Originally Posted by
Danny42C
Lonewolf 50, ...snip...who in his right mind could deny that this was a 100%, copper-bottomed, gold-plated military target? Do not Daesh (or whatever we're supposed to call them now) run around today with artillery on the backs of Toyota pick-ups ?
As I don't have a map and grid with the surrounding environment, I can't say how that would influence a "weapons free" or "weapons tight" ruling. The crew may have launched with an RoE of 'weapons tight unless otherwise advised' which is something I've seen in a variety of real world ops.
My heart is with your sentiments, of course.
And was this not a Clear and Present Danger to our troops in Kandahar ?
That's how I'd see it, but some of the RoE get into bizarre levels of detail. As Dick Deadeye said in HMS Pinafore " It's a queer world!" (queer meaning strange and not natural). on the other hand, my experiences with ops in Iraq is that when a 'technical' (armed pickup with AAA or mortars or rockets on the back) were found, they were valid targets so long as friendlies or "non targets" were not within 'x' distance. The folks who usually got them were armed rotary wing assets. I do recall clearly (and we got Gun Camera footage the following day from the squadron) a lovely strike on a pick up truck with a 57mm AAA piece in the northern part of Fallujah, done by an F-18 using (IIRC) a Maverick, of all things. There were times when the pilots were allowed to deploy their weapons systems as intended.
If we're not to use lethal force on them in a case like this, then what are we doing there at all ?
Ain't that the question?
