Just remember for anyone playing Armchair General out there. The check points are *extremely* hazardous. 300 - 400 meters may seem like a long way off, but there are some IEDs with a blast *radius* of more than 600 meters.

Jugde not the soldier with the "itchy" trigger finger unless you know what manning a check point in a combat zone is like.

And while this reporter (with an agenda) may have experienced this first hand, she only has one point of view of the events.

Just like the Marine accused of warcrimes for shooting a wounded inside a mosque, there just may be more to the story than the events of the moment.

Among some other bits, the IRR (inactive ready reserve) is going away, and those soon-to-be or former soldiers that aren't part of a national guard, reserve, or active duty military unit are being recalled to national guard, reserve, or active duty (I believe it's their choice which they join).

When one joins the military they sign up for an 8 year service obligation (I spent almost a year of that in school before I went to basic, and have been IRR since April of '03) but my obligation exists until August of this year.

Many soldiers have been recalled, everything from truck drivers that got out after Gulf War 1, to officers in their 60's.

One thing that may also be influencing keeping soldiers there past their normal cycle dates is the lessons learned from Vietnam, the demographic with the highest number of casualties was those with less than 1 year in country, (the draft was a 2 year service obligation at the time), and cycling through that many people, few of them were there long term, and thus inexperienced soldiers were training other slightly more inexperienced soldiers. Not saying it is the primary, or even one of the main reasons to keep soldiers overlong, but I doubt it's being overlooked (working here at the War College I can tell you they go over lessons learned from previous wars on a frequent basis in attempts to better the knowledge of leaders in the military in general, and not just in Iraq)

Guilty as charged [img]graemlins/blush.gif[/img] . And the point you make is well-taken.

Not that I'm doubting you or anything, but 600 metres! That's almost 2/3 of a kilometre! It seems more on the scale of a small nuclear device than conventional explosives...

[ 03-07-2005, 03:38 PM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]

Possibly, yes. The hostage, a politician running for the Iraqi Christian Democratic party, has been a hostage since January 28. He's probably in the hands of some group who though they could make a quick buck kidnapping Westerners, and not in the hands of people like al-Zarqawi.

Had Sweden had personnel on the ground capable of a hostage rescue job, I might have a different opinion, but as it is now they should either pay or stall them kidnappers long enough for the Iraqi law enforcement to bring them in. Sweden can't do much about the kidnappers and they will most likely continue to
kidnap Westerners even if you don't pay them.

The sad fact of life Stratos is that many groups (most not actually affiliated with active terrorist groups) conduct frequent kidnappings, and then sell the prisoners, either to terrorists, or ransom them back to their governments, or sometimes the terrorists they are sold to ransom them (hoping for a larger return on their investment, or for whatever demands they may have, as we've all seen and heard on the news).

That’s an interesting article Shamrock, thankyou. Yes of course the USA troops can, will, do and have made mistakes and this incident I'm sure is just one of many. But can we in all honesty condemn the actual foot soldier like the Italians are doing? Stuff like this happens, its war and for the Italians to carry on like raw prawns is two faced when they are actively rewarding the problem by paying ransoms.

It's also quite likely that the driver was from the Italian secret service and thus has a rather high IQ and is fairly well trained.</font>[/QUOTE]What about planning to contact the American forces? With the lockdown of the airport and other areas the Italians would have had to involve the US at some point to fly her out so keeping things 100% quite was never going to be an option.
The piss poor planning / IQ of some people involved deserves question.


I’ve seen first hand the devastation that an IRA bomb (Manchester) can do. That would not be an unusual figure Nightstalker mentioned but I admit I really know jack about such things. [img]graemlins/heee.gif[/img]

I'm against the occupation of Iraq too. No I do not take it personally shamrock :D

My anger was against the 'moral outrage' that I call cynical and two faced, displayed by the Italians. They support the USA in the war and occupation, then they are old enough to know that innocents get killed, things go wrong, it is after all a war! Then to get onto a high horse and accuse the USA of incompetence and suggest darker motives is IMO a ruse to cover up there poor planning and the fact that they talked and gave money to the terrorist scum.

[ 03-07-2005, 05:31 PM: Message edited by: wellard ]

Not much of an update I'll admit, and again not very conclusive, but if they never tried to coordinate with US military then it is a bit more understandable, but no less unfortunate.

