Kiwi controversy after SAS war hero Willie Apiata photographed

The soldiers were named by the journalist. US reporters would do the same no matter what country the soldiers were from. You guys are acting like these military troops are spys or secret agents, they are not.

Their "cover" has not been blown.

Agree. Showing Apiata is just like showing that soldier wearing pink boxers.

I'm sure CIA agents have done some pretty bad arse things, and all they get is a star on the wall.
 
I don't think that enemies worry to much about the names of people they are fighting.

So some thought until bounties were placed on their specifically named little heads, nice pictures and all. Our enemies care, esp. in regards to established guys in certain AOs that have a defined and detrimental presence. Happy to the majority? Not at all, but it does happen.

Captiva303 said:
does the US government want the operators of delta force or whatever its called or the green berets or seals named and identified??
Special Operations personnel from all tiers of SOF have their names (or claimed names) and photos released quite often by our own respective services.

I don't think the photo is going to hurt our boy here, especially with their operational role.
 
That's funny. Why don't you go visit Area 51, take photographs of all the "Restricted Access" areas and post it on our lovely forum?

Why, isn't that what I said?

"What they don't want the press to see they put things called fences around and mark as government property and don't let journalists have access too." quote chukpike:)

But, if you want to see it try google.

http://www.metacafe.com/watch/yt-LUkvJAfUB5E/area_51_on_google_earth/

I think if you search "area 51" you will get about a gazillion hits.:-D

That's the trouble with free democracies over police states. Free and open societies, tend to be free and open. Go figure.:roll:

Let's all join a police state so the government can determine what we should see!:rock:

"After all, the public, and perhaps the world should have the right to a free press and free information. Isn't that right?" quote 13th.

At least we agree on something.

Since you thought that up all by yourself, you could use it as your signature instead of the picture of you arguing with a little girl.:-D
 
So some thought until bounties were placed on their specifically named little heads, nice pictures and all. Our enemies care, esp. in regards to established guys in certain AOs that have a defined and detrimental presence. Happy to the majority? Not at all, but it does happen.



Special Operations personnel from all tiers of SOF have their names (or claimed names) and photos released quite often by our own respective services.

I don't think the photo is going to hurt our boy here, especially with their operational role.

Yes it does, and should that man be a "warhero" in his own land.. You just encreased his chances of being tapped exponetially.

The US have very different rules about these kind of things.
Hell US soldiers walk around your nation IN uniform.

Take a second to think about your last statement there PJ.
This man can NOT work with ANY force that are stricter on PERSEC then what they are.
In the current capacity and role that´s fine.

But the world ain´t going to end with Kabul Afghanistan..
 
Being watching way to many spy movies.

As far as "super soldiers" go, sometimes countries keep their war heroes home to parade around for PR. (Like NZ did). Sometimes the soldier wants to go back and do his job.

"death of someone like Apiata would kill morale in the States"

Not going to speak for all the military, but I believe the death of a comrade usually translates into stronger resolve on the part of those serving.
Don't much care what it does about civilian morale at home.



There was an official DoD release on personnel in theater about using social communities, and providing information in online chatrooms, because insurgents can use it to track an individuals movements or next unit placement.

(On a side note, insurgents recently used a Russian developed satellite data leeching program to leech raw video data from a Predator Drone, the program is called "SkyGrabber".) Not to forget, in a great many of our past conflicts persons of great media attention or other attention were highly valued targets, and often had a bounty on their heads and this war is no different.

OPSEC is a real situation, not a made up movie scenario.

So much for that spy movie watching thing.



I've met a few SF operators, and none of them have been paraded around, and would prefer to keep a low profile. Not many operators are given medals, our SOCOM tends to act and treat it's "assets" differently than our brethren nations, and seeing as how Apiata is SF, it tends to be a bit on the smarter side of things to not parade them around and then send them back into operations.


Well weather you care what civilians think or not, our wars are now waged on TV and the internet as well. Public opinion is the judge of military movement.
 
I think if you search "area 51" you will get about a gazillion hits.:-D

Groom Lake, know by it's many incessant and obsessed follows as "Area 51", NORAD exist too you know, more commonly know in the military as "Cheyenne Mountain Complex".
 
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Yes it does, and should that man be a "warhero" in his own land.. You just encreased his chances of being tapped exponetially.

The US have very different rules about these kind of things.
Hell US soldiers walk around your nation IN uniform.

Take a second to think about your last statement there PJ.
This man can NOT work with ANY force that are stricter on PERSEC then what they are.
In the current capacity and role that´s fine.

I'm not sure what statement you want me to think about. I'm very familiar with PERSEC concerns/restrictions that go far beyond your average military member.

The US is no different with PERSEC/OPSEC in regards to our SOF than the NZSAS is. I'm not sure why you believe we're more lax. Conventional soldiers in any military have always been fair game for public photographs and are rarely singled out by name. SOF members, when caught on camera, are almost always and it's rarely a career ending thing. Just a bit embarrassing/annoying and an extremely costly purchase of beer for your comrades.

As for military members walking around in uniform at home, I'm unaware of any country's military that allows their members to show up to work in civilian attire.

