Okay, you guys, I'm very disappointed in y'all. I mean, yes, I know
our in-service brethren are too busy right now to get out to movies
any, much lest post reviews/thoughts to the list, but come on, what
are the rest o' ya sluggards doin'? (like I should talk ;-) "Black
Hawk Down" has been out for almost a week now! (okay, okay, only for
4 or so days - add a few more and it'll be a week! :0) And no one's
posted a review of the movie, or even thoughts/opinions on how it
might be adapted into an SGII/FMA level scenario (hence the 'semi'
in the 'OT' notice ;-). Tsk.
Thoughts? Opinions? Comments? I'm waitin' for you before I go see it!
(actually, I'm waiting for some free time, but since that never seems to
materialize, I'll have to fake it when I get the chance)
Mk
[quoted original message omitted]
My wife and I just rented a new apartment. I have been working for exactly a
month now. When I have that kind of discressionary income, I'll watch the
movie and let you know.
Brian B2
> From: Indy <kochte@stsci.edu>
> At 12:39 PM -0600 1/22/02, Don M wrote:
I agree, I'm suspecting it will be a hard movie to watch. Knowing the drama
and carnage was stuff that really well happened and for once, Hollyweird isn't
having to add a lot of drama to the plot (from what little I've heard of the
movie).
A major fubar of a mission that should have worked. The threat that
RPG-7's cause to Helo's wasn't well recognized. Not having armour at
hand to bull their way in was another problem. The fact that every mother's
son that had an AK in the area decided to come over and take a pot shot also
didn't help.
> I agree, I'm suspecting it will be a hard movie to watch. Knowing the
Read the book recently, it is quite interesting to see the friction between
Delta and Rangers; the difficulties they had navigating within a city; and the
way the civilians reacted. Defintiely a pyrrhic victory on a tactical level.
Ok Folks saw this on Saturday down here in Puerto Rico.
A very difficult movie to watch but well worth the experience.
Overall well done. They told the story straight without any Hollywood BS. They
stayed very true to facts, tension was super high. The troops just reached
down, followed their training and realized the only way to survive was to keep
shooting. I was very impressed with the accuracy of the portrayal of the Delta
Operatives. While the highly trained Rangers did the job the Delta guys were
operating at a whole other level. Always pointing at the highest threat, short
bursts, keeping their heads and maintaining situational awareness while the
Company Commander of the Rangers seemed to slowly loose SA and withdraw into
himself.
I highly recommend this movie.
As far as a SG scenario it would be work. Insert Light Infantry Company into a
built up but beat up town. Add 2 squads of elite troops (Delta). Allow the
elites to operate in 2 man teams. Surround them with
Hundreds/Thousands of untrained and shoddy militia. Give each militia
at least an automatic rifle. Put a couple militia teams of IVARS used in anti
air role. Shoot for a long time. Add a convoy that goes the wrong direction
every time it moves. <G> Roll lots of dice. See if the troops can get out.
Magic
[quoted original message omitted]
> --- Ryan M Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com> wrote:
> I agree, I'm suspecting it will be a hard movie to
The worst part was where the medic and an SSG were working on a kid's severed
artery.
> A major fubar of a mission that should have worked.
Bullshit--it's a goddamn miracle this CF didn't go
south on a prior mission. Every time they left the compound they went out the
same route and did more or less the same things. They go into bandit country
KNOWING they were outnumbered, with minimal air support and without
coordinating a QRF to come get them if things go south? The Ranger NCOs
dropped the
ball 100% on PCC/PCIs--for which a number of deaths
are directly attributable (ie: The guy who leaves the back plate out of his
RBA saying "I don't plan on getting shot in the back by some skinny" and gets,
sure as shit, shot in the back by a skinny). The Rangers, as a matter of fact,
acted more like Boy Scouts on a camping trip than the highly professional
elite troops that they claim to be. For God's sake, they left two guys behind
on the exfil! Their company commander flaked out and became a psychiatric
casualty halfway into the fight. If it weren't for Delta operators stiffening
the Rangers and the initiative of a handful of NCOs, this would have been a
far worse CF.
> The threat that
They knew they were inserting into Aideed's stronghold and they knew that
every adult male in Somalia carries a weapon. Even those who aren't fulltime
fighters are part of local neighborhood self defense militias.
