friendly fire?

[SenorBeef]

*Originally posted by glee *
**Is this a logical question, or a strawman?
**

The sentiment seems to be: Wow, look at the American army! How incompetant! They kill more friendlies than the enemy does!

He said: “What is wrong is that every time there is conflict and the British back up the Americans the Americans manage to kill more Brits than the fuckin enemy does?”

To demonstrate the flaw in that logic, if the friendly fire rate stays the same throughout the war, but the casualties taken from enemy fire increase ten fold, then enemy fire deaths overtake friendly fire deaths, and the American army (by those standards) seems more competant. And that’s with absolutely no change to friendly fire casualties.

Using that perverse logic, the American army actually seems more “competant” the more casualties it takes from the enemy.

Forces operating in the same area inflicting lots of punishment on an enemy are always going to incur friendly fire. Shit happens. That’s war. What’s amazing is that we’ve managed to fight so well and take so few casualties from the enemy.

But the common sentiment often is to call the US army incompetant for that happening, when in reality, it only goes to prove that it’s extremely competant - to have gotten casualties inflicted by enemies low enough to make friend fire a large portion of casualties.

[Daniel]

*Originally posted by pierre72 *
And you must be able to tell if this big hunk of metal firing IN THE SAME DIRECTION AS YOU ARE is one of yours… given the technology, the thousands of satellites hovering over Iraq, the radar (not even a modern invention), the communication systems… each plane has a unique signature on a radar… so why aim at a FRIENDLY sig?

There was a satellite system developed, but it’s not fully in place yet. Once it is, you have your Warcraft style mini-map with good guys in blue and any known enemies in red. Right now, however, they rely on radio communication and special infrared (I think) tape they wear in a specific pattern to identify themselves. It’s imperfect, but the “fog of war” exists, and deaths to friendly fire are disheartening but pretty much impossible to prevent.

[Daniel]

this, btw, I got from a 60 Minutes II story a few weeks back

[glee]

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
The sentiment seems to be: Wow, look at the American army! How incompetent! They kill more friendlies than the enemy does!

But friendly fire is a genuine problem. And your initial response of “Would you feel better if the Iraqis killed 50 times more British soldiers than they do, making the friendly fire casualties seem irrelevant?” was not helpful, as my cites showed.

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
He said: “What is wrong is that every time there is conflict and the British back up the Americans the Americans manage to kill more Brits than the fuckin enemy does?”

To demonstrate the flaw in that logic, if the friendly fire rate stays the same throughout the war, but the casualties taken from enemy fire increase ten fold, then enemy fire deaths overtake friendly fire deaths, and the American army (by those standards) seems more competant. And that’s with absolutely no change to friendly fire casualties.

There isn’t any flaw in his ‘logic’. So far, in both wars, his statement is true.
Your hypothesis that ‘if the friendly fire rate stays the same throughout the war’ has no backing from the facts.

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
Forces operating in the same area inflicting lots of punishment on an enemy are always going to incur friendly fire. Shit happens. That’s war. What’s amazing is that we’ve managed to fight so well and take so few casualties from the enemy.

How about my cite of a senior British officer complaining of no safety improvements in the last 12 years?
War is bad enough without having to admit you killed your own guys.

[SenorBeef]

He specifically asked:

**
What is wrong is that every time there is conflict and the British back up the Americans the Americans manage to kill more Brits than the fuckin enemy does?

**

If the Iraqis killed more Brits, then the premise for his question would be invalid - that was my point, that his logic was flawed.

Friendly fire is a problem, I never denied that - but he seems to be implying incompetance on the part of the US army strictly based off the relative rate of friendly and enemy fire casualties. I was criticizing the logic behind that particular assertion

[glee]

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
**He specifically asked:
What is wrong is that every time there is conflict and the British back up the Americans the Americans manage to kill more Brits than the fuckin enemy does?
**

If the Iraqis killed more Brits, then the premise for his question would be invalid - that was my point, that his logic was flawed.

Yes, but the Iraqis aren’t killing more Brits. So your logic is flawed.

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
Friendly fire is a problem, I never denied that - but he seems to be implying incompetance on the part of the US army strictly based off the relative rate of friendly and enemy fire casualties. I was criticizing the logic behind that particular assertion

I appreciate that there is an implied criticism of the US army. I think that the US arms manufacturers need to explain why their weapons do kill allies on a low, but regular basis.

