Nicely put, AS.

MSF people are not naiive. They deal with the consequences of American (and other) aggression literally every hour and every day of their working lives.

Their problem is that they cannot easily engage with the 'politics' of those who disregard the Geneva Convention(s) and/or with those who disregard the norms of civilisation.

That is the problem which was addressed by the MSF person in the light of the American aggression which obliterated a well known hospital in Kunduz (the only hospital, actually).

No, nothing so grandiose. Geneva wasn't written for the kinds of wars that have been going on for the last 20 years, no matter how hard you try to shoehorn them into it.

This is a :mad: up, make no mistake. If it was deliberate (which I seriously doubt) it is far more serious and in that case may approach the matter of how allegedly civilized nations wage war.

It strikes me as a failure in C3I, or C4I, and IMO not a complex one, particularly when you look at the tools available and the experience base available to do the job correctly. As a US taxpayer and someone once involved in stuff like this, I am not pleased to see what looks like numerous errors in the decision chain resulting in a tragic outcome.

As I pointed out, and as Caz' citation form the NGO points out, it's hard enough to get modern medical care in Afghanistan as it is without someone (accidentally or otherwise) blowing up a hospital.

My understanding is that the Geneva Convention is supposed to prevent certain deliberate actions by combatants. It does not and cannot address the accidents that happen in the fog of war. And please keep in mind that this is a very non conventional war where the various "combatants" are difficult if not impossible to identify.

How do you define "well known"? By a set of GPS coordinates? The next time you fly over any "well known" town, please try to identify the "well known" school, hospital, orphanage, etc from above 10,000 ft AGL. Things look a lot alike at that altitude.

Let' try an experiment. Below is a link to an aerial photo of Kunduz. Can you identify any "well known" hospital, orphanage, school, mosque, etc in that photo?

https://www.google.com/maps/@36.7186.../data=!3m1!1e3

I don't believe the nexus to the Geneva convention and this is there unless you believe the US knowingly attacked the hospital, knowing full well what was there.

Well said, KenV. I was about to make a similar illustration.

For the non-mil aviation people that suddenly seem to have pitched up here itching to sling some mud at mil aircrew and the rest of the mil chain, here's a couple of questions for you.

Where is N34°32'38.0256'' E69° 9' 38.3472'' in this cockpit view?

http://www.fhsclassmates.com/images/kabulR.jpg

How many other significant locations are also notified?

How long do you have before you miss the opportunity to attack your designated target?

How many friendly forces will die if you do not commit to the target you have been directed to by ground forces? - hence the importance of Lonewolf's distinction between an air strike and CAS.

Repeated, ill-informed references to the Geneva Convention are not only incorrect, they demonstrate a desperation to seek out any old reason to start shouting "war criminals". We don't even know what actually happened yet.

Try plotting the only known hospital in a city on a map.

Then pick your target.

Then think about your actions.

Then think about the consequences of your actions.

Not necessarily in that order.

You figure it out.

And you really believe that's the only important Lat and Long active on that particular day?

Now try answering all the above questions, not just one of your own invention.

Cazalet33, a different question for you. How hard did you find it to identify the target, positions of friendly ground forces and civilian areas the last time you did a CAS mission?

M2, the bombers didn't have any difficulty in identifying the hospital when they targeted it.

Targeting the only hospital in a region as large as that really isn't difficult, especially when you've had the co-ords for months.

Just do it, if that's what turns you on.

It's not as if the hospital might have moved or shot back or something.

It really wasn't something seriously threatening to the Empire, like a pheasant or a grouse or a goose or something. Not something really worth shooting at like that.

So the answer is never.

Yup.

Never bomb hospitals. Not ever, ever.

Just never worth the profit. Ever.

We wrote a rule about that, but the type who just don't understand the rule will never ever respect it.

That's a limitation of all Geneva Conventions.

The Geneva convention prohibits mistakes?

Cazalet33

Your avoidance has answered my question very well. You have clearly never flow CAS.