This isn't the movies, there's not some super secret clandestine assignment out there where the the requirements are no photos taken or published in any forum in any way, EVER. It's just not how it works.

While no one wants their photo out there for all to see, the biggest issue in all of this is the information about his family. For no other reason than personal and professional lives should always be kept separate.

I'll rephrase my previous statement, I don't see this being a career ender for him given the NZSAS' operational role in the past, now or in the future.
 
I'm not sure what statement you want me to think about. I'm very familiar with PERSEC concerns/restrictions that go far beyond your average military member.

The US is no different with PERSEC/OPSEC in regards to our SOF than the NZSAS is. I'm not sure why you believe we're more lax. Conventional soldiers in any military have always been fair game for public photographs and are rarely singled out by name. SOF members, when caught on camera, are almost always and it's rarely a career ending thing. Just a bit embarrassing/annoying and an extremely costly purchase of beer for your comrades.

As for military members walking around in uniform at home, I'm unaware of any country's military that allows their members to show up to work in civilian attire.

This isn't the movies, there's not some super secret clandestine assignment out there where the the requirements are no photos taken or published in any forum in any way, EVER. It's just not how it works.

While no one wants their photo out there for all to see, the biggest issue in all of this is the information about his family. For no other reason than personal and professional lives should always be kept separate.

I'll rephrase my previous statement, I don't see this being a career ender for him given the NZSAS' operational role in the past, now or in the future.

I haven´t really bothered to get the straight poop on to many different countries PERSEC regulations either.
When I come into contact with such people I treat them as I would anyone in SWESF.
In our country, and in some other that I know of the identity of operators are protected by law concealing their identities.
"Protected ID,s"

Soldiers in the regular Army decide on their own if they want to use their uniform outside their home regiment.
Should they decide to they are allowed to walk around the regiment in civilian clothes as long as they are dressed in uniform at first formation.
That means it´s very unusual to see a service member in uniform outside of work.

Key personel are infact discouraged from using their uniforms outside their regiments for security reasons.
There have been incidents where foreign powers have been gathering intel for an preemptive strikepackage on pilots and higher officers in case of unrest/invasion.
And no, not all countries takes pics of their operators.

As for the comment I asked you to take another look at.
After the rewrite and some reading up on NZSAS I think you are right.

The only thing I could find that is a no go is joint exercises with other nations operators.
Atracting attention to such visits are not only frowned upon in some circles.

And no, PERSEC and non disclosure agreements are not some super secret ninja ****.
It´s a way to keep your guys safe and give your goverment some deniability, nothing more, nothing less.

//KJ.
 
I'm not sure what statement you want me to think about. I'm very familiar with PERSEC concerns/restrictions that go far beyond your average military member.

The US is no different with PERSEC/OPSEC in regards to our SOF than the NZSAS is. I'm not sure why you believe we're more lax. Conventional soldiers in any military have always been fair game for public photographs and are rarely singled out by name. SOF members, when caught on camera, are almost always and it's rarely a career ending thing. Just a bit embarrassing/annoying and an extremely costly purchase of beer for your comrades.

As for military members walking around in uniform at home, I'm unaware of any country's military that allows their members to show up to work in civilian attire.

This isn't the movies, there's not some super secret clandestine assignment out there where the the requirements are no photos taken or published in any forum in any way, EVER. It's just not how it works.

While no one wants their photo out there for all to see, the biggest issue in all of this is the information about his family. For no other reason than personal and professional lives should always be kept separate.

I'll rephrase my previous statement, I don't see this being a career ender for him given the NZSAS' operational role in the past, now or in the future.

in australia it was debated and discussed whether military members should be in public in uniform, they came to the conclusion that military membersl in public in uniform had a positive effect on the community.

however certain groups of members within the defence force have been encouraged to travel to and from work in civilian attire.
 
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in australia it was debated and discussed whether military members should be in public in uniform, they came to the conclusion that military membersl in public in uniform had a positive effect on the community.

however certain groups of members within the defence force have been encouraged to travel to and from work in civilian attire.

The US military also has policies concerning the wear of the uniform. However, even the super doper sneaky guys are still members of a uniformed service and as thus, must present themselves while in the rear as a uniformed member (correct name tags and scare me badges optional :mrgreen:) most of the time.

The Navy and Marine Corps has a very strict policy of wearing the utility uniforms outside of work. The Army and Air Force have a guidance on the wear of utility uniforms, but there is no official regulation stating they cannot be worn.

I commute to work in a pair of running shorts and a teeshirt 9 times out of 10. Prior to the start of the work day, I change if the day's duty calls for it. This is common for many individuals.

The point of my statement was not so literal in that people must travel TO work in uniform (though I did leave much room for it to be taken literally :p), but that militaries all over the world expect their personnel to wear the assigned uniform for work.
 
oops....
i can be extremely literal at times...
:idea: i get what you mean :idea::wink:

i was mainly just shedding some light on what other countries policies are like but over here alot of in in before mentioned situations live at work so i guess in the end it doesn't really matter...
 
apiata300-300x368.jpg


Death's coming bitches.

Wallabies excellent photo!! Where did you get the high res version from?

Cpl Apiata is a true hero and I am glad he got to get back into the fight!

Cameron
 
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