Posted on 09/23/2002 6:51:30 PM PDT by blam
Bunkers make Saddam a difficult target
Ewen MacAskill in Baghdad
Tuesday September 24, 2002
The Guardian
Western diplomats yesterday dismissed as negligible the chances of killing the Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein, through air strikes or some other form of assassination. President Saddam has a series of deep underground bunkers capable of protecting him from a direct hit with conventional weapons.
The prospect of a military strike aimed at him and senior members of his government was reported by US newspapers at the weekend.
The US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, in comments consistent with the reports, said late on Sunday, on a visit to Warsaw, that the US planned to try to avoid civilian casualties in the event of war with Iraq and focus on the country's leaders.
But a western diplomat, sceptical of the US chances of success through assassination or organising a coup attempt, said there was an exaggerated view of what the US was capable of. He said that President Saddam's whereabouts at any given time was not known.
"The idea of a CIA team getting in is for the birds," he said. "Getting anywhere near Saddam Hussein is near impossible." He added that a land invasion would be needed to remove him.
The diplomat was also sceptical about the chances of a revolt, or a coup, given that President Saddam frequently rotated his commanders. "There are whole sections of society that feel excluded. From survival instinct, they will do nothing," he said. "But, like Ceausescu, only if they thought he was going would they move."
Government ministers have not yet taken to bunkers. The Iraqi deputy prime minister, Tariq Aziz, has made many public appearances over the last week, and still uses an office in the foreign ministry building, which is above ground.
Iraq's bunkers can accommodate hundreds of people and contain supplies, including air, food and water, for up to a month. They house military command posts.
Tanks can also be stationed in the bunkers, and there are several underground hospitals.
They were built in the 1980s by engineers from the former Yugoslavia who gained their expertise building shelters in Belgrade.
One of the engineers who built the Iraqi bunkers said in a recent interview: "Conventional weapons can hardly reach him and I don't believe the US can get rid of him that way."
He added: "Saddam's shelters can resist a direct hit by a TNT bomb of 2,000 kilograms, or a 20 kiloton explosion as close as a kilometre away." The bunkers were buried under a minimum of 30 metres of stone.
When the Labour MP George Galloway recently met President Saddam in a bunker after being driven for an hour from a Baghdad hotel, he said the lift journey took 20 seconds, suggesting it was deep underground.
US technology so far does not appear to be able to penetrate such bunkers.
Even if Washington had the necessary weapons, US intelli gence would have to have a fix on his whereabouts.
An Iraqi businessman, at present in Baghdad but who travels widely in Europe, said President Saddam, whom he had met, seldom slept in the same place more than one or two nights, and used locations in different neighbourhoods around Baghdad.
The president makes few public appearances, though his image is everywhere. At a fashion show on Sunday to mark the opening of the annual Babylon festival, the models strode along the catwalk to martial music and a backdrop of footage of President Saddam on a white charger riding through Baghdad.
In a speech at the start of the show, the Iraqi vice-president, Taha Ramadan, said that Iraq had been the birthplace of civilisation, including writing, and that Baghdad had withstood wave after wave of invasions throughout its long history. "We will survive the next one," he said.
Heh heh heh, appearances can be deceiving ;o)
Tacky and maniacal. A vote for Democrats is a vote for letting Saddam have his own daytime talk show.
The U.S. should scrap plans for battle, sponsor a motion in the U.N. to lift Iraqi sanctions, and then apologize to the Labour Party in Britain for not heeding its warnings much earlier.
I've seen this headline before.
Osama may be alive (though I doubt it) but at least for the last 10 months he sure has been quiet
I don't know about today but back in the early 90's I worked for Texas Instruments who in the Gulf War designed a makeshift guidance system for some old battleship gun barrels filled with explosives.
They came up with the idea that the extra tough gun barrels could cut through much earth and concrete if dropped from a very high altitude.
I say a demo tape of the barrel being tested on a rocket sled and slammed into a 10 foot cube of concrete. The barrel went through it like butter and went at least another 1 mile skipping along the ground.
I had heard that this was one of the factors that caused Saddam to give up so quickly. If you remember one or 2 of his bunkers were blown up with people in them and then immediately after he gave up as he knew his days were numbered.
Sorry
Yup. Just consider the case of the late Osama bin-Laden. You are a wise man; I've said the same myself since Tora Bora. The man who retreats to a cave retreats to a tomb, if his enemies have the firepower to seal exits. We do. Your point about eliminating a martyr is also accurate. I said at the time of Tora Bora that we would not acknowlege OBL's demise if we knew about it, for just that reason. No corpse, no martyr.
I was working at TI then also, retired in 1994. Below is what was built in 13 days from old howitzer gun barrels, it's called the GBU-28. Only two were used in the Gulf War.
How about the B 61 BUNKER BUSTER?
This thing was made with guys like Saddam in mind.
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