Pakistan officials: U.S. missile attacks kill 17
December 18th, 2009 . by TexasFredPakistan officials: U.S. missile attacks kill 17
MIR ALI, Pakistan - Two U.S. missile strikes — including one believed to be the largest ever using Predator drones — pummeled targets inside the main sanctuary for Qaida and the Taliban along Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan on Thursday, killing 17 people, local intelligence officials said.
The drone attacks came amid the prospect of renewed political instability in Pakistan, with President Asif Ali Zardari facing calls for his resignation after the Supreme Court struck down an amnesty that had protected him from corruption charges.
The missiles rained down Thursday on North Waziristan, a haven for many militants including groups determined to push the U.S. and NATO out of Afghanistan. The second, bloodier attack involved five drones and 10 missiles — an unusually intense bombardment, officials told NBC News.
The strikes in North Waziristan are especially sensitive because they risk angering Afghan-focused militant groups who have agreed to be neutral as Islamabad cracks down on Taliban fighters in neighboring South Waziristan who have threatened the Pakistani state.
Pakistani officials said they were trying to establish the identities of the dead.
Full Story Here:
Pakistan officials: U.S. missile attacks kill 17 - Pakistan
Those Predator Drones and the Hellfire missiles they fire are a great things, they keep American fighting men from harms way! I am all for that too, any American life saved in battle is a good thing.
Several years ago I was at Ft. Rucker, Alabama and I had the opportunity to see a test firing of a Hellfire missile. It was a very impressive site! It was fired from an AH-64 Apache and you could almost see the grins on the gunslingers faces. They truly enjoyed their work!
Below is a Navy Seahawk firing a Hellfire missile.
I don’t know what todays cost of each individual Hellfire missile might be, but if these figures are accurate, we’re looking at approximately $68K every time one of these missiles is used.
Each Hellfire weighs 47 kg / 106 pounds, including the 9 kg / 20 pound warhead, and has a range of 8,000 meters. As of late 2007, some 21,000 Hellfire IIs have been built since 1990, at a cost of about $68,000 each. SOURCE
So, let’s do the math on this mission alone. The figures aren’t exact, the story may or may not be 100% accurate but, given a $68K price tag per missile, these 2 combined missions fired, as far as we know, a total of 12 Hellfire missiles. That would be a total missile cost of at least $816K, if the manufacturing costs quoted above are accurate.
Given the hopes that the facts and accuracy of this story are correct, 17 hostiles were killed. That’s 17 that we know of, and admit to. That comes up to $48K per raghead terrorist, not counting the operational costs of the Predators, their support crews, pilots and all of the satellite and electronics gear that goes into each individual mission.
Current estimates say that the cost to field troops in theater (Afghanistan) is somewhere in the neighborhood of $1M per year, per troop, according to this SOURCE and another confidential source I talked to recently. That is the overall cost for all the things it takes to maintain a U.S. Army trooper in the field, in a hostile environment, for 1 year. Just 1 soldier!
So, I’ve been trying to think of a more cost effective method to take these raghead terrorists out, and my 1st thought was, 3 man teams, a shooter, a spotter and a security guy. Arm the shooter with a REAL weapon, a serious reach out and touch weapon.
There is no way to do this on the cheap. Cheap went out the window a long time ago. Given the fact that the USA is in one of the worst financial positions it’s been in since the Great Depression, getting this thing over in Afghanistan as quickly as possible is the only saving grace I can see.
Iraq, and all that came with it, has all but taken the USA into bankruptcy. We can’t let the war in Afghanistan become another Vietnam. Americas finances can’t stand it!
So, would it be too far out of line if we called for a few of these to be used?
Just sayin’… 
My vote goes to the last PHOTO! I have been calling for the use of battlefield nukes in Afghanistan since Tora Bora. If Obama wants to downsize our nuke arsenal, heck, this is the way to do it and get some gratifying results at the same time!
“I LOVE the smell of nuclear weapons in the morning!”
JDL
Really like Longstreet’s proposal. The three man teams would work well in the DC area.
Longstreet & minuteman26
Hell guy’s, lets use/em both. LOL
I love them Barrett .50’s. Like Fred says, they reach out and touch somebody, and not very friendly either.
Yep…we need to nuke that Toro Boro area…or what ever it is called in that mountain area where BinLaden is hiding in caves. If we nuke the area….whoever is not killed in initial blast will die later from radiation poisoning. Those that don’t die quickly from the bomb will be easy night targets ( green glowing men running around ) for the sniper teams.
Yup. What you said!
I’ve been for that final opition for a long time. As that damn yankee general, Sherman said “war is hell”. We need to stop playing games with these bastards and then they would think twice before crying jihad. The hellfire seems to be a great weapon and I hope the assembly lines are working overtime turning them out.
A small tactical nuke deployed in those mountains will make them think quite hard if they want to continue Jihad.
Hey Fred, you notice the new story bout the Russians assisting the Rag Heads on how to hack into the info beams from the Raptors! Another thing, that little Rag Head in the WH will never do anything to hurt a Muslim, anywhere. Afghanistan is down the tubes. Count on it. (Right now he’s in Copenhagen committing the first installment of $100,000,000,000 per year for ten years.) Come to think of it a small tactical nuke in Bora Bora would be ideal!
Aw man. Don’t bomb Bora Bora. I wouldn’t mind going there someday. How ’bout just taking out Tora Bora instead?
Yeah yeah….I know….typo…but I just couldn’t resist. Sorry.
I’m with you. More Barretts = being able to “reach out and touch someone” for a reasonable price.
BZ
Kate in my younger days I use to dream of Bora Bora too, but since 9/11 my dreams of Tora Bora involve a different kind of mushroom, one that grows from the belly of a stealt bomber and not from some cow turd.
Fighting “on the cheap” seemed to be what Donald Rumsfeld wanted to do in Iraq, we see how that worked out for us. I say drop a few tactical nukes and let our boys come home!
The word “nuke um” drives the american left up the wall, those bastards wouldn,t even throw spitballs at them or even insults. A few large man-made landslides in those mountain passes sounds right to me.