Hunting Bin Laden: Let History Be Your Guide
In 1916 Pancho Villa, with his band of soldiers, crossed the Rio Grande and attacked the town of Columbus, N.M. President Woodrow Wilson dispatched an American punitive expedition into Mexico consisting of seven cavalry regiments with aviation support. The force operated out of Chihuahua and was told to bring him in “dead or alive.” They never managed to do so.
The force returned to the United States after getting into a number of battles with the local militias and the regular Mexican army. Is history going to repeat itself in regard to Osama bin Laden? Villa was later murdered by another political faction in the 1920s. There’s a bounty on Bin Laden worth $25 million, American dollars. Patience.
Robert Hughes
Santa Ana
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Pakistani border patrols should be on the lookout for a slender six-foot, five-inch Afghan maiden who is too shy to lift her burka for even a glimpse of her face.
Robert John Schwarzmann
Los Angeles
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