A perverse agenda

The Sun continues its coverage today, ostensibly campaigning for better equipment for "Britain's servicemen and women in Afghanistan." To promote this agenda, it focuses on the Viking, rightly pointing up its vulnerability, but then makes a case that this vehicle continues in use because the Army has "insufficient Mastiff armoured troop carriers".

Having thus reduced complex issues to a pastiche, it then firmly pins the blame on "the Government" for its alleged "failure to show true support", personalising the issue by inviting a "squaddie" to tell us that "I would like Gordon Brown to spend 48 hours with an infantry battalion on the front line."

To complete the parody, the paper then enlists the support of "Tory leader David Cameron", whose support for the "campaign" is duly reported by Conservative Home which also records, with apparent approval, shadow defence secretary Liam Fox accusing the prime minister of leaving British forces to face an uphill struggle while he plays "the invisible man of politics".

This reductio ad absurdum technique is what passes for journalism these days and ignores, as a somewhat inconvenient truth, the fact that the staunchest advocacy for the Viking resides within the military. The MoD itself was extolling its virtues in June, as it has done previously and, as late as this July, the case was still being made.

Furthermore, in a dishonest sleight of hand, the paper fails to make the obvious point, that the Viking and the Mastiff are not comparable vehicles – that the Mastiff could not perform many of the roles currently allocated to the more mobile and lighter tracked vehicle. To do so would destroy its core assertion that troops were being forced into Vikings because of the shortage of Mastiffs.

Nor, to add to the dishonesty, does it recognise that the Viking is scheduled for replacement with the better-armoured and heavier Warthog. One may have views about the utility of thus replacement, but the fact is that the government is responding to concerns about the vulnerability of the Viking, replacing it not with Mastiffs, but with another high-mobility tracked vehicle.

That Cameron should so easily lend his name to The Sun's dishonesty, however, reflects poorly on his political judgement. He is quoted as saying, "Yesterday's front page (pictured) was in a great British tradition which has seen our newspapers so often play a crucial part in holding politicians to account in wartime."

What we are seeing, of course, is cynical exploitation of the deaths of British service personnel in pursuit of a political agenda, without the least attempt to address the factors which are in part responsible for those deaths.

It is right and proper that newspapers should hold our politicians to account in wartime – and more so opposition politicians holding the government to account, something Cameron's defence team has transparently failed to do – but it is quite another for a paper to distort and falsify the arguments in order to pursue an attack on the government.

Here, as we have so often observed, much of the fault – such as it is – with the selection and deployment of vehicles in theatre lies with the military. Ministers do not as a rule challenge military decisions and the likes of The Sun would be (and has been) the first into the fray when it perceives political intervention in such matters.

But then to turn round and blame politicians for the decisions made by the military is perverse. More to the point, it is dangerous. The military command – cravenly hiding behind the skirts of the politicians – escapes any degree of scrutiny and, thus protected, is not held to account for its own mistakes.

By this means, there is no corrective and no deterrent. The military can continue making mistake after mistake, confident in the knowledge that the politicians will take the fall. And if Mr Cameron and his team honestly believe that by supporting this dynamic, they are in any way helping "Our Boys", then they are sadly mistaken. This they will find to their cost when they are in the hot seat.

COMMENT THREAD

They were in a Mastiff

In The Observer today we find published extracts from the diary of a soldier engaged in Operation Panther's Claw. As well as recording his experiences, the account provides a valuable insight into the thinking of one soldier as he grappled with the news of colleagues terribly injured and killed by the growing menace of IEDs.

He himself is shot in the chest and has to be evacuated, but he also finds himself twice in a Viking struck by IEDs. On these occasions, all troops inside survived.

Clearly conscious of the IED threat (he could hardly be otherwise) he asks why the Army does not have more sniffer dogs, suggesting that finding IEDs would be "a lot easier with a furry friend running about and a lot more lives would be saved." He observes that, since arriving, he has not seen one dog.

The pertinence of this observation is reinforced when he learns that another soldier has been killed in an explosion while searching for IEDs. The soldier also observes that, "We are so spread out and overstretched on the ground and it means the Taliban are taking the piss. They can lay these IEDs at fucking will. We are not there at the moment to put out ops or sniper over-watch and the Taliban know it."

Several points emerge from these observations. Firstly, as one might expect – this is not a criticism – the man is interpreting what he sees from his own very narrow perspective.

Thus, while he is clearly aware of the utility of sniffer dogs, he has not necessarily thought the issue through – that in a "kinetic" environment (which this certainly was) dogs and their handlers are extremely vulnerable and tend to be targeted by the Taleban.

As to "ops or sniper over-watch" to counter the IED emplacers, that is an infantry response but, in the context of this overall operation, we have already observed that this was an ideal role for UAVs and, in this piece noted:

In that Panther's Claw is a "deliberate operation" – i.e., one that was planned and executed in an area of choice - the fact that the Taleban had laced the area with IEDs could perhaps have been pre-empted. Not least, troops could have been provided with far more knowledge of their locations and extent than they seem to have been.

Our soldier also writes of being told that a checkpoint spotted "two males lying prone and digging on the track where we keep getting hit." In this instance, he reports with disgust, "...we only fired warning shots at them. Another wasted opportunity." Indeed.

In other instances, we have seen reports of the lethal effect on bomb emplacers of the combination of UAV surveillance and airpower and one wonders why such assets could not have been employed here.

But in another diary entry, we read this appalling observation:

We have spent all that money on a new bomb-proofish vehicle but you've still got four blokes with metal detectors out at the front of it and one commanding them. Sometimes I just don't get it. We need to invest in better bomb detection equipment and get more dogs out here. Surely there is something that we can use to trigger bombs off early?

And, of course, there is. Earlier, we reported on these self-same "primitive" British mine/IED clearance methods, compared with their US counterparts, noting that the USMC were equipped with a 10-vehicle clearance team that included a vehicle equipped with a mine roller, pushed ahead to detonate pressure-pad actuated mines and IEDS, a Husky mine detection vehicle and a number of MRAPs, all manned by specialist combat engineers.

Later, we then noted how the British deficiency had been made up by borrowing "an American anti-explosive unit, Task Force Thor, with specialised vehicles, sweeping the road ahead for the ever-present threat of bombs."

The soldier's comment, where he calls for investment in such kit, displays his own ignorance. The MoD has invested in some of this kit, announced last October as "Project Talisman". A better question, therefore, might have been why the investment was made so late – a question which the media could be asking, but have never bothered with.

The results of this lack of investment have all too often been tragic, but on one occasion the soldier is able to report better news. He is told that two casualties had been flown in, their vehicle hit by a 40kg IED. One "had a bad arm" and that other "his vertebrae done". "They were in a Mastiff," writes our soldier, "that's why they survived. They were both very lucky. The Mastiffs are worth their weight in gold."

Compare and contrast this with the experience of Pte Richard "Hunty" Hunt, as recorded by Sean Rayment in The Sunday Times. As the driver of a Warrior, he was protected by several tons of metal but, as it trundled along a river bed, en route to the main British base at Musa Qala, his vehicle, the 11th in a convoy of 30, hit an IED.

Such was the force of the blast that Pte Hunt's head was smashed against the side of the Warrior. Even though he was wearing a helmet, the impact caused immediate brain damage. Close to death, he was taken to the field hospital at Camp Bastion, where surgeons fought to keep him alive long enough so that he could be flown home to spend his final hours with his family.

Our soldier, of course, was luckier. With his chest wound, he was flown home on a medical flight. There are, he writes, "blokes with no legs on board." He sits next to one lad who is completely deaf. Another tells him he has been hit with IEDs four times while inside a Viking and he's just had enough, too frayed to get inside another vehicle.

It would be facile to suggest that he should have been in a Mastiff, and that mine clearance/detection teams should have preceded him. But the diary of our soldier does suggest very much that our troops are not getting the deal they deserve.

