Idema said he was in daily telephone and e-mail contact with officials "at the highest level," including in Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's office.
Let's see those e-mails.
It occurs to me that we haven't heard anything out of Rumsfiend for a while. He's keeping a low profile. Condi, too.
And check this out...
The U.S. military acknowledged Thursday it held an Afghan man for a month after taking custody of him from a trio of American counterterror vigilantes who have since been arrested on charges of torturing prisoners at a private jail they ran in the Afghan capital.
The American military has tried to distance itself from the group, led by a former American soldier named Jonathan Idema, insisting they were freelancers working outside the law. But spokesman Maj. Jon Siepmann acknowledged that the military had received a detainee from Idema's group at Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul, on May 3.
The American military has tried to distance itself from the group, led by a former American soldier named Jonathan Idema, insisting they were freelancers working outside the law. But spokesman Maj. Jon Siepmann acknowledged that the military had received a detainee from Idema's group at Bagram Air Base, north of Kabul, on May 3.
'Splain that one, Lucy.
Siepmann said Idema had appeared "questionable" the moment he presented the detainee, and that suspicion grew when, one month later, the man turned out not to be the top suspect that Idema had described.
"That doesn't mean at the time that we knew Mr. Idema's full track record or other things he was doing out there," Siepmann said. "This was a person who turned in a person who we believed was on our list of terrorists and we accepted him."
Siepmann declined to identify the detainee or the fugitive he was mistaken for.
He said it was unclear how Idema, who officials say had been posing as a U.S. special operations soldier, identified himself to soldiers at Bagram, or if he asked for anything in return for the detainee.
"For all I know, Jack Idema may have appeared to be perfectly credible at the time," Siepmann said, adding that officials were trying to reconstruct the handover.
"That doesn't mean at the time that we knew Mr. Idema's full track record or other things he was doing out there," Siepmann said. "This was a person who turned in a person who we believed was on our list of terrorists and we accepted him."
Siepmann declined to identify the detainee or the fugitive he was mistaken for.
He said it was unclear how Idema, who officials say had been posing as a U.S. special operations soldier, identified himself to soldiers at Bagram, or if he asked for anything in return for the detainee.
"For all I know, Jack Idema may have appeared to be perfectly credible at the time," Siepmann said, adding that officials were trying to reconstruct the handover.
Sure. Somebody walks up with a prisoner that he claims is a valuable target and nobody asks any questions. They just say thank you.
Afghan security forces seized Idema, two other Americans and four Afghans on July 5 after freeing eight prisoners from a makeshift jail in Kabul. The arrests came only after international peacekeepers contacted the U.S. military about their own suspicion of Idema's group, which duped the NATO-led force into helping in three raids in late June.
The seven defendants went on trial in Kabul on Wednesday, charged with hostage-taking and torture.
The seven defendants went on trial in Kabul on Wednesday, charged with hostage-taking and torture.
That's rather curious, isn't it? Duped NATO forces into helping them in raids?
Carp or catfish? I can't quite make out the smell.
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