exactly . before you were doing what we are doing in Afghanistan . which annoys me . the mission isnt to kill the enemy , hunt them down where ever they’re . its , this is your area , provide security to A, B and C and win hearts and minds .
that was the basis of my operations in the regular parachute regiment .
a great example of this is on my second tour (my first as an officer ) we were positioned about 8 miles from a very important Taliban strong hold . where they trained , lived and operated from .
we used to be like a training exercise for them , many of the Taliban’s new recruits first contacts was with our patrol base . i cant even begin to describe the amount of times i asked for permission to assault it . and every time my request was refused .
and that was common all through the war . the frustration amongst officers was unreal . hands tied behind our backs constantly . if the gloves had come off i have no doubt the war would of been over years ago . the taliban crushed . completely.
when ISAF did fully attack we crushed everything . AC130 's Apaches , you name it when we brought it in the taliban were wiped the floor with , but the pure bureaucracy in requesting such an operation with such support was unreal and normally refused