U.S. fighter inadvertantly bombs Britons
Man, I hate hearing about this kind of thing…
KABUL, Afghanistan — A U.S. warplane mistakenly dropped a 500-pound bomb on British troops after they called for air support in Afghanistan, killing three soldiers and seriously wounding two others.
Friendly fire involving U.S. troops led to the deaths of three British servicemen in the current Iraq war, but the incident Thursday night was the first confirmed case between the two forces in Afghanistan. British officials said they are investigating the error.
The story doesn’t indicate if it was a precision-guided weapon or a “dumb” bomb which free-falls. Even if “precision”, things do go wrong - inaccurate coordinates inserted into GPS-guided weapons, wrong coordinates given by ground controllers, poor laser designation, etc.
“During the intense engagement that ensued, close air support was called in from two U.S. F-15 aircraft to repel the enemy. One bomb was dropped and it is believed the explosion killed the three soldiers,” the British said.
In Washington, a Pentagon official said initial reports were that the air strike was called in by a British forward air controller. The forward controller is usually a person on the ground who has the target area in sight and directs an aircraft to attack, giving target coordinates and ensuring that friendly forces are not in the way.
My heart goes out to the families of those British soldiers. It’s bad enough to die at the hands of the enemy, let alone in a mistake by one’s ally.
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I’ve seen some British troops who are really bitter about this kind of thing. This doesn’t help our case.
This is so sad….