C-4 connected with propane tanks with old Iraqi Army artillery shells that were to be remotely triggered by cell phone. We were lucky that the man jumped the gun a little early, actually hitting another car.
F.ck me and quoting Keanu from Speed "that's enough to put a hole in the world" lol
See thats the thing, these bombs have killed MANY more Iraqi's than us. Although, IED's were the #1 thing that killed most of the coalition soldiers.
That's the sad part of this war in that these insurgents are willing to trade 10 of their lives just to get 1 US/Coalition personnel. Moreover they are so indiscriminate in who they blow up and I don't know how they can sleep at night knowing they have killed a mother with her babies as collateral damage.
I'm not a bigot but there is no place on Earth for Islamic extremists and fundamentalists who want to turn society and women rights back to the Stone Age and live under the barbaric Sharia Law! I can't want for the day when the oil runs dry and/or other technologies take out the Western world's reliance on crude oil. Just like was said in
Body of Lies the Middle East will return to the Stone Age with no economy.
But what I was getting at when I started this paragraph off is that the constant state of readiness you had to have for an enemy that as invisible really messes with your mind. You are alert 24-7 every damn day for over a year and since I have been home I have had trouble sleeping that that was 5 years ago.
I understand what you're saying, you've just gone from a YEAR of CONSTANTLY checking roof tops for snipers, turning around all the time thinking somebody is following you and watching your 6, mortars landing inside the Green Zone if you were ever there or your FOB etc? Then you return home and I don't care what anybody says you simply can't just turn off perpetually being at at high state of readiness all the time. Unfortunately at lot of men eat their guns because of PTSD.
How is your Veteran Affairs Department, have they helped you out in any way, maybe access to a psychologist/counsellor? Our VA Dept is top notch but then again we only had a couple of the 1000 troops at any one stage rather than you guys with tens of 1000s of military personnel in Afghanistan and Iraq over the 10 years...
I should also clarify that even though is says stay back 100 meters or you will be shot, we were pretty much told to not engage them unless they were aggressively coming at you at a much closer range.
What was your ROE, were you allowed to fire warning shots over their heads or was that too hostile and the possibility of hitting something or someone in the background?
It did not bother me because almost everything portrayed in the movie is false
That must piss you off that movie makes up so many things in the movie that don't happen in real life. People must says to you that "so that's what it's like in Iraq for EOD or infantry"? When it makes their are so many erroneous scenes, dialogue and down right scenarios going against Standard Operating Procedures that it is embarrassing. The only one good thing you pointed out is where they filmed in Jordan looks like Iraq.
You serve anywhere?
I'm only an Australian Army Reservist with the 4th/3rd Battalion, The Royal New South Wales Regiment.
http://www.army.gov.au/Who-we-are/Divisions-and-Brigades/Forces-Comman d/2nd-Division/5th-Brigade/4th_3rd-Battalion-The-Royal-New-South-Wales -Regiment
I have had a mate serve in the Royal Australian Armoured Corps in Iraq providing escort in ASLAVs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASLAV for VIP transport such as Diplomatic personnel in a convoy along "Route Irish", the road from Baghdad to the Green Zone, he had several contacts in his 7 month deployment from small arms fired luckily not from an RPG-7 which would destroy the ASLAV.
All our conventional troops pulled out by the end of last year leaving only our Special Operations Task Group (SOTG) which is our SASR and 1st/2nd Commando Regiments. Even when we had our conventional troops over there unless you were say a "Commando, Military Police, Fuel Specialist, Signals Corps Officer, Medical or Nursing Officer to name a few then no general infantry reservist is going to be deployed to either Afghanistan or Iraq.
However I have however participated in Exercise Talisman Saber which was a great experience cross training with the Yanks:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Talisman_Saber If you're not willing to give up everything, you've already lost
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michaeluk26
10 years ago
F.ck me and quoting Keanu from Speed "that's enough to put a hole in the world" lol
Oh there would have been massive casualties. We are talking dozens and dozens of Iraqi Citizens deaths, the 5 of us, and hundreds of injuries. At first we suspected that this man had done this against his will. He could have blown the car by hand which would have been much easier and much more likely to go off. However in our report we concluded that had he done it against his will, the person with the cell phone trigger would have still blown it anyways and killed as many as possible. Who knows? The insurgents had unlimited explosives as during the 2003 invasion dozens of Saddams weapons sites were unguarded until it was to late.
That's the sad part of this war in that these insurgents are willing to trade 10 of their lives just to get 1 US/Coalition personnel. Moreover they are so indiscriminate in who they blow up and I don't know how they can sleep at night knowing they have killed a mother with her babies as collateral damage.
