If this is true, get ready for a week-long propaganda blitz:
Saddam's Sons Believed Dead in Iraq Raid
MOSUL, Iraq - A firefight erupted when U.S. forces surrounded the home of a cousin of Saddam Hussein in the northern city of Mosul on Tuesday, killing four people. U.S. officials in Washington said they were trying to determine whether Saddam's sons Odai and Qusai were among the dead.
Of course, it may not be true -- we've been through this drill before. Hiding out at your cousin's house doesn't seem like a very smart survival strategy, and you gotta admit, when it comes to survival, the Husseins are as agile as cockroaches. Which, given their personalities, is appropriate.
But let's assume Saddam fils are dead -- blown to bits in a hail of gunfire, which is infinitely better than they deserved. This will be described by the White House -- and every conservative leaning commentator between here and Baghdad -- as the greatest victory in the history of warfare. The dawn of an era of peace and reconstruction in our new protectorate. The cliche light at the end of the cliche tunnel. The White House needed a PR break in the worse way, and now it's got one. So for the next few days, you know the administration is going to be like a kid who's been given a new drum for Christmas. Just try to get them to stop banging it.
But once the excitement has faded a bit, the administration may begin to wish the Army hadn't been quite so successful in the manhunting department. Saddam and sons have had several handy uses for the White House and the Coalition Authority in recent weeks: They'be been an all-purpose excuse for everything that's gone wrong in the New Iraq, a constant reminder to the Iraqis of what could happen if their liberators decide to bug out, and a convenient explanation for the growing guerrilla war, which can be blamed on the "diehard" Hussein heads.
In other words, Saddam and his demon spawn have been the PR equivalent of the kitchen gadget in those old Ronco ads: "They slice! They dice! They grate! And they make great bad guys!
But now only the old monster himself is left. And once he's been caught or killed, it's going to become progressively harder for the administration to rationalize news items like this:
While the military has not released figures on the number of attacks on American forces each day, a senior officer told reporters last week that the attacks were averaging 12 a day.
And this:
A U.S. soldier was killed and another wounded Tuesday when their convoy was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade and small arms fire northwest of Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement.
And this:
Iraq's American-backed administration failed in its first week to choose a president, abandoning that mission in favor of a weak, three-man rotating leadership.
And this:
U.S. commandos have raided an office of Iraq's main Shiite group, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), in Baghdad and detained three members, SCIRI said yesterday.
The war, the weakness of our puppet government and our deteriorating relations with the radical and pro-Iranian elements of the Shi'a community won't go away because the Saddam boys -- or their pop -- are frying in the infernal regions. But the all-in-one PR excuse will.
No doubt, the administration will try to develop bad-guy substitutes: Iranian mullahs, Syrian generals, whatever. But, when it comes to marketing demonic enemies, these guys don't have anything like the "brand equity" the Husseins brought to the table.
Which means that once Saddam Sr. has finally been Fedexed back to hell, the task of persuading the American people to continue chasing the neocon mirage of "democracy" in the Middle East could get really hard, really fast.
That is, unless cloning gets added to the list of alleged Iraqi WMD programs ...
if this story is true, the bush team can sit back and relax.
But not for long.
Humpty Dumpty (trust in Bush) has fallen and they will not be able to put him back together again. Ask someone a few months ago if Bush should be replaced and she would say hell no
because only he can protect us from the terrorists. Ask her now and she is not so sure.
I suppose that now I'll hear the administration say over and over and over and over agin that these two were reposnsible for coordinating attacks on our troops, even though they've been saying until now that there is no coordination of the attacks on our troops.
Whatever. I'll take anything to stop the attacks, establish stability and get most of our boys home in the next few months.
I'm sure its been said elsewhere, but--how convieeeeenient!
What were Q and U doing up in Mosul, anyway? Isn't that Kurdish?
I wonder if the Army got orders to surround a likely house, and then trumpet their success.
As far as the two spawn of satan go good riddance!
As for the media they will pick up on the first US casualty that happens from this point on and ask why haven't the attacks stopped now that the evil twins are gone. They are all sharks and they just follow the blood.