[severin]

First of all ‘friendly fire’ is another euphenism. Friendly fire sounds so friendly.
In ‘The sniper’s tale’ Anthony Swofford describe how one day suddenly the truck behind him in the convoy - full with mates - gets blown up by a tank of another division. Baaam - dead.
Is that friendly fire?!

And secondly I do understand, that a tired, frightened and sometimes ‘stim packed’ soldier does make mistakes.
But how the f*ck is it possible, that a patriot rocket hits an allied A-10 ??
The patriot soldiers are stationed in kuwait, they work in shifts and should be in contact with the airstrike command center.

(excuse mistakes, Iam not a native speaker)

[JRDelirious]

every time there is conflict and the British back up the Americans the Americans manage to kill more Brits than the fuckin enemy does

“Every time”?? Really? Care to count?
Contrary to popular belief, every single unit out on the battlefield is NOT equipped with the technology to make a 100% exact ID of the target – nor is that expected of them. Sometimes it’s even deliberately obscured where it exists – in the battlefield, many aircraft will fly with their transponders turned OFF, and not every radar or IR detector, of the many used, is configured to pick up and identify the blip characteristics of every vehicle or aircraft at every range and every angle. Still, as pointed out, there are instances of honest accidents, AND there are instances where someone dropped the ball, procedure-wise (the Afghanistan/Canadians incident, and the Patriot/Tornado shoot-down)

There is a famous guncamera-video, with audio, from Gulf War I of a flight of Apaches destroying a patrol of their own Army’s Bradley IFVs. On the nigh-vision screen it just looks like a bunch of blurry green vehicles. You can hear the set up and the orders for the strike, then missiles away… and then the call from elsewhere to hold fire because those might be friendlies, and one of the pilots saying “I sure hope they weren’t , 'cause now they’re dead. Oh, [bleeeep]”

[cowgirl]

In an article about the incident with the British last week:

[British military analyst Francis] Tusa said the Americans initially said that they thought they were attacking Soviet-made Iraqi T-55 tanks. In fact, their target turned out to be the British Scimitars. The latter is about one-third the size of a T-55 and “looks nothing like it.” The vehicles were also covered with identification symbols designed to avoid these incidents, including a Union Jack decal.

According to the surviving soldiers, flying conditions were excellent when the A-10 attacked the five-vehicle British convoy as it patrolled a village north of Basra. As several villagers waved white flags on the side of the road, Cpl. Gerrard said he heard the sound of the A-10’s antitank gun.

<snip>

Mr. Tusa said that British and U.S. pilots work by the same rules of engagement, but while the British insist that every condition be met, the Americans will go ahead and attack if four of six conditions are met.

Comments?

[glee]

‘every time there is conflict and the British back up the Americans the Americans manage to kill more Brits than the fuckin enemy does’

*Originally posted by JRDelirious *
“Every time”?? Really? Care to count?

Well the only times I know that the British ‘backed up the US in a conflict’ were the two Gulf wars.
And I have already posted links in this thread about British casualties in those two wars (100% friendly fire casualties last time, 90% self-inflicted this time - admittedly some of those were by the British).

[SenorBeef]

*Originally posted by glee *
**Yes, but the Iraqis aren’t killing more Brits. So your logic is flawed.

**

sigh.

No, this means his logic is flawed. He bases his argument on the ratio of losses by enemy and friendly fire.

The fact that the actual situation coincidentally supports his sentiment doesn’t mean the the logic he uses it sound. It’s flawed, because the logical consequence of such thinking is, as I’ve explained above, the US army looks more competant the more loses it receives to the enemy.

My “logic” isn’t flawed. I’m merely showing the logical consequences of his argument. I’m not sure how I can make this clearer, you don’t seem to understand what my position is.

The logic he conveyed in his argument is invalid. I explained why, by showing the logical consequences of his argument. Because those logical consequences haven’t actually been the case doesn’t mean that MY logic is flawed - the conditions don’t actually have to exist to prove his logic invalid.

[glee]

Originally posted by glee
Yes, but the Iraqis aren’t killing more Brits. So your (SenorBeef) logic is flawed.

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
sigh.

