Last American soldier comes home from Iraq war
Lucky and Patrick send links to the story about Army Staff Sgt. Ahmed Altaie, the last American MIA in Iraq. We wrote about him last month briefly. His family in the US tells McClatchy that he has been confirmed as KIA and his remains are in the US.
At about 1 a.m. Sunday, U.S. officers knocked on the door of the family home in Ann Arbor, Mich., with news that Army Staff Sgt. Ahmed Altaie was confirmed dead, though they had no details yet on how or when he died….
The Army Times has the details of his capture and the struggle to get him released;
Altaie’s in-laws say he often met secretly with his wife at her family’s home despite warnings that he was in danger of being kidnapped.
It was during one of those visits that Altaie disappeared. Masked gunmen hiding in an abandoned Saddam-era army building seized him as he went to find his wife at her uncle’s house, less than two blocks away in the Karradah.
“A neighbor saw the gunmen and went to my family and informed them. My parents, brothers and sisters all came at once and pleaded with them to let him go,” Altaie’s sister-in-law Shaimaa Abdul-Sattar, who witnessed the abduction, told the AP during an interview in 2010 at her Baghdad apartment.
Qanbar, Altaie’s uncle, denied during a previous interview that any ransom demand had been made, but he described for the AP a web of negotiations with a number of intermediaries as he continued to pursue leads through the years. Altaie was last seen four months after his abduction in a video posted on the Internet by a Shiite militant faction called Ahl al-Bayt Brigades.
OK, so now, all Americans are home from that war.
Category: Terror War
Sorry but that is not the last one …
There is still the remains of a pilot : Maj. Troy Gilbert, left somewhere over there.
http://www.wfaa.com/news/local/family-seeks-pilots-body-left-in-Iraq-138817449.html
Welcome home SSG Altaie, RIP. Idk about you guys, but I plan on sometime going to visit section 61 (I think thats the right one) at Arlington, the Iraq and Afghanistan section to visit friends that rest there
@2 – If I remember correctly, Section 60 is where most of our Brothers and Sisters from GWOT lie.
Well worth the trip, but it’s a bit of a hump to get there from the entrance, unless I just took the scenic route…
Welcome back SSG Altaie, RIP…
Thats the one, thanks CI! And, I don’t mind a long walk, leaves time for silence and circumspection. The brother of one of my friends is buried right near the start of that section, a brand new 2nd LT, hit by a Sniper in Iraq during the surge. Theres too many IMHO
OIF hits a chord with me, because I was a DEP, Drilling with the unit before leaving for Basic in 2003, and throughout the year before that, I got to know the unit, helped them pack for the trip to Kuwait for round 1, and watched them leave. The 1SG was killed my first day of Basic Training, one of my best friends took a 9mm bullet to his brain stem (its still there, he is very paralyzed), another lost the use of his hand and was next to Top when he went down, and another died suddenly after a Drill in 2005, heart exploded. I didn’t get to go until the final rotation of OIF (got sent to OEF first), but its still Idk even how to describe that country accept that I fucking hate it with pretty much all I have.
The last American? Really?
None of the State Department’s security contractors count as “Americans”?
Last American soldier…is that better?
Eagle Keeper: the meaning was pretty damn clear from the context originally.
Sheesh – I guess some people would argue about which particular shade if you told them the sky was blue.
Oh, and Eagle Keeper: those security contractors are their by choice. Last time I checked, Soldiers/Sailors/Airmen/Marines didn’t generally get to say “no” to a deployment.
And there is no SOFA for those contractors, if they fuck up, they face the Iraqi “Justice” System
@11 – Yep. I’m getting ready to head over. We have to have a VISA and our tourist passport. My job requires deployments, but I’m not terribly jazzed about being over there in that status.
CI, I almost went as a PSS for State, last minute medical issue was the only thing preventing me from going.
Lucky, sounds like the issue just might have worked out in your favor.
Theres a reason its my screen name here lol
What, you’re not one of the lead characters from the DBS cartoon who’s “slumming” here? (smile)
Hahaha I plead the 5th…….
CI: In that status, while it might be costly you have an option not available to those in uniform. You can always quit and go home without having to stop in jail en route.
That said, best of luck. Be careful out there.
Watch your 6 CI, get me your address and I will shoot care packages your way from my VFW
@Hondo, Lucky…thanks, true I can always quit, but that’s not in my nature. So, though I’m not going over as a shooter this time, you better believe I’m going to make fast friends with State’s PSD!
Not a problem, and like I said, TSO and Jonn have my email, drop me the address via them, and I will shoot out a couple care packages through the VFW program
CI: You’re nuttier than a squirrel turd going over there armed only with your love gun.
Good luck and keep your six clear!
John L. @ 8:
Thanks John. I know you didn’t mean anything “nefariously nuanced,” but it’s like Rush says: Words mean things. And with issues (such as the Iraq War) in which people passionately hold opposing views, I think it’s important to try to communicate as clearly as possible.
Peace.
Hondo (10): … those security contractors are their by choice. Last time I checked, Soldiers/Sailors/Airmen/Marines didn’t generally get to say “no” to a deployment.
EK: Which is precisely my point: Speaking with necessary precision.
To say “last American” could possibly be construed such that those who do have that option are somehow something other than American.
I’m happy with John’s edit to “American soldier.” I’d be happy with that even if he were a Marine or USAF pilot. It communicates the point better.
GI=Government Issue, that means Mud Cruncher, Dog Face, Doguhboy, SOLDIER, kinda hard to misconstrue EagleKeeper unless you know not of what you speak……. Listen to the message and cut the semantics crap.
Eagle Keeper: the context was clear. You’re proving my point about some people arguing that the sky is not blue, but is azure instead.
Further: your whole argument here is based on an invalid assumption. Barring a formal break in diplomatic relations, the last American virtually NEVER leaves – due to something called an Embassy, I think. It generally has at least a few US citizens assigned.
And even breaks in diplomatic relations don’t always result in all US citizens leaving. Diplomatic relations often are reestablished. And even without diplomatic relations, often US citizens remain or are sent. A fair number of US citizens have gone to Iran since the hostage crisis.
Above was mine. Forgot to add ID info.
CI,
Good Lord! Iraq is getting more hinky by the day. Keep yer head on a swivel, and good luck.
Lucky and Hondo,
Yes, the context was quite clear. I was only addressing the headline, “Last American comes home from Iraq war.”
And the reason that I keyed on it was only because of what I’ve heard (peripherally — I don’t know the actual headcount) of how many State Dept. security contractors/trainers will still be stationed/assigned/left. It’s almost like the war ain’t really over. (I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if we had troops back in Iraq in a year or two.)
An undeclared war with an undeclared end (due to an undeclared definition of victory).
That’s my perspective, and what went through my mind when I saw the headline.
I don’t owe you an explanation, and you don’t care to get one.
But I gave you one anyways.
(So then, maybe the only thing worse than me takling the time to offer a critique of the headline is you guys taking the time to give me shit for it.) 🙄
Incidentally, I noticed no one commented on Suka’s comment @ 1.
Did anyone read the piece? heartbreaking. “There’s no search for Troy Gilbert because he is listed as killed in action, ‘body accounted for.'”
But he isn’t.
So maybe Altaie isn’t the last American soldier left.
Only the last one the feddle gummint wants to acknowledge.
He is significant because he was listed as CAPTURED not MIA, and the other one was accounted for as you said so yeahhhhh, go back to your Oath Keeper buddies and don’t go away mad, just go away