US shoots down RAF plane

[Ensign Paris]

<Rant>

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/030323/80/dw2u6.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2877349.stm

So one of our planes has been shot down, not by Iraq, but by the US. You gotta sort yourselves out, you are acting unprofessionally! This is far too important for you to make mistakes like this, this is really tragic. You may be the worlds one and only super power, and yes, you have numbers but for skill you rank very low, if you make mistakes like this.

Lets forgive and forget (I am really mad about this, I don't understand how you make such a pathetic mistake) but please be more careful in the future, please.

(This msg isn't going on at americans btw, i like you guys i just wish ur military was more careful)

</Rant>

Ensign

 

[scem0]

that is horrible. Stupid mistakes like these can make a good
thing be bad.

 

[iGav]

Although it's not as bad as 2 of our RAF helicopters hitting each other.....

Unfortunately these things happen in war, and hopefully we won't suffer anymore casualties as either a result of mechanical failure, geniune mistakes, or freak accidents like this latest one....

 

[mymemory]

Well, remember that the military are not the most brillian peowith so many people in the world, now with so many people in that area it is just a matter of time for a mistake like that.

Just to show you that all those Discover Channel programs about the army are allways overrated. No matter how much tecnology you have, there always are gonna be a human been behind.

 

[kylos]

1000's of missiles fired and only one friendly hit. While accidents like these sadden others and me greatly, the comparative loss to the damage done to Saddam's infrastructure is unbelievably great compared to any previous war. We all hate it when these sort of accidents happen, but unfortunately they do. Please don't be critical of the soldiers unless you yourself have had to deal with the same high stress situation they face, knowing that just a small mistake can result in tragedy.

 

[kylos]

Originally posted by mymemory
Well, remember that the military are not the most brillian peowith so many people in the world, now with so many people in that area it is just a matter of time for a mistake like that.

Just to show you that all those Discover Channel programs about the army are allways overrated. No matter how much tecnology you have, there always are gonna be a human been behind.

Shut up. These people are extremely brilliant. You try coordinating guided and precision military attacks and then pretend that this is child's play. They are operating a complex and massive strike and if they miss even one piece of of the massive amounts of info constantly bombarding them major problems may result. Add this very knowledge to the operators stresses along with critics like you who automatically scorn and mock whenever they make a mistake and then maybe you'll understand better. I'm sure you could easily identify all the different radar sigs they have to deal with for each different model of airplane involved in this conflict.

 

[guv]

posts like this will get deleted

 

[edesignuk]

Very constructive

 

[icetraxxg5]

Well, remember that the military are not the most brillian peowith so many people in the world, now with so many people in that area it is just a matter of time for a mistake like that.

Just to show you that all those Discover Channel programs about the army are allways overrated. No matter how much tecnology you have, there always are gonna be a human been behind.

I guess there are a lot of stupid people here

On how many troupes we have over in the middle east and Iraq; There will always be human error and mistakes because its a war and we have shot off 1000's of weapons on Iraq, of course, something will always go wrong.

I think someone should really close this thread before it turns into something nasty.

 

[Ensign Paris]

Originally posted by Kyle?
1000's of missiles fired and only one friendly hit. While accidents like these sadden others and me greatly, the comparative loss to the damage done to Saddam's infrastructure is unbelievably great compared to any previous war. We all hate it when these sort of accidents happen, but unfortunately they do. Please don't be critical of the soldiers unless you yourself have had to deal with the same high stress situation they face, knowing that just a small mistake can result in tragedy.

It might just be me, but I do not find it acceptable that with all your technology you manage to mistake a plane for a missile, they are very different, different size, different shape, different emmisions.

This was an avoidable accident, I know it wasn't meditated or planed in anyway, and i accept that accidents do happen, and I could understand a friendly fire accident on the ground during the night when there was no indication about who was firing towards you and you just fire back, but this (as far as I know) was during day light hours, and for gods sake, its a plane! not a missile! they are different!

Sorry for all this ranting, IMHO americans are not stupid btw.

Ensign

 

[edesignuk]

Originally posted by Ensign Paris
It might just be me, but I do not find it acceptable that with all your technology you manage to mistake a plane for a missile, they are very different, different size, different shape, different emmisions.

This was an avoidable accident, I know it wasn't meditated or planed in anyway, and i accept that accidents do happen, and I could understand a friendly fire accident on the ground during the night when there was no indication about who was firing towards you and you just fire back, but this (as far as I know) was during day light hours, and for gods sake, its a plane! not a missile! they are different!

Sorry for all this ranting, IMHO americans are not stupid btw.

Ensign

Could not agree more! How on earth could a fighter jet get accidently shot down? It's not like Saddam even has an Air Force (does he?) that they could mistake this fighter for! Nor could it be mistaken for a missile. That being said, yes, I do understand that this is war and accidents will happen, but this is just a little hard to swallow.

 

[kylos]

Ensign Paris and edesignuk:

I understand what you are saying and my rant was not expressed at you but at those who berate the armed forces simply because of their existence. I do realize that it seems unlikely to confuse a scud with a plane, but under the stress involved in such situations, it is not impossible. The situation is being investigated and will hopefully be resolved well. I express my sympathies to the UK, its troops and their families.

 

[G4scott]

I think this thread can survive, if people keep from throwing pointless insults around. It'll get you quickly banned. If you don't believe me, check this out:https://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?threadid=22602

Originally posted by arn
banning

the mods have my blessing to ban anyone who throws out a personal insult. even the first offense. we'll sort 'em out later.

be back on Sunday.

arn

Anyways, back on topic:

With the number of air operations going on, with constant around the clock flights coming and going, I'm amazed that there haven't been any more accidents.

The problem was that a patriot missile thought that the plane was an incoming missile, so it launched and destroyed the plane.