No, this means his (gio) logic is flawed. He bases his argument on the ratio of losses by enemy and friendly fire.

sigh yourself!
I was being slightly sarcastic. :eek:
I think you should have said that your hypothesis (not logic) was:

1. the US army would look more ‘competent’ if they took more casualties, while friendly fire numbers stayed the same (agreed)
2. if the US army changed their current strategy on firing, inflicting less friendly fire, they would take more casualties from the enemy (unproven)

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
The fact that the actual situation coincidentally supports his sentiment doesn’t mean the the logic he uses it sound.

This is a worrying thing to say. The facts (over 2 wars) provide the basis for his argument.
You claim this is coincidence!
Alas you have no facts to support your hypothetical argument above, but still claim you are correct.

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
The logic he conveyed in his argument is invalid. I explained why, by showing the logical consequences of his argument. Because those logical consequences haven’t actually been the case doesn’t mean that MY logic is flawed - the conditions don’t actually have to exist to prove his logic invalid.

But your logic depends on the assumption above. And you have no facts to back it up.
For example, suppose the Americans change their rules of engagement (look at cowgirl’s useful post).
Suppose they inflict less friendly fire casualties, but take no more casualties themselves.
Then gio is right and your ‘logic’ is flawed.

[SenorBeef]

*Originally posted by glee *
**sigh yourself!
I was being slightly sarcastic. :eek:
I think you should have said that your hypothesis (not logic) was:

**

I didn’t make a hypothesis. I was just demonstrating the logical consequence of his.

**

1. the US army would look more ‘competent’ if they took more casualties, while friendly fire numbers stayed the same (agreed)

**

Yes, this is a consequence of the logic used in his argument. The concept, is, of course, silly - how can an army be MORE competant on the basis that they take more casualties?

**
2. if the US army changed their current strategy on firing, inflicting less friendly fire, they would take more casualties from the enemy (unproven

**

I said nothing about the actual prevention of friendly fire casualties. I don’t care. I’ll repeat: His whole argument is based around the RATIO of casualties inflicted by friendlies and enemies. The error in his logic is that according to it, the more casualties the US forces take from the enemy, the better they look. That’s all I was doing, pointing out that error, and the invalid logic.

**

This is a worrying thing to say. The facts (over 2 wars) provide the basis for his argument.
You claim this is coincidence!

**

What I meant by coincidence is:

He has flawed logic that appears to be correct in one particular case, in the way that broken clocks are right twice a day. His logic appears to make sense in the case that the US inflicts more casualties on itself than the enemy, but not in any other case (which is what makes the logic invalid). I was saying that it was a coincidence that the facts happen to do something that makes his logic look valid - but upon any reasonable examination, it’s clear that it’s not.

**
Alas you have no facts to support your hypothetical argument above, but still claim you are correct.

**

What argument did I make? I just pointed out the flaws in his. The only “fact” I need for that is to say that using his logic, the US army looks more competant with every enemy casualty it takes.

**

But your logic depends on the assumption above. And you have no facts to back it up.
For example, suppose the Americans change their rules of engagement (look at cowgirl’s useful post).
Suppose they inflict less friendly fire casualties, but take no more casualties themselves.
Then gio is right and your ‘logic’ is flawed. **

You’re misinterpreting me. I didn’t say anything at all about the reduction of friendly fire casualties at all. All I said was, as I’ve repeated several times, that judging the competant of an army based on the RATIO of casualties inflicted by the enemy and friendlies is logically invalid.

[glee]

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
**
I didn’t make a hypothesis. I was just demonstrating the logical consequence of his.

Well maybe you didn’t mean to.
But if the US army can change its rules of engagement, leading to a reduction in friendly fire without increasing its own casualties, then gio has a valid point. (And your ‘logic’ simply doesn’t apply.)
And there certainly is a problem (see my links earlier in the thread).

Originally posted by glee

1. the US army would look more ‘competent’ if they took more casualties, while friendly fire numbers stayed the same (agreed)

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
Yes, this is a consequence of the logic used in his argument. The concept, is, of course, silly - how can an army be MORE competant on the basis that they take more casualties?

Yes, but your assumption is that they can’t reduce friendly fire without taking more casualties.
If you want ‘logic’, I think the US army would look more ‘competent’ if the number of casualties stayed exactly the same, but they were all enemy inflicted i.e. no friendly fire.
Wolud you call this concept silly?

