Besides the kidding around, here was my predictions.
The Taliban DO have parts of a US helicopter. They showed the metal tags and printed words on them. Boeing and Pennsylvania. They're not Russian. It is not a hoax.
The Taliban didn't show anything else.
Ergo, multiple deductions can be made.
1. They did shoot down a helicopter and our government is lying to us. The lack of dead bodies and the rest of the helicopter is odd though.
2. They scrounged up some parts of a US helicopter, threw them on the ground, brought in the press (Al Jazerra), and staged a fake shoot down for morale building amoung Taliban forces. I doubt any US aircraft hardware has ever been used in Afganistan before, so I find it unlikely this happened. Still, it is not impossible.
3. A US helicopter clipped something, a wall or building shearing off its undercariage, but successfully returned home and landed on it's belly without using wheels.
I personnally thought it was #3 myself, and now Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld is saying the same thing.
The only thing I have to say to the Taliban is, "So what? Even if you can shoot down our helicopters, and you didn't this time, we're still comming for you."
Hans.