WASHINGTON -- The deaths of four U.S. soldiers from exposure while on an exercise in a Florida swamp this week has triggered an investigation into the rigors of military training for the elite Army Ranger force.
This week's training victims, all in their 20s, died of hypothermia after spending hours in water that was 52 degrees, two degrees higher than the minimum set in 1977 after two other soldiers died during Ranger training.
The Ranger water training program -- conducted in a swamp at Eglin Air Force Base -- has been suspended, while Army medical and psychological experts decide whether it is too harsh for the young men who volunteer for it.
Defense Secretary William J. Perry said yesterday that the investigation would determine whether training procedures should be changed or more safeguards introduced.
For the Rangers the training is about as tough as it gets. They are taken to the limits of physical and emotional endurance, fed just enough to stop them from losing muscle, allowed to sleep only long enough to prevent disorientation, and exposed to desert, mountain and swamp conditions.
After eight weeks of extreme rigor they have earned the right to wear the simple "Ranger" tab, identifying them as members of an elite band of warriors who trace their roots back to frontier scouts in colonial times, to "Roger's Rangers" in the 18th-century French and Indian War, to "Mosby's Rangers" in the Civil War, and to "Merrill's Marauders" of World War II fame. The common thread over the centuries: -- and derring-do.
Noting that the Rangers had "a very, very arduous and difficult training routine," Mr. Perry added: "I want to emphasize that in the kind of training we do for very difficult military operations, they will never, never be risk-free."
Tough training is meant to give elite troops -- such as the Marines, the Army Rangers and Special Forces, the Navy Seals and Air Force Air Commandos -- an edge in combat.
Col. Barry Willey, a Ranger training battalion commander from 1991 to 1993 and a trainee 20 years earlier, said: "I remember specifically one of the problems some of us had was our feet literally freezing, and having, at the end of all this, to cut the boots off my feet.
"You get to the point where you just want it to be over, and yet you also realize that you can't, as we say 'stack arms,' you can't completely give up. You have to go to the very last mission, the last day, the last phase, and then, eventually, it's finished.
"You are emotionally drained, but you are elated at the same time that you have made it through, and you realize you are going to get that [Ranger] tab after all."
David Hogan, author of "Raiders or Elite Infantry? -- The Changing Role of the U.S. Army Rangers from Dieppe to Grenada," said: "It goes beyond the training, really. I think it is the belief that 'We are a special unit.'
"It doesn't necessarily mean the best men, and yet . . . you do have a certain esprit you don't see in a lot of other units. I think this idea of being one of the chosen few does contribute to that."
To be chosen for the Rangers you have to be a three-time volunteer -- for the Army, airborne training and the Rangers.
The training is designed to simulate battlefield conditions and to teach the Rangers their combat specialties -- behind-the-lines reconnaissance, ambush and raid.
The official Army description of the course credits its graduates with being able to "overcome insurmountable mental and physical challenges." It adds: "The graduate of the Ranger course is the epitome of military competence and efficiency in all infantry skills."
Graduates return to their Army combat units or join the 75th Ranger Regiment. Wherever they serve, their creed calls on Rangers to "move further, faster and fight harder than any other soldier."
The creed continues: "I will never leave a fallen comrade to fall into the hands of the enemy," an oath last put to the test in the October 1993 Somalia firefight, in which 18 Rangers died and more than 70 were injured during a 10-hour battle with the forces of rebel leader Mohammed Farah Aidid.
If the Marines view themselves as "A Few Good Men," the Rangers are "The Quiet Professionals."
Stealth is a Ranger way of life, whether it is scaling the cliffs at Omaha beach in Normandy, creeping to within 50 yards of an Italian stronghold in Libya's Sened Pass before overrunning it, or surprising the guards at the Japanese prisoner-of-war camp at Cabantuan in the Philippines.
The father of the modern Rangers was Lt. Col. William Orlando Darby. He modeled them on the British commandos with whom they initially trained in Scotland during World War II. The first 40-man unit then joined Canadian commandos for a raid across the English Channel against the Germans at Dieppe, France.
Top brass in the United States were so impressed that they formed a second battalion, and later gave Colonel Darby permission to form the third and fourth battalions, which fought in North Africa and Italy. Eventually two other Ranger battalions were formed and fought in Europe and the Pacific.
After the war, the Ranger battalions were disbanded. But in the Korean War, commanders decided they again needed the sort of behind-the-lines strikes Rangers could launch. In 1951 they opened the Ranger training course at Fort Benning, Ga.
During the Vietnam War, Rangers attached to various divisions proved their worth on long-range patrols, and the 75th Ranger Regiment was reformed.
The current Ranger course is divided into four phases: basic BTC combat training at Fort Benning, Ga; desert training at Fort Bliss, Texas; mountain training at Dahlonega, Ga., and swamp training at Eglin.
"The Ranger is supposed to be one man who can do anything and survive," said Roma Danysh, a historian with the Army Center for Military History. "The idea is they are supposed to be able to do the best a soldier can accomplish. That's why the training needs to be rigorous."
HYPOTHERMIA
* Hypothermia means the body cannot produce sufficient heat to function properly.
* A relatively young, healthy person can tolerate air temperatures down to 50 degrees for several hours, retain body heat and still function normally. Immerse the same individual to his neck in 50-degree water and in less than 10 minutes he'll be shivering uncontrollably. Forty minutes after being immersed, he'll be in irreversible shock, lapse into a coma. Within an hour, he'll die of cardiac arrest.
* As body temperature dips, drowsiness sets in, and breathing and heart rates slow. As hypothermia becomes more severe, it leads to cardiac arrest, unconsciousness and death.
* Treatment includes warming the body gradually, sometimes using warm baths or an enveloping mattress-like device filled with warm air. Warm fluid can be pumped into the abdominal cavity.