The Deadliest Weapon
November 15, 2009 4:53 PM
Byron Pitts and 60 Minutes cameras spend two days on the road with a bomb-hunting unit in Afghanistan as they encounter one deadly bomb after another.
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November 15, 2009 4:53 PM
Byron Pitts and 60 Minutes cameras spend two days on the road with a bomb-hunting unit in Afghanistan as they encounter one deadly bomb after another.
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See all 41 CommentsAre we spread so thin on the ground that there's no support for our soldiers -- no depth etc. If that's the case then it's criminal to expose our soldiers to this risk. In Colin Powell's words, we "find, then fix and then kill the enemy." We're doing a great job of finding the enemy (or at least his bombs) but what about the second and third parts of this? Also I would never have allowed a bomb team to continually put bombs in the same place. I personally would have led ambush patrols at night to make sure that this was not a habit forming activity for the enemy. I'm not seeing aggressive night patrolling at all in anything I read about in either Iraq or Afghanistan! This is not a failure of the soldiers, it's a failure of the chain of command.
We seem to have forgotten Counterinsurgency 101 -- take the fight to the enemy, don't wait for him to bring it to you. BTW do you think the 18 year old draftees wanted to do aggressive counter patrolling and ambushing at night -- no, of course not, until they had good leadership going with them, teaching all the while, and actually defeating the NVA on their own turf. When's the last time that COL was outside the wire at night?
Either get off the roads and stop relying on the million dollar equipment of get our troops out of there!
Anyway, Afgan & Iraq wars is like the war on drugs, no end in site.....
Too MUCH pesos in the military hardware market..neither you or I can't do something about it.. Just to watch the ship sink..
Granted it gives us insight into this frustrating job, but it does not help, or even contribute to, the winning of this war. It is only what it is; a field trip into this misery. Better for Bryon. Not any use to us.
Unless the people on the ground in Afghanistan..the villagers, the locals and the shura leaders used their collective influence to stop this..then this type of situation will go on indefinitely.
Khost/Paktia Provinces/2003
Something about the McChrystal interview disturbed me, and it wasn't until the, "Deadliest Weapon," interview that I figured it out. While civilians find themselves in a bullets way, by their permissable or particially participatle practics, they make themselves part of the problem. The first goal should be to kill the emeny (terrorists, the second should always be to protect the troops. It is nothing sadder then to see the willingness to accept self losses. If a bomb is placed in the same location, then why isn't that area underwatch until the bombplacer is killed. Because chances are, that bomb placer is that farmer? Terrorism aside, I have seen this attitude in Baltimore City in regards to crime and criminals. A store is robbed, the perpitrator caught red handed and that owner is told he was sentenced to four years in jail. The sad truth is, all but three months were actually suspended. The same can be said for terrorism. The more that is tolerated and permitted, the more that is going to be coming our way.
One of the previous problems with Afgahnistan is that we pushed the terrorists into Pakestan and they did nothing. Now that they are fighting back, we decide to do nothing. Foreigners are said not to like this country and personally, I have found this to be wrong. Most become angry at us, because they dont have the ability to fight for right, we come in and usually at the worst time, we suddenly leave; as they hold the bag. With Pakestan fighting, we should have been right their on the other side of the border killing off those terrorists. There is no noman's land in war. Period.
My feelings towards terrorists formed when I realized that we publish the names of all people killed by terrorists in the paper. Very often, side by side, we publish the numbers of Muslims killed by terrorists for various terrorist attacks. With a rate of 10 to 100 times more then us. Terrorism is nothing more then a tyranny that can not be permitted any quarter by any county or group of peoples.
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