EU Referendum

Showing posts with label Mamba. Show all posts

Blackhawk+brit[i-Blackhawk+brit]
As another British soldier is reported killed in Afghanistan, two investigative sleuths from The Daily Mail, Tim Shipman and Matthew Hickley, breathlessly tell us that the announcement came "as Lt Col Richardson revealed that American, Dutch and even Australian helicopters are being used to launch British combat operations in Afghanistan." UK forces have used coalition aircraft to "seize areas of ground" from the Taliban, said the Colonel.

The Daily Telegraph goes one further as star reporter Rosa Prince scribes these immortal words:

The Daily Telegraph understands that American Chinooks were used for a combat mission as part of the Panther's Claw operation within the last month. Lieutenant Colonel Nick Richardson, spokesman for Task Force Helmand confirmed that UK forces were forced to rely on foreign helicopters.

These fearless hacks can however, shelve their dreams for nominations for the next Pulitzer prize for investigative reporting. The MoD Website for 23 June – nearly a month ago – blandly informs us that:

More than 350 soldiers from The Black Watch, 3rd Battalion The Royal Regiment of Scotland (3 SCOTS), have launched an airborne assault into one of the last Taliban strongholds.

Twelve Chinook helicopters, supported by 13 other aircraft including Apache and Black Hawk helicopter gunships, a Spectre gunship, Harrier jets and unmanned drones, dropped the British soldiers into Babaji, north of Lashkar Gah, just before midnight on Friday 19 June 2009.

Not only did we rely on helicopters (with the MoD thoughtfully providing a pic – see above), we were "forced" to rely on a USAF Spectre gunship, Harriers (USMC – ours have gone home) and probably US Predator UAVs. Since 90 percent – or thereabouts – close air support is provided by US assets, we are routinely "forced" to rely on F-15s, F-16s, B-1 Lancers, A-10s ...

And then, of course, on the ground, we are "forced" to rely on Danish Leopard II tanks, on their APCs, on Estonian APCs and even the Ex-MoD Mamba mine protected vehicles which we sold off for a song.

But Hey! This is a coalition effort. We are not alone ... and have not been for some time. But then, here's another "scoop". During WWII, the US stripped out the armour from its one and only armoured division and sent the Shermans to the 8th Army. To win the battle of el Alamein, we were "forced" to rely on foreign tanks.

Shock! Hold the front page!

COMMENT THREAD

EMB-314_super_tucano[i-EMB-314_super_tucano]When, like this blog, we are so often far out on a limb, discussing ideas that no one else seems to be looking at – with critics lining up to pick holes in the arguments or tell us we've simply got it wrong (as they did when we advocated better armoured vehicles for our troops in Iraq), the sheer weight of contrary opinion, combined with the isolation, does make you seriously question your own arguments (and even your own sanity).

Readers' comments on the forum and the steady flow of supportive e-mails, therefore, do give us an important boost and help us keep going. And, in this case, several have sent me a link from the excellent military site, Strategy Page, headed: "Blackwater Buys Brazilian Bombers". It is fairly short, so I reproduce it here in full:

Security company Blackwater USA. is buying several Super Tucano light combat aircraft from the Brazilian manufacturer Embraer. These five ton, single engine, single seat aircraft are built for pilot training, but also perform quite well for counter-insurgency work.

The Super Tucano is basically a prop driven trainer that is equipped for combat missions. The aircraft can carry up to 1.5 tons of weapons, including 12.7mm machine-guns, bombs and missiles. The aircraft cruises at about 300 knots and can stay in the air for about 6.5 hours per sortie. One of the options is a FLIR (infrared radar that produces a photo realistic video image in any weather) and a fire control system for bombing.

Colombia is using the Super Tucanos for counter-insurgency work (there are over 20,000 armed rebels and drug gang gunmen in the country). The aircraft is also used for border patrol. The U.S. Air Force is watching that quite closely. The Super Tucano costs $9 million each, and come in one or two seat versions. The bubble canopy provides excellent visibility. This, coupled with its slow speed (versus jets), makes it an excellent ground attack aircraft.

Blackwater already has a force of armed helicopters in Iraq, and apparently wants something a little faster, and more heavily armed, to fulfil its security contracts overseas.

One of our readers noted that this was private enterprise scoring again, and indeed it is. The company has a major operation in Iraq and consistently leaves the traditional military flat-footed, trailing in its wake when it comes to innovation, flexibility and economy.

Mamba+Bl[i-Mamba+Bl]While the British Army was still pratting about equipping its troops with desperately vulnerable "Snatch" Land Rovers, Blackwater was equipping its people with the highly protected Mamba mine protected vehicles – ironically purchased second-hand, for a song, from the British Army after it had failed to see their potential for high-risk tasks in Southern Iraq.

The vehicles operated by Blackwater sustained several IED hits, their occupants escaping without injury, an experience which indicates that, had the criminally stupid fools geniuses in the MoD and Army kept hold of the vehicles and used them properly, a number of soldiers who were killed in "Snatch" Land Rovers would be alive today.

Similarly, while the Army is messing about with limited numbers of useless Lynx helicopters (useless because they cannot fly in the heat of the Iraqi summer) - and are proposing to buy the obscenely expensive Future Lynx at an average cost of £14 million - Blackwater have been successfully operating a version of the MD 500 helicopter, for convoy escort duties and as a light, tactical gunship.

MD+500+1[i-MD+500+1]In the latter role, compared with the Army's Apache assault helicopters – more than a quarter of which are currently grounded through lack of spares – the Apache cost £60 million each, while MD 500s, brand new, cost less than £1 million. For sure, the Apache is vastly superior to the MD 500 (when they can get it flying), but pound for pound, which would provide more protection for our troops – one Apache (most likely sitting in the repair shop) or 60 MD 500s?

Clearly, Blackwater did their sums, as they have done with the Tucano. At a cost of less than £5 million (and an operating cost in the order of £5000 an hour) it will be doing a job that we are gearing up to use the £80 million Eurofighter (and are currently using Harriers at £37,000 an hour). Which would be better value – one Eurofighter (most likely sitting in the repair shop) or 16 Tucanos?

Yet, despite rehearsing these issues again and again, as a blog, we are still largely out on our own. Thus, with the aid of our readers, we have occasionally to remind ourselves: we are not wrong. I will say it again.

We are not wrong.

