Patriot missile problems led to friendly fire deaths, report says

WASHINGTON -- A number of problems with Patriot missile defenses and related systems contributed to three friendly fire deaths during the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, according to a new Pentagon report, which nonetheless says the Patriot was a "substantial success" during the fighting.

Patriots appear to have shot down nine incoming Iraqi short-range ballistic missiles during the invasion, says a summary of the report.

But Patriot batteries also misidentified and shot down an American and a British fighter in separate incidents, leaving three air crew members dead. A Patriot system also mistakenly tracked another U.S. fighter, which bombed a radar in response. The incidents took place in March and April 2003.

The report, posted on a military Web site this week, was authored by a task force of the Defense Science Board, which advises Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld on a range of issues.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/03/04/patriot_missile_problems_led_to_friendly_fire_deaths_report_says/

I can already see it: 3 corpses who say the missile was "a substantial success!"

"During the 1991 Gulf War, the military and Raytheon, the Patriot's Waltham, Mass.-based manufacturer, claimed high success -- up to 80 percent -- with earlier versions of the Patriot. Congress' General Accounting Office later found Patriots intercepted no more than four of 47 Iraqi Scud missiles, a 9 percent success rate."

We (Canada) are doing everyone a favor, really.

:hi: and :toast: from this DUer to our friends to the North!!

We know that vast majority of DUers (and at least a slim majority of Americans I think, if there was no vote rigging) are actually of the same mind.:toast: :hi:

It is a fantasy some people just can't give up, like the tooth fairy.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/19/60minutes/main601241.shtml

The Patriot Flawed?
June 27, 2004


In the Pentagon's multi-billion dollar arsenal of weapons, one weapon that the government has already spent more than $6 billion on has had trouble doing what it was designed to do -- bring down enemy missiles.

That weapon is the Patriot missile system, and as Correspondent Ed Bradley reported last February, it also does something it was not designed to do -- bring down friendly aircraft.

... if the fires were "friendly", why did they kill people?
Did we not pay them back for borrowing their stereo?