Times has an article up that contains notes from Saddam in custody. Many bloggers and their readers have been wondering what Saddam will reveal in interrogations. The first questioning has not produced much it seems, the transcript was full of “Saddam rhetoric type stuff,” according to the official who paraphrased Saddam’s answers to some of the questions.
When asked “How are you?” said the official, Saddam responded, “I am sad because my people are in bondage.” When offered a glass of water by his interrogators, Saddam replied, “If I drink water I will have to go to the bathroom and how can I use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?”
More importantly, Saddam is denying everything and replying with really dumb answers to questions that might incriminate him.
Saddam was also asked whether Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. “No, of course not,” he replied, according to the official, “the U.S. dreamed them up itself to have a reason to go to war with us.” The interrogator continued along this line, said the official, asking: “if you had no weapons of mass destruction then why not let the U.N. inspectors into your facilities?” Saddam’s reply: “We didn’t want them to go into the presidential areas and intrude on our privacy.”
Hm, Saddam as a champion of privacy?
Poor Saddam. He is such a victim.
Chirac can sleep a little easier if his pal keeps mum.
“George Galloway can vouch for my good intentions.”
Personally I have a great deal of confidence in the ability of interrogators to derive answers for their questions. There are so many non-violent means of extracting information that Saddam doesn’t have a chance. He might as well cough it all up now.
And if we can’t get anything, there’s always the Iraqi people. God knows there are tens of thousands of Iraqi’s who have gained a Phd. grade experience in torture and interrogation first hand in the hardest school of all.
Strangely enough, I think it possible that Saddam’s reply to the U.N. inspectors question might be the truth.
If one tries to adopt the viewpoint of a malignant narcissist, one might decide to let 25 million people suffer so that you can avoid the indignities of having your palaces searched. After all, you still live in luxury. The sanctions can be used to help control the population (by creating a visible external enemy). And, as a malignant narcissist, there is only one person in the world that you care about in the slightest, and that’s yourself!
After all we have heard, I’d give about a 1 in 3 chance that he’s telling the truth, weird as it is!
Have we granted Saddam Legal Aid yet? And has he got Max Clifford pimping his story to the papers? “My Private Hell! In Saddams Own Words!”,
“How Saddam Was A Victim Of A Right-Wing Conspiracy”, serialised exclusively only in The Drivel.
Strangely enough, I think it possible that Saddam’s reply to the U.N. inspectors question might be the truth.
Very highly unlikely. Saddam had active chem, bio, and nuke weapons programs before the Gulf war, never accounted for the vast majority of them. Most of the inspection demands were driven by his failure to deliver even superficially plausible paperwork. If he really shut them down, he would have the receipts, and everyone would have gone home happy. One thing these totalitarians do well is keepy records, but he couldn’t even account for tons (literally) of chem and bio agents. Oh, he’s guilty on this one, have no doubt of that.
“Col. West would you please report to interogation room two. Please bring your pistol.”
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
In support of what R C Dean said, it is a common misdirection when people talk of “no WMD has ever been found”.
Finding WMD and knowing they exist are two different things, as the UN inspectors knew from the deficit in bombs made and bombs dropped, with the lack of evidence to prove their destruction you can only conclude they still “exist”.
Rather than ask “where are the WMD ?”, simply ask “where did you destroy the WMD”.