National Defense > Blog > Posts > Rules of Engagement in Afghanistan Spark Ideas for How to Prevent Civilian Casualties

7/8/2010

Rules of Engagement in Afghanistan Spark Ideas for How to Prevent Civilian Casualties
The recently dismissed U.S. commander in Afghanistan Gen. Stanley McChrystal was lambasted by military experts and even by many of his own troops for imposing rules of engagement that restrict U.S. forces’ ability to shoot back when they’re under attack. The ROE are intended to prevent civilian casualties, but troops have complained that they are confusing and endanger U.S. forces.

McChrystal’s replacement, Army Gen. David Petraeus, is said to be reviewing the ROE and may come up with clearer guidance.

For field artillery units, particularly, the civilian-casualty dilemma has been daunting because of the weapons’ massive firepower and propensity to hit unintended targets. Several commands in Afghanistan severely restrict artillery fires.

In Afghanistan’s Wardak Province, troops from one field artillery unit have concocted an inventive way to curtail civilian casualties by firing less-lethal training rounds from their 155mm M777A2 howitzers in the initial “registration” phase of their mission.

“Task Force King of the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team came up with an alternative for indirect fire missions by using solely high-explosive TNT,” wrote Staff Sgt. Bruce Cobbeldick, a task force spokesman.

The high-explosive fragmentation rounds have a considerably larger kill radius, which increases the risk for civilians.

The idea came from soldiers of the 4th Battalion, 319th Airborne Field Artillery Regiment, who crafted a way to fire “non-exploding training rounds in the adjustment phase, and then switch to a lethal round in the fire-for-effect phase,” Cobbeldick explained in a story published in Army.mil.

“Using this method, fewer live rounds are fired,” he added.

Command Sgt. Maj. Dennis Woods, 4-319th AFAR, noted: "Our rules of engagement have been a challenge, because our enemy knows when we use artillery in a conventional fire fight there remains a very real possibility of unintended collateral damage. … Commanders have previously been far less inclined to use artillery. Insurgents are not stupid. This enemy has been using our ROE to avoid our fire support advantage.”

The less-lethal non-fragmentation training round is the M804A1 also known as the "smurf" round due to its blue color. “It's a ballistic match for a live high explosive artillery round, meaning the round will have the same effects while in flight from the tube to the target. The difference is in the impact effects,” Cobbeldick noted.

Environmental issue also are at play here. Woods said that because Afghanistan is an agrarian society, when high explosives are used, they contaminate the soil. “When TNT, RDX, and HMX erode into the fields, crop yields can be harmed.”

Reducing civilian deaths has been a struggle for U.S. forces both in Afghanistan and Iraq.

"The insurgents are choosing to fight among the people, employing them as human shields," Woods said. He also noted that insurgents try to avoid artillery fire by hiding near protected structures. With this new technique, “We can fire closer to protected structures with less potential for collateral damage."
Posted at 12:56 PM by Sandra Erwin | Permalink | Email this Post | Comments (0)

Comments

There are no comments yet for this post.
Items on this list require content approval. Your submission will not appear in public views until approved by someone with proper rights. More information on content approval.

Name: *

eMail *

Comment *

Title

Attachments

Name: *


eMail *


Comment *


 

Refresh
Please enter the text displayed in the image.
The picture contains 6 characters.

Characters *

  

Legal Notice *

NDIA is not responsible for screening, policing, editing, or monitoring your or another user's postings and encourages all of its users to use reasonable discretion and caution in evaluating or reviewing any posting. Moreover, and except as provided below with respect to NDIA's right and ability to delete or remove a posting (or any part thereof), NDIA does not endorse, oppose, or edit any opinion or information provided by you or another user and does not make any representation with respect to, nor does it endorse the accuracy, completeness, timeliness, or reliability of any advice, opinion, statement, or other material displayed, uploaded, or distributed by you or any other user. Nevertheless, NDIA reserves the right to delete or take other action with respect to postings (or parts thereof) that NDIA believes in good faith violate this Legal Notice and/or are potentially harmful or unlawful. If you violate this Legal Notice, NDIA may, in its sole discretion, delete the unacceptable content from your posting, remove or delete the posting in its entirety, issue you a warning, and/or terminate your use of the NDIA site. Moreover, it is a policy of NDIA to take appropriate actions under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and other applicable intellectual property laws. If you become aware of postings that violate these rules regarding acceptable behavior or content, you may contact NDIA at 703.522.1820.

 

 

Bookmark and Share