American Troops Are Coming Home From Iraq by Gregory Hilton

After a year in Iraq the 250 soldiers of the 146th Signal Battalion came home to Jacksonville, Florida today. They suffered no casualties. They faithfully answered our nation’s call and the U.S. mission to foster a free and secure Iraq is almost complete. Our troops pulled back from all of the Iraqi cities and towns in June.
The tremendous change was demonstrated this week when Prime Minister Malaki announced his unity slate for the January 16th elections. It includes Sunnis, who turned on al-Qaeda, Kurds, tribal leaders, religious minorities and, of course, the dominant Shi’ite’s. The campaign will be difficult and the opposition National Alliance could win. That is what democracy is all about.
There is still violence and basic services have not been restored everywhere, but Iraq is now safer, more orderly and farther along the path to liberty than ever before. For six years American soldiers stood between the elements of a fledgling free market democracy and the forces of destruction. Now the Iraq Army is standing up and the baton is being passed. We are witnessing the dawn of a new Middle East and we should be proud and eternally grateful for the sacrifice of our armed forces.

Was The Iraq War a Mistake Because WMD Stockpiles Were Not Found by Gregory Hilton

The United States and its allies believed Saddam Hussein had WMD stockpiles. Prior to the U.S. invasion no one could determine if these stockpiles had been destroyed because the Iraqi regime had kicked out the UN weapons inspectors four years earlier.
The stockpiles did not exist but the UN Report by weapons inspector Charles Duelfer concluded that Iraq had the ability and infrastructure for instantly creating new WMD stockpiles in about a week. They intended to begin churning them out the minute the sanctions ended.
Many of the allies we wanted to help us bring down Saddam Hussein were already in a corrupt coalition to keep him in power. The UN found documents which showed the “guiding theme” of Saddam’s regime was to be able to start making WMD again “with as short a lead time as possible.” Once again, Saddam was convinced that the UN sanctions – which stopped him acquiring weapons – were on the brink of collapse and he bankrolled several foreign activists who were campaigning for their abolition. He personally approved every one.

Attacks From Child Suicide Bombers are Expected to Increase by Gregory Hilton

His death was caused by a child suicide bomber.

Attacks From Child Suicide Bombers are Expected to Increase by Gregory Hilton–
Many events will occur on July 4th to honor our active duty service members and coalition partners who are now on the front lines. U.S. troops pulled out of Iraqi cities two days ago, but unfortunately the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq are not behind us. This week intelligence reports from the government of Pakistan demonstrate that the Taliban is increasing its recruitment of child suicide bombers.
Per capita income in Pakistan is $2,600, but the Taliban is paying between $7,000 and $14,000 to families who will allow their young children to be used as suicide bombers. Corporal Marc Birch, 26, was killed just four months after this wedding photo was taken. He died along side Sergeant John Manuel, 38, Corporal Damian Davies, 27, and Lance Corporal Steven Fellows, 26. They were all killed by a 13 year old boy who was pushing a wheelbarrow. Similar attacks will occur in the weeks and months ahead.
July 4th — Are our soldiers dying in vain?
Those who defend our freedom are volunteers. Regardless of how one feels about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the worst thing we can do is to say they died in vain because the war on terror is not winnable. The hundreds of firemen and police officers who perished at the World Trade Center did not die in vain even though their efforts to save lives proved to be futile. Those who have given their lives in the Drug War have not left us in vain, even though drug activity continues.
Deaths are pointless only when people go through their entire lives without knowing why they exist and what they should do with their lives. Evil will flourish only when good people do nothing. We can never have a world where we hold back and do nothing simply because evil will always be with us. Sacrifices in the service of humanity are not wasted, and our soldiers have not died in vain.

Second Anniversary: Harry Reid Declares Iraq War Lost by Gregory Hilton

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV)

Sunday will mark the second anniversary of the day Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid declared the war in Iraq was lost, and the surge would not accomplish anything. Reid said “I believe myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense and — you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows — (know) this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday,” said Reid said at the time.
At one time al Qaeda in Iraq had 10,000 troops, but today over 9,000 of them are deceased. The conflict is not over but troop withdrawals are taking place, and the situation is far better today.
President Obama was wise to retain Secretary Gates and he maintained continuity with the Bush administration policies that were working. On his recent visit, Obama praised our troops in Iraq: “From getting rid of Saddam, to reducing violence, to stabilizing the country, to facilitating elections — you have given Iraq the opportunity to stand on its own as a democratic country. That is an extraordinary achievement.” He never said that during the campaign, but at least he is saying it now.

