home

ISIS and Knife Size

By Jeralyn, Section War In Iraq
Posted on Sun Feb 08, 2015 at 10:42:02 PM EST
Tags: ISIS, Iraq, Syria (all tags)
Share This: Digg! StumbleUpon del.icio.us reddit reddit

A lot has been written about beheadings, and how it it must hurt the victim more and take a lot longer with a small knife like the one Jihadi John uses.

ISIS released some new beheading videos today (of soldiers and "magicians".) Check out the size of this sword. As bulky as the guy is who's wielding it, it looks almost as heavy as he is.

[More...]

Here's the beheader in yet another video today. His knife looks smaller than Jihadi John's.

In yet another video today, a small knife is used by this guy:

How does ISIS decide who gets the small knife and more painful death?

< Sunday Night Open Thread: Grammys and More | New John Cantlie Video: Inside Halab >

  • The Online Magazine with Liberal coverage of crime-related political and injustice news

  • Contribute To TalkLeft


    • Display: Sort:
    ISIS and Knife Size | 10 comments (10 topical)

    Readers Must Login or Create an Account to Comment

    I'm waiting for the discussion of knife envy (5.00 / 1) (#3)
    by scribe on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 09:47:03 AM EST
    to come up.

    But, seriously, the guy with the big sword is wielding something reminiscent of the pictures I remember seeing in 7th grade social studies - "World Cultures".  My teacher that year was perfectly suited for the gig - drafted, he left a small-town existence and served on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific during WWII, fed his wanderlust working around the world, then returned to the same small town to teach after getting a college education.  One of the jobs he held, which yielded the pictures I'm talking about, was as a roughneck for ARAMCO, extracting oil in Saudi.  He had the opportunity to see thieves and other criminals meet the sword and had the pictures to show.

    I think a fair inference which can be drawn is that the sword guy is  doing "official" "government" executions for ISIS, enforcing the ordinary criminal law.  (At least he's not pushing gays off a high-rise into the parking lot below where a crowd waits to watch them splat.)  Likely the sword - a specialized instrument made for the purpose - was supplied out of Saudi, whence came a lot of the seed money for ISIS.  The knife guys, OTOH, are probably also carrying out "official" "Government" executions but using the knife to put a gap between the source of the big swords and ISIS killing hostages.  Wouldn't do, for PR purposes.
    Or, the knife guys might be trying to prove to the higher-ups in ISIS just how badass they are, so they can graduate to a sword or something.
    It's also possible the knife guys are using knives to cause extra pain - if they wanted to do it quickly and painlessly but couldn't get the big swords, they could use an axe of the kind readily available in hardware stores.  (Of course, such axes are probably low-density items in the hardware stores in that region, seeing as how there aren't that many trees and not a lot of wood-cutting going on.)
    Best thing to do with these clowns is build a wall around them, kill any who come out, and wait until they turn on themselves all "Lord of the Flies".

    No comments on... (5.00 / 2) (#9)
    by Mr Natural on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 08:13:27 PM EST
    ...the little kids watching the proceedings from the background of the big sword photograph?

    Had knives pulled on me a few times... (5.00 / 2) (#11)
    by Dadler on Tue Feb 10, 2015 at 10:24:54 AM EST
    ...by the time I was 18 or so. Twice during 7th grade, when I was only 12. Hate those phucking things. And, sorry, but if you can whack someone's head off like that -- unless, maybe, you witnessed them murdering your entire family -- you are a psychopath. The ugly ironies abound in this phucked up beyond all measure world.

    Loss of innocence, Dadler (none / 0) (#12)
    by Mr Natural on Tue Feb 10, 2015 at 10:58:32 AM EST


    Parent
    Don't they slash their throats first (none / 0) (#1)
    by fishcamp on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 07:53:00 AM EST
    with the little knife to kill them, and then use the big axe for the beheading?  As horrible as that sounds, I hope that's the way they do it.

    Thank you? Or "good to know?" (5.00 / 4) (#4)
    by Anne on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 10:33:22 AM EST
    Maybe I should I stash this in my mental file in case it comes up on Jeopardy one day ("I'll take ISIS BABY for $600, Alex."  "And the answer is...The little knife."  "DING!"  "John, for $600:" "What is...the one that kills you before the big knife lops off your head?"  "Correct!")

    Sigh.

    Not picking on you, and realize you're just trying to be helpful, but I find this whole discussion just beyond bizarre.

    Parent

    gads (none / 0) (#2)
    by leap on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 08:51:22 AM EST
    It is hard to believe we are even having discussions like this. In the 21st C. Oh the humanity. Exactly. Humanity can be so sublime, or worse than bestial.

    Shades of Crocodile Dundee... (none / 0) (#5)
    by kdog on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 10:47:16 AM EST
    "That's not a knife.  This is a knife!"

    Pretty Sure... (none / 0) (#8)
    by ScottW714 on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 05:30:11 PM EST
    ...it has nothing to do with anything other than taste.  Like cars or clothes, some prefer ridiculously flashy, other like low key and quaint, some like functional, some simply like the accessory.  What is cooler than a soldier in dress uniform with a finely crafted sword.  IMO looks 100x better than a pistol, yet 100x more useless.

    I have a bit of an obsession with them, or rather my obsession is seeing how sharp I can get them.  From the kitchen knives to my stiletto that I use to open the mail.  But I never take them anywhere, they aren't displayed, just sit in various drawers for when I need them.  I just like sitting and sharpening, then seeing if indeed I left a clean edge, sharp enough to shave with.  Usually depends how long it's been since my last shave.

    I have this amazing scuba knife someone bought me.  I took down with me once, at some point it occurred to me that knives and hoses probably don't mix.  The knives aren't for protection under water, but to collect things, cutting and prying, which of course I don't do, so it really was a fashion accessory.  And since that isn't really my thing it sits in a drawer and has probably been sharpened more times than it's been used.

    Obviously to lop someones head off you need a certain amount of steel, but you don't need gold inlay or a samurai sword from the 15th century.  Like kitchen knives, some work better than others for certain things, but for the most part any knife will do the basics, and for me, of my set, two are used daily, the rest are special occasion, like slicing a watermelon or bread, the pairing knife isn't cutting it, literally.

    Of all the knives I've owned and used (none / 0) (#10)
    by scribe on Mon Feb 09, 2015 at 08:26:35 PM EST
    the one that was easiest to sharpen and took and held the best edge was, of all things, a Boy Scout pocketknife.  One of the mid-80s still-made-in-the-USA ones.

    I'm not a purchaser of high-end cutlery - I'm too hard on my tools on the one hand and too cheap on the other - so I suspect there's better steel out there.  But, still, a ten-buck pocketknife worked and works best of all.

    Go figure.

    Parent

    ISIS and Knife Size | 10 comments (10 topical)

    Readers Must Login or Create an Account to Comment