U.S. War Crimes Ambassador Reviews Saddam Hussein's Criminality

The Case for Justice in Iraq
By David J. Scheffer
Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues

Monday, September 18, 2000

Middle East Institute and the Iraq Foundation
National Press Club, Washington, D.C.

Thank you, David Mack, for your kind introduction, and thanks to you
and to the Middle East Institute and the Iraq Foundation for
sponsoring this important conference on the crimes against humanity
and war crimes of Saddam Hussein and his regime. It is good to be
among so many groups and individuals who are dedicated to the pursuit
of justice, democracy and the rule of law for the Iraqi people. I am
here to tell you all that the United States looks forward to the day
when justice, democracy and the rule of law will prevail in Iraq.

I want to do three things this morning, by way of starting us all on a
series of interesting presentations on different aspects of the case
for justice in Iraq. First, I want to recall to everyone's attention
the reason we are here -- the need to address the continuing
criminality of Saddam Hussein's regime. Second, it has been almost a
year since I saw many of you here in Washington last October, when I
spoke at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on the subject
of Iraqi war crimes, or at the Iraqi National Assembly in New York
shortly thereafter. I want to update you on what the U.S. Government
has been doing to promote accountability for Saddam Hussein's 20 years
of criminal conduct. Third, I think you will find of interest some of
the reaction, in Baghdad and elsewhere, to what we -- and many of you
-- have been doing to promote the cause of justice in Iraq.

Let me be clear at the outset. Our primary objective is to see Saddam
Hussein and the leadership of the Iraqi regime indicted and prosecuted
by an international criminal tribunal. If an international criminal
tribunal or even a commission of experts proves too difficult to
achieve politically, there still may be opportunities in the national
courts of certain jurisdictions to investigate and indict the
leadership of the Iraqi regime. The United States is committed to
pursuing justice and accountability in the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda,
Cambodia, Sierra Leone and elsewhere around the world. We are also
committed to the pursuit of justice and accountability for the victims
of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq.

I. The Criminal Record of the Regime of Saddam Hussein

Let me turn to my first main point, the need to address the criminal
record of Saddam Hussein and his top associates for their crimes
against the peoples of Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, and other countries. To the
United States Government, it is beyond any possible doubt that Saddam
Hussein and the top leadership around him have brutally and
systematically committed war crimes and crimes against humanity for
years, are committing them now, and will continue committing them
until the international community finally says enough -- or until the
forces of change in Iraq prevail against his regime as, ultimately,
they must.

This may seem self-evident to all of you here today. Interestingly, in
my discussions of this issue I have found some people who will agree
that Saddam Hussein is a criminal, but who are genuinely unaware of
the magnitude of his criminal conduct. Those who want to gloss over
Saddam's criminal record often want to gloss over the need for him to
be brought to justice. This goes to the very heart of why his conduct
deserves an international response, so I find it useful to review what
we now know of the criminal record of Saddam Hussein and his top
associates.

1. The Iran-Iraq War. During the Iran-Iraq War, Saddam Hussein and his
forces used chemical weapons against Iran. According to official
Iranian sources, which we consider credible, approximately 5,000
Iranians were killed by chemical weapons between 1983 and 1988. The
use of chemical weapons has been a war crime since the 1925 Chemical
Weapons treaty, to which Iraq is a party. Also during the Iran-Iraq
War, there are credible reports that Iraqi forces killed several
thousand Iranian prisoners of war, which is also a war crime as well
as a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions of 1949, to which Iraq is
a party. Other war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by
Saddam Hussein and the top leaders around him against Iran and the
Iranian people also deserve international investigation.

2. Halabja. In mid-March of 1988, Saddam Hussein and his cousin Ali
Hassan alMajid -- the infamous "Chemical Ali" -- ordered the dropping
of chemical weapons on the town of Halabja in northeastern Iraq. This
killed an estimated 5,000 civilians, and is a war crime and a crime
against humanity. Photographic and videotape evidence of this attack
and its aftermath exists. Some of this is available to scholars and
God willing -- to prosecutors through the efforts of the International
Monitor Institute in Los Angeles, California. More visual evidence is
available from Iranian cameramen, who collected their images of the
victims of this brutal attack -- most of whom were women and children
-- in a book published in Tehran. The best evidence of all is from the
survivors in Halabja itself.

I am proud to say that the United States has been working with groups
such as the Washington Kurdish Institute and scientists like Dr.
Christine Gosden to document the suffering of the people of Halabja
and -- just as importantly -- to find ways to help the people of
Halabja treat the victims and bring hope to the living. Working with
local authorities, we are looking for ways to help investigators,
doctors and scientists document this crime and plan the help that the
survivors need and deserve. We know they will not get that help from
Saddam Hussein. As one example, to help war crimes investigators, the
U.S. Government is today announcing the declassification of overhead
imagery products of Halabia taken in March 1988, the best image we
have that was taken a little more than a week after the attack. We
hope this will serve as a photo-map to enable witnesses to describe to
investigators, doctors and scientists what they were during those
terrible days of the Iraqi chemical attack and its aftermath.

