Why is friendly fire so high in the US military?
Honestly, it's not that high. Friendly fire is one of those little things that is hard to eliminate. Mostly, friendly fire comes from fire support from artillery and aircraft, and to be honest, if the co-ordinates are a little bit off, chances are you could be seriously injured. Imagine, you're a flying a plane, at god knows what height, and you are essentially told to drop a bomb on a specific position, you can't see the soldiers below, you don't know what is going on on the ground, bar what you have been told, so you just drop it where you've been told to. If those soldiers on the ground gave the wrong position, or you are just off (which, let's face it, it's more than possible to be) then they could die. As with friendly fire from small arms, well, most fighting is at about 300-100m distance, you'll all be taking cover.. essentially, battle is hectic. Friendly fire per capita is higher in most other Armed Forces, and there needs to be less stigma surrounding it, just imagine how hard it is for a member of the military to deal with the fact they have accidently killed allies?
Why don’t we send troops home from Afghanistan now?
Firstly it’s not a war . It’s an illegal occupation and and illegal invasion . A war is when 2 armies confront each other . In this case it’s Americans killing innocent civilians whether by friendly fire or by drones . The pride and arrogance does not allow Americans to leave and its been a costly and unnecessary exercise resulting in untold deaths . In fact Afghanis want these mucks to stay on longer leading to more American deaths and creating more orphans and widows . In addition causing more Americans to suffer from PTSD . The more the merrier . Afghanistan is known as the graveyard of Empires. Ask the Russians!
Why is the United States military so prone to causing friendly fire?
Early during WW2, the Germans were infamous among their troops for suffering 'friendly' fire. They had no land-air cummnication between the Lufwaffe and the Infantry, and they were fairly consistently being targeted. Yes, their air force did some fantastic attacks early in the war, their Stuka (Sturzkampfflugzeug/dive bomber) performed highly successful strafing runs, but that was only when the enemy was on one side of the river, and the Germans on the other. (The enemy quickly learned better). Then again, at the end of the war, when Germans were being pushed back towards Berlin, it was the Russians that were dropping shells on their own troops; hundreds per day of wounded Russians from their own artillery fire. The Germans had no decisive military protocol for retreating- and unlike the Russians, they did it poorly (also, they wanted to be captured by Americans or the British, not the Russians). So by the time the Russian Artillery had set up their attack area, the Russian infantry had already occupied it.
Why were there so many friendly fires in the 1st Gulf War?
Not sure if there's a Brit FF there as but i talk to this one Brit officer who was from the 1st Gulf war saying that Brits have done FF of their own. He said that a FF incident and it was the ground war started 26/27 of feb and only lasted 2-3 days. That particular incident was near the end of the ground war, so would say it was the 28th feb 91. His unit was D, squadron 14/20 kings hussars, it was Dave lavels tank which i think was he said was from the B,sqaudron. One of his troop corporals commanding a Challenger fire two rounds at his own artillery forces and badly injured 4 British personel. It never made news as nobody died, but it still happened. The only incident when a challenger as been lost in wartime was when another Challenger wrongly opened fire on it and killed one crewman i think it was the driver! its war so yes its not going to run smoothly. So he then had a stand down and waited in theater til moving into Kuwait city for over a month as piece keeping force. **** happened. It just that the Americans get a lot of stick for FFs since they provided bulks of air-power to it's coalitions allies.
Part 2: Why is punishment for a death by "Friendly Fire" deemed separate from similar incidents...?
In normal civilian incidents, unless you're talking about children, there's no such thing as a firearms accident, it's carelessness that leads to such occurances in most cases. But a lot of time in the field of battle it's chaotic and such things are bound to happen. It has been so very common throughout history. It's not uncommon for 10-20% of the casualties in a conflict to be victims of friendly fire. But it should still obviously be investigated and the circumstances considered. When that American pilot dropped a bomb and killed 5 Canadian soldiers training in Afghanistan, he acted in breach of standard procedure and was charged for that. He didn't receive any real punishment though, forced to retire or something like that. the US Army rarely if ever punishes it's troops for such things. There's this new thing where a convoy in Afghanistan was hit by a bomber and the troops started firing wildly and random into the crowds around the street and killed something like twenty innocent people. Instances like these aren't the same as friendly fire in Vietnam for example. It's shaky troops who don't respect the rules of engagement and furthermore pretty well know that their actions won't be punished. If, in instances like these, it is still determined that recklessness was the cause of the death, and it could easily have been prevented, the punishment should be severe. But accountability is minimal in the military. They released a survey recently and only something like 45% of soldiers said they would report a fellow troop for killing a civilian, something like that. The brotherhood is strong to the point that these guys can do whatever they want and nobody would dream of making them face consequences. I think that is a huge problem. Collateral damage is just something accepted now by the armed forces. And it's only perpetuated by those in charge who won't address it.
Why are people against the afghanistan war?
6. We have no business in someones else country unless they ask us to help out. What happened on 911 was because we have let people into this country that shouldn't be, and we are still letting them in. Stop all the freakin visas, lockup and deport anyone illegal !!! And why did they come here to do that? And why do they hate us in other parts of the world? Because the U.S. doesn't mind it's own business !! Afghan people and people in the middle east have been fighting each other for 10000+ years. Let them kill each other, who gives a dam !!! Where is it written that we have to police the world. We are 14 trillion in debt thanks to our foreign affairs. Shawn....please, don't believe the Washington DC propaganda. Use your own mind.
How many abrams tanks have been destroyed in iraq/afghanistan?
i know that there has never been a abrams destroyed by an enemy tank, but i'm curious as to how many abrams are actually destroyed being that they are pretty much the number one target in combat? is there a lot less casualties than you would expect?