Your statement demonstrates very well that you have come here to criticise the mil pilots. It is based on an assumption that the instruction was to target "a hospital" and not "a building". Your posts are so contradictory that I suspect you are only here for one reason. Earlier you wanted them to mark the hospital on their "map", now you suggest that they identified it in order to target it.

This was a CAS mission. I am not about to go into a long and involved description of how CAS is done, but I will remind you to consider the targeting role involved.

The latter part of your post and your insistence that this was a deliberate act are simply trolling. Not necessary here. The rest is simplistic and somewhat naive.

Just to remain you: Military Aviation A forum for the professionals who fly military hardware. Also for the backroom boys and girls who support the flying and maintain the equipment, and without whom nothing would ever leave the ground. All armies, navies and air forces of the world equally welcome here.

April 2015 satellite imagery of the coordinates provided, roughly 1km2:

http://i58.tinypic.com/29vne8.jpg

the (almost) cross-shaped larger building in the center is identified as "Kunduz District Hospital" in older maps.

(direct link here TerraServer - Aerial Photos & Satellite Images - The Leader In Online Imagery )

closeup, 0.1km2:

http://i59.tinypic.com/15xsvw9.png

this is a recording of CAS as seen through AC 130 sensors:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSOG9GHVV0c

Are we expected to believe that the US military did not know that the targeted building was a hospital?

Is the denial in any way credible?

It's not a very plausible denial, but the murderers should be given a chance to make their excuses to a properly constituted war crimes tribunal.

If the Americans cannot or will not abide by the Geneva Convention(s) then it's probably best for everyone that they just go away. Leave Afghanistan and Iraq and just go away.

MSF's task is hard enough without American-style thuggery being added to the problem list of the NGOs.

If you watch the video above you'll see how the crew identifies a mosque, to NOT fire on it. I don't believe for a second that that the US would deliberately sustain fire on a hospital. I do believe this is an accident. The question is, how did it happen. We can only speculate here, we weren't there, and maybe we shouldn't speculate but it's a rumor forum. To me, the most likely speculation is that the crew didn't have the information that it's a hospital.

Cazalet/JH has moved beyond asking questions, indeed he has arrived at a conclusion minus the data to do so. I think M2 has nailed it in the description of this man as a troll and as such should be ignored, which is exactly what I plan on.

If the US military did not know that the hospital was located at that very prominent position, right at the head of the Nasvan-e-Markazi Road, then they should not have been attacking the city at all.

If that's the best they can do, then it's better for all that they just go away. They are not doing any good in Afghanistan, so they should just leave.

14 years ago we were told that it was necessary to attack Afghanistan in revenge for the 9/11 atrocities. 14 years later we still haven't found a shred of evidence that Afghanistan or any Afghans were involved. Time to back off.

The wrongful attack on the hospital was just a microcosm of the macromistake of attacking Afghanistan in the first place.

Caz, we were invited in by the Afg Government to fight the Taliban.

The pictures of that hospital might suggest it is recognizable but I see no visible indications, no crescent, no help pad, nothing. While 'everyone' should have known it was a hospital you presume the aircraft crew also knew. They may have been new in theatre. This may have been a very early sortie in their tour.

Just because it is a hospital does not mean it is only a hospital.

In WW 2 the Germans stored ammunition in the underground hospital in Guernsey.

In Iraq terrorists place a huge bomb outside a hospital. The target was the EOD officer, the hospital was bait.

Wait for the facts.

The fundamental problem is that the US military just don't know when to stop. There's no restraint and there's no mindset for peace.

Thomas Barnett gave a rather good talk on the matter:

Pontius, Doctors without borders stated "Our staff reported no armed combatants or fighting in the compound prior to the airstrike". Without any information to the contrary, I do believe this is credible, as they regularly and loudly protest when armed combatants enter the hospital.

( In a statement posted online in July, they said "heavily armed men from Afghan Special Forces entered the [Médecins Sans Frontières] hospital compound, cordoned off the facility and began shooting in the air."

