Air strikes - challenging the "collateral damage" narrative [Archive]

Easy Street

5th Dec 2015, 00:51

Another public debate over the use of air power, another round of commentators and Twitter-mobs worrying about collateral damage and dead women and children, some saying that only 'boots on the ground' can get right in to terminate the enemy without a general bloodbath. The MoD media office must be busy enough already steering press coverage in its desired direction, but they've obviously felt it necessary to publish under their own cover a statement (https://modmedia.blog.gov.uk/2015/12/03/preventing-civilian-casualties-and-coordinating-strike-action-what-you-need-to-know/) on how careful our aircrews are, how precise and controlled the weapon effects are, etc. This is good stuff.

However, I think that advocates of air power need to take a more robust stance and challenge more directly the enduring link in the public consciousness between air strikes and collateral damage, as if air power is somehow inherently less discriminate than other forms of military force. Plenty of material to build such a case is available in the series of UN reports on civilian casualties in Afghanistan (2015 midyear report here (http://unama.unmissions.org/Portals/UNAMA/human%20rights/2015/PoC%20Report%202015/UNAMA%20Protection%20of%20Civilians%20in%20Armed%20Conflict% 20Midyear%20Report%202015_FINAL_%205%20August-new.pdf) and others easily Google-able under "UN Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict Report"). Taking one example from the 2014 report:

http://aixpaix.de/bilder/afghanistan/unama2015/graph4.jpg

it is pretty obvious that ground war is far, far worse for civilians than air strikes. Even if our ground troops cause few casualties themselves (as was the case in Afghanistan) the use of asymmetric tactics against them, including IEDs, rockets, mortars, suicide bombs and urban ambushes, creates far more suffering than anything air power has managed in recent times. I can only conclude that the negative public sentiment towards air strikes derives from the fact that when air strikes go wrong, they can go REALLY wrong, as in the Kunduz hospital attack, the oil tanker strike in Afghanistan some years ago, and a goodly number of (possibly apocryphal) wedding parties. Events such as these certainly grab the headlines, but our 'talking heads' should make more of an effort to point out that the continuous drip-drip of casualties of land warfare makes it, in the long run, far from a discriminate option. Not to do down land forces in any way - but to try to put some perspective into and take some emotion out of the debate that always emerges at times like these.

A second chart from Afghanistan:

http://aixpaix.de/bilder/afghanistan/unama2015/graph2.jpg

can be used to make a moral case that we should worry less about causing civilian casualties ourselves, and worry more about defeating the enemy quickly before he causes a far greater number. A tricky case to make, for sure, but the obsession with "zero civilian casualties" may not always be the morally-defensible cause that it seems on first sight.

Thoughts?

Lonewolf_50

5th Dec 2015, 03:38

http://aixpaix.de/bilder/afghanistan/unama2015/graph4.jpg
http://aixpaix.de/bilder/afghanistan/unama2015/graph2.jpg

can be used to make a moral case that we should worry less about causing civilian casualties ourselves, and worry more about defeating the enemy quickly before he causes a far greater number. This is and has always been correct. The press/activists look at a thin slice of pizza and try to describe a restaurant district. But that is what shapes a lot of political narrative because people choose not to see the larger picture.

These graphs will be hand waved away by people who have a confirmation bias in a different direction.

Nice post, but sadly the people who need to hear it won't listen.

The Old Fat One

5th Dec 2015, 04:09

We live in world where the vast majority of the voting public willingly imbibe brain-numbing bilge from whatever media channel they have at their finger tips and buy in to whatever social media message hits their retina and strikes a limbic accord with their materialistically driven self-obsessed, wish-I-was-a-celebrity, level one thought process.

There's no "narrative" for them on this or any other political judgement. Just a snap call, based on whatever random lever is pulling their chain at any given moment.

You want a majority for peace...show a kid wounded by friendly fire.

You want a a majority for war...show a kid wounded by a terrorist bomb.

