Posted on 03/05/2005 6:21:41 PM PST by Lessismore
Bush promises Italian leader a full investigation
The Italian journalist kidnapped in Iraq arrived back in Rome yesterday as fury and confusion grew over the circumstances in which she was shot and one of her rescuers was killed by American soldiers. The shooting in Iraq on Friday evening, which occurred as Giuliana Sgrena was being driven to freedom after being released by her captors, was fuelling anti-war activists in Italy and putting pressure on Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
'The hardest moment was when I saw the person who had saved me die in my arms,' she said. Her poignant words and weak, haggard appearance as she had to be helped from the jet that brought her back from Baghdad are fuelling national rage.
Berlusconi, a staunch ally of the US who defied widespread public opposition to the Iraq war and sent 3,000 troops, took the rare step of summoning US ambassador Mel Sembler to his office.
He demanded that the US 'leave no stone unturned' in investigating the incident. President George Bush called Berlusconi to promise a full investigation.
Sgrena, 56, a journalist for the Communist newspaper Il Manifesto, was hit in the shoulder when US soldiers opened fire on the car she was travelling in as it approached a checkpoint less than a mile from Baghdad airport. The Italian secret service officer who had negotiated her release was killed as he shielded her from the gunfire. Two of his colleagues were also hurt.
Berlusconi prides himself on his close personal friendship with President George Bush, but he was grim-faced when he told reporters that someone would have to take responsibility 'for such a grave incident'.
The US Army claimed the Italians' vehicle had been seen as a threat because it was travelling at speed and failed to stop at the checkpoint despite warning shots being fired by the soldiers. A State Department official in Washington said the Italians had failed to inform the military of Sgrena's release.
Italian reconstruction of the incident is significantly different. Sgrena told colleagues the vehicle was not travelling fast and had already passed several checkpoints on its way to the airport. The Americans shone a flashlight at the car and then fired between 300 and 400 bullets at if from an armoured vehicle. Rather than calling immediately for assistance for the wounded Italians, the soldiers' first move was to confiscate their weapons and mobile phones and they were prevented from resuming contact with Rome for more than an hour.
Enzo Bianco, the opposition head of the parliamentary committee that oversees Italy's secret services, described the American account as unbelievable. 'They talk of a car travelling at high speed, and that is not possible because there was heavy rain in Baghdad and you can't travel at speed on that road,' Bianco said. 'They speak of an order to stop, but we're not sure that happened.'
Pier Scolari, Sgrena's partner who flew to Baghdad to collect her, put an even more sinister construction on the events, suggesting in a television interview that Sgrena was the victim of a deliberate ambush. 'Giuliana may have received information which led to the soldiers not wanting her to leave Iraq alive,' he claimed.
Sgrena was kidnapped on 4 February as she interviewed refugees from Falluja near a Baghdad mosque. Two weeks later her captors issued a video of her weeping and pleading for help, calling on all foreigners to leave Iraq. Italian journalists were subsequently withdrawn from the city after intelligence warnings of a heightened threat to their safety.
Italian newspapers reported yesterday that Sgrena had been in the hands of former Saddam loyalists and criminals, and that a ransom of between £4 million and £5 million had been paid for her release. The military intelligence officer who lost his life, Nicola Calipari, 51, was hailed as a national hero.
I'll defer to your judgement on the political climate of Italy, as I can't claim the same experience of living there.
In your opinion, then, how do you think they would take it if a U. S. investigation revealed that:
1. The Italian government did indeed pay 5 - 9 million dollars to anti-coalition forces.
2. The American military had no idea that this deal was going down.
3. Agents of the Italian intelligence services were deliberately trying to rush the reporter to the Bahgdad airport and out of the country in such a way as to avoid having her having to answer questions about her captors and her time in captivity? That is, deliberately evading Coalition and U. S. checkpoints.
Thank you! President Bush said we would do a full investigation and I thought at the time, excuse me? How about we demand the Italian gov conduct an investigation instead of taking the commie freak's word as Holy Script.....3 to 4 hundred bullets indeed!
Yes. It's a propaganda victory for the terrorists.
And, the story stinks to high heaven ... someone needs to interview the driver of the vehicle.
Yup.
