Something Wicked This Way Comes
It wasn’t “by the pricking of my thumbs”; it was by accumulation of things that I heard and read that did not fit the normal patterns for numerous events.
Two experienced infantry soldiers, members of the 502nd Infantry Regiment are captured. How? These guys were armed and armored. They would as soon shoot you as look at you and they were working in an area noted for attacks.
Here are “some of the dogs that didn’t bark”:
- An Iraqi talking to the BBC mentioned finding the bodies by the odor. Decomposition is faster in the heat, but they must have been killed on they day they were taken, or may have been dead when taken, for the process to be that far along.
- There were no demands made. The demands are almost always totally outrageous, but they make them.
- There was no video of the death. Al Qaeda in Iraq claimed credit for the deaths, but they always put up a video of the event. The Russians were shown dying, but not the Americans.
- The mutilation was well in excess of the norm including Iraqi reports of castration.
War is a form of insanity, but after a while things tend to settle into a pattern. This incident breaks the pattern. This was a different type of insanity.
Then via Laura Rozen and Steve Gilliard a new pattern appears – a clan blood feud.
Those accused of the rape/murder and the two soldiers who were taken belong to the same platoon of the 502nd and could be identified by their uniform patches and patrol area as part of the same unit. In a tribal society they would be identified as being part of the same clan and targets of revenge.
One of those who came forward about the alleged crime reportedly did so because of the abduction, probably realizing that he was being targeted for a revenge killing. Weregild would be acceptable for the deaths, but a rape requires blood. It’s the custom.
The biggest reason for believing that the two incidents are connected is that the military in Iraq says they aren’t. Given their track record, it makes the connection just about certain.
5 comments
I hesitated to write my thoughts about this at the time – I suppose because my thoughts weren’t very, shall we say, tactful.
When there were no demands, no video, etc., my one-word reaction was – amateurs.
So maybe ‘amateurs’ wasn’t correct, but I knew al Queda or a deliberate kidnapping by insurgents would have been handled differently.
Were these soldiers part of the group that raped and killed the woman (girl)? If so, I would say retaliation might be at work here.
Andante, I’ve held off, especially about my belief that they were killed in the attack and their bodies were removed, because it didn’t make much sense for the regulars among the insurgents, but makes good sense as a revenge killing. The missing piece was the reason.
POP, they were in the same platoon as those accused. A platoon is the smallest unit commanded by an officer and contains between 16 to 40 soldiers. All of them would have been wearing the eagle’s claw of the 502d and their vehicle markings would have identified them as part of the same unit.
Great; that’s all we need now. It isn’t enough we’ve invaded their country; now we’re getting involved in clan wars. Those can be worse than the political ones; after all, Iraq isn’t really as much a nation by people as it was a recent political compromise (after World War I). These clan rivalrys go back many, many generations and aren’t soothed by outsiders.
Bobby, deaths can be resolved by the weregild, as was the custom of the Nordic and Saxon clans, but the rape falls in the “honor” category. We might resolve some of it by pulling the 502d out of Iraq after paying the weregild. There should be a sheik in the area who could arrange the payment, but the military is going to have to make the effort.
The Iraqi clan involved is not going to understand that this is action of individuals, that’s not how their world works. The 502d is probably not going to be safe to use in any Muslim country.
As you say, these things are passed on from generation to generation.