November 2, 2005, Faruq you
Well, well. It seems we have an... embarassing situation. It seems that a key Al Qaeda player just kind of walked out of American custody at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Omar al-Faruq, purportedly an organizer of Al Qaeda in Southeast Asia and confidant of OBL himself, was captured in Indonesia, and rendered to us.
Interestingly, Mr. Faruq's disappearance (apparently, he picked a lock and slipped past an Afghan guard) has become an issue at a military trial in Texas of Sergeant Alan Driver on charges of abusing prisoners in Afghanistan (you will note that its always a sergeant; it seems the military under the Bush Administration can't bring itself to assign criminal responsibility for implementation of its... legally questionable policies... on anyone above the rank of sergeant. Troubling, no?)
Anyway, one can check out my interviews with lawyers for Hamdan and Hicks to realize that we are holding any number of inconsequential schmucks at Guantanimo Bay while simultaneously either outright releasing, or... in this case, allowing a key Qaeda player to escape... who seem far more... dangerous... when it appears that those players might, oh, reveal embarassing evidence of abuse, for example.
If al-Faruq is as dangerous as he is purported to be, it shouldn't let us sleep too easily knowing that our government decided to put him the kind of facility where he could pick a lock and sneak past one Afghan guard... seems we should have taken the security of a key Qaeda player... a little more seriously.
Of course, that's just me.
Comments
...no wonder we have to torture these guys. If they're able to get up and move around under their own power, they just walk out the door...
Posted by Jack K. at November 3, 2005 11:47 AM
First of all, Negative Nabob:
Your own attached article says that the prison redoubled their security, so now there are two Afghan guards sleeping at their posts.
Regarding yesterday's abortion posting: interesting that with all recent postings of war, hurricanes, indictments, treason, etc., you get flurries; but, you mention abortion and you get a blizzard of comments.
Your attached "Bad fact" article, however, was very telling about the sorry state of the Democratic Party.
You have Hillary (Wife of "Define what is is") Clinton giving a partial statistic, knowing that the devoted constituency will perceive a national trend.
Then you have John (Do I still have a plan?) Kerry outright lying about the facts. Shocking.
Finally, Howie (YEEEEEOOW) Dean, the Beloved Democratic Leader, for whom lying is not enough: He must inflict upon his crew an outrageous statistic, that will remain indelibly on their fragile minds in Magic Marker, as they spend their days sniffing that same Magic Marker, en route to another devastating defeat.
Oh, the humanity.
Posted by Still Crabby After All These Years at November 3, 2005 3:07 PM
Maybe he escaped. On the other hand, maybe he was a witness set to testify against an American soldier and the soldier had friends still at the prison. Maybe he didn't escape. Maybe he was disappeared.
Posted by DBK at November 4, 2005 1:36 PM
Maybe he escaped. On the other hand, maybe he was a witness set to testify against an American soldier and the soldier had friends still at the prison. Maybe he didn't escape. Maybe he was disappeared.
Posted by DBK at November 4, 2005 1:36 PM