That German Air Force chap said something about this at Nuremberg...come to think of it, there was a Blackadder sketch that summed it up pretty much as well.

air pig

5th Dec 2015, 11:33

The so called general public' think we are sending a thousand Lancaster's out each night. I use the analogy, in 1944 we needed 800 bombers to shatter a city to destroy a factory, now we need one bomber to destroy the factory and leave the city unharmed.

The world moves on, just people have no idea, which is a result of the armed forces shrinking and moving away from their communities and politicians painting them as unthinking robots, fortunately we know different.

SWBKCB

5th Dec 2015, 12:27

We live in world where the vast majority of the voting public willingly imbibe brain-numbing bilge from whatever media channel they have at their finger tips and buy in to whatever social media message hits their retina and strikes a limbic accord with their materialistically driven self-obsessed, wish-I-was-a-celebrity, level one thought process.

There's no "narrative" for them on this or any other political judgement. Just a snap call, based on whatever random lever is pulling their chain at any given moment.

Do you really think that is the way people think or is that your interpretation based on what you see in the media??

gr4techie

5th Dec 2015, 12:33

After reading the total inaccuracies on The Guardian website, this thread is very appropriate.

At first I thought The Guardian comments were just naive. When they think of a bomb they picture a dumb 1000lb GP and totally oblivious to what Paveway is or does. To quote their journalist Boyle in his article dated Fri 4th Dec "Dropping something from a great height can never be precise".
However after a few days of the same comments, I don't believe they are that stupid. But in denial. They don't want to say Paveway and Brimstone are good kit as it would go against their biased agenda.

Thelma Viaduct

5th Dec 2015, 13:23

I think people are generally sick and tired of being involved in matters that were either created by us or made worse. Collateral damage is only a small part of the discontent, people are sick of the lies and industrial/commercial/political/military agendas, let alone the still fresh images of repatriated military personnel that have died for the square root of f**k all.

So yeah, many people are generally pissed off with it all. Being taxpayers, also have a right to display their opinion whether you like it or not.

gr4techie

5th Dec 2015, 14:02

PP,

Theres voicing your opinion then there's The Guardian being selective with the facts to deliberately mislead the public.

Is there a newspaper out there that doesn't have a bias or agenda and just states the facts and both sides of the argument objectively?

A newspaper that just publishes news and not sensationalism or opinion? it'll never catch on.

Thelma Viaduct

5th Dec 2015, 15:38

Fair enough, at best all sides are selective with 'facts'.

The general point remains, that a good number of people are sick of the death and destruction regardless of who is at fault. It's all we've seen for the past 25 years, people are pissed off. This Syria scenario gives another few years of bombing before the inevitable ground troop deployment and more UK deaths.

It's for reasons such as this, as to why Tony Blair cronies et al should be in jail. Sending troops to war on the basis of lies has caused all this death, destruction and billions £ pissed up the wall. No wonder people are saying enough is enough. Bit late now a monster has occupied the power vacuum though, send peace envoy Blair over to them to sort it out.

Melchett01

5th Dec 2015, 15:58

I understand that people have concerns, and when those concerns are genuinely born out of not understanding I'm more than happy to sit down and explain things. What really gets me irritated is when the holier than though self righteous brigade spout absolute drivel and it isn't challenged. It really makes me fear for the future of the country when such utter cockwombles are given air time and then when everybody else blindly agrees without knowing what they are agreeing to. I bet these are people who would join the back of a queue without knowing what they were queuing for.:mad:

The perfect case in point was when some bearded imbecile in the Question Time audience on Thursday began preaching that our bombing Syria was racist. I kid you not. Apparently that we viewed civilian deaths in Paris as a tragedy but collateral in Syria was racist. Cue lots of shouting at the to in Melchett HQ. I suspect he didn't even understand what racist actually means, but instead bandies it around as a tool to beat people with who don't follow his PC line of thinking.

