In United States military terminology, high-value target (HVT) is the term used to describe a person or resource which an enemy commander can least afford to lose. [1] The term has been widely used in the news media for Osama bin Laden and high-ranking officers of al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations. Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was known as High-Value Target Number One by the United States military before his capture.
High-value individual (HVI) can be used if the target is a person.
A high-payoff target, also known as an HPT, is a high-value target whose loss to the enemy will significantly contribute to the success of a friendly course of action. [1]
Various Joint Special Operations Task Forces (Task Force 145, Task Force 121, Task Force 11) have been established for the main purposes of capturing or killing targets judged to be vital to an enemy's chances for success. Forces assigned to these include units mainly from the Joint Special Operations Command and SOCOM such as the US Navy SEALs, US Army Delta Force, US Navy SEAL Team Six, US Army 75th Ranger Regiment and elements of the British Army's Special Air Service (SAS). [2] The term has also become associated with secret US Department of Defense programs to capture and subsequently interrogate terrorist leaders. [3]
The United States Navy Sea, Air, and Land (SEAL) Teams, commonly known as Navy SEALs, are the U.S. Navy's primary special operations force and a component of the Naval Special Warfare Command. Among the SEALs' main functions are conducting small-unit special operation missions in maritime, jungle, urban, arctic, mountainous, and desert environments. SEALs are typically ordered to capture or kill high level targets, or to gather intelligence behind enemy lines. SEAL team personnel are hand selected, highly trained, and possess a high degree of proficiency in direct action (DA), and special reconnaissance (SR), among other tasks like sabotage, demolition, intelligence gathering, and hydro-graphic reconnaissance, training, and advising friendly militaries or other forces.
Operation Anaconda or the Battle of Shah-i-Kot was a military operation that took place in early March 2002 as part of the War in Afghanistan. CIA paramilitary officers, working with their allies, attempted to destroy al-Qaeda and Taliban forces. The operation took place in the Shah-i-Kot Valley and Arma Mountains southeast of Zormat. This operation was the first large-scale battle in the post-2001 War in Afghanistan since the Battle of Tora Bora in December 2001. This was the first operation in the Afghanistan theater to involve a large number of U.S. forces participating in direct combat activities.
Seymour Myron "Sy" Hersh is an American investigative journalist and political writer. He gained recognition in 1969 for exposing the My Lai massacre and its cover-up during the Vietnam War, for which he received the 1970 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting. During the 1970s, Hersh covered the Watergate scandal for The New York Times, also reporting on the secret U.S. bombing of Cambodia and the CIA's program of domestic spying. In 2004, he detailed the U.S. military's torture and abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib in Iraq for The New Yorker. Hersh has won a record five George Polk Awards, and two National Magazine Awards. He is the author of 11 books, including The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House (1983), an account of the career of Henry Kissinger which won the National Book Critics Circle Award.
The 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), abbreviated as 160th SOAR (A), is a special operations force of the United States Army that provides helicopter aviation support for special operations forces. Its missions have included attack, assault, and reconnaissance, and these missions are usually conducted at night, at high speeds, low altitudes, and on short notice.
The 75th Ranger Regiment, also known as Army Rangers, is the premier light infantry unit and special operations force within the United States Army Special Operations Command. The regiment is headquartered at Fort Moore, Georgia and is composed of a regimental headquarters company, a military intelligence battalion, a special troops battalion, and three Ranger battalions.
The Special Activities Center (SAC) is a division of the United States Central Intelligence Agency responsible for covert and paramilitary operations. The unit was named Special Activities Division (SAD) prior to 2015. Within SAC there are two separate groups: SAC/SOG for tactical paramilitary operations and SAC/PAG for covert political action.
Task Force 20 is a temporary combat force designation that has been used several times and may still be used by separate parts of the United States armed forces. The longer-established iteration was a part of the United States Second Fleet in the Atlantic from after the Second World War. This was part of the formal United States Military Communications-Electronic Board system.
Task Force 121 was a United States Department of Defense special operations task force. TF121 was a multi-service force from Joint Special Operations Command, made up of operators from the U.S. Army's Delta Force, 75th Ranger Regiment, and 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, the U.S. Navy's SEAL Team Six, the CIA's Special Activities Division, U.S. Air Force Combat Controllers, Pararescuemen, Tactical Air Control Party operators, and Special Operations Weather Technicians, the Aviation Tactics Evaluation Group (AvTEG), and the Joint Communications Unit. Two companies of armor from the U.S. Army 4th Infantry Division and later two cavalry troops from 1/1 Cav 1st Armored Division provided armor support.
The Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) is a joint component command of the United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) and is charged with studying special operations requirements and techniques to ensure interoperability and equipment standardization, to plan and conduct special operations exercises and training, to develop joint special operations tactics, and to execute special operations missions worldwide. It was established in 1980 on recommendation of Colonel Charlie Beckwith, in the aftermath of the failure of Operation Eagle Claw. It is headquartered at Pope Field.
Targeting is the process of selecting objects or installations to be attacked, taken, or destroyed in warfare. Targeting systematically analyzes and prioritizes targets and matches appropriate lethal and nonlethal actions to those targets to create specific desired effects that achieve the joint force commander's (JFC's) objectives, accounting for operational requirements, capabilities, and the results of previous assessments. The emphasis of targeting is on identifying resources (targets) the enemy can least afford to lose or that provide him with the greatest advantage, then further identifying the subset of those targets that must be acquired and engaged to achieve friendly success. Targeting links the desired effects to actions and tasks.
Shortly after the September 11 attacks, the United States declared the beginning of the war on terror and subsequently led a multinational invasion of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan. The stated goal was to dismantle al-Qaeda, which had executed the attacks under the leadership of Osama bin Laden, and to deny Islamist militants a safe base of operations in Afghanistan by toppling the Taliban government. The United Kingdom was a key ally of the United States, offering support for military action from the start of the invasion preparations. The American military presence in Afghanistan greatly bolstered the Northern Alliance, which had been locked in a losing fight with the Taliban during the Afghan Civil War. Prior to the beginning of the United States' war effort, the Taliban had seized around 85% of Afghanistan's territory as well as the capital city of Kabul, effectively confining the Northern Alliance to Badakhshan Province and smaller surrounding areas. The American-led invasion on October 7, 2001, marked the first phase of what would become the 20-year-long War in Afghanistan and was the technical start of the War on Terror.
Farouk Hijazi is a former Iraqi government official who served the Iraqi government during the rulership of Saddam Hussein. Hijazi served as Hussein's Director of External Operations for the Mukhabarat, the Iraqi intelligence service for many years before becoming Iraq's ambassador to Turkey.
The United States Army Intelligence Support Activity (USAISA), frequently shortened to Intelligence Support Activity (ISA), also known at various times as Joint Reconnaissance Evaluation Group (JREG), Mission Support Activity (MSA), Office of Military Support (OMS), Field Operations Group (FOG), Studies and Analysis Activity (SAA), Tactical Concept Activity, Tactical Support Team, and Tactical Coordination Detachment, and also nicknamed "The Activity" and the Army of Northern Virginia, is a United States Army Special Operations unit which serves as the intelligence gathering component of Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC). Within JSOC, the unit is often referred to as Task Force Orange. Originally subordinated to the US Army Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM), it is one of the least known intelligence components of the United States military, tasked with clandestine HUMINT operations and collecting actionable intelligence during or prior to JSOC missions.
On May 2, 2011, Osama bin Laden, the founder and first leader of the Islamist militant group al-Qaeda, was shot and killed at his compound in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad by United States Navy SEALs of SEAL Team Six. The operation, code-named Operation Neptune Spear, was carried out in a CIA-led mission, with the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) coordinating the Special Mission Units involved in the raid. In addition to SEAL Team Six, participating units under JSOC included the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), also known as the "Night Stalkers," and the CIA's Special Activities Division, which heavily recruits from former JSOC Special Mission Units. The success of the operation ended a nearly decade-long manhunt for bin Laden, who was accused of masterminding the September 11 attacks on the United States.
The terms Tier One Special Mission Unit and Special Missions Unit (SMU) are used, particularly in the United States, to describe some highly secretive and elite military special operations forces. Special mission units have been involved in high-profile military operations, such as the killing of Osama bin Laden.
Manhunting is a term sometimes used for military operations by special operations forces and intelligence organizations to search for, and capture or kill important enemy combatants, known as high-value targets. It has been used particularly in the United States during the War on Terror.
Joint Special Operations Command Task Force in the Iraq War was a joint American and British special operations unit, of which little is publicly known. It is described as a "hunter-killer team" with its core made up of the United States Army's 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta and the 75th Ranger Regiment, as well as the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group and members of the United States Air Force's 24th Special Tactics Squadron, all under Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) and elements from the United Kingdom Special Forces, including the Special Air Service, Special Boat Service (SBS), Special Reconnaissance Regiment (SRR), 18 (UKSF) Signal Regiment and the Special Forces Support Group (SFSG). The unit was reported to be responsible for the cross border raid into Syria from Iraq in October 2008 that resulted in eight deaths including Abu Ghadiya, along with several US operations in the Horn of Africa targeting al-Qaeda.
The United States Special Operations Command is the unified combatant command charged with overseeing the various special operations component commands of the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, and Air Force of the United States Armed Forces. The command is part of the Department of Defense and is the only unified combatant command created by an Act of Congress. USSOCOM is headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida.