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Subject: NAVY SEALS VS BRITISH SAS
LJ813    7/1/2005 9:34:17 PM
I WILL GO FOR THE NAVY..
 
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JTR~~    in regards to the actual topic however   10/28/2011 9:50:31 AM

In regards to the actual topic, despite being difficult to compare anyway, it is
always unfair to try and compare the SAS to any other Special Forces unit in
the world for one simple reason. Their level of secrecy. all units have their
secrets but i would gladly put money on saying the in terms of the known
special forces units in the world, the SAS are indeed one of if not the single
most secretive special forces outfits around, certainly more so than their US
counterparts (and i am not suggesting here that the US special forces are not
in any way secretive about their operations either as they quite clearly are).
in fact the only outfit that i feel keeps its cards even closer to its chest
would be the SAS' counterparts in the British SRS/SRR (Special Reconnaissance
Service/Regiment) which originally sourced its routes from the highly elusive
I14 (Intelligence 14) company that operated extensively and highly covertly
throughout Northern and indeed Southern Ireland during the troubles over there.
There is simply not enough information in circulation to make any form of
neither accurate nor reasoned comparisons. as such, most arguments are based on
hear say, guestimations, nationalist pride and legends/reputations which i
think most would agree do not make for particularly effective arguments
especially when you attempt to marry such theories with the few actual
plausible snippets of information than one may have to hand, which even then
would be difficult to confirm with absolute authority.

exercises in regards to most special forces comparisons largely just boil down to a war
of reputations and rumours of exploits with the ever frequent undertones of
nationalism (which is not entirely bad when respect is shown to both sides, its
biased nationalism, without any consideration for the opposing argument that i dislike,
unless perhaps it is being used in the face of total ignorance, in which case
it may be acceptable).

to this end though should i make a comment in regards to the original topic, as far as
reputations are concerned the SAS has one of if not the best in the business,
few can even attempt to emulate the few exploits that we do know of and they
continue to make very big impact today (recent reports have revealed that joint
special forces task groups killed 1400 senior and junior Taliban soldiers on
the so called "hit/hunt" missions in a single 90 day period), and
since all we have to go on in purely reputations based on past activities and a
few pieces of plausible information, i would like to state that personally i
feel that the SAS/SBS/SRR (essentially all part of the same unit if you will,
to all intents and purposes that is) are quite simply the best of the best.

but then again, can i confirm my claims, probably not and i would never be able to, not
unless someone was to set up an exercise where the mimicked every single
possible military scenario, with every variable taken into account over many
hundreds of occasions featuring a comparison between two sets of special forces
with a winner being declared as the absolute best based only upon achieving at
least a 95% success ratio against all opponents in all the scenario ranges that
they are pitted against to officially be declared the best special forces in
the world. This as we all know is impossible and even then, the results
wouldn't be 100% assured.

 

 



 
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lunar    right JTTR...   10/29/2011 7:24:49 PM

Service/Regiment) which originally sourced its routes from the highly elusive
I14 (Intelligence 14) company that operated extensively and highly covertly
throughout Northern and indeed Southern Ireland during the troubles over there.
There is simply not enough information in circulation to make any form of
neither accurate nor reasoned comparisons. as such, most arguments are based on
hear say, guestimations, nationalist pride and legends/reputations which i
think most would agree do not make for particularly effective arguments
especially when you attempt to marry such theories with the few actual
plausible snippets of information than one may have to hand, which even then
would be difficult to confirm with absolute authority.

exercises in regards to most special forces comparisons largely just boil down to a war
of reputations and rumours of exploits with the ever frequent undertones of
nationalism (which is not entirely bad when respect is shown to both sides, its
biased nationalism, without any consideration for the opposing argument that i dislike,
unless perhaps it is being used in the face of total ignorance, in which case
it may be acceptable).


