TERRORISM: Dangerous Garbage "US troops in Afghanistan have been ordered to burn their mail"

StrategyPage.com ^ | May 21, 2002 | Stephen V Cole

[Spar]

TERRORISM: Dangerous Garbage

May 21, 2002; US troops in Afghanistan have been ordered to burn their mail after an Afghan local was found going through trash piles and taking home envelopes with addresses on them. It was unclear why he wanted the mail, but military police are concerned that al Qaeda might use the information to attack the families of American soldiers serving in the Afghanistan (to destroy the morale of entire units) or could pass the information to al Qaeda cells that might try to steal their identities to make money to support their activities.--Stephen V Cole

[swarthyguy]

THey weren't burning or saving them before?!!. This is really underestimating the enemy. Great they've started doing it now.

[HiJinx]

Hmmm...can you say OPSEC?

[TADSLOS]

It was unclear why he wanted the mail, but military police are concerned that al Qaeda might use the information to attack the families of American soldiers serving in the Afghanistan (to destroy the morale of entire units)

Talk about a plan with a backfire built into it...

[vetvetdoug]

ATTN: Soldiers don't destroy those pieces of mail that give the Clinton's and Dashole's return address and leave them undamaged in the garbage.

Yea, I wish....

[JRandomFreeper]

Forewarned is forarmed. I know of one troop's family that would meet the bad guys with more firepower than the bad guys could bring. And have no hesitation about using it.

/john

[Quix]

I AGREE WITH YOU. Someone was not thinking things through thoroughly enough.

When lives are at stake, err on the side of being appropriately obsessive!

[swarthyguy]

Let's hope nothing was taken previously. It could be innocent; trash from Americans could turn up lots that an impoverished place like Afghanistan could put to good use. But the deviousness of these guys is phemonenal.

[Quix]

I agree with you on all counts.

[tracer]

The only problem with the scenario you describe is that these jackals never would engage their victims face-to-face. Their style is to bomb and/or ambush like the vipers that they are...

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

Just thought you'd want to be aware of this - courtesy bump.

[neutrino]

My, my. Does anyone recall all of the discussion on the board about "innocent Afghans" and "feed the Afghans"? Hmm? And now we see a little glimpse of reality. Yeah, we really need to help these vipers, don't we?

Iodine-131. For those hard to cure infections.

[eno_]

My favority product slogan for this conflict is "Trident kills anthrax dead."

[hockey d gal]

Yeah and if they were smart they would get the "fabulous" team of Arthur Anderson to help shread the "unwanted" stuff but leave the "juicy" stuff behind!!!!

[BlackbirdSST]

You guy's see this? Bump! Blackbird.

[Free the USA]

Check the Bump List folders for articles related to and descriptions of the above topic(s) or for other topics of interest.

[housethatruthbuilt]

This may be wishful thinking, but maybe we are starting to think like them, and are setting a trap for them.