Jill Carroll Heading Home

She's already landed at Ramstein AFB in Germany, after a short stay in Baghdad's Green Zone. Her next stop will be Boston to be reunited with her family and friends in what I can only imagine will be an emotional and joyous homecoming.

More information is slowly coming out about Carroll's release and that she was forced to make anti-American statements in those videos as a condition of her release. If your choice was either an agonizing death or possible release after making those tapes.

Debbie Schussel misses the point. Those terrorist-appeasing groups she speaks of are elated not necessarily for her release, but the propaganda value of her statements made under duress. To them, it doesn't matter that Carroll was coerced or not; it only matters that she made anti-American statements that further their own agenda.

As for Schussel's statement:

The answer is quite obvious. Jill Carroll's extremist buddies tell us everything we need to know about her.

I think she couldn't be more hopelessly wrong. The terrorists, their useful idiots, and terrorist apologists know good propaganda when they see it and wouldn't look the gift-horse in the mouth. They're simply paying lip service for their purported happiness that Carroll was released. Other hostages who were released or rescued didn't get this kind of treatment from these groups because they didn't have propaganda value.

This is an information war being fought, and Carroll was an instrument in the terrorists campaign. It was successful as the US now has to deal with the fallout from her coerced statements.

It isn't hard to understand why Carroll made those tapes. She was coerced. The problem isn't Jill Carroll, but the coerced propaganda coup that will make things more difficult for the US, Iraqis, and coalition forces. I also fear that this will make things more difficult for journalists operating in Iraq who are not necessarily embedded with coalition forces.

I figure that we'll get to hear more about her ordeal in the coming weeks, which should help shed light on what had happened.

Others blogging: Dr. Sanity, Meryl Yourish, The Moderate Voice, Captain's Quarters, Don Surber, Gina Cobb, The Counterterrorism Blog, and All Things Beautiful.

Technorati: jill carroll, hostage, kidnapping.