this article was posted on IDF as well.
I'll leave my reply here....
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Face saving I see.... this thing looks more and more sinister as they make excuses....
Pakistani forces were "unusually accurate" as they fired shots on an Afghan-United States patrol on November 26, an American officer stationed in Afghanistan has said, providing new details about the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation attack that could put fresh strains on the already tattered US-Pak relations.
Well first thing is first...yes Pakistani forces stationed there are trained, unlike the rag tag talibs they face there, and they are battle hardened. Which then should raise questions....
What were the casualties on the other side? did Pakistani forces ever injure anyone with their fire? We know full well that Pakistani forces had the ability of causing casualties, they could well have shot Afghan/ISAF personnel in cold blood. Hell if they really saw a threat they would opened up with the mortars they had available there...
So this is strange.... Pakistani forces who were armed to deal with any threat from the ground, they were trained and armed enough to cause massive casualties to the other side. But they didn't. Was it that they fired warning shots? (we've seen this before; where a NATO gunship had entered our airspace and Pakistani troops with 12.7mm anti-air guns fired warning shots)
Before we even begin to contemplate all of the above, we must ask ourselves, why they where there in OUR territory in the first place? They trespassed! Did they expect to receive sweets and garlands? They should prepare themselves for bullets or warning shots for that matter.
Now here are their list of excuses... You see for yourself how trustworthy they are...
- First it was chasing terrorists under the guidance of Afghan police...
- Secondly, they say that the taliban led them into our territory, no saying what caused our troops deaths.
- Then they say that it was highly likely that they caused the deaths, no word of the distress call PA sent to them, and their response.
- Then they say that PA/GoP authorized the strike, needless to say, why would they come up with such a story, when NATO had knowledge of the location of our checkpoints?
- Now they say they came under fire after they trespassed into OUR territory, well I wonder who told them they'd receive garlands and sweets for trespassing in our territory?
He said a joint patrol of 120 Afghan and American Special Operations soldiers had come under Pakistani fire as it was entering an Afghan village, endangering Afghan civilians as well as the soldiers., The New York Times reported on Friday.
NYT.... propaganda machine for Washington.... No surprise there.
Anyway... Now 120 Afghan and American personnel needed to enter a village? Quite high a number, but fair enough.
Now this I find absurd, they said that they chased Taliban into our territory at which point Pakistani checkpoints fired upon them, why the sudden change?
Anyway lets see if this story checks out... International borders along the Durand line are unmarked and there is a leeway of about 400m either side, now if they were in afghan village, would it be possible for Pakistani soldiers almost a kilometer away to fire at them, and that too as the officials say 'surprisingly accurately'?
Of course that story doesn't check out^
Nato claimed that a fighters (unknown whether taliban or PA personnel ( still dodgy since PA personnel especially in the border regions have a very distinct uniform) moved into Afghan territory and fired upon them, and then made a retreat to somewhere near Pakistani positions, bearing in mind that the Pakistani check point and Afghan village where well over a kilometer away from each other.
Now if you've ever been to these areas, you see for yourself that for a man to move 1 km over and around the difficult terrain, steep and tall hills, it can take well over 2 hours to move a kilometer. Judging by the pictures of the wasted checkpoint, this terrain was pretty difficult for anyone to move across, let alone move with gear and guns. Now they say that it was roughly 2 hours between when the firing began and when the 'fighters' returned near the checkpoints.... For them to cover close to 4 kilometers of ground in the space of an hour more or less, just doesn't make any sense.
Another nail in the coffin me thinks^^^^
The report came as the US Central Command (CENTCOM) and NATO said in their investigations that mistakes were made by both the US and Pakistani forces.
By defending their right and sovereignty, where the PA personnel at fault? Hell we can't be sure if they even engaged ISAF? Warning shots may have been mistaken for something else.
