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Thread: Worst US loss of life in Afghan war as helicopter shot down - 31 Special Forces killed

  1. #1

    Worst US loss of life in Afghan war as helicopter shot down - 31 Special Forces killed

    The US suffered its worst single loss of life in the nearly 10-year Afghan war when a helicopter carrying 31 special forces soldiers crashed on Friday night in the east of the country.

    Both the Taliban, via a spokesman reached by telephone, and Afghan officials in Wardak province, to the west of Kabul, said insurgents had shot down the Chinook helicoter with a rocket.

    Nato would only confirm that "there was enemy activity in the area" and that the US-led alliance was still trying to work out what had happened. US air force captain Justin Brockhoff, a Nato spokesman, said: "We are in the process of accessing the facts."

    A western official said 37 people were on board, all of whom were killed. The Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, said the helicopter was carrying 31 US special forces and seven members of the Afghan national army.

    It is very unusual for Nato deaths from a single incident to reach double figures. The previous most deadly day for foreign troops was in June 2005 when 16 US soldiers were killed when a Taliban rocket hit a Chinook in the eastern province of Kunar.

    The crash happened at 3am when the helicopter was hovering over the town of Tangi Joi Zareen, in the district of Saidabad, according to a spokesman for the provincial governor.

    A Taliban spokesman, Zabiullah Mujahid, said Nato attacked a house in the district where insurgent fighters were gathering. He said eight insurgents died in the fighting.

    Special forces from many nations, including the UK, conduct up to half a dozen such operations every night, usually targeting mid-level insurgent commanders whose whereabouts are pinpointed by high-tech intelligence gathering teams.

    The downing of a helicopter, quite apart from the massive loss of life, will alarm war planners who rely heavily on Nato's air superiority in the fight against the Taliban. They will want to discover whether the aircraft was downed by a lucky shot from a rocket-propelled grenade, a highly inaccurate weapon, or by something more sophisticated.

    The Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s was greatly hindered by portable Stinger missile systems provided by the US and the far less effective Blowpipe weapons provided by the UK. Nato forces have intercepted so-called Manpads, or man-portable air defence systems, illegally smuggled from Iran and there have been recorded incidents when they have been used.

    Classified military reports released by WikiLeaks last year showed that the US military covered up a reported surface-to-air missile strike that downed a Chinook helicopter over Helmand, killing seven soldiers.



    http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011...opter-crash-38
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  3. #2
    Rest in Peace

    How much more Blood and Treasure are we willing to spend?
    "They sure like eating their marshmallows."

  4. #3
    Wonder if this claim by the Taliban came before or after the news got out that the 'copter crashed?
    Quote Originally Posted by Swordsmyth View Post
    We believe our lying eyes...

  5. #4
    First thing I read this morning. Tragic. This exercise in nation building really needs to end.

  6. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by flightlesskiwi View Post
    First thing I read this morning. Tragic. This exercise in nation building really needs to end.
    Nationbuilding is such an oxymoron--downright Orwellian in its resemblance to a Ministry of Peace dedicated to war.

    These nations are nations, and we can't build them until we bomb the living snot out of them. Nationbreaking would be a better term.
    Quote Originally Posted by Swordsmyth View Post
    We believe our lying eyes...

  7. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by acptulsa View Post
    Nationbuilding is such an oxymoron--downright Orwellian in its resemblance to a Ministry of Peace dedicated to war.

    These nations are nations, and we can't build them until we bomb the living snot out of them. Nationbreaking would be a better term.
    True indeed.

  8. #7
    How convenient. The SEALS that "killed" Bin Laden were on the helicopter. Guess we'll never hear details about how they killed and dumped him in the sea. http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/08...est=latestnews

  9. #8
    ..
    Last edited by Jace; 09-20-2011 at 10:59 AM.



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  11. #9
    Quote Originally Posted by Aden View Post
    How convenient. The SEALS that "killed" Bin Laden were on the helicopter. Guess we'll never hear details about how they killed and dumped him in the sea. http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/08...est=latestnews
    Dead men tell no tales.