3. The Anfal campaigns. Beginning in 1987 and accelerating in early
1988, Saddam Hussein ordered the "Anfal" campaign against the Iraqi
Kurdish people. By any measure, this constituted a crime against
humanity and a war crime. Chemical Ali has admitted to witnesses that
he carried out this campaign "under orders." In 1995, Human Rights
Watch published a compilation of their reports in the book Iraq's
Crime of Genocide, which is now out of print. Human Rights Watch needs
to reprint this book. Human Rights Watch estimated that between 50,000
and 100,000 Kurds were killed. Based on their review of captured Iraqi
documents, interviews with hundreds of eyewitnesses, and on-site
forensic investigations, they concluded that the Anfal campaign was
genocide. I challenge anyone to read the evidence cited in Iraq's
Crime of Genocide and come to any different conclusion.

4. The invasion and occupation of Kuwait. On August 2, 1990, Saddam
Hussein ordered his forces to invade and occupy Kuwait. It took
military force by the international community and actions by the
Kuwaiti themselves to liberate Kuwait in February 1991. During the
occupation, Saddam Hussein's forces killed more than a thousand
Kuwaiti nationals, as well as many others from other nations. Evidence
of many of these killings is on file with authorities in Kuwait and at
the United Nations Compensation Commission in Geneva. Saddam Hussein's
forces committed many other crimes in Kuwait, including environmental
crimes such as the destruction of oil wells in Kuwait's oil fields,
massive looting of Kuwaiti property -- Saddam's son Uday appears to
have treated Kuwait as his personal used car lot. As well, Saddam
Hussein's government held hostages from many nations in an effort to
coerce their governments into pro-Iraqi policies. During the war,
Iraqi authorities also committed war crimes against Coalition forces.
War crimes against American service members were detailed in a report
to Congress and in an article by Lee Haworth and Jim Hergen in Society
magazine back in January 1994.

5. The suppression of the 1991 uprising. In March and April of 1991,
Saddam Hussein's forces killed somewhere between 30,000 and 60,000
Iraqis, most of them civilians. The story of the uprising of the Iraqi
people is one of courage and hope for the people of Iraq and has been
told by men such as former Iraqi General Najib al-Salihi in his book
Al-Zilzal, "The Earthquake," The story of the uprising that started in
the south, a part of the country traditionally neglected and deprived
by Saddam Hussein's government in Baghdad, deserves to be better known
outside of Iraq. Most of those killed were civilians, not resistance
fighters -- a distinction that Saddam Hussein did not respect in 1991
any more than he has before or since. This qualifies as a crime
against humanity and possibly also a war crime.

6. The draining of the southern marshes. Beginning in the early
1990's, and continuing to this day, Saddam Hussein's government has
drained the southern marshes of Iraq, depriving thousands of Iraqis of
their livelihood and their ability to live on land that their
ancestors have lived on for thousands of years. This is clearly not a
land reclamation project, or a border security project, as some of
Saddam's defenders have claimed. Instead, as groups such as the Amar
Foundation have begun to document, Saddam's efforts have served to
render the land less fertile, and less able to sustain the livelihood
or security of the Iraqi people. This qualifies as a crime against
humanity and may possibly constitute genocide.

7. Ethnic cleansing of ethnic "Persians" from Iraq to Iran, and an
ongoing campaign of ethnic cleansing of the non-Arabs of Kirkuk and
other northern districts. This ongoing campaign of ethnic cleansing
was documented by the former U.N. Special Human Rights Rapporteur for
Iraq, Max van der Stoel in his reports in 1999.

8. Continuing unlawful killings of political opponents. Many groups
have documented Saddam Hussein's ongoing campaign against political
opponents, including killings, tortures, and -- lately -- rape. As
some of you may know, the regime has been using sexual assaults of
women in an effort to intimidate leaders of the Iraqi opposition. We
salute the courage of opposition leaders such as General Najib
al-Salihi for speaking out about this crime. The regime is also
carrying out a systematic campaign of murder and intimidation of
clergy, especially Shi'a clergy. The number of those killed unlawfully
is difficult to estimate but must be well in excess of 10,000 since
Saddam Hussein officially seized power in 1980. The number of victims
of torture no doubt well exceeds the number of those killed.

Who is responsible for these crimes? Like Slobodan Milosevic, Saddam
Hussein did not commit these crimes on his own. He has built up one of
the world's most ruthless police states using a very small number of
associates who share with him the responsibility for these criminal
actions. The non-governmental group INDICT some time ago developed a
list of 12 of those most deserving of international indictment. To
refresh everyone's recollection, they are:

1. Saddam Hussein, president of Iraq and chairman of the Revolutionary
Command Council (RCC). I will have more to say about the RCC shortly.

2. Ali Hassan al-Majid, "Chemical Ali," reviled for his enthusiasm in
using poison gas against Iraqi Kurds and in the Iran-Iraq war. He also
turned up in Kuwait during the occupation and, more recently, as
governor in the south of Iraq during recent periods of repression
against the people there. When someone shows up at crime scene after
crime scene, the pattern of evidence becomes clear.

3. Saddam's elder son Uday, a commander of a ruthless paramilitary
organization that maintains Saddam's hold on power.

4. Saddam's younger son Qusay Saddam Hussein, the Head of the Special
Security
Organization, reputed by many to be Saddam's likely successor.

