Thread: Ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein hanged to death

Ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein hanged to death

Saturday, December 30, 2006, Zill-Haj 8, 1427 A.H.

BAGHDAD: Ousted Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein has been hanged to death here couple of hours after he was handed over to Iraqi authorities by the US, the reports said.

Saddam's half-brother Barzan Ibrahim and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, the former chief justice of the Revolutionary Court, were also hanged to death.

The scaffolding where Hussein was hanged was in Baghdad's Green Zone, the center of power for coalition officials.

The security was beefed up in the surroundings of Green Zone to avoid any untoward incident during the execution.

Munir Haddad, a judge on the appeals court, a cleric and a physician were present at the site. According to Iraqi law, these people have to be present at the execution, that is why they were told to remain there on standby waiting for orders for the government.

Other parliament members, government officials, relatives of victims of Saddam's brutal rule also attended the hanging.

Saddam Hussein was sentenced to death by an Iraqi court on 5 November after a year-long trial over the killings of 148 Shias from the village of Dujail in the 1980s.

A trial in a second case, alleging genocide against Kurds, continued against him.
The former Iraqi leader was captured by US troops on 13 December 2003, after a tip-off. He was found hiding in a tiny cellar at a farmhouse near his hometown of Tikrit.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/update_detail.asp?id=15350

Saddam Hussein hanged, says Al Hurra TV station
Fri Dec 29, 2006 10:15pm ET15

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S.-backed Iraqi television station Al Hurra said Saddam Hussein had been executed by hanging shortly before 6 a.m. (0300 GMT) on Saturday.

Arabic satellite channel Arabiya also reported the execution had taken place.

The former Iraqi president ousted in April 2003 by a U.S.- led invasion was convicted in November of crimes against humanity over the killings of 148 Shi'ite villagers from Dujail after a failed assassination bid in 1982.

An appeals court upheld the death penalty on Tuesday. Iraq's government has kept details of its plans to conduct the execution secret amid concerns it could spark a violent backlash from his former supporters.

Photo

The top news, photos, and videos of 2006. Full Coverage

Saddam's conviction on November 5 was hailed by President Bush as a triumph for the democracy he promised to foster in Iraq after the 2003 invasion.

With U.S. public support for the war slumping as the number of American dead approaches 3,000, Washington is likely to welcome the death of Saddam, despite misgivings among many allies about capital punishment.

But the hanging could complicate efforts by Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to heal Iraq's sectarian divisions with violence spiraling out of control and threatening to pitch the country into full-scale civil war.

© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.
http://today.reuters.com

Good riddance.

I hope the video is posted on YouTube!

R/ Skip

After Saddam’s execution, outlook for Iraq grim
If Bush sends additional troops, their mission must be clearly spelled out

ANALYSIS
By Lt. Col. Rick Francona
Military analyst
MSNBC
Updated: 18 minutes ago


Lt. Col. Rick Francona
Military analyst
The caption that accompanies the Associated Press photo here reads: "Iraqi children pass by a vandalized mural of the former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in Tikrit."

The word "vandalized" would indicate that the graffiti would be negative. However, the spray-painted Arabic actually reads, "Long live Saddam and the Baath [Party]."

The graffiti underscores the divisions in Iraq — and the execution of Saddam will likely only exacerbate the sectarian and ethnic violence taking place mostly in Baghdad.

It also has the potential to unleash a wave of Sunni violence in the Sunni Triangle, in those cities now well known as hotbeds of insurgency — Baquba, Ramadi, Fallujah, Samarra, Tikrit.

Now that Saddam has been executed, there is a good reason to be concerned about the convergence of events that may occur in January.

Escalation of troops expected

In addition to the execution, there is the ongoing deployment of the 82nd Airborne Division's 2nd Brigade from Fort Bragg to Kuwait to become the theater reserve for U.S. forces in Iraq.


The previous theater reserve, the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, was deployed to al-Anbar Province in November. The 2nd Brigade is the 82nd's "ready brigade," the brigade currently on standby duty for rapid deployment as needed. The initial battalion should be in place in 24 hours from deployment order. The fact that the ready brigade is being deployed indicates just how stretched the Army and Marines have become.