The fact that they surrounded the house and then killed everyone in it -- when there was no chance of the occupants being rescued -- frankly stinks. It tells us that BuSh was afraid of what these two might say. Of course, they are complicit up to their eyeballs in human rights violations of the worst kind, but since when did BuSh ever care about these? But if they didn't know about WMD.... or denied them.... I'm sure that's why they were reduced to powder. Dead men tell no tales.
Is is better to have the banner say "Mission Accomplished, Accomplished!", "Mission Accomplished, Again", "Mission Accomplished, II -- the Revenge", or "More Mission Accomplished"?
I've got to call the Department of the Navy by this evening, so the banners can be made.
PS. I think we were wise to reject "Mary Kate and Ashley's 'Mission Accomplished'."
How about: "Mission Still Being Accomplished"?
Raiding SCIRI headquarters is just baiting the Shiites to start a guerilla war with us. If this happens it will make the current insurgency look like a camping adventure.
The stupidity of the military high command never ceases to amaze me. Guess they need some more medals or are bored with the current guerilla ops.
Actually I wish for the story to be true because (a) the bastards deserve it and (b) since I believe it won't dampen the violence in Iraq, it'll exppose the mendaciousness of BushCo for what it is, ie: more lies.
I believe that many Iraqi are waiting to make sure that Saddam is dead. They are letting the Americans make that happen. When he is clearly gone, then there are just the Americans to deal with. I expect that the unhappiness with us will now rise.
CNN is calling it...
My first thought is the same as roger's - there's gonna be serious blowback if we did get the sons. You don't think Saddam is gonna take that personally, for Christ's sakes? By making such a big deal of it, the media are putting our soldiers on the chopping block for a massive, and i mean MASSIVE retaliation from the Saddam loyalists, and most iraqis will probably be fine with that due to the inhuman way we are treating them.
Meanwhile, Bush has ALREADY started a six week vacation in Crawford.
"Mission Accomplished 5-- Assignment: Miami Beach", closely followed by "Mission Accomplished 6: City Under Siege"
Wolf Blitzer now!
Are U.S. troops safer now that Saddam's sons are dead?
Yes 23% 626 votes
No 77% 2144 votes
Total: 2770 votes
Not to create too tortured a Vietnam analogy, but isn't this sort of like when we bumped of the Diem brothers, one of which was the head of the government, as part of the military coup we supported in 1963? That was supposed to "clear the air", as it were, but only meant one less faction among many that were competing for control of what eventually became a sinking ship.
Likewise, the various Shia, Sunni, Kurdish elements, and others, are still in play. To think at least one or more of them won't consider (or continue, for that matter, if it applies) taking pot shots at the American troops as a means of acquiring or maintaining "street cred" is a little naive.
How about: "Mission Still Being Accomplished"?
mission still being defined
what.a.coincidence
One of the toxic sons (Q) was in charge of the WMDs concealment. You know, the ones Wolfowitz is not concerned with.
AP (Washington) September 8th 2003:
With the assassination of the [deleted] twins, [deleted] and [deleted], Saddam Hussein has released a press statement claiming that this is a great step forward in the restoration of democracy in the United States.
"We heap praise on our brave bombers who couragously planted high explosives in the bar, executing the [deleted] terrorists (as well as a few minor collateral casualties). We believe all freedom loving peoples of the Earth should celebrate the murder of these two women, and that this is a positive step forward in driving an illegitimate regime from its stranglehold on American life."
President George Bush is still unavailable for comment, claiming to be "grief-stricken" by this turn of events. The Navy aircraft carrier "Ronald Reagan" has been shifted into the Gulf region, and reports are coming in that activity is high on the vessel. When asked if he anticipated retaliation, Saddam Hussein looked puzzled and said "Gosh, we hadn't considered that."
(Sorry for the edits, folks, but that one had Secret Service threat investigation written all over it, so to speak --billmon.)
So are they pissed this happened the same time Jessica went home or.......relieved? Hmmmmmm?
Oooh, a double whammy! Jessica Lynch wheeled out and the sons gone! This isn't a damage limitation exercise, is it? Because:
On Sunday 20 July in Najaf when 10,000 angry Shi'ites gathered, prompting the fixing of bayonets, an aide to the cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said that US troops had better get out of Dodge within three days or face an uprising. Well, that's Monday, Tuesday, that makes tomorrow Wednesday... day three (see Reuters, http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=3122454)
The BBC (at 23:39 GMT top story on BBC News Front Page) is putting everything in quote marks (maybe they remember the Saddam 'dead' in neighbourhood restaurant story?), viz.