to this end though should i make a comment in regards to the original topic, as far as
reputations are concerned the SAS has one of if not the best in the business,
few can even attempt to emulate the few exploits that we do know of and they
continue to make very big impact today (recent reports have revealed that joint
special forces task groups killed 1400 senior and junior Taliban soldiers on
the so called "hit/hunt" missions in a single 90 day period), and
since all we have to go on in purely reputations based on past activities and a
few pieces of plausible information, i would like to state that personally i
feel that the SAS/SBS/SRR (essentially all part of the same unit if you will,
to all intents and purposes that is) are quite simply the best of the best.


but then again, can i confirm my claims, probably not and i would never be able to, not
unless someone was to set up an exercise where the mimicked every single
possible military scenario, with every variable taken into account over many
hundreds of occasions featuring a comparison between two sets of special forces
with a winner being declared as the absolute best based only upon achieving at
least a 95% success ratio against all opponents in all the scenario ranges that
they are pitted against to officially be declared the best special forces in
the world. This as we all know is impossible and even then, the results
wouldn't be 100% assured.


 


 








 
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lunar       10/29/2011 7:30:06 PM

Service/Regiment) which originally sourced its routes from the highly elusive
I14 (Intelligence 14) company that operated extensively and highly covertly
throughout Northern and indeed Southern Ireland during the troubles over there.
There is simply not enough information in circulation to make any form of
neither accurate nor reasoned comparisons. as such, most arguments are based on
hear say, guestimations, nationalist pride and legends/reputations which i
think most would agree do not make for particularly effective arguments
especially when you attempt to marry such theories with the few actual
plausible snippets of information than one may have to hand, which even then
would be difficult to confirm with absolute authority.

exercises in regards to most special forces comparisons largely just boil down to a war
of reputations and rumours of exploits with the ever frequent undertones of
nationalism (which is not entirely bad when respect is shown to both sides, its
biased nationalism, without any consideration for the opposing argument that i dislike,
unless perhaps it is being used in the face of total ignorance, in which case
it may be acceptable).


to this end though should i make a comment in regards to the original topic, as far as
reputations are concerned the SAS has one of if not the best in the business,
few can even attempt to emulate the few exploits that we do know of and they
continue to make very big impact today (recent reports have revealed that joint
special forces task groups killed 1400 senior and junior Taliban soldiers on
the so called "hit/hunt" missions in a single 90 day period), and
since all we have to go on in purely reputations based on past activities and a
few pieces of plausible information, i would like to state that personally i
feel that the SAS/SBS/SRR (essentially all part of the same unit if you will,
to all intents and purposes that is) are quite simply the best of the best.


but then again, can i confirm my claims, probably not and i would never be able to, not
unless someone was to set up an exercise where the mimicked every single
possible military scenario, with every variable taken into account over many
hundreds of occasions featuring a comparison between two sets of special forces
with a winner being declared as the absolute best based only upon achieving at
least a 95% success ratio against all opponents in all the scenario ranges that
they are pitted against to officially be declared the best special forces in
the world. This as we all know is impossible and even then, the results
wouldn't be 100% assured.


 


 








 
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Flightmedic    You're an idiot   2/6/2012 9:42:22 PM
Really? we obviously know you're not military because you think seals only train for 6 weeks, Pre BUD/S is longer than 6 weeks. My 6 year old nephew even knows that's absurd. Are you even qualified to answer this thread? SeALs trains for 2+ years. They go thru Navy Boot at Great Lakes, Pre BUD/S, BUD/S, Post BUD/S, Basic Parachute then their AIT (corpsman, electronics, etc.) Also, Lanton there are more boots on ground SeALS in Iraq and Afghan than any other Special Operations group, Army, Air Force, Marine Corps. I have evac more SeALs than Delta or Combat Controllers.BTW I'm 68W F3 just if you wanted to know.......
 
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BrianLe25       4/18/2012 1:54:42 AM
HAHAHA you're funny.. SEALS training are never over and their boot camp is over 6 months
 
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samR.    Amazing   5/11/2012 12:11:03 AM
This must be the longest thread I've ran into...  Of course I didn't read even 10% of the thread, so not sure if all the the discussion was about the SEAL vs SAS, but I can tell you that many new seals and SAS individuals have joined, retired, and died since this thread was started.  But you guys are just like the energizer bunny!! ticking and typing... FOR SIX YEARS...wow!!!
 
