So here’s an idea that I haven’t seen yet in the blogosphere about the hostage taking of Giuliana Sgrena.
What if the entire episode was just a scam to force the Italian government to financially support the terrorists in Iraq?
I don’t think the Italian government was involved but I do think it likely that Giuliana Sgrena was. She is a communist with a long track-record of anti-American hatred. She was in Iraq in the first place to provide propaganda support for the “insurgency.” Perhaps she simply thought she could help the “insurgency” more by becoming a high-profile hostage than she could as a “journalist.” The “insurgents” are reportedly running out of money. Maybe they convinced her to cooperate with funding their operations.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the Italians paid as much a $6 million dollars to secure her release. What a boon to the terrorists!
Even if Giuliana Sgrena was just a useful idiot, she failed at her stated aim of helping the Iraqi people. The millions paid for her release will pay for more terrorist attacks whose primary victims will be ordinary Iraqis.
Whether due to intent or incompetence, she will in the end kill far more Iraqis than will the most trigger happy American soldier. Had she in fact died at the checkpoint it would have been karmically just.
At LGF, there are lots of similar rumors afloat. Given the discrepancies between her narrative and the minimally damaged car, such questions need to be raised. Along the same lines then: was the intelligence officer already dead when they reached the checkpoint going 100 mph and refusing to stop?
This woman’s story is beginning to crumble beneath her.
I’ve thought something of the sort for days; that her captivity and that of the two Simonas was in fact, a fund-raising excercise. Berlusconi had to do SOMETHING to knock down the stink at home, rather than just hang tough, and take the hit politically. So, worst of both worlds for him: screwed the coalition by paying the ransom(s), and what should have been a quiet little exchange is all over the US and Italian media, and getting nastier with every development. GWB and Rumsfeld do NOT have a reputation for tolerating this sort of two-timeing by someone who us supposed to be an ally.
Ditto, guys. The European Left is now helping the terrorists operationally. If they’ll pull a stunt like this, what won’t they stoop to?
If I was an Italian taxpayer, I’d be outraged. I’m sure there’s an orphanage in Rome, or a fire department in Milan that could have used that $6M.
Shame!
And Berlusconi got played like a fiddle. I just hope he’s a shrewd enough politician to deliver some payback to his Italian Socialist opponents over this.
-Steve
I’ve been having the same thoughts. Either she was being used or was directly involved in a con game, or both.
An Italian version of a DOUBLE WHOPPER. Slur intended. Can’t be swallowed. Try it and choke.
But ya know what gets me? The American Colonel, waiting at the airplane, must have been some ass-kissing officer type dude. Reminiscent of the type that existed during Vietnam.
Maybe, TWO ‘WORTHY’ OFFICERS GOT FRAGGED? One dead. And, one’s career now in the garbage.
As to Sgrena, it’s very possible she will sit as a bookend on GWB’s shelf? Given that Rather-dumb managed to use a fake report that backfired. And, enabled our president’s popularity to climb, among American voters. To the toon of 5 or 6 million MORE votes; than he would have gotten if the race didn’t heat up, so.
Now? Maybe, the elites still hate America. But the rank and file? Maybe, they’re beginning to warm to Bush? Eye-talians don’t need to remind us of their “whop[per] status again, ya know? And, whatever this war time incident is, it isn’t GUNS OF NAVARONE. (Italians aren’t stupid.) Just their leadership. Which works like the mafia.
And, now? I’m pretty sure the Italian government wanted to double-deal. They gave Bush 3,000 troops. But they gave the terrorists probably close to $24,000,000 (dollars) … over their past two ransom payment induced kidnappings. So that now Italy is on par with the Philipines. Where’s the compliment in that?
And, Bush knows this information is NOW OUT IN THE OPEN. Sgrena may have blown the cover off future funding of terrorist operations. (While over in England, Tony Blair looks pretty stupid for thinking the IRA could change its ways.
New Sisyphus has some interesting observations about this matter.
It is indisputable that Sgrena killed Calipari. She is the only one with a motive. Also, it isn’t being reported too widely, but the checkpoint actually came under fire as the vehicle was approaching. Sgrena was the only one who could have fired the shots.
The soldiers were acting in self-defense.
Sgrena also “covered” Al-Quadea training camps in Afghanistan before the war and lived in Cuba for 10 years in the 1980s. There is also evidence to link her with Quebecois nationalists.
She was named an “honorary Indian” by the American Indian Movement and was at Pine Ridge when Leonard Peltier and their collegues killed FBI agents Ron Williams and Jack Coler.
You’re really broadening your readership, Jonathan.
Dikotl,
I’d love to know your sources for your assertions. I won’t be surprised by their voracity. But It’d be nice to verify them for myself.
-Steve
The voracity of the assertions can hardly be in doubt given the broad ground they cover. Whether they’re true or not is a different matter.
Thanks for the link to Sisyphus, Richard Heddleson. It was an interesting read.
Regards,
I have a feeling that Dikotl is pure satire of some ex-treme right-wing conspiracy theorists. I have actually read some comments suggesting that Sgrena might have killed the agent. The fact that he has thrown in the ‘Quebecois nationalists’ comment that first tipped it for me. The ‘Honorary Indian’ (a la Ward “I play an Indian on Campus” Churchill clinches it. He gives no source because his only source is between his ears…read in that light, his comment is actually quite humorous, I think.
By the way, it seems that great minds think alike.