Posted on 04/03/2003 1:34:43 AM PST by kattracks
Tip from Iraqi led to hospital roomJessica was being tortured.
That was the urgent word from an Iraqi man who alerted U.S. troops where to find Pfc. Jessica Lynch - and her injuries seem to bear out the allegation.
Lynch, who was flown to a military hospital in Germany yesterday, had her legs broken, one arm broken and at least one bullet wound, officials said.
The 19-year-old West Virginia private was able to call her parents yesterday for the first time since her rescue Tuesday. She was in good spirits but very hungry, her parents told CNN.
The rescue of Lynch, who was driving a water truck when she went missing after a March 23 ambush in Nassiriya, had added urgency when one of two tips to Americans said she was in danger.
One tip came when an English-speaking Iraqi man approached NBC reporter Kerry Sanders to tell him about the soldier being held captive.
"Please make sure the people in charge know that she's being tortured," he told Sanders.
Belying her country-girl smile and petite 5-foot-5 frame, Lynch put up a Rambo-worthy fight when her unit, the Army's 507th Ordnance Maintenance Co., came under attack, according to a new report.
Lynch opened fire on the Iraqi assailants, picking them off one by one until she ran out of ammunition, according to today's Washington Post.
She continued shooting - even after she was shot and stabbed and her unit members were killed all around her.
"She was fighting to the death," a U.S. official told The Post. "She did not want to be taken alive."
Yesterday, when Lynch was plucked from Saddam Hospital, Special Forces troops found a soldier in pain.
Her broken bones are a sure sign of torture, said Amy Waters Yarsinske, an ex-Navy intelligence officer and an expert on POW treatment.
"It's awfully hard to break both legs and an arm in a truck accident," Yarsinske said.
Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's thugs are known to use steel bars to bash their prisoners' limbs, she said.
"In the first gulf action, they tried breaking their [captured U.S. airmen's] legs with steel bars," Yarsinske said.
Another clue that Lynch and other POWs were being tortured came Friday, when Marines raided a hospital near Nassiriya where other members of Lynch's unit were videotaped and later shown on Iraqi TV. Marines found at least one shredded woman's uniform spattered with blood and the name patch torn off. In addition to Lynch, two other female soldiers went missing after the ambush.
In one hospital room, Marines discovered a car battery next to a bed - a possible electrical shock torture chamber.
During the last Persian Gulf War, Iraqis attached wires to one American POW's jaw and shocked him, Yarsinske said.
An Iraqi pharmacist who works at Saddam Hospital told Britain's Sky TV he treated Lynch's leg injuries. He added: "Every day I saw her crying about wanting to go home."
The pharmacist, who gave his name only as Imad, said Lynch knew U.S. troops were on the other side of the Euphrates River, and "kept wondering if the American Army were coming to save her."
Lynch's hometown of Palestine, W.Va., continued its celebration of her recovery yesterday.
Her brother, Gregory Jr., who is also in the Army, told CNN his sister sounded "disoriented" when she phoned home. "Her voice was crackly and low. She sounded like she was sick."
West Virginia Gov. Bob Wise stopped by the Lynch's home yesterday and told her parents that their daughter, who had joined the Army to pay for college so she could become a kindergarten teacher, would not have to worry about tuition.
"There will be a full scholarship for her whenever she wants to go for college," he promised.
With News Wire Services
You mentioned that "theorizing" "furthers the torture started by the Iraqis"...and you suggested that these comments "in the public forum" does her no good or adds to her "post traumatic stress". I find this (with all due respect) ridiculous. FR is a discussion forum. We are here to discuss issues & theorize. Granted, some opinions may not be PC or warm & fuzzy to some, but isn't that what makes an opinion an opinion?
Again...
I address this with all due respect, NOT to inflame.
Just throwing this out there for the sake of argument, but sadism seems to be a profound character flaw. OTOH, there is nothing in general to suggest that a military interrogator, say, who is applying a little physical pressure to a prisoner in order to extract some specific piece of information, has a flawed character.
The one would gladly torture anyone [he could get away with torturing] for as long as possible. The other would have little or no interest in doing that.
Iraqis, at least those in the Baath Party, all seem to be genuine sadists.
Because it's a "child" (by your own words). 9 months is 9 months but a dead child is dead forever.
...and I should not have jumped on you. Truce.
Somehow I doubt it.
Because of the events she was involved in, Jessica will from this point forward be a public figure. She will undoubtedly have physical pain and scars that she will hae to live with. She will undoubtedly suffer from some level of 'post traumatic stress' (which by the way is a real ailment--used to be called battle fatigue) that she will have to heal from as well. Does she really need people discussing whether or not she was raped/soddamized. Did she get pregnant? Did she abort or did the Army make her abort? Have we (as a forum) ever theorized a specific situation like this before? I don't think so. Pfc. Lynch needs to heal and get healthy. Her emotional and physcial state should NOT be a topic of discussion.
But then again, "torture" is a relative term, is it not?
For instance, having to watch Alan Dersh-Bag's face on CNN is "torture" to me...
If the story stays true that the rest of her unit and/or other US prisoners found at the site were killed, perhaps the caller is right. We could argue that it might have been an advantage then, could we not?
Did I say anywhere that she was?
It is obvious that Jessica was tortured (the two broken legs) any other therorizing on what else may have happened to her during her captivity is, in my opinion, furthering the torture started by the Iraqis. She is 19 years old. There is a reason news outlets do not publish the names of rape victims...yet here we sit, safe and sound at our keyboards, taking the horror Jessica (and other American POWs) face and contorting them to our own political agendas. Let it go folks...say a prayer for her recovery (physical as well as emotional), and let her heal. Let her family heal. She (again) is only 19--last year her biggest problem was maybe finding a dress for her prom, and now she is the flashpoint for women in the military, enlisting for college money, and (now) even abortion. All of that and the emotional (being ready to die at 19) and physical (two broken legs, at broken, arm, gun shot wounds) trauma, and now a nation theorizes of what 'else' may have happened. Post traumatic stress is very real--adding additional problems (in the public forum) does her no good.
God bless Jessica, and all the young women and men serving our Country.
Such an excellent post. The whole thing. I am also disturbed at this thread.
If she and the others on that unconscionable POW video are still alive. Prayers for them and their families.
Says you. *rolleyes*
I see alotta PC in the house.
My prayers go out To Jessica Lynch and her family.
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