Wednesday 17 September 2014

SAVING NIGERIAN INFANTRY FROM BOKOHARAM


The issue of security in Nigeria has deteriorated to an alarming state. All eyes are on the army to help restore the country to its former state, but the reverse has been the case. The country is ranked fourth in Africa when military prowess counts. Why are we still wallowing in the battle against Bokoharam? What is the army during wrong?
The wrongs of the Nigerian army are so much that in this article I will highlight a few.  We are living in the 21th century not in the 20th century. The Nigerian army still has leaders who still think and issue orders as if we are in 1967. The advancement of countries in military knowledge comes when the old ways, tactics and weapon deployment are dropped.
People and soldiers alike complain that the Nigerian army has no modern hardware for combating Bokoharam. It is said the insurgent group has better hardware than our army, I wonder how this is so. In every video released by the insurgents they are seen carrying AK 47 riffles which is the official riffle of the Nigerian army.
The army leaders expect the Nigerian infantry to fight fire for fire(both riffle fire, grenades and sub and heavy machine gun fire) without proper planning. Why should we sacrifice our soldiers without a bit of proper planning and conscience?
Which advanced army sends its soldiers to battle, patrol and reconnaissance mission in a pickup/ helux van? No matter how weak an enemy is soldiers must not be sacrificed to quickly root the enemy out. The most recent example is the Israeli’s war against Gaza that just ended. I did not see for once any infantry unit loaded in pickup van moving towards Gaza from Israel. Gaza is a weak nation but yet Israel deployed hundreds of its armored vehicles. There were both heavy and light tanks, infantry armored vehicles, Missile launcher vehicles etc fighting and patrolling the borders of Gaza. In 2013 I was watching a news flash on Press TV, a Lebanese government official convoy has just been hit by a suicide bomber. The Lebanese army rushed to the scene in armored vehicles, not even one pickup van came in. Egypt and Turkey had armored carriers for their soldiers during the riots, the USA’s coast guards were conveyed to St Louis in armored carriers.
What is the army waiting for in deploying their infantries in armored carriers? The deployed soldiers will definitely be aided in returning fire for fire. We are at war, full scale war and using pickup vans against enemies is outrageous. There should not be one pickup van in the northern states, the pickup vans should be replaced with armored vehicles including tanks. There is what we call psychological effects in war, tanks induces fear. There have been reports of Bokoharam fighters breaking fire to flee into the bush. If Tanks are present during this time a quick bombardment of the bush should be done and sweeping by the infantry after the bombardment.
The development of Tanks was to give protection to Infantries and in the war with Bokoharam such protection is strongly needed. Yes we need planes to carry out coordinated strikes but infantries are needed the most to minimize civilian casualties. The army should and must do away with the Helux vans if we must win this war. What is expected of a unit in a Helux van with only a machine gun to support them if the unit is attacked by men with anti tank guns, grenade launchers and heavy machine guns? Soldiers are humans and I will not blame them if they break up and race for their lives. The army should go with the trends, Ukrainian army uses IFV’s to convey their army in the recent war. Egyptian army patrols the street in IFV’S and Ethiopian army is well beefed with IFV’S. What of South Africa? They are even producing their IFV’s.
Let our army do away with the un-protected vans that cannot give cover to our gallant soldiers.  We should and must leave the vans to other smaller African armies if we want to win this war.




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