Scan of Todays Sun - Friendly Fire Incident

I will never spend money on that rag again. They like to whip up myths like the yanks having higher rates of this stuff than our own troops. That the yanks are dumb gun ho idiots while our boys are these highly educated professionals.

It does the wife no good. She says when they realised they made a mistake their first concern was for themselves. Thats not bad, thats a natural reaction that anyone makes. OMG i'm in the poo.

The day before in the sun they had a tiny article how we have as many friendly fire incidents as just about anyone.

We have a tiny force there airforce wise compared to the yanks. We have about 55 C130's to transport our troops. 15 of those at any one time are being repaired or serviced ATLEAST. We wouldn't even be able to get our 'boys' to the gulf if it wasn't for the yanks. An ageing fleet of C130's some loaner C17's and some clapped out old L1011's for troop transport.

The yank coast guard has more transport aircraft than the RAF. Of course it's going to look like the yanks have more incidents they are the ones with 1000 times the machinery there. Also their guns actually work.

I feel for the wife and family but this does nothing to really help her.

What with the way they wrote this story and the one hoping that Jo Omera kills herself I can read this paper ever again. Even though I like the sport sections.
 
dannyjo22 said:
I feel for the wife and family but this does nothing to really help her.
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O rly? I thought she wanted to know the truth. Without the Sun she wouldn't do, as our own government were happy to keep it all secret.
 
andy said:
that was before they knew it was friendlies...


when they found out they said "i feel sick"

dont know if the paper pointed it out because i dont buy it
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Badly made point.

I was trying to show how "The Sun" was stirring it up by the language they used ,but feel no one would complain if it was an enemy combatant they had been talking about
 
PsiFox said:
I trust the papers unbiased viewpoint will be reflected on any further transcripts that detail servicemen attacking enemies

"On the tape, one pilot — call sign POPOV36 - appears to gloat sickeningly during the attack.

He is egged on by the second — call sign POPOV35 — who encourages: “Get him, get him!”

Looking down at the chaos as a soldier drags burning comrades from the vehicles, he adds: “It looks like he is hauling ass. Ha Ha.”.
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Yeah. If you actually watch the full video that was posted in the other thread on here, its absolutely, nothing like that. I swear i didnt even hear the pilot laugh after he said "It looks like he's hauling ass". :rolleyes:

I dunno why everyone is blaming the US for a cover up, they said that the MOD never asked for the video, so they didnt release it (why should they).

I feel sorry for the pilots. God help them when they have the scum of the British press on their asses looking for a fall-guy. In truth it was a terrible accident -- ostracising those two professionals will do absolutely no good for the future.
 
Accidents happen, yes. But this was a catalogue of errors.

I'm sure the pilots in question don't feel great about it, but they should be held to account. This isn't something you can sweep under the carpet.
 
arfur said:
if there was no doubt why did they keep questioning it? and if you LISTEN to his voice not the words he doesnt sound confident that they are not friendlies.
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He questioned it because they had doubts. Command confirmed to him that there were no friendlies in the area, which in hindsight makes it pretty clear that it was int at fault, not the pilots.
 
Phnom_Penh said:
He questioned it because they had doubts. Command confirmed to him that there were no friendlies in the area, which in hindsight makes it pretty clear that it was int at fault, not the pilots.
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possibly but I still didnt hear them get an official ok to fire... thats my argument
 
arfur said:
possibly but I still didnt hear them get an official ok to fire... thats my argument
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And they weren't told not to, essentially they were just doing what they did every other day.
norm said:
I'm sure the pilots in question don't feel great about it, but they should be held to account. This isn't something you can sweep under the carpet.
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If it was due to a catalogue of errors, how can you hold the pilots responsible?
 
arfur said:
possibly but I still didnt hear them get an official ok to fire... thats my argument
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Do they need one?
this was in the early days of engagement, we where at war. I don't think armed forces need permission to shoot in these cases. Might be wrong though.
 
Phnom_Penh said:
If it was due to a catalogue of errors, how can you hold the pilots responsible?
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If it is due to cumulative errors then you can hold people responsible for the part they played in the final outcome so that each failure in the catalogue of errors can be examined.

I don't know about this individual situation and I don't intend to spend enough time on it to learn all the intricacies (even assuming I could) to properly comment but my point is simply that you can hold people responsible (in law) for the part they contributed to the situation - simplest example is contributory negligence in a road accident, you walk into the road without looking and a speeding driver hits you and blame will be apportioned on the basis of how much was your fault so it might be a 70/30 split rather than 100/0 against them.
 
But the pilots didn't do anything that appears to be in the wrong (from my pov anyway), they were given the wrong int, and were just doing what they usually did.
semi-pro waster said:
simplest example is contributory negligence in a road accident, you walk into the road without looking and a speeding driver hits you and blame will be apportioned on the basis of how much was your fault so it might be a 70/30 split rather than 100/0 against them.
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That sounds like J walking ;).
 
What people need to remember is that if you're station in iraq, in the baking sun, based on what the guy on the radio is telling you, you need to make these sorts of calls time after time. I think its just a very unfortunate case of 'accidents will happen' - I don't think anyone set out to be unprofessional here.
 
HOLY REPEAT THREAD BATMAN!!!

This topic has ben discussed in another thread. Why doesnt everyone look there? Heck, most peoples areguemnts for or against can be found in that thread, and probably 99.9% of the people on this forums do not have the knowledge of either US or military training or procedures to make comments on the professionalism of either force. What they do know is what the media tells them.

EDIT: as for the pilots not showing remorse. well one said he was gonna be sick and one (maybe the same one) was heard weeping.
 
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Scam said:
ostracising those two professionals will do absolutely no good for the future.
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a) they aren't professionals, they are amateur weekend warriors
b) it will do a whole lot of good if the US military learn to look before they shoot in future

Incidentally, there has been next to no mention of the report that two Iraqi civilians who had been waving a large white flag were also killed in this contact - I guess that they don't matter - I wonder how many other Iraqi civilians, waving large white flags were also murdered by US cowboys without comment in the western media or courts?
 
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