Afghan insurgents make wreckage of U.S. armored vehicles

[progressiveGI]

Source: McClatchy Newspapers @ Yahoo News

Taliban -led insurgents in Afghanistan have devised ways to cripple and even destroy the expensive armored vehicles that offer U.S. forces the best protection against roadside bombs by using increasingly large explosive charges and rocket-propelled grenades, according to U.S. soldiers and defense officials.

At least eight American troops have been killed this year in attacks on so-called Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicles, or MRAPs, and 40 more have been wounded, said a senior U.S. military official who, like others interviewed on the issue, declined to be further identified because of the issue's sensitivity.

The insurgents' success in attacking the hulking machines, which can cost as much as $1 million each, underscores their ability to counter the advanced hardware that the U.S. military and its allies are deploying in their struggle to gain the upper hand in the war, which entered its ninth year last month.

The attacks also raise questions about how vulnerable a new, lighter MRAP, the M-ATV, which is now being shipped to Afghanistan , are to the massive explosive charges that Taliban -led insurgents have been using against its bigger cousin.

The insurgents are also hitting MRAPs with rocket-propelled grenades that can penetrate their steel armor, according to U.S troops in Afghanistan , several of whom showed McClatchy a photograph of a hole that one of the projectiles had punched in the hull of an MRAP.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20091106/wl_mcclatchy...

[bertman]

1. That's the way it works. You build a better defense, they devise a better way to penetrate it.

The history of warfare in a nutshell.

A tragedy for our troops and the American taxpayers, but a windfall for the war profiteers who make those things.

Like General Butler said "War is a Racket."

Rec.

[shadowknows69]

2. What he said. Spot on.

[New Dawn]

3. +1

[dysfunctional press]

4. and their costs are generally A LOT less.

just add more BOOM.

we gotta get out of that place...if it's the last thing we ever do.

[Sal Minella]

5. Just like bacteria and Big Pharma.

[DireStrike]

11. Also, methods of defense just get weaker in general as time progresses.

Unless force-fields turn out to be super-expensive BUT impenetrable, this isn't gonna change.

[thunder rising]

6. There are mines that take out M1s, so MRAP is like a "game in the small".

The problem is there are no front lines and everybody is a suspect; hence you can't really use M1. Wonder where I've heard that before.

[Lagomorph]

7. They've been using roadside bombs in the 1200-1500 lb range...

Cripple it? That would send it back to Pakistan.

[krispos42]

8. In the battle between artillery and armor, artillery generally wins

However, it does force them to make fewer bombs, and bigger bombs are harder to transport and harder to hide.

Increased armor reduces the effective range of IEDs, which means that fewer vehicles will be in the lethal range.



I know which one I'd rather be in.

[cliffordu]

9. I'd bet that's what every dead Soviet tank commander said, too....

Never bet against a motivated insurgency.

[AtheistCrusader]

10. They didn't have a lot of the options we have today.

Like Predator drones watching roads night and day for people with shovels and carts or other means of transporting explosives. The first problem of planting a 1200lb roadside bomb is: moving it.

Considering how busy EOD has been in Afghanistan, I'm not sure this 8/40 number is really proof they have 'overcome' our MRAP's. You can't expect zero loss of life to friendly soldiers in any sort of war, I don't care how powerful your weapons are. At the end of the day, there's always friendly fire, if nothing else.

The loss of life is lamentable, but if this was 1990, we'd have already been sent packing, just like the Russians. The tech is working. But we need to fully commit, or cut our losses and come home. One or the other. Bush didn't make the decision, for all his blathering about being 'the decider', so now Obama is stuck with it. Them's the breaks.

[cliffordu]

16. I do believe that you can build a 1200 lb roadside bomb by using

1200 one pound packages of explosive, shuffled in one at a time on the backs of mules.

Or 120 10lb packages, or any denomination you'd like to spend.

If the Tech is working why are they getting stronger?

[Igel]

17. Precisely right.

Which is why it's so important to make sure we don't have troops "out there" to block supply lines.

Pull back into populated areas, make it easier for insurgents to re-arm, train, recruit. That's definitely the winning strategy.

