Screeners

Sumdain x

Trakanon Raider
1,555
490
Really enjoyed Lone Survivor, i felt the script was really accurate to the events that went down.
 

Sumdain x

Trakanon Raider
1,555
490
How is what went down considered "dumb"? Was what happened a huge flaw in Intel? Yes. Definitely the mission failed in the Intel planning stage when they had assumed the Shah only had 10-15 guys with him and had no other corroborating sources but a few Taliban turncoats trying to make a dollar. The movement and Reaction of the Team once they hit the goatherders was completely accurate, they did exactly what the ROE stated even though no one wanted to. when they were ambushed they did the standard SOP that SOF pushes, if you get ambushed you push into the ambush to break the momentum and gain the upper hand. When the team saw that it was a losing battle they attempted to flank, which did not work, then they attempted to retreat which lead them to the mountain edge, while preparing to jump and slide down the mountain RPG rounds blew them off before they were ready to move.

As someone who has deployed in support of several teams (including Marcus himself post redwing and his brother Morgan) everything this movie showed was standard operating procedures for shooters to follow. Comms always fails, and your plan changes as soon as you have a TIC action on your hands.
 

Maul

Dental Dammer
3,502
10,701
Terrible fucking movie with a good cast that were once again wasted on a retarded script.
Movie will aggravate the shit out of you imho.

Made the seals look like a group of bumbling idiots.

My favorite shot of the film is a guy clearly loses his rifle on a ridge as he is falling down. The director even focused on the rifle being lost, and in the next shot he all the sudden has the rifle back in his arms.
You realise Rambo isn't real, right? I thought it was a great movie, Special Ops aren't superheroes. If you don't want realism then watch the expendables.
 

Column_sl

shitlord
9,833
7
Was what happened a huge flaw in Intel?
Huge flaw in intel, are you joking???

1st thing the mission was a kill not a support or rescue.
2nd the commanding officer knew there would be massive com issues going in, and told no one. When Eric Bana calls his superior at the end he blatantly takes the blame for that.

Even without the com issues they had no exit strategy, they did absolutely no recon for that seal team for a mission to kill a high profile target.

If it was supposed to be a suicide mission, then give that team authority to terminate.

There gross misjudgment in intel, costs those men there lives. That was a 200 man army stronghold with no other villages in the vicinity..
Why the fuck were they even there on a assassination mission?? You don't need ground troops for that shit, blow it the fuck off the earth.

That's all before we even get to the ROE nonsense.

So they immediately get spotted by a group of sheep herders, who the seal team confirms as enemy. Guy has the radio to the camp right on him..
At that point they decide to let them go because the ROE said so?? I find this extremely hard to believe ,and reeks of politics.
The Seal team has no comms for an extraction, no one even bothers to recon ahead to see if they can even get off the damn mountain when they know for a fact they will be attacked by 200 armed soldiers.
So there answer is letting them go?? If they couldn't kill them, then fine. Tying them up so they can't immediately run to the village is off the board completely?? Walking them out as prisoners is not even an option??? What kind of stupid shit is that

So what happens in the movie? they run to the village immediately, and alert everyone. Who then come marching on there position from all sides....
No way to survive, how the fuck does a 4 man group flank 200 soldiers...

Its over , good game..


Now lets talk about the air support that they get later on. Which is actually a more retarded decision then what I wrote above.
They have 4 men under heavy fire, so they send in 2 unarmed personal carriers into a battle where the enemy has anti aircraft weapons on them.
They immediately get shot down killing 16 men on the spot..

In the movie it says they came in with no air support so were going with the movie version.
In the real life version they had Apache support.


Mistake, after mistake ,after mistake. And this wasn't a small kill mission btw, this was a high profile target linked to bin laden.
If our best of the best strategists are this inept, how the fuck do we get anything done.
 

Column_sl

shitlord
9,833
7
You realise Rambo isn't real, right? I thought it was a great movie, Special Ops aren't superheroes. If you don't want realism then watch the expendables.
Obviously you didn't watch this film, because they made them appear to be super heroes...

They had 200 men shooting at them, every shot from them was an immediate kill, and they took insane damage constantly with seemingly no pain.
Those movie characters would have given Rambo, or the Expendables a run for there money.


One other footnote, I am in no way attacking the real life version of these events. I am only attacking the movie version.
My brother and best friend both serve for the Army, and Air Force.

Reading the Wiki, the original book has allot of controversy around the facts. So what happened in the real version I can not make a comment on.
 

Sumdain x

Trakanon Raider
1,555
490
Huge flaw in intel, are you joking???

1st thing the mission was a kill not a support or rescue.
2nd the commanding officer knew there would be massive com issues going in, and told no one. When Eric Bana calls his superior at the end he blatantly takes the blame for that.

