Jægerkorpset
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jægerkorpset (translated from Danish as Hunter Corps or Ranger Corps) is a Danish Special Forces unit, a part of the Royal Danish Army. Its base is Aalborg Air Base. Members of the corps wear a burgundy beret with a hunting horn badge.
Jægerkorpset is comprised of 136 (September 2005) highly-trained soldiers with special expertise in Counter-Terrorism, including demolitions, parachuting, and combat swimming. Its mission and structure is generally considered equivalent or similar to that of the U.S. Army Special Forces and the British SAS.
The selection course to becoming a Jægersoldat (a member of Jægerkorpset) is very demanding, both mentally and physically. For a candidate to be accepted into the course, he must complete a shortened Patruljekursus ("Patrol Course") of five days and subsequently an additional two weekends of exercises. He also has to meet the demands for becoming a sergeant, since applicants who are not at least a sergeant have to go to sergeant school. The course focuses primarily on navigation and orientation skills. If this course is passed with a grade of "very satisfactory" (equal to 4 on a 1-5 scale), the applicant can then proceed to the Patrol Course. The Patrol Course lasts eight weeks; only if it is completed with the grade of "very satisfactory" can the applicant be part of the Aspirantkursus ("Aspirant Course"). If this is completed the applicant is considered "one of the family", and placed on a "tryout" period of 1½ years after completing a ten day swimming course, followed by ten days of basic parachute training.
As a rule of thumb, only one or two out of each 100 applicants to the Patrol Course become members of the Corps. Since the corps was founded 1. November 1961 between 300-400 Jægers have been trained.
Members do not spend much time at the Aalborg base, as they generally spend 200 to 250 days a year in training or on missions.
In January 2006 the corps chief, Lieutenant colonel Henrik H. Friis, appeared in the Danish media in a new show of openness on behalf of the corps. He regretted that the corps had no real missions lately which could not be substituted by training. At the same time it was reported that though the corps had been active in reconnaissance and designating targets in Afghanistan 2002 they had not been involved in direct firefights.
