Terrorists Threaten Toy!

‘Member how Thomas Sowell warned us a while back against thinking of the terrorists in Iraq as an enemy with unlimited resources?

Well, it seems this enemy is reaching its limits. Consider the following press roundup:

(CNN) — A photograph posted on an Islamist Web site appears to be that
of an action figure and not a U.S. soldier being held hostage [as CNN first reported].

Liam Cusack, the marketing coordinator for Dragon Models USA, said the
figure pictured on the Web site is believed to be "Special Ops Cody," a
military action figure the company manufactured in late 2003.

"It pretty much looks exactly like the same person," he said.

On the Islamist Web site, a group calling itself the Al Mujahedeen
Brigade, posted a photograph of a man it claimed was a captured U.S.
soldier named John Adam, and it threatened to behead him if Iraqi
prisoners are not released by U.S. forces.

Staff Sgt. Nick
Minecci of the U.S. military’s press office in Baghdad told The
Associated Press that "no units have reported anyone missing."

The
photograph showed the figure against a black flag with white lettering
reading, "God is great, there is no god but Allah." A U.S. military
assault rifle was pointed at its head. It appears that "rifle" was part
of the plastic weaponry that came with the action figure.

The photograph immediately raised questions.

CNN military analyst James Marks, a retired Army general, questioned its authenticity.

He
told CNN in a phone interview that the flak jacket in the picture had a
kind of trim along the edges that he’d never seen before, and that the
open-legged pants, as opposed to gathered hems, struck him as odd.

He also questioned what appeared to be camouflage paint on the face.

"We have not used camo paint with conventional forces serving in Iraq," Marks said.

(Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
In the days immediately following Iraq’s historic election, two
videotapes from "insurgent" groups were distributed to the news media.
One purported to show an American soldier being held hostage. The
second purported to show that a British C-130 transport aircraft, which
crashed on election day, had been shot down by a surface-to-air missile.

The "American soldier" was Cody, a G.I. Joe action figure. This is
obvious from the picture, but The Associated Press and CNN bit hard.

The cause of the C-130 crash is still being investigated. But experts
at Jane’s Defence Weekly have doubts about the claim of "insurgents."

"The missile footage has just been grafted onto the front," said editor
Peter Felstead. "And it looks like a surface-to-surface missile to me."

The terrorists had to do something to revive their plummeting prestige.
That they resorted to clumsy frauds is not a sign of strength.

"The captured toy story could be pretty significant," said the Web
logger John Hinderaker (Power Line). "The terrorists need, more than
anything else, to be seen as awesome, terrible figures. If they stop
inspiring fear, they are finished. So the one thing they cannot stand
is ridicule. … Their pathetic effort to pass a doll off as a captured
American soldier will [make] them laughingstocks throughout the Arab
world."

It’s also interesting that the terrorists turned to the news media to
recover lost momentum. Journalists who fell for these hoaxes may merely
be idiots, and their silence about the implications of the hoaxes may
simply be the by product of embarrassment. But the Web logger Shannon
Love (Chicago Boyz) wonders:

"Why were the major media so quick to disseminate pictures of an action
figure as a genuine hostage photo?" More to the point, why are major
media so quick to disseminate anything that a terrorist group, or
purported terrorist group, releases? … For the terrorist, it is like
being given millions of dollars in free advertising."

The major media have from the beginning exaggerated the strength and
popularity of those they mislabel "insurgents," to the disgust of
American soldiers.

(DAILY PLANET) Metropolis pundit Buzz Loudly said, "This is great! The terrorists have made a fatal move! The more people mock them over kidnapping a toy, the more they lose reputation! It’s patriotic to give the terrorists a vicious mocking!"

While much of the world scoffed at the terrorists’ attempts to cow America into submission by threatening a toy, Toy Americans were outraged.

"I can’t believe how callous the rest of my fellow Americans are toward this event," said G.I. JOE First Seargent Conrad S. Hauser (a.k.a. "Duke"). "I mean, if an American of any other extraction was being held hostage and threatened–with his own weapons, no less!–the public would be incensed. Yet because he is a Toy American, it’s as if nobody cares! What, just because you’re made of polyethyline, you don’t count?"

"This will not stand," Duke declared defiantly. "G.I. JOE is a team, and we operate with a strict no-toy-left-behind policy." He indicated that he would be leading the Wave 1 Valor vs. Venom 2-Pack Assortment on a special ops rescue mission to save Cody "at a time of our choosing."

Also rumored to be in on the mission was Johnny Longtorso (a.k.a. "The Man Who Comes In Pieces"), a Deep 13 action figure capable of being disassembled into his component parts and reassembled again without injury. "That ability could be crucial on a mission like this," said Chad Slabbody of Janes Defense Weekly. "It could enable Special Operative Longtorso to get into all kinds of places a regular action figure couldn’t go. The success of the mission might hinge on such abilities just as much as it might hinge on the famous G.I. JOE Kung Fu Grip."

After seeing their success in sowing division in American society by turning Toy Americans against regular Americans, the terrorists broadened the scope of thei toynapping operating, seizing a civilian Pee Wee Herman toy and HOLDING HIM FOR RANSOM ON E-BAY.

No rescue mission for the toy Pee Wee Herman is planned at this time.