Sorry, I ain't buy'n it. Saddam has oppressed the Iraqi people for more than 20 years.....if they are ALLOWED to have guns, it is MOST definately WITHOUT bullets.
Do you really think Saddam would furnish guns WITH ammo to the very people who he's viciously oppressed for so long. In essence giving them the "chance", however remotely, to overthrow, or kill him?
No one ever mentions what the registration requirements are in Iraq, or other relevent details.
It's not the first time this has been brought up in the press- last week it appeared frequently enough to look like it was an intentional talking point distributed for the seminar caller crowd. Since it appeared in different papers among correspondants who are allowed to be in Iraq because of their malleability, and who are escorted at all times by Iraqi intelligence officers, it is most likely a point directly from the Iraqis, who are trying to play on western fears of coalition troops having to engage in house-to-house fighting. As such it is unreliable information.
Note that they have paraded around their fattened home guard for the cameras as well, and claimed they have volunteer suicide bombers lined up. It's all an effort to imply that the civilian population will fight to the death to keep Hussein in power.
They won't of course- because if they were really as well armed as the government agents claim, they would not be living in fear of Hussein's security forces. They live in fear of hussein's security forces becasue they know every detail of the life of each Iraqi. They know the family links and friendships, employment history, etc, of each citizen- even of dissidents who have long since gone overseas. This is nothing new- it has gone on for decades. That's how Hussein's agents were able to assasinate dissidents abroad and how they were able to find the family members of those they blackmailed. They have literally registered the people- and having done so, knowing and controlling who is armed, how well they are supplied, and whether or not they ever get to practice is an easy matter. Everything is regulated by the one party in power. Unusual purchases or buys deemed excessive will be duly noted, investigated, and punished, and there is no legal defense for anyone the government selects for arrest on any charges, or no charges at all.
And in a land without free speech and right of assembly, gun ownership does little good for you cannot rally your fellow citizens. Gun ownership in Iraq, owing to the lack of basic liberties, limits militias to a membership of one or at most a small family unit. The inability to assemble without drawing the ire of party officials or government prevents citizen's militias from forming and threatening the power of those in charge.
Good question! Saddam's "arming" of the population seems like a PR ploy, to scare us from fighting a war in the city from street to street.