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CBC Sniper Documentary - Rob Furlong

This is definitely an excellent watch. I mean, it is proof that no matter who you are, what you do, or what you did, you do sometimes get the short straw.

Plus, he is a Newfoundlander. Not that it means anything, but it is interesting that seemingly more Newfoundlanders are getting into the military, and in the main light.
 
"The mere sight of a .50 caliber round causes massive heart attacks in all that lay eyes on them"
"The weapon itself is made from the bones of vikings and the steel from spartan swords"
 
Watched both those links. I am impressed. Good on that bloke for coming thru, and getting to be where he is now.

I am sure he will do well and prosper. A casualty of politics. The CF's loss and the EPS's gain.

Regards,

Wes

EDITed for spelling
 
Delta said:
I guess he chose not to renew his contract?

I think "left in disgust" might be more accurate. Him and his buddies were treated very shabbily, IMO. I saw the program. I thought he was very restrained and diplomatic, given the way he was treated and the opportunity he was presented with to publicly lash out. He showed a lot of class in keeping things "above the waist"!

As an aside, he has a very apt last name for a sniper, "furlong" being an ancient agricultural unit of measure still used in horse racing today; "fur" meaning furrow and "lang" (as it was then in Old English) meaning long. It describes the long plough furrows of the early middle ages which came to be used as standard units of measure, one furlong X 1 "chain" (one tenth of a furlong) wide then being one acre. A furlong being a hair over 220 metres, his famed shot would have been almost exactly 12 furlongs.
 
This was originally posted over 2 years ago but whatever, I still watch the youtube video from time to time.

I also found this article "We Were Abandoned" http://www.macleans.ca/canada/national/article.jsp?content=20060515_126689_126689

It's a great article with a lot more information about both the shot and the investigation.
 
I'm posting this here because it's a tribute to Rob Furlong although it concerns the (hopefully dying) Gutfeld/Fox controversy. It's a tribute to him and the Princess Patricia Canadian Light Infantry. And it's an excellent positive reflection on all past, present and future CF members--IMHO :

Fox News Mocks Service of Canadian Soldiers

http://www.vetvoice.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=2594

This is Rob Furlong:

Rob_Furlong.jpg


Rob is a Canadian.  These days, he's a police officer in Edmonton where he tries to live a pretty normal life.  But in military circles, Rob is sort of famous.  That's because in the early days of the war in Afghanistan--only months after the 9/11 attacks--Rob was serving in the Canadian infantry as a sniper in the Shah-e-Kot Valley during Operation Anaconda.  One day, while covering American soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division, Rob killed an al Qaeda fighter carrying an RPK machine gun.  It was one of many that week for Rob and his team.  For their service during the operation, the Americans of the 101st Airborne will always be indebted.  Maclean's put it this way:


They destroyed al-Qaeda firing positions, saved American lives and tallied a body count unmatched by any Canadian soldier of their generation. U.S. commanders who served alongside the snipers nominated all five for the coveted Bronze Star medal. "Thank God the Canadians were there," is how one American soldier put it.
The thing was, the al Qaeda fighter with the RPK was nearly a mile and a half away when Rob took the shot--and no one before had ever recorded a kill at such a long distance.

This is all true.  I was there.

Now.  This is Greg Gutfeld:

Greg_Gutfeld.jpg


Greg wasn't in the Shah-e-Kot Valley and he's never been to Afghanistan.  In fact, Greg has never provided cover of any kind for American troops in the field.  I'll have more about Greg and some of his friends in just a minute.

But back to Rob Furlong.  This is footage of Rob Furlong's colleagues--members of his Canadian infantry unit--in action, in Afghanistan, in 2006:

http://www.youtube.com/v/ot2gu5tmJwA&hl

As you can see, Rob's colleagues are in what we in the military call "the shit."  And they've been putting their lives on the line there since 2001--after the United States was attacked.  They even decided to continue helping after the first four Canadian troops killed in Afghanistan were killed at the hands of an American pilot in 2002.  And they're still there now, even after four more Canadians were killed last week, bringing their total number of killed to 116.

