I know it’s been out for a while, but I thought I’d give the recently released investigation report on the air strikes in Farah province Afghanistan a chop and post the entire report here.
You might remember this was the latest high-profile close air support strike on a village that allegedly killed as many as 140 civilians — but probably killed more like 60 (still a WAY too high number) during a day-long battle in Farah province in May.
I’m not going to get into the whole idea of using CAS in villages against an enemy that may (or may not) be deliberately hiding amongst civilians, the perception versus reality arguments and any doctrinal issues. We can cover that at DoD Buzz and Military.com, but I have a purely defense tech-related issue I’d like to bring forward for you to consider as an outgrowth of the investigation’s findings.
The report states that there were essentially two rounds of air strikes called in by a Marine Corps Special Operations team which was acting as a QRF for Afghan forces and their “coalition” trainers (it doesn’t say where these trainers were from but they could have been other Marines or Brits) who came into contact with enemy forces around 3pm on May 4 during a patrol intended to secure a small village rumored to have been hassled by foreign Taliban.
The MarSoc bubbas took control of the CAS when they arrived on scene and talked in an escalation of force strike with four F/A-18Fs which popped flares, did a couple gun runs and eventually dropped some bombs on confirmed Taliban positions that the MarSoc commander observed and confirmed for each strike.
While the direct fire stopped for a while, the enemy was never completely suppressed. But the Hornets were running out of juice, so they had to RTB. In came our Soviet nuclear strike bomber to save the day.
Four hours later, as the Marines and Afghan forces were waiting for a medivac chopper and coming under intermittent fire from a nearby village, a B-1B Lancer called in on station. It dark by then and the B-1 spotted a group of military looking men walking toward the village to reinforce the enemy firing on the Marines and ANA. Of course, this was almost a mile away from the ground force commander, so he had to trust the B-1’s thermals and used “a variety of real-time intelligence resources” which probably means he was listening to a radio scanner and having the jibberish translated to confirm that the group was coming in for the kill.
Farah Province Investigation
Of course they hid in two buildings.
Boom! Three 500 pounders on air burst fuses destroy a mosque and a shrine. No one in the air or on the ground has any idea who’s taking shelter in the mosque and shrine aside from the Talibs.
Then the B-1 sees another group like the first one, tracks it for 20 minutes on the thermals moving toward the Marines’ front line and rallying near another building outside the village. Threat=strike. Boom: two 500 pounders and two 2,000 pounders (which must have looked like a nuclear strike).
More than two hours after the B-1 came on station, and spotting a third group of tactically-moving personnel take shelter and another building, the Lancer drops its last 2,000 pounder, destroying the building and killing everyone inside.
Again, we can debate the policy and tactics of CAS and target ID in another forum, but what this incident tells me is that we absolutely need a counterinsurgency aircraft. The F-18s could ID the targets themselves and get low enough to do strafing runs, etc. But they couldn’t stay very long and had to relinquish control to a strategic bomber sheep-dipped as a tactical support aircraft.
An A-10, or some other COIN aircraft would have done a much better job eliminating the enemy with graduated force and IDing the targets — and staying on station. They can be cheap, easy to field at FOBs and convenient to maintain (especially prop-driven planes). And I got no problem with the armaments either. Give me some Hellfires and a couple chain guns, and I’ll put your Talibs on the ground.
I hope that this incident arms those in the Air Force and Army to advocate for a “back to the future” focus on simpler, long-endurance, stick and rudder with a pair of binos CAS that is critical to keeping the population on our side in a conflict with an economy of force that demands a the careful use of precision airpower.
– Christian
I agree with Daniel a UAV gives you persistance and is an expendable scout,
However the ‘video game kids’ that run them have neither the background or vision to see the total picture, so I don’t think they are a suitable CAS/COIN platform.
We have criminals who justify killing because of the ‘respect’ thing. The people you deal with in COIN are at the same level. If you don’t get up front and personal they don’t think your worth of ‘respect’.
I may noyt be the conventional ‘hearts and minds’ but the ‘toughest mother in the valley’ approach doe shave it’s place.
we need A-10’s, Broncos, and even a Skyraider replacement.the A-10 was probably one of the best investments this country ever made and we need to build more or a replacement ASAP.Rough field capability, long loiter time and something you can pretty much fix at a Ford dealer that can carry a Gatling gun, a dozen or fourteen 250 lb bombs, and some rockets. make it a blast to fly and durable. KIS.
How about a mini-Spectre, with a good “eyes” package, Backed up by high flying/orbiting UAV’s acting as bomb trucks.
The mini Spectres can carry some guns and several hellfires as a reasonably light weapons load and ensure a decent loiter time. While some large UAV’s, also with a long loiter, can orbit far overhead and just need to be able to peal off a large PGM when commanded by the Spectre and guided in by the Specter too.
One platform doesn’t have to do it all, make it a combined package. And hopefully cheap enough that you can have them in some numbers too.
Using a B1 is nuts.
Peter and Matt,
SOC is currently looking at the C-27J being utilized as a mini-Spectre gunship.
The Navy has currently leased at least one Super Tucano from of all people Blackwater. They are using this to develop CAS requirements for an aircraft of this size.