Saddam's sons 'dead' (headline)
The US military says it is 'certain' its troops have killed Saddam Hussein's sons (standfirst)
Iraq 'deaths' will have huge effect (heading to subsidiary story)
US celebrates 'good' Iraq news (heading to subsidiary story)
Tantamount to saying we don't believe a word you say, I think.
Tantamount to saying we don't believe a word you say, I think.
Well, it's like Reagan used to say: Trust, but verify.
Billmon, Agree on the above, but I'm not sure about the SCIRI raid. The link says Iraqi group office raided Baghdad |Reuters | 22-06-2003
That is a month ago and, if you remember, there was a raid about then. Is this a new one with a wrong date, or has it skipped back a month?
More on the implications of Bibi sadam for the political situation vis a vis Sunni/ Shia relations on the blog if anyone is interested.
Superdupont, I feel you. No one in the mainstream media seems to be asking why we didn't try to capture these men rather than kill them -- as I posted at BadCulture.com, if we're serious about finding weapons of mass destruction, wouldn't it have been a major coup to be able to question Saddam Hussein's heirs apparent about where said WMD might be?
Ugh.
BTW, thanks for the plug the other day, Billmon!
Last week Bush said "I will be vindicated in Iraq."
People should listen when he tells them what he is going to do. It is clear that WMD needs to be made to vanish as a war aim, since there not only wasn't any, but no credible evidence of anything that could be called credible evidence - something that is surprising, given that the US government couldn't live up to the zero tolerance standard they set.
Thus, the last rationalization in the minds of Americans was "Saddam bad. Bad man. We blow him away, his kids away, his dog away. Kill Kill." And, suddenly, the military comes through with a pair of scalps.
It isn't that they needed a break, it is that carping about little details on the road to Baghdad allowed the people in the executive to change the subject by spending a few million dollars of OPM.
The recent events in Iraw show why doing things the right way - rule of law and the rest - is better. People, frightened by the freep, are busy qualifying their statements on the deaths of Saddams sons with declarations about how evil they are, etc.
Well, if they were, there is the rule of law to take care of that. Seek war crimes/crimes against humanity and apprehend them. Consider, under Islamic Law, the US is now guilty, and they have as much right under it to simply kill Americans, including civilians, in pursuit of just vengence.
Now, Americans will stand up and declare "they have no right..." but then, we have no right to be doing what we are doing in Iraq under our own laws. It is irrational to expect our enemies to hold themselves to any higher standard, by their own laws, than we have held ourselves to.
Does anyone know if there is a tax on the reward money or was that affected by the tax cuts also?
Which means that once Saddam Sr. has finally been Fedexed back to hell, the task of persuading the American people to continue chasing the neocon mirage of "democracy" in the Middle East could get really hard, really fast.
That is, unless cloning gets added to the list of alleged Iraqi WMD programs ...
Or maybe the Iranians will get there first.
I hate to be in the position of wearing a tinfoil hat, but lately, it just seems a little more fashionable than previously. When I first heard about the extermination, I wondered to myself, what were they doing in the same house? From everything I'd heard, they hated each other and were deliberately kept apart by Papa Saddam.
The very next thing I wondered, when I heard that they were positively identified by the Ace of Diamonds, by "images" shown to him was, how many body doubles did these boys have still floating around?
Then I wondered why they packed the bodies up and shipped them to the airport for export before, apparently, anybody could get a close look. It's a good thing that after 3-6 hours of fierce fighting, their faces were still unmarked for the photo-op.
Trust but verify. You know, maybe the senile old goat was onto something after all.
Not that I think it will mean a significant difference to the resistance in Iraq, but I wonder how many Iraqis will actually believe the story under these circumstances.
Is it possible to duplicate a set of teeth for a body double?
Dental Records Confirm Deaths of Saddam's Sons
I don't know, but it might be easy to change the name on dental records
Or more likely that Odai and Qusai have been dead for quite some time, waiting only to be defrosted when needed...
Not that I feel any sympathy for Quday and Uday (or whatever their frigging names are), but:
* No one, no matter how vile, deserves to be executed at the hands of government, especially without a trial. As much as executing Timmay McVeigh bothered me, at least the SOB had a trial.
