Advanced Weaponry Kills The User FOB Falcon

Techie warriors tend to believe more advanced weaponry equals superiority. It doesn't. It just kills the user more efficiently.

When the invaders stockpiled advanced munitions at FOB Falcon in Baghdad they though it meant security for them. Instead it blew them up. The war was lost in twenty minutes. Don't expect anyone to admit to this, but look at what's happened since then.

My claim is there is a point beyond which advanced weaponry is not advantageous to the user. Dreadful as it may seem, you actually have to use your brains. Like a bodybuilder who pumps iron till his biceps burst, there is a point beyond which escalation doesn't work.

One word of warning here. The standard troll line is to start talking about nukes. Completely irrelevant, other than the DU fallout which was terrible. There is no need to discuss nukes, unless you are paid to disrupt conversations.

The major US and British media were filming this. They could feel the blasts where they were eight miles away. They all stopped transmission before the big flash at 3:57. Iraqi television carried on, and some of the staff were killed the next day.

Have you seen this video before? This was the moment modern warfare was proven to be counter-productive. This was the destruction of the largest US arms store in Iraq. Following this the ammunition stores at other bases were also targeted. This hasn't been lost on those who have been on the receiving end. They know the ammo store is a riper target than at any time in history.

Keep your powder dry, and well hidden.

Malarkey....

a reply to: jappee

Can you expand? Which part of a billion dollars worth of DU shells etc. going up at once is malarky?

It was this place. www.pbs.org...

a reply to: Kester

Weapons stores have been a target since cavemen were running around bashing each other over the head , nothing new here .

a reply to: Kester

where's the part where the weapons being used killed the user? there is no video evidence of a advanced weapon killing the user while using one.

all i see is a successful attack on a ammo dump, or a accident made by personal. those things happen in war.

a reply to: hutch622

The newness is the extra efficiency. It becomes a more efficient method with every advancement in firepower. That's the point. It isn't static. It gets worse for the aggressors with every escalation.

a reply to: Kester

and here is a video that says a IDF unit (assuming that means iraq denfence force, not israeli denfence force) that started the fire that set off the ammo.

It all started by IDF from the East Rashids that started a fire around the 155mm charge containers. The bright lights that flare during the MICLIC explosions were mortor illum rounds stored next to them. There were also CS grenades in the AHA, we found out because we were down wind from it the entire time. There were no nuclier weapons at this AHA, it was all normal ammo for a base that has tanks, artty, Brads, and a lot of gun trucks.
FOB Falcon, Iraq AHA Explosion

and according to the wiki, it was hit by a motor by insurgents,

October 10, 2006 attack Members of a U.S. Air Force explosive ordnance disposal team unpack C-4 explosives, Oct. 16, 2006. The explosives will be used to detonate a cache of unexploded ordnance recovered from a blast area on Forward Operating Base Falcon, Iraq, following a recent mortar attack. The airmen are assigned to the 447th Expeditionary Civil Engineering Squadron. On October 10, 2006, at about 10:40 p.m. (1940 GMT), a major explosion rocked the base, reportedly due to the base's ammunition dump being hit by a 82mm mortar round fired by Iraqi insurgents. Further explosions continued for hours. Images of the explosions were carried live on CNN.[3] There were no casualties. According to the official Department of Defense report released by US Central Command, the base resumed normal duties within 24 hours.[4]
October 10, 2006 attack

a reply to: hounddoghowlie

There was a small berm, a short distance, and a lot of accommodation. Look at the bunker roof, or some other object, flying up and descending down between 4:02 and 4:05. That gives you the scale.

The distance between the AHA and the accommodation was very small. I don't remember the exact yardage offhand.

If you can get the commentary translated you'll hear a caller saying debris was landing many miles away. There's no hiding from the effects of these blasts at close range. That's what the stuff is designed for.

a reply to: hounddoghowlie

Wrong video, wrong place. That was a much smaller event that is often passed off as Falcon. Another sure sign that Falcon was super-serious. You'll find many of those wrong videos and supposed veterans saying they were there. Total bunk.

That's no tactical nuke...standard P-Wave ordnance explosion.
a reply to: Kester

a reply to: Kester

Have...

Perhaps if one is going to pretend they know things about military ordnance they should do at least a tiny friggin smidgeon of research...

Otherwise, you just end up making completely asinine threads like this one where the sole thing actually proven is that the OP proves that even though he thinks he's smarter than every single person in military procurement and r&d while actually just showing that they know nothing about the subject they're speaking of.

Here's a short list of why you're wrong...

1. DOD has on a very short time table decided to use nothing but insensitive munitions in every role it's feasible to make them in...

2. Even as it is current munitions are much less sensitive to sympathetic detonations etc compared to munitions used even 30 years ago!

3. These advanced munitions you seem to believe put the user in danger actually do the opposite because in general EVERYTHING about current munitions is smaller than legacy munitions!

That's right, not only is there less explosive filler, solid fuel etc per munition but there's also an order of magnitude less munitions needed to sustain a day a week or a month of fighting...

So you have actual munitions that on a 1:1 basis average not even 50% of the explosives you used to need to get the same 1:1 equivalent effect AND you only require a literal order of magnitude less of these 1:1 equivalent munitions!!