Why Are We in Iraq?: Did Bush Lie and Was There Any Link to Terrorism by Gregory Hilton

President Bush Speaking in Saddam Hussein's Republican Palace in Baghdad in November of 2003

Winston Churchill once said, “The price of greatness is responsibility.” America is truly a great nation, and that is the simplest answer to the “why” we are in Iraq. As a great nation we have global responsibilities to ourselves and to others. The conflict is not over in Iraq, but 27 million people are living in freedom and I believe history will prove our cause just.
Sandy Berger, the National Security Advisor to former President Clinton, spoke a few years ago about America’s role in the world. “We cannot be everywhere and do everything. But we also cannot afford to do nothing, and be nowhere,” Berger said. Without American leadership the job will not get done. Iraq is an example of where the US had to lead in order to maintain security and maintain prosperity. We cannot hunker down if we want our children to live safely and thrive. Many people say we must be engaged in the world — but they never want us to do so when our engagement is needed.
The UN inspectors were asked to leave Iraq before President Clinton’s Operation Desert Fox in 1998. They did not return until President Bush insisted. Every intelligence agency in the world told us WMD was still present. Saddam’s high command did not realize he had destroyed the stockpiles, because it was a state secret. If President Bush lied about Iraq, then so did President Clinton, Prime Minister Blair, President Chirac and Chancellor Schroder.
Saddam Hussein did not live up to the 1991 cease fire agreement by meeting HIS burden of proof to disclose the whereabouts of the WMD.
As far as direct connections between Saddam’s Iraq and al Qaeda, this was addressed in a March 2008 Pentagon-sponsored study entitled Saddam and Terrorism: Emerging Insights from Captured Iraqi Documents. It was based on a review of more than 600,000 Iraqi documents captured after the 2003 US invasion. The study noted that “Saddam supported groups that either associated directly with al Qaeda (such as the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, led at one time by bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri) or that generally shared al Qaeda’s stated goals and objectives.” According to the Pentagon study, Egyptian Islamic Jihad was one of many jihadist groups that Iraq’s former dictator funded, trained, equipped, and armed.
Saddam was willing to use operatives affiliated with al Qaeda, and this “created both the appearance of and, in some ways, a ‘de facto’ link between the organizations. At times, these organizations would work together in pursuit of shared goals but still maintain their autonomy and independence because of innate caution and mutual distrust.”

Presidential Leadership: The Military Command Decisions of Abraham Lincoln and George W. Bush by Gregory Hilton (Part Two, George W. Bush)

President Bush in 2003 at Saddam Hussein's former palace in Baghdad. At left is Gen. Ricardo Sanchez and at right is Amb. Paul Bremer, the U.S. Administrator for Iraq.

Presidential Leadership: The Military Command Decisions of Abraham Lincoln and George W. Bush by Gregory Hilton, Armed Forces Radio Network, Part Two, George W. Bush. (This commentary was originally recorded in two 90 second segments. The complete transcript is below).

