OnPoint: A Friday-Appropriate Hager Excerpt
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I thinks it's "memento" - unless it was an automatic rifle...
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Some US soldiers in the same position would have seen an Afghan with a gun and simply shot him to avoid the mission being compromised.
Or, just shot a teenage goatherder who didn't actually have a gun.
As the morning wore on, three local goat herders stumbled upon the SEALs' hiding place. Unable to verify any hostile intent from the herders, Dietz attempted to contact HQ via radio, but was unable to get an answer from anyone. Absent any higher-level guidance, LT Murphy put the decision as to what should be done with them up for a vote: Axelson voted to kill the Afghans, stating, "The military decision is obvious," in reference to the near-certainty that the herders would alert the Taliban. Dietz abstained, and Murphy allowed Luttrell the deciding vote, but warned him that the killings would have to be reported, and that they would be attacked by the "US liberal media" and would almost certainly face murder charges. Luttrell voted to release the herders. He would later state, "It was the stupidest, most southern-fried, lame brained decision I ever made in my life. I must have been out of my mind. I had actually cast a vote which I knew could sign our death warrant. I’d turned into a f—ing liberal, a half-assed, no-logic nitwit, all heart, no brain, and the judgment of a jackrabbit."
Hearts and minds, boys. Hearts and minds.
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You just know there are no Stanislav Petrov's in the US military.
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Tristan, in reply to
to be fair that was said in hindsight after his whole team was killed (and this his whole rescue team) because they couldn't get an extraction..
The guilt of having that vote and the lived of nearly 20 men on your hands might make you say things like that
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Rich Lock, in reply to
It wasn't so much that he said those things, and they didn't actually kill the goatherds.
However, in my opinion, the most striking, and chilling part of the account is that the discussion took place at all. They clearly considered that killing at least one unarmed and blameless teenage boy in more or less cold blood was a viable option. From a purely military PoV that may well be the case. But....that's pretty fucked up.
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...and even if you consider that it would have been justifiable to protect yourself and your troopmates, on the basis that you were effectively alone and unsupported and releasing them would have been signing your own death warrent, I'd like to know how that argument applies here:
A UN complaint contained in the latest batch of cables published by the whistle-blowing organisation suggests that in 2006 US troops killed at least 10 civilians, including five children and an elderly woman, in the central town of Ishaqi.
The incident is raised in a letter from Philip Alston, the UN rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions. Mr Alston's letter to US officials, which went unanswered, challenges the American military version of events. It says that autopsies carried out in the nearby city of Tikrit showed the victims had been handcuffed and shot in the head. They included a woman in her 70s and a five-month-old.
insert disclaimer about 'alleged' here, yadda yadda.
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Vote? This makes as much sense as Bravo Two Zero. A great yarn based on aspects of truth.
Notice how the ex-Defense Minister is er well, defensive?
I'm sure Hager is factually correct, and the Military followed their political leaders. The question over whether their direction were the same as broadcast.
And of course the CIA shared our facilities & due to space requirements left to make way for other guest. Who subsequently never saw them.
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High on a hill was a lonely goatherd
Lay ee odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo
Loud was the voice of the lonely goatherd
Lay ee odl lay ee odl-oo.....Who would have guessed that the SAS Regimental March was the Sound of Music
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Who would have guessed that the SAS Regimental March was the Sound of Music
SAS: The Musical. I'd love to see that.
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Sacha, in reply to
Willie gets a solo
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merc,
But when journalists asked Key to comment he refused, saying simply “I just don’t comment on issues of national security”.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10749096But Mr Key, that is all I just want you to comment on.
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But when journalists asked Key to comment he refused, saying simply “I just don’t comment on issues of national security”.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10749096But Mr Key, that is all I just want you to comment on.
It's becoming the catch-all for politicians who rather wouldn't. I don't remember it being the case, it seems like a relatively recent thing. While I don't expect to know what street New Zealand troops are walking down this afternoon, OUR representatives have the obligation to tell us what damned country they're in, and why they're there.
Willie gets a solo
Willie is the lead. Mateparae has a starring role, as does Helen Clark - the woman who just doesn't understand (the NZDF) until it's too late.
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BenWilson, in reply to
Yes, it's fucked up. The tying up option seems perfectly good to me, and complaints of not having a rope simply pathetic. They could have cut bindings from their own, or the goatherd's, clothes. We're talking about elite commandos here, people who are meant to be able to cope with difficult situations. I could fucking well tie a couple of people up just with the clothes I'm wearing right now. If the safety of my team depended on it I find it extremely hard to believe they didn't have anything at all on them that could have been used. The straps from their packs? The laces from their boots?
