Afghan military pilot kills 9 Americans

[Manolito]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110427/ap_on_re_as/as_afghanistan
This is the fifth or sixth time Afghan military has killed those trying to help.
This wasn't even outside the wire but in a briefing room.
Bill

 

[Viper1]

Holy smokes that's terrible. Rest in peace and prayers to the families of those killed and wounded.

 

[tmroun01]

From what fox reported earlier today, the Afghani pilot got into a dispute with the Americans and proceeded to shoot them, then was shot and killed.

RIP.

 

[tova]

RIP, Godspeed, PBS....

 

[AWP]

I'm waiting on Karzai's outrage.

 

[Teufel]

This is a cultural issue. We have been running into the same thing. If an Afghan feels that he has been disrespected, they will often take revenge in some fashion. Usually this ends in tragedy.

 

[DA SWO]

I'm waiting on Karzai's outrage.

Yeah,
Obama should call him up and ream his ass; but he won't, bowing is easier.

 

[AWP]

What's funny is how they tout this guy as a 20 year veteran of the Afghan Army/ Air Force. Yeah.....that makes him both TB and a Communist. People forget, or more likely they simply don't know, those a lot of the pilots and senior officers in the military, but especially the pilots, areleftovers from the old Communist gov't here. They're pilots who were sent to the USSR to learn how to fly and you don't score that gig without being a loyal Communist. Add to it and they are flying what they know: Russian aircraft. How does that look to the rank and file Afghan when an Mi-24/ 35 flies over? Yeah, we're from the gov't and we're here to help.....

This whole country is one bad choice after another. Not a radical Muslim? Yay! Oh, he traffics in narcotics. Boo! Our loyal ally....who switched sides when the money and political fortunes were right. Not a radical Muslim? Yay! Oh shit, his human rights record is appalling......

And the list goes on.

I agree with Teufel, this incident is a cultural thing. But our loyal Afghan allies? When the shooting started they all bailed out of the building, some jumping from the second floor. Meanwhile we have 9 dead Americans, 8 of whom will receive a hero's sendoff here shortly and one poor bastard who will be shipped home as freight.

Meanwhile, Karzai the Impotent, Mayor of Kabul, issues a brief statement comdemning the attack. The guy who owes his job to being more or less the last man standing who doesn't have some black mark against him. With Massoud gone (who we turned our backs to in the late 90's because the Northern Alliance bought weapons from Iran using money gained from drug trafficking) Karzai was vanilla enough (and Pashtun enough) to be "elevated to the purple" as Gibbon would say.

Madness.....

 

[dknob]

I'm sure you read it on the news. Some former Afghan military pilot goes to Kabul to pick up his paycheck when an argument ensues and the man kills 8 ARMED US service members and 1 US contractor before he is gunned down.

Now my question is.. HOW does this happen. I can't think of one scenario in my great imagination where this gun fight could make sense.

Anybody care for a second take? Are some of our soldiers so horribly trained?

Because to be honest, I don't think I can spontaneously erupt and kill 8 armed soldiers in such a short time span without getting smoked.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/04/27/afghanistan.violence/index.html?iref=allsearch

 

[AWP]

Merging threads.

 

[AWP]

The shooting took place in a building and while I haven't seen it or any photos, I know it is multistoried because a number of Afghan Army/ Police types injured themselves bailing out of the second floor rather than figure out what all of that shooting nonsense was about....

If he was in an area populated by US personnel who are training/ mentoring the Afghan Air Force, I can easily (sadly) see how you could get the drop on 8-10 quite easily. I won't go into all of the details why I believe this to be easy, but if you're dealing with aircrew in a tight environment like a briefing room or conference room, aircrew who 1) Don't see the guy as a threat. 2) Never expect to draw their weapons which is reflected in some of the ridiculous shoulder holsters I see around BAF 3) Barely fire at all each year beyond annual qualifications and 4) Would have to chamber a round before they can use their weapons anyway?

Under that scenario I can easily see 8-10 killed in a short amount of time. The shooting starts, the guy gets maybe 2 or 3 before anyone can process what is going on. A panic ensues, folks start ripping and clawing at their jacked up, floppy, untied shoulder holsters or trying to peel back the velcro on an old style Bianchi or maybe they have a Serpa and simply don't practice the draw (some of the belts around here are straight out of Tombstone and while they may look cool and feel comfortable, good luck drawing from one)...now panic really ratchets up as no one is returning fire. In a confined space (if this is the case) there's no place to hide so 2 maybe 3 more go down. Some finally draw their weapons and reflexively pull the trigger on an empty chamber, now they have to chamber a round....