Radio 4's Today Programme wasn't much better with Nick Robinson's inference that because we weren't using the much vaunted Brimstone, then we were causing CIVCAS. Now that worried me because Robinson is usually competent and down the line, so if even he is getting it wrong, I don't hold out much help for the rest of the media darlings.

StickMonkey3

5th Dec 2015, 16:59

..and,unlike the MSM, let's not forget all the civilians being murdered daily by IS, which should be factored in to any decision not to act/to impose restrictive RoE, but typically isn't.

And for a complete picture, though it's very difficult to calculate, those of our own citizens who die from delayed medical help/poverty/etc because the money got spent on expensive precision weaponry, instead of cheap bombs and kidney transplants, etc.

And apart from the sheer numbers game, our civilians or theirs?

Thelma Viaduct

5th Dec 2015, 22:39

thunderbird7

5th Dec 2015, 22:50

But you can't deny (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-34925237) that collateral damage happens....

By all means bomb them but be prepared to justify the inevitable mistakes.

Easy Street

5th Dec 2015, 23:46

tb7,

Nowhere did I advocate denial. The facts presented in those UN reports speak for themselves. The point about collateral damage events is that the way in which they have been handled over many years has skewed the perception of air power by the public. No-one has ever made a concerted effort to put the figures in wider context, and the public rarely hears about any other forms of collateral damage so are just left with the impression that air power has a particular propensity for killing babies. That's what needs correcting if we are to have public debate of any quality over the use of air power (including in Parliament, where the standard of debate on the topic was abysmal).

As to other posters' points on the right of the press or public to have their own opinions, let's turn to philosophy to examine those claims:

Having a right to an opinion does not make that opinion right. (http://www.critical-thinking.org.uk/critical-thinking/bad-arguments/entitled-to-an-opinion.php)

You are not entitled to your opinion. You are only entitled to what you can argue for. (https://theconversation.com/no-youre-not-entitled-to-your-opinion-9978)

SASless

6th Dec 2015, 00:49

SM3 raises an excellent point.

While we chalk up the Butchers Bill on Collateral Deaths....should we not add onto that tally the thousands that die while we show our wondrous restraint and by doing so delay ending the killing that goes on by the other side.

Are we not in some way responsible for those deaths that could have been prevented had we unleashed the proverbial Dogs?

StickMonkey3

6th Dec 2015, 01:51

Check out the Guardian's Defence bod - he does investigations into alleged miscarriages of military justice, and wouldn't know one end of a Paveway from the other - They really ARE that stupid.

Thank you, SASless. The point is: there is no zero option. Taken to the extreme - Do absolutely nothing and IS would take over the Planet (that is their stated aim) - 6.8 billion non-muslims executed. Probably another half billion of those we think of as muslims but they don't as well. Well, maybe 5 billion executed and the rest as sex slaves. The responsibility only accrues if we have the capability to stop them and do not. We have, and we currently aren't doing.

PPRuNeUser0211

6th Dec 2015, 07:15

In defence of the Guardian article, having read it, what I think he actually means by 'dropping weapons from height can never be precise' is that dropping a PWIV with a CEP of bugger all is fine, but if you drop it in the wrong place because the only intel you have is 'from height' then it still misses.

Not saying I agree with the guy, but give him some credit for a modicum of intelligence.

Pontius Navigator

6th Dec 2015, 08:23

It may be splitting hairs but there is a difference between collateral and accidental deaths.

At a policy level the decision to deliver ordnance will result in collateral damage.

At a tactical level true collateral deaths will occur when non-combatants are in close proximity to a legitimate target. Mis-identifying a target as combatant is a tactical error and at the same time political collateral.

SASless

6th Dec 2015, 12:53

All this concern over Collateral Damage confuses me.

We did not give a Tinkers Damn about carpet bombing Cities during WWII and even used two Nuclear Weapons on the Japanese.

The early surrender of the Japanese as a result of the Nuclear Bombs saved Millions of Lives probably.

Perhaps we need to get back to fighting Wars instead of what we do these days as we certainly do not have a very good record from the Tactics and Strategy we employ today.

