Giuliana Sgrena update

You just have to wonder what the hell they thought they were doing...and then how Ms. Sgrena and the two surviving Italian agents got so lucky as to be left alive to tell the story.

In the weeks after Sgrena was taken hostage in Baghdad on Feb. 4, Italian intelligence officers worked to identify the kidnappers, determine that she was still alive, locate her and negotiate her release. Along the way, Fini said, information was shared with the U.S. Embassy's hostage working group in Baghdad.

Nicola Calipari, a senior intelligence officer familiar with working in Iraq, arrived with a colleague at Baghdad International Airport on Friday. Calipari spent 40 minutes contacting U.S. military authorities in charge of the airport to notify them of his mission and receive a safe-conduct document to move around the airport, according to the Italian leaders.

[...]

U.S. military officials in Iraq had approved an Italian intelligence officer's mission to free a kidnapped journalist and were expecting their arrival at Baghdad's airport on Friday when U.S. soldiers opened fire on the Italians at a checkpoint, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi said Wednesday.

[...]

Calipari sat alongside Sgrena and made phone calls to superiors to report his success. One was to an Italian official who was standing next to an American colonel at the airport, the prime minister said Wednesday, addressing the Italian Senate.

Calipari "therefore warned the American military officials of their immediate arrival in the airport zone," Berlusconi said.

[...]

Fini, citing testimony by the driver, also an intelligence officer, said Tuesday that the car was traveling at no more than 25 mph as the driver steered around concrete blocks. Fini said the driver was applying the brakes when the car was hit by gunfire that lasted 10 to 15 seconds.

[...]

U.S. Army Gen. George W. Casey, the top American commander in Iraq, said Tuesday in Washington that he had been unaware on Friday that Italian officials had entered Iraq to rescue Sgrena and said he had heard nothing since to indicate the Italians had told U.S. forces of the car's route.

[...]

Though Berlusconi has come under growing domestic criticism for keeping 2,700 Italian troops in Iraq, his speech drew a standing ovation from opposition senators as well as members of his governing coalition.

[...]

Berlusconi, like Fini, described the shooting as an accident.
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Clearly, there are some questions to answer. Early reports claimed Ms. Sgrena said they were beyond the checkpoint when they were fired upon. But no matter how you slice it, it looks very bad on the U.S. military.

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