POW Jessica was tortured

New York Daily News ^ | 4/03/02 | MAKI BECKER

[kattracks]

Tip from Iraqi led to hospital room

Jessica 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

[HairOfTheDog]

Well, to some degree I was trying see if you were saying that death is better than surviving rape, and I am not going to believe that is true until a victim of both tells me that. I think would rather be alive, and the others found there (has that been confirmed?) certainly are dead. You are right that she would not have been spared out of the kindness of their hearts, and I would not categorize *it* as an advantage either, but it may have in fact saved her life.

[conservababeJen]

Just responding to several posts that seem to be running ahead of known facts...wasn't trying to criticize any-one personally. I'm sure a serum HCG will be run in Germany if she was raped, and it will be up to Jessica with family support to deal with the after-math if it is positive. I could just see the political can of worms being opened up in this country should Jessica find her-self pregnant

My apologies, I didn't mean to snap but I'm finding myself in a position where I have to defend sharing my thoughts on a discussion board, lest be labeled shameful and behaving badly.

I pray that she doesn't have to ever think about the decisions discussed here. i pray that she wasn't raped. I also hope that in the awful event she was that it isn't made public (or her state of pregnancy for that matter). The discussion is hypothetical (which apparently isn't welcome here).

Again...My apologies for snapping.

[Texas Gal]

The Marines had a booth at a job fair in my town Tuesday, and they had a chin-up bar set up there. Guys who could hang on and do 20 chin-ups got a T-shirt, but for the girls all it took was holding their chin above the bar for 70 seconds. I guess the military doesn't expect the women to be as strong.

[PennsylvaniaMom]

Just responding to several posts that seem to be running ahead of known facts...wasn't trying to criticize any-one personally. I'm sure a serum HCG will be run in Germany if she was raped, and it will be up to Jessica with family support to deal with the after-math if it is positive. I could just see the political can of worms being opened up in this country should Jessica find her-self pregnant!

Do you honestly believe 'this country' should be made aware if she was raped or impregnated? The military won't confirm/deny specifics of Jessica's (or any soldiers) injury. That is why generic terms (fair condition/guarded,critical, etc.) are used...to protect patient confidentiality (read your local newspaper--accident victims conditions are reported in the most generic of terms). We (collectively) don't have a right to know the specifics of anyones condition. As to military doc's running the blood/urine work for hcg, I would hazard to guess that some protocol was instituted prior to women being sent into combat to handle situations such as the one Jessica (and the other female MIA) are in now.

[Lord_Baltar]

Jen, with all due Respect, you missed entirely my point.

You are free, if you like to scream from the roof tops your ideals regarding abortion, that's fine.

What I'm saying is that this topic WAS *NOT* AN ABORTION TOPIC, WAS IT?

We were discussing the Cruel, inhuman torture of Jessica Lynch.

Yes, she Might have been Raped, WE DON'T KNOW. Lurid speculation whether she was or not is entirely inappropriate. Then dragging that ridiculous line of speculation even lower by slamming your Ideology about Abortion into the Mix was at best RUDE, and at worst Shameful.

If you want to start up another Abortion Thread, feel free, there's already a myriad of them here. You can talk about Abortion in those threads until your fingers are raw from typing for all I care.

But why do you feel the need to bring it here, when the topic had nothing to do with Abortion?

There's nothing PC about telling you to take your Abortion Conversations into a thread that has something to do with Abortion.

I'm Truly sorry if this sounds Harsh Jen, It really isn't meant that way. I'm just really blown away by the behavior of people here sometimes, and this was one Thread that not only made me angry, but really made me embarrassed at the very idea of Jessica's Parents MAYBE logging into FR to be greeted by this stuff.

Frankly, whether she's pregnant or not after her ordeal is None of Our Business! Period! I for one won't be a party to Torturing this young lady any further by speculating on it, or prying into it.

[BradyLS]

He sent the homosexual movement back about twenty years, and the NTY didn't help any.

Heh, heh! and if PFC Lynch ever comes out as a Republican, the Left is finished!

[Lord_Baltar]

I'm really just shaking my head at this...

Does it REALLY matter to you what her Political Party affiliation is?

What happens if it comes out that she's a Democrat, would what she went through be lessened in some way because of it?

