Top Shot competitor Ashley Spurlin describes his time in the Air Force as part of the spec ops group no one’s heard of:
I graduated basic training on January 1, 2001, or 01/01/01, which is always easy to remember. I attended basic aerial gunner school where I was selected to be an aerial gunner on the infamous AC-130 gunship. Little did I know how important that would be. The schooling is several months of training in multiple locations. Finally the day of graduation arrived and my classmates and I marched our way into the classroom awaiting our course certificates. It was the morning of September 11, 2001. A few weeks later, the AC-130 gunships rolled into Afghanistan working with coalition Special Forces ground troops, pushing deeper into the country and devastating the enemy. It was the first combat the gunship had seen in years. As a young gunner, I was exposed to every aspect of the Special Operations Command (SOCOM) there is. This allowed me to learn the command structure for each part of SOCOM and the various capabilities and personnel each service has.
One that really intrigued me was the Air Force Special Operations Command, and more specifically, Air Force Combat Controllers. People have heard of Green Berets; people have heard of SEALS; people have heard of Marine Reconnaissance; and people have heard of Army Rangers. So I asked myself why nobody knew about Air Force Combat Controllers (CCT). Is it because the Air Force is generally known for being the Chair Force, or traditionally non-combatants? Probably. Is it because the Air Force is full of pencil pushers and desk jockeys? Ninety-nine percent correct. But the one percent that does not fit into those descriptors is one of the most amazing jobs in the DOD and SOCOM. No I am not just saying this because I am one; please feel free to check into the facts yourself.
After meeting several CCT guys and other Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) members — yes, the guys who got Bin Laden — I decided I wanted to be on the ground and in the fight as any young man in the military usually does. So after several deployments on the AC-130 gunship and multiple combat missions, I put in my paperwork to cross train to try out for Combat Control.
The CCT pipeline averages about two years of training just to be combat mission ready and deployable, this is assuming you pass every school and do not get injured while doing so, which is very difficult to do. Some of the schools include Army Airborne School, Military Freefall Parachutists Course (HALO — High Altitude Low Opening) in Yuma, Arizona; Special Operations Combat Dive School in Key West, Florida; Marine Combatant Dive School in Panama City, Florida; and several other schools in the SOCOM or DOD. Aside from those schools, all CCTs have to go to Air Traffic Control School and become certified FAA air traffic controllers (ATC). The reason for this school is due to the fact that it is precursor to becoming a Joint Terminal Attack Controller (JTAC). A fully qualified CCT-JTAC on the battlefield can control every air asset from a man portable Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) up to a B-1 or B-52 bomber and everything in between. This makes a CCT a very, very valuable asset. Any ground force commander will tell you the first guy they look for when things go bad is the CCT guy to call in Close Air Support and put accurate firepower on the target. It does not matter if it is ground artillery such as 105mm or 155mm Howitzers, AC-130 gunship fire missions, A-10 gun runs, or Apache rocket attack, the CCT is responsible for it all, sometimes all at once. Yes, one guy with one or two radios can do it all while being shot at in a fire fight.
CCT guys do not operate as a team amongst themselves; our specialty is being attached to whatever SOCOM team that needs one. It sounds easy. However what this means is that if you get attached to an Army Green Beret team, you have to know your own job inside and out, and at the same time you have to know their training as well. Hence the reason we go to the Army’s Ranger school, SCUBA school, Airborne school, HALO school and any other Army school you can think of such as Air Assault, Static Line Jumpmaster, HALO Jumpmaster, and the list goes on—all so we can work with the Green Berets. What happens if you get attached to a Navy SEAL team? Yes, you guessed it, next thing you know, Navy Freefall School is in order along with several other schools necessary to be able to operate with the SEALS. Marines traditionally have always had their own Close Air Support (MARSOC). Marines doing similar jobs to a CCT, but in the last few years since MARSOC has been stood-up, CCT guys have been doing a lot more work with the Marines as well. I was fortunate enough to attend some of their training with 3rd Recon in Okinawa Japan and can say that those Marines provide some of the best training I have ever received.
After several years of training, a fully qualified CCT member will finally get to deploy attached to a SOCOM unit and go to war. Afghanistan could not be a more perfect environment for a CCT. It was the war that would finally get CCTs noticed. Shortly after Afghanistan, Iraq became a hot bed of CCT activity as well providing an even greater need for CCT guys on the ground. It has not slowed down to this day and probably will not any time in the future.