Posted on 06/27/2014 1:50:39 PM PDT by Rusty0604
You are making the assumption that the Mexican military is as well equipped, trained and has the same resources that a US pilot / crew would have. I can tell you for certain that is NOT the case. Since they were running drug interdiction, likely they thought they were firing at drug dealers.
You speak as if you were a pilot. I dont know but I will assume that as a fact. You would therefore know about all the training that our pilots receive and how we work to verify our targets. The US military is one of the most professional, well trained organizations in the world.
Even so, there are multiple documented incidents of friendly fire from helicopters. Perhaps you remember the US friendly fire incident from the AH-64 in 1991?
Now given that the Mexican pilots don’t have near the training, equipment, skills or professional pilots that the US military does, and considering that they were conducting drug interdiction operations, it is very easy for them to confuse targets.
I applaud the pilot / crew for realizing there error, stopping the firing (two rounds), pulling back and then taking ownership to their government for the mistake.
According to the report, they were involved in drug interdiction operations.
Probably just a diversion tactic while some large drug shipment was coming across. Maybe the chopper even made a drop.
They were 15 yards from a vehicle with 4 border agents inside and they fired at the vehicle.
The shooting, let alone the border crossing, was inexcusable and unprovoked.
I am curious where you got your information of 15 yards from the vehicle. I did not see that detail either in the article or the referenced news report from Tucson News 4. Perhaps you have some other link or source that you can share with us?
What I did see in the article is that the helicopter crossed only 100 yards (300 feet) into US territory. That is just a second or two at 80 mph.
How do you know it was going 80? Not 50 or 35?
or even faster, how about 90 or 120?
300 feet is nothing for a helicopter. But to counter point a slow moving helicopter, is the simple fact that a helicopter is MOST vulnerable when moving slow. According to the report, they were involved in drug interdiction operations. Drug cartels and their soldiers have no problems shooting at helicopters. Pilots know this so it is far more likely that the helicopter was moving with some speed rather than just sitting there waiting to be shot at.
I got the link from another thread on the same subject.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3173052/posts?q=1&;page=101
Ok, that was information I did not have. 15 feet, even in reduced viability should have been enough to identify the target.
Since Mexico performed an “Act of War” against the United States, it is now perfectly legal to retaliate by having a SEAL Team snatch their President. We can then trade him for our marine.
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