Blue Light

Blue Light was a unit of the 5th Special Forces Group that existed into the early 1980s. There are two theories extant as to Blue Light's origins.

Beckwith Memoirs - According to Col. Charles Beckwith's memoirs, this counter-terrorist group was formed by U.S. Army Special Forces leadership who disagreed with or felt politically threatened by Beckwith's Delta Force. The unit was supposedly disbanded when the Delta Force went operational. It is rumored to still exist under the same name or covert black ops name. [Beckwith, Charles. "Delta Force", Avon Books, 2000. (Mass market paperback; original work published 1983.) ISBN 0380809397]

Rod Lenahan book's "Crippled Eagle" [July 1998 Publisher: Narwhal Pr Inc ISBN-10: 1886391238ISBN-13: 9781886391239] reports that the creation of Blue Light was asked by top brass of the Pentagon when they had just given the order to found Delta because Beckwith estimated that it would take 24 months to set up its unit . The purpose of Blue Light was to provide a immediately available CT unit as long as Delta wasn't operational. Blue Light was deactivated shortly after Delta completed its initial certification exercise in July 1978. Allegedly, no Blue Light member applied to Delta nor was asked by Delta to do so. The Blue Light S-2, Capt. Tim Casey, was latter one of the intel officers assigned to JTF 1-79 which commanded the ill-fated Operation Ricebowl / Eagle Claw.

References in popular culture

In the film "Die Hard 2", the counter-terrorist team that is called in to deal with the terrorists is also called Blue Light.

References