Welcome back. Earlier today I reviewed some of President Abraham Lincoln’s key command decisions. Similar to Lincoln’s experience, during the first four years of the Iraq war President George W. Bush also deferred to his generals. He went along with all of their recommendations but the situation in Iraq continued to deteriorate.
The promises the military made to Bush never materialized, and domestic opposition to the conflict was becoming widespread. Bush repeatedly said his Iraq commander, General George W. Casey, Jr., “will make the decisions as to how many troops we have there,” but by the Fall of 2006 the President had lost confidence in both Casey and his boss, General John Abizaid.
American casualties were continuing to climb in Iraq. The 2006 elections resulted in a tremendous win for the Democrats and they captured control of both the House and Senate. The major issue in the 2006 campaign was the Iraq war and the pressure on President Bush to pull back was tremendous. Republicans lost 36 seats in the House, and if Bush had campaigned on increasing the number of troops in Iraq the GOP losses would probably have reached 55 seats.
Bush’s approval rating was at rock bottom but he dramatically opposed popular opinion by deciding to increase the number of troops and to implement a new population centric counter insurgency strategy. This is now known as the surge. It included 5 brigades (20,000 troops) and was announced by President Bush on January 7, 2007. The next day the President went to Georgia to meet with the soldiers who would soon be leaving for Iraq.
Behind the scenes the surge was opposed by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, former Secretary of State Colin Powell and the top commanders in Iraq. On the CBS program “Face the Nation,” Powell said “the surge can not be sustained” because the Army was at the breaking point. Powell claimed a surge had already been tried in Baghdad and had failed.
The opponents also included practically all of our senior military commanders in the Pentagon. In mid-November of 2006, President Bush told General Peter Pace he wanted a new strategy and a significant surge of forces in Iraq. Pace, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, immediately assembled his colleagues to discuss the President’s plan.
The opposition to the Bush proposal included General Peter Schoomaker, the Army Chief of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, the Chief of Naval Operations, and General George W. Casey, Jr., the Commander of Coalition Ground Forces in Iraq. Schoomaker said a surge would not transform the situation and “our forces are already stretched to the breaking point.” The Army chief said the idea “worried the hell out of him.” Casey felt a civil war was beginning in Iraq and American troops should not be in the middle. Admiral Mullen thought the troops would provoke violence rather than quell it.
General Pace informed the President of the JCS’ adamant opposition, and to quell the anger Bush agreed to a direct meeting at the Pentagon where he could hear the JCS viewpoint. It did not sway him. If a surge was to occur the JCS said it should be limited to two brigades, but Bush insisted on five.
The report of the Iraq Study Group (better known as Baker-Hamilton) was released on December 6, 2006 and called for an immediate “phased withdrawal” of U.S. forces. This would have been a complete reversal of Bush’s plan.
Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) agreed with the recommendations and said withdrawals should begin in the Spring of 2007. The new Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid (D-NV), introduced legislation calling for a complete U.S. withdrawal by March of 2008, and said Iraq was “the worst foreign policy mistake in the history of this country.” Senator Chuck Hagel (R-NE) called the surge “Folly,” and his colleagues Joe Biden (D-DE) and Hillary Clinton (D-NY) were in agreement with him.
All of the withdrawal recommendations were rejected by the President who was continuing to move in the opposite direction. The surge also required major personnel changes.
The first to go was Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld who resigned under pressure in early December. It was also not possible to have an Iraq Commander opposed to the new policy, and this meant General Casey had to be removed. He was kicked upstairs and succeeded Schoomaker as Army Chief of Staff. Bush then reached well down into the Army ranks to promote the pro-surge General David Petraeus as Casey’s successor in Iraq.
The surge opponents also included Lt. General Ricardo Sanchez, Casey’s predecessor as Iraq commander from June 2003 to June 2004. Sanchez called the surge a “desperate” move and said “The best we can do with this flawed approach is to stave off defeat.” He went on to say the United States was “living a nightmare with no end in sight.”
In November of 2005, Rep. John Murtha (D-PA), the current Chairman of the Defense Appropriations Committee, introduced a resolution calling for the redeployment of troops from Iraq as soon as practicable. Murtha had the behind the scenes support of General John Abizaid, the Commander of the United States Central Command, from 2003 until March of 2007. In December of 2006, Abizaid told Bush directly that “our forces need to get out of Iraq.” He said a surge would only increase Iraqi dependence on Americans.
David Brooks of “The New York Times” made the best observation of the President’s war leadership:“Bush is an outrageously self-confident man. Well, without that self-confidence he never would have overruled his generals. In fact, when it comes to Iraq, Bush was at his worst when he was humbly deferring to the generals and at his best when he was arrogantly overruling them.”
This is the Armed Forces Radio Network and I am Gregory Hilton in Washington, D.C.

Presidential Leadership: The Military Command Decisions of Abraham Lincoln and George W. Bush by Gregory Hilton – Part One, Abraham Lincoln

The Bush Administration came to a close at noon today.

