Posted on 09/24/2007 6:39:11 AM PDT by presidio9
At the urging of Pentagon experts in special operations, US military snipers operating in Iraq are "baiting" Iraqis by scattering items like detonation cord, plastic explosives and ammunition and then ambushing and killing those who pick them up, The Washington Post reported Monday.
The newspaper said the classified program was described in investigative documents related to recently filed murder charges against three snipers who are accused of planting evidence on Iraqis they killed.
"Baiting is putting an object out there that we know they will use, with the intention of destroying the enemy," Captain Matthew Didier, the leader of an elite sniper scout platoon is quoted as saying in a sworn statement.
"Basically, we would put an item out there and watch it," Didier continued. "If someone found the item, picked it up and attempted to leave with the item, we would engage the individual as I saw this as a sign they would use the item against US forces."
In documents obtained by The Post from family members of the accused soldiers, Didier said members of the Pentagon's Asymmetric Warfare Group visited his unit in January and later passed along ammunition boxes filled with the "drop items" to be used to disrupt ... attempts at harming Coalition Forces and give us the upper hand in a fight."
Eugene Fidell, president of the National Institute of Military Justice, said such a baiting program should be examined "quite meticulously" because it raises troubling possibilities, such as what happens when civilians pick up the items, the paper said.
"In a country that is awash in armaments and magazines and implements of war, if every time somebody picked up something that was potentially useful as a weapon, you might as well ask every Iraqi to walk around with a target on his back," Fidell is quoted in the article as saying.
Soldiers said that about a dozen platoon members were aware of the program, and that numerous others knew about the "drop items" but did not know their purpose, The Post reported.
Two soldiers, who had not been officially informed about the program, came forward with allegations of wrongdoing after they learned they were going to be punished for falling asleep on a sniper mission, the paper said.
Army officials declined to discuss the classified program, according to the report.
pingya
I'm suspicious of the article for that reason. I think the military would require better evidence of the person being a tango than merely picking something up.
Good!
..it just shows the contempt the MSM,along with liberals have for our military. It's called a WAR for a reason, you kill,you despose your enemy,snipers are very good at it. .. I'm finding the claim that two snipers have come forward to disagree with tactics, hard to believe, after the intense training they go through and the weeding out process they have supposedly survived. If there is an investigation, like MOST reports from far left sources, we'll probably find "other" issues that sort of got lost in reporting facts. Careful Moore like editing, reeks
You can't really justify that comment -- it's far too broad -- but I'll let it slide so as to ask the more important question:
If somebody picks it up, are they automatically "the enemy?"
That's the weak point of this approach: it requires the snipers to ascertain the intentions of the person picking up the items, and I'm not certain that can be done through binoculars or scope.
Another weak point: even if the target is not "the enemy," once he's been killed his family and friends will most likely become the enemy.
The article is probably not presenting all the facts, or even a majority of them. One would hope that there's a bit more work going into positively identifying folks as really being "enemies" before they're shot down. If not, the tactic needs to be stopped.
Like the tag.
AFP?
[1944] - In Algiers, the provisional government merges the Office Français d’Information and France-Afrique, thus forming Agence Française de Presse. In April, the French National Resistance Committee clandestinely launches the Agence d’Information et de Documentation (AID) in occupied France. In August, a group of Resistance fighters trade in their weapons for typewriters, and merge the OFI and the AID, turning them into Agence France-Presse. Martial Bourgeon becomes its first Managing Director. Later that year, a decree confers the provisional status of public corporation to AFP.
this article is a warning to help the enemy
In the past, snipers tended to be assigned as direct attachments to higher headquarter units, then distributed as the mission directed by the higher headquarters.
It isn’t uncommon for officers ranked O-3, Captain, to be assigned to train sniper units, generally no larger than platoon size for deployment as individuals, teams, squads, sections, or possibly a platoon.
WRT the term platoon leader, for an officer, especially in the field, it is generally platoon commander. A Platoon leader implies lack of command authority.
There might be a chain of command where the snipers are under the command of the area commander, and coordinated similar to special operation forces by a platoon leader, who lacks the command authority in the area of operations in combat. Hard to tell. Besides, the command arrangements have changed considerably in the last 2 decades, so even this description doesn’t accurately portray explicit command relationships.
I hadn’t intended to question the validity of your outrage, but whether the article was accurate.
That was exactly the thought I had. If I found a dangerous item laying on the ground, I would probably try to secure it, just so it couldn't end up in the wrong hands - and that group includes more than insurgents. From what this article says, if I'm an Iraqi, the U.S. Army (?) would shot me in the head for my troubles.
Nah, something about this report doesn't square up. My B.S. meter is tingling. U.S. soldiers, especially the one's that become snipers, have too much common sense, training, and experience to agree to do something like this (kill any civilian) on such thin evidence. Either some further discriminator to determine intent has been left out of the report or its description is an exaggeration/outright lie.
Agreed.
If the article presents the whole story, and it may not, then this ROE for snipers is troubling. There are a number of legitimate reasons a non-combatant may pick up one of those items. Heck, I wouldn't even know what detcord is if I picked it up! I may just be curious... BANG!
More leftist undermining our Troops.
Who will be the first Democrat crying “cold blooded murderers?”
Gentlemen, we have a race.
Who will be the first conservative to prove it's disinformation?
sounds like police prositution sting
sounds like police prositution sting
sounds like police prositution sting
The Surge is Working and the DNC is in the Trap
Pray for W and Our Freedom Fighters
What's the problem? Sounds good to me.........
Not very professional to hunt in a “baited” field.
Think about it. When's the last time you heard a good old-fashioned car bomb or IED story? Been a while?
There's a reason for that.
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