COMMENT THREAD

HMS+Brecon[i-HMS+Brecon]In a letter to The Daily Telegraph today, Lt-Cdr Mike Critchley RN Rtd, editor of Warship World makes some interesting points about the Iranian hostage debacle.

Under the heading, "Navy needs to get its laid-up patrol vessels into the Gulf", he suggests that it is madness to have laid up at Portsmouth three vessels (Brecon – pictured - Dulverton and Cottesmore) that were converted at great cost as patrol vessels to intercept suspect shipping.

He notes that we deployed one of our remaining frigates in the fleet (HMS Cornwall), armed with the latest sensors and weapons (Goalkeeper, Harpoon, Seawolf and torpedo tubes) to protect oil flowing from Iraq, but were humiliated by small craft with the simplest small arms.

Critchley writes: "our multi-million-pound vessel was unable to join the action and defend our men for lack of water under her keel, whereas something smaller would have been appropriate."

From this he concludes that, once again, the Treasury is not giving our servicemen the kit to do the job asked of them. He thus asks that these three vessels at Portsmouth should be returned to service as soon as possible for deployment to the Gulf or even the Straits of Dover - wherever the terrorist threat exists.

That is good stuff, and it does point up the theme which we have been addressing on this blog, but Lt-Cdr Critchley does not seem to be aware that we already have two modern minesweepers out in the Gulf, HMS Blyth and HMS Ramsey.

Furthermore, Critchley does not seem to realise (or, at least, acknowledge) that we are in the Gulf working as part of a coalition team. As we reported yesterday, whatever problems Commodore Nick Lambert might have had, he had no shortage of naval assets on which to call. It was not for lack of shallow draught patrol vessels that the two boats from HMS Cornwall were sent unescorted to their rendezvous with the Iranian revolutionary guard.

However, if we do take Crichley's point that there is a general shortage of shallow-draught patrol vessels, then the situation is even worse than he makes out. Of the 12 Sandown class minesweepers built for the Royal Navy - represented by HMS Blyth and HMS Ramsey - only eight are still in service.

Three of the vessels were decommissioned following the 2003 Strategic Defence Review (another was used as a training ship) and sold to Estonia in September 2006, an episode not dissimilar to the sale of the Army's armoured Mambas to Estonia, only for them to reappear alongside unarmoured British Land Rovers in Afghanistan.

One way or another, British defence policy is looking increasingly surreal.

COMMENT THREAD

al+Amarah+explosion2[i-al+Amarah+explosion2]Attacks on the Basra Palace base are intensifying, says the Radio 4 BBC Today programme, which this morning ran a short piece on how the Army is coping. Soldiers, we are told, are routinely getting only three or four hours sleep a night, as they are exposed to incessant mortaring.

Despite this, a young Army officer interviewed claimed that the Army is "getting the upper hand" and "has the ability to track and defeat this enemy".

The piece follows this officer and his troops, who form the "Quick Reaction Force", chasing down the attackers … in Warrior mechanised infantry combat vehicles. Predictably, by the time they arrive at the co-ordinates from which an attack had been mounted, there was no sign of the enemy, although the piece recorded that, on this occasion, the patrol was ambushed and a gunfight erupted.

As is so often the case, the report was superficial. The previous night, a patrol had captured a car in which rockets and bombs had been found, but we were not told how this came about. But no insurgents were captured or killed.

Once again, therefore, we seem to be in the same situation that frustrated the ground patrols at the Abu Naji base in al Amarah, before it was abandoned because of the incessant attacks (the picture above shows the effects of one). By the time they arrived, the insurgents had long gone, hence the need for a helicopter response – which we know was occasionally provided by the United States.

Why this resource is not available remains one of those modern-day mysteries, compounded in this event by another. The patrol described by the Today programme, arriving at the scene, did not appear to know the whereabouts of the mortar crew which had mounted the attacked. Yet, as we discussed in our earlier piece, the technology exists to pinpoint and follow attackers, using advanced electro-optical equipment fitted to fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters.

Here the mystery deepens. Despite my comments about the lack of equipment and the failure to learn from Northern Ireland, it seems the Army was well able to learn the lessons.

Defender[i-Defender]
As the picture and narrative above shows, in December 2003, three Britten Norman Defender aircraft were ordered for use in Basra - each equipped with the formidable electro-optical equipment which has been so successful in tracking insurgents - the first aircraft entering service with the Army on 1 October 2004 - just 9½ months later.

It also appears that these aircraft were available in al Amarah. We also know that the base there was equipped with Mamba counter-battery radar, which means that some of the key elements needed to deal with the mortar threat were in place.

What appears to have been missing were the helicopters to convey troops rapidly to the scene, and an effective patrol strategy.

AIR+-+Sama+008[i-AIR+-+Sama+008]This notwithstanding, currently, there are no indications that the Defenders are still in use. There is no reference to them on the Army Air Corps website, they do not appear on the main MoD site and no official photographs seem to have been published. And, even if they were still in use, three aircraft are not enough to mount 24/7 standing patrols covering all the British bases. This might explain why we are resorting to using the Iraqi Sama aircraft (the model here seen over Basra air base).

Operational security is one thing but, on the face of it, it would appear that the lack of information on our capabilities is aimed more at concealing inadequacies than protecting our troops. And, despite having its reporter on the ground, the BBC did not even seem to notice.

COMMENT THREAD

link[i-link]There can be few readers of this blog who have not, in their own ways, come to the conclusion that governments are intrinsically untrustworthy – which means that the material they produce is also, necessarily, suspect.

It is in this context that one can make clinical judgements of a piece posted yesterday on the MoD website, headed, "Keeping Kandahar Air Base Safe". As an example of the way the propaganda machine works, it is an absolute classic and perhaps should be studied for years to come, typical of the way governments keep the "good news" flowing and suppress the bad.

By way of background, readers will be fully aware of our concern – and to be fair to them, the concern of a number of MPs – about the vulnerability of our bases in Iraq to mortar and rocket fire (see here and here). However, when questioned about the protection afforded to our troops, the secretary of state for defence, Des Browne, refuses to discuss the issue in public, simply offering MPs private briefings.

Now, by contrast, when we get a situation in Kandahar Air Base in Afghanistan where the protection is adequate, the MoD website rushes out information on the systems used at a level of detail that has been entirely denied to us in respect of the badly protected raqi bases.

LAND+-+Arthur+Danish[i-LAND+-+Arthur+Danish]And, although not all the protection strategies have been adopted, we note that – in addition to the perimeter guardposts, manned by Romanian infantry, which have the latest surveillance and CCTV equipment - there is a battery of Danish weapon-locating radars (similar to our Mamba sets) and elements of an American airborne forces unit.

