The Irony Party of Australia
Encephalatronicalogical Pamphlet
16th February 2006
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Cheney Outgunned by Iraqi Quail Hunter
US VP Dick Cheney: shot friend
While US Vice-President Dick Cheney is being praised for the quick thinking and finely-honed reflexes that automatically swung into play during an emergency at a recent quail hunt, elsewhere in the world the Veep's gun-slinging exploits have been pushed from television screens and web by reports on the adventures of pin-up crack shot insurgent sniper Juba, a quasi-mythical quail hunter thought to be responsible for capturing at least four dozen brace of exotic game in recent years in Iraq.
Out hunting game birds in Texas last weekend intrepid Vice President Cheney was disturbed by a sound behind him, and in a split second turned and competently shot approaching 78-year-old lawyer and hunting companion Harry Whittingdon in the face. Whittingdon was reportedly briefly released from intensive care after being treated for bird-shot, but then suffered a heart attack when one pellet shifted to a position near his heart.
The self-deprecating US President Dick Cheney does not often feel the need to parade his accomplishments before the chattering classes. The notoriously shy Vice-President was in this instance modest almost to a fault. For twenty hours after the expert shooting, Cheney deigned to advise police of the incident. Last night in a reluctant interview on the Bush Administration friendly Fox network the Veep said he had had no public relations personnel with him on the hunt. White House advised him at the time to tell not only the police but also the media. Instead, Cheney, still unwilling to step into the public spotlight, released the story to a local paper after forty-eight hours. It was left to the owner of the ranch on which the shooting took place to talk to media curious about the Vice President's superb close-range marksmanship.
The world has been entertained in recent days by the stylings of satirists and American talk-show hosts who have explored at length the dangerous but potent new power.(the best of which comes from the United States' single Redeeming Feature, The Daily Show ) The prospect of a political leader also able to take up sophisticated weaponry and hold his/her own against a sea of deadly adversaries was a powerful motivator in the election of former Hollywood high-adrenaline performer Arnold Schwarzenegger as Governor of California. But now the Home Guard is being abandoned by strategists confident Cheney will single-handedly defend the US mainland with his trusty large-bore shot-gun, at least until his ailing heart or Bush's ailing Presidency gives out, whichever comes first.
But hopes the display of brutal short-range shooting virtuosity could give pause to some of those thinking of taking on the United States as part of a programme of the reform of the geo-political status quo may be premature. A new video release from the loosely co-ordinated insurgency opposing the occupation of Iraq entitled The Sniper of Iraq features a weapon handler of unsurpassed skill capable not only of peppering friends nearby and winging the occasional flustered bird, but also equal to the task of silently killing heavily armed adversaries at a range of up to a kilometre-and-a-half.
The Sniper of Iraq
The crack-shot Cheney may have found his equal in the form of Juba, an insurgent sniper whose deadly efficacy is fast becoming the stuff of legend in a world hungry for new champions. While Cheney's street credibility and reputation in hunting circles is significantly enhanced after he gunned down his ageing companion, the Sniper of Iraq has developed an even more fearsome reputation in the hunt, reportedly taking several dozen brace of Marines and associated Coalition military personnel in hunting expeditions of the past two years.
Juba, a name reportedly given the enigmatic insurgent gunman by US military personnel who have come to respect and fear the silent killer, is the central subject of the short film The Sniper of Iraq, which forms part of a longer instructional and motivational package designed to assist the budding anti-American militant.
In the video, available even in the English-speaking regions of the Internet, a figure with face obscured previews footage that appears to have been shot in Iraq, where conflict between the invading Coalition comprised of the United States and tributary nations and local warriors resentful of the intrustion is nearly three years old:
"I have nine bullets in this gun and I have a present for George Bush, I am going to kill nine people. I am doing this for the viewers to watch. God is great. God is great."
What follows is footage taken from what appears to be a gun-mounted camera of a series of expert shootings demonstrating the skill of the Baghdad sniper, cut together in order to present a montage of illustrations of the insurgency's capability. In each instance a shot is heard, the camera jerks in recoil, a and a distant helmeted, khaki-clad figure slumps out of shot.
Sydney Morning Herald journalist Paul McGeogh appeared on Lateline last night to discuss the video and his article yesterday on Juba and insurgent propaganda for the morning paper with host Tony Jones. McGeogh, recently returned from Iraq, obtained his copy of the freely available instructional film from local sources in Baghdad, and brought it back for exposure to the Australian public. After reading some of the wealth of material online concerning the mysterious insurgent warrior the newpaper journalist learned the film's protagonist, the Sniper of Iraq, may or may not be the quasi-mythical 'Juba' of international repute.
A melodramatic article in The Guardian provides a succinct description of the already legendary qualities of the sniper.
'They have never seen Juba. They hear him, but by then it's too late: a shot rings out and another US soldier slumps dead or wounded.'
The most commonly heard piece of mythology about the unseen sniper is that he never shoots from the same location twice, instead slipping away immediately he has given away his position. Every time Juba kills, the legend tells, when Coalition forces do locate the hunter's blind they invariably find, firstly, a single bullet casing left behind by their adversary and secondly a note, written in Arabic, that says, translated: "What has been taken in blood cannot be regained except by blood. from wiki entry on Juba
As to the Herculean deeds that flesh out the romantic mythology now associated with the twenty-first century folk-hero, in conversation with Jones on Lateline Paul McGeough related the classic sniper tale from the Battle of Fallujah of late 2004, written up by Dexter Filkins for the New York Times:
American marines called in two airstrikes on the pair of dingy three-story buildings squatting along Highway 10 on Wednesday, dropping 500-pound bombs each time. They fired 35 or so 155-millimeter artillery shells, 10 shots from the muzzles of Abrams tanks and perhaps 30,000 rounds from their automatic rifles. The building was a smoking ruin. But the sniper kept shooting. He - or they, because no one can count the flitting shadows in this place - kept 150 marines pinned down for the better part of a day.
Marines bomb the bejesus out of buildings potentially housing snipers during mop-up operations after the Battle of Fallujah (Irony Party report of the time here)
As McGeogh told Jones somewhat incredulously, and as Filkins reported in November 2004, at dusk, and after this extraordinary feat, Juba retreated to safety on a bicycle:
At one point, they thought that they had a bead on someone running back and forth between the two buildings. Then Capt. Christopher Spears exclaimed: "He's on a bike!"
And somehow, through a volley of gunfire, whoever it was got away.
The author of the web journal Treasure of Baghdad wrote in January of this year on the impact of these legends on the youth of the suburbs of the Iraqi capitol:
this sniper becomes a “hero” in my neighborhood. Yesterday, there was a group of young men gathering in an internet café watching series of his attacks on a website called Ogrish. “He is so brave,” one young man said. “He is not a terrorist. He kills the occupiers only,” the other said with his both eyes concentrated on the computer’s monitor.
With not one but two great heroes loosed upon the world planetary media networks now anticipate a high-stakes conflict between the master triggermen reminiscent of the mythical feud between Soviet sniper Lt Vasily Zaitsev and his German adversary SS Obersturmbannfuehrer Heinz Thorwald in Stalingrad during the Second World War.Unless Cheney has a stroke.
disclaimer: the Irony Party does not condone violence against or even the physical inconveniencing of non-combatants, and would prefer where possible that invading armies went home instead of staying on and getting hurt
email or comment to: david@ironyparty.org