COMMENT THREAD

Coincidence?

In July, we reported the shooting down of a Mi-26 as it was delivering supplies to the British military base at Sangin.

Now we learn from the MoD website that a convoy stretching for five miles and consisting of more than one hundred UK, US and Afghan National Army vehicles set off recently to resupply coalition bases in northern Helmand.

The 116-vehicle convoy, one of the biggest to ever leave Camp Bastion, was travelling a dangerous 40 miles to bases in the Sangin Valley via the outskirts of Gereshk and then off-road through open desert. It took a full day to get to the first base, with a Manoeuvre Operations Group [MOG] in Vikings acting as a screen for the convoy and clearing the path ahead (one of which took an IED hit).

The road convoy was mounted, incidentally, at a time that the US forces are increasingly relying on airlift. Since 2005, there has been an 800 percent increase in air drops – from two to three per week to seven to eight per day. In July, the USAF made 1,700 air drops over Afghanistan. That is the most since the start of the Afghan conflict, in 2001.

Given the considerable manpower required to mount extensive road convoys and the danger of attack, one would have thought that the British would be keen to use helicopters as force multipliers. But then, with 20 tons of lift capacity having been taken out, and the situation obviously very dangerous in Sangin, here we see land convoys being mounted.

Of course, this could be a coincidence. It could be that the British have so many troops that they are short of things to do with them.

COMMENT THREAD

A battle lost?

In our second look at the "Shotvarfet" report in The Independent today, we look specifically at our anonymous Captain's comments about equipment – which form a significant part of the piece.

Leading up to these comments, the human cost of flawed equipment is brought home as the Captain speculates on the effect on those who deal directly with the deaths and injuries, "who have to go into the Viking vehicles after the explosion to pull out the casualties, who have to tourniquet the remaining stumps after both the legs of a person have been blown off, those who have to pick up the leftover pulpy fragments of a disintegrated body and put them into a bag."

The reference to Vikings is especially significant here, as in a number of instances, we have seen recorded their use in supply convoys. Due to the pitiful numbers of support helicopters and Apaches needed to escort them, we are told, every day troops on the ground are forced to expend an enormous amount of hours and manpower just standing still.

They sacrifice their reserves of energy, motivation and willpower securing and picketing routes for the never-ending vehicle convoys that have to keep happening in order to resupply the patchy spread of patrol bases with water, ammo and rations; as well as recovering the vehicles that invariably go into ditches and securing helicopter landing-sites for the evacuation of casualties from improvised explosive device strikes.

The Captain then goes on to say:

If someone provided one of those garishly coloured (army) pie charts depicting the percentage of time and effort sucked up into the black hole of orchestrating these road moves, it would provide a statistic that would be both shocking and embarrassing. It might also partly explain why the military is struggling to gain an advantage over the Taliban and cannot hold a significant amount of ground.

Its energy, time and focus is bound up with those road moves, and our most vital asset, our troops, are either sweating on the sides of the roads, securing them, or sweating inside the vehicles of those often doomed convoys. I am not criticising the military on the ground, who have to deal with this dilemma.

Everyone seems to already agree on this issue of the equipment, in particular the lack of support helicopters – which rather begs the question of how on earth is nothing done about it? And how does the fact that nothing gets done about it seem to be the status quo and keeps occurring year after year, budgetary policy after budgetary policy, operational tour after operational tour?

If a magic genie were to appear in front of my eyes, who in keeping with the spirit of the present credit crunch cutbacks, could afford to grant me just one wish, I think I would simply choose a massive increase in helicopters and pilots – a wish that would have such a crucial influence on what is happening to the British Army out here.

Thus we have the helicopter issue writ large, in particular the logic of replacing time-consuming, expensive convoys and vulnerable convoys with helicopter supplies, the logic of which we explored nearly two years ago.

Here, first hand now, we have evidence of the extraordinarily debilitating effect of the shortage of support helicopters, forcing much of the available effort to be devoted simply to supporting outlying bases – effectively creating the "self-licking lollipop" phenomenon, of which we have written before.

What also comes over from the Captain is the number of troops deployed not only in the convoys, but in securing the routes down which the vehicles travel. Yet, as reported by the MoD website, there are other means of securing road security. The MoD report records how a US Apache helicopter chanced upon a bomb emplacement team, killing two of them, allowing ground troops to move in and remove the bomb.

This points up the role not only of support helicopters, to deliver supplies, but the vital role of airborne surveillance, a role for which light helicopters such as the Kiowa would be admirable, a point we have been making for something like three years.

However, to narrow down the issues simply to "one wish", calling only for more helicopters, is to over-simplify a complex situation and, in some respects, to miss the point. It is most certainly the case that more helicopters are needed but, as we argued earlier, it is important that British troops do not abandon the road network. Their presence is needed to provide security, not only for themselves but for the Afghan security forces and the civilians.

Thus, we need a whole range of measures and kit, of which helicopters are only part and, in some respects, not even the major part. Where the Captain sees our troops "sweating on the sides of the roads, securing them," a whole range of machines, from UAVs to Buffaloes, Huskies, mast observation vehicles and other aids to could the job, most often better without putting men at risk.

Emotive and powerful though the Captain's message is, therefore, it dwells on what is but actually offers very little insight as to what could and should be done. It is a cry to the heart, not an appeal to the brain.

Similarly thus does he frame his appreciation of the Taleban. "We are dealing here with a tenacious and stubborn enemy," he says. "Despite our dropping bombs on compounds that the enemy is using as firing-points, the very next day, new enemy fighters are back." Once again he continues, in a despairing vein:

On the one hand, perhaps the enemy command is so feared, authoritative and manipulative that they force unwilling fighters into those compounds as pure cannon fodder. On the other, perhaps, the fighters willingly go back, despite their comrades having been killed there, so strong is their faith in an afterlife, or so strong is their belief in the jihad they are fighting.

Whatever the reason, they come back undaunted to the same firing-points, despite our overwhelming fire power. Their numbers seem to stay constant, as opposed to decreasing – all of which gives a strong indication that we will not be able to reduce their numbers to a level where they are tactically defeated.

It seems increasingly true that a stable Afghanistan will only be possible with some sort of agreement, involvement or power-sharing deal with the Taliban.

However, as the British Army units here are increasingly sucked into the turmoil of the latest "fighting season" there seems little evidence that anything is happening on the political and diplomatic stage. In the meantime, tour follows tour, during which the most intense fighting appears to achieve not much more than extremely effectively inflicting casualties on both sides, whilst Afghanistan remains the sick man of Central Asia.

Such an appreciation, of course, is way above the Captain's pay grade. Officers of that rank are not employed to carry out strategic analyses, and neither are they qualified so to do. This is the classic example of where "being there" offers no more strategic insight than could gained from gathering the received wisdom of his peers. That it comes from the front line does not make it any more valuable.

The strong anti-war vein running through the "dispatch", however, clearly suits the Independent agenda, which is possibly why it has been given the prominence of its front page.

If the piece also tells us that war is "hell", as if we did not know, its other contribution is more subtle. In its tone, it is redolent of the diary of Lieutenant Mark Evison who, in respect of his routine patrol duties told us, "There is a definite lack of steer from above as to how to play this one. I am yet to be given a definite mission and clarity as to my role out here."

That same sense of lack of clarity of purpose pervades the dispatch of our anonymous Captain. To that extent, the Captain reveals perhaps more than he intends (or not). It is a cry of despair which speaks loudly of the inability of his superior officers to convey to him a coherent strategic picture, possibly indicating that they too lack that picture.

The worrying thing is that the Captain sounds like a member of a defeated army. If battles are won and lost in the hearts and minds of men, this one may be lost.

