The Times of London has a report, from folks on the ground, on the battle at the Qala-i-Janghi fortress/prison, which has turned into the bloodiest episode yet in the Afghan War.
What’s clear from the account, however, is that this was not a case of the Northern Alliance (with American and British complicity) massacring a bunch of prisoners. These foreign fighters surrendered, thinking they were going to simply turn over their arms and be freed. When imprisoned, and perhaps thinking they were indeed going to be massacred, they used smuggled weapons to counter-attack, seized the armory of the huge Qala-i-Janghi complex, and ceased to be, in the terms of the Geneva Convention, prisoners. They returned to being combatants, and were treated as such, until finally they once again surrendered.
It’s a brutal, bloody tale, full of stupid mistakes and violence. But, not to put too fine a point on it, it’s war.
(Via USS Clueless)