Lessons Learned:
1)Do your damn PCC/PCIs. Take freakin' water, NVGs,
and ALL YOUR BODY ARMOR. 2)Testosterone does NOT make you bulletproof
(Rangers, Airborne, Light Infantry take note). 3)Failing to coordinate with
relief forces is lethal. 4)Failure to make contingency plans (ie, what happens
if a helicoptor goes down?) sets yourself up for failure. 5)Failure to take
your opponent seriously causes mental shock and failure to think clearly on
the part of your leadership. 6)Armored vehicles are the only things that can
operate with impunity against large numbers of hostiles. Yes, they would be
vulnerable to RPGs. But less so than goddamn HMMWVs!!
> --- Indy <kochte@stsci.edu> wrote:
> :0) And no one's
Uhhh... do you really want to paint up 5,000 randomly dress and armed
screaming lunatics, another 5,000 or so unarmed women and children, and a
couple dozen technicals?
That's an excellent LL section. For number 1, also note that the first
casualty missed the rope while leaving the helicopter. For number 4, note that
the contingency plan did not have a contingency for losing the
second helicopter. Gotta make your contingencies recursive: chopper down,
remaining units execute plan X. Has item three ruined any careers yet over
this incident?
> John Atkinson wrote:
> -
As a certified Civilian, I won't begin to pretend to be qualified to actually
reply to this conversation. Mr.Atkinson sounds pretty convinving in his
comments, but that's my impressionability speaking. Just one
question: What's a PCC/PCI and what's an RBA?
Brian B2
> From: John Atkinson <johnmatkinson@yahoo.com>
> John Atkinson Wrote:
> Uhhh. . . do you really want to paint up 5,000
I wouldn't put it past some of the listers.....
> --- Michael Llaneza <maserati@earthlink.net> wrote:
> That's an excellent LL section. For number 1, also
That casualty was unavoidable. The pilot made the
right damn call--better to loose a man than to loose
the whole damn squad plus a chopper. An inexperienced soldier who had never
done this before is inherently at risk.
Has item three
> ruined any careers
NAFAIK.
How long can it take in 2mm? Irregular makes figs for pretty much everything
involved in the action.
> Brian Bilderback wrote:
> John Atkinson Wrote:
I suppose the problem there was putting the guy who hadn't done it before on
the chopper in the first place.
> John Atkinson wrote:
> --- Michael Llaneza <maserati@earthlink.net> wrote:
> --- Michael Llaneza <maserati@earthlink.net> wrote:
Yeah, that would work. I guess DSII would be better than SGII, especially if
you're using Irregular's minis.
> --- Michael Llaneza <maserati@earthlink.net> wrote:
Hey, you can't learn everything in training.
Replacements do stupid things--that's a fact of life.
[quoted original message omitted]
> John Atkinson Wrote:
Brian B2:
> I wouldn't put it past some of the listers.....
Don Maddox is actually working on the 5000 screaming lunatics, as John
will find out ;-)
> > Don Maddox is actually working on the 5000 screaming lunatics, as
Don:
> I'm not that bad only about 400..........)
Yeah, but what scale?
> At 10:43 PM 1/22/02 -0500, you wrote:
Actually, *does* anyone make 1/300 scale crowds? Civilians, or rioters,
or something? I could use them for a variety of games, most notably my own
"Destroy All Monsters!" I could always go the simple route, and just cut some
straight pins short, paint the heads, and jam a bunch of them into a
base. If Lucas could do it with Q-Tips in the Phantom Menace....
> At 4:25 PM -0800 1/22/02, John Atkinson wrote:
> Uhhh. . . do you really want to paint up 5,000
Recycle the casualties....
> At 04:21 PM 1/22/02 -0800, you wrote:
> --- Ryan M Gill <rmgill@mindspring.com> wrote:
DYM Hollywood added this bit?
> > A major fubar of a mission that should have worked.
Reading the book now (only in the first chapter) but according to the author,
the Rangers DID vary their routes and methods. Choppers out, land vehicles in;
land vehicles out, choppers in; choppers or land vehicles both ways.
> They go into bandit country
Horrible timing, but they figured the prize was worth it. 20/20 says it
was dumb, but if the Blackhawks don't go down and screw everything up, would
it have caught Adid? Don't know. But I agree, backups to backups. The planning
wasn't where it should have been.
> The Ranger NCOs dropped the
Oh, yeah. NCO's are supposed to be the snarling SOB's that make soldiers do
what they're supposed to do, not what they want to do.