Somebody should keep an eye on her bank account, and that of her newspaper, if it's possible. It's not unheard of for phoney kidnappers to split the take with "victims."
well, usually bullets needed to stop a car by piercing the engine block are high powered bullets. Another doc pointed out that they were probaly hurt by shrapenal not a bullet. In other words, the soldiers weren't shooting to kill, but to stop the car. And to do this, you don't use a bb gun...
Bingo.
An account a few days ago said the American soldiers were shooting at the engine of the vehicle. That might explain many, many rounds expended.
We should set up checkpoint video cameras so we can play back unfortunate incidents when they occur.
I rest my case!
The Americans ... fired between 300 and 400 bullets at if from an armored vehicle.... Sgrena ... was hit in the shoulder
(And that was from Winchesters, BARs & .45cal Thompsons)
There are quite a few differences beween me and Kerry and one is that he fought in the war and my only experience with the weapons was using a simple rifle during mandatory military training in high school.
I am sure that there is enough evidence to establish the truth, but it might be that we will never learn it because of politics. For example if the soldiers are innocent they might be sacrificed in order to appease the key ally or if they are guilty it can be covered up through some deal.
The saddest thing is the nasty arrogant hateful attitude displayed by some participants. This shameful attitude is also very harmful to American interests:
[CaptainAwesome2]
Damn!!! Missed her!!
[montag813]
I wish only this disgusting b*tch had been the one who died,
[mystery-ak]
.....and her commie boyfriend too!
[Brilliant]
The bottom line is that the journalists are getting in the way of this war. If they go in there, then they are asking for it.
[CaptainAwesome2]
We are wasting money and the only good thing i see happening is some europeans are getting killed.
[johnb838 ]
Europe is worthless. Turd world sh!thole.
[Squantos]
LOR for poor marksmanship !
Warrior Class rising up and telling the world?!!! Sprechen Sie Deutsches?
Communists in Italy are a large mainstream party. They are very different from the Communists in the old Soviet Union or a the odd political sectarians distributing leaflets near American universities. Their profile is more like the left wing of the Democratic Party in USA. And Il Manifesto is not so bad paper (if you can stand its secular progressive bias).
I rest my case!
Which case?!
I think we need to accept the fact that in reality most people around the world are not with us. Some governments support us for their own benefits but generally that has been against their peoples wishes. We need to do what is best for us first and not worry about the opinions of euroweenies and third world garbage.
As far as how many officers I've apprehended... There were only 9 officers on my base, including the Marine detachment. I don't recall any officers ever getting into any trouble on the entire island while I was there. Just for full disclosure, I worked for the Cheif Master-At-Arms but not in an enforcement capacity. I am just very curious and I always paid attention to how things are done and asked a lot of questions.
And it is "possible" that that particular Italian security agent had seduced the wives and girlfriends of every U.S. soldier manning that roadblock.......And had slapped their mothers and kicked their dogs too. Any human action that does not violate the limits of human capability is "possible" even though extremely implausible.
What is not possible is that "rogue trigger happy individuals who hate Europeans, journalists, Italians, Communists and terrorist sympathizers etc" would, through the power of mental telepathy or clairvoyance , know that a car 20 yards down the road was occupied by "Europeans, journalists, Italians, Communists and terrorist sympathizers".
Such a scenario does violate the limits of human capability.
At a checkpoint, the only thing that the soldiers know about such a car 20 yards down the road is that that particular car is being driven in a highly suspicious manner identical to the behavior expected from the suicide car bombers that strike in Iraq every few days and, if that car is not stopped dead in it's tracks, it could blown them all to Kingdom Come within the next few seconds.
Hindsight is always 20/20.
Mental telepathy and clairvoyance is always totally blind.
If that were the case, she would have "unfortunately" died at the scene or during her medical evacuation from the scene.
If a missile, sniper or bomb had taken her out, you could say IF, but not here. BTW NO flame intended.
Sgrena, 56, a journalist for the Communist newspaper Il Manifesto, was hit in the shoulder when US soldiers opened fire on the car she was travelling in as it approached a checkpoint less than a mile from Baghdad airport. The Italian secret service officer who had negotiated her release was killed as he shielded her from the gunfire. Two of his colleagues were also hurt.
Berlusconi prides himself on his close personal friendship with President George Bush, but he was grim-faced when he told reporters that someone would have to take responsibility 'for such a grave incident'.
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Blame the Death Cultists, Berl...
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