Please, Please, Please, tell me that you aren't that shallow...

Tell me that you can't look at all this and view it as a Republican versus a Democrat issue. Please, restore my faith in FR, quickly...

[conservababeJen]

WAS *NOT* AN ABORTION TOPIC, WAS IT?

My post was in reply to #15.
I answered a hypothetical question thrown out there (that wasn't started by ME) And that question (hypothetically) was relevent to the topic at hand, albeit not pretty.
We are all here having a conversation. If it's not something that you or anyone else wants to talk about, then don't. But I fail to understand why you give a rat's arse if I choose to answer a question. I didn't bring abortion up. Someone else did. And SO WHAT if they did?
It makes zero sense to me that having this discussion in this thread is somehow a direct insult to Jessica Lynch.
But, whatever....
I'll respect your gripe and say no more on abortion here, but I will defend my integrity should it be called into question by fellow conservatives again.
You choose to call my behavior "shameful" & "rude", then claim I "slam my ideology into the mix", when I'm not even the one who started this discussion. Regardless, I find your comments sanctimonious, arrogant, pompous and prudish. But hey, we all have an opinion, right?

[OldEagle]

"If this young woman was Raped by these blood-thirsty animals, why should she be forced to carry their child.{?}"

Wouldn't it also be HER child???

[Lord_Baltar]

Yes, we all have opinions.

Mine, thankfully, had something to do with the Topic of the thread, yours, did not.

Sorry if you're offended about being told to stay on topic...

[Lord_Baltar]

Old, I'm not even going to dignify that with a response...

[OldEagle]

"Yes, she Might have been Raped"

How can you doubt it?

[Lord_Baltar]

How can I doubt it?

Because I DON'T KNOW. That is my point, speculating on it is POINTLESS.

If Jessica herself wants to make that Public, then so be it, but I'm afraid sitting here speculating on whether a 19 year old Lady was brutally Raped, as well as tortured, doesn't do anyone, including Jessica, any service.

As for sitting here debating whether or not she's pregnant, and whether or not she can or can't Abort it, is in really bad taste...

[conservababeJen]

Yes, we all have opinions. Mine, thankfully, had something to do with the Topic of the thread, yours, did not. Sorry if you're offended about being told to stay on topic...

I answered this question....If she was violated, how do we who believe in the sanctity of all life deal with a pregnancy which may result? ...which was on THIS THREAD on THIS topic, posted by someone OTHER THAN ME. Just because YOU don't find it on topic, doesn't mean that OTHERS don't find it relevent discussion. Guess what?.. YOU're not the only one here.
Have a nice day.

[PennsylvaniaMom]

It makes zero sense to me that having this discussion in this thread is somehow a direct insult to Jessica Lynch.

Isn't this thread about Jessica Lynch? And hasn't the discussion of rape, abortion, relative to the torture she received at the hands of the Iraqis being posed as it applies to Jessica? I think the critisms leveled were at the further invasion of privacy of a young woman who (by every account) has already been tortured.

[Lord_Baltar]

Oh Yes Jen, I'm having a wonderful Day. I'm sitting here watching a bunch of people speculate on whether a Young American Hero, who was Tortured, Beaten, Shot, and Held prisoner by a bunch of blood thristy Animals, might be pregnant, and whether or not she should be allowed to Abort some Imaginary pregnancy.

...And I'm wrong for finding that Tasteless, Rude, Shameful, and downright disgusting...

Gee, did I log into DU by mistake...

[HairOfTheDog]

Because I DON'T KNOW. That is my point, speculating on it is POINTLESS.

I would go on to say that the amount of discussion about rape here as the first and only subject having to do with Jessica since she went missing is at the very least, creepy.

[BradyLS]

Not that I ever said thing one about PARTY. But I'll tell you what. I'll have whatever Jessicca was drinking. You can drink the rest of Steve's Kool-Aid.

[Lord_Baltar]

Thank you Hair.

I touched on this in another thread. Seeing Jessica's pictures really hit me hard, because it was like looking at my own Daughters.

To put it mildly, if I was Jessica's Father, and I logged in here and saw this garbage, I'd at the very least be appalled to see my daughter's ordeal being dwindled down to whether or not she was Republican or Democrat, or debates about whether she was Raped, and may be Pregnant.

This makes me sick.