12/30/2023 0 Comments Colonel saddam hussein captureResidents of an area in Northern Baghdad, around the Adhamiya mosque, told New York Times correspondents that Hussein had visited them on April 9 to offer a farewell message. Hussein had released a video on April 4 which showed him surrounded by a throng of supporters, and it is now certain that this video was shot in the same neighbourhood bombed by the U.S. MI6 told the CIA shortly afterwards that he had left the building just before the strike hit. However, in the aftermath of the last raid, his fate was unapparent. The strike had been launched just twelve minutes after the order was dispatched and forty five minutes after the intelligence arrived in CENTCOM, Qatar - but it was apparently also unsuccessful. A sixty foot crater was left and as the area of Baghdad targetted was not under coalition control, casualties were unknown. A single B1-B bomber acted on specific intelligence and dropped four precision-guided JDAM 2,000 pound bombs, destroying the target building and others around it. Three days later on April 7, another strike was launched on the Mansour district of Baghdad. Intelligence analysts concluded that this latest video was probably made after the first night of bombings, and so it was probable Hussein was still alive. Then, on April 4, 2003, Hussein appeared again on Iraqi TV and referenced an Apache helicopter which had been shot down with an antique musket. Geoff Hoon, UK Defence Minister, claimed that Hussein had made a number of tapes for use in different eventualities, and it was still uncertain whether the tapes had been recorded before or after the decapitation strike. Hussein made another TV appearance on Maand referenced particular commanders and their locations. But, despite reports that Hussein left the scene of one of the bombings in an ambulance, he was certainly still alive. A man with the appearance of Saddam appeared on Iraqi TV at 21:00 local time, but at the time of writing it is unknown whether this was actually him or not - he wore glasses and read from notes, both of which were not usual in his TV appearances. The Pentagon said 36 Tomahawk cruise missiles and two F-117-launched GBU-27 bombs were used in the strike, which took place at 5:30AM local time - about ninety minutes after Bush's deadline for Saddam, Uday and Qusay to leave the country. While no attempt had been made on his life in the Gulf War, Operation Iraqi Freedom opened with one - on March 20, 2003, a "decapitation strike" was launched on what President Bush called "targets of opportunity" in Baghdad. During the Gulf War he roamed the country, once staying in a tent in the middle of the desert, sometimes turning up unannounced at the houses of family members to stay a night. He reportedly never stayed in the same place twice, and had a network of bunkers and tunnels around the country which could survive even nuclear overpressures. Hussein is widely regarded as a "master of survival". In contrast, Saddam was in a residential area where it was easier to search houses and question local residents. Bin Laden is, according to officials, most likely hiding along the poorly-policed fifteen hundred mile long border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. In many ways the capture of Saddam Hussein was easier than the search for Osama bin Laden, so it wasn't just dumb luck at play. After a thirty-eight week manhunt which was awash with the latest technology and weaponry, a soldier with a spade - backed by good human intelligence - was what did the job. Previous frustrated attempts to find HusseinĪs the manhunt for Osama bin Laden had just entered its second year, the American and Iraqi publics might have been forgiven for being dubious about the possibilities of Hussein's speedy capture.
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