Well, it was *'s strategy for the first 6 years of the war or so, and it's what let the insurgents really get re-established. It's good to see that there's really, really serious discussion about returning to it, instead of having troops out there where--the horror!--they might actually be shot at.

So, yeah, it's a winning strategy. I'm not entirely sure who the subject of "winning" is in that sentence, to be honest. (And, yes, gerunds and even nouns can have subjects.) But it'll certainly help somebody win.

[AtheistCrusader]

18. Well

The fact they are building bigger bombs is a pretty good indication the tech IS working, because the bombs weren't working. The enemy will always adapt and attempt to overcome.

The point about submunitions to assemble a large explosive is a fair point, but they're still lugging around 50-100lb artillery shells and things like that, plus dithering around on the roads, digging, planting, etc. That gives us lots of opportunities to spot them at work. Unfortunately, since these are sparsely populated areas of pretty much wasteland, we won't have the benefit of any of the free population turning them in. We had that post-2007 in Iraq. We won't in Afghanistan, simply because there aren't as many people in these areas to see it, regardless of how much they do or do not trust us. So we'll have to FULLY rely upon observational technology.

Part of building a winning strategy in Afghanistan, is going to rely upon understanding all the things that we just did in Iraq, that won't apply or help in Afghanistan, and devising new strategies.

[NickB79]

19. The article also discusses RPG's capable of penetrating MRAP armor

Which in itself is VERY worrying. If you can do that with an easily portable shoulder-fired weapon, the whole argument about the difficulty in deploying 1200 lb bombs is rendered moot.

For example, take a look at the M1A1 Abrams tank that was knocked out in Iraq by an RPG:

http://newsmine.org/content.php?ol=war-on-terror/iraq/m...

"The “something” continued into the crew compartment, where it passed through the gunner’s seatback, grazed the kidney area of the gunner’s flak jacket and finally came to rest after boring a hole 1½ to 2 inches deep in the hull on the far side of the tank.

As it passed through the interior, it hit enough critical components to knock the tank out of action. That made the tank one of only two Abrams disabled by enemy fire during the Iraq war and one of only a handful of “mobility kills” since they first rumbled onto the scene 20 years ago. The other Abrams knocked out this year in Iraq was hit by an RPG-7, a rocket-propelled grenade.

Experts believe whatever it is that knocked out the tank in August was not an RPG-7 but most likely something new — and that worries tank drivers."

[AtheistCrusader]

20. Good point.

Identifying what and where those are coming from is critical. The MRAP's armor is probably not as comprehensive as the M1A1/A2 either. It's thicker, in all the appropriate places I'm sure, the wedge hull/keel, and areas facing a potential blast, but it's not the same type of composite armor as the Abrams. I expect the details of the MRAP's armor are classified as well, but I would guess, overall, it's inferior to our MBT.

Maybe the same ol' RPG, but with a different payload metal, instead of copper?

[krispos42]

12. Yeah, tanks have their uses, but this isn't one of them.

If all they have is small arms, then an armored personnel carrier is as safe as a main battle tank. If they have rockets, then all the tank's armor isn't a useful as you'd think it would be.


Now in general battle, with artillery rounds and other things falling all around you, more armor is a definate plus. And you have more targets for the big guns those tanks mount. Other vehicles, fortified positions, etc.

[Hubert Flottz]

13. It's creating jobs...for the 63Charlie20s

For it is written..."War Is Hell!"

Shouldn't be taken lightly when it comes to invading, because after all the hype, war is, was and always will be, painful and bloody for the soldiers who do ALL the dirty work. Politicians/cheerleaders with no skin in the games they play abroad, never do get dirty or bloody when they start all the shit and speak 24/7 of the glory of "winning." Take GI Joe LIEberman for example, or George W Bush the AWOL, or five deferment Dick Cheney...they all think war is a great idea!

[Toots]

14. I chose 67 November

"Float like a butterfly and sting like a bee"

[martymar64]

15. It also creates work for the 91's that have to try to repair the human wreckage

More death and destruction and needless waste of human life.


Fuck war. Bring our men and women home from the Graveyard of Empires known as Afghanistan.