Send in the man-eating, laser-wielding badgers (Iraq)

[barstein]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6295138.stm

British forces have denied rumours that they released a plague of ferocious badgers into the Iraqi city of Basra.

Word spread among the populace that UK troops had introduced strange man-eating, bear-like beasts into the area to sow panic.

But several of the creatures, caught and killed by local farmers, have been identified by experts as honey badgers.

...

Dr Ghazi Yaqub Azzam, deputy dean of Basra's veterinary college, speculated that the badgers were being driven towards the city because of flooding in marshland north of Basra.Honey Badgers on Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DsDBBpdjoI)

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/news/archives/2007/07/12/basra_badger_rumour_mill.html

Locals claim that the "giant" badgers eat human flesh, attack cows and can run as fast as deer. The British army may have been responsible for some atrocities in Iraq, but not this one.
But it turns out that the Basra badgers, or ratels, are native to the area. They are smaller than British badgers but are one of the world's most fearless creatures, according to the Times, and can eat antelopes and even crocodiles.
I think this is the same creature that attached itself to the professor's shoe in The Gods Must be Crazy.

[drewl]

Let me be the first to say: Badgers? we ain't got no badgers...I don't have to show you any stinkin' badgers.

[Njal]

They look a bit like wolverines, which have much the same rep.

[Ben Sones]

British forces have denied rumours that they released a plague of ferocious badgers into the Iraqi city of Basra.

That is the best sentence to come out of a professional news organization, ever.

[Mark Asher]

I kind of like this sentence:

"My husband hurried to shoot it but it was as swift as a deer," she said. "It is the size of a dog but his head is like a monkey," she told AFP.

It sounds...mythological!

[Njal]

Quick, alert the authors of the Monster Manual.

[Podunk]

Quick, alert the authors of the Monster Manual.

Sounds more like Fiend Folio material to me.

[Tim Partlett]

That is the best sentence to come out of a professional news organization, ever.

I thought the actual denial was even better:

"We can categorically state that we have not released man-eating badgers into the area."

I bet he was fighting back the giggles while making that statement. It's like something from a Monty Python sketch.

[Glenn]

"We can categorically state that we have not released man-eating badgers into the area."Sure, they say that now, but in two years they'll be issuing a clarifying statement that rattels, while mustelids, are not technically badgers.

[Machfive]

MUSHROOM MUSHROOM SNAAAAAAAAKE

[Raife]

Badgers of Mass Destruction, or BMD's, have long been in the arsenal of the British military. Just ask Scotland and Ireland.

[Glenn]

That's actually the reason Ireland has no snakes. Trust me, I'm a scientist, I know shit.

[Tim Partlett]

It's viral marketing (http://www.weebls-stuff.com/toons/Big+Ass+Badgers/)!

[Slainte Mhath]

The U.S. needs to up the ante and bring in a couple of Chupacabra from Puerto Rico.

[Ben Sones]

"We can categorically state that we have not released man-eating badgers into the area."

Sure, they say that now, but in two years they'll be issuing a clarifying statement that rattels, while mustelids, are not technically badgers.

Also, they don't deny the possibility that they have released man-KILLING badgers into the area. As long as the badgers don't eat anyone, they haven't technically lied.