Okay.  Now, about Greg.  Greg hosts a TV show with his colleagues in the media on Fox News.  It's called Red Eye and it's on late at night.  Like him, Greg's colleagues have never provided cover of any kind for American troops fighting in Afghanistan or anywhere else.  But for some reason, when they all got together last week, they decided it would be funny to mock those who had.  That is, they decided to deride members of the Canadian military--troops like Rob Furlong and the four killed on Thursday--for being effeminate slackers and stupid pansies who can't hack it. 

This is Greg and his crew last week engaged in their version of "action:"

http://www.youtube.com/v/tcJn5XlbSFk&hl

NewsHounds has a great write-up with the portions of the transcript here.

At this point, Greg Gutfeld and his handlers at Fox News have embarrassed the United States.  And when I say that, I'm not exaggerating.  As the video clip featuring Fox's unabashed chickenhawks spread across the country, Canada's Defence Minister called for a Fox News apology--which he and the rest of the country received this afternoon.

And it's great that Gutfeld has apologized for the ignorant chatter over which he presided last Tuesday, but it's still demonstrative of the larger problem we face in this country of the disconnect between those who serve in uniform and those who don't.  Fox News is part of the problem.  They always have been.  And until that culture changes, we can expect to see more Greg Gutfeld's on the air mocking those who've sacrificed in the service of their country--or someone else's country--like Rob Furlong and his brothers in Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry.


 
I believe that David Paetkau's charactor Sam Braddock on Flashpoint is based on Rob Furlong.  CF makes it's way into tv's backdoor..cool
 
ballz said:
This was originally posted over 2 years ago but whatever, I still watch the youtube video from time to time.

I also found this article "We Were Abandoned" http://www.macleans.ca/canada/national/article.jsp?content=20060515_126689_126689

It's a great article with a lot more information about both the shot and the investigation.

The writeup mentions that the ombudsman was going to submit his final report of his investigation, and this was in 2006 - has anyone found a copy of this report?

 
bms said:
Plus, he is a Newfoundlander. Not that it means anything, but it is interesting that seemingly more Newfoundlanders are getting into the military, and in the main light.

I remember reading about that Rob Furlong when the longest shot hit the news, and then making the off the mark comment "I bet it was a Newfie", with a response that he was. Really sucks at what happened to them afterwards. :(

 
Sniper Investigation link: http://ombudsman.mil.ca/rep-rap/sr-rs/sb-bte/rep-rap-01-eng.asp#com-pla  and status of recommendations link: http://ombudsman.mil.ca/sr-er/snipers-te-eng.asp
 
Greymatters said:
Those two links dont seem to work anymore...

The links in question are DWAN only (which means I can't see them either).  Are you trying to access them from home?
 
Three links from Internet:

http://www.ombudsman.forces.gc.ca/rep-rap/sr-rs/sb-bte/index-eng.asp

http://www.ombudsman.mdn.ca/mr-sm/nr-cp/2007/2504-eng.asp

Status of Recommendations - http://www.ombudsman.forces.gc.ca/sr-er/snipers-te-eng.asp


 
Thanks for the internet links.  I hadn't googled it yet.

I was the CC for the unit when all this went down.  I'll save the reading for when I've got a fresh bottle of Rye and a long time to spend doing it.
 
BYT Driver said:
I believe that David Paetkau's charactor Sam Braddock on Flashpoint is based on Rob Furlong.  CF makes it's way into tv's backdoor..cool

If so, it's very loosly based.  "Braddock" is an ex JTF-2 sniper released after killing a fellow trooper in a friendly fire incident in Afghanistan.  Other than being a sniper, the connection isn't there..
 
Roy Harding said:
The links in question are DWAN only (which means I can't see them either).  Are you trying to access them from home?

Yes, but looks like problem solved...
 
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