Bag's Rants

A highly skilled force. Just a little bit more training required.

I read this article about a bit of UK friendly fire. Remember that friendly fire isn't.

I know that these things happen in the heat of not wanting to be killed so I do have a lot of sympathy for these guys. The live ones as well as the dead.

Then I read this phrase in the article and thought 'I don't believe that.' The article said 'The report will make recommendations on better dissemination of critical information on the battlefield and improved training. This would include teaching soldiers what different types of armoured vehicles look like and knowing when to fire.' (My emphasis)

WTF. What are they doing when they do all this training. Schoolkids are hot on identification of planes, boats, cars etc. Everything that boys find exciting. Yet, these highly trained soldiers, cough, don't recognise the difference between a mainline Russian battletank and one of their own. And it's not like we have that many to chose from all they have to do is remember what ours look like. Everything else can be blown away. Note: we don't have to worry about US forces. They will be the ones shooting at us already and from the air. That's why we have separate areas to fight in. In addition they were 'slightly disoriented' I think he meant lost. So these guys were firing into our tanks from outside the area where they should have been.

But no-one was at fault. I'll remember that next time I'm heading down a motorway the wrong way. I was slightly disoriented officer. That's OK then, those deaths were no-ones fault.

As far as the training goes I think the knowing when to fire part seems to be down pat. Identify enemy tank. Point big gun at it. Fire when pointing at it. Keep reloading and firing until all you can see is a hole in the ground. That worked OK. Now if they managed to get the identify part right and read a GPS then they will be fully trained.

And one of the widows was OK with that explanation. It was highly detailed. Talk about taking one for the good of the corp.

Jeez, so much for our professional army.

posted by Bag @ 11:25 am