COMMENT THREAD

No wonder we are in trouble

An official involved in the design and engineering of armoured vehicles has denounced the recent criticisms directed at the Armed Forces' fleet, calling them "inaccurate", "dangerous" and "ridiculous."

So says Defence Management, allowing the official to retain his anonymity, yet allowing him the claim that he "has worked closely on the design of several armoured vehicles including some of the MRAPs."

The man - let's call him Mr Smith - says that he felt it was time to dispel some of the running myths in the press about armoured vehicles and what does or does not make them safe.

Our Mr Smith starts by noting that criticism of armoured vehicles has grown over the last year due to the perception that they are increasingly vulnerable to IED plus, he says, "a number of procurement gaffes on the part of the MoD." These appear to include the Snatch Land Rover, the Viking and the Vector armoured vehicles - withdrawn from service due to their inability to protect passengers from explosions and the high number of casualties that have occurred in them.

He also notes that there have been questions over the design and safety of the Panther and Jackal vehicles - although they remain in service – and then acknowledges that the MoD and industry were not perfect. Nevertheless, he avers, criticisms of the [current fleet of armoured vehicles] are "largely untrue".

Without going any further, we can tell that we have an odd sort of a person here. Anyone inclined to address criticisms as "inaccurate", "dangerous" and "ridiculous" is someone who is inclined to dogmatism. Then to brand them as "untrue" is bizarre. Criticism may be right, it may be wrong, it may even be misplaced, or any number of things, but truth does not come into it.

Looking then to win the one-sided debate, he employs the trick of the polemicist, framing the debate as one of "mobility v. protection." Vehicles ripped apart by IEDs and mines, says Mr Smith, are often the more mobile models that can quickly transport troops across the battlefield or help them escape a firefight.

Having thus established the desired framework he creates for himself a false comparator, defining the classic "straw man" alternative. This, predictably, is "using the heavier armoured vehicles such as the Mastiff and Ridgeback, which although better protected are far less agile."

The trick here is in defining these two vehicles as "heavier armoured", on which basis he attacks our argument that having one or the other is "a false paradigm." Says Mr Smith, "If you want more protection, you are going to be using more weight." Thus, "simple physics" wins the argument: "More armour equals more mass and more mass equals less acceleration. Essentially one cancels out the other."

Of course, we don't know Mr Smith well enough (or at all) to ask him any questions, but if we were to have the opportunity, we would like to know which he thinks is the better tank – the German Panzer Mk IV (Ausf H) at 25 tons, the Russian T-34 at 26.5 tons, the British Churchill at 38.5 tons or the US Sherman at 33.4 tons.

Then he might address the question as to which specific feature the Germans copied from the T-34 when they produced the Panther tank.

Straight from the Janet and John school of armoured vehicle design, however, Mr Smith's view of how to limit weight "is to make the vehicles smaller," and, not being averse to patronising his audience, he tells us: "People do not understand that there is a trade off between firepower and protection vs. mobility." I think we knew that, but that is not all there is to it.

Obviously unaware of the world around him, Smith then blandly informs us that "the chance to revise the vehicles after testing in order to make them more mobile is simply not possible." Clearly, no one told the Americans.

But he is right in one thing: "To go back and install mine protection is difficult. Unless you designed it from the start, the cost and operational compromises is not going to be worth it."

From there, however, Smith loses it. Advocates of more mobile vehicles have argued that protection should be built into the design of the vehicles such as V-shaped hulls, he says, adding:

The guaranteed safety that V-shapes hulls provide are something of an urban myth. For it to be effective, a blast must hit the vehicle right at the point of the V. If it hits anywhere else, the blast would not be properly deflected.

From there, he tells us:

Early mine attacks saw insurgents put mines in the middle of a road. Today IEDs are made up of multiple parts and explosives and can be placed anywhere in the vicinity of a road. For the V-Hull to be effective a blast would have to hit right under the point of the hull. Square hulls are therefore still a valuable design tool as long as they are properly armoured.

This is terrifying. This is a man who claims to be involved in armoured vehicle design, and he can seriously say that for a v-shaped hull to be effective, "a blast must hit the vehicle right at the point of the V." Thousands of soldiers, in thousands of MRAPs, hit by thousands of IEDs would say otherwise.

But it is also insulting. Blast protection is not solely a function of the v-shaped hull. There are other design principles involved, which we outline in another piece. If Mr Smith has heard of them, though, he does not mention them - yet our criticisms are "inaccurate", "dangerous" and "ridiculous."

And as for the "properly armoured" square hulls ... fine – if you want your vehicle weighed down by massive armour plate and then flipped over on its back by the force of a blast. Mr Smith, one feels, would design ships with square bows.

At last, though, we get to Smith's pride and joy - the Jackal. This time, criticisms are not "untrue". They are "unjustified" since it is not actually an armoured vehicle, rather a vehicle that has armour on it. So that's alright then. Because it was not designed ab initio as a mine protected vehicle and is thus extremely vulnerable because it only has "bolt on armour", the criticism is "unjustified".

Similarly "unjustified" is the criticism of the "fatal flaw" of having the front passengers ride above the wheels. That, says Smith, is not the fault of the Jackal. The problems stem from the way the vehicle is used, not its design. "When it hit the market, it was designed for a specific task. It was designed to travel across country in off road conditions."

"Now it is being used to protect convoys and provide cover and protection. It becomes the focus of attacks. The Jackal was never designed for convoy protection," he adds, then declaring: "Weaknesses are bound to emerge. But you leave it up to the commanders at the front to use the vehicles as they see fit."

So does Smith rest his case. He came forward with his statements because "he felt it was time to clear up a number of inaccuracies reported in the press and to begin restoring the image of the armoured vehicle industry."

The 14 dead so far in Jackals will be mightily impressed. And, if they can hear Mr Smith, they will surely agree that that their premature deaths arose because of the way they used their vehicles. But then, they might have preferred to have driven in the type of MRAP pictured above, from which the crew escaped shaken but unhurt, after the v-shaped hull took a massive blast under a front wheel.

COMMENT THREAD

A reckoning

The MoD has now released the name of the latest British soldier to die in Afghanistan. He was Craftsman Anthony Lombardi of the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME), attached to The Light Dragoons.

In an unusually detailed report, the MoD goes on to tell us that he was killed on 4 August in Babaji, in the Lashkar Gar district of Helmand province.

He was attached as a vehicle mechanic to The Light Dragoons and was, at the time, driving a Spartan as part of an escort for a Viking supply convoy, moving between the company's two locations when the vehicle was hit by an explosion. The force of the explosion breached the hull, killing him instantly.

This appears, on the face of it, almost a re-run of the circumstances surrounding Lt-Col Thorneloe's death. He too was with a Viking supply convoy, only that time it was the Viking that got hit rather than a Spartan.

Had it been a Viking this time, and/or a high ranking officer, the media might have taken some more notice. As it stands though, very few media reports bother to mention the vehicle type. It is not one with which they are familiar.

The details, however, do beg a series of questions. One would like to know why a lightly armoured vehicle like the Spartan – which is an armoured personnel carrier – was being used as an "escort" for the more heavily armed and armoured Vikings.

Even then, as the Thorneloe incident – and others – demonstrated, the Vikings are highly vulnerable when used for routine tasks such as supply convoys, where they are unable to exploit their mobility, which is supposed to confer their protection.

The same also applies to the Spartan and it was only fate that this was the vehicle targeted rather than a Viking.

One would also like to know whether the convoy route was such that the high mobility of these tracked vehicles was really necessary, or whether a better protected vehicle – like the Mastiff or the Ridgeback – could have been used.

That, of course, we will never be told, especially as it now transpires that the Ridgebacks in Dubai were never intended for immediate use. This comes over from the BBC report and has been independently confirmed.

Although Ridgebacks are available in small numbers, the Army has no intention of deploying them until there are enough to equip the brigade group, with fully trained drivers and all the infrastructure in place.

