A key factor in the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault)’s capability to conduct very large-scale air assault operations is the role played by the Sabalauski Air Assault School, co-located with the 101st’s headquarters at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

Soldiers

SFC Matthew Conrad has an extensive military background in artillery and is second in charge and Lead Instructor at the Sabalauski Air Assault School. He summarized the function of the school’s air assault course as building a basic mastery of the air assault tactics and techniques necessary to conduct air assault operations in the future. “It instils the basic amount of grit a soldier needs to have the required tenacity and teaches the basic knowledge required to establish a comfortable baseline skillset to conduct a successful air assault operation,” he commented.

Captain Jonathan McLeroy is a West Pointer and completed Officer basic training and Ranger school, serving on the 10th Mountain Division and the 75th Ranger Regiment before joining the 101st. He commanded the Air Assault School until mid-2024 and described what is special about the 101st and how that is tied in with the school. “We’re one of several light divisions that can carry out air assault missions, along with units like the 82nd Airborne, the 75th Rangers, the 10th Mountain Division and Special Operations, but what makes us different is the scale of our capability and our sense of urgency. Those other units can do air assaults at a company or platoon level, but only we can do it at a brigade or division level,” he explained.

To enable the 101st’s scale of operation, the division’s CAB (Combat Aviation Brigade) has more fuel capacity and vertical lift capability than any other division in the U.S. Army. For example, the normal aviation support unit fields 12 CH47s, while the 101st boasts 26. “That’s just in the aviation. Then there’s the scale in the guns and the scale in the Air Assault School,” Capt. McLeroy elaborated. “There are several other air assault schools in the Army but they don’t do it at the scale we do. The next closest school does about 1,100 students a year, which seems a lot but we do 14,400. At maximum capacity we take 300 students at a time and while they do ten classes a year, we do 45 and that’s not counting when we go overseas and do several more around the country.” The 101st takes on a significant number of new personnel every year, some soldiers take several attempts to pass the air assault course, and many participants come to the school from other U.S. and partner nation units, so filling the courses is never a problem.

After completing the ten-and-a-half-day air assault course, soldiers have rappelled from a UH60 Blackhawk, learned about different tactical insertions, rigging and inspecting sling loads and talked about extraction and movement of all the equipment required to conduct and sustain air assault operations. Although nowhere near as demanding and challenging as a Special Forces induction course, for most regular soldiers, the air assault course is one of the more demanding courses they will undertake during their career. SFC Conrad elaborated on the makeup of the course schedule, outlining, “There are three phases, not including Day zero. Day zero is effectively an audition to get into the course, and they have eighteen minutes to complete a two-mile run in uniform and running shoes, then are briefed on the obstacle course. After a warm-up, they must successfully negotiate both major obstacles and six out of seven minor obstacles. Day zero also includes a number of briefings on the standards and expectations for course participants.”

Phases

Day one commences with an inspection of all the required equipment that participants have been briefed on. “If they do not have a particular piece of equipment or it is not presentable, they are dropped immediately,” SFC Conrad advised. Phase one of the course proper includes aircraft orientation, aero-med’ and PZ/LZ operations. Theory work is mainly done through PowerPoint presentations and is supplemented by hands-on practical training and familiarization. Phase one culminates with a six-mile road march, carrying approximately 35 pounds dry, with a 90-minute time limit.

Phase two introduces sling load operations, concentrating on the four most common loads utilized on the 101st’s air assault operations. These are the AC2, the 5K cargo net, the M1102 high-mobility trailer and the M1151 Humvee. “They get a block of instruction on each load; how to rig and inspect each of them and then they’ll do practical exercises on inspecting them within the two-minute time standard. Within that time, they have to identify three out of four deficiencies on that load in order to receive their go,” SFC Conrad explained. “The culminating event for Phase-two is a four-mile run at a nine-minute pace and they must remain in formation throughout the run to receive their go.”

The third and final phase is commonly regarded as the fun phase, which participants usually enjoy most as they learn and execute rappelling. “We start with ground training and teach them their equipment, how to tie a hip rappel seat and how to inspect their equipment for serviceability.” Participants then move to the inclined ramp, where they get comfortable with using and trusting the equipment to rappel. In a crawl-walk-run training methodology, the next step is rappelling down the walled side of the 34ft tower, followed by a switch to the open side of the tower. Capt. McLeroy explained that the 34ft height has been determined as that at which one can no longer distinguish the difference in height above ground, so there is theoretically no psychological difference between rappelling from 34ft or 100ft.

During Day nine, participants are tested on their ability to correctly tie a hip rappel seat in 90 seconds and must demonstrate the ability to hook up properly within fifteen seconds. After passing those tests, they can then rappel from the UH60. On the morning of day ten is a twelve-mile (20km) foot march with full equipment, and it must be completed within three hours. On the face of it, it could appear that there is an inordinate emphasis on running and marching in what is essentially a specialized course, but Capt. McLeroy explained that the school reinforces the standards and discipline taught at the Army’s entry-level PMEs. “What we try and do is have that be the standard for the division and it’s the minimum expectation of a 101st soldier,” he advised and pointed out that during real combat deployments, soldiers will not be walking when moving around LZs or engaged on active operations.

