Where are the investigative journalists? Questioning the official story about Uday and Qussay, By Richard Steven Hack

Opinion, July 2003, www.aljazeerah.info

Where are the investigative journalists: Questioning the official story about Uday and Qussay

By Richard Steven Hack

7/28/03

One wonders how the media could possible accept the internally inconsistent, contradictory and changing story of how the raid on the villa in which supposedly Saddam's sons were killed.

For starters, the original story said that in response to a "walk-in tip", several Humvees of soldiers approached the villa at 9 AM. Rebuffed by the occupants, they left and returned an hour later with reinforcements. After taking casualties even with these reinforcements, they are forced to call for further backup. Then the shooting escalated, eventually involving a representative sample of the entire US military arsenal (minus only B-52's, cruise missiles and tactical nuclear weapons).

Then General Sanchez laid out the story in more detail. Now the tip was received Monday night, a full TWELVE HOURS before the raid. Supposedly the raid was PLANNED overnight and US troops were placed in the neighborhood to backup the lead elements. The raid began at TEN AM, not NINE AM. The lead elements were rebuffed by gunfire and had to call for "backup". One wonders why backup had to be called when the raid had been planned for twelve hours before.

One also wonders at the amount of firepower used. Supposedly the two reasons are: we could not "siege them out" because they might escape, and "they were determined not to be taken alive". The problem with these concepts is, for the first, that the US waited TWELVE HOURS to begin the raid with no indication that they placed surveillance on the villa to insure the targets did not escape in the interim, possibly after becoming suspicious that they were being snitched on, and for the second, that once you run out of bullets, the only way not to be taken alive is to use the last one on yourself. It is clear from the firepower applied that the US military made no reasonable attempt to take the men alive, even though they were the clearest possible route to the capture of the man the US had been drooling to capture all along - their father. The excuse is, well, we didn't want to second-guess the commander on the ground - again, despite the fact that the raid had been planned for twelve hours before.

The next twist in the story comes when officers of the troop involved in the siege supposedly revealed that they DID NOT KNOW that the target was Saddam's sons. One wonders why the commanders of the forces involved were not told who the target was. Since the organizers had supposedly been tipped a full twelve hours before and had planned the raid for twelve hours, why weren't the troops involved - or at least their commanders - informed? Given the fact that these had to be considered both "high value" and "high risk" arrests, one would expect the troops to be shown pictures of the targets - to insure they could be identified and prevented from escaping - and that the troops would be counseled to use the utmost caution and care to insure both that the targets were captured and that it would be done with minimum casualties. Instead, a few troops march up to the door, try to enter and sustain at least three or four casualties.

The basic problem for the scenario is the first approach at nine AM. One could suspect that the entire event was an accident, and the original troops really did not know who was in the house while visiting it on a routine patrol or a routine tip. Then it could be that Sanchez, to cover up this embarrassing operation, couched the events to make them appear as a deliberate and professional operation based on a valid tip and a carefully laid plan. But this notion also falls down, since it too ignores the 9 AM approach. If there wasn't a tip, what were the soldiers doing there? Why did they leave and return an hour later? Didn't they have radios? Couldn't they have remained and called for assistance, as they supposedly had to do later? What if, during the hour they were gone, the men in the villa had escaped?

More unanswered - and unasked, by the media - questions exist:

1) Why were the sons, known to dislike each other, together? 2) Why would they have travelled together when it would have been more secure - and efficient, if in fact they were coordinating resistance activities - to travel separately? 3) Why were they in the house of a man known to have a grudge against them for jailing his brother for claiming kinship with Saddam? 4) Why were they in Mosul, a town very near the Kurds who would have killed them in an instant had the Kurds known they were there? 5) Why were they in the home of a man whose residence had apparently been used by the US military in the past? There are reports that photos of this house exist showing US tanks parked in front of it. 6) Why did the owner of the house - the supposed tipster - remove all his furniture in a van a week or so ago? 7) Why didn't the brothers become suspicious when this occurred - or when the man sent his wife and family away the morning of the attack?

All of this makes a bit more sense if you consider the following scenario: The man who owned the house was a collaborator with the US. The US went to him and said, "We need your house to stage the capture of Saddam's sons. We'll pay you for the house." - to which he replies, "Can I save my furniture?" The men seen coming and going in Mercedes cars are not Saddam's sons, but US intelligence people setting up the event. On the morning of the show, a carefully orchestrated series of events occur. First, a few troops go up to the house to verify that all is set. They leave and return later for the main event. First they "arrest" the owner and "whisk him away" - as one report put it - where he is later seen eating fruit and drinking tea in a US vehicle. Then the "big fight" erupts. Someone supposedly is firing from the house, but the neighborhood is in a panic and reports that the US troops are firing everywhere and numerous houses in the neighborhood are damaged to some degree, so who knows where the bullets came from. After a "measured escalation", as Sanchez put it - and six hours of chaos to make it look good - the troops enter the building. Four bodies are "removed" - or "placed" - from - or in - the building.

Within hours, Uday's X-rays are found - from where? Photos are taken. From another unidentified source, Uday's and Qusay's dental records are found. ( An interview in "The Scotsman" with a former Uday body double reveals that even his teeth were surgically adjusted to resemble Uday's.) Prisoners under the control of the US military are "reported" to have "identified" the bodies. The Iraqi Council members are shown the bodies. One confirms that there is not a shadow of a doubt that it is the sons. Did anybody ask him - or report - whether he knew the sons personally and could be in a position to spot a body double? He is a Shiite, no friend of the Husseins, but how do we know we can trust his statement?

So what we are left with - in the absence of a proper journalistic investigation - are some bodies which are vouched for entirely by the US military - the same military who declared Saddam dead twice, Um Qasr captured seven times, Private Lynch "rescued" (once), and Saddam's statue toppled (once) (by a joyous Iraqi mob consisting entirely of Ahmed Chalabi's men and some US soldiers surrounded by tanks), and "confirmed" by photographs and videos taken by the US military, X-rays "found" by the US military, "leg pins" removed by US military doctors, and dental records "found" by the US military.

And all of this occurs precisely at the moment that the President of the United States is enjoying calls for impeachment by US Senators, the British Prime Minister is enjoying calls for his resignation by his own Party, and US troop morale is universally reported to have hit "rock bottom" as US casualties mount daily.

And NO ONE in the so-called "independent" media has any questions to ask.

And by the way, one might also ask when is it that government - any government - allows men like Dr. David Kelly - a head full of Porton Down biowarfare secrets, talking to not one but three journalists and criticizing the government's case for WMD, in despair because his career and reputation were to be ruined by being so exposed, and who was telling people that he felt "betrayed" by the MoD - to walk around freely? Just a thought....

Richard Steven Hack richardstevenhack@sbcglobal.net

Earth, a planet hungry for peace

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03).

The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03).