I'm not a bigot but there is no place on Earth for Islamic extremists and fundamentalists who want to turn society and women rights back to the Stone Age and live under the barbaric Sharia Law! I can't want for the day when the oil runs dry and/or other technologies take out the Western world's reliance on crude oil. Just like was said in Body of Lies the Middle East will return to the Stone Age with no economy.
Haters gonna hate
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michaeluk26
10 years ago
F.ck me and quoting Keanu from Speed "that's enough to put a hole in the world" lol
Oh there would have been massive casualties. We are talking dozens and dozens of Iraqi Citizens deaths, the 5 of us, and hundreds of injuries. At first we suspected that this man had done this against his will. He could have blown the car by hand which would have been much easier and much more likely to go off. However in our report we concluded that had he done it against his will, the person with the cell phone trigger would have still blown it anyways and killed as many as possible. Who knows? The insurgents had unlimited explosives as during the 2003 invasion dozens of Saddams weapons sites were unguarded until it was to late.
That's the sad part of this war in that these insurgents are willing to trade 10 of their lives just to get 1 US/Coalition personnel. Moreover they are so indiscriminate in who they blow up and I don't know how they can sleep at night knowing they have killed a mother with her babies as collateral damage.
I'm not a bigot but there is no place on Earth for Islamic extremists and fundamentalists who want to turn society and women rights back to the Stone Age and live under the barbaric Sharia Law! I can't want for the day when the oil runs dry and/or other technologies take out the Western world's reliance on crude oil. Just like was said in Body of Lies the Middle East will return to the Stone Age with no economy.
Those very reasons are why the Sunni's, who were allied with Al Qaeda and responsible for most of the violence, finally realized that Al Qaeda was the one doing all the damage, not the coalition. When that happened everything changed. You know, knowing the war was bogus as there were no WMD's, you know what that war did that was good? We set up shop in the Middle East and brought them to us, getting them to fight and decimate as many as possible. While this was going on they were not worried about attacking the American Homeland. The middle east IS the stone ages as far as I am concerned.
I understand what you're saying, you've just gone from a YEAR of CONSTANTLY checking roof tops for snipers, turning around all the time thinking somebody is following you and watching your 6, mortars landing inside the Green Zone if you were ever there or your FOB etc? Then you return home and I don't care what anybody says you simply can't just turn off perpetually being at at high state of readiness all the time. Unfortunately at lot of men eat their guns because of PTSD.
How is your Veteran Affairs Department, have they helped you out in any way, maybe access to a psychologist/counsellor? Our VA Dept is top notch but then again we only had a couple of the 1000 troops at any one stage rather than you guys with tens of 1000s of military personnel in Afghanistan and Iraq over the 10 years...
Exactly. Everyone expects you to return home the same person. There is just no way for them to understand what we have went through. I remember right when I got home a few days later I thought, "I was engaged in firefights a week ago, and now I am standing in Wal Mart, what the hell do I do", almost exactly like it is shown at the end of this film.
The VA has group therapy and private counseling that helps a little. Their main thing is prescribing pills that do nothing but make me feel weird, like a zombie. Ours are overrun with soldiers so with the limited staff you dont get much attention.
What was your ROE, were you allowed to fire warning shots over their heads or was that too hostile and the possibility of hitting something or someone in the background?
Thats the thing, they were CONSTANTLY changing and were ALWAYS giving me the enemy the upper hand as they would figure them out quickly. Warning shots were supposed to be low enough to warn but not low enough to kill anyone. However, once they broke a certain barrier or made an aggressive act we were to light up the engine and them if the engine is not destroyed. The Insurgents would use children and women and shields. They would hide is mosques and snipe at us, knowing damn well we were never going to be given permission to return fire. Read up or the 82nd Airborne and see how we had the highest or 2nd highest casualty rate not only in Iraq but Afghanistan, which I was not at.
TThat must piss you off that movie makes up so many things in the movie that don't happen in real life. People must says to you that "so that's what it's like in Iraq for EOD or infantry"? When it makes their are so many erroneous scenes, dialogue and down right scenarios going against Standard Operating Procedures that it is embarrassing. The only one good thing you pointed out is where they filmed in Jordan looks like Iraq.
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Eh, people have already made up their minds about us. When people ask me if thats what its really like I just tell them there is no way to properly explain it, and there is not. People like us know, but the civ have no idea and nothing will help them.
I could tell you had served in some sort of military by the way you were talking. Convoy security is the worst aside from foot patrols. A convoy is a juicy target, as they know a VIP is inside. Convoy security is where most casualties came from. They were the #1 IED target.
Haters gonna hate
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