5. Muhammad Hamza al-Zubaydi, Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq.

6. Taha Yasin Ramadan, Vice President of Iraq.

7. Barzan al-Tikriti, former Head of Iraqi Intelligence.

8. Watban al-Tikriti, former Minister of the Interior.

9. Sabawi al-Tikriti, former Head of Intelligence and the General
Security Organization.

10. Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, vice chairman of the Revolutionary Command
Council and former Head of the Revolutionary Court.

11. Tariq Aziz, Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq.

12. Aziz Salih Noman, Governor of Kuwait during the Iraqi occupation.

II. Building the Case: What the United States Has Been Doing

The charges are clear. The targets of prosecution are identified. Let
me turn to a brief description of what the United States has been
doing in the past year to gather the evidence of Iraqi crimes against
humanity, war crimes and genocide.

First, we have undertaken an analysis of the de jure case against
Saddam Hussein. This is important because a more straightforward de
jure case can greatly simplify the work of prosecutors. As some of you
know, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia
took advantage of Slobodan Milosevic's official role as President of
the FRY in 1999 to indict him for crimes against humanity in Kosovo,
whereas he has not yet been indicted for his responsibility for crimes
committed during the 1991-95 wars in Bosnia and Croatia, when he was
nominally only President of Serbia.

The de jure case against Saddam Hussein and his top associates is
rock-solid. To summarize briefly, Article 37 of the current Iraqi
constitution names the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC) the supreme
body in the state. Articles 42 and 43 state that the RCC has the power
to promulgate laws and decrees that have the force of law Article 38
states that the RCC chairman is also the President, who is responsible
under Article 57-59 for the acts of the Iraqi military and security
services. The RCC chairman and Iraqi president is, of course, Saddam
Hussein.

We have also been doing our part on the de facto case. Our second area
of work has been in connection with one of the most important archives
of evidence-millions of pages of captured Iraqi documents taken out of
northern Iraq by Human Rights Watch and the U.S. Government. We
scanned these onto 176 CD-ROM's. Last October, we announced we had
given a set of the 176 CD-ROM's to the Iraq Foundation, along with a
grant to make the full collection of these documents available on the
Internet to scholars, journalists and, eventually, prosecutors
worldwide. I know the Iraq Foundation and the Iraq Research and
Documentation Project have been working hard on that project, which I
will let them describe further.

Third, the U.S. Government has another archive of millions of pages of
documents captured by U.S. forces in Kuwait and southern Iraq during
Operation Desert Storm. I announced on August 2 that we have been
working to declassify these documents and that we were giving the
first of these to the Iraq Foundation. Today, I am announcing that we
have given several hundred more to the Iraq Foundation, as well. I
will let the Iraq Foundation describe further what is in this
collection.

Fourth, the U.S. Government has an extensive archive of classified
documents relating to Iraqi war crimes during the Gulf War. Since
October, staff from my office have located and reviewed these
materials. If you remember the final scene of "Raiders of the Lost
Ark," where the Ark is being wheeled into a warehouse of crate upon
crate, I should tell you that that warehouse does exist -- it's in
Suitland, Maryland -- and that my staff found these materials on Iraqi
war crimes ... located safely right next to the Ark of the Covenant.
U.S. Army lawyers and investigators did a truly outstanding job of
compiling this evidence and organizing it in ways that will prove
valuable to the staff of a tribunal or commission. Some of the
materials can eventually be declassified. While we do not intend to
make all of these documents public, we have worked closely with past
commissions of experts and tribunals to allow them access to
classified material in accordance with U.S. laws that protect sources
and methods. We would be willing to do the same for a commission or
tribunal looking into the crimes of Saddam Hussein and his henchmen.

I must also salute the work of Kuwaiti prosecutors, the Center for
Research and Studies on Kuwait, and others there in documenting Saddam
Hussein's crimes against the Kuwaiti people. After the liberation,
Kuwaiti authorities undertook a systematic effort at collecting
evidence and documenting Iraqi war crimes in Kuwait. As some of you
know, Kuwaiti prosecutors recently completed a thorough trial of Alaa
Hussein, installed in August 1990 by Saddam. Hussein as the quisling
governor of Kuwait during the early weeks of the occupation. Kuwaiti
prosecutors showed, through their professionalism in that trial, their
ability to present evidence of Iraqi war crimes committed 10 years
ago.

Fifth, U.S. Government officials have been meeting with witnesses and
former Iraqi officials to gather evidence of Iraqi war crimes. There
is no substitute for eyewitness accounts in any criminal prosecution,
before an international tribunal or in national courts. We have
learned a lot in these interviews. As a rule, we treat information
provided to us in confidence, so we leave it to those who talk to us
whether to go public with what they have experienced. There have been
a number of cases where valuable leads have come forward. We
understand other groups are also active in interviewing witnesses, but
I will leave it to them to describe their own work.

