A rchive Date
[ 02-10-2005 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]
|
[http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,5944-619389,00.html
Leader was hurt in first attacks, CIA says
From Elaine Monaghan in Washington
March 22, 2003
THE CIA suspects that Saddam Hussein was injured in the opening US attack on Baghdad, American officials said yesterday.
Reports that he was hurt in the pre-dawn bombardment on Thursday would explain the clear discomfort on his face in a broadcast he delivered soon afterwards.
US Intelligence believes that Saddam was inside one of his residences when it was hit. Air strikes targeted a large residential complex in a Baghdad suburb, rather than a military installation or one of Saddam’s palaces. Saddam, his two sons, Qusay and Uday, and his advisers were believed to be sleeping inside a bunker beneath the ground floor.
Within hours of the bombardment, Saddam appeared on Iraqi television, condemning the attacks and calling on his people to defend the country in a “jihad” or holy war.
“He looked terrible. He was swollen, in pain,” one US official said. The Iraqi leader was wearing reading spectacles, which is rare for him in public and may have been an attempt to mask discomfort.
US Intelligence officials have been studying the broadcast to assess if the man mocking the “little, evil” President Bush was in fact Saddam, or one of the doubles that he is believed to employ to avoid assassination. The CIA said it believed that the appearance was by Saddam, and not a double.
CIA officials are leaning towards the belief that the tape was recorded after the attack precisely because Saddam looked so unwell. A pre-recorded statement would presumably have had him looking healthier.
The Iraqi Information Minister confirmed that one of Saddam’s homes was hit but denied that anyone was hurt.
He attacked “criminal George Bush and his gang”, saying: “They are superpower of villains. They are superpower of Al Capone. We will not allow them to get out of this quagmire, which we trapped them in. They will see their end there.”
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
|