Inside the Swamp Phase of Ranger School

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A Ranger student prepares to cross the Yellow River that winds through Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., on Aug. 4, 2015, as he takes on the third phase of Ranger School. The 17-day phase is the third and final portion of the school.
DAN LAMOTHE/THE WASHINGTON POST[/caption]Much has been made lately of the female students who have now entered the swamp phase of Ranger School, the final phase of the school. We had a story recently about a Ranger Instructor who had changed his mind, well, became more open-minded, about women in Ranger School. Not everyone feels the way he does. The feelings on women in Ranger School are very sharply divided. We will leave the wisdom of the decision to allow women in to Ranger School up to the generals and politicians who always make those decisions without our input.No matter how you feel, it seems that there is going to be a female graduate sooner rather than later. They are in the last phase now and The Washington Post was allowed access to the students who are at Eglin AFB for the last phase. It's a rare brief look inside a phase that few other than those who have completed the course have ever seen. From the Washington Post:EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. — As the sun beat down on Ranger students traversing the Yellow River here Tuesday, a handful of them in one inflatable Zodiac boat wondered if they’d really just passed a poisonous snake.

“I think I just saw a water moccasin,” said one soldier, paddling on the back left side of the boat.“Where?” another asked, pulling his left leg a little farther away from the river.“It was on the left side,” the soldier in the back said. “He went back below the water.”The phantom serpent — perhaps real, perhaps imagined — illustrates some of the dangers and challenges that students face in the swamps of Florida during the third and final phase of Ranger School. The Army has used the Florida Panhandle’s wet terrain as part of Ranger School since 1951, but is incorporating women into it for the first time this week as the service continues to assess how it can better integrate female soldiers in more units.Read the rest at The Washington Post[mwi-cat-listing cat="94" ppp="4" cols="4" desc="false" type="view" btn_color="black" ]