This, the Army argues, is necessary to save lives, as fielding new kit prematurely – they say – presents its own hazards. Thus, the nine Ridgebacks that have been (or are being) "rushed" to Camp Bastion will stay there unused until the new roulement arrives in October and is ready for action.

The Army, therefore, not the MoD, is the blockage, rather confounding our earlier story. The Ridgebacks were left in Dubai because there was no hurry, as there was no intention to use them yet.

It does seem extraordinary that the Army itself should reject life-saving kit and, if it could be shown that Craftsman Lombardi could have been saved, had he been riding in a Ridgeback – and that such a vehicle could have been used – then the Army case for delayed deployment looks pretty thin.

What is salutary about this whole affair, however, is the willingness of myself and others to leap in on the basis of very limited information, and condemn both the politicians and the MoD – when it is now clear that the delay in deployment is a military decision, taken for what the Army believes are sound operational reasons.

Arguably, the Army is wrong. It is displaying a peace-time preference for having everything neat and tidy, and properly organised, instead of the untidy and more difficult to manage "trickle" deployment, releasing the vehicles to theatre as they (and their drivers) became ready.

Tidiness is not a luxury the military can afford in wartime. Imagine, for instance, in wartime Malta when a decision was made to replace the outclassed Hurricanes with Spitfires. New machines were rushed in to fill the gaps, with the two types operating side-by-side for a period.

Imagine what would have happened if replacements had been delayed until a "big bang" switch-over was organised. The battle would have been lost.

It will take a great deal of convincing for me to believe that the Army is right in its current policy. If men could be alive today, but were killed for want of better equipment, then there should be a reckoning.

COMMENT THREAD

A question of balance

Predictably, in the "touchy-feely" media of today, dominated by "human interest" stories, almost all the newspapers play the current soldiers' compensation drama "big", with the broadcast media also running the story as their lead items.

Inevitably, therefore, we see – as in The Times - the devastating experience of young Ben Parkinson brought up again, the Lance Bombardier who suffered 39 injuries including brain damage in Helmand in 2006, after his Wimik was blown apart.

In other times, he might well have died – as did Jack Sadler in very similar circumstances – and that would be the end of it. But it is the very success of the medical support system which is generating what, by comparison with earlier wars, is a disproportionate number of severely injured, who then need support for the rest of their lives.

One cannot question the well-meaning media coverage. It is right and proper that we should care for our war wounded and, whether we agree with the war in Afghanistan or not, those soldiers who are placed in harm's way should be adequately compensated.

However, one can question the balance. Not for the first time, we have observed that, if the media had devoted but a fraction of the energies it expends on lamenting the poor treatment of the wounded in seeking to prevent them getting wounded in the first place, perhaps there would be considerably less of a problem than there is now.

In that context, the case of Ben Parkinson is something of a touchstone. Sent out in a scandalously vulnerable Wimik, it is undoubtedly the case that, had he been equipped with a better-protected vehicle, he would now be fit, healthy and uninjured.

Yet, for all the media focus on Snatch Land Rovers (and then only a fraction of that expended on the war wounded), there has never been any real coverage of the deployment of this vehicle (not a few media outlets do not even know the difference between a Wimik and a Snatch). Similarly, despite the toll of injuries sustained in the Pinzgauer Vector and the Viking, there has never been any serious, high level media scrutiny of the bizarre decisions to deploy this equipment.

And, while there has been limited coverage of the Jackal, neither has that vehicle really been exposed to the full glare of media scrutiny, despite the death toll in Afghanistan exceeding that of the Snatch, and continuing.

On sees the contrast most acutely with the likes of Jeremy Clarkeson, a very public and high-profile supporter of the "Help for Heroes" charity. Yet, on the other hand, he is the embodiment of the boy racer syndrome that is killing and maiming "Our Brave Boys", and not at all ill-disposed actively to co-operate with the Army in projecting the "gung ho" image that is doing so much damage.

What applies to the media – and its celebs who line up to be photographed with the injured (pictured – Ben Parkinson with "soccer star" John Terry) – also applies, in spades, to the political classes, and especially the Conservative Party. Under the leadership of David Cameron, it has quite deliberately set its face against rigorously pursuing "hard-edged" issues such as equipment performance and instead has concentrated on the more "compassionate" topics such as compensation and medical care.

Again, this is a question of balance. It is absolutely right that the Conservative Party should pursue these matters, but not to the exclusion of the other side of the equation – ensuring that our troops are better protected. Instead, it has been left to a 68-year-old "granny" on the back-benches – the redoubtable Ann Winterton – to make the running, while the big, brave, macho men bleat about the "Military Covenant" and care for the wounded.

If this is an unfair parody of the Conservative Party stance, so be it. One sees in the current policy line a deliberate attempt to play down the "nasty party" image and cultivate the idea of "Compassionate Conservatism", which my erstwhile co-editor so detests (as do I).

Thus, we end up in the situation where the "bleeding heart" feminised agenda of the popular media, lacking a political lead, drenches itself in the suffering of "Our Brave Boys" taking relatively little interest in preventing that suffering in the first place.

This speaks of a society where values and priorities are distorted and where maudlin sentimentality is overtaking hard-edged realism, doing more damage than enough. It wears its heart on its sleeve, proclaiming its compassion to the world, turning a blind eye to measures which could mitigate the very suffering it so deplores. Whichever way you look at it, this is not a healthy society.

COMMENT THREAD

Counting the cost

It seems otiose to record with any more emphasis than all the others, that another death has occurred – according to the Sunday Mirror - in a Jackal, this one an as yet unnamed soldier from 40th Regiment Royal Artillery.

The death, again from an IED, occurred yesterday in the Lashkar Gah district and we know little more, other than two other soldiers were also injured in the incident. This brings the total British service personnel killed in Afghanistan to 189, of which KIAs amount to 158.

Eleven soldiers have now been killed in a Jackal, with an estimated 53 killed in five types of vehicle, which also include the Wimik, Viking, Vector and Snatch Land Rover.

What makes the vehicle deaths different, if not special, is that – to a certain extent within technical limits – these are preventable. By using the Mastiff as a comparator, in which there have been no deaths, we can aver that if the range of vehicles in which deaths have occurred had been protected to a similar level, then all these soldiers could still be alive.

As such, "preventable" deaths take on a special significance, which marks out the toll extracted by the Taleban in this category. That is not to say that other deaths were not preventable, and perhaps by different technical means, such as persistent video surveillance of routes frequented by food patrols, to warn of possible IEDs. However, vehicles present a relatively more clear-cut issue, which tends to focus concern on them.

What must also feature in the vehicle category, as well as the human cost, is the financial burden, partly identified by the Independent on Sunday yesterday.

This paper recorded that there had been a steep increase in claims to the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS), which covers injury, illness and death caused by service since 6 April 2005. The value of lump-sum settlements of claims settled under the scheme has risen from £1.27m in its first year of operation to £30.2m last year. But the awards also come with ongoing "guaranteed income payments" costing more than £100m.

MoD figures show that at least 218 soldiers have suffered "life-changing injuries" since April 2006 alone – and more than 50 personnel have undergone amputations following injuries.

The latest MoD analysis shows that, of 53 personnel who were seriously injured in Afghanistan in 2006 and 2007, 41 made claims to the AFCS. Only one of the 23 personnel very seriously injured (VSI) in Afghanistan during 2007 failed to make a compensation claim. The MoD has reported 214 casualties, including VSIs, during Operation Herrick since 2001.

The casualties contribute to an MoD benefits bill which shows spending of more than £1bn a year on war pensions to veterans or their families. The bereaved partner of a member of the armed forces killed in action is entitled to a pension averaging £100 a week.

To these costs must, in the case of a vehicle incident, be added the value of the vehicles, many of which are total write-offs, costing upwards of £700,000. Then there are evacuation and medical costs, and then the cost of replacing the casualties. This week it was announced that 125 extra troops were to be flown out to theatre to replace losses.

