U.S. troops mistakenly kill 3 Iraqi police

[Seraphim]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3766385/

[Ratamacue]

RIP guys.

[EvanL]

This is starting to become too much of a problem

[Midav]

You think?

:roll:

[SFontaine]

I think I've heard about this happening about.. twice now.

[Dalleer]

Quite alarming when this happens yet again.

I'm a bit worried about the morale of the Iraqi police now, because if this keeps up I wouldn't be working as a police officer for the Iraqis for very much longer if I'd be in their shoes.

[garyfanclub]

Newsflash. Soldiers are humans. Humans make mistakes.

Newsflash 2. We are at war. war is hell and **** happens. What the feck do you think this is a videogame?

[Herrmannek]

Newsflash. Soldiers are humans. Humans make mistakes.

Newsflash 2. We are at war. war is hell and **** happens. What the feck do you think this is a videogame?

So why Iraqi Policeman never shot US Soldier :) ?

[Ballistic]

Have'nt the Police got clearly and easily identifiable uniforms ? Terrible that this happened, and hopefully it can be stopped in the future.

RIP.

[Argyll]

Gary
Its a war and there are also ROE's within SOP's,this has happened on more than a dozen occasions now
**** only happens when you are careless,and as Hermannek has pointed out that the US trained Police have never gunned down US/Coalition troops by "mistake".
There are already bad feelings within the Iraqi Police about the US forces,killing more of them will just widen that gap,you think this helps with the current situation?

[Dalleer]

Newsflash. Soldiers are humans. Humans make mistakes.

Newsflash 2. We are at war. war is hell and **** happens. What the feck do you think this is a videogame?


Yes, I do think that this is a videogame, now I'm currently out of coins and need some change and a milkshake, spare any?

Please, there is no need for you to lecture me about how war is hell and how "**** happens" as you said, instead you people could learn to identify which ones are the designated "enemies" and "allies".

Doing the mistake of Killing your allies should never be just "war is hell, so what?" since these police officers could just as well have been working against you Americans than with you.

I've always wondered about the high friendly fire casulties rate in the various US operations; now is it simple incompetence from the individual pilots/tank crewmen/riflemen etc. or perhaps just an accident?

When you explain to me why is it that the US forces always seem to get friendly fire casulties in these operations, or bomb anything that remotely looks like an "enemy"?

Sure there are mistakes made in many operations, "human errors" as we could call it. That is understandable, but it does not explain on how these US soldiers seem to view every other Iraqi policeman as a "bandit/terrorist/saboteur/enemy combatant etc."

Honestly, people alot wiser than me are busting their asses on the line back there in Iraq right now, can't they make some sort of a way for the US troops and Iraqi police to identify each other?

Perhaps a more detailed briefing of every little detail needed for the US and Iraqi forces before missions would be a solution, and perhaps a more visible "way" for the Iraqi police officers to be identified as police would be needed.

Maybe a "communication system" between the Iraqi police and the US troops could be considered, in which the two parties could communicate in the field and know each others' positions so that these sorts of things could be prevented.

Maybe a system like this already exist, however it has not been put into a good enough of a use from what I gather.

Lastly, this sort of behaviour from the US troops should be weeded out to a minimum by setting up some sort of a better communication system etc
since this is not going to better the situation in Iraq one bit, and you certainly can't just mark this off as a "so what, war is hell!"-explanation because that attitude will prove very fatal to the US mission in Iraq.

And as said, I do look up to those Iraqi police officers that still do their job out there, since they have got alot more to handle due to the job now than ever.

You've got friendly fire, car bombs, suicide-bombers, random attackers, road-side bombs, resistance cells blackmailing you, death threats and so on...

"In no easy place..."

[Saranof]

Maybe US troops are more jumpy, considering the fact that then feel they are in a hostile terrirory?

[Javehn]

FF situation exist in war whatever you will do , it just be less , but never tottaly out . The numbers of FF increase drasticly in small scale - low intensity conflict , because of lack in front line , where the serfice ahead of front line considered to be engagement area , and to the rear free manouvre area . Where you don't have front line , you are in much trouble to know where is the enemy , and where is friendly . Much of engagmants those days could be done in high distances , up to more then 1200 metters with ground troops means , and even higher then that on use of electro optic meassures . On this case , you just make optic eye contact with the target , and you cannot identify the target on it's full details . Lack of previos contact between forces , and coordination between soldiers on those situation-Radio contact , or coordination between commanders will make those two groups to shoot each other , just like that .
Also , This is the fact when weapon range exseades the view range (or on night operations ) - on this case FF can happend when armed man is identified by mistake as an enemy , or as a fire source , without acctualy been fully seen .
And the reasons keep on going ..

