Canadian Hostage Rescue

They were told not to go, but they went anyway. They were members of an organization called Christian Peacemaker Teams, and they went to Iraq to "investigate and document crimes against the Iraqi people". Crimes supposedly perpetrated by the American military. So they shunned the military, and waded into the heart of a war zone with no protection. After all, they had God on their side.

But God wasn't on their side on the morning of November 26. As four of them walked down a Baghdad street, a car suddenly pulled up beside them, and hooded Iraqis with assault rifles forced them into the car. Kidnapped at gunpoint by the very people they were trying to help.

The four abductees included an American, a Brit, and two Canadians. And since two of those kidnapped were Canadians, the Canadian government, usually known for its general apathy and incompetence in these situations, sprang into action in an unprecedented way. Within days, Canadian soldiers were in Baghdad, accompanied by a large team of diplomats, RCMP, and CSIS intelligence officers. And just as they were settling in, a group called The Swords Of Righteousness claimed credit for the kidnappings, and said the four hostages would be killed unless all Iraqi prisoners were released by December 8.

Since there was no way of meeting that demand, the only option was to search for the hostages, and rescue them. A combined task force of Americans, Brits and Canadians formulated a rescue plan, and the hunt for the hostages began. But when December 8 arrived they were still hunting, and the captors announced they would extend the deadline to December 10. The soldiers kept hunting, and December 10 came and went.

With the ominous silence of the captors hanging in the air like a black fog, the hunt for the hostages continued for the next three long months, with no luck. Then a video appears showing three of the hostages still alive and well. The American, 54 year old Tom Fox, was missing. His fate was discovered two days later, when his body was found in a Baghdad gutter. He had been tortured and shot several times. Murdered by the very souls he was attempting to advocate for, presumedly because of his nationality. It is not a good time to be an American.

Efforts to find the remaining hostages were redoubled. Unfortunately they were very small needles in a very large haystack. But then, on the evening of Wednesday, March 22, an insurgent connected to the kidnappers was captured. What they did to him to make him talk will never be known, but sometime in the middle of the night he broke, and revealed the location of the hostages.

Unmanned spy planes with infrared sensors were immediately dispatched to the Baghdad neighbourhood where the hostages were being held. After a thorough aerial reconnaissance, the rescue team set out. The team consisted of 50 soldiers. Leading the way was the British commando unit, Task Force Black. They were accompanied by U.S. Special Forces, and Canada's elite fighters, JTF2 (Joint Task Force Two).

A scant three hours after learning the location, the rescue team arrived at the house where the hostages were being held. They arrived in a convoy of cars disguised as taxis, but apparently the captors were not fooled, and had left the area. The house containing the hostages was swarmed by soldiers, who found them bound, but alive and well in a ground floor room. The entire rescue operation took all of two minutes.

Rescued were 74 year old British citizen Norman Kember, and Canadians James Loney, 41, and Harmeet Sooden, 32. Rescued from torture and death by the very soldiers they had slandered and shunned.

Fortunately, the rescue was completed without a shot being fired. But what if it had turned ugly? What if some of the rescuers had been killed? These naive activists may be willing to throw away their own lives, but when they inevitably run into trouble, suddenly there are other lives at risk. Is that right?

Skiers that are told not to ski out of bounds and do anyway, and get into trouble, are sometimes made to pay back the costs of their rescue. When activists are told not to go to a war zone and go anyway, and get into trouble, should they be made to pay back the costs of their rescue? And if people are killed trying to rescue them, how would they pay that back?

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