US deploys 'game-changer' weapon to Afghanistan

"Soldiers! Don't give yourselves to brutes — men who despise you — enslave you — who regiment your lives — tell you what to do — what to think and what to feel! Who drill you, diet you, treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men — machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You are men! You have the love of humanity in your heart. You don't hate! Only the unloved hate — the unloved and the unnatural!"---Charlie Chaplin in "The Great Dictator"

WASHINGTON (AFP) – It looks and acts like something best left in the hands of Sylvester Stallone's "Rambo," but this latest dream weapon is real -- and the US Army sees it becoming the Taliban's worst nightmare.

The Pentagon has rolled out prototypes of its first-ever programmable "smart" grenade launcher, a shoulder-fired weapon that uses microchipped ammunition to target and kill the enemy, even when the enemy is hidden behind walls or other cover.

Click image to see photos of the XM25 weapon system

AFP/Army Handout

After years of development, the XM25 Counter Defilade Target Engagement System, about the size of a regular rifle, has now been deployed to US units on the battlefields of Afghanistan, where the Army expects it to be a "game-changer" in its counterinsurgency operations.

"For well over a week, it's been actively on patrols, and in various combat outposts in areas that are hot," said Lieutenant Colonel Chris Lehner, program manager for the XM25.

The gun's stats are formidable: it fires 25mm air-bursting shells up to 2,300 feet (700 meters), well past the range of most rifles used by today's soldiers, and programs them to explode at a precise distance, allowing troops to neutralize insurgents hiding behind walls, rocks or trenches or inside buildings.

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[With Afghan control by 2014, Obama sees combat end]

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US soldier admits to sport killing

A US military court has spared an American soldier from an early discharge from the US Army after he admitted to shooting unarmed Afghan civilians for fun.

PressTV

Staff Sergeant Robert Stevens, 25, an Army medic from the State of Oregon, was only sentenced to nine months in prison on Wednesday for killing Afghan civilians, after pleading guilty.

He confessed to opening fire on two Afghan farmers in March 2010 for no apparent reason. He and other US troops were acting on orders from a squad leader during a patrol in March, Reuters reported.

The case began as an investigation into hashish use among US soldiers who were part of an infantry unit then known as the 5th Stryker Brigade. But the investigation has grown into the most serious prosecution of alleged atrocities by US military personnel in nearly nine years of conflict in war-torn Afghanistan.

Four more US soldiers are implicated in the case. The soldiers have been charged with other crimes, including mutilating bodies and keeping body parts as trophies.

Stevens has agreed to testify against the other members of the group.  

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ARMY GOLDEN KNIGHTS CLAIM RESPONSIBILITY FOR ‘UFO’S’ OVER TX

An Army parachute jumper is claiming responsibility for the strange lights appearing over El Paso, TX over the weekend.

On the US Army Golden Knights webpage, SGT Rachel Medley says that the Golden Knights “Black” demonstration team was doing a night time “pyro” demonstration*:

Medley was responding to a commenter on the Knight’s webpage asking the group about the news story (seen on The Blaze) suggesting the lights could be extra terrestrial. A video of a Golden Knights night time jump on YouTube does show similarities to the El Paso lights:

However, Medley has not responded to commenters asking her to explain similar lights over Manhattan, which were seen during the day:

Some are also questioning Medley’s explanation:

And still others won’t be satisfied until the demonstration is repeated:

Over on the blog, a reader photo shows similar lights occurring at dawn, suggesting the glimmers may not have been from a night time Army parachute demonstration.

The official explanation for the Manhattan lights is an errant clump of balloons released by children in Virginia. Not surprisingly, that hasn’t satisfied UFO speculators.

*UPDATE:

On a different part of the Golden Knights website, SGT Medley offers a thorough explanation of the night jumps and specifically the El Paso jump:

This about the flares:

Question: How do you pull of the whole “hovering and reverse trajectory thing?”

Answer: “Hovering and reverse trajectory” is a really fancy way of saying that we opened our parachutes, slowing from 120 mph to about 12 mph in a matter of seconds, then started steering our parachutes around in preparation to land. Because the change in speed is so sudden and dramatic, it can appear to spectators on the ground that the jumpers are hovering. Nope, they are simply gliding gently to the ground under their black and gold canopies. One fan asked if we had “jet packs,” and the answer is NO…we wish! Our parachutes have a forward speed of 22 miles per hour, and with the pyro sparks burning under the canopy, it appears that we are going pretty fast.

And this about the El Paso jump:

Question: (specifically about the El Paso jump Friday) Why were there three flares when the parachutes opened, then a fourth became visible after they were hovering?

Answer: During freefall, not all of the jumpers in the formation ignite their pyro sticks. One of the jumpers, SFC Arlyn Slade, waited until he was under canopy to ignite his flares because he was performing canopy relative work with his CRW partner, SSG Todd Beckel. As soon as their canopies were together, SFC Slade ignited his pyro, creating the fourth flare.

UPDATE II:

Another message from Medley, who says she is “the Soldier in charge of the pyrotechnic equipment for the Black Demonstration Team, who performed the night jump over El Paso, TX on Friday night”:

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