Presidential Leadership: The Military Command Decisions of Abraham Lincoln and George W. Bush by Gregory Hilton, (Part One, Abraham Lincoln).  Armed Forces Radio Network. (This commentary was originally recorded in two 90 second segments. The complete transcript is below).
WASHINGTON, D.C. (AFRN) – President Barack Obama’s inspiring Inaugural ceremonies included many references to the legacy of Abraham Lincoln. The Inaugural theme “A new birth of freedom” came from Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. Obama began his campaign in Lincoln’s hometown, Springfield, Illinois.On Monday he visited the Lincoln Memorial, he took the oath on Lincoln’s Bible, his train ride and even the menu was similar to what was used for our 16^th President.
This emphasis on Lincoln’s legacy is commendable, and Obama is close to matching Lincoln’s eloquence. Hopefully in the years to come he will also have the lonely resolve to match Lincoln’s leadership abilities. This will most involve critical decisions which will not be popular. In his address today the new President was off to an excellent start by warning of “our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age.”  He even promised not to put off “unpleasant decisions.”
We do not know the future of the Obama Administration, but the new Commander-in-Chief is another war president who spoke today of defeating our enemies. U.S. forces in Afghanistan are in the process of being doubled, and the chant “Death to America” is still repeated on a daily basis by numerous terrorist organizations. Obama will have to meet military challenges and I hope he recognizes the strong parallels between the difficult command decisions of Abraham Lincoln and George W. Bush.
Both Lincoln and Bush had little military experience, they were confronted with significant domestic opposition to a war, and it took them years to find a commander who could implement a successful strategy. Both Presidents had to reluctantly learn military strategy. They read the current books and closely questioned the experts. They courageously had to overrule practically all of their advisers to implement plans which involved a major change in tactics. They made decisions which were not popular at the time, but were in hindsight were clearly in our nation’s best interest.
The Union Army was solidly opposed to Lincoln’s decision to remove the popular General George McClellan, who would become Lincoln’s opponent in 1864. Lincoln’s cabinet was against the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation which freed the slaves. Lincoln’s advisors emphasized the dangerous political consequences of an Emancipation Proclamation.
They felt the Civil War should focus on restoring the Union rather than abolishing slavery. Advocates of emancipation were set back in the 1862 election when Republicans lost 28 House seats. The cabinet vote was 7 to 1 against the Proclamation. The sole vote in favor came at the end of the discussion from Lincoln himself who opposed everyone and said “The ayes have it!” The Cabinet was also unanimously in favor of harsh post-War reconciliation policies for the South, and President Lincoln noted “You are all against me.”
Lincoln became a brilliant military strategist, but it took the President a long time to acquire that skill. Lincoln was in the forefront of advocating what became the modern military command structure. The Civil War’s final end game strategy was primarily the President’s plan, while battlefield tactics were left to General Grant.
Lincoln’s problem was that his initial commanders were reluctant to engage the enemy without having overwhelming force behind them. In the early years of the war the South made significant gains despite having far fewer troops and equipment. On the Antietam battlefield Lincoln told his commander, “General McClellan, if you don’t want to use the Army, I should like to borrow it for a while.”
Lincoln had to fire five Union commanders (Generals Irvin McDowell, George McClellan, Ambrose Burnside, Joseph Hooker and George Meade) before he found the winning formula in U.S. Grant. McDowell lost the first major engagement of the war at Bull Run. McClellan won at Antietam but did not strike a fatal blow against Robert E. Lee who he failed to pursue. Burnside was defeated at Fredericksburg, and Hooker was defeated by Lee’s army at Chancellorsville despite having a huge advantage in troops. Meade let Lee and the Confederate army escape after Gettysburg.
Over 620,000 soldiers were killed in the Civil War. President Lincoln would have lost his 1864 bid for re-election without the public jubilation which resulted from General William Sherman’s victory in Atlanta two months prior to the balloting. Many of these stories are best told in “Lincoln and his Generals” by T. Harry Williams (1952).

President George W. Bush’s Legacy in Iraq (Part Two) by Gregory Hilton

President Bush with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Secretary Gates

Guest Commentary by Gregory Hilton, Distributed by Matrix Media via WDHA 105.5 FM. (Editorial Note: This is part two of a two part 90 second commentary).

