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TIME Exclusive: Notes from Saddam in Custody
TIME ^
| Dec. 14, 2003
| BRIAN BENNETT
Posted on 12/14/2003 11:52:51 AM PST by 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. Hes 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 didnt 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 Saddams 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? Saddams reply: We didnt 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 Saddams 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] hasnt really spoken, he said, and Abid Mahmoud [Saddams former personal secretary] hasnt 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 couldnt 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?
TOPICS: Breaking News; Front Page News
KEYWORDS: agitprop; aoltimelifewarnercnn; baghdadbob; bigmedia; gulfwar2; gulfwarii; interrogation; iraq; lyingliars; mediabias; mriraq; nationalsecurity; propaganda; reddawn; regimechange; saddam; saddamcaptured; saddamhussein; saddamincustody; saddaminterrogation; saddamites; securityleaks; time; topplesaddam; viceclosed
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To: the Real fifi
Usual Time B.S. I doubt that anyone connected with his interrofation would talk to Time I'm not believing anything until its posted by Newsmax.com.
41
posted on
12/14/2003 12:18:56 PM PST
by
Doe Eyes
To: FairOpinion
Who will be Time's Person of the Year, Bush or Saddam?
To: Mihalis
Saddam Hussein was not in hiding; he was a prisoner.I know you posted it reluctantly. However there's nothing there to support the conclusion that he was a prisoner.
I recall a post from some time ago (a month? 2 months?) stating that Saddam was riding around Baghdad in a taxi and was sporting a full beard.
43
posted on
12/14/2003 12:19:53 PM PST
by
angkor
To: Mihalis
According to analysts, these seven anomalies point to one conclusion: Saddam Hussein was not in hiding; he was a prisoner. . . . Perhaps his "followers" realized that Saddam would cut any sort of deal to save his butt, including selling out all his followers.
44
posted on
12/14/2003 12:20:19 PM PST
by
SauronOfMordor
(Happiness is a belt-fed weapon)
To: FairOpinion
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 Mother of All Pee Breaks looms!
He ain't been since the Coalition invaded!
45
posted on
12/14/2003 12:21:04 PM PST
by
Ole Okie
(Sooners, get those Cajuns! And stick a finger in the eye of USC whiners.)
To: FairOpinion
I never believed that, short of torture, we'd get much out of Saddam. The intelligence boon, if there is one, will come from Iraqis who will feel free to come forward and tell what they know now that they no longer fear Saddam's retribution.
46
posted on
12/14/2003 12:21:15 PM PST
by
squidly
To: FairOpinion
Yeah right. Saddam's gonna talk. He's a coward. Even Hitler took his own life.
He'll tell us whatever we want to know if we spare him the death penalty.
Saddam's in a LOT of TROUBLE. We can help him though.
We just need him to answer a few thousand questions.
47
posted on
12/14/2003 12:21:50 PM PST
by
Smogger
To: squidly
I never believed that, short of torture, we'd get much out of Saddam. I doubt torture will be necessary. He'll talk to save his own skin.
48
posted on
12/14/2003 12:22:33 PM PST
by
Smogger
To: Mihalis
whose prisoner? why does a prisoner need $750K in cash? and what prisoner carries a pistol?
To: Mihalis
Uh oh....there's the new spin. Bush has kept Saddam buried in a hole for months and pretended to capture him in time to help his re-election campaign. What to place bets?
50
posted on
12/14/2003 12:23:45 PM PST
by
WVNan
To: Peach
The interrogators also asked Saddam if he knew about the location of Captain Scott SpeicherYES!!!!
51
posted on
12/14/2003 12:24:12 PM PST
by
Dog
(First question to Saddam..........Where is Scott Speicher??)
To: Steel Wolf
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?
Clearly, one of the great criminal minds of our time.
52
posted on
12/14/2003 12:24:52 PM PST
by
Gumption
To: FairOpinion
We didnt want them to go into the presidential areas and intrude on our privacy. He's maintained a sense of humor anyway.
But seriously, why has this info been given to the press? Nothing should be released to the media.
53
posted on
12/14/2003 12:25:12 PM PST
by
Aquinasfan
(Isaiah 22:22, Rev 3:7, Mat 16:19)
To: Loyalist
LOL!!!
54
posted on
12/14/2003 12:25:59 PM PST
by
Gumption
To: fourhorsemen
The Iraqis need to be able to confront Hussein in a trial. And no one would truly know the truth if he had not been captured alive.
55
posted on
12/14/2003 12:26:55 PM PST
by
arasina
(What will YOU do when Howard Dean or Hillary Clinton is president?)
To: Ole Okie
Saddam learned about bathroom breaks from Al Gore.
To: FairOpinion
The conditions under which Saddam was captured -- alone with two bodyguard, a couple of guns, $750,000 and hiding in a "spider hole" in the ground -- does not, at first glance, indicate that he was in any way in a position to lead a consistent resistance movement of any sort. There were no immediate reports of communication equipment or even a cell phone in the small underground hole he was hiding in. His appearance was for more that of a man trying to save his own life than that of one leading an uprising.
Recent reports form Baghdad also indicate that Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network has been funneling more and more of its efforts -- both financial and logistical -- away from Afghanistan, and concentrating them on Iraq instead, where the new war on terror is now being fought.
The immediate dividends from Saddam's capture is that it will finally convince those Iraqis who were sitting on the fence, those who were unsure if the dictator would eventually return to power, that this dark chapter of their history is finally closed. Former Baath officials in U.S. captivity who saw Saddam looking like the prisoner from the "Count of Monte Cristo" will no longer fear his wrath and would likely become more cooperative with their American captors.
http://www.upi.com/print.cfm?StoryID=20031214-112018-1415r
57
posted on
12/14/2003 12:27:36 PM PST
by
lchoro
To: Smogger
Agreed ...Saddam will talk.
Everytime we enter the room to question him.....we need to have a member of the Kurdish Peshmerga along with us....
Saddam will be given the choice TALK or the Kurds get you!
58
posted on
12/14/2003 12:27:53 PM PST
by
Dog
(First question to Saddam..........Where is Scott Speicher??)
To: Ole Okie
If I drink water I will have to go to the bathroom and how can I use the bathroom...He probably remembers the effect of the ice tea on Al Gore.
59
posted on
12/14/2003 12:27:56 PM PST
by
NCjim
To: fourhorsemen
It does no good to allow him to continue to spew his propoganda for the next 20 years or so. I have a nagging feeling that he won't last anywhere near that long...
60
posted on
12/14/2003 12:28:07 PM PST
by
Chad Fairbanks
(I don't hear voices. I AM the voices...)
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