A completely horrible tale

This article is about Jessica Lynch and her ill-fated convoy. I cringed as I read it. The stupidity of her commander, the dirty weapons that didn't fire, the implied lack of convoy discipline.... ugh. Unfortunately, the yanks really do seem to have the stupidest troops at times.

I spent a few years driving a truck in the Reserves, and if I had stuck around, I might have ended up doing a tour or two in places like East Timor and the like. There aren't enough Regulars to fill all the spots these days, so reservists are doing more and more of the rear echelon stuff.

Anyway, I blanched as I read the article. When I was a pogo driver, all of us were not that long out of the infantry. We knew all about cleaning our weapons every day, regardless of whether they had been fired or dropped in the dirt or not. It was part of the daily routine - wake up, clean weapon, shave, shit, eat etc etc. The thing was always ready to use.

The yanks grunts always seem to get in the shit thanks to dirty weapons that don't work when they need them. Then again, the M16 is a bastard to keep clean, and it is a "prissy" weapon - it doesn't take much dirt to stop it working. I liked the old SLR - it was quite robust and it took a lot of dirt and muck to cause a stoppage. I don't know what the Steyrs are like, as I got out just before they reached the Reserves, but I do know that the Australian military is red hot when it comes to cleaning weapons. It is just absolutely ingrained. I would sooner stop brushing my teeth than cleaning my weapons.

The other horrible thing was the lack of convoy discipline. For starters, driving at night with the lights on. I couldn't believe that. Then the fact that Jessica Lynch was captured because her humvee ran into the back of a semi trailer and the crash killed or badly injured everyone in the humvee.

For crying out loud! When we were doing convoys, it was standard to have 100m separation outside of built up areas, and 50m separation when in built up areas. You never got closer than that, except for when the convoy had to stop at a red light etc. There was no way one vehicle should ever have cause to run into the back of another, as there should be sufficient separation to stop. The other reason for being separated is that if you did drive into an ambush, the convoy would be spread out enough so that one or two vehicles might get caught, but the rest would be far enough away to be out of the killing zone, and thus able to conduct an anti-ambush drill.

In short, the whole thing sounds like a complete fuck-up from start to finish. The company commander should be taken out and shot.