Comparing the Nazi's and Militant Japanese to the likes of ISIS, Al Qaeda, and Taliban is not completely inappropriate as each were and are subgroups of various populations that brought death, pain, and misery to everyone around them.

Finding the way to attack their infrastructure and funding sources along with their personnel without harming too many innocents in the process is the hard part.

If we are going to defeat ISIS we shall have to wage War on them....War in every essence of the concept.

Pontius Navigator

6th Dec 2015, 13:08

SASLess, you would be better employed pushing a pea up a hill with your nose.

Allied bombing in WW 2 undoubtedly had am effect with targets selected with collateral damage as an intended effect. Subsequently the campaign was rewritten as abhorrent. Your Vietnam war was undoubtedly crippled by this new consciousness.

To fight a total war against those terrorists is impossible.

SASless

6th Dec 2015, 13:47

Total War....perhaps that definition can be brought up to modern times.

We don't need to build 247,000 airplanes to fight the War we find ourselves fighting.

Perhaps what we need to do is actually accept that it is a War and as such we should devote our combined National energies to fighting it.

Instead of calling up hundreds of thousands of Men (and perhaps Women), we need only to man such Units, Ships, and Aircraft that we need.

The other side is waging Asymmetrical War against us while we have yet to dedicate any significant combat strength to the fight.

Mr. Obama has dispatched 100 SpecOps Troops and some support elements to conduct Direct Action Raids in Iraq and Syria. How is that supposed to help re-take Mosul, Fallujah, and the other areas being held by ISIS?

What we must do is devote every bit of Military and Political Power available to us to aggressively conduct combat operations to achieve destruction of ISIS.

That does not mean we re-fight WWII in the Sand Box but it should mean we do mobilize the full array of resources needed to achieve that.

We mucked about in Iraq and Afghanistan (not learning from our experiences in Vietnam) far too long.

We need to get stuck in....deliver overwhelming force....kick their Ass and leave.

Otherwise, they keep on with their rape, torture, and killing.

Or....do we reinforce our Borders and just continue to repel Boarders as best we can and accept that some shall always get through and kill our Citizens as they did in Paris, California, New York, London, and Madrid?

Ron Manager

6th Dec 2015, 13:54

Taken from a Facebook post of a friend of a friend:

'As a teacher I would like to pass on the following wisdom from an 13year old who I teach-
"Is the Prime Minister an idiot? Because even I know that when someone hits your friend with a stick, you don't hit everyone in the playground with a stick. You take the stick away. And you find out who gave them the stick in the first place. And you find out where he got the stick. And clear up the sticks so nobody else can be tempted. Everyone gets angry. But if they don't have a stick then their anger isn't as dangerous."
I congratulated her on her wisdom.
"Sir. It isn't wisdom. It's obvious. If I gave someone a stick to hit someone with id be expelled. And imagine how much trouble id get in if I SOLD them the stick!!" '

Almost unbelievable, this is a teacher who thinks he's done a good job with the above! I'd say that as a teacher, he should have corrected the analogy, bombing ISIS in Syria is about confronting the bully with a stick wherever in the playground he's standing, not hitting everyone in the playground. I'd also have pointed out that under ISIS his pupil wouldn't have been in school, at 13 she'd probably have been 'married' to some future martyr! Anyone who thinks there is any way to deal with fascists, of whatever flavour, through negotiation, simply hasn't being paying attention. :ugh:

Pontius Navigator

6th Dec 2015, 14:08

What we must do is devote every bit of Military and Political Power available to us to aggressively conduct combat operations to achieve destruction of ISIS.

SASLess, indeed, as the French and Belgiques have done and you are currently doing. We probably need to commit far more effort to police our borders, neighbourhoods and coasts than we do plinking SUVs in Syria

MSOCS

6th Dec 2015, 15:48

SASLess is 'on the money'

My uncle once told me - when speaking of unpalatable organisations such as Da'esh - that to get rid of rats you don't just take out the King Rat. You have to take out the lot.

