Discussion
Despite the vitriol I was met with on another thread, I'm going to post a restrained rebuttal to the complaints of friendly fire deaths.
Maj. Charles Heyman, a military expert and editor of Jane's World Armies, said technological advances have actually reduced friendly fire casualties.
"Friendly fire has been a dangerous aspect of warfare since time immemorial," he said. "In recent years, because of things such as press openness and so forth, these incidents have come to the forefront, but modern warfare has actually decreased the number of friendly fire casualties."
The relatively low number of casualties in recent conflicts such as the Gulf and Kosovo have magnified the incidence of fratricide.
"A World War II artillery gunner did not have the ability to know where his troops were on the field," Heyman said. "In the past, massive casualties as a part of friendly fire were a regular occurrence. But the numbers of dead and wounded in previous wars was so large that friendly fire incidents were subsumed in the overall statistics."
Heyman said that no matter how many combat identification techniques are used, it would be difficult for an army to ever fully remove the "fog of war."
"There will always be confusion in military operations," he said. "Confusion in war is like pain in childbirth."
Me again. Yes, friendly fire deaths are horrible, and yes we should endeavor to avoid them. But consider before you go blasting American military folks, and our smart bombs, that without the technology and deployment, you wouldn't hear about dozens of friendly fire deaths, because you'd only hear about the the thousands or even tens of thousands of Iraqi caused casualties.
Having said that, my resonse to those of you who question "what the hell us yanks" are taught, I spent a lot of time being trained on force recognition. I could (probably still can) differentiate between helicopter types by sound alone with a very high degree of accuracy. Such things are important when you don't want to be detected from above, etc.
It's war, s**t happens. But the fact that we are able to focus on reducing friendly fire deaths due to virtually non-existant enemy caused casualties is a testament to the technology and training on both sides (American and British.)
British footsoldiers in WW2 feared the British artillery almost as much as enemy artillery...so much that it was common for units to hide their whereabouts from friendly artillery units.
Just some thoughts...wanted to address the rampant America bashing I see here CONSTANTLY.
Mike
>>> Edited by madmike on Tuesday 8th April 20:08
Maj. Charles Heyman, a military expert and editor of Jane's World Armies, said technological advances have actually reduced friendly fire casualties.
"Friendly fire has been a dangerous aspect of warfare since time immemorial," he said. "In recent years, because of things such as press openness and so forth, these incidents have come to the forefront, but modern warfare has actually decreased the number of friendly fire casualties."
The relatively low number of casualties in recent conflicts such as the Gulf and Kosovo have magnified the incidence of fratricide.
"A World War II artillery gunner did not have the ability to know where his troops were on the field," Heyman said. "In the past, massive casualties as a part of friendly fire were a regular occurrence. But the numbers of dead and wounded in previous wars was so large that friendly fire incidents were subsumed in the overall statistics."
Heyman said that no matter how many combat identification techniques are used, it would be difficult for an army to ever fully remove the "fog of war."
"There will always be confusion in military operations," he said. "Confusion in war is like pain in childbirth."
Me again. Yes, friendly fire deaths are horrible, and yes we should endeavor to avoid them. But consider before you go blasting American military folks, and our smart bombs, that without the technology and deployment, you wouldn't hear about dozens of friendly fire deaths, because you'd only hear about the the thousands or even tens of thousands of Iraqi caused casualties.
Having said that, my resonse to those of you who question "what the hell us yanks" are taught, I spent a lot of time being trained on force recognition. I could (probably still can) differentiate between helicopter types by sound alone with a very high degree of accuracy. Such things are important when you don't want to be detected from above, etc.
It's war, s**t happens. But the fact that we are able to focus on reducing friendly fire deaths due to virtually non-existant enemy caused casualties is a testament to the technology and training on both sides (American and British.)
British footsoldiers in WW2 feared the British artillery almost as much as enemy artillery...so much that it was common for units to hide their whereabouts from friendly artillery units.
Just some thoughts...wanted to address the rampant America bashing I see here CONSTANTLY.
Mike
>>> Edited by madmike on Tuesday 8th April 20:08
I'm afraid we are British, and in being so are quite likely to be xenophobic. Pistonheads is a site founded and based in the UK so you will probably have to put up with a lot of it. To make matters worse, we have British senses of humour which most foreigners will never-ever understand.
Just thank god you are not Welsh like me, then you would know the what cheesy jokes and pisstakes taste like
Just thank god you are not Welsh like me, then you would know the what cheesy jokes and pisstakes taste like
Guys,
PistonHeads is one of the few communities I come across which is truly multi-national (some guy e-mailed me from Mallorca to buy my Scalextric set!). We are all here for a common interest - cars - lets not let this war, right or wrong, get in the way of our common global interest and friendship. I don't believe anyone would intentionally fire on an ally whatever circumstances prevail.
