INSIDE STORY: Hussein son's wild orders led to Iraq military collapse

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | May 25, 2003 | Robert Collier

[sarcasm]

Baghdad -- In the final days before Baghdad fell, Saddam Hussein's son Qusai issued a series of military orders that sent thousands of elite Republican Guard troops to their certain death in the open countryside.

According to accounts provided to The Chronicle by more than a dozen Iraqi military officials -- some of them still hiding from American forces -- the orders exposed the core of the Iraqi military to devastating U.S. air attacks and left the capital's defenses markedly weakened.

[SamAdams76]

I think we should go into Cuba next. Congo can wait until after Bush is re-elected (otherwise he'll lose the Pygmie vote).

[bert]

These rockets use a launcher fabricated from light weight polyvinyl chloride tubing. One end is capped and has a pizoelectric ignighter installed. The projectile is commonly rammed down the tube until it rests against a stop at the combustion chamber. An alchol based pressurized mist is sprayed into the chamber and ignited by the pizo igniter.

[LurkedLongEnough]

The observation about the SFC implicitly minimizing American strategy & victory is the most realistic comment so far.

This tactic is being used here in the CT valley media here but it is even more blatant. Everything about Iraq is: the US made a mistake, the US is making a mistake now, and the US will make further mistakes. http://www.ctnow.com

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

Thank you for posting this. It's about time we had a president who will not stand for a dictatorship regime that endangers us all.

Well, this article seems to indicate the exact opposite. Add the Iraq's leadership complete incompetence to their lack of WMD's and... what justifies spending $70 billions of a couple hundred of dead Americans?

Iraq was clearly not a danger to us or anyone else. Iraq could not discipline a few thousand Kurds on their own territory. Okay, maybe they did execute a few prostitutes but... would that be why 200 Americans had to die?

[sweetliberty]

"When the war was going well, we overlooked it."

At what point was the war going well for the Iraquis? I must have missed that.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

I think we should go into Cuba next. Congo can wait until after Bush is re-elected (otherwise he'll lose the Pygmie vote).

LOL (sorry) but... the Pygmies' vote is being 'lost' as we are debating the issue here. They're... toast (or roast).

[Dustbunny]

Strange article.

Are these people attempting to rewrite history while it is happening?

[snooker]

" ... Sounds like the article is trying to minimize the U.S. victory "

yep we didn't win, they lost.

I think the proper term for this is 'getting inside their decision loop'. This means we were advancing so fast the last order Saddam issued was obselete by the time the troops got it. So his troops were being ordered to do things that were out of date from the perspective of the troops on the lines. Drives the soldiers nuts.

Just what Franks had planned to do. Neato. And it worked brilliantly.

[Miss Marple]

Ah, I see you are climbing way out on that limb, a dangerous thing when we have a president who knows how to use a chainsaw.

Apparently you think that not only was President Bush lying, but so was Vice President Cheney, Secretary of State Powell, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Senator Evan Bayh, Senator Joe Lieberman, CIA Director George Tenet, PM Tony Blair, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, the PM of Australia, the President of Poland, the President of Bulgaria, and the King of Jordan.

Boy, that is some conspiracy to lie! And not ONE leak from any of the agencies or governments involved!!

You are nothing more than a Rat plant. I have said it before, and I will say it again. You have all the catch-phrases of the right, but you reveal yourself with your comment about a "few prostitutes." Fortunately, others are on to your scam.

[Common Tator]

very interesting analysis of why Bush mangles his words

It is a very common happening amoung very bright people. It tends to happen most when they are trying their best to perform well.

I had a friend that had an I.Q. of about 180. He was unable to pass an oral exam on a subject he likely knew better than all his instructors combined. He just mangled everything. I finally talked him into going with out sleep for 48 hours before he took the test again. He was totally exhaused and aced the test with a perfect score. We just had to dumb him down to the level of the people who created the test, and exhaust him so his brain slowed way down. It worked. He performed perfectly.

[A Vast RightWing Conspirator]

Sinafasi Makelo, a representative of Mbuti pygmies, told the UN's Indigenous People's Forum that during the four-year civil war his people had been hunted down and eaten.

This is nothing more, nothing less, than a crime against humanity

Sinafasi Makelo

"In living memory, we have seen cruelty, massacres, and genocide, but we have never seen human beings hunted down as though they were game animals," he said.

"Pygmies are being pursued in the forests. People have been eaten. This is nothing more, nothing less, than a crime against humanity."

More than 600,000 pygmies are believed to live in the DR Congo's vast forests, where they survive by hunting and gathering.

Both sides in the war regard them as "subhuman", and some say their flesh can confer magical powers.

[SamAdams76]

Just because WMD's were mentioned in the build-up to the war, it doesn't make it the central issue of why we did go to war. We do know that Iraq repeatedly violated the terms of the 1991 cease-fire (did you know that we have been technically at war ever since?) and that the UN security council was not serious about enforcing them, instead content to play an endless shell game with inspectors.

Saddam Hussein was a threat to the United States. Saddam had a prior history of using WMDs and attacking countries with little or no provocation (Iran, Kuwait, Israel). It is reasonable to assume, based on Saddam's history, that once WMDs were acquired, they would be sold to terrorists to be used against us. I am glad that we didn't sit around and wait for this to happen. President Bush himself said "We are not going to wait upon events before taking action."

If no WMD's are found, then this victory will be even greater than it already is. Because it would have demonstrated that we got there in time.

[Podkayne]

That's right. I just located a great quote from Mr. Stalin. Some of you were probably lead to believe that it was Mr. Frumm or Mr. Bush's original phrase but... it's Stalin's. Here it is:

Those who are not for us are against us!.

The FIRST person to say "Those who are not for me, are against me" was jesus.

[SamAdams76]

Yeah, I was too quick with that response. The Pygmie vote is being lost already. I wonder if there is anything we can to do stop these poor people from being hunted down and eaten.

[Frapster]

While there were many issues we went to war - WMDs were clearly a key factor in the decision. Powell went through great pains to give us 'irrefutable' facts in one interview... it was a significant issue and something's wrong in Denmark if we do not come up with a plausible explanation as to where they are (or what happened to them).

[SamAdams76]

Well like I said in an earlier reply, if no WMDs are found, the victory will be even sweeter, for it will mean that we got there in time.

[Frapster]

The FIRST person to say "Those who are not for me, are against me" was jesus.

Hey - could you give me a reference on that? I can't find it. Thanks.

[AmericanVictory]

Excellent. In fact they clearly were ready to fight those earlier wars and were incapable of adapting, which combined with our tactics and innovations to their disaster.

[AmericanVictory]

Exactamente, which makes all the more ironical CNN's use of him as a commentator and would be candidate backed by Bill.

[TomB]

Are you on the right thread?