So, you’re a member of al Qaeda and allied to the Somalian Islamic Courts Union and life is pretty good - you’ve got the AK’s, you’ve got the will to use them and everybody trembles when you walk by. You’re all ready to drag these poor benighted Africans back to the 7th century, where guys like you get to decide on a whim who lives and who dies, and best of all you can blame it all on God’s will, because he’s on your side.
But then the Ethiopian infidels you’ve been threatening with jihad get tired of that schtick, or else take you at your word and intervene on the behalf of your enemies, the UN-recognized national government. It turns out that maybe God is not on your side, or if he is, he’s got a strange way of showing it as your battle lines collapse in the face of an actual army, and that army drives you out of the Somalian capital, a place you’d just gotten used to ruling through intimidation and terror. They drive you south like stampeding cattle back to your former base of operations in Kismayo, and eventually out of that place too. You end up stuck in a remote corner of the country, hemmed in by your foes to the north and east who are pressing you hard with armor, infantry and air, prevented from crossing the Kenyan border to your west, the sea at your back and no haven there since it’s patrolled by lean and hungry greyhounds who’d like nothing more than to welcome you aboard.
Well, they might actually prefer you making a fight of it, but never mind.
As if all of that was’t bad enough and just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse, just when you’d run from your last warren to your final bolt hole, an AC-130 Spectre gunship, of all things, shows up overhead. What do you do?
That’s what you do.
A U.S. Air Force gunship has conducted a strike against suspected members of al Qaeda in Somalia, CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports exclusively.
The targets included the senior al Qaeda leader in East Africa and an al Qaeda operative wanted for his involvement in the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in Africa, Martin reports. Those terror attacks killed more than 200 people.
It turns out it’s not the 7th century after all, it’s the 21st and there’s nowhere to run to baby, nowhere to hide.
Sucks to be you.
Oh yeah, and you. Sucks to be you too.
14 responses so far ↓
1
foobert
// Jan 8, 2007 at 7:18 pm
You can run, but, you can’t hide! Not that CBS believes it based on that unbiased reporting, but it sounds like a job well done.
Speaking of CBS’s quality reporting, did anyone else catch this:
Sounds a tad high; like 60 times too high. And, yup, a quick google search agrees.
2 Blue Crab Boulevard » US Airstrike On Al Qaeda? // Jan 8, 2007 at 7:27 pm
[...] UPDATE: This one is going asymptotic in the blogosphere: Hot Air, Taylor Marsh, Captain's Quarters, Gateway Pundit, SevenStripes.com, Right Voices, Ace of Spades, Austin Bay, MK Ham (pinch hitting at Michelle Malkin’s), Mac’s Mind, 186KPS, Sensible Mom, Webloggin, STACLU, Gateway Pundit, Mudville Gazette, A Blog for All, Mark My Words, Jawa Report, Counterterrorism Blog, Neptunus Lex, Opininonnation Times, [...]
3
SeniorD
// Jan 9, 2007 at 4:39 am
Cap’n,
I guess there IS something to be said for the ‘Other Blue Suits’.
4
Zane
// Jan 9, 2007 at 7:25 am
Per my earlier post, they are easier to kill when they are flushed. It appears they ran to their old hiding places, but a little “ground work” has made them unsafe for the little murderers. Time to go celebrate with a cappucino grande, forte!
5
badbob
// Jan 9, 2007 at 7:32 am
Similar gun ship action at another place and time during GWOT:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3878514186730015637&q=ac-130+gunship&hl=en
It really does suck to be them…
b2
6
Babs
// Jan 9, 2007 at 8:15 am
Is the AC-130 also known as “The Spooky”? If so, does anyone know why?
7
William The Coroner
// Jan 9, 2007 at 8:25 am
The AC-130’s are known as “Spectres”. The “Spooky”s were AC-47, AKA “Puff The Magic Dragon” (a name that pissed off Peter, Paul, and Mary, BTW) from a unit nickname in Vietnam. The AC-130’s have greater throw-weight and loiter time.
8
SGT Jeff (USAR)
// Jan 9, 2007 at 8:48 am
I think that “thousands of rounds per second” depends on the weapon in use. They do have a gatling gun up front after all.
Hey Lex - how would you like to fly an airplane that lurches sideways everytime you fire the main armament? (a 105mm howitzer)
The online twits at our local paper are already bringing up the “remember what happened last time in Somalia” thing. They were quickly reminded who was in charge last time as well.
9
SGT Jeff (USAR)
// Jan 9, 2007 at 8:51 am
Oh, second vs. minute. Right.
Out of curiosity, how many rounds per minute does a CIWS fire?
10
Albany Rifles
// Jan 9, 2007 at 9:06 am
As Bill Murrey said in Ghostbusters….”Nice Shooting Tex!”
An Air Force friend of mine who flew the early C-130 gunships said their squadron called a Spectre attack as a NASCAR Nuke…..’cause you keep turning left and fire as fast as you can.
So here is my question….do Eagle and Lawn Dart drivers call Spectre drivers trash haulers? Because it just doesn’t seem right after all.
11
Curt
// Jan 9, 2007 at 9:19 am
The MK 15 CIWS fires 30 rds/sec at the low rate, meaning 3,000/min. It looks like they have upped the firing rate with a second setting (since I had to memorize such things), for 4,500 rpm….that will empty the magazine quickly….
The setting for the Gatling gun portion in CIWS is actually slowed down from the rate it can actually fire…as Lex for the MK 61 firing rates on the internal FA-18 gun…
12
Bomber Guy
// Jan 9, 2007 at 11:23 am
The motto of one of the AC-130 wings is, “You can run, but you’ll just die tired.”
Pretty much puts an exclamation point to the episode.
13
SeniorD
// Jan 9, 2007 at 3:31 pm
Curt,
My main complaint with CIWS is that it goes dry VERY quickly. It takes two sailors time to haul a new mag out to the mount, change mags and hightail it back to cover. All the time, my sailors could well be unprotected. Of course, on the Burke’s they have to go all the way to the fo’csle to re-arm.
14
Zane
// Jan 10, 2007 at 2:20 am
Sucks, indeed! Harun Fazul is reportedly dead.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070110/ap_on_re_af/somalia
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