movie,
12:30because movies, I think, is an awesome movie.
12:32The scene, how it's played out, I mean, I'd give it a 5
12:36just because it's apocalypse now.
12:46Somebody help me!
12:48Classic, I always wanted to be Rambo. What kid didn't?
12:51So Rambo, first blood, I mean, is going off of,
12:54like, he's an ex-SF guy from Vietnam.
12:57All this stuff would be 100% legit,
12:59like, as an SF guy being in the woods.
13:02So you'll be trained on, like, booby traps and all these tactics,
13:07but are you getting a lot of it?
13:09Like, you might get one class.
13:11Now, some guys will actually train on this,
13:13like, on survival stuff all the time.
13:15John Rambo trained on that all the time,
13:17and he had done it in Vietnam for years and years.
13:19Like, that's probably ingrained in his head.
13:21I mean, you're done.
13:23I mean, because he knows how to live in the woods, right?
13:27So 100%, this is legit.
13:29In time, you're the law.
13:31Out here, it's me.
13:33Don't push it.
13:34In this situation, he's not wanting any trouble.
13:36They push it upon him, and now he has to use his skills.
13:39I think most special ops guys getting out of the military
13:42do continue to do that in other organizations,
13:46or they do it, you know, create their own business doing it.
13:49It's kind of because, for one, you might miss it,
13:52and I think for others, it's just all you know.
13:55Like, if you go in the military at 17 years old,
13:57so yes, that happens,
13:59even though the scenes might look a little bit hanky.
14:02But the reality of it,
14:04of this guy doing all this stuff to these guys
14:06and it being that easy, 100% legit.
14:09I mean, I give it a 9 1⁄2 easy.
14:12I mean, it's almost a full 10.
14:14We're going after a CIA asset that's been captured.
14:19Six minutes to the DC.
14:21A lot of unreal stuff.
14:23Unrealistic stuff right off the bat.
14:25In this scene, the whole thing is,
14:27it's the unit team going in to rescue a CIA spy.
14:32Yes, I mean, that is our bread and butter.
14:34We are supposed to be at any notice or at any time
14:38be ready to go do a hostage rescue mission.
14:42But as the scene shifts to them being inside
14:45and they're in the helicopter talking,
14:47so they're talking like normal,
14:49like you wouldn't be able to hear what the guy's saying.
14:51They go to that scene right there,
14:53and it actually shifts to them on the mics,
14:55like actually how it would sound.
14:57Straight-up movie stuff, not realistic at all.
14:59We got a JTAC assigned to them or attached to them,
15:02and he's the one who's going to be dropping the bombs.
15:04We wouldn't be just using a JTAC.
15:06We'd have a CCT guy.
15:07I would say, without a doubt,
15:09especially for a mission like this,
15:11100% of the time you're going to have
15:13someone that can drop bombs with you.
15:15Hey, walk in the park!
15:24All right, walk in the park.
15:26Yeah, just jump out. No big deal.
15:28They're doing a halo, it looks like.
15:30It's because they're opening low.
15:32So everyone at the unit is halo qualified.
15:35Is it a mission or is it an infill platform
15:38that we're going to use?
15:40Most likely, most likely not.
15:42And it's all because once you get under canopy,
15:44is everyone going to land together, right?
15:46If everyone doesn't land together,
15:47well, pretty much mission's over.
15:49So to do that with a guy that's never jumped before,
15:52never, ever going to happen.
15:54He'd be hooked up to one of the operators,
15:57tandem him in.
15:59Let's go, come on, get up.
16:02But he made it. Awesome.
16:07Bomb.
16:08Reaper, you are cleared hot.
16:09Say again, you are cleared hot.
16:11Copy, target acquired.
16:15Never happened.
16:16You could not do that.
16:18He's about ready to call this bird in and launch missiles.
16:22He's not doing that by himself.
16:24He has to have a ground force commander saying,
16:28Roger, you can actually drop bombs.
16:30And he wouldn't be sitting there by himself.
16:32You have a JTAC with you,
16:34you're not going to leave the guy alone.
16:36And it would usually be, it'd probably be two people.
16:39It'd be whoever's the team commander
16:41or the ground force commander,
16:43whoever's going to be in charge making those calls.
16:45And then you'd probably have another shooter
16:46with those guys as well.
16:50Don't have 30.
16:52Don't have 30.
16:57That's a tough one with the kids involved.
16:59Is it a friendly kid?
17:01I mean, the kid could be friendly on either side, right?
17:04So that is a tough call.
17:05And yeah, I mean, me personally probably would have done that.
17:10That could be different for every team, right?
17:12Or it could be different for every guy.
17:13One guy could just be like,
17:14no, I'm not going to watch this, I'm going to do it.
17:16And then get in trouble from everyone,
17:18from his commander, right?
17:19That's a tough one to say.
17:21That's 100%.
17:22Oh, because of the opening scene in the helicopter
17:25and all that being so wrong.
17:27Not only just movie wrong, but tactically wrong.
17:30Because of that, because the rest of it,
17:32actually the gear's not bad.
17:33The weapons handling's not bad.
17:35All that put together, it would be split.
17:38I'd give it a five.
17:45You're not required to learn a language,
17:48but a lot of people will actually do it on their own
17:51or ask to go to a language school,
17:54so they actually know.
17:55So that wouldn't be far-fetched.
