TIME Exclusive: Notes from Saddam in Custody

TIME ^ | Dec. 14, 2003 | BRIAN BENNETT

[FairOpinion]

Saddam is talking, but he isn't cooperative. New details on his capture and his first interrogation

Saddam Hussein was captured on Sunday without a fight. But since then, according to a U.S. intelligence official in Iraq, the fallen dictator has been defiant. “He’s not been very cooperative,” said the official, who read the transcript of the initial interrogation report taken during the first questioning session.

After his capture, Saddam was taken to a holding cell at the Baghdad Airport. He didn’t answer any of the initial questions directly, the official said, and at times seemed less than fully coherent. The transcript was full of “Saddam rhetoric type stuff,” said the official who paraphrased Saddam’s answers to some of the questions. When asked “How are you?” said the official, Saddam responded, “I am sad because my people are in bondage.” When offered a glass of water by his interrogators, Saddam replied, “If I drink water I will have to go to the bathroom and how can I use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?”

The interrogators also asked Saddam if he knew about the location of Captain Scott Speicher, a U.S. pilot who went missing during the first Gulf War. “No,” replied the former Iraqi president, “we have never kept any prisoners. I have never known what happened.”

Saddam was also asked whether Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. “No, of course not,” he replied, according to the official, “the U.S. dreamed them up itself to have a reason to go to war with us.” The interrogator continued along this line, said the official, asking: “if you had no weapons of mass destruction then why not let the U.N. inspectors into your facilities?” Saddam’s reply: “We didn’t want them to go into the presidential areas and intrude on our privacy.”

The official is doubtful that the U.S. will get a significant amount of intelligence from Saddam’s interrogations. “I would be surprised if he gave any info,” he said. Other high-ranking regime members, he said, have by and large remained mum. “Tariq Aziz [former deputy prime minister] hasn’t really spoken,” he said, “and Abid Mahmoud [Saddam’s former personal secretary] hasn’t really given any information.”

The raid on the farm in al-Dawr, a village 15 miles from his hometown of Tikrit, initially came up empty, the official said. There was no Saddam Hussein in sight. Then one man on the property, apparently realizing the game was up, pointed out a bricked-in wall inside the basement of a small house on the property. Saddam is in there, he told the special forces operators from Task Force 121, who took down the farm with the aid of soldiers from the 1st Brigade of the Fourth Infantry Division. Saddam was bricked into his hiding place, he added. “They couldn’t get him out at first and had to dig, from either side of the hole,” said the official. The soldiers finally made a large enough passageway to drag him out. When he came out, he looked bedraggled, said the official: “He looked like a homeless man at the bus station.”

Along with the $750,000 in cash, two AK 47 machine guns and pistol found with Saddam, the U.S. intelligence official confirmed that operatives found a briefcase with Saddam that contained a letter from a Baghdad resistance leader. Contained in the message, the official said, were the minutes from a meeting of a number of resistance leaders who came together in the capital. The official said the names found on this piece of paper will be valuable and could lead to the capture of insurgency leaders around the Sunni Triangle.

The official said it may soon be clear how much command and control over the insurgency Saddam actually had while he was in hiding. “We can now determine,” he said, “if he is the mastermind of everything or not.” The official elaborated: “Have we actually cut the head of the snake or is he just an idiot hiding in a hole?”

[fourhorsemen]

i'm starting to think we would have all been a lot better off if he was brought out dead. It does no good to allow him to continue to spew his propoganda for the next 20 years or so.

[edwin hubble]

Does it appear from this story that Time has a reporter on the Saddam interrogation team?

Either that or Time was selected by the Pentagon to get this special inside information about the interrogation of Saddam.
Do you belive that? I don't either.

[thatdewd]

Leftist wishful drivel. TIME is just trying to bolster the spirits of the faithful in the wake of their latest defeat. No Intelligence official is going to tell TIME this kind of stuff, especially a few hours after he was captured.

[Cvengr]

Saddam was bricked into his hiding place, he added. “They couldn’t get him out at first and had to dig, from either side of the hole,” said the official. The soldiers finally made a large enough passageway to drag him out...

