US confirms soldiers kidnapped by al-Qaeda

[babylonsister]

Source: Sydney Morning Herald

US confirms soldiers kidnapped by al-Qaeda

May 15, 2007 - 6:12AM


The US military confirmed today that it believes three American soldiers missing in Iraq were kidnapped by al-Qaeda, as the Islamist militant group threatened to harm its captives.

"At this time, we believe they were abducted by terrorists belonging to al-Qaeda or an affiliated group and this assessment is based on highly credible intelligence information," said spokesman Major General William Caldwell.

Insurgents ambushed a US patrol on Saturday in a pre-dawn assault near the town of Mahmudiyah. Reinforcements sent to the scene found four soldiers and an Iraqi translator were dead and three troops missing.

The so-called "Islamic State in Iraq" - an al-Qaeda-dominated alliance of Sunni rebel groups - claimed responsibility for the attack and warned US forces not to search for the men or risk seeing them harmed.

"Your soldiers are in our hands. If you want them safe, do not search for them," the group said in a statement on a Jihadist internet website, while offering no proof that it indeed held the missing GIs.

more...

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/us-confirms-soldiers-kidnapped-by-alqaeda/2007/05/15/1178995107203.html

[ATK]

1. wow, time machine. do they have the lottery numbers in there?

I say this because of the date and time of the article.

[movonne]

4. Well I think their time is ahead of ours...

[ATK]

5. I know.

I was kidding

maybe..

[Ian David]

2. They're sure it's not Special-Ops Cody this time?

[AndyA]

3. Hopefully they will be treated better than we treat our prisoners.

Of course, under the Bush Administration, we've set those standards awfully low.

God be with those troops. (Please substitute whichever higher power you align with.)

[Igel]

10. They'll be treated according to long-standing Salafist

traditions (with a few late additions from the last 30 years).

Since the option of slavery is pretty much ruled out--where to stash them, how to feed them--the options are a bit limited.

"We" tend to think we're more important than we actually are. A clever conceit, that, but a widespread one.

[ohio2007]

15. I wonder if the red cresent or red cross will be allowed access to them/

oh, wait,
they were kidnapped, not taken as POW's......

[Judi Lynn]

6. It would set a dynamic example if they remained untortured, for sure, and were returned

totally unharmed.

Sure hope it's possible.

[Kagemusha]

8. No one would be impressed by such an example.

Certainly not the US government or military. They didn't show gratitude when Saddam released his hostages pre-Desert Storm; they hit him all that much harder.

[DemReadingDU]

7. or abducted by an affiliated group

"At this time, we believe they were abducted by terrorists belonging to al-Qaeda or an affiliated group and this assessment is based on highly credible intelligence information," said spokesman Major General William Caldwell.

[Igel]

11. They're ideological bedfellows.

The E. German Stasi, the Soviet KGB, the Czechoslovak Státní bezpečnost, the Polish Służba Bezpieczeństwa, the Yugoslav SDB, or their analogs were all pretty much alike; that's why they could work hand in glove. To be detained by one was pretty much like being detained by any other.

The component parts of the ISI, one should assume, work the same way. There are groups slightly more 'conservative' than AQ; there are groups that are slightly less conservative. But only 'slightly': "Much more conservative" is fairly impossible; "much less conservative" is to be apostate, in their view.

[Parche]

9. AL-Kida

Al-Kida sure gets around..........

Does anyone believe there IS an Al-Kida, I dont.
Sure there are bad people and 'terrorist' groups out there, but Al-Kida is the name
given to them by the CIA meaning 'The Base'

[alcibiades_mystery]

12. Ridiculous

"an al-Qaeda-dominated alliance of Sunni rebel groups"

O thought the Sunnis were now fighting al-Qaeda. Can't these people keep their stories straight.

There is no "al Qaeda" in Iraq. There is a group that calls itself "al Qaeda in Iraq," but it has nothing to do with the al Qaeda of Osama bin Laden, etc. This is just more obfuscation and confusion, deliberately foisted on the American public in order to continue the war.

I have no doubt that some group of Sunni insurgents hold these soldiers. But they are not al Qaeda, and saying that they are only covers up the truth of the matter.

[saigon68]

13. So true

Hopefully they won't attach electric wires to their penises

[Igel]

14. The Sunnis are fighting the Sunnis.

That's part of what "civil war" means--like Americans fighting Americans in the Civil War, or Spanish fighting Spanish in the Spanish civil war.

In this case, there are a dozen or so tribes anti-AQ that are fighting 6 tribes or so that are pro-AQ. (Or at least mostly anti- or mostly pro-.)

A nuanced view is what's called for here. Two utterances that appear to be contradictory can, with a little thought, be reconciled.

[ohio2007]

17. Saddams baathist hard core hanger's on fighting the old rank and file

Those loyal to the old boss do not want to be 2nd class citizens to the new boss.

[alcibiades_mystery]

18. I'm well aware of that

The point is that the media represents it as if the so-called al Qaeda in Iraq (which is anything but) is universally a pariah organization, which it most clearly is not. That's the nuanced view.

[Igel]

19. No, it's not considered a pariah by everybody.

Most, at this point, I think ... at least in Iraq. A few Kurds, probably few Shi'ites, and some Sunni Arab tribes. But while the ISI can stage some pretty spectacular one-off strikes, they're unable to hold their territory. Supposedly even some of the pro-AQ/ISI tribes have fractured.

[alcibiades_mystery]

20. "Hold their territory"

Is this a territory war?

Well, that's a new one.

You're an optimist, in any case. Or a propagandist. One of the two, supposing there's a distinction.

[spanone]

16. They confirmed that they 'believe' it was al-Qaeda?

wow, they are confirming what they think.....how reassuring.