Now I know squat about these things but that seems pretty good evidence to me.
Anybody who knows ((or who doesn’t 
) about this kind of stuff care to comment?
Allow me to channel December et al for you.
“That dastardly Fisk is either making up the number or the Saddamites planted it there from another site for him to find. Burn him, burn him!”
And naturally Occams Razor suggests that if hundreds of US/UK bombs and missiles are falling on Baghdad then the most likely explanation for trashed markets is of course plummeting Iraqi anti-aircraft missiles.
Am I the only one who has a problem with seeing these two statements in juxtaposition?
I will wait with interest to see if this hits GoogleNews later in the day, and whether it’s confirmed by the Pentagon. So far it’s just the Guardian, and I’ll tell ya, I’m about up to here with Rumors Of War. WOMD chemical plant found, Russian warheads found, Geraldo’s out, “No, I’m not”, he said/she said, out the wazoo.
I’ve gotta see more than an e-mail before I’ll take it to the bank.
Well, to be fair, the US has not really denied the possibility that it was a cruise missile. We’ve just “suggested” that it may have been an Iraqi missile. This suggests to me that the US does think it’s possible that the missile was ours. If they could definitively rule it out, I think they would have.
Duck Duck Goose the reader only said what the number represented.
My main point of posting this is that yesterday the news cycle was full of “It was most likely a Iraqi bomb” , “A Iraqi official has been sacked for this” etc. I doubt this will get the same airing for some reason if it’s true.
Much like I heard more about there being SCUDS than the backtrack from this position.
So do the investigation yourself. The original article by Robert Fisk(where the codes from the fragment were reported) can be found here. The URLs for looking up US munitions codes are posted in the OP. Now the only question is, do you believe Fisk.
Enjoy,
Steven
Actually there is another question as well. Do you believe codes off the side of a Iraqi anti-aircraft missile would co-incide with codes off a US cruise missile? Or if you want to get really farfetched, did the Iraqi’s capture/buy on the black market a couple of US cruise missiles and are they using them to blow up their own civilians. If cruise missiles are available on the black market(no reports I’ve seen indicate that the Iraqi’s have ever captured a US position) I’d consider that extremely worrying.
Enjoy,
Steven
IF you did want to plant a cruise missile fragment, I’m sure the Iraqi’s have plenty of them nowadays.
We have fired quite a few cruise missles at Bagdad in the last few days. The site was first gone over by the Iraqi military. It would be very easy for them to secure the fragments from their AA missles, and drop a few from one of our cruise missles that hit a legit target. Of course, we can show when we launched ours, and AFAIK, we did not launch any to that area during that small window. Note that another reporter was quoted by Iraqi sources and on this as saying that he “heard the airplane the bomb was dropped from”, and this has been cited as proof it came from a US Aircraft. Mots of the “cruise missles” are launched from a ship, although some can be launched at a long distance from a B1 or B2- in ether case, you would NOT “hear the aircraft”, nor was it a “bomb”. They ARE “stealth bombers” you know. :rolleyes:
So which is it? A “bomb dropped from an aircraft they heard”? Or a “cruise missle”? If it was a cruise missle, the pattern of the explosion does not match other US hits. Our hits did much more damage, and dug a significantly deeper crater. In fact, the small, shallow crater would be about right for an AA missle.
Note also that the Guardian claims there are several “April Fools” stories in that edition. Hmmmm.
I’ve come across the hypothesis that the craters, the shrapnel pattern and the serial numbers are actually consistent with a HARM missile. Such missiles target themselves by locking on to radar sources. Makes you wonder why the Iraq’s would be putting a radar source in the middle of a crowded market… oh wait, no it doesn’t.
Our cruise missles have internal GPS guidance systems that keep them pinpointed until dentonation don’t they? Why can’t we be pretty darn sure it wasn’t ours and this whole mess over with?
Actually the “story” makes no claim that this code came from a cruise missile. Careful reading shows that:
Nowhere is it claimed that this fragment came from a cruise missile. Only that this number, matches the numbers used by Raytheon, which happens to make one type of cruise missiles.
That’s a whole bunch of dots being connected from a simple number. Like others here I’m gonna wait before I write my congressman.
