In Video, Hussein Uses Slingshots and Bows to Rally Iraqis for War

[ECH1969]

As the world worried about Saddam Hussein’s quest for nuclear and biological weapons, he took time out to discuss with his top advisers the merits of a decidedly more primitive arsenal: slingshots, Molotov cocktails and crossbows.

In a previously undisclosed video, apparently shot in the months before the American-led invasion in 2003, Mr. Hussein, the Iraqi dictator, beams as military officers display and demonstrate low-tech weapons spread on a table in a ceremonial room. Whether the episode shows genuine preparation for an insurgency or was merely a bizarre propaganda exercise is unclear.

In the video, Mr. Hussein, wearing a double-breasted gray suit, aims a slingshot, shoots an arrow at a door using a crossbow (as aides scamper out of the way) and swings a mock gasoline bomb over his head with a rope. He urges his aides to get such weapons into the hands of Iraqis.

Whatever the thinking, enormous quantities of small weapons and explosives were hidden around the country before the invasion. “We found caches everywhere with thousands of weapons,” said Mr. Garlasco, now a senior military analyst at Human Rights Watch.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/24/world/middleeast/24saddam.html?ex=1322024400&en=02841b1e1b1e85db&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

[ECH1969]

1. pic

[jwirr]

2. I also remember a headline in the Duluth news paper that said

"Iraq Gearing up for War" under a picture of Saddam and another man riding several beautiful Arabian horses. It struck me as the only truth we were hearing as we approached a state of war.

[ECH1969]

3. interesting