The simple answer is that it is a hat. What it represents, however, is far more than that. President John F. Kennedy described it as “a symbol of excellence, a badge of courage, a mark of distinction in the fight for freedom.” He was referring to the men who wear the beret officially known as the U.S. Army Special Forces.
The term special forces is frequently misused. Within the United States there are many elite units that fall under the broader special operations umbrella, including Army Rangers, Navy SEALs, Marine Raiders, and others. However, the only organization formally designated as Special Forces is the U.S. Army unit whose soldiers wear the Green Beret.
This distinction is not widely understood. During some of my visits to Washington, D.C., and engagements across the interagency community, it has often become clear that while policymakers and their staffs are familiar with certain elements of special operations, Special Forces are frequently misunderstood or overlooked entirely.
In reality, Green Berets are among the most strategically valuable tools in the American military toolkit. Their primary mission is unconventional warfare, defined as activities conducted to enable a resistance movement or insurgency to coerce, disrupt, or overthrow a government or occupying power by operating through or with an underground, auxiliary, and guerrilla force in a denied area. Simply put, it is the deliberate creation and enablement of an insurgency to generate sufficient instability to achieve strategic objectives.
This capability is both exceptionally dangerous and extraordinarily useful. Green Berets are force multipliers. With relatively small financial investment and minimal conventional troop presence, small teams can be discreetly inserted into a country to organize, train, and lead indigenous forces capable of advancing U.S. national security goals. This approach was demonstrated during the Vietnam War, when Special Forces worked closely with Montagnard and other local forces against the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese. It was seen again in Afghanistan in 2001, when teams from 5th Special Forces Group, operating alongside CIA officers and other partners, helped dismantle the Taliban regime in a matter of months. This is why the Special Forces motto is De Oppresso Liber, meaning to free the oppressed.
While Special Forces are also tasked with counterinsurgency, foreign internal defense, direct action, and special reconnaissance, unconventional warfare is what truly sets them apart. Green Berets are cultural warriors in the fullest sense of the term. They are trained in foreign languages, cultural adaptation, and living, training, and fighting alongside partner forces. This tradition stretches back to early practitioners such as T.E. Lawrence, who operated through Arab tribal networks during the First World War against the Ottoman Empire.
Over the past two decades, much of special operations has focused on direct action during the Global War on Terrorism. That period is now giving way to a different strategic environment. As the focus shifts toward peer competitors and the gray zones of proxy conflict, elements of the special operations community are returning to their original purposes. Green Berets once again find themselves refining the unconventional warfare skills that have always defined them, preparing for the next fight long before it arrives.
De Oppresso Liber
