yes, but did he wet 'em?
Usually I don't laugh when I'm reading Aviation Week. (Yes, I'm a dork.
Yes, I have a subscription.) However, this week, there was a quote from
the new chief of Central Command, which I found quite amusing.
Central Command are the folks who oversee central Asia (among other
areas) for the U.S. military. (Now, the fact that we have different areas
of command for regions outside of our own country is a little werid, I
don't think any other nation does that. But we have a European commander,
a Pacific commander, and a North American commander, if not more.)
Gen. Tommy Franks commanded the troops in Afghanistan and Iraq as
commander of Central Command. He recently retired.
The new guy, Army Gen. John Abizaid was aboard a C-130 cargo transport
aircraft in Iraq recently. This plane was one of two that was recently
fired upon by, presumably, Iraqis on the ground with "man-portable" (aka
shoulder-fired) missles.
When the flight crew got warnings of the incoming missles, "The guys made
a hard right bank, and we fired off all of our flares," Gen. Abizaid
said. Flares are commonly used to fool heat-seaking missles.
"These guys were from the Oklahoma [Air] National Guard, and they
actually thought it was fun. I was terrified," he told Aviation Week
(July 21, 2003, page 21).
Yep. Terrified. But the OK ANG pilots were enjoying it. I wonder how
often the boys at ANG get to actually use their missle-avoidance
training...
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