Here is a very well researched and organized dénouement of The New Republic article by blogger extraordinaire Bob “Confederate Yankee” Owens. (A big hat tip to Captain’s Quarters)
Here is more great stuff Mr. Owens posted on Pajamas Media.
Just as the blogosphere dismembered CBS News and Dan Blather over the Texas Air National Guard forgeries, now The New Republic is paying the price for liberal bias, ignorance of the military, slipshod fact checking, and stone-walling.
Of particular interest to me was the way that expertise on one issue was contributed by readers of the Confederate Yankee blog. The New Republic published an article, Shock Troops, by Army Private Scott Beauchamp, writing from and stationed in Iraq. One of Private Beauchamp’s stories was highly detailed, and in reflection, totally unbelievable.
The story, as told by Private Beauchamp:
I know another private who really only enjoyed driving Bradley Fighting Vehicles because it gave him the opportunity to run things over. He took out curbs, concrete barriers, corners of buildings, stands in the market, and his favorite target: dogs. Occasionally, the brave ones would chase the Bradleys, barking at them like they bark at trash trucks in America--providing him with the perfect opportunity to suddenly swerve and catch a leg or a tail in the vehicle's tracks. He kept a tally of his kills in a little green notebook that sat on the dashboard of the driver's hatch. One particular day, he killed three dogs. He slowed the Bradley down to lure the first kill in, and, as the diesel engine grew quieter, the dog walked close enough for him to jerk the machine hard to the right and snag its leg under the tracks. The leg caught, and he dragged the dog for a little while, until it disengaged and lay twitching in the road. A roar of laughter broke out over the radio. Another notch for the book.
The second kill was a straight shot: A dog that was lying in the street and bathing in the sun didn't have enough time to get up and run away from the speeding Bradley. Its front half was completely severed from its rear, which was twitching wildly, and its head was still raised and smiling at the sun as if nothing had happened at all.
I didn't see the third kill, but I heard about it over the radio. Everyone was laughing, nearly rolling with laughter. I approached the private after the mission and asked him about it.
"So, you killed a few dogs today,” I said skeptically.
"Hell yeah, I did. It's like hunting in Iraq!" he said, shaking with laughter.
"Did you run over dogs before the war, back in Indiana?" I asked him."No,"he replied, and looked at me curiously. Almost as if the question itself was in poor taste.
The first point that commenters made was that it would be impossible for the Bradley Fighting Vehicle to be used in the way described to kill dogs. Mr. Owens contacted an expert at the manufacturing company and confirmed this. The expert was the same guy The New Republic had interviewed previously to support Private Beauchamp's story. Unfortunately for The New Republic, their fact checker was clueless about military vehicles and didn't ask pertinent questions.
First, the crew of a Bradley includes its commander, a gunner, the driver, and two to six mission soldiers. Beauchamp’s description of the driver, an Army Private, having the capacity to operate the Bradley as his own personal joy ride vehicle to act out his video game fantasies is incredible. Number 1, his commander (riding in the turret) wouldn’t allow it. Number 2, it would make an already very uncomfortable ride totally unbearable for the mission soldiers cramped inside the Bradley, and they wouldn’t let him do it.
Bradley Fighting Vehicle - note driver at left forward, with hatch behind, and turret to right and behind. The driver has a great position to spot something at the right rear, don't you think?
Second, look at the picture of the Bradley, and note that the Bradley driver has a very limited range of view. He would not even be able to see a dog near his tracks, and would not be able to see to the rear at all to appreciate what he supposedly did. Of course, Beauchamp, who wrote that he observed two kills one day, was not the driver, commander, or gunner, and would have absolutely no way to see anything happening outside the Bradley.
Occasionally, the brave ones would chase the Bradleys, barking at them like they bark at trash trucks in America--providing him with the perfect opportunity to suddenly swerve and catch a leg or a tail in the vehicle's tracks.
Look at the picture of the Bradley. The Bradley driver is on the left front, the soon-to-be-dead dog would be approaching on the right rear.
We have already established that the driver can’t see behind – look at the picture of the Bradley again, and the raised steel hatch lid behind the driver – and the picture also shows that the Bradley turret blocks the driver’s view of the entire right side, all the way to the horizon - and yet Private Beauchamp wrote that the driver would be able to see a dog approaching the Bradley from the right rear, and then be able to swerve the Bradley to the right in such a way as to catch the dog in its tracks.
That’s right. Tracks.
As the Army veterans who commented to Bob Owens noted, in order to swerve a Bradley to the right traveling at low speed – at a speed slower than that of the dog walking up to the Bradley - you have to stop the right track while the left track continues ahead. At low speed the Bradley does not skid suddenly, and it can’t catch anything in its track.
The leg caught, and he dragged the dog for a little while, until it disengaged and lay twitching in the road.
Have you ever watched a track on a rolling tank? You can’t drag anything caught in a moving tank tread. The tread is moving in an endless loop. Look at the picture again and try to visualize where a dog’s leg could be caught in order for it to be dragged. Remember, while the portion of track where the “leg caught” was in contact with the ground, it can't move. Only when that portion becomes the rearmost part of the track does it move, and then it goes up, followed by violently forward.
Not for one moment would anything caught in the track be dragged.
A dog to be caught would have to be very slow, and also deaf.
The Bradley weighs thirty tons, and makes a horrendous noise.
Just the sort of thing to attract every feral dog in the neighborhood to want to run after it and get a piece of it, right?
That brings us to dog kill number 2.
The second kill was a straight shot: A dog that was lying in the street and bathing in the sun didn't have enough time to get up and run away from the speeding Bradley. Its front half was completely severed from its rear, which was twitching wildly, and its head was still raised and smiling at the sun as if nothing had happened at all.
I just measured my dog, Buddy. He has an exceptionally long torso, roughly 28” long, probably placing him in the top five percentile for body length, and much longer than any Iraqi dogs I’ve seen pictured.
The Bradley track is 21” wide.
If a Bradley ran over a normal sized dog, there would no “front half completely severed from its rear.” There would be one dog completely crushed on the road.
Suffice it to say, just looking at one photo of a Bradley gives the lie to Private Beauchamp’s fanciful descriptions of "dogicide."
That still leaves a lot of other details in doubt.
In terms of Private Beauchamp’s description of radio traffic, since radios only allow one set to be transmitting on a frequency at a time, it’s hard for me to visualize how “A roar of laughter broke out over the radio.”
Not only how, but from whence and from whom?
Still, the editors of The New Republic are sticking to their story, but they’re stuck like a deer in the headlamps, and a convoy of bloggers are coming at them at high speed.
The New Republic road kill is on the Blog City Diner menu tonight.
For the many of you fortunate not to have The San Francisco Chronicle as your daily newspaper, the “road kill” and “Blog City Diner menu” are a tribute to the late Chronicle cartoonist Phil Frank, who had a group of black bears running the Fog City Diner, where the critter customers selected from a menu featuring the choicest of the day’s road kill.
"Hey, Bloggers, tonight's special is "The New Republic," grilled and stuffed with crow."
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