IDF Suffers a Friendly Fire Incident
IDF Suffers a Friendly Fire Incident
January 6th, 2009
Gunfighter 6 Gulf War 1 friendly fire incident
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A lot of ugly things happen in war; this is among the ugliest.
Cleared for publication: Three IDF soldiers were killed and 24 others were injured, one critically and three seriously on Monday evening, in a friendly fire incident in northern Gaza.
Among the fatalities were two officers and a soldier. Colonel Avi Peled, commander of the Golani Brigade sustained minor injuries in the incident.
According to the IDF Spokesman’s Unit, the grave incident occurred when a tank, deployed as part of Operation Cast Lead, accidentally fired a live round at an abandoned building in Jabalya, in which Golani forces, who were operating in the area, took cover.
Friendly fire is of course not new but it is a horrible thing and based on personal experiences, it leaves a soldier feeling as helpless as anything else.
Anytime a fellow soldier is killed it is a gut-wrenching experience but I always found comfort in what enevitably came to bear on the perpetartors. Being personally involved in that act of justice made it even sweeter.
Therein lies the biggest problem with responding to friendly fire; you can’t. Other than screaming cease fire into a radio and ducking, there is zero you can do.
As anyone who has been in combat knows, the fog of war is hell. Decisions are made in split seconds and people die as a result of those decisions. One always hopes that it is the bad guys who die but in the chaos that is war, sometimes people make mistakes.
But what if it happened in a totally controlled environment where no split second decision was needed. The only driving force seemed to be one commander’s need to kill something.
Almost 20 years ago, Jonn and I experienced just such a case. It wasn’t pretty.
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Some clarifications:
a. The Norfolk Line was about 20 miles wide. That’s approximately half a kilometer between combat vehicles. With generation one thermals, I could see the vehicle on my left but little more.
b. LTC Hillman did not “anchor” his line with a Bradley and a M113. The line was anchored by my Bradley and my wingman. The Bradley and M113 that was engaged belonged to the Task Force Scout Platoon. The Scout Platoon SGT, SFC Richard Miller’s Bradley experienced a total failure of his Integrated Sight Unit. The M113 housed a Ground Surveillence Radar section whose radar was also inoperative. They were pulled off the screen line which was running at a right angle and rear of the battle line. They pulled in a couple of hundred yards east of my position and were planning to wait until daylight for maintenance.
c. At the 3:42 mark, the Apache gun jams. I saw two tracers fly over my head and immediately started a series of radio calls to find out what they were shooting at.
d. At the 5:05 mark, the Apaches turn to black hot. SFC Miller’s driver can be seen beside the Bradley.
e. At the 5:58 mark, the two hot spots running from the explosion were in fact two men from the GSR section.
f. At the 6:31 mark, our Battalion S3 is flashing the net with a cease fire warning from me. He called me back on my internal and asked if there were any survivors. I said I didn’t know but that we were moving in to get them out. He ordered me to stay put until he could confirm a cease fire. I disobeyed his order.
SFC Miller’s gunner CPL Middleton and Observer PVT Talley were killed on impact; we got the rest out; all wounded. We recovered Talley and most of Middleton.
Ellie
