The Doctor’s War

[NepoZnati]

Five kids blown up playing with a land mine in the Alasay Valley, northeast of Kabul. The call came late on a slow afternoon, and the medevac crew at Bagram Air Field, the main U.S. base in Afghanistan, waited for the go-ahead to pick up its patients. But just as soldiers have rules of engagement for when and whom they can shoot, battlefield doctors have rules for when and whom they can help. And at this moment, the U.S. military’s Craig Joint Theater Hospital at Bagram didn’t have the room; some beds had to be left open in case wounded coalition troops were brought in.
...

October 2009 ATLANTIC MAGAZINE

 

[CAOX3]

I suggest an exception could have been made for blown up children considering we as adults turned their playground in a F'n war zone.

Call me crazy.

 

[nemedic]

I suggest an exception could have been made for blown up children considering we as adults turned their playground in a F'n war zone.

Call me crazy.

Call me crazy, but if I am not mistaken, it was the Soviet Union, and also the Taliban that placed the untold numbers of landmines, not the U.S. Also, One could easily argue that their "playground" was a warzone since well before any of the injured were born, and well before the majority of personnel serving in country joined the military. (Soviets 1979-89, various factions of Mujihadeen '89-96, Taliban '96-01, U.S. and ANA/ANP '01-)

 

[Tincanfireman]

Read the article and you'll find that an exception was made for two of the three, with the least injured going to another facility. Like it or not, there is a priority system (that's in the article, too), and beds must be left available. I currently have a son serving in a combat unit near Jalalabad, Afghanistan, and if he is wounded he should receive the very best care available from the US medics. If all the beds are full, he doesn't get the best, he gets what's available. This is compounded by the fact that the Taliban is causing more injuries and mortalities than anyone, but I don't think I've ever seen or heard of a Taliban hospital to treat all the Afghan civilians injured by insurgent IED's. The US has a far larger and well-equipped medical presence in the Afghan theater than any other nation and treat far more civilians than any other nation's medical personnel. In addition, USAF Pararescue and Army DUSTOFF flights provide medevac flights to civilians as well, even when they weren't combat related. In the case of one particular Air Force mission, the crew of a USAF Special Ops bird (callsign Kommodo 11) all died when their helicopter went down in a blizzard enroute to evacuate two Afghan girls with non-combat related head injuries. This man and his crewmates will never see their own children grow up because they died trying to save two hurt kids. It's sad that innocents get hurt in a war, and it's sadder still when they are kids. I just really dislike the fact that more US publication column-inches get spent on stories like this than on all the good our troops are doing. If for no other reason than they stood tall and raised their right hand, our men and women deserve the very best care that's available if they need it. It's unfortunate that not everyone can receive the best care available, but US troops deserve US care ahead of anyone, period.

 

[NepoZnati]

Call me crazy, but if I am not mistaken, it was the Soviet Union, and also the Taliban that placed the untold numbers of landmines, not the U.S.

Unexploded US bomblets

Since October 2001, American warplanes have dropped thousands of bombs on Taliban front lines, including "cluster bombs," in which nearly 10 percent of the scattered bomblets may not have exploded.
"We completely forgot about the Russian bombs and mines when we saw American cluster bombs," says Nazir Ahmad, a de-miner for the Organization for Mine Clearance and Afghan Rehabilitation (OMAR) here in Jalalabad.
"They are horrible things. Nobody knows how to detect them and nobody knows how to destroy them," he continues. "In Herat, when Americans dropped cluster bombs, there were little bomblets that were a yellow color. Children thought they might be food. Thirty have been killed and 25 wounded by cluster bombs."
More than 10 Afghans are killed or injured each day. And nearly 1 out of 10 families has a member who has been disabled by mines or unexploded ordnance left behind by the 1979-1989 Soviet war in Afghanistan.
At present, almost half of the 725 square kilometers of land identified as minefields is concentrated in the urban areas where Afghans live, or in the small percentage of Afghanistan's fertile land where Afghans raise crops or livestock.
Nearly 123 square kilometers of minefields have been cleared so far, but in the deadly civil-war years since 1995, many new minefields - more than 43 square kilometers - were laid by warring Afghan factions.
Among the most active mine-laying factions is America's new ally, the Northern Alliance.

http://www.mineclearance.org/page2.html

 

[NepoZnati]

This is compounded by the fact that the Taliban is causing more injuries and mortalities than anyone, but I don't think I've ever seen or heard of a Taliban hospital to treat all the Afghan civilians injured by insurgent IED's.

More then raining bombs or drones on completely villages? I didn't read Tali's got those weapons but then again I spent my time reading those US publication that spent they column-inches on stories like this... Damn liberals.

 

[Tincanfireman]

All due respect to differing opinions, but I've said my piece and I'm not going to debate on the myriad issues surrounding what's happened since 9/11, or even before. The US involvement in Southwest Asia isn't perfect by any means, but my point was that US troops deserve US beds more than anyone else, and I stand by my thoughts as I expressed them above.

 

[NepoZnati]

I respect you and your opinions/views, and those noble example you mention... My point is that one can be patriotic and bias due to this or that, even for wrong reasons, but to claim that one side is better and count who take less innocent lives is ridiculous... There are no "better" sides in the war since war itself if dirty business. And for me, murder is murder no matter from which side or for what reasons. That's all.