But with the base being regularly targeted by Taliban rocket attacks, launched from over five miles away, the Force Protection unit also put into effect a strategy that sees them not just guarding the perimeter wire, but going outside the base to win over the support of local villagers, amongst which the Taliban were launching their attacks.

link[i-link]The effort is run by Wing Commander Andy Knowles, Commanding Officer of 3 Force Protection (FP) Wing, a 20 man unit from RAF Marham. But that is supplemented by an extra 700 troops at Kandahar made up of personnel from various countries, including members of the UK's RAF Regiment.

But now we get to the essential difference. The Air Base is run by the US and the force protection effort benefits from American money. The result is that, while in the past it was usual for the base to come under sustained rocket attack two or three times every night, with the additional force protection, the airbase has suffered no casualties and no significant damage since June 2006.

Thus, as Squadron Leader Steve Carter - Second-in-Command of 3 Force Protection Wing at Kandahar – says, "Instead of reacting to constant rocket attacks … troops can now sleep at night."

Layer+02[i-Layer+02]What an appalling contrast this makes with the situation in Iraq where, as we saw from the photographs, the physical protection is a layer of canvas and a mattress, while troops are mortared or rocketed daily.

And what an indictment of the way the government publicity machine works - silent on the problems yet full of glowing self-congratulation when the system works. But I think the secretary of state owes us an explanation as to why troops in Afghanistan can be protected, while those unfortunate enough to be posted to Iraq are offered no equivalent protection.

COMMENT THREAD

Mamba+-+Estonia[i-Mamba+-+Estonia]
Believe it or not, I stumbled on this pic while doing a routine search for RG-31 pics, picking it up off a Japanese (I think) sex site, of all places. Why this should be displayed amongst the tits and bums defies explanation, and I can no longer even find the link to let readers see it in context.

Anyhow, this is a high-definition pic (reduced here to 800 pixels – if you click to enlarge) of one of the ex-British Mambas, sold to the Estonian Army and now deployed in Afghanistan alongside unarmoured British Land Rovers - yet again underlining the lack of medium armoured vehicles in the British inventory.

LAND+-+Mamba+002[i-LAND+-+Mamba+002]Astute readers will notice a subtle difference in this machine – it has side windows to the rear compartment – an apparent modification to the vehicle when it was in British hands (pictured). We explored the relevance of this in another post. What this picture also shows is the relative size of the vehicle, by comparison with the Spartan APC following it. This is no Dinky Toy.

Cheaper than the Pinzgauer Vector, with far more protection, the modern equivalent of this machine, the RG-31, gives much better value than these dangerous machines, illustrating a flaw at the heart of the MoD procurement process.

The only trouble is that, opening it out to more scrutiny and giving – say – the Defence Committee a stronger role does not seem to be an option, given their inability to understand what is going on.

I am not sure I know the answer here, although we are at least aware of the nature of the problem, and beginning to understand it – which is more than can be said of the either the bulk of the politicos or the MSM.

COMMENT THREAD

link[i-link]A tome of nearly 45,000 words would qualify as a small novel but it is also the typical size of modest debate in the House of Commons. And such was the length of the defence debate in the Commons on Thursday, under the title "Defence in the World".

This was an adjournment debate, which means there was no vote. With such a broad title, this conspired to make it a dull, shapeless affair which came to no conclusions and produced very little of consequence – and certainly little that we had not heard before.

However, while the media failed to take any notice of the debate, there was at least one sub-agenda, which emerged when secretary of state Des Browne offered a spontaneous comment "on the increasing threat to our bases from indirect fire, principally rockets and mortars." He told us:

I discussed that with commanders in Basra on Tuesday. The increase in indirect fire is a worrying trend. The threat is becoming more sophisticated and dangerous, and the links to Iran and Hezbollah are more evident. Our forces are not standing idly by as the threat develops—they are taking steps to deal with it by targeting the terrorists through intelligence-led operations, and with some success. We are also always looking to strengthen our defensive measures, but Members will understand that for reasons of operational security I am not in a position to say much more than that on the subject, other than to assure the House that we take it very seriously and that we acknowledge the risk our brave men and women face.

This was picked up by Gerald Howarth who noted that there was a system called the Mamba "which is able to track incoming mortars and provide an accurate fix on their source." Could he, asked Howarth, "reassure us that sufficient such devices are available to our armed forces in Basra to ensure that we have the maximum protection?"

As he did with his response to Ann Winterton, Browne took this seriously but refused to put information into the public domain that would jeopardise operational security.

You would have had to have had a journalist in the gallery who understood the issues to pick up on this and, inevitably, no such creature existed. Somebody, some time later, might take one of the poor little dears aside and spoon-feed them with the details but, until then, nothing will emerge.

Anyhow, it would be wrong of me to say that there was much more of interest. The trouble with debates of this nature is that they are so wide-ranging that they tend to be highly superficial, no more so than the response by the shadow secretary, Liam Fox.

One would actually like to be complimentary, if only because it is not always a good idea to be negative. A little bit of encouragement goes a long way. Unfortunately, we cannot do this – even if the problem was not what was said, but what was not.

However, rather than inject our own words to illustrate the nature of the deficiency, we shall use some from a US Department of Defense press release yesterday, citing the new defense secretary Robert W. Gates. "Debate about operations in Iraq is completely appropriate,” he says, adding that he believed the debates centred "not on whether there's any option except to win, but on the best way to reach that objective."

That was what was missing in this debate. We are a nation at war and, by any candid assessment, things are not going well. Nor could anyone sensibly say that the government is entirely on top the situation, or is completely in control. The debate, therefore, was wide open for some constructive suggestions as to how best to win the wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

In terms of any specific detail, there was nothing on offer. For sure, we had ritual complaints about a wide range of issues and a few generalities - but nothing bankable, nothing that you could mark down and say was a good, workable idea.

What we did get though, from another member of the Conservative defence team, Dr. Julian Lewis, was an illustration of the dangerous complacency and arrogance that pervades some parts of the establishment. Said Lewis:

I mean no insult to the record of the American armed forces when I say that Britain's achievements in counter-insurgency campaigns in the past feature lessons that can usefully be learned by our allies, and that, along with some of my colleagues, I am not entirely sure that they are always prepared to listen and take those lessons on board.