No single – even if notional – figure has been calculated to represent the average loss incurred when a British soldier is killed in action, but a US study indicated that the death of a four-man crew of an up-armoured Humvee cost the US taxpayer some $25 million. On this basis alone – irrespective of the human cost – it makes sense to provide a high level of protection for mounted troops.

The Jackal, being a relatively new vehicle in theatre should be up to the challenges posed by Taleban weapons but, clearly, it is not.

That the families should have to bear the burden of the loss, that precious lives should be cut short and that so many soldiers are seriously injured is bad enough but, when the taxpayer also has to pay serious amounts of money as well, this adds further weight to the call for better vehicles.

Unfortunately, if money was the solution to better protection, the increasing costs of vehicles would assure us a reduction on the casualty rate, but in the British inventory, expense cannot be equate with protection, when one of the most fragile is the Viking at £700,000 with the Jackal 2s working out at over £400,000 each.

One would hope that, with a cash-strapped government, therefore, if it is not moved by humanitarian concerns alone, hard-edged economics might take a hand leading the financial analysts to conclude that we simply cannot afford this attrition.

COMMENT THREAD

The trouble with armoured vehicles

Originally published by Defence Management
Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Several of the MoD's newest armoured vehicles already have major design flaws according to defence author Richard North. The old way of thinking has to change.

The MoD and Armed Forces are unable to learn from their mistakes or admit erroneous decisions in the design and procurement of armoured vehicles resulting in a string of inadequate vehicles being sent to the frontlines of Afghanistan and tragically as a result, large numbers of casualties, a prominent defence author has said.

The death of Lieutenant Colonel Rupert Thorneloe last week in a Viking armoured vehicle brought a renewed focus to the MoD's armoured fighting vehicle strategy. Although IEDs and landmines have proven to be an effective weapon utilised by insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, the MoD has only been partially successful in buying better protected vehicles. .

Richard North, author of the book "Ministry of Defeat" and the editor of the Defence of the Realm blog, outlined to Defencemanagement.com a series of poor procurement decisions and strategies that have resulted in a widely ineffective fleet of armoured vehicles coming up against IEDs and landmines.

"The concept of risk has been ignored," North said in an interview. As a result this premise is "eroding the ability to field certain vehicles."

The vehicle protection problems faced by British troops today in Afghanistan can be traced back to various campaigns during the Cold War era including in Rhodesia. The effectiveness of using IEDs on vehicles became clear yet military planners in the US and Britain for the most part ignored the new threats. Heavier armoured vehicles have to be transferred by ship because they are too heavy to fly. Military planners felt that this negated the advantages that an expeditionary force would have.

Even after the use of IEDs became a prevalent tool of the insurgency in Iraq, procurement officials in Britain continued to buy the same types of vehicles for operations in Afghanistan.

The Snatch, Viking and Vector were all sent to Afghanistan in the first year of major British combat operations but are now all being withdrawn from service due to their flawed designs and a lack of adequate armour to deflect explosions. Dozens of British servicemen have died in the vehicles during operations due to poor protection even though Snatch was upgraded with additional armour and the Viking and Vector vehicles were procured in 2006.

Protection has been the primary focus of vehicle designers in an effort to overcome casualties caused by bomb attacks. While there have been some successes such as the Mastiff and Ridgeback armoured vehicles, which the Taliban have effectively given up attacking, there have been widespread concerns with other models in the new fleet of vehicles the MoD has procured under an urgent operational requirement.

The Jackal has attracted the most concerns due to its design according to North. The front seats are over the front wheels making the driver and front passenger vulnerable to any explosion. Problems with the weight distribution have made the Jackal susceptible to rollovers, and bolt on armour has proven to be ineffective and has taken away the little mobility the vehicle has.

Army commanders have also been forced to use the vehicle, originally designed for off-road reconnaissance, for fixed road reconnaissance, supply escorts and patrols.

Already ten servicemen have died in the Jackal, despite the MoD spending hundreds of millions of pounds procuring it.

But the problems do not stop there. Last year the MoD ordered 262 Husky armoured vehicles from Navistar Defence, to be used as medium sized command and support vehicle in less dangerous areas. But according to North the deal came just as it was confirmed that the Husky had failed a blast test during a US Army vehicle contract competition. US Army officials are alleged to have expressed concerns over the "basic" design of the hull bridge which resulted in the Husky failing the mine test.

Given the success of v-shaped hulls on vehicles in Afghanistan, it is not clear why the MoD is procuring a standard hulled vehicle. Word of the US Army test failure was not announced until after the MoD had signed the £150m contract with Navistar.

There are also concerns over the new Panther armoured vehicle which North calls fundamentally flawed and "stupidity beyond measure". Panther is a designated command vehicle which will allow the Taliban to target higher ranking officers and field commanders in greater numbers than ever before.

The MoD is scheduled to buy 400 of the vehicles which North describes as "a fine modern product of the Italian automobile industry, and therefore completely unsuitable for military use."

The outside of the vehicle is made from "crushable" or "deformable" materials. While the Panther is well protected, any attack by an IED or mine will cause significant damage to the vehicle resulting in it becoming non-operational.

Procurement officials spent £400,000 per vehicle but it did not come with adequate protection for the engine, no electronic counter measures equipment and it only held three people. North estimates that by the time the full upgrades are completed, the MoD could be spending up to £700,000 on a vehicle that the insurgents can destroy with £20 worth of explosives.

The MoD for its part has argued that a number of upgrades have made the Husky, Jackal and Panther better protected and more able to deal with the operational challenges in Afghanistan.

The number of vehicle design flaws is part of a wider debate on mobility v. protection. Many vehicle design experts have argued that you cannot have both. If you have an agile vehicle it is limited in how much armour it can have. If you have a heavily armoured vehicle, case in point the Mastiff, you lose the element of surprise and ability to rapidly descend on the enemy or exit an operational centre.

North disagrees.

"I think it is a false paradigm. The Army doctrine says that you optimise on mobility and for specific theatres or specific threats you add on protection. Protection is seen as a separate issue added on after the event with design parameters," North said.

The problem is that when a "mobile" vehicle needs additional protection, engineers use bolt on armour which prejudices mobility. Vehicle engineers and procurement officials in turn conclude that mobility and protection are mutually contradictory.

Bolt on armour in many cases has proven to be ineffective against IEDs and mines.

Engineers should instead be "optimising for protection and then adding mobility" in vehicles according to North. A mobile well protected vehicle is possible but it would require a different mindset throughout the MoD's project teams and within industry.

There is still a large adherence to the successes of the past, North argued. Using mobile armoured vehicles to defeat Rommel in North Africa in the 1940s is still a primary reference point for today's armoured vehicle fighting strategies even though the scope of warfare has changed dramatically since then.

As a result, of the hundreds of new vehicles the MoD is rushing into service, many are plagued with design flaws or are used the wrong way.

"They are repeating the same mistakes and are doomed to repeat them over and over again," North said. With problems and concerns already arising in the Husky, Jackal and Panther vehicles, more mistakes could be on the way.

Richard North is the author of "Ministry of Defeat" and the website Defence of the Realm.

COMMENT THREAD

Dead soldiers tell no tales

One of the things that is possibly upsetting the defence establishment is this blog's pursuit of the story about the Iveco Panther – the latest development I have been sitting on, while other more pressing issues were dealt with.

As it stood, we had found that this absurdly expensive machine, ordered in 2003 at a cost of over £400,000 each, had to be converted at an additional cost of £300,000 to make them suitable for use in Afghanistan, bringing the price to well over £700,000 each for a four-seater protected patrol vehicle.

However, we had also established that only 67 of these vehicles were being put through this conversion process, leaving 334 from the original batch of 401 that are basically unsuitable for deployment. Thus, it was left to Ann Winterton to ask what was to happen to the rest.