Da'esh, with their barbaric ideologies, threaten the future of all peace-loving Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, Christians and any other religion that won't conform or acknowledge their extreme interpretations of the Koran. The Facist comparison may not be apples to apples, but it certainly isn't too far off.

A comprehensive, total commitment to ending the madness is needed, and needed quickly. A prolonged and bloody exchange will be inevitable if we just dip our toes into this.

Pontius Navigator

6th Dec 2015, 16:46

But the rats don t breed in Syria.

Hangarshuffle

6th Dec 2015, 17:59

The way I see it, most British people would think the prospect of being bombed by aircraft, at the place where they live, their home, utterly terrifying (and a repugnant act to boot).

Wont really matter if the aircrew are using a smart bombs or not, its the overall concept, as deliverers the RAF cant escape association. Their dropping bombs on areas inhabited by fellow man isn't going to go down well here in the UK. its never going to be loved. Generally the British still even now have some empathy for the poor blighters down below who are entirely innocent of the war.
I was going to add, hands up those on here that have been on the receiving end of dropped bombs anyway? Not I ,but I've heard ours from miles away and its close enough for me thanks.
Even so called smart bombing is terrifying for ordinary people if you are not the target but happen to share the same target area.
The effect bombing has on people is well documented.

Empathy with a fellow civilian- This is why so many ordinary non military civilian types are against it (apart from about another million greasy reasons anyway).

Easy Street

6th Dec 2015, 23:14

HS,

So you are an interesting test-case for the statistics presented in my original post. Are you at all surprised to learn that land operations and enemy action caused fifty times more civilian casualties than air strikes during a year in Afghanistan, a year in which the so-called 'drone' campaign continued unabated, and would it make you pause for thought at all?

The effect that bombing had on civilians was well-documented in WW2, inasmuch as it showed that predictions of moral collapse were entirely unfounded. As to your point regarding the British, we have been fortunate enough to escape the ravages of land warfare in and around the civilian population in recent centuries, and that makes us very poorly-placed to empathise with those in Syria. People under threat of brutality from an invading force would undoubtedly take a very different perspective, and would (I dare say) welcome defence in whatever form it comes, terrifyingly loud or otherwise. Making sound moral judgements requires effort to see things from all perspectives, not simply extrapolating your own circumstances and experiences onto every other civilian.

Danny42C

6th Dec 2015, 23:17

HangarShuffle,
...... hands up those on here that have been on the receiving end of dropped bombs anyway? Not I ,but I've heard ours from miles away and its close enough for me thanks......
I've heard a few in my in my time. But when you hear it, you're still alive. It's when you don't hear it, you have to worry (but then, your worries are over, anyway).

D.

West Coast

7th Dec 2015, 04:44

To fight a total war against those terrorists is impossible.

No it's not. They've made a decision to morph from an ideology to a nation state and thus open themselves up to tactical and strategic tools which if used effectively can return them back to an ideology.

The real question is if the collective will exists to employ those tools. It's effective to destroy their infrastructure and income stream, but they won't be beat without someone going in and holding their land.

Any takers?

Pontius Navigator

7th Dec 2015, 08:26

HS, you make an unwarranted assertion that 'so many' are against bombing without even suggesting the numbers in many.

If, logically, it was necessary to nuke Raqqa, and almost everyone you met said 'go for it', you would be surprised that 'so many', say 10 of 1000 were agin. See what I mean?

My mother in law has indeed been bombed, so have I, and all she thinks is we should have bombed sooner and be bombing more. She is 92.

Heathrow Harry

7th Dec 2015, 09:31

https://yougov.co.uk/news/2015/12/02/analysis-sharp-fall-support-air-strikes-syria/

Sorry about the size of the graphic...............

In just seven days, five million people have joined the ranks of those opposed to air strikes in Syria. But if Jeremy Corbyn is tempted to rejoice at this, he should beware. He is paying a heavy price for these gains, with support for Labour slipping and his own personal rating crashing from bad to terrible.

