Sherlock Panetta finds a clue
Leon Panetta found time between his intra-coastal romps on taxpayers’ dime to admit that which the rest of the world has known for several months now; that the green-on-blue attacks are part of a Taliban strategy to destroy the partnership between Afghan forces and NATO troops, says Stars & Stripes;
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta this week blamed the Taliban for the increasing number of green-on-blue attacks, a departure from previous comments in which he and other military leaders had downplayed the group’s involvement.
“The reality is, the Taliban has not been able to regain any territory lost, so they’re resorting to these kinds of attacks to create havoc,” Panetta told reporters in a Pentagon press briefing Tuesday. “We have not and will not allow this kind of intimidation to undermine our efforts to build up the Afghan National Security Force and try to put it more and more in the lead.”
This is a departure from previous policy statements from the Defense Department which compared the attacks to a bar fight with fully automatic weapons;
“[The shootings are] usually related to people getting into arguments,” Lt. Col. David Simons, spokesman for the NATO Training Mission-Afghanistan, told Stars and Stripes in April 2011.
“Let’s put it in the vernacular of a bar fight. But here, they have weapons,” Simons said. “It’s just, somebody told them to do something. Or they didn’t like the way they were talked to.”
Well, that was until the Taliban started broadcasting videos of the welcome home parades for murderers who got away with their dastardly deeds. And until the White House started making statements about the effects of these cowardly attacks were said to have a “negligible” effect on the overall strategy.
Apparently, turning their desks to face the door hasn’t been enough of a deterrent, so they’ve got a new program with yet another cutesy name;
One of those steps is a “guardian angel” program that would provide security during meetings between NATO and Afghan troops, which Panetta said “involves identifying one individual to stand to the side so that he can watch people’s backs and hopefully identify people who would be involved in these attacks.”
One person. I wonder if they’ll give him a target to put on his chest…or maybe a special reflective PT belt. Will he be armed or just really good at shouting “Look out!”
Category: Terror War
How about.. our guys are armed and their guys aren’t. They should get the non-body scanner TSA treatment.
Golly, gee, whiz. This is almost as special as Panetta figuring out that there’s a war on, and that the candidates aren’t talking about it. Maybe even more special.
Nooooo! Really??? Mr. Panetta done figgered out them there opp-oh-zisshun persons is out ta get our boys? All by hisself?
Whatta guy!
How about, our guys are armed, and their guys are naked, after having gone thru a full body X-ray scan (to pick up those rectal bombs).
“Guardian Angel” program my ass. They’ll probably have to have an OIC and several weeks of a selection process by a contractor to be allowed to do what it really is; being a Soldier in a war zone. Probably will have a reflective belt though…
How hard is it to allow a Soldier to carry a loaded weapon? How many Soldiers have shot an Afghan during training? Any Blue on Green stats? None? Ok, so wtf is the problem again?
Ok, here we go. The personnel shot by the Afghan turncoats or whatever you want to call them, were almost always armed. Those that are not armed are usually being complacent or ignorant of where they are. There are many military personnel over here right now that have no business being in a warzone, but here they are. I have to remind personnel that I am escorting to return and get their rifles, helmets, I.D.’s etc etc. While conducting PSD at ANA/ANP sites mysweslf or my Marines get yelled at by coalition personnel about our security posture, being in full PPE, or being intimidating. It really is quite amusing, until you realize these jacknecks are allowed outside the wire. I wish I could tell you what actually happened at a bunch of these incidents, unfortunately we cannot (as I am sure you all understand). I can say however, that a majority of these incidents were caused by inadequate training, complacency or just plain cowardice (it’s sad but true). Inside the DFAC at one of the camps in Kabul, there was an ND. Do you know what the reaction of 90% of the DFAC patrons was? They hid under the table, did not draw weapons to defend themselves, and decided to rely on someone else to save them. Now thankfully this was just an ND, but what if it wasn’t? I have had U.S. military show up for the mission brief without any ammo loaded in mags, when asked they replied that “it was too heavy, and I won’t need it”, the first thing my principles always do when we pull into a site is drop all their gear, and I mean all of it. No one ever takes notes during mission briefs, only my SecFor. I have a hard time placing the blame on higher with these, as all the policies ensuring we can defend ourselves are in place, and most afghans are not armed inside their camps, especially in Kabul. I have yet to be to a site yet that has not allowed us to be armed, and if… Read more »
Sorry, that was me above forgot to put my name. To add to all this, the Guardian Angel concept has been in use since 2003, it’s nothing new. It applies to both kinetic and non-kinetic environments and is quite effective.
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