Army Stage managed Fall Hussein Statue

Adrian wrote:

For what it's worth.

Worth a hell of a lot Adrian! Thanks!

From there we have evidence about two of my questions:

1) source of Iraqi flag = Marine Lieutenant Casey Kuhlman

(and apparently that it was an old one without Saddam's line was relevance only realized afterwards but it confirms my suspicions about it not being supplied by an Iraqi).

2) source of hammer = Kadhem Sharif "al-Yabani" Hussen

Also a good look into the Iraqis emotions on the subject. If people think it was staged after reading that it's odd, because they expressed distaste for the American invasion but genuine distaste for Saddam in their actions too.

Since they go on to criticize US troops for "repression" it's hard to say they are lackeys.

Here are some complaints, these folk sound genuine about their feelings for Saddam and it's quite apparent that it's not motivated by some American bias.

Quote:

"We're depressed and we're frustrated," says Fares. "We thought the coalition forces came here for reconstruction, for the prosperity of the people. It hasn't happened. I was glad to get rid of Saddam, but that doesn't mean I like the Americans. I don't regret pulling down his statue, because if I hadn't done it somebody else would have, but if the situation had remained as it was under Saddam I personally would have been better off now."

Quote:

Khaled says: "The Americans should leave our country, but I'm 100% sure they're not going to. They came all this way. They experienced all that sacrifice, lost hundreds of men and spent so much money. Do you think they will leave this country so easily? No. There will be American bases outside our cities."

Quote:

Later, Khaled takes me across the road to visit a friend, Hussein Abdul Bari Obeid, whose house was broken into by US troops on a raid on Eid, the last day of Ramadan. Khaled went to see if he could help, but the soldiers warned him off. "They started shouting 'Go! Go! Leave this area!'," he says. "I wasn't in a position to tell them that I was one of the ones who had toppled the statue. There were machine guns pointed at my head."

What I can't determine from the accounts there is whose idea it was. The artcle says a bit about the statue being a trophy the US wanted but doesn't clarify the issue:

Quote:

After three weeks in the desert, having been the advance troops of the US military for virtually the entire war, the Third Battalion/Fourth Regiment were feeling that they deserved a trophy of some sort. The great bronze statue of Saddam was the obvious prize.

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That's kinda where this whole debate falls over.

Psyops could have identified that statue as a target before the troops even entered Baghdad. It would make sense with so many journalists right there.

Proof one way or the other is not likely to be forthcoming.

Now, if I may play the headmistress for a second;

CRAVEN, BILL, EDGAR & FINN!
Play nice or you will all be on detention for the rest of the week! Twisted Evil

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Adrian wrote:

That's kinda where this whole debate falls over.

Psyops could have identified that statue as a target before the troops even entered Baghdad. It would make sense with so many journalists right there.

Thing is, from what I gather PSYOPs "chimed in" with what was the marines idea. Whether it was an Iraqis idea or even PSYOPs idea before the marine's is what I am unsure of.

Quote:

Proof one way or the other is not likely to be forthcoming.

Maybe not, but hey, I didn't think I'd find out the name of the person who supplied the hammer either.

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Adrian wrote:

That's kinda where this whole debate falls over.

Psyops could have identified that statue as a target before the troops even entered Baghdad. It would make sense with so many journalists right there.

Proof one way or the other is not likely to be forthcoming.

Now, if I may play the headmistress for a second;

CRAVEN, BILL, EDGAR & FINN!
Play nice or you will all be on detention for the rest of the week!

:wink:

The "BBC-eye-witness-report" by their correspondant is here

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Thanks Walter!

When Adrian showed up with evidence that so aptly met my call for evidence over rhetoric I was wondering how long it'd be before you showed up with a gem of your own. Very Happy

From that article:

Quote:

It was, though, the Iraqis who had taken the initiative, calling on US military muscle to finish the job of toppling Saddam.

This doesn't say whether they had the initiative prior to the broadcast by the US military, and we already knew they took the initiative insofar as the initial attempt to topple it went.

Quote:

The first sledgehammer blows were being struck at Saddam's plinth by a little group of scarcely half a dozen young Iraqis while US Marines were still crouching by their armoured vehicles and warily sweeping their M16 rifles left and right.

I can't tell if this part is before or after the broadcast. The journalist seems to have arrived after the broadcast and after the initial attempts were underway.

The only thing that gives a clue as to this timing is that the Marines were, in fact, present at this point.