17:57Lock the alley with the mule.
17:59The commander can see the laser designator.
18:01Check com.
18:02Got it.
18:04Weapons released.
18:08Calling airstrikes, 100% could happen.
18:10How it happened, it's a weird scene.
18:15The only thing I would say on that whole thing was good
18:17was moving the docky so he couldn't actually see.
18:21Good call on putting that in the scene.
18:24Besides that, it's hard to watch.
18:28You're not going to put the target identifier
18:31in the street of a market.
18:33That's why I said that whole scene is just embarrassing.
18:40Who is Machiavelli?
18:41A statesman and political philosopher in Florence.
18:44Where?
18:45You're selected now.
18:49Yeah, so that's hard to watch.
18:51Everything's wrong.
18:53So I can't go into selection of the unit of selection,
18:56but I can tell you that doesn't happen.
18:59That's just funny.
19:02You don't want to make it easier for anyone coming after you.
19:05So we try to keep selection a very tight-nitched secret thing,
19:09which I would want to do.
19:11But I can say anyone in the military can try out
19:15for the unit, which is awesome.
19:17We'll take a guy from the Air Cav,
19:19or we'll take a guy from the Coast Guard,
19:21we'll take a guy from the Navy, right?
19:23I started out in the Ranger Battalion.
19:25My whole thing was I was going to go to the Secret Service
19:27after I got out of the military.
19:29After that happened, 9-11 kicked off.
19:31That's what got me to go back into Special Forces.
19:33Once I did one rotation with Special Forces,
19:35that's when I went to the next level.
19:37So that's what brought me to the unit.
19:39Now for just the second scene with the selection,
19:42I'd give it a 1, but because the other scene is somewhat,
19:45like that could actually happen,
19:47we could have to do something like that.
19:49I'll give it a 2.
19:51You're lucky for getting a 2.
19:57That's Chuck Norris right there.
19:59Perfect.
20:01I mean, right here is the reason why
20:03I wanted to go to the unit as a kid, right?
20:05Unit-wise, going out and using bikes,
20:07I don't personally know of anyone or any team using it.
20:10But like Ranger Battalion,
20:12we used to have basically these mini-bikes
20:15that you could jump in
20:18and then you could drive down the runways with.
20:21I know that there's been talks on certain missions to use them.
20:24Like that could be a means.
20:26Kind of talking about the course of action,
20:28how we can infill, how we can exfill.
20:30Could it happen? Absolutely. I mean, why not?
20:34Ah!
20:39I'm always asked about the whole hand-to-hand thing,
20:42but the hand-to-hand thing, this never happens.
20:45Or very seldom does that happen on target
20:48because we always have a gun on us.
20:50Why would I use a knife when I could use a gun?
20:52Why would I use my hands when I could use a gun?
20:54So unrealistic, but awesome because it's Chuck Norris.
20:57gunfire
21:01gunfire
21:04After watching this movie as a kid, you're thinking,
21:07I'm going to be shooting missiles off of motorcycles, right?
21:10I wish that was true. Not happening.
21:14He's got grenades or frickin' mortars that come out of the back.
21:18So he goes in between the Jeeps that have guns
21:21and now you're in front of them.
21:23That would be the most dumb thing you could ever do in your life, right?
21:27Because they're going to shoot you, your back's to them.
21:30But awesome scene, and as a kid watching that,
21:32huge recruiting tool.
21:34Like, you're going to be like, heck yeah!
21:36I want to drive motorcycles with missiles and guns on them.
21:39So great job on that, but realistically, absolutely zero.
21:44On the Chuck Norris, that movie, I mean, cow dang.
21:48It's so unrealistic, but because it's Chuck Norris
21:53and it was because it just made it look so cool,
21:56I'd have to give it a 5.
21:58This is Bulldog. We have the Mike Force in position.
22:01Let us know when you're ready. Over.
22:03Haven't seen that one in a long time.
22:05But classic, classic movie.
22:07But, like, operationally, you wouldn't wear a bra.
22:09They might have back then. I mean, that was Vietnam days.
22:12You don't wear a bra.
22:14Like, you wear them, like, dress-wise.
22:16And, like, around the base or something,
22:19I don't know what uniform you're using, you'd have your bra.
22:22Yeah, so Special Forces, most people know them as the green bra.
22:26And that is the bra, and the reason why is
22:29because the bra you wear is green.
22:31But usually, like, they showed one guy with tiger stripes
22:33and he had a booty cap on.
22:35That would have been more of a field uniform
22:38instead of an actual bra on your head.
22:41But, like, on target, usually leadership will go to the rooftop.
22:45I mean, that's how you're making calls, right?
22:47You have a lot more visibility.
22:49But, I mean, you are literally stuck in a tower now.
22:52And that's exactly what happens.
22:54It gets blown up and they fall out.
22:56Just luckily it falls real slow and he's fine.
22:58But because it's John Wayne, I've got to give it, at least,
23:01I've got to give it a shot.
23:03I've got to give it a shot.
23:05I've got to give it a shot.
23:07But because it's John Wayne, I've got to give it, at least,
23:09at least a five.
23:11The one I would pick for, like, my favorite special operations movie
23:14would be Black Hawk Down
23:16because they did such a good job on the realism of it.
23:19Thanks for watching.
23:21If you like this, why not click on the next video?