Iraq: 'SAS terrorism' allegations persist - outside UK
washingtonpost: [db emphasis] Hundreds of residents and police officers filled the streets in the southern city of Basra on Wednesday, shouting and pumping their fists to condemn British forces for raiding a jail and freeing two of their commandos two days earlier.
Iraqi police had arrested the Britons on Monday for allegedly shooting at police and planting explosive devices. British troops then broke the men out of jail by ramming an armored vehicle through a wall. In response, Basra residents and police revolted, attacking British forces in the area. Read more
db: We are reading a lot about the 'infiltration' of the Basra police force, Iranian backed destabilisation, Mahdi Army splinter groups, the influence of Hezbollah - not to mention our very own favorite man-for-all-atrocities Zarqawi. But as yet the allegations that the British SAS soldiers - who got themselves caught 'red handed' with a boot full of anti-tank weapons, guns and explosives - were engaged in terrorism has raised barely a whisper in the UK media. The panic and desperation with which the British military in Iraq addressed the original problem did little to assuage the worries of ordinary Iraqis that the occupier is up-to-no-good. And surely it is the Iraqi audience - not 'sophisticated' Americans/Europeans who know such evil could never be perpetrated by US/UK forces - that we should be seeking to reassure. It is a question of perception - some perceive that we have a core of criminals within the British armed forces/SIS who are setting off bombs in support of UK/US policy to create civil war - where the only solution would be the carving up of Iraq into small, sectarian statelets which will eliminate Iraq as an Arab country, gain a permanent military footprint and further the interests of the US/UK in the region. In the absence of a serious attempt by the UK to explain what the SAS were really up to when captured 'in flagrante delicto' the rumors, fears, logical speculations will persist. And consequently the job 'our boys' are employed to do in Iraq can only become more difficult and deadly as time passes.
Iraqi police had arrested the Britons on Monday for allegedly shooting at police and planting explosive devices. British troops then broke the men out of jail by ramming an armored vehicle through a wall. In response, Basra residents and police revolted, attacking British forces in the area. Read more
db: We are reading a lot about the 'infiltration' of the Basra police force, Iranian backed destabilisation, Mahdi Army splinter groups, the influence of Hezbollah - not to mention our very own favorite man-for-all-atrocities Zarqawi. But as yet the allegations that the British SAS soldiers - who got themselves caught 'red handed' with a boot full of anti-tank weapons, guns and explosives - were engaged in terrorism has raised barely a whisper in the UK media. The panic and desperation with which the British military in Iraq addressed the original problem did little to assuage the worries of ordinary Iraqis that the occupier is up-to-no-good. And surely it is the Iraqi audience - not 'sophisticated' Americans/Europeans who know such evil could never be perpetrated by US/UK forces - that we should be seeking to reassure. It is a question of perception - some perceive that we have a core of criminals within the British armed forces/SIS who are setting off bombs in support of UK/US policy to create civil war - where the only solution would be the carving up of Iraq into small, sectarian statelets which will eliminate Iraq as an Arab country, gain a permanent military footprint and further the interests of the US/UK in the region. In the absence of a serious attempt by the UK to explain what the SAS were really up to when captured 'in flagrante delicto' the rumors, fears, logical speculations will persist. And consequently the job 'our boys' are employed to do in Iraq can only become more difficult and deadly as time passes.
posted by exoplanet at 11:15 PM
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