[Fox2]

Newsflash. Soldiers are humans. Humans make mistakes.

Newsflash 2. We are at war. war is hell and **** happens. What the feck do you think this is a videogame?

So why Iraqi Policeman never shot US Soldier :) ?

I think it's partly because a US soldier, even from a distance, looks entirely different from your typical terrorist/insurgent/bad guy.

Compare:

US Military soldier patrolling with Iraqi soldier

http://a1112.g.akamai.net/7/1112/492/03312000/news.lycos.com/news/ot_getImage.asp?op=img&id=495059



Iraqi policeman at a funeral for another policeman earlier this month

http://a1112.g.akamai.net/7/1112/492/03312000/news.lycos.com/news/ot_getImage.asp?op=img&id=492753

A US soldier seeing a group of men similar in appearance to the above man, with a mish-mash of camouflage or civilian clothing, and automatic weapons at the ready, may deduct that he is a hostile target.

Also, does anyone remember that picture some time ago of a mixed US/Iraqi (I think police) team getting ready to enter a house or something to that tune? I can't find the picture just now to illustrate, but all the Iraqis had kufiyas wrapped around their faces. I had to do a double-take, because even with that close-up, I thought for a moment they were bad guys. Can anyone hook me up with that picture?


Then of course, there is this:

http://photo.worldnews.com/PhotoArchive//uploads/2003/12/18/uploaded-40654_large.jpg

Perhaps at this time, there is not enough of these uniforms to go around. So, as an example, the guy above at the funeral might not have gotten his blues. Or, he could just be off duty. I don't know. Just speculation on my part. So, take this whole post with a grain of salt and a good measure of leniency. :D

Regardless, something does indeed need to be done about this problem. I'm sure the guys in command over there are trying to figure out a way to stop this from happening.

[Trident-za]

Firendly fire happens.... but I sometimes wonder if the seeming willingness of US people to dismiss the issue as "its war, **** happens" doesn't contribute to its frequency.

Either way, the point really is that it doesn't help win hearts and minds. Who's fault it is, and whether or not a particular incident could have been avoided is almost irrelevent - the effect is the same. I doubt that the Iraqi people are quite as understanding as the "armchair warriors" here :)

It's obviously not an ideal situation for the US troops on the ground, and I'm glad I don't have to make those sorts of judgement calls on a daily basis....

[Argyll]

During the Patrols pre Op brief,it should've been made clear to them that there were "friendly" callsigns on the ground,they should also have established comms between the 2 group.
In Low intensity combat such as this,then ROE's need to be clear and concise,unless the US troops come under direct enemy fire,then no shooting until visual comms be established.
What are the ROE's.......the Yellow card (UK ROE's) state that a warning must also be given ,unless he/she/they are an immediate threat to life,and the said warning need not take place.
If this patrol came across the IP,then establising who they were should have been a priority,instead of oppening fire without confirming they were hostiles.
Don't get me wrong I'm not totally condemning the actions of the US Patrol,but the lack of Intel and comms between them and the IP has failed here,again this incident places a bad mark against the US troops,this type of incident mainly seems to happen with them and not with other coalition troops.
Something needs to be done to prevent this type of thing happening again,but I'd hate to thing what would have been said if the roles were reversed!!

[Trident-za]

Good post Argyll....

It seems to me that the US troops and the Iraqi police don't really work together very much. A question of trust, perhaps?

[Fox2]

Firendly fire happens.... but I sometimes wonder if the seeming willingness of US people to dismiss the issue as "its war, **** happens" doesn't contribute to its frequency.

Either way, the point really is that it doesn't help win hearts and minds. Who's fault it is, and whether or not a particular incident could have been avoided is almost irrelevent - the effect is the same. I doubt that the Iraqi people are quite as understanding as the "armchair warriors" here :)

It's obviously not an ideal situation for the US troops on the ground, and I'm glad I don't have to make those sorts of judgement calls on a daily basis....

