Bloody Wankers...
Posted on 04/07/2007 4:26:42 AM PDT by SkyPilot
April 7, 2007 -- A SOLDIER'S law in the U.S. Army holds: "The maxi mum effective range of an excuse is zero meters." Yesterday, the two officers on a panel of former British hostages delivered nothing but excuses for their disgraceful conduct.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I’m sorry that Ralph Peters had to write this article but someone had to do it. Those Brit officers are the opposite of everything we believe about conduct becoming, etc.
No matter how they were treated offcamera, their behavior on camera was disgraceful.
Despite the controlled conditions, thrree out of our group of 72 were broken, signed confessions, and read them from the guard towers. The reason they broke was claustrophobia. The couldn't stand to be in the small box, which was very confining and hot. I literally was numb from the waist down and had to be helped out of the box. I could understand why someone with claustrophbia would have a hard time enduring it.
Anyone can be broken eventually. The key for the enemy is to find that fear that marks the tipping point. I don't fault the UK boarding party for surrendering and being captured. As more and more information comes out, I do have a hard time with their conduct while in captivity. They appeared to put up no resistance at all and didn't even suffer "torture" that would be administered in a training program.
I’ll excuse them, the rules of engagement are so messed up,
what can we expect?
Iran is killing our Troops in Iraq,
and we can’t even shoot at them before they approach
our side in Iraqi waters.
I am a bigger chicken than all these British Troops,
and I would need more ammo and a big weapon that kills anything
that moves if I were in a war zone.
They did? How? They let the prisoners go and not a shot was fired. How come?
Y'all act like there is a code of chivalry and prisoners these days are accorded their Geneva convention rights. Grow up.
You have your facts wrong.
By janes.com editor Peter Felstead
An ‘inside’ account of the 1 April collision between a US Navy EP-3E surveillance aircraft and a Chinese J-8 interceptor over the South China Sea, recently unearthed by janes.com and corroborated by the US Navy, sheds new light on the event and further vindicates the actions of the EP-3 pilot, Lt Shane Osborn.
Combined with details released by the US Navy in press briefings, the new account - determined to be accurate by a source in the US Navy Office of Information - fully explains why Lt Osborn was forced to land at a Chinese base rather than ditching the aircraft along with its highly sensitive equipment fit.
Pooling the various accounts, a fuller picture of events can be described as follows:
Lt Osborn’s EP-3E (aircraft number PR-32) was flying straight and level, on autopilot and heading away from Hainan Island in international airspace when the aircraft flown by pilot Wang Wei, one of two intercepting Chinese F-8 fighters, embarked on a series of harassing manoeuvres.
Having already made two passes on the EP-3, during which the Chinese jet came within 3-5 ft (0.9-1.5m) of the US four-engined turbo-prop, Wang Wei’s F-8 attempted to join the EP-3’s left wing for a third pass. At this point the EP-3 was doing 180 knots indicated air speed (KIAS) at an altitude of 22,000ft. Such an airspeed is uncomfortable for the F-8, approaching as it is the aircraft’s stall speed, leaving it much less manoeuvrable than at its normal cruising speed (an F-8’s design maximum level speed is 701kts).
On this third pass the Chinese pilot apparently miscalculated; either trying to stop closure or as a result of being too slow, the F-8’s right wing came up, hitting the EP-3’s No 1 propeller. The tailfin of the F-8 then drove the EP-3 port aileron full up, causing the US aircraft to snap-roll near inverted at three to four times the aircraft’s maximum roll rate using maximum aileron. Lt Osborn said his initial thought at this point was: “This guy just killed us.” He said he could look up through the aircraft’s windshield and see the ocean.
The nose of the F-8, meanwhile, had suffered an impact with the EP-3’s radome and the Chinese fighter had broken apart, although a parachute sighted by the EP-3 crew suggests that Wang Wei had managed to eject.
