Your task is to extract the thesis of an opinionated news article by selecting some of its text segments. The thesis is a summarization of what the author wants to persuade the reader of. Your answer should consist of segments of the given text. Note that you are not allowed to combine different sentences.
--------
Question: The hostage rescue dilemma. Saturday's failed hostage rescue mission in Yemen was indeed tragic . While the official details as to exactly what happened have not yet been released , it appears Luke Somers, an American journalist, and Pierre Korkie, a South African teacher, were killed by their captors during a night-time rescue attempt carried out by US Navy SEALs . Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) had been holding Somers and Korkie captive for over a year . It was the second such attempt to rescue Somers in two weeks . On November 25, a SEALs team hit what they thought was the compound holding Somers , who, as it turns out, had been moved from there just hours before . In Saturday's operation, the SEALs knew Somers' exact location . To maintain stealth, they landed by V-22 Osprey several kilometres away, and then made the trek overland to the compound where Somers and Korkie were being held captive . But something went terribly wrong in the final approach . Perhaps it was a barking dog or some other noise , but the SEALs came under fire as they approached the compound's main entrance . The element of surprise, which is so critical to rescue operations, was lost , and a fierce firefight ensued . Within 30 minutes, the SEALs had secured the compound and put Somers and Korkie, who were both still alive on a V-22 that had a surgical team standing by . Unfortunately, medics were unable to save them . Plainly necessary . For Somers, Saturday's rescue mission was as urgent as it was plainly necessary . Late last week AQAP released a video stating he would be killed in 72 hours unless unspecified demands were met . Those demands have not been made public, but likely involved payment of a ransom or release of AQAP captives, something the US is prohibited by law from doing . For Korkie, the sense of urgency in attempting the rescue operation is more controversial . According to the South African charity Gift of the Giving, a deal had been made with AQAP to release Korkie in just a matter of days, suggesting to many that it would have been better to wait . Maybe there was a deal that would have gone through in the end . Maybe there wasn't . But in rescue operations, hope is not figured into the equation , where planners and decision makers have to weigh the risks of action against the consequences of inaction . By their very nature, hostage rescue operations are among the most difficult and risky military missions to carry out . With little margin for error, either in intelligence or the operation itself, they demand highly trained and equipped special operations units that only a handful of countries have . Are they dangerous and uncertain? Absolutely . Are they impossible? No . In 2012, US Navy SEALs rescued Jessica Buchanan, an American aid worker, and Poul Hagen Thisted, a Danish aid worker , who had been held hostage by Somali pirates for 93 days . The pirates were demanding a $45m ransom for their release . In this particular case, precise intelligence as to their exact location, along with concerns about Buchanan's rapidly declining health, were major factors in moving forward with the rescue mission . Under the cover of darkness, the SEAL Team parachuted 19km from where they were being held, and then moved cross-country to conduct the rescue . Nine pirates were killed during the operation , and Buchanan and Thisted were unharmed . In 2009, US Navy SEAL snipers ended the hostage ordeal of American Richard Phillips, captain of the cargo ship Maersk Alabama , which had been hijacked by Somali pirates in the Indian Ocean five days earlier . Talks with the pirates ended when they threw the phone used to communicate with negotiators into the ocean . When one of the pirates pointed his rifle at Captain Phillips' back , snipers shot and killed all three in near simultaneous fashion . Captain Phillips was unharmed . Heartbreaking failures . In 2005, US Delta Force operators rescued Roy Hallums, an American civilian contractor kidnapped by an al-Qaeda cell in Iraq, after 311 days in captivity . Again , the intelligence as to Hallums' location was exact - pull up the kitchen carpet and open the faux cement trap door leading into his one room cell . Hallums was unharmed in the operation . But , as was all too evident on Saturday, there are heartbreaking failures, too . This past July, US special operations forces attempted to rescue James Foley in Syria . Unfortunately, the intelligence as to where he was being held was incorrect . Foley was brutally murdered by ISIL just a few weeks later , the videotape of which was released on the internet for the world to see . In 2010, the US special operations team attempting to rescue her in Afghanistan accidentally killed Linda Norgrove, a British citizen . There are other failures, all tragic, as well . But there are also other successes , where hostages like Jessica Buchanan, Poul Thisted, Captain Phillips and Roy Hallums, all of whom faced indefinite captivity or even death, are home with their families because decisions were made to rescue them based on calculated risks . No guessing, no maybes, no "let's keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best" . Rescue missions are risky, both for the hostages and for the operators who carry them out . Lives are at stake , and it's never an easy choice to give the "green light" . But given the circumstances, particularly when dealing with terrorist organisations, leaders can't always sit back and wait to see what happens . Sometimes, it's less risky to act than not to . And in the case of a hostage rescue operation, I'd place my life in the hands of men dedicated to the task before taking my chances with the likes of a terrorist in the hope that maybe they'll let me go .

