How would you like to be the parents of these two soldiers, knowing that some computer jockey in Washington DC blew up your son? In case you had forgotten, an American soldier dies every day in Afghanistan. For who? For what?
Fatalities by Year and Month
| Year | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 5 | 4 | 12 |
| 2002 | 10 | 13 | 15 | 10 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 8 | 70 |
| 2003 | 4 | 7 | 12 | 2 | 3 | 7 | 2 | 4 | 2 | 6 | 8 | 1 | 58 |
| 2004 | 11 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 9 | 5 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 8 | 7 | 2 | 60 |
| 2005 | 2 | 3 | 6 | 19 | 4 | 29 | 2 | 33 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 4 | 131 |
| 2006 | 1 | 17 | 13 | 5 | 17 | 22 | 19 | 29 | 38 | 17 | 9 | 4 | 191 |
| 2007 | 2 | 18 | 10 | 20 | 25 | 24 | 29 | 34 | 24 | 15 | 22 | 9 | 232 |
| 2008 | 14 | 7 | 20 | 14 | 23 | 46 | 30 | 46 | 37 | 19 | 12 | 27 | 295 |
| 2009 | 25 | 25 | 28 | 14 | 27 | 38 | 76 | 77 | 70 | 74 | 32 | 35 | 521 |
| 2010 | 43 | 53 | 39 | 34 | 51 | 103 | 88 | 79 | 57 | 65 | 58 | 41 | 711 |
| 2011 | 32 | 38 | 38 | 14 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 122 |
Sources: Predator drone may have killed US troops
WASHINGTON — The military is investigating what appears to be the first case of American troops killed by a missile fired from a U.S. drone.
The investigation is looking into the deaths of a Marine and a Navy medic killed by a Hellfire missile fired from a Predator after they apparently were mistaken for insurgents in southern Afghanistan last week, two senior U.S. defense officials said Tuesday. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.
Unmanned aircraft have proven to be powerful weapons in Afghanistan and Iraq and their use have expanded to new areas and operations each year of those conflicts. Some drones are used for surveillance and some, such as the drone in this case, are armed and have been used to hunt and kill militants.
Officials said this is the first case they know of in which a drone may have been involved in a friendly fire incident in which U.S. troops were killed, and they are trying to determine how it happened.
Marine Staff Sgt. Jeremy Smith of Arlington, Tex., and Seaman Benjamin D. Rast of Niles, Mich., were hit while moving toward other Marines who were under fire in Helmand province.
Military officials in Afghanistan declined to provide any details, saying only that it was a friendly fire incident. “A formal investigation will determine the circumstances that led to the incident,” the International Security Assistance Force said in a statement last week.
But reports from the field indicate that the Marines who were under attack mistook Smith and Rast for militants heading their way and called in a strike from a U.S. Air Force Predator, one official said.
Smith, 26, and Rast, 23, were with the 1st Battalion, 23rd Marine Regiment, a reserve unit in Houston.
Smith’s father, Jerry, said he didn’t want to place blame for what happened.
“Whoever that young man or woman was, they didn’t send that drone over there to kill my son or Doc Rast,” Jerry Smith told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. “If it was a royal screw up, it was a royal screw up. Make corrections because I don’t want another family to have to go through this.”
He said “trying to put a bigger burden on that person who fired the missile is not something I would do.”
“I guarantee you if he was standing in front of me, he’d be asking for forgiveness, and I would give it to him,” Jerry Smith said.
The Marines have been in a fierce fight in the south, battling insurgents in key Taliban sanctuaries such as Sangin, a militant stronghold.
Currently, Air Force Predators and Reapers, the high-flying hunter-killer drones, are logging 48 of the 24-hour air patrols a day, moving toward a goal of 65 in 2013. The aircraft are prized for their intelligence gathering proficiency and ability to pinpoint targets, reducing the risk to U.S. pilots and other personnel.
Under pressure from Defense Secretary Robert Gates, the Air Force has dramatically increased the number of armed and unarmed drones in the war zones over the past three years.
Other military services have their own drones, ranging from the Army’s smaller shoulder-launched Ravens to the sophisticated, high-altitude Global Hawks, which are used for surveillance missions and do not carry weapons.
The military’s use of armed drones in Afghanistan has become a flashpoint for Afghan anger over civilian deaths in the nearly 10-year-old war.
Drones are an even more contentious weapon in Pakistan, where they are largely operated by the CIA to strike insurgents hiding along the border. Pakistan tacitly allows the drone strikes within limited areas but denies in public that it permits the Americans such leeway.
The Pentagon plans to add another $2.6 billion in drone targeting and surveillance equipment for the Afghan campaign this year, according to a senior intelligence official in Afghanistan. The boost is an acknowledgement of the new focus on intelligence, for a mission that previously was last in line for assets and personnel after the war in Iraq, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss matters of intelligence.
_ AP Intelligence Writer Kimberly Dozier contributed to this report.
Colma Rising says:
“He said “trying to put a bigger burden on that person who fired the missile is not something I would do.”
“I guarantee you if he was standing in front of me, he’d be asking for forgiveness, and I would give it to him,” Jerry Smith said.”
Of course a parent doesn’t want to hear about the death of their children… in any form.
