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11/25/2003 Archived Entry: "Interesting sentence in the Pentagon's 'new' story..."
Interesting sentence in the Pentagon's 'new' story...
As has been pointed out in comments, the Pentagon is backing off of the report that 2 soldiers killed yesterday were mutiliated. But I noticed a couple of interesting sentences in the NYTimes report.
Confusion swirled Monday as a United States military official retracted his earlier report that the throats of two American soldiers had been slashed during an attack on Sunday in the northern city of Mosul.The official, who said he was receiving his information from written military records, said that the two soldiers had died of gunshot wounds to the head, and that their bodies had been pulled from their car by Iraqis and robbed of their personal belongings. Contrary to initial accounts on Sunday from Mosul, he said the bodies of the men had not been mutilated or pummeled with rocks.
[...]
In his revised account, the military official said the victims, both of the 101st Airborne Division, were not set upon by a mob but were shot by unidentified gunmen who stopped their car in front of the Americans' car, forcing it to halt. The assailants got out and fired at the Americans through the windshield.
Okay. But Yahoo! news published this picture, captured from videotape at the scene:
My question is this - if the assailants stopped their car in front of the soldiers' truck and killed them - presumably in the street - then how did the truck end up crashed into a wall? The Yahoo report from eyewitnesses says this:
According to witnesses, gunmen shot two American soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division as they drove through the city center to another U.S. garrison, sending their vehicle crashing into a wall. Then, teenagers dragged their bodies from the vehicle and pummeled them with concrete blocks. (AP Photo/APTN)
Sorry, but color me skeptical.
Replies: 11 people speak up
its hard to know which lie to believe. i usually just assume that whatever they say is a lie, but what do you do when the are contradicting themselves? i guess they can say the opposite of a lie and have it still be a lie.
"im a billionaire" "im bankrupt" , both are opposits, neither are true (sometimes both of those statements can be true at the same time for some people)
christ, the level of double think required just to watch the news is making my brain throb. 2+2=4 just come and arrest me now
Posted by justin @ 11/25/2003 12:49 AM NY
The whole think smacks of spin, we know a Somalia moment is coming, they know it's coming but they will do their level best to make sure we never know.
Does it matter in the end? Two more dead soldiers, which will lead to harsher treatment of Iraqis which will lead to more dead US soldiers.
And on it goes.
Posted by salvage @ 11/25/2003 11:35 AM NY
Given the level of violence in Iraq and given the antipathy on the part of some Iraqis towards Americans, why were these two soldiers traveling in a civilain vehicle? And why only two? It seems to me that whoever gave these poor guys their orders is guilty of negligence. In the mess that is Iraq, US troops should be in armored vehicles and moving about in armed convoys.
Two more soldiers dead, two more families grieving. This will be a miserable Holiday Season for hundreds of American families. Try to imagine what Thanksgiving Day will be like in the houses of those families. And Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day, and New Year's Eve.
I was watching Branaugh's superb 1989 version of "Henry V." In the scene that takes place in the English camp on the eve of the Battle of Agincourt, one English soldier, Williams, says:
But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath
a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and
arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join
together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at
such a place;' some swearing, some crying for a
surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind
them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their
children rawly left. I am afeard there are few die
well that die in a battle; for how can they
charitably dispose of any thing, when blood is their
argument? Now, if these men do not die well, it
will be a black matter for the king that led them to
it; whom to disobey were against all proportion of
subjection.
Posted by Metropolitan99 @ 11/25/2003 12:17 PM NY
that pretty much sums it up
Posted by justin @ 11/25/2003 02:22 PM NY
Oddly enough this photo also appeard on the CNN site along side the story http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/11/24/sprj.irq.main/index.html
it has now been replaced with a nice photo of the UN...too shocking I guess...
Posted by mcrob @ 11/25/2003 06:45 PM NY
Oddly enough this photo also appeard on the CNN site along side the story http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/11/24/sprj.irq.main/index.html
it has now been replaced with a nice photo of the UN...too shocking I guess...
Posted by mcrob @ 11/25/2003 06:45 PM NY
Nice catch... I read all the articles I could find - and I must have just been so angry that I missed the "conflicting" words and picture.
Is this the ultimate in spin? Spinning your own. story?
Disgusting.
Posted by Charles2 @ 11/25/2003 09:14 PM NY
They like to lie. It's a lot more fun than being sent out into a war zone in a PICKUP TRUCK!
Admittedly, a Humvee is no safer ('Do the rockets go right through the canvas doors? No sir, they just rattle around inside for awhile'). But being offed in a Ford while being sent to get dates for the General's date-shake, or some hashish for the officer's mess...that's embarassing.
Heck, killing soldiers is easier than killing convicted felons. They don't BEG.
Posted by Paul @ 11/25/2003 09:27 PM NY
The average IQ of this blog goes up 20 points every time I log on.
Posted by Geoffrey @ 11/25/2003 10:20 PM NY
you really could use a new hobby my friend
Posted by Chris @ 11/25/2003 11:23 PM NY
Geoff, only when I'm not here, otherwise it goes up 35 points.
Posted by Stentor @ 11/27/2003 03:14 AM NY
