Thursday, March 8, 2012

#Wikileaks Why did the New York Times suppress WikiLeaks details of US assassination squad task force 373?

SNIP

Task Force 373 is alternately described by the New York Times as “a secret commando unit”; as “an undisclosed ‘black’ unit of special forces” by the UK Guardian; and “an elite American unit…. which operates in Afghanistan outside of the ISAF mandate” by Spiegel Online.

These three news sources were partners with Wikileaks in the release of the documents, and had special access to the material prior to their public posting.

By all accounts, Task Force 373 seems to be a kidnapping and death squad, run by the Americans, but housed at a German base in Afghanistan. The very secret unit, unknown even to other ISAF forces, works off a “kill or capture” list known as JPEL, which stands for “Joint Prioritized Effects List.” From this bland name springs an operations force that, according to the UK Guardian, has “more than 2,000 senior figures from the Taliban and al-Qaida” on its seize or kill list.

Most of the world press has reported this same or similar figure, though Spiegel only says the figure is “large”:...read more

wikileaks