What’s Special

“Other divisions don’t have air assault as a significant part of their culture and we try and use it to make our division more lethal and more disciplined than the rest of the formations across the Army,” Capt. McLeroy stressed. “Although you don’t need the air assault course to jump out of a helicopter, it is our basic expectation that when a soldier joins the division, they will then pass the air assault course and be a member of the team.” Other units may typically send five or six per cent of their complement through air assault training, while the 101st has a target of 80 per cent. With a total complement of around 13,000 soldiers, Capt. McLeroy’s comments about scale, urgency and capability become readily understandable. “We’re the only ones that have the capacity to do that and a lot of these other units that say they do air assault send their guys through here.” A less tangible but crucial factor in the effectiveness of the 101st as an air assault division is the co-location of its CAB at Fort Campbell. This means the soldiers and Army airmen work closely together regularly and develop a close relationship that is impossible in units far more distant from their air assets. “We use helicopters here almost every day and each person in the division would have some form of contact with a helicopter at least several times a year.”

Capt. McLeroy added. “Another thing that makes us unique is that we don’t just run air assault courses. Although that is our main effort, we run a number of different courses. We run a three-week pre-Ranger course, a FRIES/SPIES Master course for E5 NCOs and above so they can then go and train their personnel, a Rappel Master course, we have a whole facility for teaching hands-on level one and two combatives to teach you how to fight, and the all-academic three-week Pathfinder school – a super advanced level of air assault for leaders that has a very high fail rate of around 60 percent of the 65 initial participants.” This comprehensive range of training options makes the 101st a one-stop-shop for virtually anything to do with vertical lift operations. Every member of the 101st is encouraged and expected to avail themselves of the training options, regardless of their MOS (military occupational specialty). A previous two-star commanding general has even completed the air assault course. The courses and operational methodology are not stagnant but under regular review as the unit culture recognizes that learning is constant and, therefore, so is the need to be adaptable, modernizing and fine-tuning as necessary to remain as effective and relevant to current needs as possible.

“We have primacy within the division for teaching as well as planning and actioning. Everything we do here is designed to give a commander options and capabilities,” stated McLeroy. “Normally SPIES (special patrol insertion/extraction system) is reserved for special operations but we do it here as part of the culture of giving our commanders all possible options. We’d never do it en-masse as a division as it’s too limited in speed and altitude, but it gives us a capability for insertion or extraction in extreme, limited circumstances.” The same applies to FRIES (fast-rope insertion/extraction system) and because many 101st personnel and pilots are trained in the techniques, they can be utilized with in-house assets without the need to rely on specialist units such as the 160th SOAR, although there is a tight, close relationship between the 101st and the 160th, with pilots in one often having served in the other. “Again, that multi-faceted relationship with the pilots means we can do this stuff because we each know the other and their abilities,” he stressed. “If it’s in relation to vertical lift and a ground force, we’re going to do it because that’s our culture. And if we don’t do it yet, we’re going to figure out a way to do it.”

Attrition

The attrition or failure rate varies from course to course and depends largely on the particular participant groups, but SFC Conrad estimated the average graduation rate for Rappel Master at 66-75 per cent, similar for the FRIES/SPIES course, 45-50 per cent for the Pathfinder course, anywhere from 45 to 60 per cent for the air assault course and 90 to 100 per cent for the combatives courses. Capt. McLeroy added that the school’s pre-Ranger course is designed to emulate the first physically strenuous week of Ranger school so that soldiers who pass dramatically increase their likelihood of successfully completing Ranger school, from around 15 per cent up to around 75 per cent. Because so much of the school’s curriculum involves some form of high-risk activity, there is a very strong focus on ensuring the leadership and instructional staff are highly competent and diligent at risk assessment and mitigation. As a result, there a very few serious accidents and injuries are generally limited to such things as the expected occasional heat stress from marches and runs or rolled/broken ankles from obstacle course or rappelling.

SFC Conrad finds satisfaction in observing the progression of new soldiers. “The new soldier on day one doesn’t know his a-hole from his elbow, but he comes through the progression and gets better at every phase. You see the progression of the classes until they eventually graduate. They get their air assault wings, the unit comes out and supports them, their loved ones come out, and it’s really gratifying to watch that development,” he remarked. “I get to watch and mentor thirty NCO instructors and watch their growth and career development as well.” Capt. McLeroy commented that he enjoys holding the officer corps to a high standard. “The NCOs are all really good but there has to be a mechanism for holding the officers accountable. Soldiers need to see the officer corps suffering alongside them and here you can see that. You might look over to your left and see a full bird colonel doing push-ups, just as muddy as you are. They’ll get the respect that their rank warrants but they’ll never get an easier ride,” he concluded.

History

Both men concur that throughout history, armies have learned and operated largely from passed-down knowledge and hard-earned experience. Although much is written down and can be taught from books, the fine details, the little tricks and techniques that make things work better and more smoothly come from the vast pool of combined ‘tribal’ knowledge. “I may never see the division go to war,” commented SFC Conrad. “But if and when it does, maybe some guy that went through the school here is now a commander of a brigade and using that tribal knowledge that he got here. Then there’s the satisfaction of watching the combined suffering of a group of people, regardless of rank, and the overcoming of that initial struggle to a victory.”