Fog Of War

Goodness knows I have no fondness for much of the nonsense that goes on in military units. At the same time I acknowledge that this is based on my limited personal experience from 40+ years ago. Today's military is a much different beast from the one I was a part of in the Viet Nam era.

I have the utmost respect for those individuals who choose to place themselves at the sharp end of the spear. In this particular case I'm speaking of the U.S. Navy Seals who were involved in attempt to rescue British hostage Linda Norgrove from terrorists.

Yes, an error - a tragic, tragic error - was made. And yes, there was some confusion in reporting the events. But unless you've been there and experienced the fog of war, the pressure to make an instantaneous life or death decision, then don't second-guess the people in that situation. Have the decency to withhold judgment until all the facts are known, and then temper any judgment with the realization that it's easy to play back the video in super slow motion, but when you have split seconds to make a decision it's a totally different situation.

Here's some excerpts from a pretty detailed account of the rescue operation. (Here's a second account.)

The only realistic option was for the US special forces to descend on the target compound out of the night sky, sliding down ropes, guns blazing. Far away, in the taskforce headquarters, the operation was being watched on six big screens, each showing a live feed from a different source — the drones, the helicopters and even the Seals' helmet cameras. It was not the sharp green clarity as portrayed Hollywood films – sometimes a feed would be lost as an aircraft made a turn for example – but the unfolding action was clear enough.

Sliding down ropes from a helicopter into a hostile encampment. Senior officers watching on video screens far, far away. This is not a Hollywood movie. This is real-time real life. If you hesitate you're quite likely dead.

In the first few violent minutes, the plan seemed to be working. The six abductors holding Norgrove stumbled out of their huts into the central compound and were shot and killed. What the Seals did not see however, was one of the insurgents dragging Linda Norgrove out of a hut with him.

She managed to break away and lay down, hunched up in the foetal position – the safest thing to do given the hail of gunfire around her – but on that moonless night, the Seals did not spot her, even with their night vision goggles.

Fog of war...

To the horror of the senior officers watching back at headquarters, the six big screens were lit up by a blast that seemed to come from the vicinity of Norgrove and the insurgent closest to her, and soon afterward word came from the returning helicopters that Norgrove was mortally wounded. The operation had failed.

The immediate assumption was that the blast had come from a suicide bomb, as it is not unusual for insurgents to slip into suicide vests if there is a risk of attack.

Late on Sunday, however, the taskforce commander acted on a hunch and asked to see the video of the assault stored on the computer hard drive at its headquarters. Running through it again, he spotted one Seal, standing on the roof of one of the huts, toss something underhand into the compound. Four seconds later the screen went bright from the explosion. He called the team in and asked who had thrown a grenade. One man stepped forward.

Let's not lose focus here. An unarmed civilian aid worker was kidnapped by terrorists. Based on history and intelligence intercepts her fate was dismal at best, fatal most likely. The best option to save her was a military strike. Limited time and geographical constraints dictated who would make that effort. Would it have been better to have stood down and done nothing, accepting that Ms. Norgrove would most likely be killed or moved to a location where rescue would have been impossible.

By late last week it was clear, according to sources, that Norgrove's life was in very grave danger. One group of local elders was calling for her execution, talking of killing her like "the Russian" some years before, an apparent reference to the long war with the Soviet army, in which captured soldiers were often slaughtered in horrifying ways.

The other option her captors were debating was shipping Norgrove to North Waziristan, the tribal territory in western Pakistan, which is almost entirely outside the control of government forces, and where it would be virtually impossible to keep track of the British woman and her abductors.

I'm not condoning any failure to follow orders or procedures. But I'm also not second-guessing the people who slid down those ropes into God-knows-what. Imagine leaning out of a helicopter and staring down into the darkness, knowing that armed men are waiting for you down there. And then leaning forward even more and falling into the great unknown.

We should thank those people, not pillory them.

If I'm ever in the position that Linda Norgrove was in, I'd much rather take my chances with a rescue attempt than abandon myself to the tender mercies [*snort*] of a gaggle of raghead camel-fuckers.