Revealed: how bungled US raid came close to disaster (Delta Force raid)

The Guardian (UK) | Tuesday November 6, 2001 | Luke Harding in Quetta, Julian Borger in Washington

[ARCADIA]

Notice how the British have set themselves up as official critics.

Maybe the Pentagon's denials have to do with the secrecy of the Delta Forces.

[WriteOn]

The Guardian is up there with CNN on the liberal fantasy spectrum.

[Viet Vet in Augusta GA]

The Guardian is the worst trendy-lefty paper in the UK (perhaps on the planet). I wouldn't beleive them if they said the sun would rise tomorrow.

[AppyPappy]

The reason I doubt this Taliban line is because the Delta forces would be covered by helicopter gunships and aircraft who would have pummeled the Taliban when they opened up.

[Jeff Head]

This is about the third or fourth time the UK press has tried to throw this BS up against the wall on this particular raid.

Obviously it is not sticking.

Of course the Taliban people who were there returned fire ... how can you take fire and it not be ferocious? Any fire directed at you is ferocious ... so?

This is war, we're going to take casualities. The facts in the case are simple. Our special forces went into the heart of indian country on a raid to get information and ice some tangos. They came back with NO KIA's. That's a good outcome. End of story.

Semper Fi!

[ScreamingFist]

"They are trained to attack with stealth in small teams, but the Kandahar raid was an extensive, noisy production, involving a back-up force of 200 rangers, AC-130 gunships and a 100 Delta Force commandos"

I dismiss this report for one reason and one reason only. The amount of firepower 200 Rangers can lay down is absolutely awe inspiring, they aren't trained to run away, and they don't panic. They are 18-21 year old shock troops, and their one reason for exsisting is to kill things. I believe if a fire fight as intense as this tripe stipulates truley had broke out, the Rangers would have mauled anything in the fire zone.

[Wright is right!]

Sounds as though the Guardian picked up Seymour Hirsch's now-debunked piece - and reworked it.

Michael

[GEC]

THESE PEOPLE ARE COMMUNISTS.

ANYTHING THEY SAY REQUIRES BUCKETLOADS OF SALT.

[dighton]

Pure wishful thinking at the looney-left Guardian.

[Grim]

Free Republic needs a new posting category: "FICTION" for debuked bozo-bait like this.

[Grampa Dave]

SF posted, "I dismiss this report for one reason and one reason only. The amount of firepower 200 Rangers can lay down is absolutely awe inspiring, they aren't trained to run away, and they don't panic. They are 18-21 year old shock troops, and their one reason for exsisting is to kill things. I believe if a fire fight as intense as this tripe stipulates truley had broke out, the Rangers would have mauled anything in the fire zone."

You are right on target. Our rangers who died in Somalia thanks to X42 and his traitor defsec, apparently killed over 500 Somalians. That was with no support or backup from the traitors in the Clintoon White House.

Now add several C130 gunships and other air support teams for total disaster for the Taliban. These young warriors are ready to kill as many Islamic Goat Humpers as they can get their sights on! We have a SECDEF and POTUS who would not allow our specops to be in the situation created by the communist and anti America/American Hersch!

This is part of the left wing lies started by Hersch the commie working for the NY Slimes! This bs worked in Nam, and they are trying for a repeat in history!

[Captain Kirk]

Who can tell? In World War II, American journalists were there in the field with the soldiers. The current policy under breeds speculation and lack of confidence in the official version.

[Yankee]

There are 4 kinds of lies. In order of increasing magnitude they are:

1)Lies
2)Damn Lies
3)Seymour Hersh lies.
4)Seymour Hersh lies regurgitated by left-wing propaganda outfits, like the Guardian.

[denydenydeny]

The Taliban later retrieved "an American foot" from the scene, still in its boot.

If this fantasy had really occurred, does anyone not believe that the incriminating "foot" would have been immediately displayed on al-Jazeera and CNN for the world to see? Remember the grotesque display of the 18 Rangers killed in Somalia.

[jackchaos]

People, this story is fiction. It's put together from the original fictional source, and added to by more fictional comments by people who read the original fictional acount. Trust me people. It never happened like this. The more it's written about... people will begin to think it's true.

[rangerwife]

I agree with you. All these people need to do is read Blackhawk Down. They would then see that after 2 helicopters were shot down, the Rangers and Delta fought back. They did not run away or back down. I forget the number of casualties the Rangers and Delta inflicted on the Somalis, but it was up there.

I read the article yesterday by Seymour Hersch or whatever his name is. Supposedly some officer told him that this is not a war for the special operations units. He's probably getting all his info from some rear echelon, chairborne ranger type whos ticked off about the special ops getting so much press and getting the action over in Afghanistan.

[arjay]

In WWII the press was on our side and that made a big difference. I don't trust our press today to be with our soldiers or to know anything in advance because they are much more committed to "journalism" than they are to America.

I have much more confidence in what we are getting from our present government than I do in any of our press people.

[Diogenesis]

[mvscal]

the speed and intensity of the Taliban response at Mullah Omar's compound "scared the crap out of everyone", a senior officer told the New Yorker,...

Uh...riiiight. I'm sure that's exactly how this went down. Our badly confused and disorganized special operation professionals versus the lighting quick, elite Taliban forces. You would think they would at least try to make their BS credible.

[ARCADIA]

I agree that Hersh got tipped off by someone upset with mission, not necessarily by the participants.

However, I don't think the whole thing is false. Where there is smoke, there's fire. Right now, the most telling detail is that after the raid we --

haven't seen any other raids. If this one was successful, why not try more.

after much talk about not favoring any specific group in Afghanistan, we are now supporting the Northern Alliance. Probably because don't have any other ideas.