Last week, 59% of Britons backed air strikes; now the figure is just 48%. That eleven-point decline equates to five million electors. The number opposed is up eleven points, from 20% to 31%. Every political and demographic group has seen a change, but two stand out:

The gender gap has widened. Now men favour air strikes by more than two-to-one (58-26%), while women divide evenly: 39-36%.
Those who voted Labour in May have switched from backing military action by 52-26% a week ago, to opposing it, by 42-35% today.

https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/inlineimage/14473/syriaNovDecChange01.png

Among voters who would vote Labour today, opposition to air strikes is even stronger, with 57% backing Mr Corbyn’s stance and just 23% backing the Prime Minister’s position. Paradoxically, that should worry Labour’s leader, for the party is haemorrhaging support among people who voted for the party in May but currently back air strikes. They comprise more than three million people; our figures suggest that well over one million of them would no longer vote Labour if an election were held today.

In essence, Mr Corbyn is polarising the electorate – gaining ground among a large, worried minority of voters, but alienating the much larger majority.

Why has the public mood changed so sharply? Movements in our other tracking questions are much smaller – on the likely effectiveness of air strikes, the dangers of reprisal acts by terrorists, and the case for sending ground troops (on which the public remains divided, with supporters narrowly outnumbering opponents a week ago, and opponents holding an equally narrow lead today.)

The likeliest explanation is that as the debate about air strikes has intensified, the issue has moved to the forefront of voters’ minds. For five million voters, this has meant that doubts about military action that, perhaps, lurked in the background have now surfaced.

Having moved once, the public’s view may well move again. At different times, voters have backed military action in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the air raids in Libya. But in each case the public mood soured, as conditions in each country worsened.

robin

7th Dec 2015, 10:04

I think the change is mainly due to a decision in the abstract turning to the enactment of that decision in reality.

There are going to be a lot of people out there watching and waiting for the first bit of collateral damage. There is too much 'boys own' talk from Fallon and others for my comfort.

Looking at today's news an alleged bombing by the US of a Syrian Army barracks won't help. It's either a genuine mistake of targeting or a deliberate act to induce regime change. Neither of which was raised at the recent debate.

Frostchamber

7th Dec 2015, 10:43

I think we're partly seeing the effects of the fact that the "stop the war" Corbynista types are aggressively dominating the twittersphere quite successfully - there's some effective "volume management" going on and it would be easy to get the impression that theirs is the pervasive view - which may give it an element of momentum of its own, especially as it repeats the "innocent people will die" meme.

I'm reminded of the Scottish referendum - there was an unpleasant campaign directed at anyone with the temerity to declare themselves in the "No" camp and in the end many of those against independence tended to keep their heads down because they didn't need that sort of grief. I suspect that many like me who on balance support the current action, albeit with reservations, tend not to be fired up about it with the same sort of evangelical zeal evidenced by the stop the war agitators.

If true that would support the view that the "collateral damage" view does need to be countered where it wilfully distorts the true situation.

Lonewolf_50

7th Dec 2015, 16:36

Looking at today's news an alleged bombing by the US of a Syrian Army barracks won't help. It's either a genuine mistake of targeting or a deliberate act to induce regime change. Or it wasn't an American plane.
That's the current line from Pentagon. Not sure if that will change in time.

camelspyyder

15th Dec 2015, 16:21

Maybe Iran won't be so keen on Russian cruise missiles in it's airspace now:

Russian cruise missile hits flats in Arctic accident - BBC News (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-35106935)

They can't even avoid collateral damage on their own ranges.

SASless

15th Dec 2015, 16:36

We might not be able to hit the intended Target every single time but we at least know where the Aircraft were on their Sortie. Bit of checking the time and location and Bob's yer Uncle.

It is not like we have thousands of aircraft over the Bad Guys all day and night is it?