Mike, I have the pleasure of knowing CarZee personally and have a great respect for his writings, and knowing him like I do I read behind the actual words used and understand what he is trying to say(albeit not very well - sorry Aiden).
Friendly fire is unfortunately an aspect of war we have to live with, it isn't big and it isn't clever and I'm damn sure any American - or Enlishman - who has been the cause of a comrades death will be mortified and will struggle to live with this for the rest of their days. No matter how much we slag off the Americans or the other way around it is going to happen, we ain't going to stop it.
PistonHeads is a great community, lets not resort to virtual fistycuffs and keep on-topic of cars and car related business because I get enough war shit from the news, the paper, and work mates - PistonHeads is/was a welcome relief from the horrors of war.
I'm done. Flame me.
PistonHeads is one of the few communities I come across which is truly multi-national (some guy e-mailed me from Mallorca to buy my Scalextric set!). We are all here for a common interest - cars - lets not let this war, right or wrong, get in the way of our common global interest and friendship. I don't believe anyone would intentionally fire on an ally whatever circumstances prevail.
Mike, I have the pleasure of knowing CarZee personally and have a great respect for his writings, and knowing him like I do I read behind the actual words used and understand what he is trying to say(albeit not very well - sorry Aiden).
Friendly fire is unfortunately an aspect of war we have to live with, it isn't big and it isn't clever and I'm damn sure any American - or Enlishman - who has been the cause of a comrades death will be mortified and will struggle to live with this for the rest of their days. No matter how much we slag off the Americans or the other way around it is going to happen, we ain't going to stop it.
PistonHeads is a great community, lets not resort to virtual fistycuffs and keep on-topic of cars and car related business because I get enough war shit from the news, the paper, and work mates - PistonHeads is/was a welcome relief from the horrors of war.
I'm done. Flame me.
Agreed Mike - It's all too easy for armchair generals to criticise. I once told my family that I'd come back and haunt them if a 'blue on blue' happened to me and they went to the media demanding a public enquiry.
If I'm dead, I'm dead, the how & why is irrelevant. "I'm off to war but I'm only allowed to die in certain (approved?) ways" - what's that all about?
"This must never happen again". Eh? There'll be millions of wars before the Sun dies (assuming humans last that long), of course it's going to happen again - stop fcuking moaning and get on with the job.
If I'm dead, I'm dead, the how & why is irrelevant. "I'm off to war but I'm only allowed to die in certain (approved?) ways" - what's that all about?
"This must never happen again". Eh? There'll be millions of wars before the Sun dies (assuming humans last that long), of course it's going to happen again - stop fcuking moaning and get on with the job.
dick dastardly said:Just thank god you are not Welsh like me, then you would know the what cheesy jokes and pisstakes taste like
I'm a quarter Welsh...so I guess a feel a little of your pain.
I realize it's a British board. It's just that the anti-US stuff has been extra thick lately, so I jump in and scrap where I can.
Sense of humor I do understand...and appreciate. I'm just posting because some of the stuff on the boards these days is more than that.
Mike
.Mark said:
PistonHeads is a great community, lets not resort to virtual fistycuffs and keep on-topic of cars and car related business because I get enough war shit from the news, the paper, and work mates - PistonHeads is/was a welcome relief from the horrors of war.
I'm done. Flame me.
.Mark, PH is a great community BECAUSE it allows a broad topic range and a bit of banter, which any regular would never give second thought to. Try some of the tightly moderated car forums, see how long you last before you have to gouge your own eyes out from the deep dispairing dullness.
'fratricide' killing of ones brother, is a common occurence in war and in this one, as Mike said, highlighted by the lack of casualties by 'enemy fire' also the US are slinging a fcuk sight more hardware around than us so are statistically bound to cause more 'blue on blue' incidents.
No one wants this to happen, imagine how a perpetrator of such an action will feel afterwards knowing he caused the death of a 'brother'
I felt the previous thread had got out of hand too.
No one wants this to happen, imagine how a perpetrator of such an action will feel afterwards knowing he caused the death of a 'brother'
I felt the previous thread had got out of hand too.
.Mark. I'm not talking about the CarZee post here. Moving on. I started this thread just to rebut the friendly fire stuff in general. Thanks for your kind words tho about that other...incident.
Skywarp, couldn't agree more.
I tell you, I was never worried about friendly fire incidents...I was much more likely to bite it in a training accident. When you enlist, you assume the risk you might die in uniform. And you quickly realize that doing so in combat at the hands of an enemy is the least likely way to do it.
In fact, in training, I've had my skull bashed, nearly been cut to ribbons on concertina wire (that one was miraculous), fallen from a cliff into a barbed wire roll, had a parachute malfunction, and came within a hairs width of having my right arm torn clean from my body (I'm beyond lucky to have it at all today).