The deployment of the 2nd Brigade, totaling about 3,500 troops, is probably the first of the expected increases in the number of U.S. forces in Iraq.

Click for related content

* Saddam Hussein executed
* Discuss: What will impact be?
* Newsweek timeline: The rise and fall

In January, President Bush is expected to unveil his plan for the "change of course" in Iraq. I believe that the decision has already been made that there will be an increase in the number of U.S. troops deployed, although the exact numbers may not be as high as five brigades (about 20,000 troops).

It is interesting that the same generals, who claimed in the past that they did not need more troops, now do. I say that because the situation — the sectarian violence or civil war, depending on your perspective — has not significantly changed since the bombing of the Shiites’ Golden Mosque in Samarra in February that led to the escalation of violence in the first place.

What will the mission of additional troops be?

If there is going to be an increase in the number of troops, it is important that Bush spell out exactly what their mission will be.

Will they be dispatched to al-Anbar Province or the Sunni Triangle to quell the Sunni insurgency (Baaths and al-Qaida in Iraq, among others)?

Or will they be sent to neutralize the Shiite militia — particularly Moqtada al-Sadr’s militia?

Or will they provide a security cordon around Baghdad in support of Iraqi security forces who will try to stop the sectarian violence in the city?

Or perhaps they will be used to bolster Iraqi forces attempting to seal the porous borders with Iran and Syria, the infiltration routes for explosives and fighters?

Some successes

Dispatching additional troops to the Sunni areas does not appear to be necessary. American special operations forces are having great success against the insurgents in al-Anbar Province, as are regular Iraqi and American forces throughout the Sunni areas.

Every day, these units conduct "cordon-and-search" operations against suspected insurgents, terrorists and general lawbreakers — and are usually successful in apprehending either the primary or secondary targets.

Suspects are usually turned over to the Iraqi police — however the vagaries of the Iraqi justice system result in many detainees being released by Iraqi judges for unknown reasons and it is suspected that ethnicity and religious affiliation come into play. This is aggravating when American troops are killed or wounded in action in these daily operations.

Baghdad security is the key

Recent assessments by senior U.S. officers indicate that the civil war between the Sunnis and Shiites is the major problem, and that problem is centered in Baghdad.

Baghdad is the key; if the security situation there cannot be resolved, progress in the remainder of the country is moot. Ultimately, this needs to be an Iraqi solution to an Iraqi problem, but that cannot happen until the security situation is addressed.

The Iraqi government, and by this I mean Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, has to eliminate the Shiite militias, especially al-Sadr's militia. This will be difficult because of the close, perhaps too close, relationship between al-Maliki and al-Sadr. If al-Maliki is unwilling to, or incapable of, ordering his forces to disband al-Sadr's militia, and possibly arrest al-Sadr for complicity in the 2003 murder of Imam 'Abd Al-Majid Al-Khu'I, then the Iraqis need to seriously consider a change of leadership.

January will certainly be an interesting month.

Retired intelligence officer Lt. Col. Rick Francona is an NBC News Middle East military analyst. More of his commentary on various Middle East topics can be seen on his blog “Middle East Perspectives.”
© 2006 MSNBC Interactive


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16396338/

This is a 1990 picture of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, center seated, with his family. At the back row, from left, are Hussein Kamel, Saddam Kamel, his wife and Saddam Hussein's daughter Rana, Saddam's eldest son Odai, Hussein Kamel's wife and Saddam Hussein's eldest daughter Raghad. In her arms is her son Ali, the President's first grandson. At fare right is Hussein's younger son Qusai.

MOD EDIT

Here in El Cajon, CA, where I live, we have a large population of Iraqis and Iraqi-Americans, in fact the second largest contingent of Iraqis in the U.S. outside of Deerborn, Michigan. Many of these are Chaldeans, that is Catholic Iraqis, who relocated here as a result of the persecution by Saddam. Ever since the announcement of his death, long lines of cars have been parading down the streets honking their horns with people hanging out the windows, cheering and whistling. It is really a wild scene, people laughing and crying, shouting and waving, in celebration of the brutal murderer Saddam's execution.

I saw these former Iraq citizens cheering on tv as you said reptile, it must have been grand to really see it in person!

Outlook grim for Iraq regardless of Saddam's execution!