Meanwhile, the EP-3’s No 1 engine was flaming out due to the damage it had sustained, the radome had exploded due to the F-8 impact and the aircraft had depressurized. All airspeed and altimeter information had been lost due to damaged or lost probes, and the aircraft was vibrating violently due to damage to the No 1 and No 3 prop and the tailplane. The aircraft’s high-frequency radio wire had separated and was wrapped around the elevator trim.
By now, such was the extent of the damage to the EP-3 that it was taking maximum effort from both pilots to bring the aircraft level and still took ‘cherry lights’ (maximum power, or ‘red-lining’, on the three remaining engines) as well as full right aileron to initially hold the wings level. The EP-3 had rolled to a 130 degree angle of bank with 30 degrees nose down, finally recovering at an estimated altitude of 15,000ft but still having a 3,000ft/minute rate of descent despite maximum power.
The flight crew’s greatest concern at this point was separation of the No 1 propeller due to high vibration, despite their attempts to feather it. Lt Osborn apparently ordered the crew to prepare to bail out until he had finally recovered control. He then commanded the crew to prepare to ditch before assessing the extent of damage and the question of to what degree he could control the aircraft. The aircraft’s descent was finally arrested at around 8,000ft.
Having regained (relative) control of the aircraft, Lt Osborn and his flightcrew selected an emergency landing at the nearest field as their best possible option. This turned out to be Lingshui airbase on Hainan Island since the nearest allied fields were over 600 nautical miles away. The option of ditching, given the level of damage the aircraft had sustained and the tenuous degree of control maintained, would almost certainly have led to a number of the 24 crewmembers losing their lives.
On the approach to the airfield Lt Osborn made 10 to 15 guard (emergency VHF channel) calls outlining his intentions and predicament but was unable to hear any response due to air noise in the cockpit caused by holes in the pressure bulkhead. Being careful not to overfly land until he had Lingshui airfield in sight, Lt Osborn then overflew the runway at a perpendicular angle to check it was free of any obstacles and to make his intentions clear. He then turned the aircraft through 270 degrees and made a 170 knot ground speed, no flap, high gross weight (49,000kg), no trim, no KIAS landing with a damaged left aileron, damaged elevator, high drag due to the unfeathered No 1 propeller and full right aileron.
No surprise, then, that far from berating Lt Osborn and his crew for leaving a valuable surveillance asset in Chinese hands, his superior officers praised their airmanship, teamwork and conduct upon their safe return. Rear Admiral Michael L Holmes, Commander, Patrol and Reconnaissance Force, Pacific, stated he was sure that the only course to have kept all the EP-3 crew alive was the course that Lt Osborn took. He also announced that Electronic Countermeasures Squadron One (VQ-1, from which aircraft PR-32 hails) had won this year’s Pacific Fleet ‘Battle E’ award.
Secretary of Defense Donald H Rumsfeld, speaking at a press conference after the repatriation of the EP-3 crew, stated that this incident was not the first time that a US reconnaissance flight had been subjected to “that type of aggressive contact from interceptors”, as footage released by the US Navy of an encounter on 24 January certainly proves. According to Secretary Rumsfeld, there were 44 intercepts of US reconnaissance flights by the Chinese air force in “recent months” prior to the 1 April collision: six involving Chinese interceptors coming within 30ft (9m) and two involving encounters within 10ft (3m).
Oh, I don’t want to read all that crap.
I was in that squadron. I worked on that very airplane. I know the mission, I know what SOP is.
Without going into detail, they violated it.
The plane could have and should have incinerated itself on the tarmac.
The hardware was available, it needed only the will of the pilot to use it.
This “story” is a good story. But the truth is another matter.
The "confessions" make the Iranians look like heros in the Muslim world, and the "excuses" make the Brit soldiers look like undiciplined whiners in the western world.
Yes, the infantry is still trained at Benning.
Bloody Wankers...
And yes, the Chicoms did get valuable info, but the crew lives to fly another day. Much more expensive training a crew that a P-3 Orion costs.
5.56mm
Sheesh.
