Resolution

[rowyn]

I was thinking, earlier today, about Nick Berg's death. As the news of his murder was first circulating, some of my LJ friends were pointing at things in the video, or in the events leading up to his death, that appeared inconsistent with the story presented in the video: that he'd been kidnapped and executed by Muslim terrorists while the videotape was rolling.

And I was wondering: did anything more ever come of that? Was a hypothesis advanced that explained the apparent inconsistencies? Were the concerns of armchair bloggers refuted by mainstream sources or official channels? Does anyone here know?

[Edit: Here's an example of the inconsistencies that were being discussed at the time.]

Comments

Re: Nothing was resolved

[garyamort.livejournal.com]

Oh, and most of the evidence seems to point to the idea that Berg was unfairly targetted by some people - I'm guessing freeper followers went a bit too far and then had to cover up for their stupidity. Unluckily for them, their covering up led to Berg's capture and subsequent execution.

So there seems to be lots of elements of a coverup because there WAS a coverup, it just wasn't a diabolical plot to kill Berg - except on the part of a few Muslim extremists. It's the simplist explanation to me.

Re: Nothing was resolved

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Do you think that the writing about Nick Berg's father on the website triggered the jihadists to capture and execute his son? It doesn't seem so to me.

I'd looked around at the time on various Free Republic threads that were linked to at the time of the release of the Nick Berg video, such as this one:
http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1133804/posts?q=1&&page=1

I note the references to his father's very active involvement in International A.N.S.W.E.R, but I am not seeing a cover up, nor evidence that the jihadists were even aware of this. However, knowing that Berg's father was on their side would not likely have overcome their revulsion for Nick Berg himself being a Bush supporter (in the unlikely event that they knew that much about him and his famous father).

The jihadists probably simply saw the Jewish name, Israeli stamp in the password, American citizenry, and had all the information they needed to pronounce death. Probably any one of those would have been enough.

But if you've got something else, I'd certainly like to see it.

===|==============/ Level Head

Technocolor!

[garyamort.livejournal.com]

Do you think that the writing about Nick Berg's father on the website triggered the jihadists to capture and execute his son? It doesn't seem so to me.

No, I don't subscribe to a black/white, right/wrong, good/evil view of the world.

There are lots of groups with their different motivations.

And in the Nick Berg case I see what looks to be six different groups that could potentially be interacting.

First off, you have Berg himself. Who, if we take everything said at face value, was an opportunist looking to profit off the Iraq war. No shame in that. So he's poking around, without official dispensation, and annoying folks.

Secondly, we have the Freepers who were engaged in an active campaign of smearing people who oppose the war - and who listed his lastname and business on their website.

Thirdly, we have the American military who may have had him detained. The most likely scenario here is one of them reads the Freepers website, puts 2 and 2 together and get's 5. Not some big plot at high levels of goverment, just some low level guy who decides to play with fire with other peoples lives.

Fourthly, we have the Iraqi police who are let loose on this guy. They know he is an American, they know he is jewish, and here they are handed an opportunity to extract some payback.

Fifthly, along comes the state department, getting reports of an abducted American and a family who are rapidly approaching big conspiracy theories. They work through the issues, first they have no idea where he is, than they find him, than he was arrested by american soldiers, than it turns into Iraqi police. Lots of confusion. But they apply some leverage and get him sprung.

So, back to the first group, Nick Berg himself. Sprung from prison, suspecting American soldiers - probably justifiably - and the state department has the bright idea of asking the military to escort him out. He refuses the escort and determines to make his own way out.

Enter the last party, the thugs who kidnapped and killed him. Maybe they got the information that an American who seemed important(after all, the State department pressured the police to release him) from the Iraqi police. Maybe Berg happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and they just happened across him. I dunno.

Continue the story from there.

Now, each party is going to be covering something up. His family(who are also his business partners) is covering up just precisely what he was doing in Iraq. The military is going to cover up that some thug working for them is responsible for him being arrested. The freepers don't want to be associated with it and will point out that they never mentioned Nick directly, just his father and his business. The Iraqi police will cover up their treatment of Mr. Berg. And the guy in the police who fingered him to the thugs, if such happened, will cover that up. Oh, and people from the middle east in general are going to adopt the natural position of "it wasn't someone like me" and so add fuel to the conspiracy flame.

So everyone is covering up something, no one in the goverment wants to dig too deeply, so it looks like some massive conspiracy when in fact it is just a bunch of pathetic little conspiracy's.

That is my working hypothesis. No hero's, just lots of small bit villians.

Re: Technocolor!

[level-head.livejournal.com]

I understand what you're saying -- but I do not see the cover up happening at the "Freeper" site you mentioned. I'd expect that opponents of that site would be delighted to post that a thread was removed, and I've seen no evidence of this.

Your last point I would certainly concur with -- Berg was in the wrong place at the wrong time. An unescorted American Jew wandering the streets of Iraq on his own -- particularly the city he went into -- is a tragedy waiting to happen.

Here is a timeline, turned up by Google just now and with links that largely still work.

Nick Berg's father still insists that he was held by the US. An aquaintence says he was told that by Nick Berg himself. But the email that the family received from Nick, supposedly saying this, they will not release. Curious.

I'm inclined to think he was detained for being a lone civilian American trying to get into a troubled Iraqi city under peculiar circumstances.

But the "enemies list" -- the list of people on the side of the terrorists -- would hardly condemn Nick Berg. If anything, it would encourage the terrorists to treat him well.

Conspiracies are fun, though. ];-)

===|==============/ Level Head

Re: Technocolor!

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Whoops: Missed the timeline:

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread49809/pg1

===|==============/ Level Head

Re: Nothing was resolved

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Looking around, I found that hundreds of references to the "right wing enemies list" were in fact ultimately pointed at this:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1092851/posts

It is, instead, a list of signers to a petition for International A.N.S.W.E.R. regarding a then-upcoming anti-war protest. In other words, rather than being gathered by "right wing" forces, these were people and companies who voluntarily added their names.

Perhaps not all of them realized that the organziation explicity supports the Iraqi insurgents, and calls for the failure of the US military there. But in any event, the list has been misportrayed. And the list does indeed show the name of the company Nick Berg's father had at his home -- and that the father was an officer of.

I suspect that the son would be annoyed, but I do not know what their arrangements were.

If the appearance of the name on this list got Nick Berg killed, it should be noted that the name was put there by his own father.

===|==============/ Level Head

Re: Nothing was resolved

[garyamort.livejournal.com]

I respectfully disagree with your premes(plural of premis?) and your conclusion.

Oh, and for future reference, it's just Gary. I'm too boring for cool nicknames, so my LJ handle is simply my name.

Re: Nothing was resolved

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Which premise? Which conclusion?

===|==============/ Level Head

Which one? All of them. :-)

[garyamort.livejournal.com]

Seriously though, just about everything in your post I disagree with your view of.

I know, it's a bit rude not to go into details. But the subject has drifted off the main topic(did anything get resolved regarding Nick Berg) and since this is in someone else's 'house' so to speak, I think it would be kind of rude to fill up her semi-private journal with debate over the side issues.

Re: Which one? All of them. :-)

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Perhaps it can be said that such resolution (of the Nick Berg video questions) was reached with by dint of the same scene being repeated by a far-too-large number of performances by the same actors upon other hapless hostages.

And without FreeRepublic comments on their fathers, even. ];-)

===|==============/ Level Head