> The
There was a CSAR team in case a chopper went down. From the movie (remember,
I'm only a chapter into the book), it seems like the CSAR team wasn't beefy
enough. What if it was two Blackhawks, a squad in each and a couple of
gunships? They get the pilots and crew out, the Rangers evac as
per the plan, and US fatalities are 5-6. A lot fewer Somali's die too.
> 5)Failure to take your opponent seriously causes
> At 04:58 PM 1/22/02 -0800, you wrote:
According to the book, he hadn't even been through Ranger school. WTF??
> John Atkinson wrote:
> At 04:35 PM 1/22/02 -0800, you wrote:
Err, me too? I've studied this stuff somewhat (I'm a wargamer!), but the
nuts 'n bolts TLA's sometimes get away from me. At a guess, Pre-Combat
something-or-others?
<snip Johns comments>
> The worst part was where the medic and an SSG were
not if the book is accurate. the poor kid takes a shot through the femoral
artery, and then slowly bleeds out over the course of several hours, as the
higher-ups refuse to send in a medivac (which probably would have been
shot
down), and the on-scene medic runs out of options...
> Horrible timing, but they figured the prize was worth it. 20/20 says
They weren't actually after Aidid on that op. They were going in to a meeting
of a group of his senior henchmen.
> They knew they were inserting into Aideed's stronghold
even worse than this.
not only were vast numbers of the local men armed, but women joined the fight
when the men were shot, and plenty of people turned up unarmed and stayed in
the fight just in case someone was shot and they could get a gun.
the Somalis used tactics like advancing up alleys with a group of women in
front - forcing the Americans to make some really tough choices...
> There was a CSAR team in case a chopper went down. From the movie
Something that doesn't show up in the film is the wide variety of forces that
were actually involved. The action included Air Force CSAR pararescuemen (one
or two of whom, IIRC, were decorated for bravery) and
Navy SEALs - though certainly it was primarily Delta and the Rangers.
What struck me most, when I read the book (and this doesn't come across as
strongly in the film, I think) is the complete breakdown of command and
control at all levels above the guys on the ground. They had it hard enough,
but the commanders in helos and the ones back at base were quite out of touch
with what was actually going on. The relief convoy was misdirected
continuously.
The film is quite good, however. It stayed very close to the book, as far as
movies go, and did an excellent job of capturing the "feel" of the book.
It isn't a "fun" film, for sure, but it is well done. More of a
docu-drama, than anything else.
Worth the viewing, absolutely.
***************************************
> On Tue, 22 Jan 2002, John Atkinson wrote:
<<snip lots of good stuff on what went wrong>>
> The
PCI = Pre-Combat Inspection? PCC = ??
> 2)Testosterone does NOT make you bulletproof (Rangers,
I read the book just a few months ago, finally, but haven't seen the movie
yet.
I've got to say the Rangers come out looking really, really stupid in the
book - way too much hoo-rah & testosterone nonsense, which all came
apart
when the 'cunning plan' did. The Delta guys were impressive - the only
real mistake they made seemed to be saddling themselves with the Rangers for
perimeter security...
> 3)Failing to coordinate with relief forces is lethal.
There was a SAR Blackhawk - it was the 2nd bird to go down; there wasn't
a backup beyond that, AFAIK.
> 5)Failure to take your opponent seriously causes
See your Point 2 - the Rangers came unglued, it seems.
> 6)Armored vehicles are the only things that can
That surprised me, too - no Bradleys, no M113s, no LAVs even. Just
trucks and Hummers.
Two reasons, I suspect - politics & not wanting to escalate things on
the ground. Sending 'tanks' in on a nominal peacekeeping mission looks bad
back home for Yank politicians, and on the streets in Somalia it could,
theoretically, provoke more confrontations than the US wanted.
Of course, helo raids were pretty provoking too, but a chopper is faster than
a ground vehicle. That let the US choose who & where it provoked people...
My $0.02 - I'm going to have to see the movie now, I guess.
[quoted original message omitted]
Only if you wear a blind fold whilst clicking, but you could end up fighting
sex vixens and nuns with large syringes as well?