Sixth, to support our other work, the U.S. Government has undertaken a
review of imagery to declassify potential evidence of both historical
and more recent Iraqi criminal conduct. We have made public imagery
products showing the ongoing work to drain the southern marshes, and
destroy Iraqi villages. Recently, the Iraq Foundation received a
report of the destruction of the southern Iraqi village of Albu Ayish
on March 28 and April 5, 1999. We were able to locate imagery products
from September 1998 and December 1999 that confirms this account.
Those of you familiar with Jamie Rubin's press briefings of the
conflict in Kosovo will recognize this presentation. [Show] On the
left is Albu Ayish as it existed before Iraqi forces moved in. You can
see the school near the river, here. The buildings surrounding it have
roofs on them. In the "after" picture, here, the school is intact.
That is more than you can say for the buildings surrounding the
school, which bear the signs of destruction from ground level. I will
leave it to Rend Franke if she wants to say more about what happened
to the families at Albu Ayish and surrounding towns in southern Iraq.
Albu Ayish is but one example of what the U.S. Government is doing to
review imagery of Iraqi war crimes.

All in all, we have had a productive year in developing and preserving
evidence of Iraqi crimes against humanity and war crimes. We are the
first to say there is much more that needs to be done. To that end, we
are hoping the Congress will give us the President's full requested
appropriations so that this important work can continue for another
year. We also anticipate further strong contributions to this work by
the Iraqi opposition. The Iraqi National Congress, in particular, tell
us they plan to devote substantial efforts to this cause as part of
its upcoming $8 million work program.

III. The Reaction from Baghdad and Elsewhere

Let me turn to my third main point. One of the most interesting
aspects of our work on documenting Iraqi war crimes, and engaging with
other governments on this issue, has been the reactions we have
received. Let me first talk about Baghdad's reaction, Saddam Hussein
recognizes that he is vulnerable to calls for accountability for his
crimes against humanity, genocide and war crimes. Articles in the
international press have reported that the regime takes international
efforts to establish a tribunal seriously. Threats of possible arrest
have caused Iraqi officials to curtail or forgo travel to European
countries whose laws allow arrest under the UN, Convention Against
Torture, The regime has also harassed Iraqis and others who speak out
against the regime's crimes. For example, the regime sent someone with
an Iraqi diplomatic passport -- hesitate to call him an Iraqi diplomat
to try to film participants at INDICT's conference on Iraqi war crimes
in Paris this past April.

There is another important aspect of the Iraqi reaction, as well,
Saddam Hussein realizes that international discussion of his crimes
against humanity, genocide and war crimes reveals the truth about his
policies towards the Iraqi people for the last 20 years. This is a
regime that maintains its power through crime-whether it be by crimes
against humanity and war crimes, or by killings, torture or the threat
of killings and torture, of Iraqi citizens, and by looting the
property that rightly belongs to the people of Iraq or Iraq's
neighbors. Make no mistake -- those crimes are continuing to this day.

Saddam Hussein clearly fears the truth. Journalists who travel to Iraq
all have "minders." It takes courageous journalists, and documentary
film producers like Joel Soler, to tell any story other than the one
that Saddam Hussein's regime wants you to tell. (I hope you all can
see Mr. Soler's documentary, "Uncle Saddam" at 1:00 this afternoon.)
One recent visitor to Iraq traveled to Baghdad earlier this year and
was shown hospital beds with two patients to a bed. It was only when
he slipped away from his minder that he found out that around the
corner, out of sight, was a room full of empty hospital beds. Last
week, as you read in Barbara Crossette's story in September 12th's
"New York Times", Saddam Hussein kept U.N. humanitarian experts from
traveling to Iraq to assess the true living conditions in Iraq. She
wrote, "President Saddam Hussein, whose government is now probably the
world's most repressive, wants to control all contact between Iraqis
and outsiders, and can in effect veto the assignment to Iraq of even
United Nations officials." Large aid organizations based in Europe
have been barred from areas in Iraq under the regime's controls.
Instead, only small, anti-sanctions protesters, "who bring in
relatively small amounts of aid, are welcomed for their propaganda
value."

Any statistics from Iraq, or taken by Iraqi officials for the U.N. are
seriously suspect. A recent Fellow at the US Institute of Peace,
Amatzia Baram, documented in this Spring's issue of "Middle East
Journal" how the Government of Iraq denies U.N. relief agencies
accurate and reliable statistics on the true conditions inside Iraq.
No reporter should uncritically accept as true any Iraqi statistics,
based on the research and data shown in this article. Iraqi human
rights and opposition groups frequently must work hard and take risks
to get the truth out of Iraq, and I am honored to be here with some of
their representatives today.

Saddam Hussein refused every year to allow the former U.N. Special
Human Rights Rapporteur for Iraq, Max van der Stoel, to visit Iraq to
find out the truth about Iraqi human rights abuses. The new
rapporteur, Andreas Mavrommatis of Cyprus, has not been allowed into
Iraq, either. Efforts to keep U.N. arms inspectors from the truth
about Saddam's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons are so
well-known I will not repeat them, except to say there were many "full
and final disclosures." Russian diplomat Yuli M. Voronstov was this
year denied entry to find out the true fate of more than 600 missing
Kuwaitis taken captive by Iraq during the occupation of Kuwait and,
thus far, never returned to their families. Their fate is known up
until the time they were taken to a prison in Basrah, southern Iraq,
and they have never been heard from since. It is true that, a few
years ago, Iraq admitted it had been holding hundreds of Iranian
prisoners of war more than 10 years after the end of the Iran-Iraq
War. When the truth came out, Iraq was forced to release its
prisoners.