And that's just the highlights.
These men and women take incredible risks, and they sometimes make incredible sacrifices. They know it, and they are prepared for it.
So please, when it happens, don't automatically point the finger across the pond and assume WE here are incompetent.
That's all.
Mike
Skywarp, couldn't agree more.
I tell you, I was never worried about friendly fire incidents...I was much more likely to bite it in a training accident. When you enlist, you assume the risk you might die in uniform. And you quickly realize that doing so in combat at the hands of an enemy is the least likely way to do it.
In fact, in training, I've had my skull bashed, nearly been cut to ribbons on concertina wire (that one was miraculous), fallen from a cliff into a barbed wire roll, had a parachute malfunction, and came within a hairs width of having my right arm torn clean from my body (I'm beyond lucky to have it at all today).
And that's just the highlights.
These men and women take incredible risks, and they sometimes make incredible sacrifices. They know it, and they are prepared for it.
So please, when it happens, don't automatically point the finger across the pond and assume WE here are incompetent.
That's all.
Mike
Hi Mike, don't misunderstand me here but are the US forces also killing themselves in friendly fire incidents? I'm asking because if it happens we aren't hearing about. If we knew they were copping it perhaps some here wouldn't feel so annoyed. Indeed there would probably be a lot more sympathy for all concerned.
It had to be done, it's being done and I'm glad I'm not doing it!
It had to be done, it's being done and I'm glad I'm not doing it!
1. "Friendly fire has been a dangerous aspect of warfare since time immemorial,"
2. "A World War II artillery gunner did not have the ability to know where his troops were on the field," Heyman said. "In the past, massive casualties as a part of friendly fire were a regular occurrence. But the numbers of dead and wounded in previous wars was so large that friendly fire incidents were subsumed in the overall statistics."
3. Me again. Yes, friendly fire deaths are horrible, and yes we should endeavor to avoid them. But consider before you go blasting American military folks, and our smart bombs, that without the technology and deployment, you wouldn't hear about dozens of friendly fire deaths, because you'd only hear about the the thousands or even tens of thousands of Iraqi caused casualties.
4. Having said that, my resonse to those of you who question "what the hell us yanks" are taught, I spent a lot of time being trained on force recognition. I could (probably still can) differentiate between helicopter types by sound alone with a very high degree of accuracy. Such things are important when you don't want to be detected from above, etc.
5. British footsoldiers in WW2 feared the British artillery almost as much as enemy artillery...so much that it was common for units to hide their whereabouts from friendly artillery units.
1. up close and personal - pitched infantry battles of the past always resulted in mass friendly fire casualties. Just imagine what you would be like toe to toe and trying to survive on a battle field not knowing who is trying to kill you because you only have a split second to decide who is friend or foe and the battle field is covered in smoke from both sides cannons......
2. The artillery use 'Forward Observation Officers' their only concern is where the artillery is falling and then direct it onto target. They generally can't tell if your own troops are under the barrage as they would be camoflaged in position.
3. Having a good number of my friends currently serving in Iraq, I would not like any of them to come under 'friendly fire'. I served in the last Gulf War and was fortunate enough to come back in one piece having almost died in a helicopter crash on the eve of the ground war. I was being flown over the front line at the time when the Lynx ingested something into the engine. Most of the causalties of the last Gulf War were due to simple road traffic accidents. All troops are aware that you could be injured or killed by your own troops just as easily as the Iraqis, but it is more likely that you will be killed if it's your own troops shooting at you due to more advance munitions.
4. All NATO troops are taught basic vehicle recognition as part of their basic military skills. The majority were trained to recognise Warsaw Pact vehicle prior to the last Gulf War, but this changed to include NATO forces equipment as well. What you have to be aware of is that it can be very difficult to recognise different types of vehicles at long range or in the dark. Even the news crews have made mistakes during their broadcasts and they were 10 feet away, claiming that the troops in the pictures were American, when in fact they were British (First few days of the war).
5. The days before encrypted radio networks and GPS. They hid their positions by keeping radio transmissions to a minimum so that Axis troops could not use DF (Direction Finding) to triangulate their positions and then launch their own artillery. The adverse effect was that the Brigade HQ did not always know the exact location of their own troops. Even when they did, not all the shells were acurate and fell short, usually on your own side.