This is from the representative of a nation that is struggling to put 20 Mastiff mine protected vehicles into Iraq, when the US is looking at better than 4,000 RG-31s.

There lies the disappointment. It was all very well for minister of state Adam Ingram to declare of our armed forces that, "we really do recognise that they are the best in the world", except that they are not. We may – and in fact do – have some good elements, some good people and some very dedicated and brave service personnel, but that does not make for the best armed forces in the world.

But we also have poor equipment, poor structures, poor administration and some singularly bad leadership. We are far from convinced that the top Army brass have got a grip on the situation or are acting in the national – as opposed to their own sectional – interest.

How things could be made better though is not clear. This is why we really do need a debate – a serious, intelligent debate, not just ritual offerings and point-scoring. Not for the first time, therefore, do we suggest that the opposition needs to raise its game.

COMMENT THREAD

LAND+-+Mamba+Estonia[i-LAND+-+Mamba+Estonia]In today's Sunday Telegraph, Sean Rayment reports an officer in Afghanistan complaining that troops from Estonia … who were working alongside the Royal Marines were better equipped and had more reliable armoured vehicles than did British troops.

Er… would that be because the Estonians are operating ex-British Mambas, as reported by this blog on 8 January and The Booker column last week?

It would be too much to ask Rayment to read this blog but one might have thought that, at the every least, he could read his own newspaper – from which he might have learnt something.

In this week's edition, however, the Telegraph's defence correspondent also tells a sorry tale that all four of the Army's mine protected vehicles (MPVs), "used to extract injured troops from minefields in Afghanistan", have broken down.

LAND+-+Tempest+003[i-LAND+-+Tempest+003]Commanders, we are told, regard the MPV (illustrated) as one of the most vital pieces of equipment in Afghanistan, where more than 10 million mines lie primed after 20 years of war. Since last June two servicemen have been killed in mine explosions and three have been seriously injured yet "one source" reveals that the farthest the MPVs have travelled outside Camp Bastion in Helmand has been just one mile. The same officer who complains about the Estonians is then cited as saying that "we need four more MPVs and we haven't got them".

Although Rayment doesn't say so (possibly because he does not know), he is actually referring to the vehicle known as the Tempest MPV (illustrated above), which we described last June. Ironically, as we described then, the Tempests were the replacements for the Mambas which have been sold off to the Estonians.

However, not all is lost. Despite the Telegraph conveying the view that there are only four MPV, readers of this blog will know that there are in fact eight vehicles (see also here), so somewhere (possibly in Saffron Waldron, where they were last seen) there are another four. It would not take very long to fly them out in a C-17 Globemaster, so perhaps the newspaper could not ask why this isn’t being done.

LAND+-+Mastiff_PPV2[i-LAND+-+Mastiff_PPV2]Even then, there is another option. Once again this is not "revealed" by the Telegraph, but as we know, the Tempest was effectively the prototype for what is now known as the Force Protection Cougar, a fact we revealed last June.

As we also know, the British have bought 100 Cougars under the name of Mastiff, some of which, we have been told, are destined for Afghanistan. These are described by the manufacturer as a "mine protected vehicle" so, far from there being only four MPVs, there are a considerable number on their way – perhaps as many at 30.

These, however – according to Rayment - are vital tools that have been refused by the Ministry of Defence. To that list, Rayment adds "night-vision equipment and thermal-imaging devices used to distinguish friend from foe" - the latter, as we know, being particularly useful for detecting suicide bombers.

LAND+-+Vipir+sight[i-LAND+-+Vipir+sight]Something else we know is that these is no shortage of night vision equipment – the shortage was in thermal imagers, which was "revealed" by the Daily Mail in November. But, as we reported on this blog on 9 January, plans are in place to increase this number, by the procurement of over 300 additional sights.

All that leaves little Sean with is the original litany of a shortage of helicopters and troops, which makes for rather a thin story, especially as he does not bring in the issues raised by the use of Apache helicopters to carry troops in last Monday's attempted rescue.

Fortunately, the Sunday Telegraph's alternative defence correspondent, Christopher Booker is on the ball.

COMMENT THREAD

I had intended to do a long piece on Somalia – which will have to wait until later today. I simply could not miss the opportunity of noting a huge irony – one that, without our intervention, would probably have escaped any comment at all.

The irony stems initially from our seeing on television the ultimate ignominy of the Estonian Army turning up for a firefight in Afghanistan alongside the British Army – and better equipped, having purchased the Mambas which the MoD so carelessly and cheaply discarded.

RG-31+B%26A[i-RG-31+B%26A]
But today, the irony is complete. With 148 already delivered to the US military in 2005, another 94 having been ordered last year, we learn that the US Army Tank Automotive and Armaments Command (TACOM) has just announced a $76.5 million order to General Dynamics Land Systems - Canada to provide another 169 RG-31 Mk5 Mine Protected Vehicles, with an option for nine additional vehicles - bringing the total to well over 400.

These vehicles will be built in the British-owned OMC Land Systems factory in South Africa and finished in Canada's GD factory for delivery commencing June of this year.

But this is far more than just another "toy" story. With the expected announcement today by president Bush of a massive "surge" in the number of troops deployed in Iraq – and the start of a delicious political battle between the president and the newly emboldened Democrats over whether he has to power to do so – this order for RG-31 is a (belated) recognition by the US military of the tactical realities of the Iraqi and the Afghanistan theatres.

british-soldiers-b[i-british-soldiers-b]And what it also does, of course, is reinforce the very point made by the appearance of the Estonian Mambas – that the British Ministry of Defence and the Army hierarchy are still wedded to tactical doctrines which bear no relationship to the demands of the modern, non-linear battlefield.

On that modern battlefield, soldiers can be fighting for their lives in a largely conventional battle one moment, be pursuing a "hearts and minds" agenda the next, handing sweets to children and the like, and seconds later be the target of suicide or roadside bombing.

jeep_sas[i-jeep_sas]The British hierarchy, however, seems to be relying on the so-called "WIMIK" Land Rovers as fighting vehicles, equipment which has a linear and spiritual relationship with the jeeps operated by David Stirling's SAS in the western deserts of North Africa during the Second World War. (In the picture, the jeep even mounts the same machine gun - the M2 .50 cal.)

That the equipment is, on balance, unfit for purpose, is demonstrated by the two sets of pictures we have assembled – the RG-31 "before and after" (top) and the same for the Land Rover (below). In both, the damaged vehicles had been targeted by car-borne suicide bombers but only in the RG-31 did the crew escape uninjured.