Even without the com issues they had no exit strategy, they did absolutely no recon for that seal team for a mission to kill a high profile target.

If it was supposed to be a suicide mission, then give that team authority to terminate.

There gross misjudgment in intel, costs those men there lives. That was a 200 man army stronghold with no other villages in the vicinity..
Why the fuck were they even there on a assassination mission?? You don't need ground troops for that shit, blow it the fuck off the earth.

That's all before we even get to the ROE nonsense.

So they immediately get spotted by a group of sheep herders, who the seal team confirms as enemy. Guy has the radio to the camp right on him..
At that point they decide to let them go because the ROE said so?? I find this extremely hard to believe ,and reeks of politics.
The Seal team has no comms for an extraction, no one even bothers to recon ahead to see if they can even get off the damn mountain when they know for a fact they will be attacked by 200 armed soldiers.
So there answer is letting them go?? If they couldn't kill them, then fine. Tying them up so they can't immediately run to the village is off the board completely?? Walking them out as prisoners is not even an option??? What kind of stupid shit is that

So what happens in the movie? they run to the village immediately, and alert everyone. Who then come marching on there position from all sides....
No way to survive, how the fuck does a 4 man group flank 200 soldiers...

Its over , good game..


Now lets talk about the air support that they get later on. Which is actually a more retarded decision then what I wrote above.
They have 4 men under heavy fire, so they send in 2 unarmed personal carriers into a battle where the enemy has anti aircraft weapons on them.
They immediately get shot down killing 16 men on the spot..

In the movie it says they came in with no air support so were going with the movie version.
In the real life version they had Apache support.


Mistake, after mistake ,after mistake. And this wasn't a small kill mission btw, this was a high profile target linked to bin laden.
If our best of the best strategists are this inept, how the fuck do we get anything done.
lets see if we can hit the high points for you...

who do you think does recon for a SEAL team? yep SEALs when they were at the first OP they phoned in exactly what they were going to do. move back, hold at OP2, wait for comms to be established. We have had guys go 6+ hours with no comms traffic and we immediately dont start bombing things. the team had intel from some taliban traitors that the Shah was only guarded by a small number of men, when they arrived they obviously realized this was wrong. in 2005 while drones were prevalent in the area not every team had drone support handy so they couldn't get video of the town and its inhabitants. If you use satellite imagery (where their maps came from) you cant tell combatants from non combatants.

Just because a village houses Taliban does not mean the entire village is. there were probably 200+ women and children also in that town as well as a school of some kind. Once again ROE dictates you cannot attack unless you know with a certainty all targets are combatants. I have been in a FOB in a small village and watched guys holding the taliban flag, obvious members but holding no weapons and we could not engage due to ROE.

You also have no idea how many soldiers were attacking, i guarantee it was not 200 at the onset.

the Airsupport was a huge issue because everyone shares air assets in theatre teams dont have dedicated close air support at least at the time. The army had troops in contact at another location so the SEALs apache's were pulled. The Chinooks should have turned around and not taken off without any support, they weighed the risk/reward and decided to carry on.

and finally your comment on rambo after the battle and the removal of the Shah when they did sight recon every man on that team was responsible for a dozen+ kills. and each were shot several times. Michael Murphy was shot 7 times while radioing for help, Marcus when he was rescued had a broken back and his hand replaced with 50% pins and rods ,several gunshot wounds, an intestinal parasite, and shrapnel burns on 40% of his body.

It is very easy to look at this in retrospect and call out why the op went bad but in the situation they made the best calls possible to try and survive and be criminals of war.
 

Column_sl

shitlord
9,833
7
who do you think does recon for a SEAL team? yep SEALs when they were at the first OP they phoned in exactly what they were going to do. move back, hold at OP2, wait for comms to be established. We have had guys go 6+ hours with no comms traffic and we immediately dont start bombing things. the team had intel from some taliban traitors that the Shah was only guarded by a small number of men, when they arrived they obviously realized this was wrong. in 2005 while drones were prevalent in the area not every team had drone support handy so they couldn't get video of the town and its inhabitants. If you use satellite imagery (where their maps came from) you cant tell combatants from non combatants.
This was a high profile kill from a target ( according to the movie) had just made the news for killing 50 marines, and mailing there heads back to the families...
You telling me this is how sloppy a Seal Unit is?

Also you didn't address the fact that in the "Movie" there commanding officer ( Eric Bana) knew ahead of time they were going into an area were the coms would sure to fail.
That team not only wasn't told that, but they didn't even prepare for it ahead of time.

That's a pretty big fucking screw up to go from a Shah with 15 bodyguards to a 200 men encampment.
Also you are yet to address the ROE situation which is the one that ultimately got them killed. In the movie they immediately let them go with not thought of how they will even get out of there.

