Posted on 07/12/2007 10:46:29 AM PDT by ScaniaBoy
British forces have denied rumours that they released a plague of ferocious badgers into the Iraqi city of Basra.
Word spread among the populace that UK troops had introduced strange man-eating, bear-like beasts into the area to sow panic. But several of the creatures, caught and killed by local farmers, have been identified by experts as honey badgers.
The rumours spread because the animals had appeared near the British base at Basra airport. UK military spokesman Major Mike Shearer said:
"We can categorically state that we have not released man-eating badgers into the area.
"We have been told these are indigenous nocturnal carnivores that don't attack humans unless cornered."
The director of Basra's veterinary hospital, Mushtaq Abdul-Mahdi, has inspected several of the animals' corpses. He told the AFP news agency: "These appeared before the fall of the regime in 1986. They are known locally as Al-Girta.
"Talk that this animal was brought by the British forces is incorrect and unscientific."
Dr Ghazi Yaqub Azzam, deputy dean of Basra's veterinary college, speculated that the badgers were being driven towards the city because of flooding in marshland north of Basra. But the assurances did little to convince some members of the public.
One housewife, Suad Hassan, 30, claimed she had been attacked by one of the badgers as she slept.
"My husband hurried to shoot it but it was as swift as a deer," she said. "It is the size of a dog but his head is like a monkey," she told AFP.
I HAVE read in other places that these will attack humans, and that they do not need to be cornered to do it.
Man-eating badgers. I’m sure someone in Langley is giving this some consideration right now.
“As swift as a deer with the head of a monkey” ... the West is about 500 years or so ahead of Islamic “civilization”.
Not more badgers?!!!!
The notorious ManBearSow.
Never underestimate oriental superstition and conspiracy thinking. The more absurd the theory the more will believe it.
Seems to be a liberal trait aswell.
Let's turn this into a reverse caption thread.
Yeah right. The British Tank-Badger has been used in low-level urban conflicts ever since Suez.
Have I missed a previous thread???
I was so certain this was absolutely unique.....
:-)
Badgers??! We don’t need no stinking badgers!
Badgers are about the only animal a grizzly bear will run FROM. Freak’n mean spirited, foul tempered, all teeth and attitude.
Was Hillary visiting or something?
Remind me never to provoke a honey badger...
I just flushed a badger while riding my bike in a nearby neighborhood here in Boise. This was on Sunday.
It ran away from me as fast as it could, so I was in no danger of having the flesh rended from my bare legs by tooth and claw.
The line of houses it ran between back up to a field that is near the NY Canal, so I assume they live back there.
It sounds like the residents of this area could be in mortal danger!
We should be releasing wild boars from TX in Iran.
"Get in ma' belly!" - Fat Badger
"Perhaps we could build a great wooden badger..."
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