<crosses fingers, we may yet get the evidence on this>

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Well, how do you like that? Thanks Adrian. You confirmed my recollections from watching live coverage as this unfolded... including seeing :

Quote:

Wielding the hammer with ease, he swung it at the tiled plinth supporting the dictator. The tiles shattered like biscuits. The rage of years flowed through al-Yabani's arms. It was the first blow against the statue - even before the US tanks entered the square, he says.

(I was pretty sure I hadn't made that up. Smile

)

And since PSYOPs reported that the regular guys were already there when they arrived, it removes all doubt that PSYOPs thought it up.

Thanks again. I feel a hell of a lot better.

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Note: PSYOPs never claimed they thought it up. They claimed the marines did.

The Marines were in the square long before the tanks lined it. That tanks were not in the square does not mean the marines had not been there. They arrived and secured the square mostly on foot and ringing the square with tanks was done long afterwards.

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Note, to whom it may concern,.. Screw that. You respond directly to one of my posts after threatening to kick me off A2K if I address you? Craven if you want to kick me off your website go ahead. I've done nothing to warrant it. You started the Ad Hominem exchange when you accused me of "making stuff up". Look back and see the truth. Now you've threatened to ban me if I address you coincidentally as your position is proven false. I really like A2K, but not if I have to lay down while being called a liar.

Craven de Kere just wrote:

Note: PSYOPs never claimed they thought it up. They claimed the marines did.

Note: OCCOM BILL has argued PSYOPs didn't think it up from the get go, amidst much resistance.

Craven de Kere wrote:

PSYOPs brought this stage but that doesn't mean the Iraqi exprssion was "staged" or faked so much as merely elicited through timely PSYOPs.

Craven de Kere wrote:

OCCOM BILL wrote:
Craven, please define what that title means to you. To me it implies that taking down the statue was PSYOPs idea

It was.

This I found this incredulous considering I had already shown you that PSYOPs didn't take credit. For these feelings of amazement, your Ad Hominem attack knew no limit. And you judge me?

I do hope I don't get banned for telling the truth.

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Bill,

I did not threaten to ban you. I said that if you had been doing what you do with me with others you would have been banned. The reason is that you can get away with this type of outburst because nobody gets banned for insulting me.

You might have taken it as a threat but if you read what I said it was not. I was explaining why I do not wish to be party to such episodes and the reason is because it delves below the standards we ask of people here and nothing is done about it because you directed it at me.

Bill, I say a lot of things that piss people off. I am not gentle in debate. I do however hold myself to the same standards that everyone is held to.

Recently in each and every one of our arguments you reach a point at which you simply start insults and namecalling. I might have been abrasively debating with you up to that point but past that I have not and cannot join you.

You'll sometimes apologize and write it off as a "nic fit" but either way the discussions are degraded below the standards we operate under here and you get away with it because you did so with me.

I might question your position or even claim it is falsificated. I might be haughty and arrogant. But I do not EVER delve to the namecalling you did and I have NEVER returned yours.

When you started making this a habit in each of our last arguments, I decided to simply stop arguing with you. I am not willing to keep getting into what is already becoming a predictable routine.

So I decided to simply avoid the arguments altogether and told you that this is the type of thing that would result in banning if it were not directed at me.

That was not a threat, it was basically telling you why I quit arguing, because the level of debate had descended to the point where you get away with it simply because nobody gets banned for flaming me.

Quote:

I do hope I don't get banned for telling the truth.

You won't Bill, but like I said if you'd pulled a lot of this crap with others you would have been.

And now I continue to ask that you let me avoid arguing with you, as I don't want your spat with me to make you an untouchable should you do the insult thing to others.

Please allow me to excersise my attempt at restraint. I do not wish to continue these arguments.

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You may feel free to post anything you wish. I did misunderstand your PM. I did take it as a veiled threat, because I did not know your policy. My bad. Sorry. Just so there is no doubt about this. Craven actually meant that he had given me additional latitude because he doesn't abuse his position. Upon rereading his PM I agree complete and am hereby apologizing for suggesting he threatened to ban me. That misunderstanding was all mine.

As for the petty argument that we've both taken part in, I'm as sick of that as you... but: Stop making stuff up= liar,... but I really don't care anymore. I'm quite happy to know that I'm still here.

One last thing before I leave you alone. RE-READ the thread and look at how your position evolved closer to mine while claiming I made no valid points. I noticed you skipped the blatant example I gave you. There is more. :wink:

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Well I was skipping stuff because I was trying to stop arguing (it can be hard).

But I agree that I've been coming around and in fact with the portion that Walter posted I am starting to lean toward a timeline in which a couple of Iraqis gave the US marines the idea, who in turn inspired the PSYOPS to broadcast the idea, who in turn inspired a more significant Iraqi effort and subsequently the American effort.