Another tragedy from that God-forsaken hell hole. This shit happens a lot… from manned planes too.
I have a close relative who is an Army medic. It hurts worse when the Angels of the Battlefield die. They want nothing more than to help and they put their lives where their heart is, with full knowledge that they’ve signed up for a one way ticket to the thick of the shit.
God Bless our troops.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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12th April 2011 at 6:29 pm
Welshman says:
Friendly fire killed or wounded 25% of the soldiers in WWII. What is troubling about this, the whole fucking war is unnecessary, expensive, and puts our troops in harms way because the military is alway searching for a mission. The whole concept of military hardware is to use it or lose it.
Well-loved. Like or Dislike:
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12th April 2011 at 6:38 pm
teenspirit says:
No ones gonna give a shit. Theres the military world and the rest of us. I feel sorry for family members of the military and the suffering they go through only to be given a token thanks by knuckle dragging neocons who love war.
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12th April 2011 at 7:51 pm
Steve Hogan says:
I have a lot of sympathy for the average enlisted man. He’s constantly being sent off to these shithole countries and asked to perform miracles based on lies. The mission is never coherent and always changing, and there’s never a believable exit strategy.
They are soldiers trained and equipped to kill the enemy and his means of making war. Instead, they are thrust into impossible situations as part policeman, part social worker. The locals are thoroughly pissed at their presence (no one likes a foreign occupier), and the enemy uses that against them. The result is a drawn-out quagmire. Both Iraq and Afghanistan fit the mold perfectly, and I’m sure we can soon add Libya to the mix.
That said, these soldiers and the officers that lead them are not blameless. “Just following orders” didn’t cut it at Nuremburg, it is shouldn’t cut it now. They took an oath to defend the Constitution against all enemies, both foreign and domestic. I would suggest that the real enemy doesn’t wear a turbin and he isn’t a foreigner. He wears a tailored suit, gets chauffered around Washington, and makes canned speeches about America’s interests, all of which are lies.
These wars are unconstitutional, illegal, endless, and unwinnable. They also are not protecting our liberties. America’s military presence is radicalizing Muslims and are thus making us less safe, destroying our civil liberties, and bankrupting our nation.
A soldier who is willing to think independently would acknowledge that simple reality. Consequently, the proper response to these immoral interventions would be to opt out. There should be tens of thousands of conscientious objectors saying “Hell no” to the warmongering politicians.
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12th April 2011 at 8:35 pm
SSS says:
Four words in response to the article………..Pat Tillman; shit happens.
@ Colma Rising
Right on.
@ Welshman
Who said, “the whole fucking war is unnecessary, expensive, and puts our troops in harms way because the military is alway searching for a mission.”
So, the military is always searching for a mission, eh? Tell me how “the military” searched for the mission in Afghanistan and Iraq? I totally missed that, not only for those two wars, but for any war this nation has EVER fought.
I’m sure you meant “our elected officials,” didn’t you?
Hot debate. What do you think?
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12th April 2011 at 11:38 pm
eugend66 says:
Posting this for the 2nd time: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcz7NFrPUg0
Aprox 10 mins I hope will make you think twice when comes about war !
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12th April 2011 at 12:21 pm
Kill Bill says:
Support our troops – hold our leaders accountable.
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12th April 2011 at 12:30 pm
Welshman says:
SSS,
The military, medicare, medicaid, and social security are huge welfare entitlement programs.
All these welfare programs want more and more under their umbrella, they eat empires alive from the inside out. History speaks for itself.
The military is a welfare program for the military-industrial complex to eat up what the they produce. Standing armies are huge parasites that produce little and are constantly looking for a mission to justify their being.
I am all for defensive military that protects our borders, but the size of our military is not sustainable.
I know where you are coming from, but I put my time in for God and Country, but now have comtempt for both.
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12th April 2011 at 12:49 pm
TeresaE says:
Save a Soldier
Kill a Politician
My heart, sorrow and thanks to all that have sacrificed for this (and all others) clusterfuck.
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12th April 2011 at 3:43 pm
SSS says:
Welshman
Job 1 for the federal government is the security of The Republic. Job 1.
National defense is NOT a fucking welfare program. Are you insane? The military is only as big as our elected officials, starting with the House of Representatives, allows it to be. Congress can easily set the limits on the size of the military. It’s called the Power of the Purse. You can look it up. It’s in the Constitution.
Comparing the armed forces to Social Security and Medicare is nuts.
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12th April 2011 at 8:34 pm
Welshman says:
SSS,
I respect your position and what I have read of your comments you are a decent person. You’re
taking a position from your heart, and sadly those hearts get us into these continuous wars that drain the economic life blood out of our country. We could cut the military by 60% and still turn most of the globe into a glass parking lot.
I am a student of economic history, and also know how to balance my check book. We are doomed if we do not control gov’t. spending. We won’t have a country to defend, we will be a banana republic, if we are not there already.
The Constitution states lots of things that nobody in Congress pays any attention to. For Christ sake, our president is a constitutional lawyer, do you think he believes in the Constitution. Calling our country a republic is just a word, not reality. We are people living in a Nazi-Lite empire who follow orders of our masters in Washington. We are a bunch candy ass softies who trade our freedom for security.
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12th April 2011 at 2:44 pm