Posted on 12/27/2005 8:02:56 PM PST by jmc1969
WASHINGTON - Four years after the U.S. invaded Afghanistan, Taliban and al Qaeda fighters are showing renewed strength, using suicide bombs and rocket-propelled grenades. They are even training the next generation.
Since June 2005, 54 Americans have been killed in Afghanistan, by far the most lethal period since the U.S. invaded.
Behind some of the most deadly attacks is one man, a 35-year-old Afghan who calls himself Commander Ismail.
In his first interviews with Western media, Ismail brags about killing three Navy Seals this summer, then downing a Chinook helicopter that came to rescue them, killing another 16 Americans.
Commander Ismail says ousted Taliban leader Mullah Omar is alive and well and that the Mujahaddin are fighting under his command and control.
NBC News interviewed Ismail in August and again this month.
Ismail boasts that in June, he deliberately laid a trap for American forces.
Ismail: We certainly know that when the American army comes under pressure and they get hit, they will try to help their friends. It is the law of the battlefield.
A tape obtained by NBC News showed what appears to be some of the battle, and the terrorists unsuccessful attempt to coax a Navy Seal to surrender. When the U.S. military sent in a rescue team, Ismails men were waiting with a rocket-propelled grenade, downing the helicopter, and then spreading out recovered weapons and hi-tech equipment. Later, they displayed captured communications equipment and weapons.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
I think he meant to give credence to exposure of the truth to the public, regardless to their motive.
You have many points I have been thinking about. TV is one addiction. I have been cutting back.
Too many Americans view the terrorists as primitive nutcases. Instead, these bastards are sophisticated both tactically and socially. They know how to use our media. 9-11 reinforced that notion.
-that's why I glad's he's dead and hoped he suffered and recieved no relief from pain meds and BURNS IN HELL EVERYDAY, to side with the enemy and allow our boys to be killed is no AMERICAN period. I'm glad he didn't get a chance to draw social security and to think my taxes would go in his pocket, he was until the day he assumed room temperature a filthy,liberal, elitist snob, piss on him and all of his ill!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Lisa Myers has had nothing positive to report about since GWB was elected to his 1st term.
This was a propoganda hit designed to give legitimacy to the left-wing/Islamo-fascist myth of the "indigineous, freedom fighter insurgent fighting against the cruel American occupation forces". That is exactly the impression this POS interview & article was designed to promote. It had nothing to do with exposure of the truth to the public. In fact the whole interview & article was a deliberate lie designed to deceive & distort the truth. These B@ST@RDS are terrorists....not insurgents or freedom fighters!
Those smaller helicopters can't operate effectively at the heights at which the fighting in the border regions are taking place. These guys were at...well lets just say apprx. 10,000ft + -
Additionally those helicopters can't bring the numbers of needed shooters at those heights -
Furthermore Apache's are used quite often where applicable for CAS - Along with a variety of fixed wing aircraft - CAS missions are routinely called in (a levels much more then is ever reported on).
Furthermore it wasn't the RPG itself that caused the tragedy....but when the pilot tried to land the MH-47 (at those heights) where he put it down....the ground gave way the the helicopter then tumbled down into a deep ravine. This is what lost us those 16 brave warriors.
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