But I read somewhere that it took the fast-reaction force 15 minutes to get to the scene, even though they "heard" the gunfire.
Fifteen minutes might be too long for some parts of Iraq... I really don't know.
And, if this was a well planned ambush, they might have used a woman and child or family in a car to get their attention and then get attacked from behind.
A grenade might have killed one and rendered the two others in a state that they could not escape or defend themselves, for example. An RPG might have been used.
But in terms of traditional military strategy, a fixed target such as a road block is much easier to attack than something that is quite agile and changing positions.
I really don't know the situation, and you can say I am full of sh!t for what I wrote, and you would be right.
I was trying to get the message that maybe the size of the unit MIGHT have made it vulnerable.
My concern is that Al Qaeda might be trying desparate tactics as a way to get back for the death of their leader.
But I really don't have a clue.
When I speculate, I try to do it in a way to try to make people think, but not necessarily give away information.
Considering what happened that is detailed in the book and movie Blackhawk Dowan, the Ranger unit had very inexperienced people in their unit (I believe the one that fell out of the helicopter was just over the age of 18 by months, so he probably did not have a year's experience.
I could see where having some men in a bunker seconds away from the checkpoint might have prevented the seizing of the American soliders. In that case, you might have three men at the checkpoint and three men in a bunker.
I really don't know that much of Special Ops and would not care to give out anything I might have heard that might be true - just for the safety of such soldiers...
Certainly if a sniper or two were in the area, they might have been able to help protect the checkpoint. That is one area that I have heard that the US Military has excelled in Iraq.
But it gets back to I would rather raise a concern about a POSSIBLE problem and therefore save lives than to remain silent.
I tried to overemphasize my point (intentionally) so that some INTEL from our side might read it and pass it along to the command structure.
Or maybe just some foot soldier or officer in Iraq might read it pass it on.
I am not claiming to be right - just trying to make people think so lives are not lost.
The one situation I have speculated on quite a bit was what happened at Pearl Harbor. There were US Naval Officers and US Army Officers in Washington, DC that knew something was up with the Japanese because of the decoding of the intercepts of the Diplomatic traffic on December 6, 1941.
I always felt that if there was communication between the INTEL office in DC and the Pacific Operations in Pearl Harbor, someone might have been more alert.
In other words, more communication might have saved more lives in Pearl Harbor.
The downside to that thinking is that if the Japanese figured we broke their Diplomatic Code, it would have hurt subsequent operations such as some of the INTEL decoding used for the Battle of Midway (where US Military Intelligence was breaking the Japanese Military codes to a limited extent).
So I may be full of BS, but sometimes if you raise a RED FLAG about something, it might make someone think about things and maybe they might realize that there might be a vulnerability in terms of the GENERAL deployment of troops.
Certainly the 3 soldiers were in injun territory (like in the ol' West).
Best regards,
I don't know if we possibly have enough actual trained snipers to cover all checkpoints, but if we could have a troop or two covering checpoints from a secure location and they knocked off a couple ambushers, I'd imagine the ambushers may turn tail and run.
Although they seem to be learning and changing tactics and that might work for long.
It does seem it could save some lives in the meantime.