March 04, 2005
Left-Wing Italian Journalist Released
The Jawa Report called it from the start. I guess one can only engage in making just so much anti-American propoganda for the enemy before burning out and needing to come home and rest.
Update: Sgrena was apparently shot and wounded and a bodyguard killed by U.S. Forces at a checkpoint roadblock somewhere in Iraq. Notoriously aggressive Italian drivers barreling down on soldiers primed to repel vehicular suicide bombers is a recipe for disaster. As you would expect, the Democratic Underground thinks Eason Jordan should be reinstated at CNN.
Update: Speaking of CNN:
According to a multinational forces statement, the car approached the checkpoint at high speed about 9 p.m. (1 p.m. ET)
U.S. troops "attempted to warn the driver to stop by hand and arm signals, flashing white lights, and firing warning shots in front of the car," the statement said. "When the driver didn't stop, the soldiers shot into the engine block, which stopped the vehicle, killing one and wounding two others."
I am very disappointed at the U.S. soldiers that fired on this vehicle.
If a vehicle is approaching your checkpoint at a high rate of speed and refuses to slow down or veer away despite the hand signals, flashing lights, and warning shots, you blow it away. Completely.
There should have been no survivors.
That there were survivors means that an appropriate force may not have been used. Our soldiers have one primary overriding goal, and that is their own personal safety, followed by the safety of the civilians around them that they are there to protect. If they suspected this vehicle was carrying a suicide bomber they should have put enough firepower on it to not only stop it, but to destroy any suspected explosive ordinance it could have been carrying.
That may sound callous to some, but it is a far more preferable outcome than this one last week where a suicide car bomber murdered 115 and wounded 132 Iraqi civilians. That Giuliana Sgrena is alive is the result an apparent inadequate use of force.
I would like this story to be covered in more detail so we can discover why the soldiers stopped firing upon what they had every reason to believe was a suicide bomber.