Azael- good cite. From that it appears we have two possibilities- either an F-16 fired a missle which homed in on a radar site, or that the fragments were planted. The hypothesis that it was a US “HARM” missle is also born out by the blast pattern, so I was correct that it wasn’t a “bunker buster” or a “Cruise missle”- however, the explosion is still in line with an Iraqi AA missle, although not the fragments.
Thus, at worst we have a US Missle fired off at a radar site, which may have been moved. At best (for the USA, that is), we have planted evidence by the Iraqi’s. Right now, it appears the first is slightly more likely.
I’d just like to say how amazed I am in the advancs in military technology that in a war where massive bombing is the norm that there are so few incidents such as this to even debate.
It makes me wonder just how squemishly people would react with massive carpet bombings of prior wars.
There is something to be said for a military plan that does it’s best to avoid civilians and then actually avoids those civilians once the plan is put into practice.
bayonet1976 you’re absolutely right. Substitute “US munitions” for “cruise missile” and the probability of this type of code and these particular numbers existing on Iraqi AA weapons goes up to… well, still insignificant. The fragment, assuming accurate reporting, is genuine and the markings pretty clearly make it out to be US munitions. What this means is that US munitions fragments were found at the site. How they got there seems to be in question.
Dropping a few from other cruise missile, or other munitions, strikes sure, cleaning up the other fragments? Not so sure. Still, all they’d have to do is drop the fragment that Fisk found and you’ve successfully planted false evidence.**
Well, if we’re going into conspiracy waters then I’d point out that the US would be reluctant to acknowledge firing missiles during that timeframe. I’d also point out that the requirement of this being a “cruise missile” isn’t a hard requirement. It could have been a piece of virtually any US munitions manufactured by Raytheon. Raytheon makes lots of different types of munitions.**
Ok, Cruise Missiles CAN be launched at short distances(typically not done because it is considered a waste), long distances, from land, sea, or air. But, like I said, the “cruise missile” bit isn’t the important piece. US munitions of any time, including HARMs, would still be just as damning.**
This is priceless! Are you seriously claiming they wouldn’t be able to hear a “stealth” bomber? Do you know ANYTHING about stealth technology? Hint: you can both SEE and HEAR them fine. It is RADAR that they are supposed to be able to fool. If a stealth aircraft flew over the marketplace and dropped a bomb, or launched a HARM, then human senses certainly WOULD have noticed it.**
shrug Does it matter? If it was US munitions of any type then unless you’re going to claim they’ve gotten their hands on US weapons then it can’t have been the Iraqis who blew up that area. Well, unless you favor the conspiracy theory of planting evidence/moving radar sources/planting military targets in civilian marketplaces over the explantion of a bomb/missile gone astray.**
If they’d print something like this as a joke then they deserve to be put out of business for libel. Libel is taken pretty seriously in the UK.
Mullinator, it is precisely BECAUSE our weapons are so much more precise now that we demand a low number of civilian casualties. It is also why we criticise accidents when they do happen. It is all part of the forces driving us towards more “humane” wars.
Enjoy,
Steven
Actually it doesn’t. Again, assuming the “reporting” is accurate, come on Robert Fisk?, but assuming that it is, a piece of metal, no one has presented any proof that it is anything other than a piece of metal, was found at the site. The fragment has some numbers on it, what else does it have or not have? Who knows, Fisk ain’t saying. The numbers on the metal fragment correspond to something called a cage code, that may or may not be stenciled on munitions. And did Fisk keep the metal fragment? Turn it in to authorities? Did he take a photo?
So far all that’s known is a whole lot of nothing.
Also note that the Iraqi’s still have some US ordnance from when they were buying it from us. Hell, they still have some WWI bolt action rifles, too, from some pics I saw of US marines in an Iraqi base. If we found a Imperial German Mauser are we going to blame the Kaiser?
The codes simply indicate it was made in the USA by Raytheon. So far, no one has been able to correlate them with a specific weapon type. But the original article claims to have tracked it to a US “cruise missle”, which was at best premature, as the Raytheon site gives no such “hit”. Again, it wasn’t a “cruise missle” or a “bunker buster”. The crater shows that clearly.
