An Icy Ending

The Artist Currently Known as Sprout alerts me to the fact that the CIA was told to "ice" Osama in more ways than one...

The CIA officer who led the first American unit into Afghanistan after the September 11, 2001 attacks said Wednesday his orders included an unusual assignment: Bring back Osama bin Laden's head on ice.

Gary Schroen and his six-member CIA team arrived in Afghanistan's Panjshir Valley two weeks after bin Laden's al Qaeda network orchestrated the attacks that killed 3,000 people, prompting the Bush administration's war on terrorism.

A 32-year CIA veteran with extensive experience in South Asia and the Middle East, Schroen was charged with the primary task of building up Northern Alliance forces so they could join U.S. troops in the overthrow of the Taliban.

But in the days that followed the worst terror attack on U.S. soil, Schroen said his boss at the CIA also told him and his deputy in no uncertain terms to kill the al Qaeda leadership.

"What he said [was], 'I would like to see the head of bin Laden delivered back to me in a heavy cardboard box filled with dry ice, and I will take that down and show the president. And the rest of the lieutenants, you can put their heads on pikes'," Schroen told Reuters in an interview.

The important issue is whether they could have used the beard for ice shots. Seriously, I'm sure someone out there will criticize this as part of our "cowboy" approach to foreign policy and prosecuting war. In the meantime, I think this should be American policy whenever Osama is caught and killed. Heck, I wouldn't mind if someone mounted the head over the White House fireplace.