* So what? Since these yahoos were never a threat to me or anyone I know, why should I pay for this? Is this an effective use of my tax dollars?
The score-keeper pseudo-patriots are hooting over this one ... but really, so what? They were no bother or boon to or to Americans, so why even bother to report it?
(Sorry for the edits, folks, but that one had Secret Service threat investigation written all over it, so to speak --billmon.)
Hadn't even considered that, but you're right.
Ah, the Land of the Free.
It's very refreshing to get some really intelligent reactions to the news media from the United States.
It's worrying that the grounds on which this war is being fought has been pulled right out from under the feet of Tony Blair, George Bush et al. The references to the war in Vietnam are an acute reminder of what uninvited interfering with other countries can produce. Look what's happening to Human Rights...I feel ashamed.
I have extreme doubts the sons of saddam are dead.
1)why were they in a kurdish controled area in a
huge villa on a main street(6 lane street).
2)I read saddams biography and his first grandson
was born in 1991 to his daughter raghd.the book
says qusay has three daughters.so i cant figure
out who the 14 year boy was cause he certainly
not qusays son.
3)The photos released to the public of the so
called hussein brothers,look nothing like them,
not just because they are covered in blood, but
The one of uday shows him being fat as hell,
no guy that uses drugs as much as he, will be
that fat.O yeah he was known to have shot up
drugs daily..so where are the track marks on
arms.O yeah the corpse of uday is about 4 ins
to short to be him.Also there is not any metion
the bullet that hit him in the spine in 1996 which caused paralysis on the left side..causing
severe damage to his lower lumbar region.The
dental records are a joke, that direct hit in
the mouth broke out nearly all of his teeth.
an smeared his nose all over his face.The nose
bridge on the corpse was way to wide to be uday
because he had a very narrow nose bridge,like a
weasles.I won't even mention the body double
theory because these guys didnt even resemble
uday and qusay.Hell that dead fat guy they say
that is uday, looks more like khalid shaikh
mohammad.(we better check to see if he is still
in his jail cell in pakistan.
4)They say that 100 million dollar cash was found
on their persons.anyone would have to be a real
idiot to have that much cash and have only a 14yr old boy and one body guard to guard them.shit
if i was that body gaurd i would have knocked them in the heads and stole that money way before the usa
troops got to them.oh yeah uday had 400 thousand
cash and 21000 dinar in his breif case with viagra
underwear and perfume and silk tie, codom,how the
hell could all that stuff fit in a brief case..
why the hell would uday wear a silk tie, his funky
long beard would have complely covered the tie.
and also if i wanted to change my appeance i sure
the hell wouldn't shave my head bald..i would have
grown my hair long and put shit or somthing in it and posed as a bum. or better yet qusay made a one
billion dollar withdrawl from the bank at 4am on
the eve of the war. Hell if i had 1 billion dollars i sure wouldnt stay in a place with 30 million bounty on my head...shit i get plastic surgery,change my name and go hide somewhere other than iraq, earth is a big ass place.lots of
places to hide.O yeah those post mortem touched up pictures..they made even more sceptical..since
they said that they reconstucted them to look just like the two dead sons.A good mortition can
make a dogs ass look like grizzly adams.O yeah
why doesnt their mother come claim the boys, i mean she is not in the deck of cards and nobody wants to stick a tow misile in her ass.I think
the usa has been tricked.
I was against the war in Iraq, and still am. Granted Hussein is a brutal dictator that needed taking down, but not this way. I also feel his sons were far more valuable alive than dead. fter 9/11/01, I fear all we did was open up a can of warms. Iraq was and is NOT our war and we opened the door to our terrorist enemies. I was a small child during Vietnam, but I remember a lot of tears. Think about the American mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, etc. and then think about the innocent Iraqi citizens killed. For what? George Bush I or II? Certainly not 9/11.
billmon, glad you pointed this out. i was thinking the same thing. what's worse is that the administration won't have to do a thing. the media will take the ball and run with it. why? because americans love those two scamps. i can't wait for the next piece on uday's love shack and movie collection. though irrelevant, these things get americans' motors running. prepare for more, including retrospectives on how much those two tortured iraqis, because Amis love torture stories like they love a good train wreck. if this story is true, the bush team can sit back and relax.