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Bush presidency will be judged in large part by the outcome of the war in Iraq. Future historians are unlikely to be similar to the present partisan group. They will take a long term view and note that the Middle East truly began to change during the Bush era.
The conflict is far from over but the dominance al-Qaeda had on Iraq at the beginning of 2007 is clearly at an end. George Bush stood alone in advocating the surge strategy and it has been a clear success. The 22,000 troops which comprised it have already come home, and additional withdrawals will be occurring in the months ahead.
Two years ago war critics said our troops should leave Iraq immediately because the war was lost. Now they are telling us to leave Iraq because the war is won. Iraq’s future is not certain, but it clearly will not be the failed state the critics were predicting.
The best indicator is that the Iraqi GDP is now 30 percent higher than it was under Saddam Hussein. Foreign companies have already invested over $74 billion in new porjects, and none of these investments involve oil.
Practically all businesses have now reopened, the refugees are returning in large numbers, and new construction projects can be seen everywhere. Street life is back to normal and the concrete blast walls have been removed. The suicide attacks have not ended, but the nation is safer than northern Mexico, and the homicide rate in Baghdad is less than Chicago.
The American drawdown is well underway and the Iraq army is standing up. U.S. forces will start leaving Iraqi towns and cities next June and they will complete their withdrawal by the end of 2011.
Iraq is clearly on the path to defending itself. The improved security situation can be seen in the graffiti on a bridge near Basra. A fleeing militiaman scrawled “We’ll be back;” and underneath an Iraqi soldier replied: “And we’ll be waiting for you.”
Other positive signs include oil production which is up by 400,000 barrels to 2.9 million barrels. Property values in Baghdad doubled in the past year. More and more women are driving cars. Christmas is now recognized as a holiday and Iraqi’s have the constitutional right to visit Israel, or any other nation.
Democracy is firmly taking root in Iraq, and the country will hold provincial elections in 14 of its 18 provinces on January 31. They first went to the polls in January of 2005, and national elections to determine the fate of Prime Minister Maliki will be held in December.
This transformation was possible because George Bush changed the world. Many of his predecessors were popular, but they did not respond to aggression with sufficient force, and their failure to use military power often emboldened our enemies.
If you do not believe me just ask Osama bin Laden. He spoke to TIME magazine about the October 3, 1993 botched raid in Somalia which resulted in the deaths of 18 U.S. soldiers. Four days later President Clinton pulled all American forces out of Somalia.
Bin Laden said this incident made him realize “more than before that the American soldier was a paper tiger and after a few blows ran in defeat.”
Other examples sited by bin Laden were the 1983 attack in Beirut, Lebanon when a 16 year old girl driving a bomb packed truck blew up the Marine barracks. The result was a total American withdrawal.
The terrorist also knew that the first Persian Gulf War ended after 100 hours, and Bill Clinton’s Kosovo bombing campaign resulted in no American casualties. The U.S. response was also muted after the African embassy bombings and the attack on the destroyer Cole.
There was nothing muted about the response of the Bush administration. The overwhelming enthusiasm for President Obama is encouraging, and this mandate will certainly help his foreign policy agenda. Our new Commander-in-Chief is leading the world’s only superpower, and perhaps he will be spared the scorn George Bush received at home and abroad.
Former Spanish Prime Minister José María Aznar does not believe it. After the Obama honeymoon the criticism will come, says Aznar, because military and economic power makes America, “the Rome of our times, a target of so much criticism. This comes with the territory, and President Obama and Americans will have to get use to it.”

President George W. Bush: He Made a Difference (Part One) By Gregory Hilton

Guest Commentary by Gregory Hilton, Distributed by Matrix Media via WDHA 105.5 FM. (Editorial Note: This is part one of a two part 90 second commentary).

