Posted on 11/10/2010 12:04:59 AM PST by ErnstStavroBlofeld
In Afghanistan, perhaps more so than in a small Polish town, it’s important to know exactly where you’re going. So you can imagine the frustration felt by Polish troops serving in Afghanistan when faulty GPS equipment told them that they weren’t in Afghanistan, but in one of several African nations or back home in the small town of Zielona Gora in Western Poland.
The equipment, according to one Polish officer quoted in the Polish press, has caused some units to become completely disoriented in the Afghan frontier, a place where coalition soldiers really don’t want to be wandering around aimlessly. The GPS units have also been criticized for poor battery life and taking a long time to respond to requests – in some cases up to 15 minutes. Polish prosecutors are in the midst of an investigation into corrupt procurement practices in the military, which they say is to blame for the purchase of the faulty equipment.
In warfare and geopolitics, of course, location is everything. The Poles aren’t the only ones to suffer military blunders at the hands of geolocation technology this week. Nicaraguan troops mistakenly invaded a Costa Rican town across the border last week – lowering the Costa Rican flag and raising their own – after a Google Maps glitch showed the town was actually in Nicaraguan territory. Nicaragua blamed Google for the brief incursion and the Organization of American States and the UN Security Council are now mediating a resolution. Oops.
(Excerpt) Read more at popsci.com ...
My bad.?
How would they know?????????????
Maybe comparing their units with other units from other countries.
Three Pollocks went orienteering...
I’m sorry. I was making a Polack joke. Hubby said that in a French accent, and I was laughing. I didn’t exactly convey the accent. lol But I’m still laughing about how many Polacks does it take to work a GPS. I guess this isn’t really a laughing matter though. Now I will slap myself and go to sleep!
Who knows? Maybe they are using it wrong. GPS units are not complicated.
They can’t read a map and compass?
No kidding. It’s an electronic sextant and compass. How hard can it be?
I mean wouldn’t they check their coordinates before going over the meadow and through the woods? So to speak.
Every good soldier should have a solid knowledge of orienteering. Knowledge of the current time, a compass, and a view of the sky is all that is needed to determine exactly where you are.
GPS units with faulty information? Sounds like the plot of the 1997 James Bond movie, “Tomorrow Never Dies.”
The units were made in China?
I heard that the Polish navy is using submarines with screen doors in Afghanistan, too.
Several years ago a group of Swiss Army reservists on a training exercise accidentally blundered across the Swiss border and “invaded” Lichtenstein. They quickly withdrew and everyone got a laugh from the incident, except the folks doing the deed.
Technology marches on and we now have GPS. Things have improved.
It used to be your area of “lost” was confined to the map you carried. The map is gone and replaced by GPS so now you can be lost somewhere on planet Earth. Quite an improvement!
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