Answer: Saturday's failed hostage rescue mission in Yemen was indeed tragic


Question: CIA interrogation report: Democrats want to punish America, blame Bush. In its ideological zeal to punish America , the outgoing Democratically- controlled Senate, plans to make public a report that, according to Fox News will examine "the alleged use of torture by the CIA." Although the 6,000 page full report will remain classified , the 500 page summary is expected to be released to the public in coming days . According to press reports from those who are familiar with the study, it is expected to portray the American intelligence community in the worst possible light . The report's release and details about CIA interrogations that took place a decade ago will endanger Americans abroad today, destroy essential relationships with foreign intelligence communities going forward, and cripple American human intelligence gathering networks for a generation . Put bluntly , Democrats in the Senate are behaving like tenants who got evicted and decide to trash the house on their way out the door . There is nothing to be gained by releasing the report . The CIA's actions in the immediate aftermath of September 11 attacks have long since ceased . Although President Obama has approved release of the report's summary , even Secretary of State John Kerry has warned that the report's release will put Americans and U.S  embassies at risk of retaliation . So why do this now? Perhaps Democrats in Congress think that by excoriating our intelligence community before the entire world they will expiate the sins of the previous administration . Yes, it's another chance it's to blame Bush! This is the apology tour on steroids . According to media reports, the report concludes that we tortured terrorists . These are the same terrorists who blew up the World Trade Center, bombed the Pentagon, and tried to level the U.S  Capitol . These are the same terrorists that today have beheaded Christians, Westerners and, just this past weekend, another American citizen . Think back to the days after September 11 . We were blind about Al Qaeda . Most Americans feared another attack was imminent . And the best legal advice in government said CIA actions to get that information were legal . So CIA officers did what they thought necessary to protect Americans . A decade later we're suddenly castigating them for it . Second ,  the report concludes that the intelligence gathered from CIA's actions wasn't effective . Yet that has been disputed by the very people in the Obama administration who used it to track down Usama bin Laden . To quote highly regarded former CIA Director Gen  Michael Hayden,"it is inconceivable to believe that three different CIA directors, and three different Deputy CIA directors, conspired over a seven year period to lie about the program's effectiveness . Third ,  there is a rule in foreign policy like the one in medicine . First ,  do no harm . Public release of this report will do immeasurable harm . It will encourage terrorists around the world to launch revenge attacks . It will cause foreign intelligence agencies to clam up and no longer cooperate with US intelligence for fear that their sources and method will be blown . It will cause every American intelligence officer to go into the defensive crouch -- don't stick your head out to protect America because years later somebody in government who wants to score political points will chop it off . Finally ,  take a lesson from history . We did this once before, in the 1970's , when presidential-hopeful Senator Frank Church launched a widespread investigation of the CIA . It didn't work , Senator Church's presidential aspirations never got off the ground . But his handiwork crippled American intelligence gathering for a generation . American agents overseas were killed , foreign intelligence agencies stopped sharing intelligence with us , our own human networks collapsed , and CIA officers played it safe and stopped thinking outside the box . This was one of the reasons a generation later we never knew about a bunch of Islamic extremists in a cave in Afghanistan plotting to take down the Twin Towers . Releasing the report to the public will do considerable harm to our efforts to gather essential intelligence about those hoping to do us harm . It will be a self-inflicted wound . The next time we are caught unprepared it won' t just be with 747s flying into buildings it could be with weapons too terrible to contemplate .

Answer: the outgoing Democratically- controlled Senate, plans to make public a report that, according to Fox News will examine "the alleged use of torture by the CIA."