Accidents happen, and there's not much we can do about them, except find out why they happened and keep them from happening again.

 

[iJon]

Originally posted by Ensign Paris
It might just be me, but I do not find it acceptable that with all your technology you manage to mistake a plane for a missile, they are very different, different size, different shape, different emmisions.

This was an avoidable accident, I know it wasn't meditated or planed in anyway, and i accept that accidents do happen, and I could understand a friendly fire accident on the ground during the night when there was no indication about who was firing towards you and you just fire back, but this (as far as I know) was during day light hours, and for gods sake, its a plane! not a missile! they are different!

Sorry for all this ranting, IMHO americans are not stupid btw.

Ensign

have you ever been in the military, please, just yes or no?

iJon

 

[pseudobrit]

War is pure hell. Regardless of how we see it washed and cleaned up here on our state-run media, war is the purest hell a man can encounter in his life.

To address some of the earlier posts, I would never say that there weren't some people in the military of low intelligence and that all of them are brilliant. In fact, I'd reckon quite a percentage of them are of below average intelligence. That's what you get when you recruit heavily from the poor and keep the pay very low. Your average McDonald's is not a treasure trove of employees with doctorates, either. I also realise that many who join the military are brilliant and do so for a variety of other, often selfless reasons.

Now, don't get me wrong, I have the utmost confidence in the leadership of our military to make sure that people end up in positions where their specific talents are used and their drawbacks would be nullified.

I just think that making a blanket statement that all the men in the military are geniuses is just as bad as saying they're all stupid.

To sum up, I highly doubt that this mishap was a result of any incompetence. Just a mistake, quite possibly the result of a mechanical or electronic (ie radar system) error.

Let's just all hope and pray this sort of thing doesn't happen again. That's all we can do.

 

[jelloshotsrule]

ijon, you asked exactly what i was going to

do you have any idea what goes into finding and shooting down a target? i personally don't, but i doubt you do... if you do, then please let us know how things went wrong specifically, thanks


however, this accident is just another reason that the war has many down sides that in my opinion outweigh the good... at least in this case.

peace

 

[beatle888]

Originally posted by Kyle?
Shut up.

BREATH IN BREATH OUT BREATH IN BREATH OUT.

 

[NavyIntel007]

Originally posted by iGAV
Although it's not as bad as 2 of our RAF helicopters hitting each other.....

Unfortunately these things happen in war, and hopefully we won't suffer anymore casualties as either a result of mechanical failure, geniune mistakes, or freak accidents like this latest one....

Yeah but it just ups the screw up casualties to even more than the combat casualties.

 

[kylos]

I apologise (oh my, I'm turning british) for my outburst, I just can't stand seeing the troops denigrated like that. Ensign and edesignuk, I'm not upset with how you feel. I know its not cool to lose airmen in such a terrible way.

 

[iJon]

Originally posted by jelloshotsrule
ijon, you asked exactly what i was going to

do you have any idea what goes into finding and shooting down a target? i personally don't, but i doubt you do... if you do, then please let us know how things went wrong specifically, thanks


however, this accident is just another reason that the war has many down sides that in my opinion outweigh the good... at least in this case.

peace

well i know some, my bro was in gulf was and was in the navy, he can explain all these things to me.

iJon

 

[beatle888]

Originally posted by Ensign Paris
It might just be me, but I do not find it acceptable that with all your technology you manage to mistake a plane for a missile, they are very different, different size, different shape, different emmisions.

the missiles dont rely on the factors above. they use an electronic signature. now that you know how it works, is it so hard to imagine an electronic device malfunctioning?

 

[NavyIntel007]

Originally posted by Ensign Paris
It might just be me, but I do not find it acceptable that with all your technology you manage to mistake a plane for a missile, they are very different, different size, different shape, different emmisions.

This was an avoidable accident, I know it wasn't meditated or planed in anyway, and i accept that accidents do happen, and I could understand a friendly fire accident on the ground during the night when there was no indication about who was firing towards you and you just fire back, but this (as far as I know) was during day light hours, and for gods sake, its a plane! not a missile! they are different!

Sorry for all this ranting, IMHO americans are not stupid btw.

Ensign

Perhaps we make you Forward Allied Commander and see if you can do any better? War isn't that easy.

It's not exactly like playing Risk.

 

[jelloshotsrule]

Originally posted by iJon
well i know some, my bro was in gulf was and was in the navy, he can explain all these things to me.

yeah, my dad was in the army for almost 30 years. though i don't think he would have specific knowledge about this type of case, he would certainly know the basics and could fill me in. that said, i would be very surprised to find out that it was a really simple mistake where a soldier just didn't see the target right or something... i mean, it was probably a little blip on the radar where no planes were thought to be at the time or something....

 

[iJon]

Originally posted by jelloshotsrule
yeah, my dad was in the army for almost 30 years. though i don't think he would have specific knowledge about this type of case, he would certainly know the basics and could fill me in. that said, i would be very surprised to find out that it was a really simple mistake where a soldier just didn't see the target right or something... i mean, it was probably a little blip on the radar where no planes were thought to be at the time or something....

agreed.

iJon

 

[kylos]

Clarification:

Originally posted by pseudobrit

...

To address some of the earlier posts, I would never say that there weren't some people in the military of low intelligence and that all of them are brilliant. In fact, I'd reckon quite a percentage of them are of below average intelligence. That's what you get when you recruit heavily from the poor and keep the pay very low. Your average McDonald's is not a treasure trove of employees with doctorates, either. I also realise that many who join the military are brilliant and do so for a variety of other, often selfless reasons.

...
...

I just think that making a blanket statement that all the men in the military are geniuses is just as bad as saying they're all stupid.

...

I was referring to those who would be operating such powerful weaponry.