5.56mm
The right answer would have been: What we did was wrong. We're ashamed. Instead, we got repugnant swagger and hair-splitting over qualifying adjectives and adverbs - We didn't really say what we said.
And then there's the ring kissing thing, and the nuggies while they waited for their transport...
5.56mm
“Maybe this is an indictment of having women, or at least moms, in these situations.”
No kidding! Not to mention that the woman in the group was pregnant with another child! I do have a certain amount of respect (not much, but a little) for the men who were with her.
The enemy should NEVER get the gear, even if it costs some crew.
I don’t know when that changed. But it looks like it did.
Its a hard fact in that outfit. And in the past, and in one famous case, it cost the whole crew.
His first priority was to ditch the plane at sea. If he lost some crew, it would be a tragedy, but that’s the mission.
Failing that, he had other options that he did not take.
The chicoms should never, ever have gotten into that plane
I agree. Sadly we have not heard much criticism of this relevantly new phenomenon in war fighting. It obvious leads to the feminization of the remainder of the group.
There are more recent examples. Look through the archives for pictures of our hostages taken during the early part of the Iraq war. Pay special attention to their eyes. Then compare with how the Brits looked in their videos, and at the presser.
I will..thanks:)
I saw the news conference yesterday (well, only part of it- I HAD to turn it off)...and called him to ask what he thought about it all. He’s medically retired from the army- and yet remembers The Code of Conduct exactly- he began to recite it in answer to my question.
In the battle between the ghosts- Neville seems to be beating Winston- and handily.
I agree with this part...you having read my post, I still stand with what I said. Remember, you and I were not in that particular situation, even though we have had substantial military training (an assumption because I don't know you), we may or may not have acted differently.
5.56mm
The truth is that the pilot did not voluntarily fly the plane into Chinese airpace. A Chinese plane collided with it in international airspace seriously damaging the plane. It took the great physical strength of the pilot, a former Nebraska lineman, just to land the plane. And it was far from being intact. The crew was very lucky to survive.
I was in that squadron. I worked on that very airplane. I know the mission, I know what SOP is. Without going into detail, they violated it. The plane could have and should have incinerated itself on the tarmac. The hardware was available, it needed only the will of the pilot to use it.
If that is true, why wasn't the pilot court martialled? Were you part of the squadron at the time of the incident? Is it conjecture on your part or specific knowledge of that incident?
Here is a Congressional Report on the incident.
From the Report:
"Defense Department spokesmen have stated that the EP-3 crew had about 15 to 20 minutes from the time of the incident until they made an emergency landing on Hainan Island and some 20 minutes more on the ground before they left the aircraft. According to the pilot, Lt. Osborn, the emergency destruction plan was activated “well out, well offshore.” In his April 13th press conference, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld noted that the crew “went through that [destruction] checklist and did an excellent job of doing everything that was, I believe, possible in the period of time they had.” Rumsfeld did not indicate that destruction of classified documents and equipment was complete, noting only that the crew completed “a major portion” of their checklist. Other Pentagon spokesmen have declined to provide additional details of the extent of the destruction completed.
The PRC has investigated the EP-3 that landed on Hainan Island and may have removed some electronic surveillance equipment. Although EP-3 aircraft have been operational for many years, a recent major upgrade known as the Sensor System Improvement added an array of new hardware and software to track, monitor, and process targeted radar and communications signals. The new systems are designed to collect a wider range of signals and to move data faster to sites where more detailed analysis can be undertaken.105 Equipment is designed, according to media accounts, with features by which software can be readily erased or “zeroized” in emergencies.
If the PRC obtained intact surveillance devices, attempts at “reverse engineering” could be made to create replicas for China’s own reconnaissance effort. This would not be an easy or rapid process, however, even though much information about surveillance equipment has been discussed in electronics trade publications. Observers speculate that the chief benefit to the PRC from its inspection of the EP-3 would be to gather information about U.S. targets and degree of success that could enable the PRC to prepare countermeasures, hindering future U.S. surveillance."
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