Answer there came from Quentin Davies that the remainder would be used for pre-deployment training individual and collective training, and trials and development. Never in the field of human conflict, he might have observed, have so many been used to train so few.

The more serious point is that, while the Army is crying out for protected vehicles, we have these useless machines stuck at home, when a fraction of the cost could have bought decent protected vehicles and had them in theatre.

Apart from Booker, however, only Defence Management was taking an interest in this procurement disaster. The rest of the media, so full of faux concern for "Our Boys" isn't interested in getting its hands dirty and actually reporting what is going on.

But then, an in-house cock-up by the MoD does not fit the narrative. Unless the story is about Gordon Brown and his "penny pinching", leaving "Our Boys" without the kit they need, the popular media does not want to know.

It is actually too much to hope for a responsible media though. Even if the story was handed to it on a plate, it would probably get it wrong and, if anyone gets near reporting the truth, we see the result .


However, one of the pieces can still be found on Google cache. This is what you are not allowed to see:

Hundreds of Panthers cannot deploy
Wednesday, July 15, 2009

The MoD has spent hundreds of millions of pounds on a new armoured vehicle that will mainly be used for training in non-operational settings.

Only 67 Panther armoured vehicles are in suitable condition to operate safely in Afghanistan according to the MoD.

Yesterday the minister for defence equipment and support Quentin Davies admitted to MPs in a written answer that 334 of the Panther armoured vehicles "will be used for pre-deployment training, individual and collective training, and trials and development."

The Panther Command and Liaison Vehicle (CLV) was procured earlier this decade to provide commanders and combat support services with better protection when they are on the battlefield. At £400,000, it will undoubtedly serve as one of the most expensive Army training vehicles, ever.

The vehicle has been riddled with problems from the outset, resulting in just 67 being available for Afghan operations due to a lack of capability requirements.

In May Defencemanagement.com revealed that none of the vehicles had originally been delivered with the required capabilities for Afghan operations, despite extensive field tests in Afghanistan earlier this decade. As a result, procurement officials were forced to spend an additional £20m upgrading just 67 vehicles.

This resulted in further delays to a programme that was already running over a year late.

The vehicle additions included a better protected engine compartment, the addition of Electronic Counter Measures (ECM) equipment, air conditioning and adding space for a fourth crew member to the vehicle.

Richard North, author of "Ministry of Defeat" said recently that the Panther "is a fine modern product of the Italian automobile industry, and therefore completely unsuitable for military use."

The outer portion of the vehicle, when hit by an IED or landmine is likely to be permanently damaged.

According to a National Audit Office Report, the MoD originally planned to buy 486 of the vehicles but due to "affordability" issues, was later forced to reduce the order to 401 Panthers. It is not clear whether the MoD will pay for the other 334 Panthers to be upgraded to combat standards.

As the threat from IEDs and landmines has grown, so has the demand for better protected vehicles. Ministers insist that they are sparing no expense in ensuring that troops have the best protection money can buy. However problems with the Snatch, Vector, Viking, Jackal and now Panther, leave these claims in doubt.

Even this fairly anodyne report, however, is too much for the defence establishment. It is far more important to stifle criticism than to protect "Our Boys" from getting murdered by the Taleban. In one of the more recent strikes, they only pulled the top half of the driver out of the vehicle. There was nothing else of him left. But hey! Dead soldiers tell no tales.

COMMENT THREAD

The all heat and no light show

Trying – and dismally failing – to cover even a fraction of the torrent of coverage on Afghanistan that has poured from the media over the weekend, I had thought we might see a slackening with the start of the working week – but not a bit of it.

What we are seeing is what might be called the "political phase" as opposition politicians have had time to absorb some of the details of recent events, confer with their colleagues and advisors, and prepare their own lines of attack, crafting points with which to beat the government.

With defence questions this afternoon, the last before the House rises on 21 July, rather predictably we see Liam Fox – silent for so long - leading the charge, accusing Gordon Brown of "the ultimate dereliction of duty" in his handling of the war in Afghanistan.

Those of us with a slightly longer memory will remember that, when our Liam earlier this year had the opportunity to set out his views in detail about the conduct of the campaign in Afghanistan, and what precisely was needed to ensure success, he was strangely silent, as indeed he was through a subsequent defence debate.

Now, making up for lost time, Dr Fox has decided that the prime minister has "catastrophically" under-equipped the armed forces and is now "resorting to spin rather than confronting the life-threatening reality" that the troops face.

The Conservatives' line is to accuse Brown of attempting to cover up the fact that British troops do not have enough helicopters, which has forced them to travel by road and left them vulnerable to the Taleban's IEDs. Twelve of the 15 British soldiers killed in Afghanistan this month, and three-quarters of those killed over the past two years, were killed by IEDs.

Far be it for us to disagree with the premise that more helicopters are needed in theatre, but Dr Fox is on somewhat shaky ground if he is asserting – as he appears to be doing – that the bulk of the recent deaths arose from the lack of helicopters.

Not least, the five killed from the 2nd Rifles were on a routine foot patrol, and while there may have been some measures which could have eliminated the peril to which they succumbed, the use of a helicopter was not one of them. Given that they were patrolling in the vicinity of their forward operating base, on a fixed and predictable "beat", the most obvious safeguard would have been persistent video surveillance, using either UAVs, mast-mounted cameras or even concealed micro-cameras, the like of which have been used to great effect by US forces in maintaining route security.

Of one thing one can be certain, with the elaborate nature of the ambush prepared, it must have taken some time to set up and it is hard to believe that, had the technology been in place, suspicious activity would not have been detected.

It is ironic, in a way, that while CCTV prevails in this country to keep a largely law-abiding population under surveillance – and to detect such heinous crimes as littering – the MoD has not thought fit to employ the same technology to protect against far greater threats.

The irony of this, of course, seems to have passed by Dr Fox, yet nor can he rely on the deaths of Lt-Col Thorneloe and Trp Hammond to support his thesis on helicopter shortages. A helicopter ride might have saved Thorneloe's life, for sure, but in his absence, someone else would have been in the front seat of that Viking and could well have died in his place – the casualty rate might thereby have been unaffected.

Nor indeed do we know that a helicopter would have been appropriate, as the Lt-Col was going into a combat area and pilots are rightly reluctant to fly into contested areas unless in dire emergency, which clearly this was not. And, as we know from the fate of Captain Ben Babington-Browne, killed in a Canadian helicopter last week, flying is not without its hazards. For all we know, a ground vehicle might have been the most appropriate form of transport.

What we do have a better idea of, however is that if money had not been frittered away on such unwanted extravagances as a Ferris wheel and a "wimmins' park" and instead had been diverted on improving the road network and bridges, the heavier protected Mastiffs or Ridgebacks could have been used rather than Vikings.

Again, therefore, helicopter shortages do not seem to be the issue – as indeed it may not have been with the more recent Viking casualty, Corporal Lee Scot. He had been leading his section of Vikings from the front when an explosion struck, yet another soldier blown apart in that dangerously vulnerable vehicle.

Defence secretary Ainsworth then himself points to the fact that two recent casualties were killed by an IED while dismounting from a Mastiff, circumstances which might lead one to wonder whether this was another of those carefully prepared Taleban ambushes, but again an incident where a helicopter could hardly have saved the day.

Thus, while a more general case can certainly be made for more helicopters, the bandwagon harnessed by Dr Fox is not going in that direction – which suggests that when he raises the issue in defence questions tomorrow – as undoubtedly he will, given an opportunity – he will be slapped down. That will not matter, of course – the propaganda point will have been made and will get the requisite headlines.