Firstly, you shouldn't judge the opinion of all US citizens based on comments made on an internet board.

Secondly, I agree, an indifference to the problem will not yield good results, especially in the "Hearts and Minds" campaign. What they need to do over there (and have probably already done or in the process of doing) is isolate the problem, find the causes, and figure out a solution. Dismissing it and shrugging it off will never work. And regardless of what some people may portray on this board, that is not how the US military is handling it.

[Javehn]

But there is allready a solution to this . Friendly fire situation is happening sence the begining of the wars . It happened in every war during this century . There is a simple solution to this - starts from coordination between units , briefing before mission about closed fire areas , where the friendly forces operates and so on , phisical coordination - while seing non identified force , and the force doesn't recognize you , to contact on the radio , ask if there are any group in the sector.If they not posing direct threat, to wait until you can clearly identify them .
But , all the time battlefield managed with human beings and not robots , those mistakes would continue to happend

[Fox2]

During the Patrols pre Op brief,it should've been made clear to them that there were "friendly" callsigns on the ground,they should also have established comms between the 2 group.
In Low intensity combat such as this,then ROE's need to be clear and concise,unless the US troops come under direct enemy fire,then no shooting until visual comms be established.
What are the ROE's.......the Yellow card (UK ROE's) state that a warning must also be given ,unless he/she/they are an immediate threat to life,and the said warning need not take place.
If this patrol came across the IP,then establising who they were should have been a priority,instead of oppening fire without confirming they were hostiles.
Don't get me wrong I'm not totally condemning the actions of the US Patrol,but the lack of Intel and comms between them and the IP has failed here,again this incident places a bad mark against the US troops,this type of incident mainly seems to happen with them and not with other coalition troops.
Something needs to be done to prevent this type of thing happening again,but I'd hate to thing what would have been said if the roles were reversed!!

Agreed about fixing the problem.

Part of the communnication problem, I think, and I'm purely speculating here, is the language barrier. I'm not sure how many translators the US has, and furthermore how many IP officers speak English.

Also, again speculating, perhaps the reason we hear more about the friendly fire incidents on the US side, is that it is more covered in general? I don't know anything or anyone on the British side, so I can't pass judgement on ya'll's forces. Foregoing the media coverage thing, perhaps we should indeed take a look at how ya'll across the pond are handling rules of engagement and take a cue.

[Javehn]

Maybe it's just because the us troops involve in bigger percent of operation , that's it . This can happends to everybody , even the best trained officer . It can happend without any problem to British or what so ever force ..

[Argyll]

If this incident happened at night then again there is a fundamental flaw in the way the IP have been trained and dressed,night Ops for the IP means that they should also be wearing some form of IR patch to identify them as IP.
I'd like to see Fox2 try and distinguish any shape or form from 300m plus,there are few distinguishing features seen at that range.Which makes me think that perhaps this incident happened at ranges less than 200,as the US troops could ID weapons.
During my NI training we often had shoots where we had a moving range where targets were dressed similarily,some wew armed some were not,My "Brick" had one of the best ROE disciplines in the Battalion,in all the times we were on that range we had less than 5 FF,whereas the other Bricks in my Coy were in excess 30!!
My point is that ROE discipline can be achieved,it takes more courage to hold fire and asses the target,is it hostile ,is it armed,are they Friendlies,it doesn't take long to do so when you work as a team,unless the rounds are incoming then you have no choice but to return fire,but having good Fire discipline,and a good crew,incidents like this can easily be avoided!

[Fox2]

But there is allready a solution to this . Friendly fire situation is happening sence the begining of the wars . It happened in every war during this century . There is a simple solution to this - starts from coordination between units , briefing before mission about closed fire areas , where the friendly forces operates and so on , phisical coordination - while seing non identified force , and the force doesn't recognize you , to contact on the radio , ask if there are any group in the sector.If they not posing direct threat, to wait until you can clearly identify them .
But , all the time battlefield managed with human beings and not robots , those mistakes would continue to happend

Again, I think there are problems with language in that respect. Probably not enough translators available, and even with a translator, the delay could be potentially long.