LR+B%26A[i-LR+B%26A]
Why the British Ministry and senior officer class seems to have such great difficulty dealing with reality is one of those great mysteries. However, one could venture that, for an Army that brought us the Battle of Isandlwana, William Elphinstone's retreat from Kabul in 1842, Galipoli and the fall of Singapore - to say nothing of Market Garden - the slaughter of a few Toms in unarmoured Land Rovers is neither here nor there.

Nevertheless, when even the Iraqi Army, which has up to press been patrolling in light pick-up trucks, realises that this is not a war-winning strategy, you do begin to wonder about the British.

LAND+-+Dzik+3[i-LAND+-+Dzik+3]The Iraqi government has acquired 400 Polish-made Dzik-3 armored personnel carriers. Dzik is Polish for "wild boar" and the vehicle is described as being "equipped with all-around armour, bullet proof windows, puncture-proof tyres and smoke launchers".

However, the MoD will no doubt say the Iraqis can be dismissed - they are only foreigners after all, and we British have soooo much more experience in fighting insurgencies, don't you know. So they can go on using unarmoured Land Rovers. Far better that, than the High Command and the politicos having to admit they got it wrong.

COMMENT THREAD

Mamba+B%26A[i-Mamba+B%26A]
I just could not resist the temptation of putting this up - the Mamba in British Army colours before being flogged off and snapped up by the Estonians - only to re-appear in Afghanistan alongside British Army unarmoured Land Rovers.

You really could not make it up.

Kit+compared[i-Kit+compared]
But, since truth is evidently stranger than fiction, perhaps the MoD could sell off its unarmoured "boy racer" WIMIK Land Rovers (above left), with which it is currently equipping the Army in Afghanistan, and provide some M3A1 Half-tracks. Don't worry that these are actually World War Two vintage - they would be a significant improvement over what we have in Afghanistan right now.

wartime+kit[i-wartime+kit]
I suppose we could go the whole hog here. With the addition of WWII Daimler Armoured Cars and Sherman Tanks, we would see a massive leap in our armed forces capability. All we have to do is raid the museums and we're home and dry... perhaps unrealistic, but it does illustrate the point that the Army in 1944 was better equipped than it is currently in Afghanistan.

COMMENT THREAD

link[i-link]The television device this evening had reporter Sean Langan filming alongside British troops, and with Afghani police and troops in the town of Garmser - taking on the Taliban. This was for the Channel 4 Dispatches programme.

Langan makes some play of the fact that the British are fighting in unarmoured WIMIK Land Rovers and, in one instance, a soldier is wounded – shot in the lower arm. Interestingly, he is extracted from the fire zone in one of the two vehicles operated by a small contingent of Estonian troops.

LAND+-+Mamba+Estonia[i-LAND+-+Mamba+Estonia]We are not told why this is so but can guess. Unlike the British Land Rovers, these are armoured. They are in fact, Mamba APCs, nine of which were acquired by the Estonian Army from er… the British, who disposed of them of a fraction of their original price, as surplus to requirements.

The actual machines, in British colours, are shown below - the short-wheel-base version, also known as the Alvis 8 or the Acorn. They are exactly the same, right down to the dinky little storage bins on the sides.

LAND+-+Mamba+001[i-LAND+-+Mamba+001]I doubt whether any of the British troops at the scene knew the story but, if they did, no one mentioned it. Nor did Sean Langan, who doubtless would not have known the background – and thereby missed a good story (there's unusual for you).

But how galling it is that British troops are exposed to fire in unarmoured vehicles, while our allies are able to take protection in cut-price armoured vehicles sold to them by our own caring, sharing MoD.

COMMENT THREAD

service+accom[i-service+accom]On reflection, the Boy King has actually achieved something that many readers might have thought impossible – an expression of sympathy from this blog for the MoD.

Cutting through the furore about Service accommodation standards, with such a huge estate (comprising nearly 200,000 bed units) it is very easy to pick up examples of the very worst and put pictures up on the net. But, as the MoD has done (left), it is also possible to put up examples of good conditions, thus redressing a balance that has been sorely missing.

What also has been missing is the reality that a great deal of Service accommodation is very good, while some of the tenants are very bad – the boozed-up squaddies that think nothing of trashing their barracks or the dozy little Misses in married quarters who block off all the vents and who do not open windows from one week to another, and then wonder why black mould grows in the bathroom (the bane of the life of many a housing manager).

Whatever else, as the dust begins to settle on this issue, what does emerge is that there is not a major crisis of Forces' accommodation. There are problems, yes – and they do require vigilance from and occasional intervention by MPs, who are the longstop in the system. But it is also fair to say that there always have been problems. In the old days of "Works and Bricks", some of the stories would have made your hair curl.

Nevertheless, the issue – as we observed when it broke – has given the opportunity for the touchy-feely Girlie Boy to deal with defence without getting his soft little hands soiled with nasty green (and now grey) things that go "bang!".

And however bad the ghastly Mr Harding of the Telegraph might be – and that is seriously ghastly – he does point up in today's piece on the Royal Navy that there is a serious defence spending crisis building up, which the Girlie Boy Tories are ignoring.

type45[i-type45]But, for all its indignation about the state of the Fleet, the Telegraph itself has not only been wholly inadequate in addressing the growing crisis but, in the persona of its defence correspondent, has been a cheer-leader for the Type 45 Destroyers which, at £1 billion each, are part of the reason why the Royal Navy is having financial problems.

And it the procurement of Type 45, as much as anything, that demonstrates so clearly why we need a broader debate on defence, one which the Tories should be – but are not – leading.

To illustrate just how wide that debate should run, I am much taken with a comment on the unofficial Army forum, which questioned my assertion that we should be using (MAMBA) counter-battery radar as part of our strategy for dealing with hit-and-run mortar attacks on our bases in Iraq. To the person who made the comment, all the deployment of that equipment meant was that troops would get extra warning, which would "get them to the trenches but not much more".

link[i-link]In this beguilingly simple comment lies the debate. In the last few years, the MoD has spent over £200 million on new, state-of-the-art counter-battery radar. It bought four MAMBA sets for £30 million and ten COBRA sets for £17.8 million each. If this equipment has no use in the shooting wars in which we are currently engaged – in Iraq and Afghanistan – why did we buy them?