> -----Original Message-----
Working on it now. Hmmm Wonder if I can get a set of 5000 random folks from
the GZG website <G>
Magic
[quoted original message omitted]
Well in this instance it would work. <G> Any random selection of 5000 or so
and lots of brown paint. <G>
Magic
[quoted original message omitted]
Greetings,
I am not sure this view is entirely correct. There were mistakes made but the
folks who went on this mission were not stupidly blundering into trouble. They
knew where they were going and what could happen. They had become
overconfident due to previous ops where they were able to do a "quick in and
out". They felt that they could do this the same way. The lack of concern over
RPGs used on helos was an error and once the first Black Hawk had been shot
down the situation went to hell. Overall this a boil the frog problem*. The
situation escalated slowly enough that by the time the Command elements
realized the gravity of the situation the Rangers were well into it.
The NCOs did take a strong enough stance on PCC. This is attributable to their
previous experience. Yes you should always take everything you need. However
everything is heavy and some choices need to be made. Did they make the
correct ones in all instances? No. Did the Ranger NCOs drop the ball 100%?
Also no.
Lessons learned are good ones. Though some of them were practiced during this
op (Contingency for Helo going down, there was a helo with a CSAR team on
board for an extraction. Should there have been more? Yes, and if they went
back in there would have been). Some lessons were not followed on
purpose - Alerting the QRF that an op was about to go on could easily
have alerted the Somalis early to the op. They controlled information at their
airbase but could not control info at the 10th Mountain or with the UN folks.
Early Intel of the raid could have resulted in a canceling of the meet thus
negating a reason to go (No target).
Back to the movie version - <G>
As a counter to Tomb's comments regarding the tension between the Ranger
leadership and the Delta Soldiers. I thought that was shown in the movie. The
Delta troops in garrison were totally ignoring the chickenshit rules as
demonstrated in the scene with Cpt Steele dressing down a Delta troop for not
having his weapon on safe. The guy looks at him, crooks his finger and says
"This is my safety". Could they have done more of this? In the book yes. In
the movie they had to decide what was worth showing. To add another scene
demonstrating the tension what would you cut out?
FMAS:Sk -
A good FMA:Sk scenario would be the two Rangers left at the first location.
Have them move through a mostly quiet city to reunite with their squad. Add a
couple of encounters with Somalis enroute to the sound of gunfire and you
could have a tight gripping scenario.
Magic
* Boil a frog problem. If you want to boil a frog (for what I have no idea<G>)
you cannot just boil up some water and throw a frog in, it will jump right
out. You have to put to frog in a pan of cool water and then put it on the
stove, slowly bring the heat up. By the time the frog realizes that the water
is too hot it is too late and it gets boiled.
[quoted original message omitted]
> At 08:40 23/01/02 -0400, Magic wrote:
French cooking?:)
> you cannot just boil up some water and throw a frog in, it will
> > > Don Maddox is actually working on the 5000 screaming lunatics
> Don:
Me
> Yeah, but what scale?
Don:
> The ONLY TRUE scale.........
?? Last time we talked about it, I thought you said you were *not*
using 6mm? ;-)
> Well in this instance it would work. <G> Any random selection of 5000
Much as I'd LOVE to sell you 5000 figures (or even 400....), I ought to
point you in the direction of Irregular Miniatures, who do ready-based
bunches of rioters in 6mm for (surprisingly....) their "Riot" rules; IIRC,
they also have TV crews, emergency vehicles, police etc.... They also do
ranges for "Riot" in 15mm and 20mm.
Jon (GZG)
> Magic
> Derek Fulton wrote:
> * Boil a frog problem. If you want to boil a frog (for what I have no
That's not French Cooking, that's Cooking French....
From: "Derek Fulton" <derekfulton@bigpond.com>
> At 08:40 23/01/02 -0400, Magic wrote:
Jon,
You never cease to surprise & impress me with your help and advice, to the
extent that you turn away potential business AND recommend a rival.
Good one yer
Iain.
[quoted original message omitted]
G'day,
> The truly, truly desperate in search of a high have been
Just don't touch/dissect one and absent-mindedly rub your lip.... not
being able to feel said lip for 24 hours is no fun!
> --- Bob Makowsky <rmakowsky@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I am not sure this view is entirely correct. There
You've contradicted yourself here. Overconfidence is synonymous with stupidity
when dealing with live rounds.
> The NCOs did take a strong enough stance on PCC.
Water is a no-brainer. Sorry, but. That's flamingly
stupid. Your damn body armor is also a no-brainer.