Washington, D.C. — President George W. Bush heads home to Crawford, Texas on Tuesday as the second most unpopular chief executive in modern history. His approval ratings have been under 40% for two and half years, and his final CBS/New York Times score was a dismal 22%.
Last April “Harper’s” magazine had an article on the viewpoint of professional historians towards the Bush Administration. It was entitled “Worst. President. Ever.” The scorn for George Bush will continue for quite some time, and if you rate President’s by their current popularity, then he would be considered a failure.
I have no doubt history will be kind to President Bush. Warren Harding was a very popular president at the time of his death in 1923, and Harry Truman’s approval rating was below Bush’s when he left the White House in 1953. The verdict of history was reversed for both men, and the same thing will happen with Bush.
The reversal is already happening. President-elect Barack Obama is changing positions he took during the campaign and his new views are in alignment with the outgoing Commander-in-Chief. It is also apparent that the Bush Administration has a profound foreign policy legacy, and the war in Iraq is ending in a clear victory for the United States.
The short term political consequences of the Iraq War and the Bush Doctrine were disastrous for the Republican Party. In the years to come, however, the long term impact of President Bush’s foreign policy decisions will be enormously positive for our nation and the world.
Bush’s military deployments have already given 52 million people in Iraq and Afghanistan a chance for a better life, and positive change can already be seen throughout the Middle East. Primarily because of the outgoing President, Iraq has been transformed from a chief sponsor of terrorist organizations to a frontline foe of these groups. Libya’s nuclear weapons stockpile can now be seen in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Syria’s stranglehold on Lebanon has ended, and Kuwait has an elected Parliament, and women have the right to vote and hold office. The international community is more united than ever in confronting Iran.
The Bush Administration promoted human rights in the Middle East and throughout the world. Their smart sanctions against nations such as Belarus brought about the release of all political prisoners.
There were no attacks on American soil after 9/11 and in large part this is due to Bush’s Patriot Act and his creation of a Department of Homeland Security. His administration doubled foreign aid and quadrupled spending on malaria and HIV/AIDS prevention. The result is that over 10 million lives were saved, a record no other president can match.

The Palaces of Saddam Hussein and the Iraq Body Count By Gregory Hilton

This 2001 photo shows the entrance to the Republican Palace with two large busts of Saddam Hussein on the roof.