In retrospect, perhaps this also has something to do with communicating with our British brothers, but of course not in the same respect or magnitude. I remember reading a long prose taken from a Marine pilot's journal during the invasion in which he stated that every time they communicated with the British forward air controllers, both sides had a hard time finding out what the other wanted, I'm guessing due to the combined factors of accents, pure adrenaline (high pitch), and the quality of the transmission.

[Trident-za]

both sides had a hard time finding out what the other wanted

That I can believe :) I tried asking directions from a guy in Glascow once... it took me about 30 seconds to figure out he was speaking english, and even after that I couldn't actually make head or tails of the "directions" :lol:

[Fox2]

If this incident happened at night then again there is a fundamental flaw in the way the IP have been trained and dressed,night Ops for the IP means that they should also be wearing some form of IR patch to identify them as IP.
I'd like to see Fox2 try and distinguish any shape or form from 300m plus,there are few distinguishing features seen at that range.Which makes me think that perhaps this incident happened at ranges less than 200,as the US troops could ID weapons.
During my NI training we often had shoots where we had a moving range where targets were dressed similarily,some wew armed some were not,My "Brick" had one of the best ROE disciplines in the Battalion,in all the times we were on that range we had less than 5 FF,whereas the other Bricks in my Coy were in excess 30!!
My point is that ROE discipline can be achieved,it takes more courage to hold fire and asses the target,is it hostile ,is it armed,are they Friendlies,it doesn't take long to do so when you work as a team,unless the rounds are incoming then you have no choice but to return fire,but having good Fire discipline,and a good crew,incidents like this can easily be avoided!

Agreed on all points. There definitely needs to be some investigation into this and perhaps some asses need to be kicked.



I'd like to see Fox2 try and distinguish any shape or form from 300m

Heeeyyyy, why you gotta get personal? :(

Didn't mean to offend in any of my posts, mate. I hope there was none taken.

[Javehn]

In couple of our units in IDF , we had some Arab speakers (Druzes , Arab -Armenians , Cherkess , Beduine). Good guys , but some of them could hardly speak Hebrew. When they talked on Radio , it's been very hard to understand what they want , sometimes they speaked amongst themselfes on Radio in Arabic.That was scary-you could think that Hisballah detected to frequency . Sometimes , if they would been alone , someone could even think that those are terrorists descized as IDF soldiers ...

[Argyll]

Nah Foxy
nothing personal,its the same Q to anyone ,it's pretty hard to make out details at that sort of range.
Language is a big problem,but there are Western Contractors also working in that area,who are also armed,I'd hate to think that the same thing could happen to them as the IP,just because of piss poor comms!


Hell you get an excited Jock on the Radio and even his mother will not understand a word he says!!

[Fox2]

Nah Foxy
nothing personal,its the same Q to anyone ,it's pretty hard to make out details at that sort of range.
Language is a big problem,but there are Western Contractors also working in that area,who are also armed,I'd hate to think that the same thing could happen to them as the IP,just because of piss poor comms!

Yes, that would be just as bad as this IP friendly fire stuff.

It would be hell for the families thousands of miles away. The lack of closure would make it very hard.

I know a young boy whose father was just recently killed in Iraq. From what I hear, he was a great man, father, and soldier. The little boy worshipped his dad, and now has fallen into a depression. He's fueling a deep hatred for the ethnicity of those who killed his father, and fighting with other kids. It's really sad. :(

I sincerely hope and pray we fix some of these problems so more little boys are not fatherless.

[96B]

First, US troops are infinitely more identifiable than the IP at least with the exception of the ones wearing the blue shirts. This issue obviously needs to be addressed and will be. Second, it is well known to military intelligence that there are members of the Iraqi police who are giving information to the enemy as well as insurgents posing as the police. Before we are so quick to condemn the trigger happy Americans over there we should consider all of these facts as well as the situation they are in with regards to dealing with an enemy they often cannot see.

[Fox2]

First, US troops are infinitely more identifiable than the IP at least with the exception of the ones wearing the blue shirts. This issue obviously needs to be addressed and will be. Second, it is well known to military intelligence that there are members of the Iraqi police who are giving information to the enemy as well as insurgents posing as the police. Before we are so quick to condemn the trigger happy Americans over there we should consider all of these facts as well as the situation they are in with regards to dealing with an enemy they often cannot see.

