Rescue of pfc Lynch

That was cool! :D

I wonder whatever became of the Iraqi that risked his life to let the US know her location.
 
I think he is in the States if I remember correctly

Wiki says that you are correct!

U.S. forces were tipped off as to Lynch's whereabouts by an Iraqi, sympathetic to her plight, who told them she had been tortured and injured but was still alive. The Iraqi was described as a 32-year-old lawyer, initially described only as "Mohammed" and later identified as one Mohammed Odeh al Rehaief. In light of Mohammed's role in Lynch's rescue, Mohammed and his family were granted refugee status by American forces.
 
Upon reading a little more on the rescue, I found this UK article. Maybe it's sour grapes, maybe there is some true to it. What do you guys think?

snip
One story, two versions. The doctors in Nassiriya say they provided the best treatment they could for Lynch in the midst of war. She was assigned the only specialist bed in the hospital, and one of only two nurses on the floor. "I was like a mother to her and she was like a daughter,"says Khalida Shinah.

"We gave her three bottles of blood, two of them from the medical staff because there was no blood at this time,"said Dr Harith al-Houssona, who looked after her throughout her ordeal. "I examined her, I saw she had a broken arm, a broken thigh and a dislocated ankle. Then I did another examination. There was no [sign of] shooting, no bullet inside her body, no stab wound - only RTA, road traffic accident," he recalled. "They want to distort the picture. I don't know why they think there is some benefit in saying she has a bullet injury."

The doctors told us that the day before the special forces swooped on the hospital the Iraqi military had fled. Hassam Hamoud, a waiter at a local restaurant, said he saw the American advance party land in the town. He said the team's Arabic interpreter asked him where the hospital was. "He asked: 'Are there any Fedayeen over there?' and I said, 'No'." All the same, the next day "America's finest warriors" descended on the building.

"We heard the noise of helicopters," says Dr Anmar Uday. He says that they must have known there would be no resistance. "We were surprised. Why do this? There was no military, there were no soldiers in the hospital.

"It was like a Hollywood film. They cried, 'Go, go, go', with guns and blanks and the sound of explosions. They made a show - an action movie like Sylvester Stallone or Jackie Chan, with jumping and shouting, breaking down doors." All the time with the camera rolling. The Americans took no chances, restraining doctors and a patient who was handcuffed to a bed frame.

There was one more twist. Two days before the snatch squad arrived, Al-Houssona had arranged to deliver Jessica to the Americans in an ambulance. "I told her I will try and help you escape to the American Army but I will do this very secretly because I could lose my life." He put her in an ambulance and instructed the driver to go to the American checkpoint. When he was approaching it, the Americans opened fire. They fled just in time back to the hospital. The Americans had almost killed their prize catch.

A military cameraman had shot footage of the rescue. It was a race against time for the video to be edited. The video presentation was ready a few hours after the first brief announcement. When it was shown, General Vincent Brooks, the US spokesman in Doha, declared: "Some brave souls put their lives on the line to make this happen, loyal to a creed that they know that they'll never leave a fallen comrade."

None of the details that the doctors provided Correspondent with made it to the video or to any subsequent explanations or clarifications by US authorities. I asked the Pentagon spokesman in Washington, Bryan Whitman, to release the full tape of the rescue, rather than its edited version, to clear up any discrepancies. He declined. Whitman would not talk about what kind of Iraqi resistance the American forces faced. Nor would he comment on the injuries Lynch actually sustained. "I understand there is some conflicting information out there and in due time the full story will be told, I'm sure," he told me.

That American approach - to skim over the details - focusing instead on the broad message, led to tension behind the scenes with the British. Downing Street's man in Doha, Simon Wren, was furious that on the first few days of the war the Americans refused to give any information at Centcom. The British were put in the difficult position of having to fill in the gaps, off the record.

Towards the end of the conflict, Wren wrote a confidential five-page letter to Alastair Campbell complaining that the American briefers weren't up to the job. He described the Lynch presentation as embarrassing.

Wren yesterday described the Lynch incident as "hugely overblown" and symptomatic of a bigger problem. "The Americans never got out there and explained what was going on in the war," he said. "All they needed to be was open and honest. They were too vague, too scared of engaging with the media." He said US journalists "did not put them under pressure".

Wren, who had been seconded to the Ministry of Defence, said he tried on several occasions to persuade Wilkinson and Brooks to change tack. In London, Campbell did the same with the White House, to no avail. "The American media didn't put them under pressure so they were allowed to get away with it," Wren said. "They didn't feel they needed to change."

He acknowledged that the events surrounding the Lynch "rescue" had become a matter of "conjecture". But he added: "Either way, it was not the main news of the day. This was just one soldier, this was an add-on: human interest stuff. It completely overshadowed other events, things that were actually going on on the battlefield. It overshadowed the fact that the Americans found the bodies of her colleagues. What we wanted to give out was real-time news."

Lockwood told Correspondent:"Having lost the first skirmish, they (the Americans) had pretty much lost the war when it came to media support. Albeit things had got better and everything came to a conclusion quite rapidly, but to my feelings they lost their initial part of the campaign and never got on the front foot again," Lockwood said. "The media adviser we had here [Wren] was an expert in his field. His counterpart on the US side [Wilkinson] was evasive and was not around as much as he should have been when it came to talking to the media."

The American strategy was to concentrate on the visuals and to get a broad message out. Details - where helpful - followed behind. The key was to ensure the right television footage. The embedded reporters could do some of that. On other missions, the military used their own cameras, editing the film themselves and presenting it to broadcasters as ready-to-go pack ages. The Pentagon had been influenced by Hollywood producers of reality TV and action movies, notably Black Hawk Down.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,956255,00.html
 
Well why didn't you SAY so!

Oh, wait, a local waiter told somebody that there weren't any bad guys? Shit, we should have just sent a couple nuns over to pick her up. :doh:


The Guardian is a fucking liberal eurotrash rag.
 
What do I think? I think if my ass is in a jam...I want those same guys to come get me.:2c:
 
What do I think? I think if my ass is in a jam...I want those same guys to come get me.:2c:

I agree 110%. It's just funny to see how the same incident can be viewed in two completely different ways.
 
Sweet.:cool: that was one scared girl.

Shit she sure as hell was....she looked like a child.

I don't give a rats ass what any other country has to say about how this was carried out! I know there are discussion points on serveral fronts....but from my point of view...get in there and get the hell out...what ever it takes!
 
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