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
I said nothing about the actual prevention of friendly fire casualties. I don’t care. I’ll repeat: His whole argument is based around the RATIO of casualties inflicted by friendlies and enemies. The error in his logic is that according to it, the more casualties the US forces take from the enemy, the better they look. That’s all I was doing, pointing out that error, and the invalid logic.

Actually gio posted "Its not the number of casualties or goodies vs baddies ratio that bothers me its the fact that it happens. "

It was you who first introduced the concept of ratio (by posting the hypothetical “Would you feel better if the Iraqis killed 50 times more British soldiers than they do, making the friendly fire casualties seem irrelevant?”)
Gio has facts on his side - you just plucked the number above from thin air.

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
What I meant by coincidence is:

He has flawed logic that appears to be correct in one particular case, in the way that broken clocks are right twice a day. His logic appears to make sense in the case that the US inflicts more casualties on itself than the enemy, but not in any other case (which is what makes the logic invalid). I was saying that it was a coincidence that the facts happen to do something that makes his logic look valid - but upon any reasonable examination, it’s clear that it’s not.

Well we know how both broken clocks and working clocks operate.
(And the idea that a broken clock is ‘right’ is a useless coincidence!)
We don’t know what would happen if the US changed their rules of engagement to minimise friendly fire.

Also friendly fire is a serious problem for the US. It gives the impression that they are prepared to kill allied foreigners, rather than take some unspecified level of risk themselves.
Indeed if the Iraqis get the impression that large numbers of Iraqi civilians will be put at risk to save a few Americans, then the hope of winning the country over to the US ‘rescuers’ is doomed.

[SenorBeef]

Let me make this as simple as possible.

If his only judgement is that the Americans kill more Brits than the enemy does, then he just judging the ratio. If he believes incompetance (which seems to be the case) can be judged from that ratio then:

Is it not true that if the Brits were to receive just as many friendly fire casualties but 501258128581258125812512851285218 times more enemy casualties, the American army looks a lot more competant?

If no, explain why. If yes, then you can see why I thought his logic was flawed.

Yes, friendly fire is tragic. Yes, we should work on it.

However, judging friendly fire as a ratio of total casualties is flawed. They should be judged relative to the number of friendly troops operating in a given area, or whatever - but if you analyze them in terms of total casualties, as a ratio, you introduce that logical error.

50 casualties from friendly fire is tragic. It doesn’t become more tragic because there were only 10 enemy casualties inflicted, or any less tragic because of 100 enemy casualties inflicted. Nor does it show the competance or incompetance of an army in the same way.

If you’d like, I can do a line by line response to your post, but I thought it’d be more efficient to start over and state my case that way.

[glee]

*Originally posted by SenorBeef *
Let me make this as simple as possible.

If his only judgement is that the Americans kill more Brits than the enemy does, then he just judging the ratio. If he believes incompetance (which seems to be the case) can be judged from that ratio then:

Is it not true that if the Brits were to receive just as many friendly fire casualties but 501258128581258125812512851285218 times more enemy casualties, the American army looks a lot more competant?

If no, explain why. If yes, then you can see why I thought his logic was flawed.

I’m sorry, but plucking numbers from the air doesn’t seem logical to me.

I understand your point - if more Brit casualties were inflicted by the enemy, then the US friendly fire total would ‘look better’. It would indicate that the battlefied was more dangerous, for example.

However I ask you to consider this: in the last Gulf war, all British casualties were friendly fire. What ratios can you apply to that?!
In 12 years since then, a senior British officer claims there have been no improvements. And most British casualties this time are friendly fire.
This does suggest incompetence, or carelessness, or valuing US lives above allies.

We both agree on the horror of friendly fire - I’m not sure if we are really arguing about the same priorities.

[SenorBeef]

This is simple a matter of skewed perspective. The only reason that such low friendly fire casualties (and they are extremely low, historically speaking) are even noticable at all is that we’ve conducted wars in a way so remarkable that the number of casualties inflicted by the enemy has been astoundingly low.