In a briefing, the Pentagon said that fire from the Pakistani military posts against the US-led NATO forces was the "catalyst of the tragedy" last month that led to the death of 24 Pakistani soldiers.
I disagree, this clearly shows how trigger happy the US-NATO forces are in our region.
The NYT, in its report, quoted the unnamed American officer as saying "he believed that the Pakistanis had used night-vision technology because their shooting was unusually accurate, even though there were no casualties."
Which again leads us to believe if they could have caused casualties, why didn't they? Where they warning shots, did the ISAF troops have knowledge of this.
Now even more dodgy, since this seems to suggest that this was in the dead of night, how is it conceivable that ISAF ground troops saw supposed fighters retreat to our territory, especially given the range?
Since this was in the dead of night another issue needs to be raised.... how did ISAF ground troops make positive identification of what they thought where Taliban fighters, or a Pakistani position?
It makes no sense.
The paper said that this "important detail", which was not disclosed at the Pentagon briefing, is likely to "further aggravate" US relations with Islamabad.
More lies I suppose.
Two crucial findings of the inquiry report - that the Pakistanis fired first at the joint Afghan-American patrol and that they kept firing even after the Americans tried to warn them that they were shooting at allied troops -- are "likely to further anger Pakistan, and plunge the already tattered relationship between the US and Pakistan to new depths," the paper said.
Hang on just a second there.... On one hand you folks say that PA was warned and told to hold their fire, or face the consequences. On the other hand you have senior NATO and US officials saying that it was a lack of communication (immediate and small scale communication). And then you have PA saying that it was unprovoked and PA contacted NATO first about the incident, to which NATO opened up an attack again.
They are not only contradicting what PA says, but also themselves...
They lie!
Providing a chronology of the events of November 26, Brigadier General Stephen Clark of the Air Force, who conducted the inquiry, said the US-led patrol had planned to raid a village about one mile inside Afghanistan's Kunar province near the Pakistani tribal area of Mohmand.
WOW! another nail in t he coffin.... One whole mile inside their territory, so the distance between the village and the check points is now close to 2 miles.... (edit I've altered the distance I've given above)
As the patrol hiked up steep "goat trails" on a moonless night, it came under "heavy machine-gun" fire from the ridge above close to midnight on November 25.
Heavy MG fire from 2 miles away? Anyone with a little bit of experience will tell you how accurate of a job you can do with a heavy MG at a 2 mile distance. Now standard MG for PA is the MG-3, the MG-3 when mounted has a Max range of about 2km!!!! not 2 miles either, that too at the expense of accuracy.
So to say that they fired from 2 miles away and that too accurately is just pure Bulls**t!
American officials said the first allied forces' mistake was that Pakistan was not informed about the patrol by NATO and so the Pakistani soldiers were not expecting allied forces in the area. After the allied ground forces came under fire, the Americans tried to inform the Pakistanis that they were shooting at US forces.
Again this contradicts their earlier claims and PA's claim.... more pathetic face saving attempts.
"There was no direct verbal communication, but an AC-130 gunship fired flares and an F-15E fighter jet made a deafening, 600-mile-per-hour low-level pass in an effort to signal who they were," the NYT report said.
WOW! This thing is more sinister then I could have imagined....
This proves that they knew that they fired on our troops, they killed our 24 soldiers and they knew that they were firing at us.
There is no question about it.
However, the Pakistanis continued shooting and the AC-130 gunship opened fire for six minutes starting at 11:24 pm. "That strike was set in motion when ground commanders believed they had been told no Pakistani troops were in the area. In fact, NATO was still checking," the paper said.
Now as of 2008 both NATO and PA have knowledge of each other's positions and whereabouts, in this case, PA said that NATO have grid co-ordinates of the Pakistani checkpoints that they fired upon.
So where is the confusion?
Even more so.... You displayed a show of force! If you didn't know that it was PA personnel there, why did you make high speed passes?
If they were taliban or other terrorists, why didn't you just kill them?
More BS!
regards,