All of which are still less sensitive than the versions from 30 years ago and will basically be 100% insensitive munitions and explosives rated to a point where nothing short of attachment of their specifically designed fuzes etc to interface with the internal detonation train or a nuke will be able to set them off!!

4. It's almost like you're completely unaware of the MULTIPLE instances where ammunition ships detonated in the harbors of various ports often setting off the ammo for the warships also nearby and even other ammunition ships...

Those were actually major disasters and put the lie to your entire thesis well over a half century before you thought it up!


Conclusion: (because I could write all day about how wrong you are but frankly I have better things to do)

You're essentially just regurgitating a more than century old talking point with nowhere near the eloquence, passion, or intelligence that Alfred Nobel did long ago!

Further, Nobel put huge chunks of his vast fortune from the munitions and explosives empire he built into the forming of the Nobel prize foundation...

You, well you just came in here all smarmy and convinced of your intellectual superiority.

Munitions is just one aspect, but it does show logistics is still key. Something vital in the supply line is left open to being hit, don't be too surprised if and when it happens. In the case of asymmetric warfare, it's potentially the soft underbody of a force that is superior in terms of technology or even manpower. Probably something known in strategy that's old as dirt, but not everybody gets it.

a reply to: roguetechie

You forgot the DU.

a reply to: Kester

Nope, I didn't forget the DU... quite frankly I just know more about it than you.

Though... Just as a side note, your entire premise is a rambling screed about the way advanced weapons systems are more dangerous to the army using them than anyone else.

So, how exactly is an electrically driven Gatling gun in a caliber very similar to the Hotchkiss rotary so popular in the late 1800's fitted to a fixed centerline mount that uses the pilots eyes throttle stick and pedal inputs to line up on target advanced?

See, because I happen to know that experiments in running Gatling guns with electric motors to achieve high rates of fire for use as aircraft weapons was well underway before ww2...

Likewise DU armor piercing ammunition was being used by the final year of ww2.

Centerline gun mounts? Yeah, the airplane wasn't even old enough to get a drivers license when that happened!

So, again... You don't know what you're talking about, your "point" is crap, and your smug superiority is entirely unfounded by anything you've said here.

a reply to: roguetechie

The DU fallout from this event affected who and how?

a reply to: Kester

First off DU fallout is a laughably blatant tipoff that you have absolutely ZERO idea what you're talking about!

Not only do you know nothing about weapons and the military, but you've also outed yourself as someone lacking even a working understanding of high school level science.

Words and scientific terms especially have fixed and very specific definitions and that said an ammo dump getting blown up which contains DU munitions does not equate to fallout like the HIGHLY radioactive dust and debris from a nuclear detonation at or above ground level.

DU is short for depleted uranium which while radioactive is only negligibly so and has a crazy long half life, fun fact long half life equals lower level of radiation output compared to short half life unstable and highly radioactive materials!

Now, being a heavy metal does make it pretty toxic especially if fine particles are inhaled etc and can even lead to birth defects, high infant mortality, and a myriad of other health effects in adults children and etc.

However, this is because it's a heavy metal NOT because of radiation output.

So yeah, again I'll say it, you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about!

Oh at BTW...

You still have neglected to explain how DU munitions are advanced smart weapons that somehow get their users killed...

You can't prove it of course because you have no real idea what weapons etc employ DU that the US military actually uses!

Fun fact, the Abrams tank armor package for the US military employs DU as part of it's protection package! (Export models to even our closest allies do not contain the DU elements, though Australia could have acquired their Abrams tanks with the DU elements, they however chose not to)

Here's a partial list of DU munitions the US uses.

A-10 warthog Gau-8 Gatling gun ammunition

M2/M3 Bradley APFSDS ammunition for Bushmaster M242 25mm autocannon

105/120mm APFSDS ammunition for the M1 Abrams tank gun

That's the ones I can think of right off the top of my head, and they all have one thing in common. That thing is that they are all dumb ammunition meant to be used for defeating armored targets.

APFSDS: Armor Piercing Fin Stabilized Discarding Sabot

APFSDS ammunition fires what are essentially very long darts with tail fins designed to keep the dart stable and fly straight. These darts are encased in what is known as a sabot (French word for shoe/wooden shoe) which is designed to break away shortly after leaving the muzzle of the gun. They make these rounds this way in order to massively increase the surface area of the round for bhe powder gases to push against and impart velocity to the projectile because nothing short of raw velocity and a heavy enough projectile mass can reliably punch the frontal armor of modern tanks even without ERA.

Depleted uranium is used for the darts because of it's nearly unparalleled density and thus mass per cubic centimeter, it's ability to essentially self sharpen as it's penetrating a target, and finally because it's HIGHLY pyrophoric!

It's high mass and density allow for a long very thin dart which is vital when attempting to engage a tank head on.

Self sharpening/pyrophoric effect:
Unlike tungsten DU darts don't have the finely shaped tip ablate away or shear off during penetration. Along with this a penetrating dart need not directly hit a vital part or something explosive inside the enemy tank to knock it out of action or outright destroy it because once it blows through the armor a superheated cloud of burning DU particles fill the interior and make a single hit far more likely to kill or injure crews and destroy vital internal equipment and etc.

The Bradley autocannon and the GAU-8 of the warthog work the same way too but the Bradley is meant to engage lighter armored fighting vehicles etc not tanks and the warthog attacks tanks and other armored vehicles from the top where their armor is nowhere near as thick and heavy.