- Washington ó The unarmoured Iltis jeep carrying
two Canadian soldiers killed in an explosion in Kabul was deemed inadequate
for patrolling outside military bases in Afghanistan by a top U.S. commander
more than a year ago.
-
- At that time, Canadian troops served in Afghanistan under
U.S. command and the Amercians provided armoured HMMWVs (known as Humvees)
to the 3rd Battalion of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry.
-
- Canadian troops currently in Afghanistan, however, are
serving under NATO command and are using their own vehicles. Criticism
of the Iltis dominated Question Period in Ottawa yesterday.
-
- Sergeant Robert Short, 42, and Corporal Robbie Beerenfenger,
29, were killed Thursday near their base in Kabul when an explosion smashed
their lightweight Iltis. They might have survived in a far-better protected
armoured HMMWV.
-
- In 2002 during the Princess Patricia's deployment with
U.S. troops in Kandahar, Afghanistan, a similar patrol hit a large antitank
mine while driving one of the armoured HMMWVs.
-
- "It blew the ass end off the vehicle but the soldiers
inside were virtually unharmed," said Colonel Pat Stogran, who was
a Lieutenant-Colonel when he commanded the Princess Patricia's battallion
in Afghanistan.
-
- He said the U.S. ground commander, Colonel Frank Wiercinski,
told the Canadians to bring only a minimum of vehicles in 2002 and promised
to provide armoured HMMWVs. "That was the agreement we went out [to
Afghanistan] under," Col. Stogran said yesterday in a telephone interview.
-
- Col. Wiercinski, now at the Pentagon, commanded the 3rd
Brigade, 101st Airborne Division in Afghanistan last year and the Canadian
battalion was under his command.
-
- A senior U.S. military official, familiar with Col. Wiercinski's
decision to require patrols venturing outside the base perimeter to use
armoured vehicles, said "it was particularly because of the mine threat
while out on patrol."
-
- Col. Wiercinski was so insistent that soldiers on patrol
outside the Kandahar airport base be in armoured vehicles that he "once
chewed me out" for driving an Iltis outside the fence, Col. Stogran
said.
-
- The Canadians took a handful of Iltis jeeps on the 2002
deployment, but there were used primarily for driving about the airport.
-
- The Iltis, a 25-year-old design, was made by Bombardier
after Volkswagen ceased production of the under-powered, military runabout
in 1982.
-
- By the end of their 2002 tour in Afghanistan, the Princess
Patricia's reconnaissance platoon had more or less exclusive use of half
a dozen armoured HMMWVs, although that was fewer than originally promised
because the vehicles were in such high demand by U.S. units.
-
- "We sang songs of praise for the capability that
the HMMWVs brought us," Col. Stogran said, although he said the Iltis,
a much-lighter, smaller vehicle, also had its advantages in certain circumstances.
-
- For instance, a pair of Iltis mounted with antitank missiles
were airlifted high into the Afghan mountains for one of the last Canadian
operations during the 2002 deployment, where they backed up Canada's Coyote
armoured vehicles.
-
- Despite the high praise for the HMMWVs and the enthusiasm
of Canadian soldiers who used them, Ottawa didn't even consider the vehicle,
in either its armoured or unarmoured versions, for its long-delayed program
to replace the 20-year-old Iltis.
-
- "We make do with what we have," said Col. Stogran,
a refrain that has been heard for decades ó albeit often-voiced
less politely ó in the Canadian military, which has long been saddled
with aging and inadequate equipment.
-
- Yesterday, the current Canadian commander in Afghanistan,
Major-General Andrew Leslie acknowledged that an armoured HMMWV might have
protected the Canadian soldiers killed and injured in the Iltis.
-
- "Would they have been better off if they had been
in an armoured Humvee instead of an Iltis? Possibly," Gen. Leslie
said.
-
- But Canadian military doctrine, bred of years of peacekeeping
experience, also holds that soldiers need to be seen out in the open and
interact with the local population if missions are to succeed. Both Col.
Stogran, who served as a UN military observer in Bosnia, and Gen. Leslie
said the only way to avoid risk was to stay on the base. Doing so would
make the mission pointless.
-
- Despite far less firepower and protection, Canadian officers
tend to be scornful of other militaries that deploy contingents but keep
then constantly hunkered down inside armoured vehicles.
-
- Still the adequacy of the Iltis for patrolling in mine-infested
Afghanistan remains in question.
-
- Certainly Col. Wiercinski regarded it and other so-called
"thin-skinned" vehicles, both Canadian and U.S., as unfit. "Our
success with armoured HUMWVs had led us to look at getting more of them,"
a senior U.S. military official said yesterday.
-
- Armoured HMMWVs, one of more than a dozen different variants
of the now ubiquitous vehicles in the U.S. Army and Marine Corps, were
originally purchased only for military police units. But their impressive
ability to withstand both mines and ó unlike the unarmoured HMMWVs
ó the roadside bomb attacks currently plaguing U.S. forces in Iraq
has spurred the Pentagon to look at using them more widely.
-
- After years of delay, Ottawa has ordered some German-made
Mercedes-Benz Gelandewagen jeeps as a possible replacement for the Iltis.
Although heavier and more powerful, they offer no more protection.
-
- "Quite frankly, [the Iltis] is at the end of its
life," Gen. Leslie said yesterday. "Within a couple of months,
we're supposed to get the German Mercedes, [but] if a German Mercedes had
hit or detonated .5.5. whatever went off under the Iltis, would it have
made any difference? No," he said.
-
- © 2003 Bell Globemedia Publishing Inc. All Rights
Reserved.
-
- http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20031004.uiltis1004/BNStory/National/
|
