DickHardman

are there any specific military tactics/techniques/strategies for dealing with attackers hiding among crowds of civilians?? or do you just have to do your best to keep your eyes open and watch your back?

darrianation

It really depends on the situation but this is what seems to what work most of the time.

1- Get the hell out of dodge (but just because you can drive fast doesn’t mean you are a good tactical driver, in other words learn to drive tactically)!
2- If that isn’t possible engage the enemy from behind cover, preferably.
3- No cover, close with the enemy using the angles and cover fire to gain the flank (this takes teamwork).

*Remeber these are just general tactics to a generic scenario.

If number 2 or 3 is your only choices in a crowded area it is likely innocents will get hit. This is compounded when you are unsure which ones are the bad guys and which aren’t.

I have shot past and around innocent bystanders (and teammates for that matter) often having to change my orientation to my target in other words move off to the oblique or flank until I can clear the non-combatant and reacquire my muzzle/sight picture on the BG. And I have shoved non-combatants out of the way.

You may have identified the two bad guys through the crowd at your 12 o’clock and engage them but missed the two on your 3 o’clock this adds up to innocent folks or yourself getting shot. And in the chaos it isn’t so easy figuring out who the bad guys are…all you know at the time is you are taking fire and you, your teammates, and your “principle” (the guy who pays your paycheck who you are suppose to protect) are in grave danger.

The big danger here (and one of the biggest problems for inexperienced contractors and soldiers alike) is that they see hadji through the crowd with an AK and get so focused on him (tunnel vision so to speak) they don’t realize that behind that wall to the right are two more BGs with AKs or RPGs.

One of two things happens, 1. They get hit by the guys they don’t see. Or 2. In the confusion and HEAT of battle they start shooting at anyone that hasn’t removed themselves form the battlefield because they are taking incoming rounds but they don’t know where it is coming from.

Many contractors take on the opinion if there is shooting and the non-combatant doesn't take cover or hit the deck then it is their own fault if they get hit. The reality of it is there are folks scrambling everywhere and your eyes are designed to catch movement, so the eyes go to movement and the muzzle follows…it is a caveman/evolutionary thing.

It isn’t hard to manage in a single threat situation in a stable environment but not so easy in a multi-threat situation in an unstable highly chaotic environment. It really takes all of one’s control over his mental processes and the ability to “think under fire” to successfully manage a situation like this.

And if you don’t manage these highly dynamic and chaotic situations with all the unknown variables in play in the right way…you will have cowards with their pencils who can never do what you do sitting behind their desks in air conditioned offices in safety quick to point their finger and judge your actions.

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In hills, as well as in villages and cities, hazards and predators find those who walk backwards.- Ezekiel Sanchez

darrianation

The problem as I see it:

Many Iraqis in normal everyday dress carry firearms not just the badguys. The badguys understand “strategic deception” very well and blend in with the local populace becoming indistinguishable from their non-combatant civilian counterparts.

The badguys are not concerned with bad press or public opinion they will use the innocent as shields and as fodder as they see fit. And yes, dare I say it, and to make the goodguys look bad in the court of public opinion. This is intentional strategy and they actually do this quite well.

There are more and more militias forming many are fed up with the terrorists and they either take up arms to protect their families, neighborhoods, businesses, or become vigilantes fighting against foreign insurgents. The problem is they look just like the foreign insurgents.

We do our best to avoid a bad situation in the first place. Before we move out (go anywhere) we make phone calls or directly talk to the soldiers in the field, the Intell folks, and other contractors operating in the areas we will be traveling through and at our destination to find out where the activity is so we can avoid it.

*Basic information: Where are the badguys operating, where is all the traffic, where are the road closures, and where are the check points, and what are the alternate routes. This way we know where all the hot spots are and we try to avoid them. In many ways being a contractor is safer than being a soldier.

We use local Iraqis to do forward ops. Though we do our best to hire credible people sometimes they end up working for the other side and what can happen is you can get lead right into an ambush….this happened to us, this happened to other guys too. So we are always suspicious of our information.

Whenever possible we traveled at night because curfews kept many people off the streets and we weren’t as concerned with getting caught in a traffic jam.

There is very little coordination other than the basic info we get from the military or other contractors. We don’t know what they are doing or where they are operating and the same goes for Iraqi police. This can (and on occasion does) lead to the preverbal unintended disastrous cluster-**** where soldiers or contractors end up in a firefight with Iraqi police or one of the civilian militias.

One of the key principles in self-protection is “space” a cushion or reactionary gap between you and potential baddies…this is part of your strategy for managing unknown contacts. A civilian walking around say in Albuquerque may only need 10 feet. But if an unknown contact were to invade your space intentionally against your evasive movements and after warning him to STOP or “back-off” this is your trigger to initiate some sort of offensive.

In Iraq you maybe on foot or in a vehicle and the “reactionary gap” you enforce maybe 50 times that of the civilian walking around in Albuquerque because that car traveling next to you getting close just might be a suicide bomber with high explosives packed into his van (or that vehicle may harbor baddies with AKs and RPGs just trying to get close enough to open fire on you). If he ignores or appears to ignore your warnings…that is the trigger to initiate an offensive on that target. Sometimes mistakes happen that lead to tragic results, it is sad and unfortunate but this is war.

Remeber, the burden is on you...you have to get it done everytime, the badguy only has to get done once.

However certainly there are unscrupulous people on all sides and I believe that unscrupulous contractors should be held accountable for their misdeeds. Just be careful about rushing to judgment without all the facts…and remember the press isn’t exactly known for giving us all the facts.

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In hills, as well as in villages and cities, hazards and predators find those who walk backwards.- Ezekiel Sanchez

darrianation

Last but not least, when you see tragic mistakes made on the battlefield it is more often than not the fault of the institution than the individual. In this case the fault of the company.

Let’s face it security firms are corporations and they are there to make money…bottom line. Sometime these corporate types with their number crunchers cut corners. You see it all the time throughout the business world. How to trim-up the bottom line to make it look good to the share holders? It is usually through payroll or working with the bare minimum employees at any given time.

In the case of the corporate security suites it maybe no training budget, it maybe in the form of the contractors having to supply their own weapons and ammo, it maybe hiring that out of shape 40 year old ex Navy Seal who hasn’t operated in 15 years, or it could be hiring anyone who can pass a background check. Many times contractors are overworked. I remember days of working 24 hours on 6 off and 34 hours on again. Compounded by the fact that many companies could give a rats ass about their contractors is a recipe for potential problems.

Still disasters are far and few and most contractors are good human beings who care about the people (Iraqis), and feel awful when they see senseless killing or when they make a mistake.

If it weren’t for the private companies supplying security services the military would have to go to the draft, there just aren’t enough combat troops to do it all. So if you are thankful for not having the draft…then you need to come to terms with the fact that we need contractors filling the void.

__________________
In hills, as well as in villages and cities, hazards and predators find those who walk backwards.- Ezekiel Sanchez