Former Civilian Hostage Shares Lessons From His Time in Iraq
by Rusty Pugh
April 8, 2005
(AgapePress) - The Mississippi truck driver who was taken hostage in Iraq one year ago says if America does not "stay the course," the next generation of Iraqis will continue the war of terrorism being waged against the West.Macon, Mississippi, native Thomas Hamill, known to his friends as Tommy, says he never doubted for a minute that he would return to his beloved Noxubee County. The reason he never doubted, he explains, is because he put the matter in God's hands and trusted that an escape opportunity would be provided.
Hamill endured, and eventually got free. Since his ordeal, he says he has come to realize that the fight against terrorism must be taken to Iraq, and the mindset of an entire generation must be re-oriented. "I'm not saying we're trying to change anything -- we're not trying to change those people -- but we're trying to change their minds a little bit, the way they think about us," he says.
If that does not happen, the former hostage says, "This next generation is going to be raised up indoctrinated with hate, and they're going to want us dead. They're going to want to kill us."
Hamill also believes that if Americans becomes unwilling to keep taking the fight to the terrorists, soon the country will end up fighting the enemy "here in our own backyard," on U.S. soil. Americans are too comfortable, he contends, adding that many need to understand that if terrorists are not hunted down, they will keep coming, driven as they are by an ideology that teaches that martyrdom is the ultimate path to God.
"They have an agenda," the Mississippi man says. "It doesn't have to happen tomorrow or next year or five years from now. They've got a plan and they are serious: they have an indoctrination in a belief that is teaching them to hate the Westerners, and that we should be killed."
Hamill adds that he hopes the hate-filled and anti-American aspects of Islam can be "wiped away" over time. While in the Middle East, he notes, he did encounter many Iraqis who seemed to be genuinely nice people. For their sake, he says he wishes the terrorism and violence in the Middle East could be curtailed and ultimately stopped.
Rusty Pugh, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