    That's how the regime "rolls".

  12. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by Philmanoman View Post
    Rest in Peace

    How much more Blood and Treasure are we willing to spend?
    as much as it takes to satisfy TPTB.
    Quote Originally Posted by Torchbearer
    what works can never be discussed online. there is only one language the government understands, and until the people start speaking it by the magazine full... things will remain the same.
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  13. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by Anti Federalist View Post
    Dead men tell no tales.

    That's how the regime "rolls".
    +a zillion Any sort of police/military action at the federal level (and in many local level cases), there seems to be a "leave no survivors" policy (with few exceptions in which they just want to steal stuff and make examples of folks to put the fear of the State into everyone else).

    The propaganda spread by people like John Walsh doesn't help. (he, I believe, is well-meaning but naive and ignorant, btw)
    Last edited by heavenlyboy34; 08-06-2011 at 12:12 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Torchbearer
    what works can never be discussed online. there is only one language the government understands, and until the people start speaking it by the magazine full... things will remain the same.
    Hear/buy my music here "government is the enemy of liberty"-RP Support me on Patreon here Ephesians 6:12

  14. #12
    Wait wait.. facts are important... you guys are jumping to conclusions, are you?

    Where specifically does it say that the people were killed were definitely the same people that "killed" "OBL?"

  15. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by asurfaholic View Post
    Wait wait.. facts are important... you guys are jumping to conclusions, are you?

    Where specifically does it say that the people were killed were definitely the same people that "killed" "OBL?"
    The story is changing.

    It was first reported that it was SEAL Six, then it wasn't, then it was, but not the same SEALs that played a role in the imaginary OBL raid.
    Last edited by Anti Federalist; 08-06-2011 at 12:46 PM.

  16. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by Anti Federalist View Post
    The story is changing.

    It was first reported that it was SEAL Six, then it wasn't, then it was, but not the same SEALs that played a role in the imaginary OBL raid.
    From what I gathered from reading OPs link was that it was members from the same... group?, but didn't exactly say it was the OBL assassination team.

    The incident also marks a dramatic change of fortune for US special forces whose daring midnight helicopter assaults received worldwide publicity in May when members of Seal Team 6 staged a successful raid on Bin Laden's hideout deep in Pakistan.

    Last year it was revealed that the US covered up a reported surface-to-air missile strike that shot down a Chinook helicopter over Helmand in 2007.

    In the past two years night raids have become a key weapon in the fight against the Taliban, with up to six operations carried out every night. The extraordinary pace of operations has been credited with weakening the insurgency in some areas, forcing the Taliban to replace killed or captured commanders with younger and less experienced men.

    Night raids have frequently enraged public opinion, however, and President Karzai has repeatedly called for them to be scrapped.

    However, Nato officials say that it is far preferable to conduct such operations at night, because this greatly reduces the risk of all-out battles that could create even greater public anger.
    Interesting how this came out. I see only a reference to the entire Special Forces.. I guess the organization as a whole credits itself for killing OBL, and this is bad news, contrasting the previous good news.

  17. #15
    This whole thing is bad news.. We lost a good number of very worthy young people fighting in an endless war. So sad that people can't wake up before things get deep.

    I wonder why there is so much public outrage there. Wonder if its because Nato operations are very shady and unethical in any manner, and as people see the horrors they grow hate. I wouldn't trust Nato to tell the truth about anything.

  18. #16
    wtf, they put over 30 SPECIAL FORCES on ONE helicopter? I don't know much about the military or their strategies but who was the idiot who ordered this?
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  20. #17
    Quote Originally Posted by redbluepill View Post
    wtf, they put over 30 SPECIAL FORCES on ONE helicopter? I don't know much about the military or their strategies but who was the idiot who ordered this?
    That's why the whole thing is fishy.

    Our troops have woken up, though. They are sick of this crap, and are showing their support for Ron Paul. We need to reach out to them in even more powerful ways to show them that 10 years of war and death is not the way it has to be.