The Palaces of Saddam Hussein and the Iraq Body Count By Gregory Hilton, (This commentary was recorded in two 120 second segments, a longer version appears below).–
01/01/09–WASHINGTON, D.C. –The American flag was lowered for last time today from Saddam Hussein’s main Republican Palace on the Tigris River in Baghdad. The Palace is empty now, but not long ago over 1,000 Americans worked in this 1.7 mile complex.
It served as the headquarters for Paul Bremer when he ruled the nation as the “U.S. Administrator for Iraq.” It was also the U.S. Embassy and it will soon become the office of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.
The United Nations mandate for Iraq expired yesterday at midnight and today a new bilateral agreement between the U.S. and Iraq went into effect. The agreement calls for all U.S. combat troops to leave Iraqi cities by next June, with complete withdrawal in 2011. Control of Baghdad’s government center or Green Zone, and Iraq’s airspace was also handed over today, and a few hours ago the British vacated Basra airport.
At the height of his power, Saddam Hussein controlled a one million man Army, sent rockets into space, and came close to developing an atomic bomb. His vast purchases of armaments were strictly curtailed after his 1990 invasion of Kuwait, and his subsequent spending sprees focused on the construction of palaces.
With the turn over of the Republican Palace, all of these buildings are now under Iraqi control. The various palaces include over 1000 buildings and huge land areas. A 1999 report from the Clinton Administration described the billions of dollars Saddam spent on these edifices, and 48 of the 52 palace complexes were constructed while Iraq was under international sanctions imposed by the United Nations. The importation of luxury items was forbidden but smuggling and the black market trade made this possible. The funding came from diversions out of the UN “Oil for Food” program. Iraq was allowed to sell oil to feed its population but vast amounts of money were instead diverted and squandered by the leadership of the Ba’ath Party.
Many dictators have expensive tastes, and the Saddam era palaces feature tons of marble, gold fixtures, crystal chandeliers, priceless art work, over stuffed throne rooms, indoor and outdoor swimming pools, man made lakes, dolphin ponds, as well as personal zoos and hospitals. Unique features included bunkers to withstand both chemical attacks and bazookas, and torture chambers. These chambers included hooks for hanging people by the hands during beatings, devices for electrical shock and the burning of skin.
Some of the palaces were bigger than Versailles, and the main building at the Lake Tharthar compound is five times larger than the White House and includes over 50 marble mansions.
Saddam had one of the largest yachts in the world, and his son Uday had over 1,200 exotic luxury cars. If Uday admired anyone’s car he just took it. He did the same thing with women. He even abducted a bride from her wedding. According to Human Rights Watch, he was responsible for hundreds of rapes and many of the victims were murdered.
Uday shot and killed an Iraq Army officer who failed to salute to him. In the middle of a packed reception at the Republican Palace for Suzanne Mubarak, the wife of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, Uday horrified the guests by beating his father’s valet to death.
Saddam’s palaces are quickly fading from memory, but the tremendous human rights violations of his regime will not be fully understood if the luxury building boom is forgotten. Many critics of Operation Iraqi Freedom believe the Bush Administration made a mistake by not giving UN sanctions more time to work.
Sanctions went into effect at the time of Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, and they lasted until his down fall in 2003. Despite the success of the surge and an 86% reduction in American combat casualties this year, the critics also believe the Iraq mission was not worth it because of the cost and civilian casualties.
These casualties fell by two-thirds in 2008, but past civilian casualties were high. The anti-war group Iraq Body Count (IBC) maintains a data base demonstrating over 90,000 civilian casualties since 2003. The IBC ignores Iraqi civilians killed during the Saddam Hussein era, and they make no discernment between those killed intentionally in terror attacks, or the far smaller number killed collaterally by security forces trying to stop the terrorists.
The IBC openly lays the blame for each death on the U.S. A Defense Department study concluded that the number of civilians killed in Iraq from American collateral damage to be between 1 and 2% of the overall count.
The critics ignore the large number of people, especially children, who were dying every day during the sanctions period. Sanctions were maintained after the 1991 Gulf War because of Saddam Hussein’s refusal to allow weapons inspectors into Iraq. His refusal to comply with the UN remains a mystery, but the result is not. During the sanctions period, Iraq’s GDP declined by 75%.
According to the World Health Organization, during the next decade over 500,000 Iraqi children needlessly died of malnutrition. Their story is told in two powerful documentaries, “Genocide by Sanctions” (1999) which claimed the total the number was 1.25 million, and “Killing the Children of Iraq—A Price Worth Paying?” (2000).
Iraq obviously had the available funds to feed those children, and if a problem developed, international humanitarian organizations would have gladly made food assistance donations. The children died because they were being used for political propaganda purposes, and palace construction was a far higher priority. Saddam Hussein could have prevented any child from suffering simply by meeting his obligations.
In a 1996 “60 Minutes” interview, Lesley Stahl questioned our then UN Ambassador, Madeleine Albright, about the sanctions policy. Stahl said “We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?
Albright responded: “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price–we think the price is worth it.” It was this comment that led to the title of the documentary I already mentioned.
In her book, Madam Secretary, Albright regretted the tone of her comment and said: “I must have been crazy; I should have answered the question by reframing it and pointing out the inherent flaws in the premise behind it. Little effort was made to explain Saddam’s culpability, his misuse of Iraqi resources, or the fact that we were not embargoing medicine or food. . . . Religious and human rights groups may be well-meaning [but] they need to understand who the real villain is. The villain is Saddam Hussein. It is not the international community that is keeping the Iraqi children and people from eating. It is Saddam Hussein. . . .He is the one that can pick up the key and let himself out of the sanctions box. He knows how to do it.”
All of this is important to remember as a new Iraqi government today moves into the Republican Palace. The squandered money is regrettable, but the great crime is what the late dictator did to own people.
Organizations such as Iraq Body Count do not provide complete figures. They do not mention:
The over 1 million dead during the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980’s.
The over 500,000 children who died during the 1990 – 2003 sanctions period.
The over 300,000 victims who died because of torture and other human rights violations during the Saddam era.
The over 60,000 Kurds who died during the Al-Anfal campaign of 1988.
The 85,000 casualties of 1991 Gulf War.
The 30,000 Kurds and 70,000 Shi’ites who died because of Saddam’s retribution after losing the 1991 Gulf War. 270 mass graves were discovered and exhumed after Saddam’s downfall.
If sanctions had remained in effect from 2003 to 2009 perhaps another 500,000 children would have perished.
On the positive side, there are no longer any political prisoners, no executions, no torture at Abu Ghraib Prison and no limit on the freedom of expression. The terrorists have not abandoned Iraq, but the large scale inhuman carnage and suffering has stopped, and 27 million people will have a better life.