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And then there was
Saddam
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
SULAIMANIYA, Northern Iraq - With Saddam
Hussein's sons Uday and Qusay killed by US soldiers in a
firefight in Mosul on Tuesday, all focus now falls on
the hunt to track down Saddam himself as final proof
that the deposed dictator really will not return to
terrorize Iraq.
Because the sons were found in
the northern Kurdish town of Mosul, US forces are paying
particular attention to this city and surrounding areas,
including the towns of Faluja and Hawija, as potential
hideouts for Saddam.
Since Tuesday, the US
military has acknowledged that it has received a
"significant increase" in the number of Saddam sightings
by Iraqi citizens. "We are getting a lot of different
sightings every day," a senior administration official
was quoted in the media as saying. There is a US$25
million reward on Saddam's head. According to NBC News,
Saddam's cousin, Nawaf al-Zaydan Muhammad, the owner of
the house where the sons were killed, betrayed them for
$30 million.
The movements of Saddam's wife and
his daughters have been tracked by informers, who claim
that they first traveled to Syria, then returned to
Mosul before somehow making their way to the United Arab
Emirates. As reported in Asia Times Online on July 23
(Iraqi
resistance takes on a new face) Uday and Qusay had tried to get into
Syria but were turned back to Iraq, where they ended up
in Mosul.
The death of Saddam's sons, both
notorious for their brutality but also said to be key
figures in the ongoing unrest that has bedeviled Iraq
ever since the toppling of Saddam nearly two months ago,
has had no immediate impact on that resistance.
According to a Reuters report, three US soldiers from
the 101st Airborne Division operating in northern Iraq
were killed in a rifle and grenade attack on Thursday.
Soldiers from the 101st led the raid against Saddam's
sons. "Three 101st Airborne Division soldiers were
killed in a small arms and RPG [rocket-propelled
grenade] attack," an army spokesman at US headquarters
in Baghdad said.
Resistance in Iraq can broadly
be broken into four groups: different groups from among
the ranks of Saddam's Ba'ath Party; small pockets of
Arab tribes who have been left out of the current
interim setup; a few thousand Arabs who arrived in Iraq
before the US-led invasion who have joined hands with
different resistance groups; and independent groups of
gangsters.
Of these, the Ba'ath Party remnants
have been the most effective to date. According to
insiders who spoke to Asia Times Online, on May 14, a
leader of the Ba'ath Party in Mosul, Mohammed
al-Samidai, called a meeting of different leaders of the
party from north and central Iraq, including Kirkuk,
Mosul, Tikrit and Baghdad. They resolved to operate
under a new name, Owda, meaning return, as symbolic of
restoring the party's "glory" days in power.
At
about the same time, other Ba'ath members from Hawija in
Kirkuk province met separately and formed another ring,
which they named Afaa - snake. These two groups
represent people who benefited the most under Saddam's
brutal rule, and therefore they have the most to lose.
They are clearly at a dead end from which there is no
point of return.
Meanwhile, a significant report
appeared on Thursday in the weekly Hawlati newspaper -
the largest and most respected Kurdish language paper in
the country and which is printed in Sulaimaniya. It said
that Faluja (west of Baghdad where most US soldiers have
been killed in ambushes and shootouts ) is in the hands
of different Islamic groups. Reading between the lines,
it appears that Ba'ath members - who were despised in
this region - have now adopted Islamic mantles and are
calling for jihad against US forces. This trend is
expected to continue in other parts of the country.
Beyond the Ba'ath machinations, tribal leaders
are also defining their role. The chief of Faluja is
believed to have met in Hawija on June 6, at the house
of Abu Hasan, one of the most powerful local tribal
leaders. All chiefs present declared jihad against the
US.
Soon after this meeting, in the night of
June 11, an oil pipeline exploded in the vicinity. The
action was apparently carried out by the head of the
al-Ubaed tribe, who was responsible for looking after
the pipeline during Saddam's time as it passed through
his territory. In return, he was paid a royalty, which
stopped when the US administration took over. As a
result, the tribe blew up the pipeline.
This is
just one example of the difficulties faced by the US in
post-war Iraq which could be avoided with a little more
understanding of how Iraq has worked over the years.
Saddam, of course, knows exactly how the country ticks,
as he instituted the pillars of power and influence from
the grassroots to the top. Conceivably, he also put in
place mechanisms to protect himself in exactly the
predicament in which he now finds himself.
Either way, until Saddam is found or meets the
same fate that has befallen his ill-begotten progeny,
Iraq can never rest easily.
(Copyright 2003 Asia
Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
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