The enemy within

I got to wondering the other day whatever happened to the jarhead over there on the left.

Yep, Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun; missing from his unit in Iraq back in mid-2004 and was later seen in a video tape portrayed as a hostage, has now been a deserter for more than a year.

After Hassoun turned up at the U.S. embassy in Beirut Lebanon, with no explanation about how he effected his escape; a native of Lebanon, he still has relatives there.

The video tape was determined by military investigators to be a ruse and Hassoun was returned to the U.S. where he was eventually to face an Article 32 hearing which could result in a court martial on charges of desertion and theft of his 9mm military sidearm. The desertion count carries a five-year maximum prison sentence and the other counts carry 10-year maximums. If convicted, Hassoun also could be dishonorably discharged and ordered to forfeit his pay and allowances

He was last seen in, of all places, West Jordan, Utah. 

Army Pfc. Lynndie England, of Abu Ghraib fame was sentenced to three years behind bars and a dishonorable discharge for holding a dog leash. If Hassoun is eventually captured, any guesses on his punishment?

Hasan Akbar, the former Army sergeant from Fort Bragg, N.C., convicted of two counts of premeditated murder and three counts of attempted premeditated murder of 16 U.S. soldiers in Kuwait has been on death row since May 2005.

And this rustles up the obvious question about Muslim infiltration within the U.S. military.

From the Washington Post (surprisingly): "Just after the 1991 Persian Gulf War against Iraq, huge tents were erected in Saudi Arabia near the barracks of U.S. military personnel. Inside, day and night, Saudi imams sent by their government lectured the GIs about Islam and made aggressive pitches to convert them. Saudi officials had promised that the discussions would touch only on Arab culture. But within months, about 1,000 soldiers, and perhaps as many as 3,000, converted to Islam -- the largest surge of Muslims ever into the U.S. armed forces."

"'It was quite aggressive,' said David Peterson, then the military's top chaplain in the region. In retrospect, he said, there was reason for concern that foreign clerics had gained influence over the troops, but military officials were slow to grasp the implications, he said. Twelve years later, with three Muslim employees at the Guantanamo Bay prison accused of security breaches, some U.S. military officials are again wondering whether they have been inattentive to outside influences on the small community of Muslims in the armed forces.

"But even asking that question is a delicate matter for an institution that has long embraced tolerance of all faiths."

Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch on a similar angle in the in the Washington Times.

This is a war on all fronts, from cyber-space to propaganda to spies and turncoats; the sooner we realize that as a nation the better off we'll be.

Comments

[Belstaff store]

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[moncler netherland]

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[bigwhitehat]

Nothing about the 82nd airborn?