On Thursday, January 16, 2003, at 06:42 AM, W. Heath Robinson wrote:
Moral of the Story: Better safe than sorry...In other words,
<http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/16/national/16PILO.html>
"In his testimony today, Colonel Stutzrem described a detailed process
in place to consider targets that were proposed suddenly by pilots,
ground forces or intelligence sources: first, they must be located with
precise coordinates; next, they must be positively identified; and
finally "and most importantly," he said they must be "deconflicted."
That process, which could take hours, he said, involves checking to
ensure that the targets are not actually special operations forces,
other American or allied ground forces or government agents, or
nongovernment agencies, journalists or others who do not constitute a
threat.
"The two pilots should have known of those orders, said Colonel
Stutzrem, who was a senior officer in the air operations center that
oversaw all air combat in Afghanistan. Instead, he described listening,
stunned, as Major Schmidt requested permission to shoot his 20-mm cannon
and, then, after being told twice to hold his fire, said he saw men
firing artillery at him and Major Umbach, declared self-defense, and
dropped the bomb."
"Any U.S. pilot should have realized that since "deconflicting takes hours," and missions have an active combat zone duration of less than hours, that the intent of the order is to provide a Catch-22 excuse not to fire. Those who fire, before hours of deconflciting, are insane."
In other news, Air Marshall Yossarian has acknowledged that pilots are confused.
It'd be hilarious except that these pilots fact 60-year prison terms if convicted of not understanding the lesson of Catch-22: "Frag thy commanding officers."
--Tim May
"Dogs can't conceive of a group of cats without an alpha cat." --David Honig, on the Cypherpunks list, 2001-11