"The armed men physically assaulted three MSF staff members and entered the hospital with weapons," the statement continued. "They then proceeded to arrest three patients." )

Afghan forces don't like that medical treatment is given to insurgent combatants. This may be a wild conspiracy theory, but maybe some Afghans wanted to use the US to destroy the hospital? Again, pure speculation. Anyway the US has accepted full responsibility, and stated the decision was taken within their chain of command. President Obama called Doctors without borders to apologize ( https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press...onal-president ) - it's exceptionally rare that a US president offers apologies, so I think it's clear this was indeed a major blunder, and everyone is aware of that.

What I don't like is the leaks that RoE weren't followed, it looks like a hunt for a scapegoat. Given that the building looks recognizable, and that publicly available maps identify it as a hospital, and that Doctors without borders provide coordinates, and that AH-130 have capable sensors to visually acquire a target with great precision, and in 99.999% of all cases do exactly that (doctors without borders stated that surrounding buildings were more or less unharmed), this seems odd. I'd suspect there was a communication breakdown somewhere. In the absence of more information, my best guess is that someone - probably by oversight - didn't give the crew and JTAC enough information.

It's the standard shout of 'condemn and demand a hanging first, then discover the facts.' It's a tragic event, but it is clear that the facts are currently few and far between. That Cazalet33's 'arguments' and accusations continually change shows that he is purely seeking a response. That attempt at provocation is called trolling.

The abundant repetition of anti-war, anti-military, anti-West in his posts highlights exactly where he's coming from and his lack of interest in discovering the facts. His continual refusal to acknowledge any members' responses (apart from subtle changes in his attack direction) indicates that his posts are not intended as discussion, but rather as provocation.

a quick google search for "Cazalet33" reveals the following: "I am a former high fashion model and am now an entrepreneur in the field of health, nutrition and beauty helping people to create their own financial destiny."

CM,
A pretty fair analysis, I reckon. :ok:

A terrible tragedy but that is all.
 

Perhaps Cazalet33 would be better served venting their ire at the reason for the military action in the first place...

Just saying.......

That's got to be one of the dumbest things I've seen posted in a while. For all of the wonderful kit the military of today have, one still doesn't have omniscience. To demand that is nonsense.

But you asked a previous question related to what a board of inquiry (JAG investigation) will also ask, which is
"did you know that the building you identified as the target was a hospital?"
and it's follow on question
"What building was it that you called on the aircraft to attack?"
(@Deptrai, your post makes sense to me)

I suspect that someone in an HQ a few links up the chain could have found that hospital and had it marked on a map as a hospital. Likewise marked are things like schools.

What is unclear to me is how well this information was passed or disseminated to whomever needed to use it in the field. The investigation ought to be able to figure that out.

The possible problem of a local calling in for fire support and getting it ... could happen.

The building is quite unmistakable from the air, as well as from the ground. It really can't be confused with any other.

One wonders what on Earth the attackers thought the building was when they attacked it.

Just to pickup on CM and M2 earlier requests for your aerial identification skills, can you confirm that you have flown over this hospital in a CAS role, yes or no ?

An interesting postulate, deptrai.

The problem is that it beggars belief that the Afghans could have expected the US forces to do anything so monstrous as to "raze" the province's only hospital.

The splashback against US imperial aggression was so predictable and the embarrassment would so predictably go to the very highest level that surely the Afghans could not have expected the attackers to fall for such a trick.

As ever, I think the cockup theory is vastly more plausible than any "conspiracy" theory. It was just the Americans doing what the Americans do. Not much different from bombing Sudan's only medicine factory or a baby milk factory in Baghdad or shooting down an Airbus or any of a hundred other atrocities.

If you'll kindly take your axe grinding to Jet Blast and get it off of the Mil Forum, it would be appreciated.

An AC-130 allegedly blew up a wedding party in Afghanistan some time ago. 140 casualties. Wedding parties aren't identified on any maps. As awful as it may be, it wouldn't make me think twice. Mistakes happen.

