"Who Fired On The Helicopters?"

[Fidel]

i am happy with my avatar. may comrade fidel live for a hundred more years!

[uh Clem]

From BBC:

On Tuesday, a US convoy came under fire outside Kandahar and one soldier was wounded in the foot, a US military spokesman said.

Colonel Roger King said Afghans travelling with soldiers returned fire.

The soldiers were returning from a hospital visit to some of those injured in Monday's friendly fire incident.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Ned


For once I have to agree with you Saint Marcus. This seems to be the second time this has happened. After the first screw-up, sufficient safeguards should have been put in place to prevent a second occurance. But it apparently happened again.

More like the third time. The two weddings and the attack on Canadian troops.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Tingkai


More like the third time. The two weddings and the attack on Canadian troops.

Yes. Something is seriously wrong in Afghanistan.

[Urban Ranger]

Shoot first, ask questions later.

Just like the Klingons

[1]

How can anyone say the current US military is incompetent in war? We succeded were the soviets lost. Afganistan was not another Vietnam. We got the job done. Of course they are going to be civilian deaths. But the US has spent millions upon millions, research and devoloping more accurate weapons, and in intelligence information. More so than any other nation. So don't make the argument we don't care about civilian deaths, we've done more in the field of preventing it than any other country has. If we really wanted, we could have carpet bombed the whole nation WW2 style, but we didn't.

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by 1
How can anyone say the current US military is incompetent in war? We succeded were the soviets lost. Afganistan was not another Vietnam. We got the job done.

If the job is done then how come the U.S. is still dropping bombs? Afghanistan is not yet another Vietnam, but the war there ain't over yet.

[KrazyHorse]

That's the thing, 1.

The Soviets actually tried to pacify the place. The US is letting them do their own thing, to a large extent. They also don't have to contend with a superpower providing weapons to their opposition...

[faded glory]

" If the job is done then how come the U.S. is still dropping bombs? Afghanistan is not yet another Vietnam, but the war there ain't over yet."

It wont become a Vietnam, it cant. Vietnam was a restricted war, americans were divided. The division at home put alot of restraints on the army. The army couldnt take the war to Hanoi or cross into Cambodia to interdict VC op's in a meaningful and effective way. Let face it, Vietnam never attacked us. We honestly had no business being there other than to pick up where the french and japenese got there asses kicked. I could draw a parallel to Korea, but its alot different. South Korea didnt really want anything to do with the north. The south vietnamese didnt give a hoot, and it was hard to convince them to fight for an governing entity in Saigon that was corrupt as could be.


This wont happen. If we leave now, the country will slide back into oblivion in 6 months and terrorists will have there base back. We know this cant happen, this point is clear.

I know Tingkai you would like to see our soldier killed and our buildings destroyed. Im sure it gives sicko's like you great pleasure. And dont say you never said that, I can sense it in your posts. You dont like anything we've done since October 7th. You would of had us sit back and take a few more hits.

[Tingkai]

FG: You know nothing. I challenge you to find a single quote from me to back up your incredibly idiotic statement. You won't find any because what you say is completely false. It is pure libel.

Anytime anyone questions the policies of the United States, people like you immediately resort to lies and personal attacks. You're just a troll, and not a very good one.

[Sikander]

This wasn't exactly a case of massive firepower. There were only two U.S. planes in the area, one AC-130 gunship supporting a joint Afghan-U.S. ground operation, and one B-52 with precision guided bombs hitting caves in an unrelated mission. This is all according to reports from the Pentagon btw, from the press conference with Rumsfeld.

The various reports are pretty damned wild if you ask me. Supposedly four different villages were hit, and the casualty count seems very high. My guess is that the real count is going to be a lot closer to four killed than the 200 or so claimed initially. If I am reading the fragmentary information from the Pentagon correctly, they seem to think it unlikely that the B-52 dropped more than one bomb errantly, and the ground controller claims that that bomb fell in an uninhabited area. If this turns out to be true (and one would expect that the info is believed at the Pentagon if Rumsfeld is allowing himself to be associated with it), then that leaves only the AC-130.

The AC-130 can put out a lot of rounds, but it cannot put them all out at once. Rather it would have to set up for a number of discrete firing passes. This seems to match up with the report that the U.S. was taking AAA fire, perhaps from a number of sources, some located in the villages which were reported to have been hit. That area is the home of the head of the Taliban, and is known as a Taliban stronghold politically, which is why the cave busting and ground operation were taking place there. It's not unreasonable to assume that Taliban forces located in these villages opened up on the AC-130 (which they can actually hit as opposed to the B-52 which they cannot), and the AC-130 tried to supress that fire, with the result that an unknown number of civilians may have been killed in the action.

This action would have occurred at night btw, the AC-130s only fly at night because they are vulnerable to AAA. My guess is that the AC-130 started taking fire from a number of areas at once, and laid down automatic cannon fire at the source of all the muzzle flashes. Perhaps one of those sources coincidently was that wedding party. If so it's a shame. Anyway, we are going to have to wait and see what the investigation says, I've already seen far too many false claims of American massacres in this war to take these initial reports from Afghans as accurate.

[Sikander]

Ah, here's a link with updated info:

http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/asiapcf/central/07/02/afghanistan.bombing/index.html

[MarkG]

U.S. officials in Washington said initial indications are that it was gunfire from an AC-130 gunship, rather than bombs, that caused most of the casualties.

so the rest of the casualties(that were not "the most") were caused by bombs rather than a AC-130 gunship

The others hit their targets, killing 12 enemy forces, U.S. officials said. The bombs were precision-guided munitions.

so people are not people anymore. they are "forces"

[DanS]

Like Sikander, I don't think that Rumsfeld would try to split hairs on this one. The Afghans have ready access to the press as well, so it would just set yourself for a lot of explaining.

Sounds like a lot was going on there concurrently--much more than I thought when I began the thread.

"so people are not people anymore. they are "forces""

Well, even though perhaps a hard-edged description, you had to distinguish someway between the innocent and the not-at-all innocent.

[Saint Marcus]

For once I have to agree with you Saint Marcus. This seems to be the second time this has happened. After the first screw-up, sufficient safeguards should have been put in place to prevent a second occurance. But it apparently happened again.

After an investigation, if it does turn out that innocent Afghani's were hit, Bush should replace the commander responsible - probably Franks.

I agree

I know the country isn't yet "safe", and I know there are plenty of Taliban and Al Qaida forces still present there, but the current method of taking them out seems ridiculous. Using B-52s to take out small squads of poorly armed militiamen. That's just asking for trouble. It would be way more effective to send in additional groundforces to finish the job. Sadly, America's military doctrine seems to be hugely in favor of airstrikes, and very reluctant to send in ground forces (Kosovo, and now Afghanistan). Most work on theground is done by unreliable Afghan allies, aided by some special forces from the US. Other foreign troops are stationed in key points like airbases and cities, but not in villages or the rural areas, the places the Taliban has most support in. And worse, these bombings of civilians don't weaken the Taliban, but strenghten them.