If you are in the kind of shape that Rangers allegedly are, that shouldn't
have too much problem, especially considering there's no foot marching in this
mission. Rangers let their testosterone think for them, which is in some ways
as unprofessional as the way the Somali militia acted.
> purpose - Alerting the QRF that an op was about to
Alerting the 10th Mountain should not have really been a cause of concern. UN
is a bunch of loosers, but why is there a reason to believe 10th Mtn was full
of Aideed sources?
Oh, and as far as "Chickenshit", anyone who's actually held a loaded weapon
can tell you that having your safety on at all times is a way of preventing
death and serious injury. As a matter of fact, not haivng his safety on was
the reason a kid from the Service Battery of our supporting artillery BN in
Kosovo put a 5.56mm round through the chest of an 8 year old boy.
> --- Brian Burger <yh728@victoria.tc.ca> wrote:
> PCI = Pre-Combat Inspection? PCC = ??
Pre Combat Checks. PCCs are done by NCOs and include
checking _everything_. PCIs are spotchecks done by
senior NCO/junior officers.
> There was a SAR Blackhawk - it was the 2nd bird to
However, having an SAR Blackhawk is fine in the US at a training exercise. In
the situation as presented, you need to insert some security elements while
you do your Rescue stuff.
> That surprised me, too - no Bradleys, no M113s, no
Armor was requested. It was denied by SecDef Les Aspin on the orders of Pres
Clinton for the reasons
listed. Les Aspin resigned after this in apology--he
took the fall for his boss.
> --- Don Greenfield <gryphon@sisna.com> wrote:
Most Rangers in the Ranger Regiment havn't. They go to an abbreviated version
thereof (RIP). Ranger Course is a leadership development course
(allegedly--most tabbed Rangers I've met have been
really crappy leaders)
> --- Don Greenfield <gryphon@sisna.com> wrote:
> >The worst part was where the medic and an SSG were
It's in the book.
> Reading the book now (only in the first chapter) but
Inadequately so.
> Horrible timing, but they figured the prize was
They were going after some lieutenants of Aideed. That's it.
> Oh, yeah. NCO's are supposed to be the snarling
I've had both types and ones that make Joes do their damn job are the only
ones I respect.
> There was a CSAR team in case a chopper went down.
Yeah. Also known as Crash Site #2.
> --- Brian Bilderback <bbilderback@hotmail.com> wrote:
RBA is Ranger Body Armor. It's a style of body armor that includes two
hellaciously HEAVY (We started with RBA in Kosovo and switched to Interceptor)
plates for front and back.
i have a comment here.
i was not in somalia, but i was in the rvn as a combat soldier.
in a free fire zone, in the rvn, weapons had chambered rounds, but safeties
were in the on position.
most soldiers patrolled with their fingers outside the trigger guard to avoid
accidental shootings due to the safety being switched off by accident or
carelessness.
a conscious effort was made to keep weapons were pointed away from friends at
all times
we did not wear body armor other than a steel pot, but every where we went we
were walking weapons, ammo dumps, water points.
we walked everywhere except for being lifted into an lz or being lifted out of
an lz.
lol - and our testosterone level did not inhibit our ability to think.
we planned and rehearsed, before each patrol, knew where we were going, and
what was supposed to happen when the shit hit the fan.
and we expected murphy (yes there was a murphy that far back) to stick his
ugly puss into the middle of anything that was ongoing.
best of all-we were not rangers, airborne, special forces; just grunts
who had been incountry and wanted to go home at the end of our tour.
another point; training and rehearsals, info, etc, are all very important all
of the way down to private schitt.
but. . . .
the shock of actual combat, however, is much worse than any training or
rehearsal can prepare a soldier for.
the actual violent death, or mangling of friends all around you is a traumatic
and stunning event.
even more so your own wounding.
everyone goes into battle thinking that the other guy is gonna get hit,
killed, wounded, not me!
some freeze up. some bunch up. a very, very few might run away a blind panic.
and but most, bless them, do exactly what they are supposed to do.
in combat, a soldier fights for himself, his friends, his unit. abstracts like
patriotism, politics, etc, are from another planet and are rapidly relegated
to sometime, never.
just some thoughts, here and now.
dawgie
JohnA said:
> Water is a no-brainer. Sorry, but. That's flamingly
I'd have to say that even I--a civilian whose most energetic exercise
is rolling dice--thought "No water? No armor? Duh!" Okay, it's a
short quick in-and-out job...so there's no reason *not* to carry a few
more pounds that you might really, really want if Murphy shows up.
