Wounded soldier sympathizes with U.S. pilot who fired on allies

One of seven Canadian soldiers seriously wounded when U.S. jets mistakenly fired on them said he does not feel any anger toward the pilots involved in the incident.

"None at all. I feel bad for them, as well, because I know they're probably grieving, as well," Sgt. Kym Cousineau told CBC News.

Pte. Mark Anthony Graham was killed and about 30 others were wounded Monday when two U.S. A-10 Thunderbolts mistakenly strafed a Canadian platoon. An investigation has been launched into the friendly-fire incident that took his life.

Cousineau said his troops were just breaking camp and getting ready to move out when they were hit.

"I could see guys laying all over the place, rolling, screaming, yelling. It was a sight I don't want to see again."

Cousineau was wounded by shrapnel in the shoulder, below the knee and in the foot.

He said at first he thought there had been some kind of accident caused by one of the troops.

"I realized once I could hear the aircraft itself, we were hit by friendly fire."

He said he believes the attack was "an error in judgment" and an "honest mistake."

He said the Americans were probably given a target that looked "very similar" to their own surroundings, which included a small fire burning.

"I guess once the aircraft approached the target that was described to them, it ended up looking like our target because we ended up starting a fire of our own to burn our garbage and what-not.

"A fire's a fire. At 30,000 feet, you're not going to be able to tell if it's a Taliban burning a bush or a bunch of Canadians burning garbage."

The wounded soldiers are expected to be transported home by the end of the week.

I hope they figure some sort of technology that would designate friendlies.

There is such a thing ("Blue Force Tracking") but the A-10 does not integrate it into the cockpit. It's easy to add to a command post or CO's helicopter, but much harder to integrate in a 30-year-old jet that has traditionally been the Air Force's most under-resourced fighter community. BFT is a relatively recent invention (we were fighting in Afghanistan before it was in the field); while its existence is not classified, its details are best kept under wraps.

The long-neglected A-10s are finally being updated; the end product, the A-10C, will be able to use the latest PGMs but I do not believe it will integrate BFT.

Yes, before anyone asks, we share the technology with our Canadian bros.

This Canadian kid sounds like a very mature and sensible young man, and I hope his words make it to the pilots. There have been several other friendly fire incidents in both theaters of war. A friend of mine and his interpreter were shot by the Marines at Abu Ghraib (they both lived and recovered). Steve Harriman and several of his Afghan troopies were whacked by an AC-130 at the outset of Anaconda; the guy's nav system failed and he tried to fire in support visually, and made the same mistake the A-10 pilots here did, fired up a similar-looking unit to his intended target, but it was a few pickups full of good guys in turbans and beards, and not the bad-guy pickups 800 yards away.

Of course, in WWII one close-support bombing raid in Normandy killed LTG McNair and hundreds of his troops. Remember the old bumper stickers that said, "**** Happens"? Well, the guy that made that sticker was a combat vet.

d.o.l.

Criminal Number 18F

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