Fifty Ways To Leave Your Lover: Us Army's Online Lothario Wrecks Havoc And Heartbreak

Independent (UK) ^ | 6-12-2003 | Andrew Buncombe

[blam]

Fifty ways to leave your lover: US Army's online Lothario wreaks havoc and heartbreak

By Andrew Buncombe in Washington
12 June 2003

For Robin Solod, a sassy New Yorker who had spent four years trawling internet dating sites looking for the right man, Colonel Kassem Saleh seemed the perfect catch.

He was a tall, good-looking, special forces officer contacting her from a war zone and he wrote her messages that she found as intoxicating as a crystal flute of champagne. What's more, he clearly had no commitment issues: within months of their "meeting" he had proposed marriage to her.

Unfortunately, the smooth-talking Mr Saleh had also allegedly made such a proposal to at least 50 other women he contacted through internet dating sites, luring them all with romantic prose and the prospect of a perfect future once he returned from the battlefields of Afghanistan.

He sent some of the women engagement rings and others went out and bought wedding dresses and started planning their big day, even though they had never met the man, who may have been an officer but was clearly not a gentleman.

Now, after complaints from the jilted women, the allegedly caddish colonel's unit, the Army's 18th Airborne Corps, based at Fort Bragg, Georgia, has launched an internal investigation, trying to ascertain how the 50-year-old was able to cultivate such an extensive cyber lovelife when he was supposed to have been at the forefront of President George Bush's war on terror. The officer is also likely to have some explaining to do to the real wife he had left back home.

"The commanders are aware of it, and they are currently investigating the alleged incidents," Sgt Christopher Fletcher, a spokesman for the Army corps, said.

The heartbroken women, meanwhile, want more. They are demanding the internet love rat be charged with a crime, though no one is sure if he is guilty of any legal offence.

"You did not see his letters," Ms Solod, 43, said yesterday from her home in Manhattan, explaining how she and the other apparently worldly women fell for the officer. He was more romantic than Shakespeare, she said, more romantic even than W B Yeats. "You don't know how intoxicating they were. I am a professional woman, I am smart, I am a typical New Yorker ... but he convinced me."

There were numerous other women who fell for the online Lothario - making contact through websites that included tallpersonals.com, match.com and christiansingles.com - and who only learnt of his treachery after a television channel showed footage of him returning home from his tour of duty to his wife in North Carolina.

Most of the time he communicated with the women using e-mail, writing missives that included lines such as "Oh baby, I want to tell you how much I miss you" and "I can't wait to get home to you". Most of the time he cut and pasted the same message to all the 50 women. Sometimes he would telephone them using a military satellite phone. Only a few actually met him. One woman reportedly tried to commit suicide when she discovered all was not what it had seemed.

Sarah Calder, 33, production manager of a local newspaper in Calais, Maine, said that the colonel had sent up to a dozen messages a day, though there were some days when he said he could not use the e-mail because he was "chasing terrorists in the hills".

Having spent weeks trying to choose the perfect wedding dress, Ms Calder was due to have met the officer for the first time several weeks ago. Having told her he was 6ft 5in (1.97m), the colonel warned her that he had shrunk to 6ft because of the repeated parachute jumps he had been forced to make. "I was very wary," she told The New York Times. "I know people can injure their backs. I found it strange."

The meeting never took place. Ms Calder - who had organised schoolchildren to make Valentine's Day gifts for the US soldiers - learnt from other jilted women that the man she planned to marry was apparently cheating them all.

Ms Solod said her last contact with Mr Saleh was six weeks ago, when she confronted him with his alleged lies. "He sent me a message that said, 'Get out of my life. Let me be the warrior monk that I am'."

Ms Calder is consulting a lawyer. She has also been speaking to her father about the duplicitous officer. "We are not a group of stupid, naive women," she explained. "We are bright, intellectual, professional women. I can't tell you how much he wooed us with his words. He made us feel like goddesses, fairy princesses, Cinderellas. We had all found our Superman, our knight in shining armour."

[Howlin]

"We are not a group of stupid, naive women,"

Well, the jury is still out on that one, Goddess.

[Amelia]

"We are not a group of stupid, naive women," she explained. "We are bright, intellectual, professional women. I can't tell you how much he wooed us with his words. He made us feel like goddesses, fairy princesses, Cinderellas. We had all found our Superman, our knight in shining armour."

If it sounds too good to be true.....