If all they are to do is sit unused in a warehouse, "somewhere in England", against the eventuality that they might be wanted for some distant, as yet unspecified campaign, then surely we had better things to do with the money?

On the other hand, if they are to be used, there is no value to be gained simply from identifying the location of enemy mortars unless you are prepared to act on that information – attempting either to kill or capture the mortar teams. But that costs extra money, for UAVs and for helicopters – which simply has not been spent.

Therefore, it is all very well for the Telegraph to complain that defence funds "are often spent unwisely" but the only examples it can offer are the "£20 billion so far gobbled up by the otiose Euro-fighter" and a similar sum for the Trident replacement. But, as we have pointed out elsewhere, without talking into account either of these two projects, this government has overspent £8.8 billion on European projects which could have been sourced more cheaply elsewhere.

Yet, not only has this waste gone unrecorded, the paper also bleats about the "Euro-centric nature of our defence", complaining that Britain's strategic thinking has been focused on the defence of western Europe. The paper now argues that the end of the Cold War "should have released Britain to pursue its more usual vocation as an island nation with interests in every continent."

But, it says, our top brass is gearing up for the last war whereas, "the truth is that, as our horizons widen, the Royal Navy should be assuming a pre-eminence it has not enjoyed for 50 years." And, on that basis, it argues that we "should be building more ships than ever, including unmanned vessels."

Well, that is an argument, but not a very good one. The essence of our current misfortunes is that we are currently engaged in counter-insurgency operations, in which the Navy features very little. We are engaged against enemies operating to a wholly different moral code, who are not afraid to die and who are able to exploit our weaknesses. And, currently, if we are not losing, we are certainly not winning.

link[i-link]Rather than looking to wider horizons, therefore, it might help if we looked at the wars we are actually fighting – not the last war, not the next war but the wars of the here and now. It is these that we need to win before considering any other adventures.

The trouble is that, from its most recent record, we cannot look to our Armed Forces to come up with the answers. The government is manifestly incapable of producing solutions, the Opposition is a waste of time and space and the media is not even on the same planet.

How did that phrase go? "Houston… we have a problem!" Forget the Houston bit. We have a problem.

COMMENT THREAD

link[i-link]Never believe the MoD and never, never take any details in an MoD press statement at face value.

Even as of yesterday, this lying department of state was talking about "a routine boat patrol" when describing the bomb attack on Sunday.

Now we learn from The Daily Telegraph this morning that the four service personnel killed were on a "personnel move" from Basra Palace to another British base along the Shatt-al-Arab waterway. They were being moved by boat because this was considered the safest form of transport.

Despite the war-like action pictures being put about (above left) the two Rigid Raiders in the group on Sunday were carrying 17 personnel (including crews) and being used for nothing more glamorous and exciting than water-taxis. And it was one of these boats that got hit.

From The Scotsman we get the information that "British forces have routinely used the river as a transport route, to avoid sites where IEDs may be planted." But, says the paper, "in order to navigate the bridge, patrol boats have to pass close to the eastern bank, where the fatal attack was mounted."

link[i-link]The site can be seen in the video grab (right), taken from the Telegraph/ITN footage, accessible from here. (This is copyright material taken without permission for the purpose of reporting news and making comment. If the owners wish to make an issue of it – sue me.)

Now, from what appears on the grab, the pontoon bridge rises at the point arrowed, allowing navigation by small craft – but making for an ideal (and obvious) ambush point. We are now told that "military sources are reviewing river security" which is a bit bloody late, with them saying that "the positioning and accuracy suggest considerable planning".

To me, it begins to look very much like someone (or several persons) cocked-up and one hopes that an inquiry will bring this to the fore. But that does not change the general points made in my overnight piece.

One of the best ways of protecting transiting personnel is to use helicopters, provided the general area is under control. Without that control, however, there can be tragic results , as occurred last May when a Lynx helicopter was shot down, coincidentally also killing a female – that time Flt Lt Sarah-Jayne Mulvihill, an RAF officer.

However, ground transport in "Snatch" Land Rovers has also proved unsafe and there are too few Warriors and they are being worked to death. They are not available for routine transport. In any event, by far the safest form of transport would be a mine protected vehicle, such as the Mamba, with or without a helicopter escort.

Mean%206%20012[i-Mean%206%20012]Once upon a time, we could have taken that option, except that we sold off our Mambas, which are now used by Blackwater Security Consulting … for transporting personnel in Iraq (having survived at least two IED attacks - one pictured).

Alternatively, we could have bought the more modern and reliable RG-31s, which we had on trial in 2003 and could have had in service now – as have the Canadians, whose vehicles have survived mines and suicide bombs. But no! Instead, we bought freakin useless and vastly more expensive Italian Panthers, which can't be used in Iraq and anyway are still not in service.

So we send our people to their deaths in unarmoured motor boats and then have the Secretary of State weep in his cups about "the sacrifice made by the brave men and women of our armed forces."

Brave they undoubtedly were, but they were led to the slaughter like lambs. This is simply not good enough.

COMMENT THREAD

ST%20-%20heli%20cut[i-ST%20-%20heli%20cut]Not only the content but the date also of this article in the Sunday Times is relevant. Written February last, it confirms the view that security forces cannot deal effectively with terrorism without the use of modern, properly equipped helicopters.

Thus does this newspaper record that London's Metropolitan Police has bought three high-speed helicopters (Eurocopter EC 145s) to take rapid reaction teams to the heart of terrorist emergencies - just the sort of thing that would be ideal to deal with the hit and run mortar teams that are causing such havoc in Basra.

To provide 24-hour coverage of the city and environs in an insurgency situation, however, you would probably need about 12 helicopters, the number shown below. That represents less than a third of the fleet operated by the British police and twice the number of tactical helicopters operated by the Army in the whole of southern Iraq. It also represents just over half the price of one Eurofighter or Apache attack helicopter, either of which cost around £60 million each - and one tenth the cost of the failed Phoenix UAV programme.

Police%2000.1[i-Police%2000.1]
The point is not lost on American Thinker, with James Lewis picking up the report that a Catholic bishop has entered the news by insisting that it is "morally reprehensible" to fail to equip British troops properly – something we also discuss on the blog.