6. I have served along side our American troops and can say that they do operate differently from ourselves, but then I have also worked along side many other nations troops which can be divided into two categories - 'Swimmers and Non-Swimmers'. Of the 'Swimmers' I would include the troops from New Zealand, Australia and USA. For the rest you can make you're own minds up. Lets stop all the US bashing - they have two distinct advantages over us, it's called MONEY and MANPOWER. We make up for the lack of both by courage and determination, which we have in unlimitless quantities. The British Soldier is the envy of the World and that the US troops are amazed that we can achieve so much with far less manpower can be anoying to them when they think they are omnipotent. But that is down to different doctorines, they thrown money and troops, we just use what we have better to achieve the same effect.
boosted ls1 said: Hi Mike, don't misunderstand me here but are the US forces also killing themselves in friendly fire incidents? I'm asking because if it happens we aren't hearing about. If we knew they were copping it perhaps some here wouldn't feel so annoyed. Indeed there would probably be a lot more sympathy for all concerned.
It had to be done, it's being done and I'm glad I'm not doing it!
Yes, there are US friendly fire incidents - just ask John Snow (Brit war reporter that was with the US Special Forces/Kurdish convoy yesterday)
Okay guys.. fair play Mike - I flew off the handle - it is indeed an emotionally provocative issue and perhaps my first strike makes me the morally weaker party.. or maybe I was just seeking to provoke a MadMike or a LotusGuy sort into a fight on my terms..
Whatever the case, I found my outbursts cathartic and you made me think about things.. I hope you didn't take it too seriously or get RSI replying or anything
Sorry if I got your back up anyway - it all adds up to a more interesting day, doesn't it?
I still think you need to sit the
down though, Mike, but that's because you're blocking my view of the action on the TV.. 
Cheers to .Mark for kind words, support and diplomatic reinterpretation services.
The last word, however, must go to Thom for this absolutely brilliant one-liner:
Whatever the case, I found my outbursts cathartic and you made me think about things.. I hope you didn't take it too seriously or get RSI replying or anything
Sorry if I got your back up anyway - it all adds up to a more interesting day, doesn't it?
I still think you need to sit the
down though, Mike, but that's because you're blocking my view of the action on the TV.. Cheers to .Mark for kind words, support and diplomatic reinterpretation services.
The last word, however, must go to Thom for this absolutely brilliant one-liner:
Thom said: The funny thing with some Americans is that they can sometimes be as stubborn as the French
madmike said:
I tell you, I was never worried about friendly fire incidents...I was much more likely to bite it in a training accident. When you enlist, you assume the risk you might die in uniform. And you quickly realize that doing so in combat at the hands of an enemy is the least likely way to do it.
In fact, in training, I've had my skull bashed, nearly been cut to ribbons on concertina wire (that one was miraculous), fallen from a cliff into a barbed wire roll, had a parachute malfunction, and came within a hairs width of having my right arm torn clean from my body (I'm beyond lucky to have it at all today).
And that's just the highlights.
These men and women take incredible risks, and they sometimes make incredible sacrifices. They know it, and they are prepared for it.
So please, when it happens, don't automatically point the finger across the pond and assume WE here are incompetent.
Mike
I agree that you are more likely to be injured or die in peacetime than you are in the current or previous Gulf War.
During my twelve years miltary service I have managed to survive the following incidents:-
1986 - 1. Roermond, Holland - out with friends on the pi55 when two RAF we shot by the IRA (one killed, one wounded)
2. Wegburg, Germany - filling my car with petrol, 10 minutes later an RAF Corporal and his baby daughter were shot by the IRA
1990 - 1. Iraqi desert, helicopter crash.
2. 7 scud attacks, one within 200m of my bed
1992 - 1. Motorcycle accident - 7 dislocated vertebra, one fractured
2. Shot at by the RUC (NI Police Force) - they were somewhere they should not have been, not the other way around.
3. IRA tried to detonate a bomb outside RUC Castlereagh next to my room.
1995 - 1. Maglai, Bosnia - Serbian Tank round hit our headquaters killing two and injuring six.
2. Vitez, Bosnia - 1 Devon and Dorsets accidentally fired a Milan Anti-tank weapon into our Mess, detroying the room next to mine.
3. Turbe, Bosnia - Contact with Mujahadeen in Turbe after they captured Mt Vilasich.
1996 - Lisburn, NI - IRA detonated two 400Kg bombs inside HQ Northern Ireland, killing one and wounding 15 people.
I'm not going to mention the minor accidents that I suffered on training exercises, but I have had friends die or be injured in anything from RTA's to gas cylinder explosions.
All the guys currently serving in the forces or ex-forces know the risks involved with being in the military and accept the risks. I can guarantee that the majority of the serving troops were dissapointed not to be going to the Gulf and would willingly swap with any of them right now - it's what you train for but hope never comes, but when it does you want to be their just to prove to yourself that you can stand up to the stresses of war, just like your Grandfathers did during the Second World War.
If anyone wants to have a go at me, just remember what your Grandfather went through and ask yourself if you could do the same?
Remember also that troops are not politically motivated - if they were, you would be living under martial law! It's polititions that start all wars, but the troops are the ones who have to finish them.
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