The final US report on Iraq's non-existent WMD arsenal, provided an ABC manual on how to run a dictatorship by revealing the inner dealings of Saddam Hussein and his subordinates, reports Khaled Dawoud from Washington The 1,000-page report issued last week by the director of the Iraq Survey Group (ISG), Charles Duelfer, was more bad news for US President George W Bush, hardly three weeks before upcoming presidential vote on 2 November. The report, ordered by former chief of the Central Intelligence Agency, George Tenet, was supposed to provide the "final word" on the truth of Bush's repeated claims that Iraq posed a "gathering threat" to the US and the world because of its alleged arsenal of WMD. Thus, the invasion and occupation of Iraq was necessary and legitimate, particularly in light of the 9/11 attacks and the possibility that the former regime could have handed such weapons to terrorist groups like Al-Qaeda. It turned out that not only had Iraq destroyed nearly 90 per cent of its banned weapons after the end of the Gulf War in 1991, but that it also had no links with Al-Qaeda or plans to coordinate anti-US attacks with the terrorist group. Ironically, the report revealed that the jailed Iraqi leader was even extremely eager to restore relations with the United States, sending the White House several messengers (including Duelfer, the writer of the report who was a former CIA officer and UN weapons inspector) that he was ready to cooperate on all issues. For Saddam, the main enemy was Iran, and even Israel was a secondary goal, the report stated several times. And while Bush and his deputy, Dick Cheney, repeatedly charged Saddam that he was responsible for funding the Palestinian uprising and paying reward for families of militants, the former Iraqi leader, according to the report, was even ready to cooperate on reaching a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians. "Charles Duelfer of ISG said that between 1994 and 1998, both he and UNSCOM Executive Chairman Rolf Ekeus were approached multiple times by senior Iraqis with the message that Baghdad wanted a dialogue with the United States, and that Iraq was in a position to be Washington's best friend in the region bar none," the ISG report added. But for President Bush, it doesn't matter. "I made the right decision, and I would do it again," he said in several election campaigns. Saddam had "the intent and capability" to produce WMDs, and would have done so as soon as the strict UN sanctions were lifted, he added. Bush did not only disregard Duelfer's assertions that there were no written evidence to prove such plans (let alone whether intentions alone were good enough reason to launch a pre-emptive war), but continued to insist that the former regime could have provided WMDs to terrorist groups. While affirmation that Iraq possessed no WMDs and the fallacy of nearly all claims Bush used to justify the war were old news after 18 months of Iraq's occupation, the more interesting part in Duelfer's report was that which offered a detailed picture of how Saddam ran his dictatorship for 24 years. Duelfer's team had the chance to do something no one in Iraq ever dared to think about: questioning the now jailed leader about his decisions, intentions and plans. The answers he provided to a single debriefer painted a picture of a classic, novel-like dictatorship, which will definitely sound familiar in several Arab countries. In trying to sum up how Saddam ruled Iraq, Duelfer's reiterated several times how the entire structure was built on the main assumption that "the regime was Saddam and Saddam is different." Thus, as long as he survived, the country was safe and sound. He also noted "there was no incentive and/or motivation for Saddam to cooperate with the debriefer, except to shape his legacy. Saddam is concerned with his place in history and how history will view him. "In Saddam's view, Iraq was the natural leader of the Arab world. Its people, history, and resources combined with his leadership made it the inevitable leader in the region, perhaps not without struggle, but struggle contributes to the overall glory. Saddam sees himself as the most recent of the great Iraqi leaders like, Hammurabi, Nebuchadnezzar, and Saladin. "In Babylon, where Iraq was reconstructing the historical city, the bricks were molded with the phrase, 'Made in the era of Saddam Hussein' -- mimicking the ancient bricks forged in ancient Babylon and demonstrating his assumption that he will be similarly remembered over the millennia. This narcissism characterises his actions, and, while it is not always visible, it is always there. "Saddam wanted personal greatness, a powerful Iraq that could project influence on the world stage, and a succession that guaranteed both. Saddam sought the further industrialisation of Iraq, held great hopes for Iraqi science, and saw himself as the liberator of Palestine." In explaining the relation between Saddam and his subordinates, the report explained how the Iraqi leader followed the classic rule of: divide and rule. He mistrusted even his closest and supposedly most loyal aides, encouraged them to mistrust each other so that they would never conspire against him and feel that they were being watched closely, welcomed numerous back channels to provide information on his aides, and sought to emphasise his image as a leader who was not easily accessible. In his last few years, Saddam's aides said he showed more confidence in family members, leading to feelings of resentment among them because they felt excluded. Saddam told his debriefer that he always had his own sources, and that women who had senior positions in key ministries were among the best. "It was his assessment of the utility of various policy options that was determinant. Those around Saddam knew their future depended on their ability to divine what he wanted and to be able to respond favourably to his requests. Those who survived knew how to relate in this environment. This meant that they were often forced to anticipate what Saddam wanted because they did not want to be in a position to have to say no. Complicating their lives was the tendency of Saddam to hold his cards close while he allowed minions to debate. Saddam did not lead by espousing detailed goals and objectives. He tended to allow ideas to float up and he would consider them often never pronouncing on them one way or the other. This meant that much guidance to the government was implicit rather than explicit. Saddam's senior aides, like Tareq Aziz, Taha Yassin Ramadan, Ali Hassan Majid (Chemical Ali) and his personal secretary, Abed Hamid, were repeatedly quoted in the report on how they were left many times arguing for hours on what Saddam exactly wanted. Their main goal was to please the leader all the time and to execute what they thought were his general guidelines. In meetings, the top aides and ministers would wait for Saddam to determine the agenda and the direction of the discussion, and nobody would ever dare to argue with the leader "as this would be simply suicidal" according to one aide. As expected, almost none of the aides were ready to tell Saddam any bad news, including his son and apparent heir, Qusay. Qusay was killed by US troops in Mosul a year ago, along with brother Uday and his son, Mohamed. According to Abdul-Tawab Huwaish a senior aide and former minister of military industrialisation, Qusay told his father before the early 2003 invasion of Iraq that the army "was 10 times better" compared to the situation before the 1991 Gulf War. When that aide begged to differ, Qusay became very angry. Thus, it was common that most senior aides would either remain silent or lie to the leader. While several senior leaders said they remained loyal to Saddam mainly because they feared to be executed, a practice that was very common under the former leader, Aziz provided another common reason: Had he left his job in protest, there will be "no income, no job". Contrary to a common stereotype that corruption would be rife in a dictatorship, that was not the Saddam's case, the report found out. Saddam maintained tight control over the disbursement of Iraq's funds, the money made by his closest aides, asked them to provide regular reports on their possessions, and would harshly punish those who would illegally benefit from their posts. Meanwhile, Saddam was very generous in his rewards, as long as those aides remained loyal and subordinate. He also built all structures of the modern state, in terms of ministries, courts and other institutions, but they were all inept in creating policy, and all waited for directions from the leader. Even senior aides members of the Revolutionary Command Council were not involved in the decision-making, and they were summoned to sudden meetings, driven there in cars with black windows, only to receive orders. One aide said they would sometimes know of the orders issued in their name through the radio after their meeting. Most of his aides said meetings were held in Saddam's various palaces in his last years, and said he tended to build many palaces because he always feared assassination by the US and wanted to make it difficult to spot his location.