I do not think this is obvious yet though. I need to know the timeline of Kadhem Sharif "al-Yabani" Hussen's efforts and the Marine's idea.

I'm closer to thinking that Kadhem Sharif "al-Yabani" Hussen and crew might have had the idea first but this is not yet clear by my estimation.

Incidentally, here's something we should have done a long time ago:

You do realize that in the grander scheme of things, the fact that we agree that the Iraqi feelings were genuine is more significant than the details on the timeline right?

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Absolutely. Even the timeline isn't my biggest issue. My biggest issue was the deliberate chop-job done to that Chapter in the book. What this additional information does for me is show that David Zucchino's conclusions were as baseless as they were an inaccurate summary of the work he sourced.

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A lot of people are making hay with the ambiguity of "staged".

If PSYOPs do their job many times it will be to highlight certain things and to bring them to the stage. Sometimes it means creative editing and spin.

The statue was used for propaganda or PR, which to me is a good thing, and this arm of the armed forces is part of the modern evolution of militaries that help keep wars less bloody.

That it was used for PR doesn't make it fake, even if the whole thing was schemed by PSYOPs (which it wasn't) it doesn't mean the Iraqis weren't happy Saddam was gone and that their feelings were not genuine.

Adrian posted an article that is damn interesting, those fellas didn't even like America and didn't like that we were there, one even later decided that we were worse than Saddam.

But they still hated Saddam in no uncertain terms and their feelings were not staged even if the event was used for PSYOPs.

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It's amazing to me that I get chided so much here, considering how little I have actually said. My one big contribution has been to offer the title story for discussion. I am not so thin skinned as to be offended - just bemused, you might say.

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OCCOM BILL wrote:

Finn d'Abuzz wrote:
That PsyOps may have targeted this statue is certainly likely, but immaterial.

Oh they definitely targeted it, but not first. The crowd was already there. They said so themselves.

Question is whether the word of one army's special operatives is necessarily an honest-to-god literal and objective reproduction of events ...

I mean, its very interesting source material, and I'm glad you brought it in here. It allows one to corroborate or disprove all kinds of things from one side or another. But I dont quite seem to be able to muster the same child-like willingness to go - oh, the soldier/agent/psy-op person said it himself, that thats what he did? Then it must be true!

That just on an aside ... No reason to necessarily disbelieve them either, but a little scepticism is always welcome ...

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Thing is the military's word is all that I've seen to say they targeted the statue as well.

I got the accounts of broadasting and deciding that the statue was a target from the military too.

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Finn d'Abuzz wrote:

dlowan wrote:
Finn said:

" However it you insist on a scorched earth approach to each and every aspect of the operation, intent upon casting it as the work of Satan, you're, at best, full of BS. "

Actually, if you are attributing that belief to Craven, Finn - that is quite a denial of his words - however, that is not my discussion to have.

As I have already expressed, I was not even considering Craven's postings when I added to the thread.

I claim to no special knowledge of this event.

I do not know if any Iraqis were involved with the statue before the American military became involved or not.

What I DO think is that the incident, however it began, was cleverly managed to make it look a great deal more significant - in terms of numbers of Iraqis involved, and their enthusiasm - than it actually was.

And you know this how?

I have not done the kind of thinking through that Craven, for instance, has obviously done re "psy-ops" and its possible positive effects (Craven mentions specifically the advantage of "less bloody wars".)

My tendency when I see such things stage-managed is just to think "propaganda" and not to like it - just as I do when I see large enthusiastic crowds in North Korea idolizing their leader, for instance.

I still think there is clear evidence that the US military cleverly used this incident to suggest there was more joy in Baghdad than there was - to support the case for war.

And that clear evidence is?

It certainly was a nice moment. Hussein was a truly awful dictator. Some folk had some real fun. But the incident was given a lot more generalized significance than it had. I think this is clear when you look at the wide shots

I watched a fair bit of it Bill - and these are the impressions I gained at the time, as well as on reading the information thta has been given here.

I thought the crowd was pretty small - surprisingly so. I remember, in the wide shots, noticing lots of passers-by stop for a minute, and move on. I couldn't believe the stupidity when I saw the US flag and almost prayed that somebody would get rid of it - even though I thought it was an honest flag to have there.

Bill and Finn - you will doubtless say that what I saw coloured by my opposition to the war.

Can you also accept that your views of what happened, and its deep emotive significance, is equally coloured by yours?

Sorry, no.

I too noticed that the crowd was relatively small. So how to explain this?

