Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: unclewest who wrote (9056)	11/5/2001 6:40:18 PM
From: tfrugal	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

MS Greenie probably wasn't singled out. Law enforcement types must control a situation. Objecting to being touched in a loud, indignant way guarantees detainment. She is lucky not to have been strip searched for spite. Personally, fussing with airport security right after 9/11 like that seems calculated to get a response.

To: unclewest who wrote (9056)	11/5/2001 7:06:40 PM
From: E	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

I posted that explanation earlier. I do suspect no one thought she was going to hijack the plane but that she may have behaved provocatively with the aim of creating a scene. It will be interesting to see how the story develops. Stories, I mean. We will get two entirely different scenarios.

To: unclewest who wrote (9056)	11/6/2001 1:58:47 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Hogwash, Mr. Hersh. Pure, unadulterated, misinformed, uneducated hogwash... <<Seymour Hersh, writing in the New Yorker, says that the commando raid in the Kandahar area was botched and a dozen Delta Force troops were seriously wounded when the US team was departing Mullah Omar's house. He says that by the time they had done their work, the Taliban had regrouped and open heavy fire on the withdrawing force. In his words, as quoted by the BBC: "About 100 Delta Force people were inserted to go through the complex and into the home where the Mullah hopefully would be or, without that, search for documents," Mr Hersh said. "As somebody said, it took much too long, no stealth, and by the time they came out the Taleban had regrouped. "Their combat forces began a furious assault, and they had the equivalent of high ground and there was a real shoot-em-up. "The Delta Force were enraged, and the reason I heard about it was because Delta Force doesn't like to be used so poorly," Mr Hersh added. Mr. Seymour's thesis is that Delta Force became (1) enraged because things went wrong, and (2) Delta Force's response to being used so poorly was to see that Mr. Hersh got the story, presumably ensuring such a stupid mistake would not happen again. We will not waste the reader's time except to note that commando missions by their nature are very high risk, and more often than not things go wrong. The payoff for many failed missions comes with one success, which sometimes can be spectacular. That the mission at all reached Mullah Omar's house, conducted its search, killed whoever was in the way, and withdrew without suffering a single man killed or left behind, does not seem to strike Mr. Hersh as quite remarkable, particularly if the Force was surprised in exiting. The attack was launched within a month of the force arriving in the theatre, a theatre in which the US has very few of its own intelligence assets, and in which its soldiers have never operated. If an enemy team operating under the same conditions had gotten into - say - the White House, and gotten out again with no one killed or left behind, your editor doubts Mr. Hersh would be saying the enemy botched the mission. Another small matter. A different report has Mr. Hersh saying that the Rangers were not even the first troops into the airfield: they were preceded by an Army pathfinder team, and they landed only when told the way was clear. Note To Mr. Hersh: that is the way these operations are conducted, and in case you've missed it, the Rangers are also in the Army. I do not know if the pathfinders were also Rangers - perhaps a better-informed reader might enlighten us? - but what are you trying to say here? If the pathfinders report that the jump zone is not clear, the mission commander has to balance the urgency of the mission with the likely casualties and possibility of failure. A suggestion to the Rangers: perhaps they can take Mr. Hersh along the next time so he gets a better idea of what is what in the commando business?>> orbat.com