Question: Privatising Mexico's oil industry spells disaster. Considering Mexico's history and the present political context, it's no surprise that the majority of the Mexican population nowadays is either deeply suspicious of President Pena Nieto or just opposed to the current fast-track drive to privatise oil and pass it into the hands of foreign oligopolies . At present, Mexico suffers from an extremely weak state where the vast majority of crimes go unaddressed because of a judicial vacuum . More than 22,000 forced disappearances have occurred since 2007 and more than 70,000 people have been killed since 2006 . Almost every week we hear about more mass graves discovered . Most recently, a massacre of students in Iguala shook the nation . Mexico also suffers from the third largest illicit economy in the world, according to the Global Financial Integrity Report . Clearly, organised crime is openly challenging and fragmenting the state . In the face of these facts even President Nieto has admitted in public speeches that Mexico's legal system is in shambles . International experience and basic common sense indicate that a country must possess a minimum standard of the rule of law in order to be able to foster social benefits for most of its population when privatising state assets . Without functional regulatory and judicial controls, it is technically and politically not feasible for any oil-funded social development fund to effectively spread wealth to future generations through new public education programmes, a modernised public health, adequate environmental standards and a much-improved physical infrastructure . Absolutely nothing today indicates that Mexico can implement privatisation of the oil infrastructure at even the most basic standards of security, transparency, effectiveness and efficiency . Yet ,  a Mexican paradox occurs . While insecurity still runs at record highs , foreign money keeps pouring in . What's going on? Since the beginning of the still unfinished democratic transition and since the economic opening to international trade of the early 1990s, Mexico managed to attract billions of dollars per year in foreign direct investment . Yet ,  most of this money has been channelled into politically managed non-competitive sectors in the hands of Mexican "state courtesans" disguised as private entrepreneurs who over the last 25 years created vast oligopolies out of the privatisation of state assets . The privatisation process in Mexico has largely been conducted through dubious procedures orchestrated by corrupt federal governments . All this happened in the midst of a Mexican economy lacking technological innovation with low productivity and where more than half of what is produced and consumed is exchanged within informal/illicit markets . Nevertheless ,  these so-called private oligopolies within the mining, banking and telecommunications industries operate in a crony capitalistic fashion by attracting foreign investors to politically protected markets in which governments (through bribes and subsidies) ensure rates of return two to five times above the international average . How can, for example, German or US oligopolies presently investing in Mexico fail to fall in love with such a "generous" corrupt system? The forthcoming Mexican oil privatisation falls comfortably within this "legally corrupt" economic framework . Yet ,  harsh social realities have a way of trumping politics most of the time . Mexican writer and journalist Ana Lilia Perez published in 2012 a book titled"The Black Cartel" in which she provides a description of massive organised crime infiltration within the top managerial echelons of the state-run oil company, PEMEX . The nature of the organised crime infiltration covers technical and political appointees at PEMEX . Moreover ,  with thorough documentation, Ms Perez provides a detailed account of how and where a large portion of the oil extracted and distributed by PEMEX is currently stolen through illegal operations . These have been linked to Mexican politicians and US and Mexican private companies selling illegal Mexican oil to the markets in Canada, Mexico and the US, with the complicity of the Mexican armed forces supposedly responsible for protecting the PEMEX infrastructure . The current illegal oil trafficking comes with high-level political corruption, intense armed conflict causing thousands of deaths per month and frequent acts of terrorism against the PEMEX infrastructure . One cannot expect this armed conflict scenario to just go away after privatisation . In this kind of context, any honest foreign investor bidding within a Mexican oil privatisation process should have his or her head checked or otherwise possess enough political clout within Mexico or the financial capacity to bribe with millions of dollars the government ladder and pay for a vast praetorian guard of security personnel to manage the armed chaos ahead . In comparison , dealing with other oil producing countries with problematic states, such as Nigeria, would seem like a walk in the park . Shareholders of oil companies can only expect low economic returns and chaos from investing in the Mexican oil sector , unless , prior to any private investment drive, an international judicial cooperation effort starts dismantling the vast organised crime networks within the Mexican oil business and beyond . This international judicial cooperation must entail the actual implementation of a serious anti-corruption programme within the Mexican state with much broader conflict of interest and traffic of influence statutes, all monitored by reputable international civil society organisations . Furthermore ,  the failure of the Mexican state needs to be corrected with the installation of autonomous investigative units for economic crimes within each Mexican region and the creation of witness protection programmes for cases of political corruption linked to organised crime . These reforms will be good for Mexican society in general and also good for the pockets of Mexican and foreign oil investors .

Answer:
Clearly, organised crime is openly challenging and fragmenting the state Almost every week we hear about more mass graves discovered