Where Ainsworth would be vulnerable - but is unlikely to be challenged by Dr Fox, however – is on his assertion that "extra equipment could not eliminate risk". This is true enough in that nothing can eliminate risk, but there is certainly equipment that could reduce it, whether it is bridging gear, video surveillance cameras, more UAVs or, as we saw with Private Robbie Laws, more and better mine/IED clearance equipment.

What comes over from the current Tory thrust, therefore, is an attempt to distil down a complex situation, where theatre needs are equally complex as well as varied – as indeed are the deficiencies - in an attempt to score political points rather than shed light on the problems.

Much the same can be said of the second line of attack, the "boots on the ground" argument, rehearsed over the weekend by commentators too numerous to mention, not least Gen Dannatt, who gets an enthusiastic "puff" from Brigadier Allan Mallinson (ret).

Again, there is a case to be made for more troops in theatre, to consolidate the "take and hold" strategy, the first part of which has been played out over the last two weeks or so, with the deployment of US and British troops in co-ordinated actions. But that is a different thing from asserting that, during the current actions, shortage of troops has in any way affected the casualty rate. And that pre-supposes that we should necessarily buy into the strategy, and not be looking at alternatives.

Also, conveyed in The Times today is a somewhat "inconvenient truth" articulated by an anonymous government spokesman. He says, "We are losing more men because we are taking the fight to the Taleban and more troops are being put in harm's way. But it is just not true to say that fewer would be killed if more were there. The opposite could be true. Many of our men have been killed by roadside bombs. Having more there would not prevent that happening."

There is some truth in that. With an increasingly sophisticated enemy, constantly probing for weak spots and launching opportunistic attacks, more men can equal more "targets" and greater opportunities to inflict casualties. And then, it is indeed the case that more aggressive action, with forays into enemy-held territory, will inevitably increase casualty rates.

Bruce Anderson in The Independent therefore makes good sense when he writes that casualties are inevitable. "Politicians are sometimes naïve enough to think that battles can be won without bloodshed," he adds. But, "Soldiers know better. There is a phrase, regularly used by Wellington, which soldiers will repeat and which always makes civilians quail: 'the butcher's bill'. Soldiers have been there."

Putting that in perspective, Anderson then states that this does not dispense with the need to keep the bill down. He writes:

War imposes moral obligations, especially upon those who send men into action. If they will the end, they must will the means. In Afghanistan, this would not necessitate vastly expensive space-age technology. It would merely require the basic tools of modern warfare, such as armoured vehicles whose armour is worth something, and helicopters. Without them, we are effectively reduced to Second World War methods.

Actually, it does require, in some instances, "space-age technology", some of it very sophisticated and expensive. Other kit though, is more down to earth, such as well-designed mine/blast protected vehicles. But there is no panacea, no "quick fix" which will remove the risk entirely. Helicopters are part of the mix, but there is much a need for light tactical helicopters as there is for more transports, and for a decent section helicopter, which is not currently available to British forces.

Equally, with the "boots on the ground" argument, more troops per se are not necessarily an advantage, unless there is a clear idea of how they are to be employed, to what specific effect, within the context of a clear strategy and with equipment and tactics relevant to the theatre, which will provide "added value" to the campaign.

Issues such as helicopters thus do need to be addressed, but the questions that need to be asked are what types are needed, in what numbers and for what purposes. The equipment arguments then need to be widened out to address the broad range of deficiencies in theatre – and the quality and capabilities of equipment fielded. Numbers – and types – of troops deployed need to be discussed in the context of strategy and the other related issues.

Simply to distil these complex issues down to a small number of political mantras and slogans is neither helpful nor productive. Yet, despite the torrent of coverage that we are seeing, there is no evidence yet that we are progressing to the point where we are getting past the sloganising and into the beef.

Heat, there is in this debate, but very little light.

COMMENT THREAD

The Americans understood ...

In the Mail on Sunday is an op-ed from veteran journalist Philip Jacobson, under the heading "The Americans understood the danger of IEDs – why didn't we?"

That statement is not without irony as today we learn that four US soldiers were killed on Saturday in an IED explosion in Helmand province, apparently in two separate incidents - the number now reduced to two killed, after officials reported there had been a double-counting error.

Whether two or four, these latest US death underline the deadly peril of this weapon and, in getting Jacobson to write about it, the Mail on Sunday has chosen well. He is not new to the subject and wrote a long piece for The Sunday Times Magazine in September last year, called "The success of the home-made bomb." Even after this elapse of time, it is still fresh and worth reading.

In his current article, Jacobson revisits his previous work, telling us of Lt-Gen Thomas Metz, director of the US Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization (JIEDDO), the organisation established in the summer of 2005 when the IED threat was growing to epidemic proportions in Iraq. While Metz's organisation currently enjoys a budget of $15 billion, Jacobson charges that our soldiers in Afghanistan are "facing a tough, resilient enemy with demonstrably inadequate resources".

To develop his thesis, Jacobson reminds us of the Snatch controversy, noting the "start contrast" between the US "no-expense-spared programme” and the reluctance of the MoD to provide a sufficient number (or any) armoured vehicles capable of surviving heavy IED blasts.

This remains a burning issue, he writes, recalling how in 2004, the US Marines were enthusing about an RG-31 which had sustained severe damage from an IED while the crew had escaped unharmed. Jacobson's memory is faulty here, as the incident happened in early 2006 (as late as November 2005, the Marines were still mainly concerned with up-armouring Humvees) but he recalls correctly that the incident was brought to the notice of the MoD by "Conservative politicians" (via this writer), only to be told that the RG-31's "size and profile" did not meet their needs.

Readers will recall the hostility and prevarication we encountered then, over three years ago, when the Army's idea of a protected vehicle was a Pinzgauer Vector. This has continued undiminished, where the Viking's mobility was seen as far more important than keeping soldiers alive and where the Jackal again elevates mobility to supreme status and relegates protection to a poor second. Now we see the substandard Husky being chosen in preference to the better-protected Oshkosk M-ATV and the even better Cheetah.

Jacobson argues that it is crucial that we adapt to the real threat we face and regards it as not merely unintelligent, or negligent, that a "front-rank industrial nation" cannot do better for its endlessly gallant soldiers. It is criminal, he says. Yet, the "criminals" continue in place, and the men will keep dying, while the politicians attempt to "park" the issue in the hope that it will go away.

It won't.

(The pic, incidentally, is something the MoD got right-ish – despite the panning of the media. It is an armoured JCB High Mobility Engineer Excavator, blown up by an IED while it was digging a culvert. The driver survived. Pic courtesy of El Tirador Solitario.)

COMMENT THREAD

A tale of two armies

Primitive British mine/IED clearance methods, compared with their US counterparts, may have been responsible for the death of Private Robbie Laws, 18, of the 2nd Mercian Regiment – to date, one of the youngest soldiers to die in Afghanistan.

On 4 July, Private Laws was attached to a squadron of the Light Dragoons which were operating Scimitar light reconnaissance tanks taking part in operation Panther's Claw. Laws was part of a four-man "dismount" team carried in a Spartan armoured personnel carrier (pictured below right), his and his comrades' task being to carry out mine/IED sweeps on foot, using hand-held detectors, ahead of the armoured vehicles, whenever their commander suspected a possible trap.

Recounted in detail by The Daily Mail, after Laws and his comrades crossed the start line in their Spartan on 4 July, they were soon called into action but, as they dismounted, Taleban fighters opened up with small arms. A Scimitar armed with 30mm Rarden cannon moved up to engage them, setting a pattern for the operation. The advance thus continued in a stop-start fashion as Laws and his comrades painstakingly cleared the route with their detectors.

Come the late afternoon as the light and intense heat began to fade, Laws and his comrades had been resting by the side of the vehicle for an hour or so, then helping to unload another Spartan which had come in from a water resupply run. Small arms fire started coming in and the Light Dragoons started their vehicle engines. Laws and the three other dismounts piled into their Spartan, which began to move.