All this effort to conceal the truth about what is going on inside
Iraq today is hard to explain without understanding the context of
Saddam Hussein's 20-year record of crimes against humanity by the
Iraqi regime. We know from those who have been in Saddam's inner
office that he admires Josef Stalin, and he has clearly tried to
emulate Stalin's methods of brutality, terror, covering up the truth,
and using propaganda to project a different image. An awareness of the
criminal character of Saddam Hussein's regime puts in context his
current propaganda campaign. No wonder Saddam Hussein is concerned
about efforts to establish an international tribunal that would
document the truth of his 20 years of crimes against humanity,
genocide and war crimes. It would end international support for Saddam
Hussein's campaign to gain personal control of billions of dollars of
Iraqi oil revenues that is now dedicated to the Iraqi people through
the U.N.'s oil-for-food program. Make no mistake -- the United States
is committed to finding ways of improving conditions for the Iraqi
people, but we cannot foresee the suspension of U.N. sanctions except
through full compliance with the Security Council's resolutions that
were adopted precisely as a result of Saddam Hussein's crimes against
humanity, genocide, and war crimes against the peoples of Iraq and
Iraq's neighbors.

The United States has held discussions in the last year with a number
of governments and non-governmental organizations who share the desire
for an international tribunal to indict Saddam Hussein and his top
aides for their crimes. We have also compiled a collection of
arguments from those who don't want to support a tribunal. As you
would expect, none of them withstands scrutiny. Let me share some of
the answers we have given and let you be the judge.

-- Until recently, some people said there was no reason to bring
Saddam to justice since most of his crimes took place long ago,
starting right after he seized absolute power in 1979. That argument
doesn't work any more, since other recent efforts for justice in
Europe and Asia have reached back prior to 1979, when Saddam Hussein
murdered his way to the presidency of Iraq. The worst abuses of the
Pinochet era took place in 1973-1979, and the crimes against humanity
of the Khmer Rouge era took place in 1975-1979. As Secretary Albright
has long made clear, there is no statute of limitations for genocide
or crimes against humanity.

-- Some have said that the Security Council should not establish
another ad hoc international tribunal and instead wait for the
International Criminal Court (ICC) to come into force. The ICC Treaty
will not come into force for at least two more years, and it will not
have jurisdiction over crimes committed before the Treaty comes into
force. Therefore, the ICC will be not able to hold Saddam Hussein and
his associates accountable for between a hundred thousand and a
quarter of a million civilian deaths, nor for the tortures, rapes,
lootings and other crimes against humanity and war crimes of the past,
nor for crimes against humanity that are still going on inside Iraq
today, Nor, under Article 12 of the Treaty, is the ICC going to be
able to indict Saddam for crimes he commits in the future inside Iraq
unless the Security Council acts to establish the court's jurisdiction
over his crimes, which we, and others, say should happen right now.

-- Our pursuit of justice in Iraq is entirely consistent with the
objectives of International Criminal Court, objectives we have long
supported. Governments that support international justice need to work
together in real time on the most demanding issues of accountability
of this era -- in places like the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Sierra
Leone, Cambodia -- and Iraq. It would be ironic indeed if the
generation of leaders who drafted the ICC Treaty turned their backs on
the some of the most egregious crimes of our time. The ICC will not
succeed if its supporters are not willing to demand accountability for
war criminals like Saddam Hussein.

-- Finally, there used to be those who said that the threat of
indictment of officials around Saddam Hussein would deter them from
leading a coup against him. The nature of the Iraqi regime -- both in
fact and in law -- is that Saddam Hussein and a very small group of
men around him have wielded absolute power. They are not likely to be
the ones to lead an uprising against Saddam. They deserve to be the
ones held responsible for the regime's crimes against humanity,
genocide and war crimes. When Saddam passes from the scene -- and this
will happen sooner or later -- there will need to be a process of
truth and reconciliation for the bulk of Iraqi society if it is to
make peace with itself. We owe it to the victims of 20 years of the
crimes of this regime to hold accountable those at the top who wielded
absolute power and ruined the lives of millions of Iraqis.

-- The last argument that never gets made, at least publicly, is money
-- that there is profit in doing business with the Baghdad regime
despite its criminal character. Countries that have ratified the ICC
treaty have already expressed, explicitly or implicitly, their policy
decision that economic grounds are insufficient to let a war criminal
off the book. We believe there is much more to gain for international
peace and security from pursuing international justice against Saddam
Hussein than would ever be possible to gain for private profit from
pursuing international commerce with Saddam Hussein. Moreover, in the
end, Saddam Hussein's criminal regime will go. At that time, the Iraqi
people will look up, around them, and see who stood up for justice for
the victims of Saddam. Hussein's criminal regime, and who opposed
efforts to bring the regime to justice, It is in everyone's long-term
interests -- economic, political, and moral -- to side with justice
for the peoples of Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, and elsewhere.

