The qualification course consists of six sequential phases of training, upon completion of which Soldiers earn the right to join the Special Forces brotherhood, wear the Special Forces tab and don the green beret.
The Q course medical training includes a stint at a civilian hospital trauma unit and is arguably the most arduous among the four military occupational specialties that make up the SF ranks. "It lets you know there will be a high degree of specialty placed on you," he said, "and rank comes with that.
There are several times where you will not be able to see him during the Q-course (the field phases), but there are lots of times he will be available to be "home" during training (language, some parts of MOS).
The Q Course is now designed to be completed in a little more than 12 months for all Green Berets, except those training to become medics. Four classes start each year, allowing the course to align training with Army Special Operations Command's psychological operations and civil affairs students.
Both schools are physically and mentally challenging, but in different ways. I generally say that Ranger school sucks more but the Q course is harder.
Assuming you are reasonably intelligent, and in good physical shape, you have a 31% chance of successfully passing the US Army Special Forces Assessment and Selection Course (SFAS).
This phase is approximately 13 weeks in duration and includes training in Small Unit Tactics, SF Tactics, Survival Skills and Language and Cultural Training.
If they fail or are simply aren't selected during the Special Forces assessment, they are re-assigned to infantry. It wasn't always this way. In the past, Special Forces typically wanted soldiers to be older and more seasoned in the regular Army before making the jump.
RASP 1 has a 53% attrition rate. RASP 2 has a 74% attrition rate. SFAS has 64% and 51% attrition rates for enlisted soldiers and officers respectively, whereas SFQC has 35% and 27% attrition rates for the same categories. CCT selection has a 50% attrition rate with a further 27% rate for the Qualification Course.
This phase may take up to 18-24 weeks. The language opportunities of all Special Forces operators are Spanish, French, Portuguese, German, Indonesian, Czech, Persian-Farsi, Polish, Russian, Tagalog, Thai, Turkish, Arabic, Korean and Japanese.
As of Jun 16, 2022, the average annual pay for an Army Special Forces in the United States is $44,189 a year. Just in case you need a simple salary calculator, that works out to be approximately $21.24 an hour. This is the equivalent of $850/week or $3,682/month.
There isn't any big secret about passing selection, in fact to those of us who worked out there the saying used to be, “the answer is so simple that it is hard.” It is all about you the individual. Selection is 70 percent mental and 30 percent physical. You don't have to look like an NFL linebacker to pass the course.