About that VBCI that got hit with a vehicle borne IED...

A few points need to be made about the VBCI that got with a vehicle borne IED....

1.  The vehicles obviously stood up.  No killed just injured ... at least when it comes to French troops.

2.  We need to hold our applause.  We don't know the size of the bomb.  The fact that they were operating in what passes for at least a "semi-urban area" and the fact that civilian casualties weren't astronomical indicates that it wasn't as large as those that have been seen in Iraq at the height of the fighting there.

3.  We need to hold our applause.  No vehicle, including the VBCI, that acts as an infantry fighting vehicle or APC can withstand some of the larger VBIEDs that are out there.

4.  The French are following what appears to be standard Western counter insurgency planning.  They're operating where the "human terrain" is located. The idea goes back to the Vietnam war.  Protect the population, influence the population, provide assistance to the population and after awhile the population will "come over to the side" of freedom, democracy and Western style capitalism.  These are religious based conflicts.  That doesn't apply. Instead we're endangering the population because we're not in the countryside hunting these people down and leaving local authorities to police their cities.

Overall I'd say the vehicle performed but we need to know more.  This isn't a chest thumping event.  It's simply another act of war.  Murphy got to make his call and luckily more people weren't killed or injured, but the fact remains that the enemy will learn and they will scale  up.  Next time they'll build a bomb big enough to take out a VBCI.  That's just a fact.