Along with the $750,000 in cash, two AK 47 machine guns and pistol found with Saddam, the U.S. intelligence official confirmed that operatives found a briefcase with Saddam that contained a letter from a Baghdad resistance leader.

Well, if the liberals insist we're too cruel to Saddam, maybe we should just return him back to his hole, brick him back in and cover it up with dirt again.

This way, they get their wishes and we get ours and Saddam gets to live by himself a very wealthy man.

Makes you wonder if he didn't sell his soul for the promise of meeting his demise as a very wealthy man.

[The_Media_never_lie]

It's a shame we have to dignify this thug by giving him a forum. Send him back to a hole with the mice and rats.

[angkor]

Since this story is (a) from Time, (b) too fast, and (c) too sensitive, it must be disinfo passed on to a gullible reporter.

Right about now I suspect they're getting ready to administer Saddam's new preseciption for sodium pentothal.

I'd also guess that all the captured HVTs have been talking.

[Loyalist]

"How can I use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?”

When you gotta go, you gotta go. Let my people go! :-)

[Lazamataz]

When offered a glass of water by his interrogators, Saddam replied, “If I drink water I will have to go to the bathroom and how can I use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?

Oh my. He must have an uberbladder. He hasn't gone for nine months!

I'm picturing Saddam needs to walk around with a wheelbarrow in front of him.

[Bringbackthedraft]

"spew his propoganda for the next 20 years or so."

Yup, and the NYT will be there to print every word and probably add a few of their own.

[Cultural Jihad]

... unless Hillary or Rockefeller were the sources. Anything to lower the morale of American service men and women.

[Lazamataz]

The Noo Yawk Times and Time Magazine are in a rush to see who can squander their credibility the fastest.

[angkor]

No Intelligence official is going to tell TIME this kind of stuff, especially a few hours after he was captured.

Agreed, this story is simply not credible.

[Cultural Jihad]

We're still waiting for the Times to write a word about the gulags of the Soviet Union.

[Mihalis]

I'm posting the following with reservations, source unknown:

Saddam Was Hiding or was in Captivity?

. . . A number of questions are raised by the incredibly bedraggled, tired and crushed condition of this once savage, dapper and pampered ruler who was discovered in a hole in the ground on Saturday, December 13:

1. The length and state of his hair indicated he had not seen a barber or even had a shampoo for several weeks.

2. The wild state of his beard indicated he had not shaved for the same period

3. The hole dug in the floor of a cellar in a farm compound near Tikrit was primitive indeed – 6ft across and 8ft across with minimal sanitary arrangements - a far cry from his opulent palaces.

4. Saddam looked beaten and hungry.

5. Detained with him were two unidentified men, two AK-47 assault guns and a pistol, none of which were used.

6. The hole had only one opening. It was not only camouflaged with mud and bricks – it was blocked. He could not have climbed out without someone on the outside removing the covering.

7. And most important, $750,000 in 100-dollar notes were found with him – but no communications equipment of any kind, whether cell phone or even a carrier pigeon for contacting the outside world.

According to analysts, these seven anomalies point to one conclusion: Saddam Hussein was not in hiding; he was a prisoner. . . .

[armymarinemom]

So, OK? Was one of the two body guards captured with Saddam a Time reporter?

[SauronOfMordor]

There is no way I'd believe that Time got their hands on any kind of interrogation. Our military knows what traitors they are and they simply would not give them access to anything unless it was disinformation.

Saddam is spilling his guts on where the Fedayeen hiding places are, and our side doesn't want them to make a run for it until we have them surrounded

[edwin hubble]

typo in my #22 = believe

"Do you believe that? I don't either."

[Political Junkie Too]

Saddam replied, “If I drink water I will have to go to the bathroom and how can I use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?”

Saddam: "Let my people go!"

-PJ

[Mo1]

When offered a glass of water by his interrogators, Saddam replied, “If I drink water I will have to go to the bathroom and how can I use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?”

The man is a Loon

[oceanview]

let the truth serum injections begin! worst case, he dies, no problem.