US troops, friendly fire, UK deaths

[Ronn_Bman]

Two British soldiers are reported dead near Basra in another friendly fire accident. Apparently the soldiers were killed in an exchange between two British tanks.

[Sir Taliesin]

Originally posted by Ronn_Bman: That US jet fired on the battery after the Patriot site "locked on" to it. This and the Tornado incident do not sound promising about the new, experimental Patriot's ability to ID friend or foe.

I think a few bugs may still need to be worked out, but as far as the shooting down of missiles go, from all reports it's doing a wonderful job. Of course, where have we heard that before???

[pritchke]

Originally posted by Ronn_Bman: Quote: Originally posted by Donut: The Jets strike back: "1558: Military officials say a US F-16 fighter jet shot at a Patriot missile defence battery near Najaf in central Iraq in a "friendly fire" incident; no injuries are reported. "

That US jet fired on the battery after the Patriot site "locked on" to it. This and the Tornado incident do not sound promising about the new, experimental Patriot's ability to ID friend or foe. [/QUOTE]Sounds to me like it could be a bug in either the code, or something that is blocking the signal from the jets. The code should be a simple true/false logic so I don't see how that could be the problem as well as it seems to be working most of the time. Could it be that sandstorms are interfering with the signal to the jet.

[Night Stalker]

No radar system (or radar warning system) is simple. Not even the "simple" ones of 50 years ago. There could be many things going wrong - hardware failures, software bugs, poor signal channels, or just a legit false positive. Iraq does have Tornados and there is very little different from the British and French (Iraqi) versions.

[Timber Loftis]

Well, maybe a little visual recognition or *gasp* use of the radio to say, "Hey, idiot, are you gonna shoot me?" would be called for. Or is that too low-tech?

[Ronn_Bman]

Are some of the British tanks called Challenger? I heard the name mentioned, but can't remember now.

[wellard]

Originally posted by Timber Loftis: Well, maybe a little visual recognition or *gasp* use of the radio to say, "Hey, idiot, are you gonna shoot me?" would be called for. Or is that too low-tech?

There is a human fault that places too much faith in technology Timber. Pilots are often trying to work out their instruments and gauges while the horizon outside the cockpit window is screaming towards them at a great rate of knots.