Posted: 6/21/2006 3:47:00 AM EDT
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I am curious in light of the most recent autrocities to 2 of our warriors what protocal the military is teaching our young soldiers. First of all this is not meant in any way to dimish the service and sacrifice of any of our warriors but I am concerned with what happened and why. Did the 2 soldiers run out of ammo? did their weapons fail? Did they surrender in the face of overwhelming force? I dont know, but with our current enemies I cannot see how surrender can even be an option. Sure back in Vietnam you could be captured and eventually released but how many of our guys do you see being captured and released now? I havent heard of a single one. The bottom line would seem to me to be either you fight to the death or you end up being tortured, multilated and your body booby trapped in an attempt to kill more warriors who come to find your remains. Surely our guys there all know this, but yet these 2 where captured alive. Perhaps self preservation over rules common sense when the bullets are flying and the notion that there is a shread of hope by surrendering versus dieing in a hail of gun fire is too strong. I dont know. What is our military teaching to do in circumstances like this? Again, not a critisim of our warriors but perhaps their training. |
| Before I went over for OEF/OIFI and OIFII/III our staff told us in no uncertain terms to allow ourselves to be taken alive. They said it would be better to die trying to fight, than to be tortured and have your head cut off. You will either survive or die trying. I had already made up my mind beforehand to fight. |
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Smalls- I would have thought that to be the case but it doesnt appear so. I would love to hear from others in the sand box what thier thoughts are. I realize this topic isnt one that folks want to think about but I believe it warrants discussion due to the timeliness of recent events. |
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We're being taught the same thing that's been taught since 1955. Link |
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Skinny Does the Article mean that as long as you have ammo and a rifle (or a bayonet) you are obligated to continue to fight regardless of the size of the enemy force or the likely hood of of your survival? Have we determined what the circumstance surrounding the most recent event was. One soldier was killed so apparently he attempted to fight. The end result was 100% predicatable after being captured. |
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Why would you want to let some one cut your head off? Ever? They are not going to let you go in a week. They will not treat you like Mike Durant. We all know this and act accordingly. Sometimes bad things happen and you cant help but be overwhelmed and taken.  "You may kill me, but not before I kill as many of you as possible" is still the M.O. |
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There's always a chance that these guys could have been wounded and unable to fight back at a certain point. They were heavily outnumbered and one guy was killed right away. With two guys fighting as many as 10-30 badguys, it's very likely they were wounded. They may have been incapacitated and unable to fight or avoid being captured. It seems to me that there was a serious fuckup that only 3 guys were manning this checkpoint, regardless of the reasons. If the team was split as some badguys suckered them out (which has been suggested) or if this was simply how the checkpoint was set up, then we need to make sure this doesn't happen again. If part of the group gave chase, then the whole group should have given chase. Otherwise, everyone should have stayed put. And never should we have as few as 3 guys any distance away from friendly forces. Never send out fewer than a squad and make sure that they have a radio. |
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Reports I've read say the insurgents managed to seperate their humvee from a column of what's supposed to be 'mutually supporting vehicles.' Seems to me like the insurgents got extremely lucky, and then caught the pair of them without support. The army has procedures and protocols in place that are supposed to prevent this sort of isolation and I'm sure those proceedures are getting a real strenuous review. As far as the article of the code of conduct goes... no - it definately DOES NOT require every person in uniform to keep on fighting no matter what. It does require that we all continue to fight as long as we're capable of presenting a creditable defense and/or impact upon the enemy. I may not have worded it as well as some, but basically, there is NO portion of the Code Of Conduct that requires servicemembers to commit suicidal acts. However, just given what I've read of incident, and what I know about the general situation, I kind of doubt these guys gave up. It's not too hard to imagine them getting dragged out of their humvee while they're attempting to reload, continue driving, make a radio call, perhaps even exit the vehicle to find a better fighting position. Judging by the reports of how they were killed I'm also guessing they were dealt with very harshly, relatively quickly. Which seems to indicate they managed to piss off their captors in some way (perhaps with a struggle or a strong defense right up to the point of capture). These insurgent terrorists are stupid... they should've kept these guys alive if they had any way to move them at all. Thier value alive, even mistreated but still alive, would've been huge on the propaganda network. |
Article 2. You don't necessarily have to actively fight and try to kill the enemy in that situation; however, you do NOT surrender, but instead continue to hinder their actions if possible, evade and try to meet friendly forces. |