 
 
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CJH       5/28/2012 1:26:46 PM
I can see you trying to compare the Seals and the SAS in terms of overall guiding philosopies, training regimens and just overall standards.
 
But in reading Dunnigan's book on special ops soldiers, one facet that stood out was the way the size of the nation's general population affects the services' ability to be highly selective and yet still assemble a right sized team of elite soldiers/sailors. The higher the population to draw from, the higher the standards of selection can be for a given number of program graduates.
 
That alone affords the US a significant potential advantage over the UK. Of course if the SAS draws from the whole British Commonwealth of Nations, that would offset such a disadvantage.
 
And this observation should also inform us about the potential for such advantages for China and India.
 
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yomanry1       9/26/2012 8:44:53 AM
SAS would have to parachute in?
have you heard of the iranian embassy siege?
Thou shalt not belittle THEM 
 
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yomanry1       9/26/2012 8:54:54 AM



Training. The SEALs go through very harsh training at BUD's, probably the -hardest - training in the world; Hell week is unmatched in pressure, stress, physical fatigue, and mental fatigue, but BUD's is short. After Hell week, training is nowhere near as intense. The SAS go through alot of land nav courses and also do a good bit of running, but it is not as intense as BUDs and is a more casual experience (you are treated like a human being, not a abused animal). The SAS course is much longer and it is very hard on your feet. Both training courses are very effective for what they are trying to teach. BUD's and follow up training produces top quality Combat divers and Maritime operaters. The SAS training course (I do not know what it is called) produces top-quality Land nav and counter-terrorist commandos. There is no way to compare training, as both is extremely hard and 'hard' is different for every person. For example, some SAS commandos may have trouble swimming from one side of an olympic sized pool and back underwater, but some SEALs might have trouble completing a timed land nav course in which you do not know the distance only the time you have to make it in.

Reptutation. The SAS wins this one, as they are thought of as the best in the world by almost everyone. This is probably not fair to the other SOF forces, but they have earned their reputation (even if it is a little bloated).

Who would win in a fight. Well, since there is roughly 5,000 Navy SEALs and 500 or so SAS, I am going with the SEAL's :)
 
 
Seals Hardest training?
Might be, but at least the instructors are there to push you.
Don't you dare say SAS is just running
with a 100 or so pound bergen on your back tabbing 50 miles on pen y fan with DSs that don't seem to give a shit about you is spirit crushing. People have died from frostbite in training and once you get lost its not pass or fail: you die.
Also, you may say relaxed and it certainly is, but its all about self discipline. Once you take advantage of it and slacken off, you go straight to platform 4 (railway station) bye bye!
So you can say THEY have their reputation for a reason.
Sorry don't misunderstand me I do love the SEALs like shit.
Just that I don't want you to think SAS is inferior. We both have our ways of making tough motherfuckers, although our methods are different, the result is the same. 
 

 
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MonkeyFist       10/5/2012 6:14:14 AM
WOW!! 73 pages of this. Might as well add to it.
Please correct me if i'm wrong.
1) You cannot compare SEAL's to S.A.S
2) The guy responsible for creating the SEAL's was S.A.S trained
3) SEAL'S have Hell Week where they are Mentally Abused.
4) The S.A.S comprise of the 21st, 22nd & 23rd Only the 22nd are FULLTIME.
5) Both have screwed up missions in the past.
6) Little is known about S.A.S selection/training. You have to have served time in the Army before applying to the S.A.S. Most fail the selection first time.
7) SEAL'S have the "You never leave a man behind" psyche. The S.A.S have "We have to leave you mate, sorry" if putting the others at risk.
 8) The Para's & Royal Marine Commando's are Elite Regiments within the British Army. S.A.S & S.B.S are special forces
 
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