IV. Conclusion

In conclusion, let me say this, Iraq is a proud nation. Its heritage
goes back to the days of Hammurabi the lawgiver and the four schools
of Islamic law of the Abbasid Caliphate [Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi'i and
Hanbali], and the great Shi'ite schools of Islamic theology that
Saddam Hussein has sought to destroy. Saddam tries to liken himself to
the great Nebuchadnezzar II, when it is more likely history will judge
him as a latter-day Hulagu Khan, the Mongol conqueror who left Iraq a
legacy of death, devastation and misrule. Mongol conquerors built a
pyramid of the skulls of their victims, Saddam Hussein used helmets of
Iranian soldiers killed during the Iran-Iraq War. The time has come
for Saddam Hussein and his top associates to be held accountable for
their 20 years of crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide. I
hope you will join with me these next few months in advancing the
cause of justice in Iraq

Army, Marines Release New Counterinsurgency Manual
By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Dec. 18, 2006 – "Learn" and "adapt" are the key messages of the new Army and Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual, which just hit the streets.

The Counterinsurgency Field Manual, FM 3-24 and Marine Corps Warfighting Publication 3-33.5, is a unique joint effort between the Army and Marines to put in place doctrine to help operators as they face the challenges of asymmetric warfare.

The manual codifies an important lesson of insurgencies: it takes more than the military to win. "There are more than just lethal operations involved in a counterinsurgency campaign," said Conrad Crane, director of the U.S. Army Military History Institute, in Carlisle, Pa., and one of the leaders of the effort.

He said the team working on the manual decided early on to emphasize the interagency aspect of counterinsurgency fights. "The military is only one piece of the puzzle," Crane said. "To be successful in a counterinsurgency, you have to get contributions from a lot of different agencies, international organizations, non-governmental organizations and host-nation organizations. There are so many people involved to make counterinsurgency successful."

All of these organizations bring important weapons to the campaign, "and you've got to bring unity of effort if you can to make it effective," he said.

Lt. Col. Lance McDaniel, a branch head at the Marine Corps Combat Development Center at Quantico, Va., said the manual is aimed at battalion-level officers and NCOs, but felt that all who read it could gain some insight into the difficulties of a counterinsurgency war. "We see this being part of the pre-deployment training units undergo," McDaniel said. "Once on the ground they can adapt the ideas from the manual to their particular location and enemy."

The Army and Marine Corps have shared field manuals in the past, but this is the first on which the two services worked closely to write, both Crane and McDaniel said. "This was a real team effort of Army and Marine writers," Crane said. "What I tell people is we had about 20 primary writers on the manual and about 600,000 editors."

Crane said many soldiers and Marines commented on the manual and provided input to the final product. "We received more than 1,000 comments from people actually doing the mission," he said.

But it didn't stop with military feedback. State Department employees, CIA officials, academic experts and representatives of the international human rights community contributed insights to the manual, McDaniel said. "I hope the publication will make it easier for other agencies and organizations to work with us," he said.

Chapter 4, a discussion on Campaign Design, is a unique aspect of the manual. "The Marines brought that to the manual," Crane said.

Before beginning a campaign, planners must identify the problem that needs solving, then be ready to change the plan as conditions change on the ground, Crane said. "In counterinsurgency, that is so important because it is a complex situation," he said.

A counterinsurgency campaign is much more complex than a traditional military-on-military conflict. The make-up of the community, the needs of the various groups, the history of the area, traditional allies in the region, and many other things contribute to understanding how to design a counterinsurgency campaign. "It takes a lot more analysis before you jump into it, because if you do the wrong thing, it could have major implications," Crane said. "You have to be sure you are applying the right solution to the right problem."

Crane said the idea of campaign design will probably permeate other Army field manuals.

The new counterinsurgency manual uses examples from fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq, but also uses examples from the Napoleonic War, the U.S. experience in Vietnam, and counterinsurgency efforts in the Philippines, Malaya (now Malaysia) and South America.

Crane and McDaniel agree that insurgencies are the wars of the future. The idea of a nation taking on the United States army to army or navy to navy is remote, given the U.S. conventional expertise. "Enemies will make us fight these kinds of wars until we get them right," Crane said. "Then they'll switch."

The manual is informed by Afghanistan and Iraq, but also informed by history, Crane said. "We tried to glean what was useful from the historical record, but also with the realization that there are a lot of things that are new out there, Crane said. "Trying to grapple with the nature of contemporary insurgency was one of the toughest parts of writing it."

The manual is not limited to operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. "If we've created a manual that is just good for Iraq and Afghanistan, we've failed," he said. "This thing has got to be focused on the future and the next time we do this."

The manual is going to be useful in Iraq and Afghanistan, but much of what the manual covers is already being done in those theaters. "The manual is future-focused," Crane said. "The manual gives you the tools to do your analysis and the guidelines to apply it with the understanding that every situation is going to be unique."

It also will be rewritten, as needed, the men said.

Both men said the manual is receiving a good reception. "This is not a doctrine that is being jammed down peoples' throats," Crane said." This is a doctrine that they are demanding."

Related Sites:
Counterinsurgency Field Manual

Dempsey: Iraqi Forces Will Improve Dramatically
By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Dec. 19, 2006 – The improvements in the Iraqi security forces over the next six months will be dramatic, Army Lt. Gen. Martin Dempsey said today.