  21. #18
    This was most likely an entire SEAL platoon from the same SEAL Team 6 DEVGRU that conducted OBL raid, but all accounts are that it is not the same personnel. To put this into perspective, the 22 SEALs that died account for about 1% of the total SEAL force. It takes 3 years and well over $1 million dollars each to train a single SEAL to be deployment ready.

  22. #19
    Quote Originally Posted by redbluepill View Post
    wtf, they put over 30 SPECIAL FORCES on ONE helicopter? I don't know much about the military or their strategies but who was the idiot who ordered this?
    Info was that this was during hours of darkness, and it is really hard to fly multiple aircraft together on a mission with only night vision gear without bad things happening. We have a RPF member with more knowledge about this than I do, who will hopefully be able to provide better information about night flying.
    Out of every one hundred men they send us, ten should not even be here. Eighty will do nothing but serve as targets for the enemy. Nine are real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, upon them depends our success in battle. But one, ah the one, he is a real warrior, and he will bring the others back from battle alive.

    Duty is the most sublime word in the English language. Do your duty in all things. You can not do more than your duty. You should never wish to do less than your duty.

  23. #20
    Read this:

    One current and one former U.S. official said that the dead included more than 20 Navy SEALs from SEAL Team Six, the unit that carried out the raid in Pakistan in May that killed bin Laden.
    source: hxxp://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44043847/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/?gt1=43001#.Tj3B4YL67B9

  24. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by JackieDan View Post
    Read this:



    source: hxxp://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44043847/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/?gt1=43001#.Tj3B4YL67B9
    Would make sense to eliminate the supposed Osama Bin Laden killers cut off any loose ends.

  25. #22
    Same team, different platoon. Each team has 6 platoons.

  26. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by pacodever View Post
    Same team, different platoon. Each team has 6 platoons.
    Thought most of the Teams have 8 platoons? All part of the build up of SF capability.
    Out of every one hundred men they send us, ten should not even be here. Eighty will do nothing but serve as targets for the enemy. Nine are real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, upon them depends our success in battle. But one, ah the one, he is a real warrior, and he will bring the others back from battle alive.

    Duty is the most sublime word in the English language. Do your duty in all things. You can not do more than your duty. You should never wish to do less than your duty.

  27. #24
    Not sure. DEVGRU may have a different structure too.



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  29. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by pacodever View Post
    Not sure. DEVGRU may have a different structure too.
    I would expect that they do.
    Out of every one hundred men they send us, ten should not even be here. Eighty will do nothing but serve as targets for the enemy. Nine are real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, upon them depends our success in battle. But one, ah the one, he is a real warrior, and he will bring the others back from battle alive.

    Duty is the most sublime word in the English language. Do your duty in all things. You can not do more than your duty. You should never wish to do less than your duty.

  30. #26
    Quote Originally Posted by Anti Federalist View Post
    Dead men tell no tales.

    That's how the regime "rolls".
    Wow. What an eye opener. Just wow....

  31. #27
    told ya

    In that incident, 16 Navy SEALs and Army special operations troops were killed when their craft was shot down while on a mission to rescue four SEALs under attack by the Taliban. Three of the SEALs being rescued were also killed and the fourth wounded. It was the highest one-day death toll for the Navy Special Warfare personnel since World War II.
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  32. #28
    Rest in piece brothers.
    Last edited by AFPVet; 08-06-2011 at 06:50 PM.
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  33. #29
    Anyone else find it a bit odd that it just happened to be the seal team that supposedly got bin laden? I guess we will never know the truth now...
    America is at that awkward stage; it's too late to work within the system, but too early to shoot the bastards.

  34. #30
    Quote Originally Posted by LoneWolf View Post
    Anyone else find it a bit odd that it just happened to be the seal team that supposedly got bin laden? I guess we will never know the truth now...
    Why would it be odd ? As if the biggest criminal organization in the world, the US Govt, hasnt ever done naughty things. That's all they do, 24/7 like clockwork...rip, rape and pillage the planet.

    The whole thing from the OBL 'killing' to now this is a 100% orchestrated event.
    Last edited by Echoes; 08-06-2011 at 07:55 PM.

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