Remember back in August when the Islamic State raised its global profile by publicly beheading a serious of Western (mostly American) hostages captured in Syria? Remember how it came out, shortly after this grisly procession began, that the Obama Regime had a golden opportunity to rescue all of these hostages in June but held off for a few weeks so that he could have his "football-spiking" photo-op, complete with Rose Garden ceremony with smiling, grateful families, on Independence Day? And then, when Special Forces did move in, they found that the hostages had been long since moved, guaranteeing their eventual horrific demise?
For once, apparently, the White House kinda-sorta learned something from a past egregious and criminally negligent failure:
A U.S. journalist and a South African teacher held by al Qaeda militants in Yemen were killed during a rescue attempt by U.S. and Yemeni forces, senior officials said on Saturday.
U.S. Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel said al Qaeda militants killed Luke Somers, 33, and another hostage during the rescue operation.
Major General Ali al-Ahmadi, chief of the national security bureau in Yemen, said Somers was killed during the raid and other hostages held by the group had been taken to field hospitals, but gave no details about them or their condition.
Somers was removed from the scene but died later from a wound he suffered during the rescue attempt, a senior official in the Yemeni president’s office said.
Yemen’s Defence Ministry had earlier said that a military operation had succeeded in freeing a U.S. hostage as well as killing 10 members of the al Qaeda group holding him.
The operation involved an air strike followed by a raid by U.S. and Yemeni forces, a local security official said. It took place in the Wadi Abdan Al Daqqar region of Shabwa Province in southern Yemen and targeted an al Qaeda group headed by Mubarak al-Harad.
Hagel said the attempt to free the captives was justified. “There were compelling reasons to believe Mr. Somers’ life was in imminent danger,” Hagel said in Kabul.
On Thursday, the United States said it had made a failed attempt last month to rescue Somers who was kidnapped in Sanaa in September 2013.
The reason Mr. Somers' life was in imminent danger - he was going to be executed today - was probably because of the previous failed rescue attempt. Why this Regime waits until hostages are in imminent peril to try and rescue them - when one would think the jihadist captors would be an highest alert for any rescue attempt - is a part of the lesson they evidently have yet to learn.
However, the reason why they didn't get Mr. Somers out alive turned out to be plain, simple bad luck:
U.S. commandos got to within 100 yards of the walled compound where al-Qaida-linked militants were holding American hostage Luke Somers and South African Pierre Korkie when a noise — possibly a dog barking — may have alerted people inside of the raid, U.S. officials briefed on the failed operation said Saturday.
Then the shooting started, the Wall Street Journal says in an analysis of the operation.
After about a thirty minute battle with the AQAP terrorists, the Special Operations team of about forty fighters came out, still under fire and carrying the two badly wounded hostages, who medics were not able to save.
A bleeping dog barking. Luke Somers isn't coming home to his family, and they have to live with the reality that the proximate cause why is that a dog couldn't shut up at precisely the time quiet was essential. I bet they get cats from now on.
It makes me wonder if any of these particular AQAPers are/were Terminator fans - appropriate, since ten of them have now lived up to the name.
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