<font color=plum>So the Iraqi captors are the "good guys" by warning her??? How would the Americans even KNOW she was in the car to begin with???

I don't mean to bust your chops, <font color=lime>shamrock</font>, and you've toned down your earlier commentary, but I just had to comment on this. The Iraqi captors are pre-eminently warning that the Americans may try to stop her from leaving and we're supposed to take this to heart? What ELSE would anybody EXPECT the Iraqi captors to say?? "Oh, you should have no problems with the Americans. They may be infidels, but they aren't really bad guys???" PUH-LEASE!!!!

<font color=plum>Americans may not like negotiating with terrorists, but we sure as HALE aren't going to shoot at allies or their citizens just because we don't like something they did. Good Grief!!! This woman puts Bill O'Reilly's "No Spin Zone" to freakin' shame. It is obvious she has an anti-American agenda and her comments support that assumption.

I saw an update on this situation this morning. According to the general giving the press conference, the Italians NEVER told the U.S. forces that one of their citizens was being rescued from kidnappers and would be coming through their checkpoints. ALL they had to do was let the American troop leaders know what was going on. Even if they didn't want our help, it was just ignorant to conduct such an operation in an occupied territory without telling the occupying forces about it beforehand...ESPECIALLY when the you are supposedly ALLIES with the occupying forces. :rolleyes:

Again, <font color=lime>shamrock</font>, my own rant is not aimed at you personally, but at the "spin" the Italians are putting on it.</font>

Isn't it amazing that in the modern day, with sophisticated communications devices able to put the soldier on the ground on the phone with his CO while he is conducting a firefight -- that it is communications errors that are 90% of the blue-on-blue kills?

In other words, we have all the means to communicate, but it is *people* who stonewall communications *on their own side* and *amongst allies* that really are the root cause of the problem.

<font color=plum>So the Iraqi captors are the "good guys" by warning her??? How would the Americans even KNOW she was in the car to begin with???

I don't mean to bust your chops, <font color=lime>shamrock</font>, and you've toned down your earlier commentary, but I just had to comment on this. The Iraqi captors are pre-eminently warning that the Americans may try to stop her from leaving and we're supposed to take this to heart? What ELSE would anybody EXPECT the Iraqi captors to say?? "Oh, you should have no problems with the Americans. They may be infidels, but they aren't really bad guys???" PUH-LEASE!!!! </font>[/QUOTE]No worries Cerek, the more I re-read what I wrote the more I see I need a good slapping down for it!

To respond:

1) Not all hostage-takers are necessarily foaming-at-the-mouth terrorists. In particular, these guys apparently treated her "very well". As well as a quick buck (if the reports are true) they may have wanted to make a political point in a relatively (for Iraq!) non-violent way. It's not impossible that they had no hard feelings about her personally, respected the fact she'd learned their language etc and her role about reporting in Iraq and therefore were genuinely concerned.I obviously give the 'conspiracy theories' short shrift but in the Middle-East there are countless 'bogeymen' stories about Western countries so its possible they may have believed it.

2) If all they were interested in was the money, then there was no need for the warning at all - rather than having to say "the american's are alright really" its more likely that they simply wouldnt have bothered saying anything.

<font color=plum>Americans may not like negotiating with terrorists, but we sure as HALE aren't going to shoot at allies or their citizens just because we don't like something they did. Good Grief!!! This woman puts Bill O'Reilly's "No Spin Zone" to freakin' shame. It is obvious she has an anti-American agenda and her comments support that assumption. </font></font>[/QUOTE]I'm in full agreement here - I don't hold much credibility for most conspiracy theories, this one included.

It's probably worth pointing out that the account of the remaining security agent also disagrees with that of the US soldiers though. I admit there might be an incentive to agree with the hostage in this case, but he isn't explicitly agenda drive like she is.

I agree completely. It will be interesting to see whether the Italians grudgingly admit that this is the case.

I would point out though, that in an occupied country where 'winning hearts and minds' is a desirable goal, it shouldn't be necessary to give advanced notice of your travel (something which Iraqi's aren't able to do) to avoid being shot ;)

I wouldn't really call your post a rant Cerek, and unlike mine, you haven't lost your objectivity in doing so!

[ 03-09-2005, 11:28 AM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]