unfortunate timing of course. Its not British army’s fault. This can be deferred for anywhere in the future once this issue is resolved.
by the way, if this incident would have happened to any other country within the NATO forces, their people would have been demanding the return of their troops and be done with America's war on terror.
whenever Americans have killed the British and Canadian forces there has been an uproar in the home countries asking their governments to stop cooperating in America's wars. sadly we have no choice and no where to go NATO is fighting the war next door and pushing its weaker partner in the corner.
there are only 2 possibilities
1. The NATO high command sanctioned the attack knowing what the target was.
2. The NATO troops who called the attack and the pilots who carried out the strike are inept, illiterate and cant use their own NAV systems to see where they are being sent.
The other question apart from the Ariel attack is how far the ground troops had intruded into Pakistan by when they decided to request an air strike on a target 2.5 KM inside Pakistan. What kind of tactical situation is that which needed an attack on a designated post so far away from the border?
Using the air strike as an excuse for coming under fire from the Taliban is also very flimsy, weak and meant for people who are ignorant of the world of military and warfare. What kind of weapons the Taliban were carrying while trying to be as mobile and fast to escape the perusing ISAF/ NATO troops yet be able to fire back at them from miles? Either they were super human who were able to carry medium or heavy mortars and heavy machine guns while running up and down the mountains or they had air transport that was shadowing them to deploy their long range weapons to fire back at the ISAF/ NATO troops? Isn’t it absolute garbage? The best any mobile foot unit can muster is RPGs , light machine guns and light mortars of about 50 mm that cant fire beyond 800 meters. Even the machine gun bullets beyond 1 km and under 2 km will be actually harmlessly falling on the ground. I am not even mentioning RPGs and assault rifles as they don’t go beyond few hundred meters.
Now coming to the excuse of coming under fire from the Pakistani post, same rules apply. Their only long range weapons will be heaver morters or artillery. Had they directed any artillery fire on the NATO forces? If they had then there would have been NATO casualties and people like Glen Beck and O'Reilly would have been chocking blood by now and demanding nuclear strikes on Pakistan.
I will once again highlight the need of the following.
To get the conversation of the pilots and their base that ordered the attack and the conversation during and after the attack. And the conversation of The ground troops that requested the strikes.
How far or close where the NATO troops in the “poorly marked” border?
Now one thing is clear that those air strikes were definitely called upon specifically for those Pakistani posts so again two sub questions
Were the imbeciles on ground aware of the Pakistani posts and deliberately requested their destruction?
Did the dimwits at the NATO mission HQ know what the troops were requesting (attack on Pakistani posts) and then knowingly gave the go ahead?
Did the goons flying the helicopters and the aircraft also know that they were being told to attack 2.5 KM inside Pakistan on the designated posts of their war ally?
The more you think about it and raise questions about it more it seems that either the NATO was reckless, careless and incompetent or overtly vicious and deliberately hostile in its brazen attack. Lets see what the investigations by NATO (for all their worth) show up and if there is any joint team set up to find the facts (I doubt if that will happen) so that its established at which level the mistake was made.
If you ask me, I will put the blame on the mission HQ that took the request and gave the go ahead to the air strikes.
As far as the response of Pakistan is concerned, it should stop the active participation in war on terror and get to the level of support of say Turkey or Russia or say Saudi Arabia. It should fully concentrate on fighting (ONLY) TTP and BLA terrorists and give moral support to the peaceful settlement of the Afghan crises.
Given the circumstances Pakistan is in and the parity of military power between American/ NATO and Pakistan there is nothing much Pakistan can do more than some protests and gearing down the support in WoT. Its not a gang war and a cartel animosity that should lead in reprisal attacks etc so any such suggestions are cheap and stupid. The states don’t work like that no matter how bad the situations get.
When the Soviets shot down the American U2 spy plane that took off from badabir KP, Khrushchev threatened Pakistan by wiping that airbase from the face of the earth for aiding USA. But that’s were it all stopped and the behind the scene diplomacy cooled down the political temperature.
The only positive outcome from this attack is that NATO and the USA are not acting like their characteristic machismo despite what the internet trolls and Fox news fascists wish them to say. Pakistan can ask them what will NATO do to prevent such actions in the future and if its not satisfied it conveys that it will do all it can to protect its land and the lives of its troops from any similar future attacks. Pakistan is already fighting this war on its own expense and the so called aid is not military in nature but the reimbursement for using its facilities and the corridor and that is goin in the government’s pocket so its no longer an incentive to keep it going at the risk of its troops and civilians..