 

[mycrofft]

Every injury is a strike for the Taliban.

1. They claim the victim is a collaborator/infidel, or they claim we did it (and sometimes that's right), but no matter the cause, when we don't help it's fodder for them.
2. Doctors without Borders...a message in itself.
3. Shortage of resources results in rationing of care; mission and our own are first. If the mission is hearts and minds in certain areas, then flood them with civil engineers, medical personnel, and police/fire cadres to help get them back on their feet.
4. Look up "aerial sown mine fields", something we have odne i the past. Also, submunitions from cluster bombs, while not intentionally designed to look like toys etc., are a novelty when found.

 

[joeshmoe]

I think this is an example of why us troops arent very good at counter insurgency. When you have the mindset that you are inherently better than the people you are amongst, that your lives are more important than theres, the people you are there to "help" are gonna know it and resent it. You are gonna wear out your welcome pretty fast.

I agreed with going into Afghanistan, it was a justifiable clear cut case of self defense, unlike the idiotic immoral cluster:censored: in iraq. Unfortunately I think the longer we stay the less likely a successful outcome has become. We had the chance to go in there with overwhelming force right after 9/11 and getting our fish while they were in a barrel, instead we half assed it so we could launch bushs big iraqi adventure. We've been paying for it ever since.

 

[Motojunkie]

I'm not sure how much blame should be laid on the men on the ground as Rules of Engagement have a lot to do with it.

 

[mycrofft]

Getting shot at a lot also has somethig to do with it

Afghanistan has a history of making it's many invaders pay. Allegiances are tribal and clan based, but when you have the Russians, the British, the Americans, or Pakistani and other Taliban sitting on your property, you will go along to get along and maybe get the drop on peolple not of your clan, or tribe.

Kids in places like that will also be approached by folks who will pay them for unexploded or stolen/stockpiled ordnance they come across. If ten year old Hakim is found with a 80mm mortar projectile in a gunnysack, he is in less trouble than his older brother Clarence. If HAkim gets his legs blown off...blame the Americans/Russians/neighboring warlord.

 

[joeshmoe]

I'm not blaming the troops themselves, but rather the doctrine they follow and the country that puts them in these situations. Counter insurgency requires the troops involved take risks and expose themselves. If those risks are deemed unacceptable, dont send the troops on such missions.

You cant have it both ways, go somewhere claiming its all about helping the locals, but then adopt a shoot first ask questions later mindset, or deny some dying kids medical care because some of your own troops MAY need medical attention in the immediate future.

The military is different from EMS, where safety comes before all else. In the military, at least when I was in, mission accomplishment came before all else. If that is not acceptable to someone, they should not join the military. And if a mission is not worth risking the troops lives, then that mission should not be launched(again Iraq comes to mind).

Ill get off my soapbox before I wear out my welcome here.

 

[mycrofft]

Naw, joeschmoe, I think you're right on.

HOwever, if I've reached an agreement with the local strongman and his people stop potshotting at me and are busy mopping up thioer enemies with our help, then we pour in the hearts and minds stuff.
Kind like Haiti over and over. Or is that an oxymoron.

 

[mycrofft]

A website about the subject of a good book.

http://www.aftermathpictures.com/aftermat/demineur.html

Stones, man, sheer stones.

ANd in Germany too:
http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/archive/index.php/t-70169.html

 

[CAOX3]

Call me crazy, but if I am not mistaken, it was the Soviet Union, and also the Taliban that placed the untold numbers of landmines, not the U.S. Also, One could easily argue that their "playground" was a warzone since well before any of the injured were born, and well before the majority of personnel serving in country joined the military. (Soviets 1979-89, various factions of Mujihadeen '89-96, Taliban '96-01, U.S. and ANA/ANP '01-)

Oh well in that case if we werent directly at fault for their injuries screw them.

My political views aside I would find it hard to leave a dying child in the street over a policy.

 

[Veneficus]

counter insurgency strategy? Laughable.

"War is a moral contest, it is won in the temperments before it is faught"

-Sun Tzu

 

[Shishkabob]

I like Jefferson's quote more:


"We're in a war damnit, we have to offend somebody!"

 

[Veneficus]

I think it is great that when the US goes to war we are not supposed to kill anyone.

By convention, a civillian engaging in combat is no longer a civillian, whether they are regular or irregular troops is inconsequential.

Oh well, more of the same, the US just can't fight a war anymore. I'll save the discussion on failed strategies for the non EMS boards though.

 

[Jon]

The story is a shame... but I really can't fathom why this is worthy of publication. I think it's odd that until 30 or 40 years ago, the US Military was awesome, amazing, and could do no wrong... then come Vietnam, and it then became "cool" to throw dog feces at returning troops.

I have a good friend that was seriously injured in Afghanistan by some form of IED the beginning of this month. As I looked online to try to figure out what happened, it became very obvious that IED attacks are still a daily occurrence - but it doesn't really make the news... if it does, it makes a small, home-town newspaper when one dies. It's depressing to realize that no one else knows it's happening.

Reading this article - what would have happened if my friend and his comrades needed those trauma services? Every trauma center I've ever seen has a requirement of a free bed - in the trauma bay, in the SICU, etc... or they go on divert. I would assume that diversion isn't an option, so they divert the non-solider patients before they come in the door. It's a military hospital, and its primary customers are the US military.