Because of the astoundingly low number of enemy casualties taken, because of the competance of our armies (I’m including both the US and British armies in that), it has created a historical oddity: friendly fire casualties exceeding those received from the enemy. That doesn’t mean that there’s more friendly fire than usual, or even that it’s significant, relatively. And it’s not - historically speaking, we probably received more friendly casualties from any single day’s artillery bombardments in WW2 than during this entire war.

However, without the proper perspective, one might assume that because the allied armies inflict more casualties on themselves and each other than the enemy inflicts on them, it must be because the bumbling, incompetant, trigger happy idiots. That seems to be the sentiment expressed here.

The flaw in this logic is that the actual number of friendly casualties is historically low, not a devastating menace as some seem to perceive, and it’s only because of astoundingly low enemy inflicted casualties.

To demonstrate the flaw in this logic, one could point out, as I’ve done, that the friendly fire casualties would seem less significant, and therefore the allied armies more competant, if they received more casualties from the enemy. Anyone who thinks it through should see that the fact that there are more friendly fire casualties than enemy inflicted casualties in itself means nothing, since one huge factor, the casualties received from the enemy, is totally unaffected by friendly fire. That can go up and down and hugely distort the ratio, without there actually being any difference whatsoever in the friendly fire department.

The OP expressed disdain, or however you want to put it, that friendly fire caused more casualties than enemy ones. That, in effect, sets up an analysis of ratio. I didn’t start the ratio analysis, I just showed the flawed logic inherent in it by plugging in arbitrary numbers.

Most likely, if we were receiving thousands of casualties from enemy fire, this OP wouldn’t exist - friendly fire casualties would seem irrelevant. And that’s my point - with no change in actual friendly fire deaths, they can go from seeming like a menace to being insignificant - it’s all in the skewed perspective. Anyone who thinks this through, using the logic I’ve discussed above, should be able to see that evaluating ratios is meaningless.

The number of friendly fire casualties may strike you as incompetant, and that’s fine. I don’t think so, because they’re extremely low, historically. And you can have valid logic and reasoning behind your opinion. But the OP’s logic of evaluating the ratio of friendly and enemy inflicted casualties to determine competance is invalid. That’s all I tried to say - I made no value judgements on the competance or incompetance of the armies involved, just the flaws in the logic of evaluating ratios.

I don’t think I can be much more clear than that… I think most of our argument stems from misconceptions that I’m trying to say stuff that I’m not - I’m merely criticizing the logic used in the OP, and making no greater comment on friendly fire - except to say that it’s always shitty.

[Richard_Pearse]

Glee, can I just say as an interested reader of this thread, that you are totally missing Senorbeef’s point. In fact, with each subsequent post it becomes more apparent that you have no idea what he is trying to say. Thus you are arguing against a position that he is not backing. I think your post can be rebutted in such a way that might make it clearer to you, but I’m reluctant to do so as it is not for me to clarify Senorbeef’s words.

[glee]

*Originally posted by Skogcat *
**Glee, can I just say as an interested reader of this thread, that you are totally missing Senorbeef’s point. In fact, with each subsequent post it becomes more apparent that you have no idea what he is trying to say. Thus you are arguing against a position that he is not backing. I think your post can be rebutted in such a way that might make it clearer to you, but I’m reluctant to do so as it is not for me to clarify Senorbeef’s words.

Well I must admit I was thinking along those lines myself!

I certainly don’t wish to criticise the US army in the casual way the original poster did, and it is clear that SenorBeef and I both deeply regret friendly fire.

So I’ll depart now - and see you all in other threads.

[SenorBeef]

Fair enough, I think you tried to pick an argument out of my post where I made none - I just criticized the OPs argument.

I guess I might’ve jumped on him a bit too much… but… several times over the last few years, I’ve heard from a bunch of people seeming to express the same sentiment. “The US army is incompetant! They kill more of their own than the enemy does!” - it’s the sort of thing that appears reasonable on the surface but can be easily picked apart.

Anyway, yeah, every effort should be taken to avoid friendly casualties - and if you think about it, all of these forces operating at high tempo around each other, it’s almost a miracle that we’ve lost as few as we have, at least in my mind. There will probably always be friendly fire, even in 50 years when all of the soldiers have IFF transmitters planted in their skulls

Anyway, mostly a misunderstanding, and I hope I’ve made it clear why the logic used in the OP - or by anyone who criticizes the US army on that particular basis - is flawed.