[evilgenius]

I watched the burning airman, downed helicopter in Iraq, video on some website the other night. I viewed it through a hyperlink on a military website I was looking at. As you can imagine there was no end of comments denigrating the Iraqis for doing such a thing. Comments like, 'they must be Satan worshippers after all' and 'a bullet in the head is too good for them' were typical. What struck me was that nobody said anything about the lack of the presence of other helicopters in the area to defend the downed chopper.

Is the US sending its choppers out on patrol alone? Why aren't they in squadrons as would make military sense? I can think off hand of three reasons. First, the aircraft themselves cost too much to concentrate them in such a fashion, the civilian military leaders must think that their high cost alone makes them invulnerable. Second it costs too much to keep the aircraft flying in such numbers. In other words fuel and maintenance along with the opportunity cost of the pilots is too great to concentrate the aircraft in squadrons. Lastly the US has become arrogant and believes that it can behave in a manner inconsistent with rational thought and still prevail simply because it is the US.

Rumsfled et al might be blowing this one on purpose. It is more likely, though, that it is entirely unintentional.

[coyote]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('evilgenius', 'L')astly the US has become arrogant and believes that it can behave in a manner inconsistent with rational thought and still prevail simply because it is the US.

[Itch]

What kind of helicopter was it? What was the pilot's mission?

[evilgenius]

I think off-hand that it was an Apache. I haven't got any idea what their mission was. Obviously whatever the mission a squadron of three helicopters would still have seen one down, but it wouldn't have seen the bad pr. Quickly, it isn't bad pr that we need to avoid but rather the inability to handle a Tet offensive style incursion should any patrol blunder into it. The fact that they are not organized to survive operationally in Iraq upon encountering a formidable enemy (shoulder launched missile or good shot with rpg) is bad. If forces had been moving en masse that day they might have gotten as far as a small outpost and been able to take prisoners. Ten or twenty GI's at the mercy of some internet head chopper or worse, paraded around on Iranian tv would tighen the sphincter of most Americans in a hurry.

I think Rumsfeld's reliance on tech predominantly instead of a balanced combination of tech and manpower is to blame for much of what is going wrong in Iraq today. The Administration doesn't seem interested in winning or in rebuilding. They seem to want to lose. They seem to want civil war.

I have said before that I believe that the US seeks a Sunni alliance as a basis for controlling Iraq. That would allow the Saudi's much more say, and the chance to aquire more reserves as theirs dwindle. Iran is on the wrong side of this and so is the current Iraqi power structure. We wait now only for the death of Hussein.