Some 200 yards on, the squadron commander ordered two men to dismount to carry out a sweep ahead. Laws with one other completed the task and remounted. As the Spartan started to move off, there was a "massive bang" and the cabin filled with smoke. The vehicle had been hit by a Taleban RPG. Laws was killed instantly, another soldier was very seriously injured and one other was slightly injured.

It is of course the case that the Spartan could have been targeted at any time during the operation by a Taleban PRG, with fatal consequences. But the main defence of this lightly armoured vehicle is its speed and manoeuvrability over a wide range of terrain. Its constant stop-start progress, and pauses to allow manual sweeping, thus made it a predictable and highly vulnerable target while it was stationary.

Compare and contrast, however, the experience of the US Marines further south, confronted by multiple IEDs impeding their progress. In terms of delays, their clearance team was no less impeded. But, unlike the British using lightly armoured personnel carriers with infantry using hand-held detectors, working on foot, the Marines were properly equipped.

Their 10-vehicle clearance team included a vehicle equipped with a mine roller, pushed ahead to detonate pressure-pad actuated mines and IEDS, a Husky mine detection vehicle (pictured below) and a number of MRAPs, all manned by specialist combat engineers.


After 72 "tough hours" on the road, the first IED destroyed an anti-mine roller being pushed by the convoy's lead vehicle. The explosion sent the roller's pieces flying into the air, and flipped the 17-ton onto its side, nearly toppling it into a canal that ran beside the dirt road. The crew, however, escaped unharmed.

After an overnight wait, a recovery team with specialist lifting equipment was despatched along the same route, only to hit an IED that had appeared to have been planted overnight specifically to strike them.

The explosion wrecked their vehicle but fortunately, it was another MRAP and the crew escaped unharmed. Then, and only then with the scene secure, did the Marines used hand-held mine-sweepers to check the road between the two blasts and then destroyed burnt damaged equipment to stop it falling into Taleban hands.

The convoy finally got back on the road by the evening but within an hour it was hit by a third IED that destroyed the Husky. The crewman survived. In between that point and the first of the blasts, the team had covered only a couple of miles of road and had discovered and dismantled seven further IEDs.

Said the convoy commander, Lieutenant Dan Jernigan, "Vehicles are being blown apart but the Marines inside are being kept safe. Not to sound cavalier, but it is better we take the blast than Humvees or someone else such as villagers." He was surprised that there had been no Taleban ambushes targeting his convoy when it had been stranded, but the vehicles were well armed and armoured – unlike the Spartan – and able to protect themselves.

The clearance process here was being applied to a supply route, but exactly the same process could have been applied to the route taken by the Light Dragoons. Typically then, the route is kept under observation after clearing – by UAVs or even infantry stationed along the route. As a final safeguard, an MRAP precedes the tactical convoy – a process known as "route proving" – to take the blast from any device that has been missed, or where emplacers have managed to evade observation and plant another bomb.

With a route almost guaranteed free from emplaced explosives, light tactical vehicles can then exploit their mobility and speed, without being tied to the stop-start routine that dogged the Light Dragoons, making their vehicles such vulnerable targets.

With such procedures in place, even the lightly armoured Vikings could be used with impunity, their routes through danger areas cleared, allowing them to exploit their off-road performance once they safely reach open country.

Ironically, the clearance and proving procedures – and the equipment to carry them out – were pioneered by the British – and used with great success in Bosnia in the early 90s, being copied by US forces and applied to both Iraq and now Afghanistan. Since Bosnia, however, the specialist equipment acquired by the British has been sold or otherwise disposed of. The need for such now again belatedly recognised, more equipment was ordered last October under the "Talisman" project, but deliveries are not scheduled to commence until next year – although the vital Husky is not being procured.

That is the measure of the shortfall in the British operation, but this is not a shortage of finance – clearly, as the equipment is now on order. More likely, it reflects the failure of the British Army to recognise and pre-empt the threat of mines and IEDs, with tragic consequences which stretch back into the Iraqi campaign, where troops in Basra and elsewhere faced similar threats and were similarly ill-equipped.

In this day and age, while there is still a valid and extensive role for the hand-held detector, there is no excuse for the excessive reliance on dismounted teams to do a job which could often be done more safely with armour and machines. That they are not available is yet another of those scandals, for which there should be a reckoning.

COMMENT THREAD

Parity and more ...

Originally posted at 19:30 hrs Friday. Updated and reposted.


Sooner than we feared, another British soldier was reported killed in Afghanistan, bringing the number to three on the day and the total to 179.

Then, early in the afternoon, we began to get very strong rumours of many more in what was said to be a "major incident". By early evening, five more were said to have been killed, three seriously injured and three more less badly injured.

Early, unconfirmed reports said soldiers had sought cover from direct fire in a compound which was booby-trapped with an IED. Later reports suggested that troops had been ambushed after they had dismounted from their vehicle to investigate an explosion, and were hit by another IED and took casualties. More were killed and injured when the medevac Chinook arrived to pick up the original casualties. The tactics were said to be "sophisticated".

A different report, in The Daily Mail tells a different version, suggesting that after the first hit, "amid the chaos and appalling scenes, the Taleban is said to have opened fire with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades on the injured soldiers and those going to their aid."

Apache attack helicopters are then said to have been called in to strike at Taleban positions and provide cover as a rescue operation was launched with helicopters ferrying the wounded back to the field hospital at the main British base at Camp Bastion throughout the night.

The men, from the 2nd Bn, The Rifles, were reported to have been in the Sangin area - near Musa Qala. This is not part of the current Operation Panchai Palang (Panther's Claw), which is being carried out north of Lashkar Gah.

The official total for casualties since 2001 now rises to 184, exceeding the number 179, which was the death toll in Iraq. Predictably, The Guardian - commenting on the level when it reached 179 - said that the death was likely to intensify the debate about whether the Afghanistan operation is worthwhile.

The 179th reported killed was a soldier from the 2nd Royal Tank Regiment, said to have died in an explosion during an operation near Nad-e-Ali. He was from the same regiment as Trooper Joshua Hammond, who was killed last week in a Viking.

The AP report at that time was headed, "The Climbing toll raises British doubts on Afghanistan" and cited Conservative MP Adam Holloway, a defence committee member. He said, "The casualties should fix peoples' minds on the fact that we've let the soldiers down ... The death toll means we should do it properly or we shouldn't do it at all."

He added that Britain had never had the troop strength needed to hold ground there and had failed to provide the promised security or reconstruction, leading many Afghans to believe the Taleban militants will outlast Western forces. "We're in a mess," he said.

Guthrie, according to Channel 4 News blames Gordon Brown who, as chancellor when Britain went into Helmand, had given "as little money to defence" as the Treasury could get away with.

And, in The Daily Mail, Doug Beattie, retired recently after 27 years in the Army, said: "Whether it's the 179th or the 200th, the soldier will not think twice about that number. They're just numbers - but every number and every name has a story behind it."

He added: "No soldier serving in Afghanistan will say, 'that's 179', they will say, 'that's my friend, that's my roommate, that's my commanding officer'. Very soon we are going to hit the 200 mark. The likelihood is before we leave Afghanistan we are going to hit the 500 mark - maybe even the 1,000 mark. But they are all false landmarks."

"For the politicians and for the Ministry of Defence," he then said, "public perception of the loss is crucial. For the soldiers on the ground, it won't matter."

However, despite the growing list of British fatalities, troops are continuing to push the enemy back on operation Panthers Claw. This is seen as a "crucial" operation for the security of Helmand.

The fighting had been "exceptionally arduous" with the threat from the Taliban roadside bombs "enormous", Lt-Col Simon Banton tells The Daily Telegraph.

Gordon Brown, who was attending the G8 summit in L'Aquila in Italy, admitted that the troops faced "a very hard summer". He said that there was no question of Britain pulling out until the international community had finished its mission.

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