[Reader-list] The War on Iraq IQ Test

[Rana Dasgupta]

> 17. Q: How many casualties did the Iraqi military
> inflict on the western 
> forces
> during the Gulf War ?
> A: 0 

This is not quite true.  

148 americans and 16 brits died during the war.  

what is true, however, is that a higher percentage of
these deaths than in any other modern war was
accounted for by "friendly fire" - what the military
calls "fratricide".  

Of the 16 British soldiers who died, nine were killed
by Americans.  35 of the 148 americans were killed by
friendly fire. 

(Iraqi deaths were estimated at 50,000, with 100,000
wounded.)

a significant focus of military technology since that
war has been how to identify friendly troops before
firing.  

(of course there were makeshift solutions - if you
turned your geiger counters on a smoking tank and
found it emitting high levels of radiation it was
probably iraqi because only the americans were firing
depleted uranium.)  

but the pentagon thought a better system was needed
and spent 10 years and $175 million on the Battlefield
Combat Identification System.  

A tank equipped with this system would send an
electronic signal toward its target before firing. If
the target was "friendly," it would detect the signal
and reply, preventing the first tank from firing.
Enemy targets, as well as any vehicle not equipped
with the system, would be unable to detect or respond
to the signal. 

the system has been more or less abandoned because it
was not good enough.  soldiers are going into this war
very frightened of fratricide.

http://www.sltrib.com/2003/Mar/03092003/nation_w/36578.asp

R

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