Of the MSM though, only Booker sees the point. Picking up on our posts here, here, here and here, he writes in his Sunday Telegraph column today, adding his own distinctive touch to the argument:

Basra%20palace%2004[i-Basra%20palace%2004]

Nothing should have brought home more chillingly the failure of our military presence in Iraq than the fact that last week we had to evacuate all our 200 civilian officials from the Basra Palace complex, refurbished at a cost of £14 million (including an upgrade of the swimming pool) to enable them to bring the area peace and democracy. Saddam's former palace is also the British Army's headquarters, and it is a measure of its impotence that it can no longer defend its own HQ against insurgent mortar attacks.

To do so would require a combination of counter-battery radar equipment, to detect where the bombs are coming from, with helicopters on patrol to provide the necessary instant response. We have the radar, the Mamba, but the Ministry of Defence has not seen fit to provide our troops with the helicopters. In the whole of Iraq we have only six Lynxes, used for a range of roles, not including protection of the army's headquarters, which is why our command staff have to spend much of their time hiding under tables from 15 or more mortar attacks a day.

link[i-link]The MoD does plan to buy 70 "Super Lynxes", at £14 million each. But these will not be available until 2012, to help us play our part in the European Rapid Reaction Force. Meanwhile the US Army in Iraq buys off-the-shelf commercial helicopters at less than £4 million each, to play precisely the supportive role our own troops are so desperately in need of, in the real war they are engaged in; while the MoD pays nearly four times as much for machines to equip our men to take part in some fantasy army of the future.

Booker then refers to this blog and points out that Britain's police forces are now better equipped with helicopters than the British Army. "It is hardly surprising", he concludes, "that it can no longer even defend its own headquarters." He believes the lack of interest in ensuring that the Army can do the job is a precursor to Blair pulling out of Iraq altogether. My co-editor posits that it is a cock-up, while American Thinker writes of a "cultural conspiracy" in the sense that the Left has controlled the British media, educational system and much of its politics for almost a century:

The British Left isn't nationalist, but internationalist. Undermining the armed forces by propaganda and funding cuts is a basic part of the socialist faith: "no troops, no war" is the reasoning, if one can call it that. You don't need conspirators when it is done every day by the BBC, the Guardian, and much of the Labour and Liberal Democrat Parties.

Whatever the reasons, and American Thinker has more, we are observing an Army that is being undermined through lack of equipment. The lack of response to that had us worried, to the extent that we had to do a reality-check, concerned that we might be trapped in a private fantasy.

But we are not wrong. Without the kit – in this case the helicopters – the Army simply cannot perform, for want of which performance, Iraq must eventually be lost. And, writes Charles Moore, "If we do pull all our troops out, mock Blair and Bush, and hail some deal with Iran as "peace", we shall have a few weeks of self-congratulation, but that is all."

COMMENT THREAD

Snatch%20bombed[i-Snatch%20bombed]Not on the scale of the loss of the Nimrod over the weekend, another sad event occurred today with the death of two British troops in Iraq, and the serious injury of another, following a roadside bomb attack on their "Snatch" Land Rover, just north of Basra. A fourth soldier was lightly wounded.

A report from Middle East online describes how "insurgents" attacked a British army unit escorting a reconstruction team. They were tasked to escort a reconstruction unit to assist with the rebuilding of the area north of Basra.

The "Snatch" Land Rover was badly damaged, with the wreckage of the vehicle standing upright by the side of the road, part of the rear cabin ripped open by the force of the explosion.

This brings the total number of UK soldiers killed in operations in Iraq since the 2003 conflict to 117 and, by our reckoning, the number killed while patrolling or travelling in lightly armoured or unarmoured Land Rovers to 25 – the largest single group of casualties in the Iraq theatre.

This follows the story in the Scotland on Sunday last week, which revealed that the MoD had sold off 14 Mamba armoured vehicles for a fraction of their original cost.

That story was picked up yesterday by the Mail on Sunday and again by the Scotland on Sunday, based in information supplied by this blog.

Today, however, prime minister Tony Blair described the deaths as a "terrible tragedy". He should, perhaps, have a quiet chat with his defence procurement minister, Lord Drayson, who consistently maintained that the "Snatch" Land Rovers "provide us with the mobility and level of protection that we need".

It was only after a sustained campaign by this blog, backed by Conservative shadow ministers, Booker in The Sunday Telegraph, and then the Sunday Times, that Drayson eventually conceded that new armoured vehicles should be bought.

But, since these cannot be delivered to theatre until the end of this year, our troops must continue to ride – and die – in inadequately protected Land Rovers, and Blair has the nerve to call these deaths a "terrible tragedy". Criminal incompetence by his own government would be a better description.

COMMENT THREAD

Mamba%20DM[i-Mamba%20DM]
We did it on 3 July, barring a key bit of information that we had to tease out of the MoD through a Parliamentary question. This the Scotland on Sunday picked last week and we followed through last Friday.

Now, today – two months after we broke the original story - the Mail on Sunday has finally run it. Yet, at the end of the same month that we first ran it, little Shane Richmond, Telegraph web news editor, was happily pushing out an inane comment from Malcolm Gladwell, the author and New Yorker journalist, that blogs are "derivative".

Yet again this illustrates that sections of the MSM are so far up their own backsides that they haven't even begun to realise that, increasingly, blogs are running the agenda on certain issues. They are ahead of the curve.

As for the MoS, typically, it has gone for the cheap, sensationalist angle and has missed key parts of the story. That makes it just another space-filler rather than a contribution to the debate about the inadequacies of the MoD, which would have moved the issue forward.

RG31%20Canada%204.0[i-RG31%20Canada%204.0]Not least, it parrots uncritically the MoD line that the Mambas were "too heavy", without stating why - and that they "were not designed as a patrol vehicle". Yet, that is precisely what they were designed for, a task - even as we write - at which, in the form of the RG-31, they are excelling in Canadian hands in Afghanistan.

It then mentions that, last month, the MoD "revealed" that the Army is to get 300 new, "tougher" armoured vehicles for use in Iraq and Afghanistan - failing, of course, to note that 100-plus of these are the useless Pinzgauer coffins on wheels. This, incidentally, is from Whitehall correspondent, Jason Lewis, who should have been aware of what was happening. When the butcher's bill comes in, you can bet the MSM will be waxing indignant but now, when there is an opportunity to do something and actually save lives - they are silent.

And, although all the information for the MoS piece came directly from the exertions of this blog – they even used the same photographs – was there any mention of EU Referendum? I'll give you three guesses.

COMMENT THREAD

The Alvis 8 in Bosnia - claimed by Drayson to be an RG-31[i-The Alvis 8 in Bosnia - claimed by Drayson to be an RG-31]Regular readers will recall our campaign on "Snatch" Land Rovers and our calls for more better armoured vehicles, in particular the mine-protected RG-31 used by both US and Canadian forces.

