The news proclaims 3 young college grads hiking around in the war zone between Iran and Iraq. That just happened to cross the border and speak the language.

Speculation is they are CIA that was recruited out of college. Do you think we will ever learn the facts?

Hmm.  Damned funny place to take a holiday at the current time.  Reports I've seen claim that they presented themselves as tourists on a walking holiday at the resort of Ahmed Awa, which is a legitimate resort.  Apparently they ignored warnings not to climb a nearby mountain and strayed over the border.

Any legitimate US tourist is going to attract attention, not all of it friendly, in that location. It's probable that they were being watched by folks itching for an excuse to detain them...and they duly obliged.

I tend not to ascribe stupidity to evil without something more tangible, so I suspect they were tourists - idiot tourists.

The CIA would have to be staggeringly incompetent to send 3 operatives so obviously over a border from an official resort.  The "hidden in plain sight" approach only works in the movies....but hey, who knows for sure.

QuoteThe CIA would have to be staggeringly incompetent to send 3 operatives

The Fourth one stayed at the hotel, sounds like a plan to me. They seem to have a lot of money to do what they please without any regular job. The blogs and occupations are typical cover of CIA people, writers and photo people. It gives them an excuse to collect data.

Is the CIA that out of it?  Really?  We ought to just get rid of them then.  The Army can drop people (Rangers) in, let them do the surveillance, and get them out with out a hint they were there.  (In fact, I'm sure some are there as we speak.)  If the CIA is that clumsy, they have outlived their usefulness and line in the budget.

I heard they were just freelance reporters looking for a story while they hike in a warzone.

http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_12982522

It really doesn't matter.  Iran will try them as spies.  And they won't look at the truth.  And we wouldn't hear from them for years.

IMPO
Janet

It's pretty farking stupid to mess around on a border with a state we called 'an axis of evil'.

They seem to have a lot of money to do what they please without any regular job.

That sounds any number of people I've met in my many years loitering about on a university campus.

Since when does anyone expect your average trust-funded college boy -- regardless of his marks in foreign language classes -- to act with anything but stupidity?

Around here they tend to get struck by lightning, freeze to death in early October blizzards, crater off of a route that's beyond their abilities to climb or protect safely, or, most commonly, start an avalanche that envelops them. Heck, I've seen the last one with my own eyes. (He got lucky and managed to ski out.) And of course there's the ubiquitous phenomenon of guys that choke to death on their own vomit or get blitzed and wrap their cars around telephone poles.

By those standards, poking around in the borderlands between one of the most war-torn and one of the most America-hating (by the government, at least) countries in the world sounds like a rockin' good time.