(disclosure: unlike CM I was never courteous enough to disclose my credentials or real identity, although those who know me and those who want to spend some time could piece it together from my post history. I'll disclose I was trained as a simple sailor/cadet on a traditional tall ship, in a NATO country, rarely involved with air force issues, later SIGINT, then I joined the merchant navy, and later dabbled in civilian aviation. And even if I wasn't a military aviator, I can spot a "high fashion model", maybe it's my SIGINT training...)

Deptrai, #63, I agree. I was pointing out that this hospital in a war zone did not display any recognition signs if that earlier image was correct.

If no such signs were displayed then their case is weakened.

Caz,
That it beggars belief that Afghans would have the Province's only hospital razed to the ground would only astound someone with no knowledge of people in that region.

I refer to my earlier reference to a car bomb placed deliberately outside a hospital in Iraq.

There are also instances in the region where they have bombed their own people so as to blame the opposition.

The Middle East rule book is not written in English.

As was pointed out by Thomas Barnett, if the US had put funds into building and staffing American hospitals, then the motivation for this particular atrocity would have been removed.

There is no American hospital in Kunduz. More's the pity.

Perhaps an appropriate reparation might be for the US to build a large provincial hospital in each of Afghanistan's 34 provinces and make a commitment to staff it with US medical personnel for at least 30 years. That would keep the hospitals safe from air attack.

I'm pretty sure they wouldn't have attacked the hospital if it had been an American one, staffed by American doctors nurses and other medical staff.

can I ask you a simple, direct question? are you Amanda Cazalet, aka cazalet33? https://twitter.com/cazalet33

Does it? They have form for using larger powers as proxy means of doing this. There were several cases to be found in Russian memoirs/accounts where the Soviets were convinced that there was a clear necessity to bomb/rocket/strafe a target by their Afghan advisor/LO, only to discover they'd been used to settle a tribal or family blood feud (sometimes dating back years).


It's very good of you to chin off the Privy Council meeting for our benefit, Mr Corbyn, but couldn't you have met with Her Majesty and asked one of your assistants to post that little bit of tired old invective?

Caz, now your proposal for the US to build hospitals in ever province and staff them for 30 years beggars belief.

They well be safe from US air attack but they would be a rocket, bomb, and bullet magnet for everyone else.

Anyways, carry on lightening an otherwise dull afternoon.

PS,

Remember we are talking about a tragic event and not your stance that the nasty imperialistic war mongers are guilty of war crimes. Rather than a blame game, how can risk of future tragedies be minimised.

It beggars belief?!! What mindless belief system do you operate under and under what rock have you lived the past dozen or more years that you are so clueless about the routine barbarity committed by the folks in this region? The folks in this region put IEDs on children's soccer fields, suicide bombers in crowded markets, car bombs next to hospitals, truck bombs next to dormitories, blow up ancient archeological ruins, turn airliners full of hundreds of passengers into missiles, burn captured prisoners alive, methodically execute entire schools full of children.......the list goes on and on. For every Afghan killed by an American, there are 10s of thousands killed by fellow Afghans. What truly "beggars belief" is that you imagine these folks care one wit about the Geneva Convention, assuming they've even heard of it.

That's a good point.

Unfortunately there are a few problems with the idea of painted an appropriate symbol on the roof.

For one thing, paint doesn't show up particularly well on IR. For another, rebelling tribesmen in Afghanistan tend not to abide by the Geneva Conventions and it wouldn't be long before they spoofed the system by painting red crosses or crescents on all sorts of building all over the place if they felt it might give them some immunity from air attack.

Do any buildings anywhere in Afghanistan have such symbology to prevent or dissuade air attack?

One way to minimise future war crimes is to ensure that those who are blame are brought to account and face severe criminal penalties.

The feeling of immunity from prosecution for war crimes in the International Criminal Court is quite certainly a factor in the mindset of the type of people who perpetrate such atrocities. If they thought they would face a a life imprisonment term for their actions they might apply a bit of self-restraint when attacking the environs of a hospital. Then that might, just might, dissuade them from committing the crime.