Almost four months ago, four people described as “Christian peace activists” were taken hostage while in Iraq by a group calling itself the “Swords of Righteousness Brigade” (much to their chagrin, “Legion of Doom” was already taken).
Not long ago, Tom Fox, one of those hostages, was found dead. Last week, I wrote a column revolving around this for The American Spectator entitled “Peace at Any Cost“.
Well, fortunately for the three remaining hostages, British Special Forces weren’t pacifists, because they have stormed the place where the members of the “Christian peacemaker team” were being held and freed them. The pacifist peace activists protested loudly, denouncing the violence that was taking place in order to save their lives. Just kidding.
Release-by-force the “worst case scenario” for the peace-at-any-cost movement?
The preference for the peace-at-any-cost movement clearly would have been for the terrorist captors to employ a humane “catch and release” policy for captured pacifists. This would have offered an opportunity for the anti-war movement to point to their release as proof-positive of the effectiveness of simply taking the time to talk to those with whom you have disagreements.
As a matter of fact, it’s just been reported that more U.S. citizens than ever are studying the Arabic language, perhaps partly out of a sense of anticipating the need for similar negotiations.
If only the peace activists had been released, all unharmed and unaided by outside force,this would have demonstrated the importance of learning about these victims of society who some wrongly refer to as “enemies.”
This would teach future captives to learn about the terrorists as individuals– flip through their family albums,appreciate their sylish hesitance to wear white belt bombs after Labor Day,provide them a much needed opportunity to talk out some childhood issues, and discover the best brand body bag to retard seepage during long waits at security checkpoints.
The freed “abductees” would have spent the next several months as media darlings. But all that ended when British Special Forces stormed the building and rudely disrupted the Swords of Righteousness Brigade gathering. My guess is that the next SRB meeting will be able to be held in a phone booth.
Of course,the abduction or violent rescue wouldn’t have been necessary had Bush and Blair listened to the peace activists in the first place, right? And that question brings us to this.
Late add:
Here’s a press release by the Christian Peacemaker Teams. Read it and shake your head. They’re glad the hostages were “released” (your captors tend to lose their grip once they get a bullet through the head), and there is not a single mention in the lengthy statement of the British Special Forces troops who risked their lives to get these misguided people out alive. Not surprising.
Even later add:
As news concerning the rescue operation continues to flow in, Damien, in the comments section, says the following:
It was a joint coalition rescue. There was no shots to the head or Swords of Righteousness Brigade gathering. The hostages were alone when the rescue took place. Gratitude would be good except that all the family members seemed to think that the hostages had just been released by their captors. As in “let go willingly”.
The search and rescue operation, according to some accounts, took well over a dozen days, so how do we know that no shots were fired? Maybe not right at that moment, but there may have been some Swords of Righteousness Brigade charter members who inexplicably didn’t make it home for dinner on some given night. There could be a very good reason that the hostages were in the place alone.
That said, if the hostages families were told they were simply “released”,then we’ll eagerly await the “thank you” to those in the coalition who spent a couple of weeks tracking where the hostages were being held and risked their lives coming to get them. At the same time, we’ll also wait for credible evidence of the existence of the abominable snowman.
One would think that an organization that is sickened by the invasion of Iraq by foreign troops who are there illegally and killing innocent civilians would have, especially since they were apparent lyin the house by themselves, demanded to be left alone by the meanie occupiers.
