I have an acquaintence who claims to have been in the Special Forces. He was definitely in the Army, but he is such a Walter Mitty type, I have great difficulty believing he was in SF. He told me his MOS was 18Z and I know that he was in the service in the early to mid-eighties. Is there some way to know, like a coin or something? I was sitting with him one time when he told someone that the drum on a Thompson submachinegun held 450 rounds.
Just curious,
Rob
Ask him what colour the boathouse is at Hereford.
Nicely done.
If they tell you about it, they didn’t do it. 
Challenge coins do exist, but I wouldn’t count on being able to identify someone from that. They, or close replicas, are available online, just like medals and insignia are. Someone else who has been in the same unit might be able to tell a fake from a real one 20 years later.
There might be some way to ask the Army. There was that big stink about Wedding Crashers and people faking service experience, don’t know if anything ever came of that.
Not much help, I’m afraid.
Rule of thumb, if he’s bragging about how he was in Special Forces, he wasn’t in Special Forces.
Ditto. People who have really been in special ops units don’t talk about it.
You need his full name, social security number, dates of service, and unit. You can fill out this form and send it here:
National Personnel Records
(Navy/Army/Airforce) Military Personnel Records
9700 Page Blvd.
St. Louis, MO 63132
This will tell you everything about his service record. You must say that you are requesting this information under the Freedom of Information Act or they will not respond.
Also something to note, I have seen it said in several places that although the detail of individual missions are not available to the public, that there are no “secret special ops” types that do not exist on the books, from reading a few fake vets sites this seems to be a favorite story.
Since even though my records clearly state I was a cook on a battleship, I am actually a seal team commander. 
FTR Drachillix has never served in the millitary…
How old is your friend? 18Z would indicate that he was the Operations NCO of an ODA (Operations Detachment Alpha) a twelve man team. Ask him if he knows what riser grease is.
Pretty much what everyone else said: if they’re talking about it, they probably didn’t do it.
True story: after the cease-fire in GW 1, large chunks of the U.S. Military was cycling though Khobar Towers on their way back stateside. At one of the fast-food concession stands/picnic areas (the mess hall food was atrocioius at that time), I overheard a buncha wind dummies doing the whole HOORAH! WE WERE FIRST! thing. I listened until I couldn’t stand it any longer and politely corrected them that the 1st Cav was the first conventional military ground forces into Iraq, but that we were beat by a long shot by all the various snake eaters, who wre probably in Iraq long before the air war kicked off.
Young wind dummies huffed and puffed, then went away.
Older guy, maybe a soldier, maybe not (his uniform had no rank insignia, nor unit patches) stopped by on the way out and simply said, “Thanks.”
I’m pretty sure he was a snake eater.
Didn’t call them SEALs in my day. We were UDT – Underwater Demolition Teams. I could tell you stories of training those Lien Doc Nguoi Nhia, but I won’t.
I know a guy (I’ll call him J) who was likely in the SAS. He’s about 70 years old and comes into my local a couple of times a week - always drinks a couple of straight vodkas and goes on his way. J is, frankly, a hugely impressive man. Quiet, intelligent, and even now that he is not a young man, he exudes an aura of contained power, certainly sufficient to make him the last person that anybody would try to mess with. He runs a small one man business (in no way related to matters martial!), but I won’t say what it is as there are only a handful in the UK, and only one in Scotland - suffice to say it involves extremely intricate wood craftsmanship.
Anyway, local scuttlebutt has it that J was in the SAS*, but for the fifteen or so years that I’ve known him, he’s never said a word about his military service - save once. We were talking about Vietnam war movies and how that there were very few gung-ho ones compared to WWII. J said (I paraphrase wildly here) “It’s understandable, there was no glory or glamour in Vietnam, I was there and it was a clusterfuck”. So I said “I didn’t know British soldiers were there”, and J replied (pretty much exact words) “No, a few of us resigned and went there with the Australians”. And that was about it.
So I have a question relating to this: Did some British soldiers hook up with the Aussies in Vietnam? If so, is it probable that they were special forces?
Struan’s special forces vet sounds like the one I met. He wasn’t QUITE out of service yet, but he was attending college classes while posted at a nearby base in North Carolina, getting ready to go into law enforcement and essentially counting down months to discharge.
Very neat guy. I always knew there was something about him even before I realized he was in SF. Incidentally, he just said he was in the army when I asked whether or not he was employed. I had to ask before he would mention special forces.
A young woman in class mentioned that, “Learning to defend yourself would be a great part of being in the service.”
He noted that you really wouldn’t want to use your military training on the street… most soldiers don’t learn useful amounts about non-lethal force, and “killing a man is the worst thing you’ll ever do in your life. I’ve done it seven times, and it gets worse afterwards every time; those guys were just there, doing their jobs, just like me. I know they had to have families…”
He mentioned being in the service like five times in the two years we knew each other. Real nice guy, very centered, and I wish more cops were the man he was, but I also realize the cloth he was cut from is very rare.
Oh, and I forgot to say, if you have any doubt, then he didn’t.
Ask him to show you his DD 214. I don’t see that Records Center providing a copy of that form to anyone who asks for it. It does have, after all, information covered by the Privacy Act. From the link Smitty provided:
My father gets nightmares from his 30 years in the army WW2, Korea and beginning of Vietnam. Sweetest and most gentle man I know, and I would not want his memories in a million years.
The worst thing about wannabes is that they present a false image to civilians who might tend to base their opinions about any number of issues upon these loser types who feel compelled to lie about their service, if any. “Stolen Valor” is a great book, the impetus largely brought about when a retiree was watching a news blurb one evening, and heard some idiot spouting off about something during an interview and claiming combat/special service etc. A little investigation showed the guy was a complete liar. Typically the type of folks who make outrageous claims are goofball, loner John Wayne types - exactly the sort who are never selected for the organizations they claim to have belonged to.
He is about 44. He told me he was E-6. What is riser grease?
Rob
From searching about a bit on Google it seems that riser grease is a non-existent product that is used to play tricks on people. Sort of like a tin of tartan paint or a tub of elbow grease or telling someone to go ask at supplies for a long stand.
I could be wrong and i’m sure someone will correct me if I am but that is the impression I get.
… I don’t get it