Monday, March 15, 2004
A Day Short and a Dollar Late
Here's to the NY Times for nailing down a great scoop on evolving insurgency techniques only 10 months after the fact.
BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 14 — Insurgent bombmakers, whose roadside explosives claimed the lives of six more American soldiers this weekend, have adopted new and grimly devious tactics, military officers said Sunday.
The tactics include setting multiple charges along convoy routes, disguising bombs inside animal carcasses and planting hollow artillery shells to draw troops into an ambush, they said.
Read the whole thing. The "daisy chain" technique is very basic, and they were doing that from the very beginning--we were running into some of them in May and June. We were running into the 'bait and switch' technique --where they'd put a shell out in plain view hoping you'd stop and bunch up, and then blow a series of hidden IEDs pretty regularly-- by the first week of July.
If the article tells us anything, it's that the new bunch of military officers in Baghdad that provided the source material for this story are probably recent arrivals, and are still going through a discovery mode.
The new units are going to have to go through a steep learning curve, but that shouldn't take too long. It's just going to be a very painful process for a while.
Digging a little deeper behind the scenes, here, the article gives us a glimpse into a war within a war--in this case, the Air Force's war to retain its share of next year's defense budget.
Even fighter aircraft assigned to escort convoys or to fly direct combat missions when ground troops raid suspected insurgent hideouts or seek to seize militants are told to watch for roadside bombs as well.
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A senior Air Force official involved in planning missions over Iraq said surveillance planes, by their mere presence, reduced insurgents' ability to conceal explosives.
Between 55 and 60 combat sorties are flown over Iraq each day, and 45 to 50 combat support sorties, including surveillance and intelligence-gathering missions to counter those devices, the Air Force officer said.
Apparently, they've enlisted the New York Times as an unwitting ally in this campaign. Guys, of COURSE that's what an Air Force officer would say. Howzabout a little filtering, gentlemen?
My own take: In an urban counterinsurgency, one good platoon of Kiowas or Apache helicopters--is worth an entire squadron of F16s.
Splash, out
Jason
BAGHDAD, Iraq, March 14 — Insurgent bombmakers, whose roadside explosives claimed the lives of six more American soldiers this weekend, have adopted new and grimly devious tactics, military officers said Sunday.
The tactics include setting multiple charges along convoy routes, disguising bombs inside animal carcasses and planting hollow artillery shells to draw troops into an ambush, they said.
Read the whole thing. The "daisy chain" technique is very basic, and they were doing that from the very beginning--we were running into some of them in May and June. We were running into the 'bait and switch' technique --where they'd put a shell out in plain view hoping you'd stop and bunch up, and then blow a series of hidden IEDs pretty regularly-- by the first week of July.
If the article tells us anything, it's that the new bunch of military officers in Baghdad that provided the source material for this story are probably recent arrivals, and are still going through a discovery mode.
The new units are going to have to go through a steep learning curve, but that shouldn't take too long. It's just going to be a very painful process for a while.
Digging a little deeper behind the scenes, here, the article gives us a glimpse into a war within a war--in this case, the Air Force's war to retain its share of next year's defense budget.
Even fighter aircraft assigned to escort convoys or to fly direct combat missions when ground troops raid suspected insurgent hideouts or seek to seize militants are told to watch for roadside bombs as well.
Advertisement
A senior Air Force official involved in planning missions over Iraq said surveillance planes, by their mere presence, reduced insurgents' ability to conceal explosives.
Between 55 and 60 combat sorties are flown over Iraq each day, and 45 to 50 combat support sorties, including surveillance and intelligence-gathering missions to counter those devices, the Air Force officer said.
Apparently, they've enlisted the New York Times as an unwitting ally in this campaign. Guys, of COURSE that's what an Air Force officer would say. Howzabout a little filtering, gentlemen?
My own take: In an urban counterinsurgency, one good platoon of Kiowas or Apache helicopters--is worth an entire squadron of F16s.
Splash, out
Jason
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