The Asset - Another Iraqi Hero In Need

Posted By Blackfive

RE: Trying to Kill Heroes

Below is a story that took four months of investigative work.  It's about an Iraqi that is American at heart:

The Undercover Iraqi Asset
An Iraqi double agent killed for America. But when he got left behind, a Marine stepped in
By Diana Ljungaeus, Frank Megna
published: May 21, 2009

Faris Al-Baghdadi sits like a contented prince under a date palm in the sunny courtyard of his father’s home, which he calls the House of Books, and where he learned to love Western culture. He watches his infant son wobble to his feet. The boy grins at his mother, who kneels nearby. An instant later, the peace is broken by the sound of Metallica.

Al-Baghdadi awakes with a gasp, rolls over and turns off the alarm. The joy of that distant afternoon at the House of Books has vanished. In its place he finds a motel room and a deep, desperate sense of loss. His baby son, Medhi, died in a massive bombing many years ago. His wife, daughter and second son live 6,000 miles away. And Al-Baghdadi, once a valuable asset to American forces in Iraq, asks himself if he’s a hero — or a fool.

<...>

Among all the Iraqis who aided American forces, few proved to be more valuable and fewer still risked as much as Faris Al-Baghdadi (his name has been changed by L.A. Weekly).

<...>

But Al-Baghdadi suddenly lost his cover in 2005, when the U.S. pulled his funding and support. Two enemy assassination squads tried to kill Al-Baghdadi, military officials tell the Weekly, yet U.S. officials failed to cut through the red tape to help him flee Iraq, and refused him and his family the refuge of a permanent home in America.

It was his U.S. Marine comrades, acting entirely “on a volunteer basis,” who aided him, through a harrowing and dangerous escape from Iraq...

Read the whole story here at LA Weekly.

Update: According to a source, "Recently, The Asset learned that he is losing his teaching contract at Camp Pendleton in August, leaving him faced with no income, with his Iraqi wife and kids back in Sweden, and him without a country..."

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The Asset - Another Iraqi Hero In Need

RE: Trying to Kill Heroes

Below is a story that took four months of investigative work.  It's about an Iraqi that is American at heart:

The Undercover Iraqi Asset
An Iraqi double agent killed for America. But when he got left behind, a Marine stepped in
By Diana Ljungaeus, Frank Megna
published: May 21, 2009

Faris Al-Baghdadi sits like a contented prince under a date palm in the sunny courtyard of his father’s home, which he calls the House of Books, and where he learned to love Western culture. He watches his infant son wobble to his feet. The boy grins at his mother, who kneels nearby. An instant later, the peace is broken by the sound of Metallica.

Al-Baghdadi awakes with a gasp, rolls over and turns off the alarm. The joy of that distant afternoon at the House of Books has vanished. In its place he finds a motel room and a deep, desperate sense of loss. His baby son, Medhi, died in a massive bombing many years ago. His wife, daughter and second son live 6,000 miles away. And Al-Baghdadi, once a valuable asset to American forces in Iraq, asks himself if he’s a hero — or a fool.

<...>

Among all the Iraqis who aided American forces, few proved to be more valuable and fewer still risked as much as Faris Al-Baghdadi (his name has been changed by L.A. Weekly).

<...>

But Al-Baghdadi suddenly lost his cover in 2005, when the U.S. pulled his funding and support. Two enemy assassination squads tried to kill Al-Baghdadi, military officials tell the Weekly, yet U.S. officials failed to cut through the red tape to help him flee Iraq, and refused him and his family the refuge of a permanent home in America.

It was his U.S. Marine comrades, acting entirely “on a volunteer basis,” who aided him, through a harrowing and dangerous escape from Iraq...

Read the whole story here at LA Weekly.

Update: According to a source, "Recently, The Asset learned that he is losing his teaching contract at Camp Pendleton in August, leaving him faced with no income, with his Iraqi wife and kids back in Sweden, and him without a country..."

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