> At 04:33 PM 1/25/02 -0800, you wrote:
> --- Don Greenfield <gryphon@sisna.com> wrote:
Yeah, got to that part yesterday, I think. Maybe Wednesday.
> > Reading the book now (only in the first chapter) but
*Shrug*. I wasn't there, haven't read anything more authoritative than Black
Hawk Down, and the bit about varying things up took about a paragraph. A lot
can get glossed over in a few sentances. I submit that
this a 20/20 issue, unless you have cites that have all the routes the
Rangers took the six(?) weeks they were there.
> > Horrible timing, but they figured the prize was
Yeah, someone else pointed out my lack of communication skills. I meant, what
if it *had led* to the capture of Aideed, not that he was actually in the
target building.
> > Oh, yeah. NCO's are supposed to be the snarling
Haven't had either, but I suspect I'd agree with you, at least on a personal
level. As it is, I agree with you on the outside observer level.
> > There was a CSAR team in case a chopper went down.
Yup. Another 20/20 issue. Obviously (now) 2 or 3 CSAR teams would have
been better, but there's only so much reduncy you can have. After a while
you've got a division in the air to support a company operation. It isn't cost
effective, on any level.
> John
> At 04:30 PM 1/25/02 -0800, you wrote:
> --- Don Greenfield <gryphon@sisna.com> wrote:
How long is this abbreviated course? I thought that Rangers were supposed
to be (relatively) elite troops. Not Special Forces/SEAL level, but
better than the ordinary run of troops. Hold on, let me Google it...THREE
WEEKS! That's it? Huh, for some reason I was under the impression it was a
several month course.
> John
> On Fri, 25 Jan 2002, Don Greenfield wrote:
> At 04:30 PM 1/25/02 -0800, you wrote:
[...]
> > > According to the book, he hadn't even been through
It's a "fast-food world" we all live in anymore.
:-/
John,
I started to reply to each of your points but then realized I was saying the
same thing in each. I think you are tarring the whole operation with one
brush. I cannot agree with you more that the upper leadership dropped the ball
on this mission. They had become overconfident due to a number of successful
quick operations. They did address the RPG threat even though a helicopter had
been shot down a couple weeks before this incident by an RPG. They did not
keep support elements (QRF) informed and they limited the firepower of the
units involved with rules of engagement that look similar to those that
hampered our troops in Vietnam. So as for the upper leadership I agree.
I think the junior leadership 0-3 and NCOs down, were trying to do the
right thing on a peacekeeping mission that was escalating quicker than they
realized.
It is with the NCOs on down that I do not completely concur with your blanket
dismissal. They were ordered not to put the rear armor in their vests. There
was concern that the extra weight would be a factor while
fast-roping. They had fast-roped with this much weight in training.
Stupid order? Yes. Should they follow it? Well that is sticky. At this point
they were not really in a combat situation. There had been sporadic fire but
they did not understand that they were walking into a large and protracted
firefight. In hindsight it was a poor decision and in fact resulted in more
casualties as there were instances where a round went in from the back,
bounced off the front armor plate and went back in. Causing more damage. They
made a call on this with the information they had. They should have ignored
the order from above and left them in. A bad call.
QRF should have been informed. I agree. Not the NCOs or JOs job though.
Command failure.
As far as weapons safety and holding a loaded weapon, I agree safety should be
on when you are not actively engaged in shooting or getting ready to shoot.
That is why it is located conveniently next to the trigger. Your implication
of "anyone who's actually held a loaded weapon can tell you" misses the mark
here. Before I transferred to the Coast Guard I spent 9 years in the Army,
Active and Guard. I have held loaded weapons and used them against live
targets.
Every Delta Force Operative I have worked with has been a completely
professional soldier and I think that example from the movie is just one of
the "Hollywoodisms". There was tension with the Ranger CO and the Delta Force
folks, there were "chickenshit" rules that the Delta folks did not like or
feel that they had to follow. By the same token they were actively engaged in
teaching the NCOs and junior Ranger troops.
Bob Makowsky
[quoted original message omitted]
> --- Don Greenfield <gryphon@sisna.com> wrote:
> How long is this abbreviated course? I thought that
Ranger School is a several month course. Rangers are supposed to be really,
really good light infantry. But that's more a factor of training time and
training budgets than courses run prior to entering the regiment. Oh, and
almost all the leadership has been to the real deal Ranger course.
good morning!
i am struck dumb at the idea of anyone considering the m-16 safety
switch/fire selector being considered difficult or complicated to use .