In a room full of people who aren't thinking or training for combat, I can see it.

Please note that all of the above is pure speculation based on the CNN article. Replace "airmen" with "soldiers" (read: fobbits) and I can easily see the same outcome.

 

[moobob]

Now my question is.. HOW does this happen. I can't think of one scenario in my great imagination where this gun fight could make sense.

Anybody care for a second take? Are some of our soldiers so horribly trained?

Because to be honest, I don't think I can spontaneously erupt and kill 8 armed soldiers in such a short time span without getting smoked.

I can answer that for you. Take a walk around any major base and see how many people aren't even carrying ammunition with their weapon. Then you have people (mostly officers) carrying stupid shoulder holsters that aren't worn properly (hanging down to their waist like a purse) so that there isn't a chance in hell they could draw it if they needed to. You can be damn sure they don't have a round in the chamber.

 

[moobob]

and Free beat me to it.

 

[DA SWO]

The shooting took place in a building and while I haven't seen it or any photos, I know it is multistoried because a number of Afghan Army/ Police types injured themselves bailing out of the second floor rather than figure out what all of that shooting nonsense was about....

If he was in an area populated by US personnel who are training/ mentoring the Afghan Air Force, I can easily (sadly) see how you could get the drop on 8-10 quite easily. I won't go into all of the details why I believe this to be easy, but if you're dealing with aircrew in a tight environment like a briefing room or conference room, aircrew who 1) Don't see the guy as a threat. 2) Never expect to draw their weapons which is reflected in some of the ridiculous shoulder holsters I see around BAF 3) Barely fire at all each year beyond annual qualifications and 4) Would have to chamber a round before they can use their weapons anyway?

Under that scenario I can easily see 8-10 killed in a short amount of time. The shooting starts, the guy gets maybe 2 or 3 before anyone can process what is going on. A panic ensues, folks start ripping and clawing at their jacked up, floppy, untied shoulder holsters or trying to peel back the velcro on an old style Bianchi or maybe they have a Serpa and simply don't practice the draw (some of the belts around here are straight out of Tombstone and while they may look cool and feel comfortable, good luck drawing from one)...now panic really ratchets up as no one is returning fire. In a confined space (if this is the case) there's no place to hide so 2 maybe 3 more go down. Some finally draw their weapons and reflexively pull the trigger on an empty chamber, now they have to chamber a round....

In a room full of people who aren't thinking or training for combat, I can see it.

Please note that all of the above is pure speculation based on the CNN article. Replace "airmen" with "soldiers" (read: fobbits) and I can easily see the same outcome.

That's probably what happened.

 

[AWP]

and Free beat me to it.

Don't hate yourself, the Three Wolf Shirt gives me magical typing powers.

 

[tmroun01]

This morning on the news it was reported that this POS got into an argument with the training staff and left the room. He then came back into the room with a weapon, and made the Americans drop their weapons, then shot them execution style before offing himself. But who knows how accurate this report is.

 

[TheSiatonist]

RIP to the soldiers.

This is some really fucked up shit you guys have to deal with out there. Keep sharp and stay safe! You're all dealing with some really unstable people...

 

[DA SWO]

Maybe the AF types will be less touchy feely, and more combat focused now.
Hurts that so many of my AF bro's just died, but we have to learn and move forward.

 

[AWP]

You know what I don't understand and what really infuriates me?

This isn't the first attack by our "friends" and "allies" and it will not be the last. Do you think we'll change our behavior? There's the tragedy: people dying and we don't learn from it. We'd rather accept these "one off" incidents than re-train Snuffy how to properly handle a weapon. We're saying we'd rather be killed by our "allies" than run the risk of having NDs all over the place, that our troops are a greater threat to us than our "friends."

 

[Marauder06]

Everyone thinks it can't happen to him.

On our "secure" SOF compound, I was one of the only officers to regularly carry a sidearm, on a very simple Uncle Buck holster on my belt. I always carried it with a full magazine, I felt that if I was going to go down in a blaze of gunfire at the DFAC, it wasn't going to be due to a lack of shooting back. IIRC, Army and Marines were the only ones to make their personnel carry, Air Force and Navy didn't even tote their weapons back and forth to the PX, fuel point, wherever. I guess the local national and 3rd-country national guard force was going to protect them

Even if everyone had been armed, in tight quarters with surprise on his side and an automatic weapon, I think a motivated guy could mow down a very large number of people. I guess we're lucky that the body count wasn't larger.