Dempsey, the commander of Multinational Security Transition Command Iraq, spoke via teleconference from Baghdad.
He said the Iraqi security forces will reach their manning goals this month. But the quality of the soldiers and police will increase as more intensified training kicks in.
"There are lead times in procurements and things and even in training, and those things will come to fruition here in the first six months of this next year," he said.
In June 2007, all 10 army divisions will be under the control of the Iraqi Ground Forces Command. "They will be in receipt of additional armored protected mobility," Dempsey said.
The Iraqis will soon receive 16 helicopters. For the first time the Iraqis can start flying their own medical evacuation and transport missions, Dempsey said. The Iraqi security forces will also have their own vehicles to clear streets of roadside bombs.
The Iraqi government has set aside $1.5 billion for military sales. "They're now beginning to engage us with the desire to purchase and procure more modern weaponry," Dempsey said. "In particular they're immediately interested in U.S. personal weapons - that's rifles and machine guns and such."
Multinational Forces Iraq officials in Baghdad said the coalition training teams now embedded with all Iraqi units will concentrate on teaching Iraqi commanders and staffs how to plan and execute operations, how to gather intelligence and then act upon it, and how to direct units in the field, they said.
The Iraqis will also concentrate on cooperation between the ministry of defense and the interior, officials said.
The size and composition of the coalition embedded training teams will probably change, Dempsey said.
"I think that growing the size of the transition teams makes a great deal of sense, and also changing their composition," he said. "If you think about it, when we started down this path of embedding transition teams, the Iraqi security forces were not very well developed, and so we had kind of a minimal approach to the embedded transition teams and we maximized the approach of having a partner unit with it.
"Now the Iraqi forces are becoming more capable, and it's my view, and I think it will be our view, that we should probably at this time reverse the paradigm," he continued. "We should enhance the transition teams and minimize our partnership with them so that they get used to standing on their own. And I think that's where we're headed." Related Sites:
Multinational Security Transition Command Iraq

Report: Iraqi Government Must Stop Violence for Progress to Continue
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, Dec. 18, 2006 – Increased violence in Iraq threatens, but so far has failed, to stop progress on the political and economic fronts and in building Iraq's security forces, according to the Defense Department's latest quarterly report to Congress, released today.

DoD delivered "Measuring Stability and Security in Iraq" to Congress today. The report, the sixth report of its kind, evaluates political stability, economic activity, the security environment, and security force training and performance between mid-August and mid-November.

Peter Rodman, assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, told Pentagon reporters today that escalating violence is destabilizing what he said he once considered the "strategic prize in Iraq": momentum in its political process.

All hopes were for 2006 to be the year Iraq's new government would get on its feet, Rodman said. However, he pointed to the Samarra Golden Mosque bombing, and the cycle of sectarian violence it sparked, as giving "partial strategic success" to insurgents that they previously couldn't achieve.

As a result, Iraq's new government, under Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, is embroiled in a struggle as it strives to be "a rallying point for the moderate center," Rodman said.

"Our job is to help the Maliki government succeed," a process that demands an effective national reconciliation, he said. Rodman cited several recent Maliki initiatives that offer hope, but emphasized that obstacles remain.

While citing challenges confronting the Iraqi government, the Iraq progress report also notes the government's willingness and ability to take over responsibility and deliver essential services, and the Iraqi security forces' assumption of more leadership in counterinsurgency and law enforcement operations.

This progress is notable, the report recognizes, particularly in light of escalating violence in some of Iraq's most populated regions. Attacks increased 22 percent during the three-month reporting period. Although 68 percent of those attacks were directed at coalition forces, Iraqis suffered most of the casualties, according to the report.

Slightly more than half those attacks occurred in Baghdad and Anbar provinces, and most of Iraq's other provinces remained in relative peace. Outside the "Sunni Triangle," more than 90 percent of Iraqis reported feeling "very safe" in their neighborhoods, the reported noted.

Marine Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, director of strategic plans and policy for the Joint Staff, cited progress in preparing Iraq's security forces to meet their country's security challenges.

Training and equipping of Iraq's security forces is "on course," at 323,000 troops, and will reach the 325,000-person goal by the year's end, he said. The report notes that 45,000 Iraqi soldiers and police completed their initial training and equipping during the last quarter.

Of these troops, about 280,000 are considered "available for duty," Sattler said, noting that 30 percent of the force is on leave at any given time to take their pay to their families. "It's a continuous cycle ... (and) a fact of life."

These troops are increasingly taking the operational lead, despite the challenges they face, the report notes. "The nature of the high has changed dramatically since we started building the Iraqi security forces," Sattler said.

Six division headquarters, 30 brigade headquarters and 91 Iraqi army battalions are currently in the lead -- up from five divisions, 25 brigades and 85 battalions reported in the last quarterly progress report, released Sept. 1.

In addition, 94 Iraqi army, special operations combat forces and strategic infrastructure battalions are fully independent or in the lead with coalition support. That's up from 24 in June 2005.

The report emphasizes the importance of speeding up training to ensure that Maliki has more capable forces able to fight terrorists and death squads while providing security and stability for the country.

Maliki shares the United States' recognition that escalating sectarian violence "has to be squashed," Sattler said. "To break the cycle of violence, extremists on both sides have to be taken head-on and brought to justice."

