Helicopter versus RPG
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
The enemy weapons causing the most deaths in Afghanistan are simple. There are the machine guns, and the AK-47s, and many thousands of improvised bombs planted in the earth, and suicide bombs, and the RPG: Rocket Propelled Grenade.
There are a few other kinds of weapons, but in a nutshell, that is about it. Meanwhile, it is probably not risking much overstatement to say that ISAF employs a thousand sort of weapons.
In the image above, the shooter has already pulled the trigger. There was a very quick delay, with a quiet pop. Some smoke puffed out from the front and from the rear of the RPG launcher.
I made the images in this dispatch in Urozgan Province. A few American civilians along with a bunch of Afghans were out working. On the way back, they stopped to fire their AKs and the RPG for fun.
We stood far back due to the back blast, which can be lethal. The back blast is the hot air that is expelled from the rear of the tube when launching a grenade. The gunner seemed to aim at the top of the hill.
The RPG is so simple that a kid—or an illiterate tribesman—can learn how to use it in just a few minutes. The Mujahidin shot down Soviet helicopters with these things, and of course the same has happened to us in Afghanistan, Somalia, Vietnam, and elsewhere.
If the shooter fires straight up at a helicopter, the back blast can kill the shooter. Afghans made special tubes that allow them to shoot straight up, but he is not using that tube in these photographs.
In combat, I stay away from the RPG gunners. They get excited and it is easy for them to turn quickly and blast your face off. At night it can be worse when you cannot see where they are, and Afghans have a way of not looking back and checking their back blast area. They often just shoot the rocket. They do the same with cars. They will shift into reverse and hit the gas without checking the mirror. (I got hit like this in Afghanistan.)
A US Soldier told me that he got knocked down by an RPG back blast last year.
Tourists in Cambodia can fire an RPG at a commercial shooting range, and for a price, the proprietors will let you shoot a water buffalo. No thanks.
This phase of the launch will be visible for miles at nighttime if you are wearing night vision gear.
Movie scenes featuring RPGs often make them appear to fly slowly with a plume of trailing flame and smoke. The reality is faster: squeeze trigger and BOOM! The grenade goes fast, and it is very loud. There is no Whoooshh…just BOOM! And usually it is BOOM and BOOM as it hits the target, but I have seen rounds that just bounced off: BOOM! Klank!
There are different sorts of ammunition. All are subsonic with the fastest at about 900 feet per second. If the shooter is close, there is not going to be time for a Rambo jump. If the shooter is on target, the victim on the receiving end will not have time to move.
Comments
In the movie, "Act of Valor," A seal gets hit with an RPG but its a dud and he gets knocked down, but not out. Is this actually possible?
Yes is it. I have seen it in Iraq. They had removed the fuse and it did not go off. It still can and does cause a lot of damage depending on the angle of the hit, but depending on where you get hit you can get right back up.
Define "effective". If you were to measure effective by casualities inflicted, ISAF vs. Taliban. Not very effective. If you define it as ability to take and hold ground. NO. If you define it as causing enough mayhem to sap ISAF resolve, because we don't have enough troops to stop the annoying mayhem. Then yes it could be called effective. If you want to see a repeat of history, find the interview with a North Vietnamese officer who said they new they could not win militarily, but they knew if they held out long enough. The defeatist and antiwar crowd in the USA would win it for them.
Spook
I would love to read an interview with some Kiowa Warrior pilots, especially if they were women.
I love it when our infidel women warriors kill hadji bad guys, whether they are piloting fast movers, Spectre gunships, or Apaches.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5elJNyLVEQ
Mike, I know how serious war is, but that gave me a chuckle.
Keep it up and your powder (er ...camera) dry. (10th SFG)
Pencil Neck
RSS