I wish we'd found another way to prove their deaths.
This, to me, strips us the moral high ground to condemn others when they show our dead troops on TV.
I'm really surprised that our govt made the decision to do this--so soon after our men and women were photographed dead for TV.
Of course, in the current political conspiracy theory environment, I guess the Bush administration would be accused on lying about it--and conspiring with the military to lie about it to boost Bush's popularity.
cjhsa
insults will get you nowhere
Some people just refuse to see the double standards of this administration. c.i.
There is no doubt in my mind that we could have established conclusively that the brothers were dead without those pictures.
There is no doubt in my mind that if the Iraqis (or anyone else) had killed important individuals from the United States and sent pictures of their bodies out that were like the pictures we have released -- everyone in America -- right wing; left wing; and middle of the roaders would be justifiably furious over it.
cjsha -- you would be one of the most outspoken if that happened.
the higher moral ground is in the basement
I don't see them as having any other choice. Obviously they are trying to protect the troops still in Iraq, with highly questionable results.
Obviously it would have been preferable to take them alive. I suspect the brothers had it planned such that that would never happen.
Frank, do tell how you would prove to 25 million Iraquis that they were dead, without pictures?
By the way, my milktoast comment wasn't aimed at anyone in particular.
Someone needs to stir things up around here. I'm promoting discourse, not personal attacks.
cjhsa wrote:
Frank, do tell how you would prove to 25 million Iraquis that they were dead, without pictures?
Well, so that was the reason why it was okay to present the allied soldiers?
Hey, some people think Hitler is still alive.
Better read up on your tabloids.
cjhsa wrote:Frank, do tell how you would prove to 25 million Iraquis that they were dead, without pictures?
My guess is that you are not going to PROVE to 25 million Iraqis that those brothers are dead by exhibiting those pictues.
The pictures don't look anything like the brothers -- although I have little doubt but that they are of them.
Obviously, while in hiding -- they tried to change their appearances as much as possible -- and I don't know how it looks to you, but to me, it looks as though they did a pretty good job of it.
And quite honestly, the results of the fire-fight did little, in my estimation, to enhance the resemblance to what they looked like while alive.
Humans being what they are, there will always be doubts.
My preference would have been to simply check out the identities with DNA references -- have individuals who knew them well (and who could see through the disguise changes and fire-fight reconstruction) -- and have them identify the bodies. Then publicize the identifications as much as possible.
It would not be completely effective -- but neither are the pictures -- and it would have the advantage of being a great deal more civilized.
In any case, I seriously doubt the death of the brothers or of Saddam himself when his turn comes -- will ease tensions in Iraq. I think things will get noticably worse. We are making the the mistake of thinking that because most of the world hated them -- the Iraqis, as a whole do too.
But I suspect they will see the slaughter of the brothers -- and any of the other high officials as ARABS BEING KILLED BY SATAN. In essence, I see revenge, rather than reassurance, being the end result.
We'll see.
But I hope my explanation made my concerns more palatable to you, cjh. I accept your explanation that you are just trying to stir up conversation and debate. That's an admirable thing. I've been know to do that from time to time myself.
This day of horrible car crash photos (oops, I mean photos of dead men) is undoubtedly going to be cause for confusion among many Americans yet I hope MOST Americans! While we pause to rubber-neck at the grisly photos, will any pause to read the Final Congressional report on 9/11? That there is NO connection between Iraq and al-quaida for that disaster, the ultimate Bush justification for the War on Iraq? I fear that most of the world sees Americans as embarassments or worse as world citizens. Here is a link to how I view other folk's vison of Americans. No, this is no understatement to me.
I think it is larger than a2k allows, so here is the URL
http://sp.fotologs.net/users/c/o/b/a/l/t/cobalt/my_photos/2003/07/24/1059039503.jpg
If the link doesn't work, I will get a smaller version to post...
Dang, was too large, obviously. Let's try this one and if it doesn't work, I will get it into a public online album to share:
http://sc.groups.msn.com/tn/D1/C0/EulessBasic/b/12e.jpg
Hoof
My understanding was that the brothers bodies were identified by several Iraqis who knew them personally. This was widely reported and met only with skepticism from the Iraqi public. I'm sure DNA testing will be done, but it takes awhile.
I just hope they are who they are claimed to be. I'd hate to think that these two sick SOB's might get away.
My kids play soccer. I'm sure glad they didn't work for Udai.
Secrets of Saddam's family at war
Secrets of Saddam's family at war
From Catherine Philp in Baghdad - London Times 7/25/03
Escaped restaurant bomb by ten minutes
Drove past American patrols in ordinary cars
Public prayers at mosque after fall of Baghdad
UDAY HUSSEIN'S personal bodyguard broke a three-month silence yesterday to give the first authoritative account of how Saddam and his sons spent the war.