Agreed. No one is placing the fault solely on the shoulders of the US soldiers, though. But, as you said, something needs to be done. I'm thinking that the blue uniforms as pictured previously are not in abundant supply, and so are not getting to everyone. I'm sure after these incidents the powers that be are looking very closely at the problem. We know we're on thin ice here as far as "Hearts and Minds" goes. We need to step cautiously, and I believe our boys are attempting to do that.

Also, as you mentioned, we have to remember we are recycling most of the infrastructure and personnel from the old regime. There is definitely going to be corruption rooted in it, because that is what was there before we invaded. That corruption needs to be routed out so the US soldiers can trust those we need to work closely with.

[Argyll]

I also agree there 96B
NNobody is faulting the troops on the ground here,it's the procedures that need to be sorted out quickly!

[Fox2]

Has anyone noticed we just had over a page of discussion on militaryphotos.net forums that had to do with:

- Iraq
- United States Military Invasion of said Iraq
- Problems with friendly fire by United States Military

And it was actually decent and civil?!

Excuse me while I go have a FRIGGIN HEART ATTACK!

:lol:

[California Joe]

I'm sure the professional soldiers here among us would agree that there is a world of difference in policing and combat. Both very stressful but in different ways. Specific training needed for both and nothing can replace experience. I was not a soldier but have been a cop. Once while investigating a alarm and a possible B&E I rounded a corner going upstairs with gun drawn and saw a guy with a gun pointing it at me. I held fire for a split second and then realized it was a full length wall mirror. :oops:

[Trident-za]

:lol:

I almost shot a Shetland pony while on guard duty one night in the middle of bloody nowhere. There had been some gunfire in the not so far distance about 45 minutes earlier, so I was a bit jumpy and I walked around a tree and saw this shadow moving rapidly towards me - all thoughts of ROE went out the window and I just prepared to engage! (to be honest I was shocked to the point of freezing for about a second first - my mind did NOT want to comprehend this shadow charging me) As I was pulling the trigger, I heard the sound of a hoof hitting a stone or something and realized what it was (I had actually seen a few of them earlier in the day) - still took my heart about 3 weeks to come back to normal pulse rate . :oops:

[Saranof]

Has anyone noticed we just had over a page of discussion on militaryphotos.net forums that had to do with:

- Iraq
- United States Military Invasion of said Iraq
- Problems with friendly fire by United States Military

And it was actually decent and civil?!

Excuse me while I go have a FRIGGIN HEART ATTACK!

:lol:


Yes, I'm very proud of ya' all!
Have a lollypop! :D

[Argyll]

Damn Joe who got the bigger fright you or the reflection!!? :lol:

Ha nice one TZ!
We almost had a firefight in NI with some Peacocks!!
We were all bivvied down for the night,I was on stag with my mate,and we thought we heard someone coming up the stairs,as we were in an estate on CP where no movement at night was Authorised,so we started waking up the rest of the section,the footsteps got louder and closer,as quietly as we could we all made ready,me on the GPMG,there were 8 of us all pointing our SLR's at the door,so on the count of 3 we were to open the door ,shine the Sharkeye torch and open fire,so on the count we pulled the door open these 2 huge fuc*in Peacock flew right at us ,the guys scattered like mice and we all fell about laughing our heads off,nobody fired a shot either much to everyones surprise!!

[California Joe]

Damn Joe who got the bigger fright you or the reflection!!? :lol:

Funny thing is I was more worried about the amount of abuse I would have suffered for double tapping a mirror for the rest of my time there. :D

[martinexsquaddie]

My brothers in basra and got to whatch the iraqi police in full action they went off to capture a bunch of oil smugglers.
who were using a tug to tow a massive barge full of oil.
they had royal marines in a rigid raider in support did'nt really need it first thing first.
at least a dozen rpgs went into the tug followed by shed loads of tracers.
the smugglers got off a few rounds of ak fire thats all.
The royal marines were impressed especailly as the police are not suppoused to have any RPGS :lol: the smugglers did have one of those bloody great soviet AA mgs but could'nt get it into action. We'll have to do more joint patrols as iraqi police white card says if in doubt shoot :)
various rumours going round that the shia police have been capturing resistance members and giving them swimming lessons in the al shayt.
my brother was coming through basra at 1 am and some bloke came out from the shadows full headscarf on AK in shoulder. brother had the safety catch off and the bloke just waved.
but then everyone in basra has an AK