Friendly Fire

[Typhoon1244]

(I posted an identical message under "General" since not many of you guys hang out there...I apologize for the redundancy.)

According to an NPR reporter, the latest friendly fire incident was perpetrated by a pair of "F-15 Tomcats." I wonder what they really were...

Anyway, here's my question: it seems like there have been an awful lot of these accidents lately...and not just by aircraft. As we saw last week, artillery and Patriot batteries can screw up too. What I want to know is which of the following statements is true...

(1) The number of friendly fire incidents is increasing alarmingly, suggesting deficiencies in training and technology integration.

(2) The number of friendly fire incidents is normal compared to other conflicts...it's just being reported in more detail by CNN, NBC, BBC, Fox, etc.

Any thoughts?

 

[Spur]

Neither statement is correct. I would say the overall number is actually lower than normal compared to other conflicts, with the possible exception of the Patriot FF incidents. However, in addition to the 24 news cycle effect, the weapons employed have such a higher lethality each incident has a greater probability of a large number of casualties. As far as the Patriots, I would suspect that this being the first serious combat use of the PAC-3, the sheer number of aircraft in the air, and the fear of chemical laden missile attacks from Iraq have contributed to those incidents.

 

[FastCargo]

Yeah, what he said...

Spur pretty much echoed what i was thinking...

In addition, remember the actual number of casualties, and I mean TOTAL coalition. I'm not being flippant, but this isn't the war our grandfathers, fathers, even older brothers fought.

If you look at the history of war in the 20th century, and number of US/Allied losses of personnel, it has gone down geometrically, even from as recently as Desert Storm. Because of a combination of the lower number and the constant news coverage, each individual casualty leaps out at us.

I'm not saying it shouldn't!!! But, because of this combination, friendly fire incidents stand out even more so than they did back when. So it is partially a perception issue...

Realistically though, war is controlled chaos a lot of the time...and unfortunately, things like this will always happen...

It sucks, but that's the way it is...

 

[firstthird]

Agree with above two posters. Only really since the 80's has the information on the battlefield been good enough to separate the friendly fire casualties from the enemy fire with any degree of accuracy. I don't think anyone has good numbers for the number of FF accidents from WW2 or most other ones for that matter.

p.s. Fastcargo - great quote by Heinlein, never seen that one before, it is a keeper.