Jade Helm 15 area of operations. Image Source: Department of Defense

MacDill Air Force Base, Florida (TFC) – There are scores of rumors flying around about Jade Helm 15, a US Special Operations Command operation that will begin on July 15th in the Southwestern United States. It’s time to separate reality from fiction.

To start out it may be best to clarify what Jade Helm is not. It is not a precursor to martial law. It is not an operation designed to round up American citizens for FEMA camps. It is not a UN ordered invasion. The truth behind Jade Helm is much less conspiratorial, but much more interesting.

After speaking to several former and active duty soldiers, The Fifth Column can say with almost certainty that Jade Helm is a massive Field Training Exercise (FTX) to enhance the SERE (Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape) capabilities of American special operations troops.

The uproar of Jade Helm was triggered by a map that surfaced on the internet labeling some areas of the United States as “hostile.” Had the sites that cast this as some plan for martial law researched the acronyms on the map, they would have quickly realized it was a large scale training exercise involving some of America’s most secretive units. It should have also been immediately evident that there is currently no “insurgent pocket” in Southern California.

Demystifying the military jargon

In the hostile area of Texas, there will be a JOAX event and a CRF event. This is the starting point of the exercise.

JOAX (Joint Operation Access Exercise): This is where the 82nd Airborne Division will parachute into “hostile territory.” An exercise identical to this phase of Jade Helm was recently conducted in North Carolina.

CRF (Crisis Response Force): This is typically a force that is made up of different units put together to handle a given scenario. The most recent example of a CRF was the group of units sent to the Mideast to protect US facilities. In this case, the CRF appears to be made up of a list of America’s most secretive units. In some cases the units are so secretive that The Fifth Column’s sources were either unaware of their existence or unwilling to talk about them.

MSOT (Marine Special Operations Team): The Marines have several special warfare units that fall under this acronym. The best known of these units is Force Recon.

NSWTU (Naval Special Warfare Training Unit): This is a unit dedicated to making SEALs better.There is the possibility that this is in reference to Naval Special Warfare Task Units, which are subgroups of a SEAL Team. This seems highly unlikely given the massive size of the operation.

ODA (Operational Detachment Alpha): These are Green Berets. This is otherwise known as an “A-Team.” Sometimes identified as SFOD-A

ODG (unidentified): ODG is so far unidentified, but sources state that it is most likely a designation for another type of Green Beret unit. What most people commonly call “Delta Force” is actually titled Special Forces Operational Detachment Delta (SFOD-D or simply ODD).

So now the acronyms are explained and America is safe in the knowledge that Texas is being “invaded” by America’s elite fighting forces. Special attention should have been paid to the fact that NSWTU, a training unit, was the Navy’s contribution. If this was an actual operation, the acronym would have been ST-6, ST-4, or something similar (Seal Team Six, Seal Team Four).

Utah is also listed as “hostile.”

LSE (Logistical Support Element): These are the men and women that handle the logistics of an operation.

So what happens after all the players are on the ground?

The most likely scenario is that at the JOAX and CRF “events” the operation will go terribly wrong and while the large force at the JOAX will likely handle the fake disaster in the area they parachute into, the CRF will have to “escape and evade.”

So, America’s special forces will most likely have to evade capture by local law enforcement, suspicious citizens, and whatever military unit is turned loose to try to catch them. One source believes the force from the JOAX will become the “bad guys” and try to catch the CRF troops while they attempt to make their way undetected to a safe (blue states on the map) “country.”

This “survival” and “evasion” portion of the exercise explains Chief Deputy Roy Boyd’s ominous statement:

“They’re going to set up cells of people and test how well they’re able to move around without getting too noticed in the community.”

There is no way of knowing exactly what the scenario presented to the troops will be, but it is a certainty that this is not a federal takeover.

At some point, some or all of the troops will be captured. They will begin attempting to “resist” interrogation and plan their “escape.”

Why the big secret?

These exercises are very common. Let’s suppose you were 1000 miles from where you had to be and you had little or no funds to get there. What would you have to do to arrive safely at your destination while avoiding law enforcement and a military detachment?

These training exercises are not discussed because America’s most elite units will most likely be committing a slew of minor crimes along the way. They will certainly trespass, engage in petty theft, sneak onto a train, hide in the back of an 18-wheeler, they might even steal a car. This training is absolutely necessary for these troops’ survival in extreme situations, however, the public reaction to the above wouldn’t be favorable.

Why do they need this training really?

Can’t the US just send a helicopter to pick them up if something goes wrong in real life? In an incident that has become legendary in the Special Operations community, a group of soldiers was tasked with assassinating a terrorist in a foreign country. Initially, the foreign country agreed to the operation and was a “permissive environment.” Moments before the assassination was conducted, the government of the foreign country changed its mind and informed the US government. The news did not reach the soldiers in time, who carried out the assassination as ordered. Suddenly the troops were wanted by the local authorities in a “nonpermissive environment” and had to steal cars, hide away on planes, and do everything they could to get home. When the story is told (I’ve heard it four times from different people), the unit is always different, the target is always different, and the country is always different. The details of the story, including one hilarious anecdote about one of the soldiers hiding out on the boat of gay man, are always the same.

Conclusion

I never condemn “conspiracy theorists.” Too many conspiracy theories have been proven to be true. A coup d’etat in the United States at some point in the future is not out of the question, but it isn’t happening on July 15th. Never stop questioning, but never take the word of websites or outlets that generate all of the revenue from the ads on articles pushing the most outlandish theories without researching them for yourself.

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