. . .
as far as the great old.45 ACP goes, there are 3 safeties designed into it.
the lever safety is just one. half-cock is two. and the squeezable
grip safety is three.
ole slabsides made it hard for even a moron to shoot himself or his friends by
just having the safty lever clicked off.
i need to look, but that S&W autopistol the RCMP carry probably has a built in
safety device of some sort that does away with an external safety.
political agenda of the clinton administration was the that task force ranger
was dispatched, and then denied the armor and other support that the commander
requested.
the late les aspin (may he burn iin hell) stood on the tv in front of the
world and said someing to the effect that giving the rangers the support they
wanted was not financially feasible as president clinton was preparing to send
troops to bosnia instead.
dollar and political considerations instead of american blood considerations
were first and foremost.
with this in mind, why did we spend millions to apprehend a killer that was
only worth a $25,000.00 bounty to the UN?
and why did not the UN membership ( other than the USA) provide elite troopers
from other member countries to run this scum and his henchmen to ground?
afterall, this was a UN humanarian mission that the murderer ic was interfer
ing with, and UN peacekeepers his minions were killing and wounding?
and why after we had our soldiers killed and wounded by his followers
attempting to arrest him/his henchmen, did the USA haul him around on
USAF transport with US security until he met his end?
the whole somalia operation, to me, appeared to be stupid, risky, and a
perfect example of mission creep.
dawgie
> On 25-Jan-02 at 21:14, Laserlight (laserlight@quixnet.net) wrote:
My S.O., who backpacks with me occasionally, told me not taking water was
crazy on leaving the theatre. I do kind of wonder if in real life t hey just
didn't take less then SOP would dictate and they reduced that
to none so us non-army types would understand.
I have trouble recommending this movie. It was a good movie but it is
difficult watching "the good guys" get chopped up. It does anger you, you
should either send troops in with a proper force or not send them in at all.
Screw the politics.
The sad thing is if proper armour support had been there not only would fewer
US soldiers have died but far fewer of the 1,000 somolies would have died
also.
One thing, am I pretty safe in assuming it is difficult to hurt an APC with an
RPG?
> Roger Books wrote:
> One thing, am I pretty safe in assuming it is difficult to hurt
In the open? Difficult to get close enough to score a good hit.
In a city? Ask the Russian soldiers who tried to drive APCs and tanks through
Grozny during the 1st Chechen war. If you can find a survivor, that
is...
Regards,
> On 28-Jan-02 at 16:51, Oerjan Ohlson (oerjan.ohlson@telia.com) wrote:
That's what I wanted to know. I had always envisioned RPGs as normal grenades
attached to a rocket. As such they wouldn't have much armor penetration.
Obviously my vision was wrong.
> At 5:05 PM -0500 1/28/02, Roger Books wrote:
Thats the beauty of shaped charges. They have a very nice directional effect
and a good blast effect around them. A glancing blow won't penetrate armor but
a direct hit will (penetration vs size of warhead being a key component).
Some shaped charge warheads have frangible casings or ball bearings in a
plastic matrix to enhance their blast effect to nearby personnel.
Several 40mm grenades have this design as does the DPICM grenade.
> --- Roger Books <books@jumpspace.net> wrote:
> One thing, am I pretty safe in assuming it is
Nope. One RPG is pretty inaccurate, but at close range (urban areas) they'll
get a hit eventually, even with really bad technique. Somalis were getting
hits from blind luck, mostly. Once you get a hit
straight-on, it _will_ penetrate the armor and
probably either destroy the vehicle outright, or just kill everyone in the
troop compartment.
> Roger Books wrote:
See http://www.ktroop.com/useofarmor.htm regarding the old M113
APC.
"...one penetration for every seven RPG hits. Hits in themselves averaged
about one in eight to ten rounds fired due to the inherent inaccuracy of the
weapon... Statistical analysis reveals that only one vehicle was destroyed for
every seven penetrations and casualties were 0.8 per penetration."
(e.g. 400 RPG shots = six dead people and one dead APC.)
On the other hand, Jane's has an entry for an Israeli M113 upgrade that has
enormous and very, very sloped reactive armour panels
specifically for defeating RPG-7 bombs, so people take them
seriously.