They don't have a seal scout ahead to see if they can even exit, they don't think of another way to buy themselves any time to escape.


Just because a village houses Taliban does not mean the entire village is. there were probably 200+ women and children also in that town as well as a school of some kind. Once again ROE dictates you cannot attack unless you know with a certainty all targets are combatants. I have been in a FOB in a small village and watched guys holding the taliban flag, obvious members but holding no weapons and we could not engage due to ROE.
They had the dead or alive orders on the target. When the seal team saw that they were in over there heads with no extraction, and no coms they should have moved out of the kill zone area.
In the movie they couldn't even kill the Shah without direct communication with a senior officer. There was no way for them to kill this guy either way.

That new intel they obtained could have been used by there commanding officers to decide how they were going to proceed with this new situation.

You also have no idea how many soldiers were attacking, i guarantee it was not 200 at the onset.
I'm going by the movie, and the never ending waves of soldiers that came at them constantly.

the Airsupport was a huge issue because everyone shares air assets in theatre teams dont have dedicated close air support at least at the time. The army had troops in contact at another location so the SEALs apache's were pulled. The Chinooks should have turned around and not taken off without any support, they weighed the risk/reward and decided to carry on.
Except according to the wiki that shit isn't even accurate. In the Movie they have no air support at all, and in real life version of those events they had Apache support.
That is a huge fucking difference.


and finally your comment on rambo after the battle and the removal of the Shah when they did sight recon every man on that team was responsible for a dozen+ kills. and each were shot several times. Michael Murphy was shot 7 times while radioing for help, Marcus when he was rescued had a broken back and his hand replaced with 50% pins and rods ,several gunshot wounds, an intestinal parasite, and shrapnel burns on 40% of his body.
Did you even watch this film? they never missed, every shot was a kill immediately, and they seem unaffected by massive trauma.
Adrenline may make you forget the pain, but it doesn't stop you from bleeding out, or moving on broken limbs.

The first damage they take is catastrophic. Emile gets his hand severed in half, and seems to not only stop the massive bleeding that would have caused with a simple piece of cloth, but also is able to still fire a high powered rifle more then effectively against enemy troops.

It is very easy to look at this in retrospect and call out why the op went bad but in the situation they made the best calls possible to try and survive and be criminals of war.
They did not make the best calls possible, and it started from the top down to the bottom.

The US government is not going to put people in prison because you A) marched 3 prisoners out with you to an extraction point or B) Tied them up while you got away.
Not everything needs to be a kill....


One last point the original book is steeped in controversy. The facts related in the book do not match up with the official after-action reports they have of that operation filed by Marcus himself.
How did Marcus get clearance to even write this book? Why did the book come out in the middle of massive ROE issues in Washington?
 

Void

BAU BAU
<Gold Donor>
9,761
11,660
I don't disagree with some of your (Column) statements in this thread, but you're obviously fairly critical of movies (Rush, for example), so I'm wondering if you could give us a few examples of movies that you feel are top quality, or fun, or just worth a watch. I'm not asking to be a dick, I'm asking to get a basis for determining how I compare your tastes to mine. I think we all try to get a little feeling for how others view the same movies, if they match up with our own thoughts, are just trolling (not saying you are), etc. If all you enjoy are high-falutin' artsy movies, for example, then obviously we aren't going to have similar tastes, but I might not realize that if I never read the artsy movie reviews, if that makes sense.

Thanks.
 

Column_sl

shitlord
9,833
7
This is the 2013 list, just pick what you like ,and Ill give my comments on it.

http://www.wildaboutmovies.com/2013_...ters_2013.html

I watch about every movie that comes out, and I like movies in all genres. From the big summer movies to small indie films.
I will say that my top movie for 2013 was Prisoners.

I also thought the "We are what we are" remake was better then the original.

Notable disappointments were Refn's Only god Forgives.
 

Column_sl

shitlord
9,833
7
Yeah, I need to watch that one later tonight. Was hoping Wolves would also be released, but I haven't seen it pop up yet.

Think I've watched what will probably be most of the nominations.
 

Tarrant

<Prior Amod>
15,746
9,145
It really puzzles me how the ?10 for a cinema ticket (or however much it costs in the US) is so beyond your reach
Because I work 60-70 hours a week and don't feel like trying to squeeze in time to go to a theater when it's easier to come home, spend what time with my kids that I can and just relax and watch it on my computer?

I did go see The Hobbit but that meant I didn't get home that day until almost 2am after leaving it at 5:30am that morning. Also it's winter and when it's winter in MN you don't go outside unless you're forced to.
 

Loser Araysar

Chief Russia Reporter. Stock Pals CEO. Head of AI.
<Gold Donor>
79,821
159,026
yet still has enough time to fuck up this board routinely and hand out bullshit infractions