Biographies:
Peter Rodman
Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, USMC

White House, Joint Chiefs At Odds on Adding Troops
By Robin Wright and Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, December 19, 2006; A01

The Bush administration is split over the idea of a surge in troops to Iraq, with White House officials aggressively promoting the concept over the unanimous disagreement of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, according to U.S. officials familiar with the intense debate.

Sending 15,000 to 30,000 more troops for a mission of possibly six to eight months is one of the central proposals on the table of the White House policy review to reverse the steady deterioration in Iraq. The option is being discussed as an element in a range of bigger packages, the officials said.

But the Joint Chiefs think the White House, after a month of talks, still does not have a defined mission and is latching on to the surge idea in part because of limited alternatives, despite warnings about the potential disadvantages for the military, said the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the White House review is not public.

The chiefs have taken a firm stand, the sources say, because they believe the strategy review will be the most important decision on Iraq to be made since the March 2003 invasion.

At regular interagency meetings and in briefing President Bush last week, the Pentagon has warned that any short-term mission may only set up the United States for bigger problems when it ends. The service chiefs have warned that a short-term mission could give an enormous edge to virtually all the armed factions in Iraq -- including al-Qaeda's foreign fighters, Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias -- without giving an enduring boost to the U.S military mission or to the Iraqi army, the officials said.

The Pentagon has cautioned that a modest surge could lead to more attacks by al-Qaeda, provide more targets for Sunni insurgents and fuel the jihadist appeal for more foreign fighters to flock to Iraq to attack U.S. troops, the officials said.

The informal but well-armed Shiite militias, the Joint Chiefs have also warned, may simply melt back into society during a U.S. surge and wait until the troops are withdrawn -- then reemerge and retake the streets of Baghdad and other cities.

Even the announcement of a time frame and mission -- such as for six months to try to secure volatile Baghdad -- could play to armed factions by allowing them to game out the new U.S. strategy, the chiefs have warned the White House.

The idea of a much larger military deployment for a longer mission is virtually off the table, at least so far, mainly for logistics reasons, say officials familiar with the debate. Any deployment of 40,000 to 50,000 would force the Pentagon to redeploy troops who were scheduled to go home.

A senior administration official said it is "too simplistic" to say the surge question has broken down into a fight between the White House and the Pentagon, but the official acknowledged that the military has questioned the option. "Of course, military leadership is going to be focused on the mission -- what you're trying to accomplish, the ramifications it would have on broader issues in terms of manpower and strength and all that," the official said.

The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said military officers have not directly opposed a surge option. "I've never heard them be depicted that way to the president," the official said. "Because they ask questions about what the mission would be doesn't mean they don't support it. Those are the kinds of questions the president wants his military planners to be asking."

The concerns raised by the military are sometimes offset by concerns on the other side. For instance, those who warn that a short-term surge would harm longer-term deployments are met with the argument that the situation is urgent now, the official said. "Advocates would say: 'Can you afford to wait? Can you afford to plan in the long term? What's the tipping point in that country? Do you have time to wait?' "

Which way Bush is leaning remains unclear. "The president's keeping his cards pretty close to his vest," the official said, "and I think people may be trying to interpret questions he's asking and information he's asking for as signs that he's made up his mind."

Robert M. Gates, who was sworn in yesterday as defense secretary, is headed for Iraq this week and is expected to play a decisive role in resolving the debate, officials said. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's views are still open, according to State Department officials. The principals met again yesterday to continue discussions.

The White House yesterday noted the growing number of reports about what is being discussed behind closed doors. "It's also worth issuing a note of caution, because quite often people will try to litigate preferred options through the press," White House press secretary Tony Snow told reporters.

Discussions are expected to continue through the holidays. Rice is expected to travel to the president's ranch near Crawford, Tex., after Christmas for consultations on Iraq. The administration's foreign policy principals are also expected to hold at least two meetings during the holiday. The White House has said the president will outline his new strategy to the nation early next year.

As the White House debate continues, another independent report on Iraq strategy is being issued today by the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based crisis monitoring group that includes several former U.S. officials. It calls for more far-reaching policy revisions and reversals than did even the Iraq Study Group report, the bipartisan report issued two weeks ago.

The new report calls the study group's recommendations "not nearly radical enough" and says that "its prescriptions are no match for its diagnosis." It continues: "What is needed today is a clean break both in the way the U.S. and other international actors deal with the Iraqi government, and in the way the U.S. deals with the region."

The Iraqi government and military should not be treated as "privileged allies" because they are not partners in efforts to stem the violence but rather parties to the conflict, it says. Trying to strengthen the fragile government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki will not contribute to Iraq's stability, it adds. Iraq's escalating crisis cannot be resolved militarily, the report says, and can be solved only with a major political effort.

The International Crisis Group proposes three broad steps: First, it calls for creation of an international support group, including the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Iraq's six neighbors, to press Iraq's constituents to accept political compromise.

Second, it urges a conference of all Iraqi players, including militias and insurgent groups, with support from the international community, to forge a political compact on controversial issues such as federalism, distribution of oil revenue, an amnesty, the status of Baath Party members and a timetable for U.S. withdrawal. Finally, it suggests a new regional strategy that would include engagement with Syria and Iran and jump-starting the moribund Arab-Israeli peace process.