Human Shield Buses Stuck in Beirut, Seek Fare Home

Reuters ^ | 3/5/03

[areafiftyone]

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Two red double decker buses and a white London taxi that ferried anti-war activists to Baghdad to serve as "human shields" are stranded in Beirut with their owner short of the $5,500 it costs to ship them home.

The buses and taxi, dusty after a six-week overland journey that began at London's Tower Bridge, were plastered with signs saying "No to a war on Iraq" and "No to war, Yes to peace."

"The buses have to be shipped back. It's just not practical to drive them...I am not even really sure how much money I've got, but I'm sure it's not enough," said owner Joe Letts, adding that he would fly to London on Thursday to try to raise cash.

"I thought I would let people know it's a problem," he added, sitting in a makeshift kitchen on his bus in central Beirut.

Letts said he left London with 45 human shields of 10-12 nationalities, and picked up a dozen or so more in Turkey before arriving in Baghdad, where he spent a week sleeping in a power station hoping to prevent a possible U.S.-led attack.

"We were taken to see some of the installations that the Iraqis thought were suitable for protection," he said, adding that he had feared a bombing campaign could start at any time.

"We painted a huge sign on the roof saying human shields, so when any planes bombed the target, they'd see they were killing us -- Englishmen and Finns and Turks."

Some 50 other Swedish anti-war human shield activists who had traveled to Iraq began to leave on Monday, saying they had wanted to protect hospitals and schools but had been forced out to refineries, power plants and water works.

Letts said about 200 human shields, including many who traveled on his bus, remained in Baghdad when he left. But he said that although he stayed on as a shield for a week, he had no intention of staying in Baghdad for the duration of a war.

"I own these buses and they are my livelihood and my family's livelihood. And all along I was there really to take the people down and then come back," he said.

When he left London, he thought he had enough money to pay to ship the buses home, but ended up spending his personal finances to help pay for the trip.

"I had promised my wife I would get the buses home," he said. "If I don't get them home, we're absolutely stuck."

[KC_Conspirator]

This is what happens when you don't have jobs.

[twigs]

What amuses me about this is that we now find out that these shields really do care about whether they live or die (thank goodness). They were going to chain themselves to civilian targets, proving that they must have known that the US was not going to bomb them (or they would not have been there). So they knew all along that the US is not the "great satan" that they proclaim. Instead, they discover that Saddam uses (i.e. kills) innocent people, which is one of the reasons we're sending our military in there. His word cannot be trusted (he lied about WMD), which the shields have spent a lot of their own personal money to discover. They should have used their brains and watched Fox News to begin with.

[SupplySider]

Heck, if the "human shields" had any sense of honor and responsibility they would have chipped in to help. Looks like true friendship doesn't exist in the left-wing camps...

The compassion crowd is a vicious bunch!

[Trust but Verify]

Send 'em to Haifa. I'm sure there are some Israeli's who'd be happy to have some human shields!

[Snowy]

"I had promised my wife I would get the buses home," he said. "If I don't get them home, we're absolutely stuck."

Idiot: "Hunny, I'm going to Baghdad and I'm taking the buses...."

Wife: "Ok. Could you pick up some tofu at the store before you leave?"

[pfflier]

You mean Saddam won't pay for the round trip?

[Mr. Mulliner]

I think we ought to start a fund to help this poor man get home

If the money is to send him back to Baghdad, I may come up with a donation.

[nicmarlo]

The wheels on the bus go round and round.....

The babies on the bus go
whah whah whah,
whah whah whah,
whah whah whah,
the babies on the bus go
whah whah whah
all through the town.

: )

[scott7278]

Irony Ping (in the informal use of the word)!

[Search4Truth]

Charlie Daniels without a doubt. A true American.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/857464/posts

[scott7278]

Those darn internal combustion engines! :)

[Slip18]

"i think the girlie who plays basketball for Manhattanville College that turns her back for the pledge of allegiance, should hold a bakesale in Beirut in order to raise the $$ to get the brave human shields back home."

What a great idea!

[AppyPappy]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!

[RansomOttawa]

Two red double decker buses and a white London taxi that ferried anti-war activists to Baghdad to serve as "human shields" are stranded in Beirut with their owner short of the $5,500 it costs to ship them home.

BAHAHA! Who needs "reality" TV when you've got reality? The networks should have stuck some cameras on the buses.

[AppyPappy]

Here's my prediction: He's pulling a scam. He will collect money from different sources who know nothing about each other and end up fleecing the flock for $50k.

He could drive the buses back but he doesn't want the embarassment of being seen running for home with his tail tucked. So he dreams up a charity gimmick.

[8mmMauser]

Human shields, huh. They can't take a joke.

[ImpBill]

"If I don't get them home, we're absolutely stuck."

And we are supposed to feel sorry for the idiot? The only thing that bothers me is that he bugged out. He should be sitting on top of his bus watching a 500 lb. bomb as it drops on his head.

Realizing that I am sounding a bit blood thirsty here, but that's how I feel about these idiots. I hope the collateral damage gets each and every one of them. We need their genes out of the pool.

[Happygal]

ROFLMAO!!!! This is hysterical! :-)

[far sider]

What idiots! They wanted to stop the war but they just ended up adding to the refugee problem!