Afghan Insurgents Cross-Dress To Escape U.S. Marines

CNN:

(CNN) -- Insurgents locked in a standoff with U.S. Marines tricked them by dressing up as women to escape, a task force spokesman said Monday.

Women and children had been caught in the standoff between the armed groups, but some of the women were not what they seemed, according to task force spokesman Capt. William Pelletier.

Read the whole story: CNN

Comments

[LabRat]

What, they haven't been doing it all along?

Garments that cover the the entire body and leave room for carrying all kinds of weapons/whatever underneath? That would be my first disguise.

[jsgaetano]

And not only that, but "culturally" they get offended if you in any way want proof that it is indeed a woman there.

Yeah, culturally, right. That's why Muhammad never required the burqa, but the fundies do.

[BushBites]

Yeah, don't believe that Muslim Honor crap.

They're just as slippery as anybody else.

Maybe more so.

[charlespointer]

They do use it a lot. It's just that it's not as common in Iraq where most of our troops have been. It's used in Afghanistan quite a bit.

[KLordsha]

Time to start pulling skirts...

[purplewave]

Here we go again........another clusterf**k in the making. These guys keep breaking the rules!

[plaidsportcoat]

This amounts to using women and children as human shields, since they KNOW the enemy - especially if not Muslim - may just end up shooting everyone to make sure they get the actual armed men.
Also - isn't this the oldest trick in the book? If you can see through clothes on innocent people in an airport why can't you make burqua-peek technology??

[whiteconch]

I agree with plaidsport. Unfortunately, now they may use this as even more justification to randomly shoot innocent women hidden under burkas. It's all BS. War is in-effective in getting the real 'enemy'..
only more civilian casualities that they can hope to justify. Sickening. With all the technology we have, why can't they take their time to use it to detect who is exactly under the burka. Too much impulsive random shootings. Sickening.

[eternalkerri]

Hey, i can get back in the military as a cross-dressing secret agent!!

[barackobama4prez]

Diabolical.

[RACVC]

Surprise surprise.
Of course if you are completely covered - head to toe - with only your eye slits exposed you can get away with anything.

[marco01]

They could be completely naked under there.

[smchp]

Really, what can you do. If you make the women take off their head dress you pi$$ off the locals.

Tough situation. Only thing they can do is get the non-militant locals to trust and support them.

[eternalkerri]

have them get searched by female soldiers in a private setting

[Feanor]

Or simply interrogate them in a public setting.

How many men can convincingly imitate a woman's voice? Not many.

[charlespointer]

That's used in Iraq, but in the case of large manuever operations that would mean putting a female soldier in every 8-12 man squad. I don't even think the Marine Corps has enough women to cover the amount conducting that operation in Afghanistan, let alone the entire area. Also think of this situation with the insurgents, GI Joe and Jane move forward to search the women and both get shot while trying to respect cultural sensitivities...

Come to think of it, it might make a lot of sense to embed female Marines in every squad. But you'd have to change military regulations about having women in combat arms units. Also carrying 80+ pounds of gear in a line company will probably lead to more than a few dead female Marines, as I've seen 5 young, athletic male Marines drop dead of heat stroke.

[jsgaetano]

Muhammad never required women to wear burqas.

[charlespointer]

I think if I were a woman in Muhammed's time, I would wear a burka outside, with the Arabian weather and lack of law enforcement outside of what my husband and brothers could muster. Not to mention that Muhammed himself was a pretty darn violent and rapacious man.

Do American muslim women need to wear Burkas in 2009? No.