Also, there are rumblings the Air Force is looing at the AT-6B Texan II (attack variant of the T-6A) for this CAS requirements. Interestingly enough, the Iraqi Air Force just purchased some of these aircraft.
The Iraqi AF is also looking at putting Hellfires on their Cessna FAC aircraft. Something we might adopt for our own.
But I will reiterate this mission was doomed to create civilian casualties from the beginning due to piss poor planning. There were no CAS or ISR assets used in this operation because it was planned in hours and not days.
Imagine if we had Project Liberty ISR assets available for this operation. They would have been able to track all personnel within the area of operations.
DC2
“A Modest Proposal” from the Canadian American Strategic Review:
http://www.casr.ca/mp-army-aviation-coin.htm
What about an X-Hawk type vehicle? Israel is still working on it, payload and protection are issues. But the ability to hover and fly among buildings would be beneficial for large urban environments. Also the ability to land and pick up casualties would be a big plus.
It would need to come a long way, but a future version could be the ticket.
A Spectre would have been ideal here. Or maybe the hypothetical mini-spectre. Or a good old fashioned AC-47 Puff upgraded with night vision gear. In fact, pretty much anything armed with a resonably small weapon that does not flatten an entire city block when it is dropped and can be used against moving targets near the line of contact, would have been better. Putting smaller bombs on the B1 might have made a difference, but probably not. The bad guys were not bombed while they were out in the open. The strike was made after they stopped moving at the buildings.
One thing that some of the posters may not understand here is that the civilian deaths did not occur as part of an actual firefight. You can not drop 2000 lb bombs within small arms range of your own forces without fragging your own guys. These Taliban were attacked because they were moving toward the battle, not because they were in it.
Although this was a Marine operation (well ANF/Marine), several people have questioned why the Army does not use COIN planes. The answer is that they would love to, but are not allowed to operate armed fixed wing aircraft. There is a link below to a story that describes some of the situation. It also gives an idea of how the Army brass feel about it
http://www.casr.ca/ft-coin-army-aviation-1.htm
I’m sure that if the Army had their way you’d see a whole lot more A-10/Spectre/OV-10 type aircraft in the theater.
To the poster “SMSgt Mac”:
You wrote: “Remind the civilain populace if you feel you need to, but they already know it. This is only a problem to people who do not understand war (…) Always express lament for what is neccessary, but do not stop doing what is neccessary“
Others wrote: “This politically correct warfare is BS” and “So I guess those (Afghans) that were forced to stay and hide in their homes deserved to die”.
That’s right: Kill the very civilians you’re supposed to protect from the enemy, and murder them preferrably massively, at night and with M.O.A.B.s, even 8 years after the war began, discuss even the ideal “platforms” for that, and all that because the U.S. Armed Forces are just too COWARD to fight the enemy on the ground with its own Infantry (Army, Marines), house to house, man to man, even as the enemy is still WALKING FOR 20 MINUTES towards the village! Then “explain” the massacre of innocent civilians with “enemy lies”, “self-defense” and of course with “11 / 9 / 2001″ and “Enduring Freedom”.
No, it’s spelled U.S. American C-O-W-A-R-D-I-C-E . Now go back to your tables and eat the fouling scraps of your 4th of July celebrations!
Which former Empire of Evil ever called in a heavy bomber to drop tons of ordnance on a small column of guerillas returning home to their village at night: The Nazis, the Japanese or the Soviets?! You U.S. Americans even killed a single heroic R
freefallingnitwit,
I am not sure if you are Obama or Ahmadinejad…
I know, you had some free time, all your friends were at 4th of July parties and you needed to take a break from trying to overthrow democracy right?
Okay, maybe you are just a Taliban or some other misguided youth. Well, now that you are here, and I have a chance to talk to a Taliban, there is a question that I always wanted to ask you…
You are willing to kill yourself in a suicide bombing so you can have 70 virgins. Well, why would you do that when you make your women, here on Earth, cover themselves from head to toe so you can’t see them??
I mean, come on, you like Camels right??
Serious question: If you war-heroes already employ platforms like the B-1 heavy bomber against SUSPECTED rankless Taliban foot-soldiers, what platform are you gonna use if you finally find and want to kill Osama Bin Laden?
A Death Star?
Rambo,
Please do not feed the trolls.
Thanks
To the poster “Rick” :
You wrote: “Rambo, Please do not feed the trolls“
What’s wrong with (feeding) us trolls?!
Do you know what the r
I spent the 4th of July with an old friend, a former CG of Marine Air way back when. He flew everything from F-6’s to Phantoms including rotary. We had a long discussion about he AD-1, which he loved. Said it was one of the best aircraft he flew and could deliver huge amounts of ordnance precisely at 400kt. Capable of flying for 10 hours. Could take a lot of damage. Moderate fuel cost. Reliable as hell. Sounds like a good idea these days.
Wasn’t a prop driven plane looked at recently? That would be a big help in ID’ing hodtiles. It has the capacity to carry a fairly big load, has about 8 hardpoints, i just cannot name the aircraft. Just a thought-but it makes sense.
SUPER TUCANO. Thanx. Sounds like a good move.