In an exclusive interview with The Times, the bodyguard claimed that, far from fleeing Baghdad, the three men held out in the capital for at least a week after its fall.
He said that they evaded repeated American attempts to assassinate or capture them, and even appeared in public under the noses of US troops.
During a three-hour interview in a house in a town an hour northwest of Baghdad, the bodyguard said that Saddam and his sons had remained in the capital throughout the war, convinced they could hold the city.
When the first bombs fell on a house in a southern suburb, where the Americans believed Saddam and his sons were meeting, he and Uday were on the other side of the city in one of dozens of safe houses belonging to trusted friends and relatives through which the three men were to pass in the weeks to come.
The bodyguard said the Americans' next "decapitation" strike came a lot closer, and that Saddam survived only because several safe houses had come under attack and he suspected there was an informant within his camp.
Saddam asked the suspect, a captain, to prepare a safe house behind a restaurant in the Mansour district for a meeting. They arrived, and left again, almost immediately, by the back door. "Ten minutes after they went out of the door, it was bombed," the bodyguard said.
Saddam had the captain summarily executed while the Pentagon was claiming that the strike had probably finished off Saddam and Uday.
The 28-year-old man, who asked for his real name to be kept secret for fear of reprisals, served as one of Uday's coterie of handpicked personal bodyguards from 1997 until the moment his former boss finally left Baghdad to organise guerrilla resistance further north.
Uday bade him farewell with a $1,000 golden handshake, promising to be in touch again "when he was needed". On Tuesday US troops killed Saddam's son in a gunfight in the northern city of Mosul. Yesterday the Pentagon released pictures of his mutilated head.
When Baghdad fell on April 9, the three men were in separate houses in Adhamiya, a Sunni neighbourhood full of loyalists where Saddam had been on a televised walkabout two days before.
Uday's bodyguard was not present on that occasion, but was there two days later when, to the astonishment of all around, Saddam and his sons appeared at Friday prayers at a mosque in Adhamiya, a few miles from where American troops were patrolling.
"There were crowds all around and an old woman came up to Saddam and asked, ?'What have you done to us?'," the bodyguard recalled.
"Saddam clapped his hand to his head and said, ?'What can I do? I trusted the commanders but they were traitors and they betrayed Iraq. But we hope that, before long, we will be back in power and everything will be fixed'."
The men never appeared in public again, but the bodyguard said that they were able to travel freely from safe house to safe house in unmarked cars, sometimes under the noses of the Americans.
"Once we were in Mansour, their convoy was going by and we just drove right past them in ordinary cars. They never saw us," he said.
For an increasingly anxious Uday, it was a moment of comic relief. "He made fun of them. When he saw a soldier with a red face, he said, ?'That's not a soldier for war'." Uday offered an obscene suggestion of what the soldier's face might be better used for.
The bodyguard said that Saddam and his sons had remained in Baghdad in the genuine belief that they could hold the city. Only later, when they believed they had been betrayed by their commanders, did they consider an alternative. "The resistance was not factored in before the war," he said. "There was a closed meeting five or six days after the war, and that is when they began to discuss the resistance."
A couple of days afterwards, the bodyguard was summoned by Uday, who handed him $1,000 in cash and said he could go home. Uday would not say where he was going ?- only that it was time to begin the resistance. "He said you can go. We'll get you when we need you," the bodyguard said. "They only kept their relatives with them after that. They didn't trust anyone else."
Soul-searching before release of morgue pictures
The Pentagon released photographs of the bloodied, mutilated heads of Uday and Qusay Hussein last night to persuade Iraqis that the sons of the former dictator really were dead.
The decision was made by Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, after a heated debate within the Administration. Television crews will be allowed to film the bodies in Baghdad today.
One photograph shows Uday with a wound obliterating part of his nose and upper lip, fuelling speculation that he committed suicide. A Pentagon official told The Times: "We were disgusted when the Somalis televised images of dead US troops being dragged through the streets of Mogadishu. There are many here who feel this is no better."
But Mr Rumsfeld argued that Iraqis were "frightened of Saddam Hussein and his regime. To get closure, to have two vicious members confirmed dead, I believe will contribute to more Iraqis coming forward."
Readers may find the photographs disturbing.
I just saw some video of their corpses on MSNBC.
They have been cleaned up--embalmer's putty patching the wound on Uday's face; their beards have been shaved--and they look much more as they did, at least according to the pictures of them alive.
This seems a little grotesque to me, however.
Is the administration trying too hard to convince Iraqis of their demise?
