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Subject: air strikes and firefights
kerravon    12/22/2008 5:28:41 PM
There is an amazing 8-part series on Afghanistan here: h*tp://www.vbs.tv/video.php?id=1834373791 link (I gave the link twice, not sure if the second will work). Note that this is just the link to the first part - there are another 7 parts at the same place. Can someone explain to me why we don't have the technology to use GPSes to call air strikes in on the enemy rather than your own forces a majority of the time? I can understand things being rushed in the heat of a battle and you don't have time to double-check things. But the friendly forces were not remotely about to be overrun by a Taliban charge. If the Taliban had actually tried to do that, they would have been slaughtered. The gunfight lasted hours I believe. Isn't that sufficient time to explain to the helicopters exactly where all your men are positioned, with GPS coordinates, and for them to plot that on a map, and then use a compass to explain where the enemy is in relation to you (I thought there were binoculars with this sort of capability built-in), before dropping bombs? Regardless, if for some reason this sort of accuracy is not available, and that it's instead a complete hit and miss affair, can't the air assets at least drop flares or smoke bombs or something instead of real bombs to range the fire as they try to figure out the right place to blow up? Once the people on the ground confirm that the smoke is in the right place, then follow up with a real bomb. That video I saw is very far from the picture I get from reading strategypage. That was British troops rather than American though, but I thought that the troops were pretty much interchangable, all trained to NATO standards. And all highly professional. This is apparently not just my view either. The ANA commander also remarks "what are the bloody British doing?" as his troops come under fire. Are he and I missing something? He didn't say "this is the fog of war, we expect to come under friendly fire". I won't go into the ANA being drugged up in the middle of a firefight. I just hope the Taliban are doing the same thing so that they're on equal footing.
 
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