They've made a decision to morph from an ideology to a nation state and thus open themselves up to tactical and strategic tools which if used effectively can return them back to an ideology.

They've made a decision to morph from an ideology to a nation state and thus open themselves up to tactical and strategic tools which if used effectively can turn them into a Memory. You Reckon?

Not_a_boffin

15th Dec 2015, 17:07

http://www.sott.net/article/273517-Study-US-regime-has-killed-20-30-million-people-since-World-War-Two

I wonder what the real number is? 20-30 million seems a bit conservative. Suppose the article only goes to 2007.

How many people did the Nazis kill??

You can summarise the conclusions of the above as "it doesn't matter who was fighting who - it was all the fault of the dastardly CIA/MIC/US - nothing to do with anyone else".

Moonhowling tripe which would be funny were it not for the credulous halfwits who believe it.

Hangarshuffle

16th Dec 2015, 16:13

The RAF haven't done any bombing for 10 days, according to one report I saw today. Might be true, might not. They're hardly in the headlines though, after all the brouhaha.
If true, why?
Lack of targets?
Lack of ammunition?
Fear of collateral damage?
Lack of right aircraft?
Other factor? Fear of Russian action? Slow realisation we've backed the wrong horse?
Its unravelling more and more IMHO.

Pontius Navigator

16th Dec 2015, 17:13

HS, IMHO, intermittent operations can have a greater psychological effect one many rather than plunking the odd Toyota.

Lonewolf_50

16th Dec 2015, 17:47

The RAF haven't done any bombing for 10 days, according to one report I saw today.

If true, why?
Lack of targets?
Lack of ammunition?
Fear of collateral damage?
Lack of right aircraft?
Other factor?
Fear of Russian action?
Slow realisation we've backed the wrong horse?
I did a small edit on your post to make this easier to respond.
1. Is the why important, given that your government has not yet declared "we are done bombing" at this point?
2. On a given day, if you don't have a target that you are allowed to hit and able to hit, you don't drop anything. I got to learn that IRL.
3. Doubt that
4. That's ever present and directly related to the answer to point 2.
5. Not likely, since the ones sent seem to still be deployed. See answer to point 1.
6. Such as?
7. Not likely
8. Who have "we" backed and how are they wrong as compared to the Daesh/ISIL/newcaliphate horses'behinds?

Hangarshuffle

16th Dec 2015, 18:19

It just seems a bit strange to me. The push to get a mandate from the UK parliament, from the UK Govt. seemed massive. Dominated the news in the UK. Now they have it, nothing much has actually happened recently, within the last 10 days.. It seemed very stage managed - an immediate raid literally minutes after the vote was made, and this was well reported. And since then, not a lot of UK air attacks at all.
Why is this?
Surely that goes against modern air operations. Certainly the previous ones I took a part in, sustained operations of a certain tempo were the way it was done.
Rumour is rife on other parts of the net, and in some sections of more independent online available newspapers, about what is actually going on. About whose side the UK really is on and what the actual end game, the real aim actually is.
To still say the UK role is to assist in the bombing of ISIS..destroy them..this is very simplistic and not at all true.

Someone well known within UK politics had gone further though, much further - and then dried up a bit.
Surprised, bearing in mind some people on here and their pretty high level of intelligence haven't gone further either.
The UK and France's Suez campaign wasn't all it seemed either in 1956 and it unravelled soon enough. Wonder if this one will as well?

Hangarshuffle

16th Dec 2015, 18:29

About oil. The pipeline that would be built. Who supplies Europe in the end and from where. Who doesn't want who to be in charge at the end of the war. Its nowhere near as straightforward as what it seems, we all know this anyway.
But the tempo of the RAF bombing, the sudden urgency has totally slacked off and there is a reason for that, which you aren't being told.
The RAF have what, 16 highly capable FB aircraft in situ - a very potent little package, suddenly doing very little.
All isn't what it seemed.
Goodnight. (Got to sleep, not being rude - I work damned hard, still).