On the one hand is the explanation that no one in Iraq wanted to tear down the statue, and so the American Military was forced to recruit a small group (who, by the way, would be so irresponsible as to bring their children).

On the other is the explanation that the majority of Iraqis were scared sh*tless of Saddam (and rightly so) and weren't convinced that the American entry into Bahgdad signified his ultimate demise or that the Americans would have staying power( and rightly so), and so only a relatively small and courageous (or stupid) band of Iraqis came out to take down their oppressor's symbol. (Under this explanation the Iraqis who brought their children did so that they might bear witness to a historic event. Hard to attribute such motivation to Iraqis?)

I rarely argue that stupid moves are not part of a design, but assuming PsyOps was so instrumental in staging the entire affair, it's difficult to imagine that they could produce the Iraqis, but not GIs with the awareness to us an Iraqi flag and not an American one.

Yeah, but I am sure they cleverly milked the thing for all 'twas worth - and a rather glamourized version of the thing has, indeed, been used very widely to suggest things about the Iraqi reaction to the American invasion that I do not believe are strictly true. I think this is clearly shown by any number of accounts of the actual Iraqi reaction, including those in the new accounts given here.

B

Thanks nimh and walter for the new sources - they ar every interesting!

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nimh wrote:

OCCOM BILL wrote:
Finn d'Abuzz wrote:
That PsyOps may have targeted this statue is certainly likely, but immaterial.

Oh they definitely targeted it, but not first. The crowd was already there. They said so themselves.

Question is whether the word of one army's special operatives is necessarily an honest-to-god literal and objective reproduction of events ...

Nimh, you were part of the initial discussion and saw my reaction to reading David Zucchino's rendition before reading the "one army's special operative's actual words". I didn't at that point know who the liar was, but new from memory of watching it unfold that someone was lying. It could have been that David Zucchino was merely repeating lies, but it wasn't. He had twisted the story to make the story.

nimh wrote:

I mean, its very interesting source material, and I'm glad you brought it in here. It allows one to corroborate or disprove all kinds of things from one side or another. But I dont quite seem to be able to muster the same child-like willingness to go - oh, the soldier/agent/psy-op person said it himself, that thats what he did? Then it must be true!

I'm sorry if this is the impression that I've given. I do not believe this one person's story has a monopoly on the truth of what happened that day, although since it coincides with most of what I remember so I do "think" it pretty accurate. On the other hand, I think the actual text of the document is the holy grail of truth when it comes to debating the actual text of the document. An argument ensued when I said Zucchino was a liar and proceeded to present his deviations from the sole piece of material he sourced. The additional evidence makes me feel better about my own recollections being accurate, but need not even be considered when judging whether Zucchino twisted the facts.

Twisted the facts he did, and a liar he is, and I must have done a lousy job of presenting my case since that wasn't made clear by my argument. Perhaps if I had stayed focused on the facts, the inherent truth in my post would have been more evident and easier to swallow.

nimh wrote:

That just on an aside ... No reason to necessarily disbelieve them either, but a little scepticism is always welcome ...

I'm quite skeptical about most everything actually. I think the report that Zucchino butchered likely gave the US military more credit than they deserve in regards to that incident (has no bearing on Zucchino's integrity or lack thereof mind you). I think it was a beautiful, naturally occurring event, that once noticed was used to tremendous advantage by PSYOPs. I remember feeling then, and consequently still feel now, that the US should have waited till everyone who wanted to take a crack at that thing was exhausted before stepping in to help, if indeed our help was truly required. I thought and think the Iraqis would have liked it better if they managed to accomplish it themselves, with us standing by to protect them. I think this would have added, rather than taken away from the beauty of the incident had they succeeded and sent a better message well. That's just my honest opinion.

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I don't know who first decided to take the statue down. To me it seems it was a chosen in advance target of the Americans. It also seems the Iraqis had the same idea at very nearly the same moment the Americans were ready to act, since they would have been afraid to do it any sooner. I know I am missing some of the fine points in the debate, but the end result was the two groups working together, if for only a few minutes. The good will that could have been mined from such experiences was wasted after that anyway.

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I meant to say this earlier Edgar and think I forgot to... But I sure hope I didn't offend you in any way. I did not mean to.

It's also occurred to me that the toppling itself was actually secondary to the pounding (both before and after with shoes as well as hammers) in my mind as far as tear generation goes. Watching that was literally watching people enjoy a kind of political freedom, which we take for granted, for the very first time in their lives. I remain quite moved by it.

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Army Stage managed Fall Hussein Statue

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