Friendly fire - is the US doing enough?

Factual Questions
1

Here is a news story about US A-10 pilots in the second week of the Iraq war firing on a British tank convoy, killing one soldier:

‘U.S. and British officials denied trying to hide the details of a friendly fire incident on Tuesday after a classified cockpit video was leaked showing U.S. pilots mistakenly killing a British soldier.
Lance Corporal Matty Hull was killed by U.S. friendly fire during the second week of the invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003. A British coroner’s investigation into his death has reignited questions over whether both allies are doing enough to protect their troops from friendly fire deaths.
Coroner Andrew Walker suspended his inquest last week after learning that there was video of the incident that the government would not allow Hull’s family to see. That video was leaked to the Sun on Tuesday.
“I’m going to be sick,” one pilot in an A-10 attack jet can be heard saying after he realises he mistakenly opened fire twice on a convoy of light British tanks, killing one soldier later identified as Hull. “We’re in jail, dude.”
Another pilot is later heard weeping: “I’m dead.”
Washington gave the video to British authorities but refused to allow it to be shown in public, saying it might contain security secrets. The British government said it could not release it without U.S. permission.’

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/06022007/325/iraq-friendly-fire-video-unleashes-storm.html

I find this very depressing.
9 British soldiers were killed by the US in the first Gulf War - why were suitable safeguards not taken?

The UK have been faithful allies to the US in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Terrible mistakes happen in war, but when they keep happening and your ally refuses to give evidence how it happened, it creates a horrible mistrust.

2

Are there ANY enemy fighters in Iraq that still have access to tanks?

3

The friendly-fire incident wasn’t on Tuesday - the alleged event-hiding was.

Any such incident is tragic but I’m glad they’re rare.

4

Note that the pilots were assured by their controller that there were no friendly forces in the area, after they reported seeing orange panels on some vehicles and asked whether there were any friendly forces in the area.

I feel bad about it, but “shit happens” during war. All we can do is to try to minimize it. When I was in the Army, I heard plenty of stories about artillery barrages and close air support killing and wounding our own troops due to bad communications, confusion, and all the other things that get called the “fog of war”. I had hoped that GPS and better communications gear would have reduced the problem. Still, if you get sent out on a patrol to a hostile area, and the people coordinating other forces aren’t aware of your presence, mistakes can happen and people can be killed.

5

This is an understatement. Mankind has always had and will always have “friendly fire” incidents no matter how hard we try to safeguard the troops. War is dangerous. To be surprised that such things occur one has to be fairly ignorant of the ways of war or simply disingenuous. Whatever, is still pretty sad though.

6

How is this a GQ? There isn’t an objective standard of “enough”, so we can never definitively say whether the US has done “enough” in Iraq. We can only debate that.