So, yes indeed, the Iraqis have US Ordinance. They also have access to plenty of fragments. The HARM Missles are launched in response to a radar hit, and fly tot that radar site. Thus if it is a HARM Missle, it was launched as radar from that site, or close to it, locked on a US F16. Now, the Iraqia aren’t stupid, they have seen the following “turn the radar on, and within seconds a missles comes after it”. That is why they are launching AA missles without radar guidance (which could explain an AA missle hitting the ground). However, how easy it would be to set up a radar site in a marketplace, turn it on, then skedaddle out of there, so they’d have another “US atrocity” to report. Or, if you want to be pro Iraqi, assume rather that they turned the radar on some small distance away, then the HARM missle got lost as they turned it right back off. Taking the “anti-Iraqi” position could include planted evidence.
I pointed that out about “stealth bombers” as they have no need to (in fact it would be foolish ) get real close to fire a “cruise missle”. At launch range, you’d neither hear nor see one, even though they are only “invisible” to Radar & such.
I too, doubt that THAT article is an April Fools joke. But still, the caveat is there…
I live in California and used to work a block away from the Northrop plant in Pico Rivera. We were, one day, told to watch the skies at 12:30PM. We all went outside not knowing what was gong to happen at 12:20PM. Almost exactly at 12:30, a dull muffled roar suddenly came and we looked straight up to see that freaky jagged boomerang shaped plane passing directly overhead. We didnt hear or see a thing until it was right over us. Heres an even freakier part. When it turned to make a second pass, the sound disappeared. When we looked at it from the side, it looked like a thin black line in the sky. At a certain distance away, it seemed to disappear because it was so thin. As a witness to this, I am damn glad that thing isnt dropping bombs on me because by the time you see and hear this thing, it wouldve already dropped its payload.
With regards to the Market being hit by a cruise missile. News report state that whatever it was, it left a crater the size of a coffee table. We use cruise missiles to take out whole buildings and reinforced hangers. anti ship cruise missiles goes thru ship armor using kinetic energy alone. The Raytheon Tomahawk BGM-109 cruise missile is a 18 foot 2650 pound flying torpedo traveling at 550 MPH carrying a 1000 pound conventional warhead. It will leave a mark significantly bigger than the size of a coffee table.
Come now! This is reaching new heights in denying reality. Fisk may be sensationalist, but you’re claiming he made up the story out of whole cloth and he went to such great lengths to research the story that he was able to describe markings(western, not Arabic, remember?) JUST LIKE the US has on munitions manufactured by A SPECIFIC Raytheon manufacturing plant? Are you really saying this could be a fragment of a manhole cover or some poor shopkeepers strongbox? Some random part of a car which was hit? Why do the evidentiary standards skyrocket when it may implicate the US?**
This is just unfair. There IS a cage code and it IS stenciled on US munitions. Take a look at some in your local army surplus store. There is writing all over them. Identifying marks are plentiful. Did you look at the cites in the OP? Particularly the Government Industry DataMart site? Take a look at this page, which allows us to look up products by their identifying marks, including cage codes, UPC, etc. To suggest this is just some random piece of metal which HAPPENS to have numbers in the same format and style as a cage code for US munitions AND those numbers HAPPEN to jive with an actual cage code assigned to a Raytheon plant in McKinney, TX is serious denial of reality IMHO. The piece is pretty obviously a US munitions fragment.**
[/QUOTE]
And did Fisk keep the metal fragment? Turn it in to authorities? Did he take a photo?**
[/QUOTE]
Have you seen photos of the WoMD Hussein reportedly used to gas the kurds? Have you seen analysis of samples of those gasses? We can play the “I’ll up the rules for admission of evidence till you can’t get your evidence admitted” game all day long. In the end it doesn’t change two facts.
- Civilians died.
- At least one identifiable fragment of US munitions was present at the site.(or Fisk is lying, at which case I’d ask you to prove he is lying)
You can shrug and say there are alternate ways of the fragment arriving there, and I’ll agree with that analysis, I never claimed this was proof positive that the US was responsible for the deaths, but to deny either of the facts listed above on any grounds other than outright denial of Fisk’s evidence is dishonest at best.
X-Slayer(ALE): Re: “hearing” stealth fighters. It is true of any aircraft capable of near-sonic or supersonic speeds that you will see them before you hear them and that they can drop their payloads as/before you hear them. This doesn’t mean you won’t hear them(assuming you’re lucky enough not to have been hit by their payload if it went off before the soundwaves from the plane reached your ears), nor does it mean you can’t see them. The marketplace was destroyed during daylight hours and there was enough light to see by.
Enjoy,
Steven
Even if it was a US missile, so what? Does anyone seriously think the US targeted the market?