[FairOpinion]

I guess the gullibility of lovesick women knows no bounds.

Where did these women put their brains?

Also, I expected it to turn out that the guy was NOT really a US Army officer, and it turns out he is a colonel! That is shameful.

[justshe]

Did I miss it in this article? Was he a REAL Colonel---at Ft. Bragg???

[Williams]

"trying to ascertain how the 50-year-old was able to cultivate such an extensive cyber lovelife..."

Are they planning to bottle it?

[Izzy Dunne]

I am smart, I am a typical New Yorker

! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

[Dog]

Having spent weeks trying to choose the perfect wedding dress, Ms Calder was due to have met the officer for the first time several weeks ago. Having told her he was 6ft 5in (1.97m), the colonel warned her that he had shrunk to 6ft because of the repeated parachute jumps he had been forced to make. "I was very wary," she told The New York Times. "I know people can injure their backs. I found it strange."

Hahahaha!

[BossLady]

These are the same women who are professing undying love to Scott Peterson in jail.....LOL

[auntdot]

'Ms Calder is consulting a lawyer. She has also been speaking to her father about the duplicitous officer. "We are not a group of stupid, naive women," she explained.'

Stupid and naive? How else would you define a woman who would agree to marry someone she has never seen and has contacted only through email?

I bet half of these gals would have sent this guy money if he had made a plausible story why he needed it.

Old P.T. Barnum had it right.

[LurkedLongEnough]

"She has also been speaking to her father about the duplicitous officer."

Daddy will take care of everything, baby. There's the crux of the problem right there, the idea that Daddy can and should fix anything and everything. <sympathy still off>

[Izzy Dunne]

Dear Robin Solod,
  I am Dr. NDenko McHebejebe, an official in the Nigerian Finance Ministry. During a routine audit, I discovered an account that was oipened in 1991 and has not been accessed since 1993. It was controlled by a Mr. Albert Cann of Great Britain, who died in 2001 in an auto accident. My superiors have no knowledge of this account, which contains approximately $17,300,000 (seventeen million, three hundred thousand dollars).

  I am prohibited from accessing the account directly, or disbursing it within the country.

  Therefore, I would request your kind assistance in transferring this amount into a foreign bank, in exchange for which you will receive 20 percent.

  If you are interested in such an arrangement, kindly send your bank account number to:

RichGuy@ScamsRUs.com

[Howlin]

Yea, goddesses!

They give the rest of us a bad name.

[Howlin]

based at Fort Bragg, Georgia,

???????

[csmusaret]

How much credibility can Mr Buncombe have if he thinks Ft Bragg is in Georgia?

[crazykatz]

kassem salah... a muslim per chance... just looking for all those EXTRA wives moooohaaammmed promised.

[TheMole]

"We are bright, intellectual, professional women."

Totally unlike the unbright, unintellectual, unprofessional women who would have seen through this guy's BS line in about .00045 seconds.

As for that part about about how his 6'5" height had shrunk because of repeated parachute jumps, truly ROFLMAO. That is the best laugh I've had in weeks. Thank you.

[SauronOfMordor]

"You did not see his letters," Ms Solod, 43, said yesterday from her home in Manhattan, explaining how she and the other apparently worldly women fell for the officer. He was more romantic than Shakespeare, she said, more romantic even than W B Yeats. "You don't know how intoxicating they were. I am a professional woman, I am smart, I am a typical New Yorker ... but he convinced me."

There is nothing more gullible than a 43-year-old professional woman who thinks Prince Charming is out there looking for her. She couldn't find somebody in NYC who met her high standards (and more importantly, had any interest in dating her)?

I've known too many women who wasted their lives looking for Mr Perfect, and refusing to settle for anything less than perfection

[BradyLS]

Colonel Kassem Saleh sounds like a muslim name to me, but the article seems to point to him being a US Special Operations officer.

[Old Professer]

Well, there's always used cars if his service career doesn't work out.

[BradyLS]

There were numerous other women who fell for the online Lothario - making contact through websites that included tallpersonals.com, match.com and christiansingles.com - and who only learnt of his treachery after a television channel showed footage of him returning home from his tour of duty to his wife in North Carolina.

Bragg is in North Carolina, but I can't explain the Georgia snafu...

[fourdeuce82d]

Kassem Saleh sounds like a muslim name

could be christian arab.

[Izzy Dunne]

the article seems to point to him being a US Special Operations officer.