During this campaign, it emerged that the MoD had already purchased a fleet of 14 RG-31 type vehicles - the precursor version called the Mamba (although they were also called the Alvis 4 and 8 series) – for use in Bosnia.

As a result, through MP Mike Hancock, questions were put in to find out what happened to these vehicles, knowing that some were actually in use in Iraq, being used to protect US diplomats travelling between Baghdad International Airport and the Green Zone.

The answers were picked up by Scotland on Sunday last week and make fascinating reading. It seems that all the vehicles in the fleet, which originally cost £4.5 million to buy, were sold abroad for the princely sum of just £44,000. Nine went to Estonia, four to "a US company" – which we know to be Blackwater Security Consulting - and one to a company based in Singapore.

pm1[i-pm1]Even now, though, the MoD is still attempting to put their "spin" on the deal. It claims that the modifications of the Mambas left them "too heavy" to go on patrol. This, as we know, was the addition of underside armour to deal with the TMRP-6 mine threat, the armour having been developed specifically for the MoD by a South African technology company (see right).

But we also know, from an exchange of e-mails with some of the soldiers who operated the vehicles out in Bosnia that they remained perfectly serviceable with the additional armour. Latterly, we were told that the real reason for the claimed "maintenance problems" was that the UK supplier, Alvis, had withdrawn technical support for the model - for reasons we know not why.

The Scotland on Sunday paper remarks that while the financial loss to taxpayers is another embarrassment for the MoD, but adds, "far more serious is the suggestion it could have put the lives of British troops at even greater risk."

Bound for the airport on the way from the Green Zone[i-Bound for the airport on the way from the Green Zone]For sure, 14 vehicles would not have made much difference in Iraq, where over 200 "Snatch" Land Rovers are operating, but even they could have helped. At least one death, for instance, was attributed to a Land Rover ambush, where the vehicle was being used to ferry an officer from the British base to the airport – precisely the use to which the Mambas are currently being put by Blackwater Security Consulting. And, as we also know, Blackwater vehicles have survived at least two IED attacks (see picture below).

A Mamba damaged by an IED - the crew and passengers escaped unscathed[i-A Mamba damaged by an IED - the crew and passengers escaped unscathed]Tory defence spokesman Gerald Howarth insisted that the government should have kept hold of its Mambas when it had forces in such danger in Iraq and Afghanistan. He told Scotland on Sunday that, "To flog these vehicles so cheaply when there must have been a reasonable chance of them being usable in both Afghanistan and Iraq is unforgivable." He is absolutely right on this. As have Blackwater Security done, the additional armour could have been removed for the different theatres where there was no TMRP threat, and the vehicles would have been perfectly usable.

The British version of the Cougar - aka 'Tempest'[i-The British version of the Cougar - aka 'Tempest']But, perhaps, an equal scandal is that the replacement vehicles – the Tempest MPVs, on which the US Cougar design is currently based, were not used in Iraq beyond the initial "war" phase of the invasion. The eight purchased have now been returned to the UK, pending despatch to Afghanistan.

It is decidedly ironic – if not tragic - that, having recognised the potential of these vehicles nearly four years before the US forces realised their value, the Army failed to exploit them. Only now, is the MoD buying a hundred to supplement the "Snatch" Land Rovers – with deliveries to start at the end of the year.

All of this, though, simply reinforces the wide-held and accurate view that, when it comes to understanding the equipment needs of our troops, and managing the procurement process efficiently, the MoD is simply not on this planet.

COMMENT THREAD

For an update on this post, see here.

The Blackwater advertising leaflet[i-The Blackwater advertising leaflet]Remember the Noble Lord Drayson telling us on 12 June that, "we had 14 RG-31s in Bosnia, which we took out of service some time ago due to difficulties with maintenance?"

As we now know, these were not RG-31s but Mambas (or, more precisely, Alvis 4 & 8s) and we also know that the "maintenance problems" arose simply because Alvis, their suppliers to the British Army, had ceased supporting these models and spare parts were no longer available from this source.

And now, someone else has found a very good use for them and maintenance does not seem to be an issue. The fleet – or a goodly proportion of it – is now owned by the US Blackwater Security Consulting, which proudly advertise their virtues in their own leaflet (above left), declaring that "the Mamba is the armored personnel carrier of choice for Blackwater ops in Iraq".

Inbound to Baghdad International to pick up the customers[i-Inbound to Baghdad International to pick up the customers]And Iraq is where the vehicles are based. Their particular role is to transport diplomats, VIPs and US State Department officials along the most dangerous stretch of road in Iraq, if not the world – the 6-mile shooting gallery of snipers, car bombers and mayhem, otherwise known as the route from Baghdad International Airport to the Green Zone in the centre of the city.

Convoys are frequently ambushed and suicide car bombers are distressingly common and, on at least two occasions, one as recently as 2 May of this year, the Blackwater Mambas have been targeted by roadside bombers. And, in each of those two occasions, the crew and passengers emerged unscathed.

Outward bound, to the Green Zone[i-Outward bound, to the Green Zone]The daily transport routine has been described graphically in The Washington Post, where the Mambas are described in terms "as used by the South African military in Angola". The vehicle, says the Washington Post:

…is Blackwater's primary means of zipping State Department employees and other nations' diplomats to Baghdad's fortified Green Zone. For additional protection, the convoys are shadowed by helicopters with armed guards perched at the open doors scanning for potential attackers.

The American Popular Mechanics journal gives a fuller, "Boys Own" account of the operations, describing in detail how Blackwater contractors must "run the gauntlet", only to recount how, at the end of the mission, the crew found "a new spider mark" from a high-powered round in the windshield of one of the Mambas.

A Mamba damaged by an IED - the crew and passengers escaped unscathed[i-A Mamba damaged by an IED - the crew and passengers escaped unscathed]But what none of the journals realised though is that these are ex-British Army vehicles, sold by an MoD which now equips its troops with the dangerously vulnerable "Snatch" Land Rovers. At least one of our soldiers has been killed while being transported to the airport in a "Snatch" which makes it a cruel irony that vehicles which were not good enough for "our boys" are routinely saving American lives in one of the most hostile environments in the world, carrying them to and from the airport.

Stand up and take a bow, Lord Drayson, the man whose lies are killing our soldiers.

COMMENT THREAD