I also find it hard to believe that human restraints aren't just stock army gear, considering that those cable ties that are typically used take up a minimal amount of pack space and their utility in the handling of prisoners is both incredibly obvious, and very likely to come up in warfare.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
Vote?
Very possibly, yes. One interesting consistency of at least the English-speaking special forces (I haven't read too much about the French and German ones, but the SAS (of all national persuasions) and Delta/Rangers/SEALs have also trained a lot of the rest of the world) is that until it comes to giving an order, everyone's opinion carries equal weight.
This is, at least in part, because officers mostly don't have the time-in-service of the men they command, either in uniform (a lieutenant might have five years, but be commanding corporals and sergeants with 10 years or more) or in the special forces. Assuming that your senior position imparts greater knowledge is a great way to get people killed; it's not even a very good idea in civilian life, as most people who've worked for a few organisations know from first-hand experience.
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Sacha, in reply to
I could fucking well tie a couple of people up just with the clothes I'm wearing right now
Noted. A bit part for that man too, perhaps..
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BenWilson, in reply to
I will confess to having spent a little too much time thinking about such things. It's an interesting martial art sub discipline, tying people up, whom you are pinning. I presume people can see immediately why it's not widely taught?
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Agreed, an Officer would be wise to listen to his NCOs. This is in no way the same as a vote. Time is a key factor here. A good story it is, fact it is not likely to be.
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I would have thought the junior officers in the SAS were like a jury foreman, only there to have a single person to pass on or receive orders from higher up
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Officers are mostly involved in logistics and strategy issues, and generally do not deploy into the field. NCO's do most of the in-field work, and it is usual to deploy in teams of four, or thereabouts.
NCO's joining the SAS lose all previous rank and have to work their way back up. One of the selection criteria is the ability to act independently and on your own initiative to achieve the wider strategic objective.
The argument would have been that to leave them tied up would have inevitably led fairly quickly to their discovery and release, and the local bad guys would then have known there was a US team, on foot, in the local area. Dead bodies are easier to hide, and can't give out useful information like numbers, direction of travel, etc.
In my view, it is a failure - a horrendously bad failure - of planning and intelligence that the team didn't have an extraction option in the situation they found themselves in, except to start killing locals. It is also symptomatic of their mindset that that was a seriously discussed option in relation to the very people they were supposedly there to free and protect from Al-Quaeda and the Taliban.
Guess they just had to destroy the village in order to save it, right?
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BenWilson, in reply to
The argument would have been that to leave them tied up would have inevitably led fairly quickly to their discovery and release, and the local bad guys would then have known there was a US team, on foot, in the local area. Dead bodies are easier to hide, and can't give out useful information like numbers, direction of travel, etc.
It would have been less quick than letting them go so they could then head straight to ... whoever they were going to go to. Which was what they actually did, and what then happened.
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Wow SAS Officers just do logistics.
I can understand the confusion. Their Corp belt is like a logistics blue seatbelt.The supposed "vote" was about commiting a War Crime.
They train harder, and have other qualities, a propensity to murder isn't one.
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The SA S stole a rifle from a civilian? I know times are tough but fo our SAS to be reduced to this is ridiculous.
How and when is tha Afghani gpotsherd going to replace that rifle?
No Wonder that occupying forces are so strongly resisted.
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jb,
The SAS officers were highly embarrassed that, after pushing to be given missions, the first one had gone wrong; and even more embarrassed because the urgent extraction of the New Zealanders involved heavy US military resources.
Why “embarrassed”?
They have extraction strategies, being compromised by locals or targets is factored into the operational risk analysis.Move along, nothing to see here….
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Rich Lock, in reply to
Wow SAS Officers just do logistics.
I can understand the confusion. Their Corp belt is like a logistics blue seatbelt.
The supposed "vote" was about commiting a War Crime.
They train harder, and have other qualities, a propensity to murder isn't one.1. Don't confuse US special forces, which the are 'vote' troops in question, with the SAS.
2. No, they don't 'just do logistics'. However, they don't tend to go out in the field as much as NCO's. They are generally more concerned with strategic considerations and support (logistics) for smaller teams in field. The strategic aspect outweighs the logistics aspect.
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Rich Lock, in reply to
They have extraction strategies, being compromised by locals or targets is factored into the operational risk analysis.
Well, one would hope so. But it rather frequently doesn't seem to work that way, and that does beg an obvious question.
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