This was an EXTRA-special Operation...

[FryingPan101]

"Fort Bragg, Georgia,"

?

[Tribune7]

Having told her he was 6ft 5in (1.97m), the colonel warned her that he had shrunk to 6ft because of the repeated parachute jumps he had been forced to make. "I was very wary," she told The New York Times. "I know people can injure their backs. I found it strange."

Hey, she was wary.

[GrandMoM]

Stupid and naive? How else would you define a woman who would agree to marry someone she has never seen and has contacted only through email? ....yep! I bet half of these gals would have sent this guy money if he had made a plausible story why he needed it.....yep!

....If it is one thing I have learned in this life, it is the fact that SOME women will do ANYTHING to keep/have a man in their life. ANYTHING!!!!!!

[Norse]

There are plenty shameful military officers in our armed services, unfortunately.

[BossLady]

You are so right!!!

[BradyLS]

could be christian arab.

Yeah...

[Carolinamom]

"He was more romantic than Shakespeare, she said, more romantic even than W B Yeats."

"Oh baby, I want to tell you how much I miss you."

"I can't wait to get home to you."

She evidently has not read much Shakespeare.

[Life of Brian]

"You did not see his letters," Ms Solod, 43, said yesterday from her home in Manhattan, explaining how she and the other apparently worldly women fell for the officer. He was more romantic than Shakespeare, she said, more romantic even than W B Yeats. "You don't know how intoxicating they were. I am a professional woman, I am smart, I am a typical New Yorker ... but he convinced me."

Something tells me we will be seeing those letters soon and depending on how intoxicating they really are or are not you can bet someone, somewhere, will captialize on them and out of sheer curiosity women and perhaps men will milk them for every last delicious drop of necture they contain whether-or not they were spoken in truth or falsehood, love or lust, soulfully or expoitively. I had an interesting thought...how would a group of female professional writers scam an unwitting population into reading a book of letters that they themselves compiled in order to sell a book? Yes baby!

[E. Pluribus Unum]

"... I am a professional woman, I am smart, I am a typical New Yorker ... but he convinced me."

Pride goeth before the fall.

[LibertarianInExile]

That was my favorite line, too.

I'm seriously considering becoming a Colonel in Ft. Bragg, Georgia, and meeting these women myself. Of course, I'll be 6'13"--if we meet, I shrank to 6'5" because of the parachute jumps--and my nom de plume will be Awanulay Anuyoka.

Or maybe not...that would mean I'd have to be interested in a woman from New York, which would mean they'd know I wasn't a Colonel--not many too active blind Colonels (only one I can think of is Ray Charles, and he's a Kentucky Colonel).

But then, I'm sure enlisted men would have more to say about the presence of blind Colonels in the current army, too.

[LibertarianInExile]

"I wanted to wring his neck," said one fooled New York woman who identified herself only as Hillary.

[Tamzee]

Utter twits...

I'll bet this Don Juan chatted up hundreds of women who saw right through him and these Mensa candidates were just the few who fell for the scam.

[vetvetdoug]

Lying to gullible women is not a crime. If lying to gullible men was a crime, 75% of the women in the US would be convicted. This Colonel seemed to be just a cyber sleuth, he did not have relations with any of the women; he just jerked their chains. The Colonel must have had a lot of down time to be able to surf the dating sites for gullible women. I have no sympathy for the women that are complaining because women on those dating sites do the same to men on a regular basis. I hope the army gives the guy a medal for exposing how easy it is to manipulate women via the internet.

[BossLady]

LOL That crossed my mind as well when I read the article. It's more likely the guy grabbed quotes from Homer Simpson than Yeats. :o

[banjo joe]

. "We are bright, intellectual, professional women. I can't tell you how much he wooed us with his words. He made us feel like goddesses, fairy princesses, Cinderellas. We had all found our Superman, our knight in shining armour."

Hmmmmm... a dichotomy!

[banjo joe]

Where did these women put their brains?

And they say men think with thier p_____? Har!

[Rebelbase]

"I've known too many women who wasted their lives looking for Mr Perfect,"

There's a gal in my office who says she's tired of waiting for Mr. Right, instead she wants Mr. Right Now.

[pacelvi]

I smell a Lifetime movie out of this.

[Jhoffa_]

You took the words right out of my mouth..

Just like the guy who's (ahem) "too good" for anything less than a super model, there's the chick who is "too good" for anything less than a Special Forces Colonel.