The Capture of Saddam Hussein
Yesterday, Saddam was captured while trying to elude his captors by crawling down into a "spider" hole near a farmhouse in Tikrit. And just in time for Christmas and the Christmas shopping rush. And just two days before the unlikely hero’s of the Fellowship (Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, Sam, Frodo, Pippin, Merry, Gandolf, and Gollum) battle the forces of evil in the battle for all of Middle Earth for boxoffice gold. Is this great timing or what?
There is some great commentary out there on this. I’m foregoing commenting on it myself, except for my smart-ass cynicism above, because so many others have explained my sentiments better. For your consideration--
Mark at Fried Green Al-Qaeda posts commentary by Steve:
An evil, tired and pointless old man is dragged out of a dirt hole. Hip, hip hooray. I cannot rejoice at this news as I wish I could. Bush and his team, already drunk with power, are given more. They backslap and highfive and plot anew, with no checks, no balances to impede them.
I care about THIS country and not so much about Iraq. Try this exercise: gather in your mind all the abuses of our trust, the blatant cozy relationship with big business, the vicious consolidation of political power, the trashing of environmental safeguards, the incredible penchant for governmental secrecy, the rollback of the rights of individuals, the labeling of dissent as un-American, and the belligerent 'my way or the highway' foreign policy.
Josh at Talking Points Memo writes about Saddam’s reign and how this capture might affect the violence plaguing the US’ rebuilding mission:
[O]n a day like this it's worth stepping back and remembering that this was a man who took what is probably the most educated, cultured, and close to the most wealthy country in the Arab middle east and ground it down almost into dust over more than thirty years of rule (Saddam was the de facto ruler of the country prior to becoming the official head of state.) He tortured and killed untold numbers of his own people and launched two unnecessary and, for his own country, disastrous wars.
Yet, looking forward from today, there is one fundamental question: was Saddam Hussein central to the guerilla war or resistance fighting in Iraq? Either operationally or as a symbol (the person they were trying to put back in power)?
I've never thought either was true. And if it's not, then his capture should not fundamentally change the situation on the ground in the country.
LiberalOasis explains that the Dems need to speak out against the heart of terrorism that still beats strong and how the Bush team has neglected it.
It’s time to start stressing that the problem of radical Islamic terrorism is bigger than just one man.
It’s time to start criticizing the Administration for losing the hearts and minds of the Islamic people.
And it’s time for the Dems to articulate their own long-term, comprehensive strategy for winning those hearts and minds, based on multilateralism, real democratic reform, and improving the quality of life for all in the Muslim world.
The urgency of this may be politically motivated.
But as Karl Rove likes to say, "good policy is good politics."
Christopher Scheer, in his AlterNet article titled "Hussein’s Capture is Yesterday’s News," writes:
[I]t's time to return to Earth and reality. The TV talking heads tell us that the 2004 elections and the future of Iraq were decided this morning when Hussein was found in a hole. In my humble opinion, that's perhaps the stupidest comment since Paris Hilton speculated that Wal-Mart is a store that sells walls. Catching Saddam was a mop-up operation, rather like the slaying of his sons a few months back. The guy was already done-for; once a dictator falls from his perch, the wolves – his own or others – ensure that he will never again be alpha male in that pack. All the issues surrounding the occupation of Iraq will be with us tomorrow morning, and the day after that, and the day after that.
As far as I can tell, catching Saddam is not going to fix Iraq's economy, build a functioning democracy, prevent a Sunni-Shiite civil war, or bring back the Americans and Iraqis who have died and will continue to die at the checkpoints, home invasions and while driving their Humvees down the nation's roads. Humiliating Hussein with public dental examinations will hopefully reassure some Iraqis that peace is on the way, but while it would be nice if his old cronies who may be involved in the insurgency would lay down their arms, I wouldn't hold my breath.
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Nor can the capture of Saddam heal the rifts in our own country, where the lies of this administration have so polarized the populace that the coming election year promises to be extremely nasty. The President repeated Sunday that the occupation of Iraq and the overthrow of Hussein is part of the "War On Terror," despite having finally admitted only weeks ago that there was no evidence linking him with Al Qaeda.
We Americans are now in one of three miserable positions: We can deny that the Administration lied and continues to lie about Hussein's ties to terror and the threat he allegedly posed to the United States; we can get angry about the lies and afraid of how truth has become a casualty of 9/11; or we can be aware of the lies, but cling to a faith that good things will come from them, that the ends justify the means.
TomPaine published the article "It’s Not Over" by William Rivers Pitt. Pitt focuses on the issue of missing weapons of mass destruction--
Former United Nations weapons inspector Scott Ritter, reached at his home on Sunday, said, "It’s great that they caught him. The man was a brutal dictator who committed terrible crimes against his people. But now we come to rest of story. We didn’t go to war to capture Saddam Hussein. We went to war to get rid of weapons of mass destruction. Those weapons have not been found." Ray McGovern, senior analyst and 27-year veteran of the CIA, echoed Ritter’s perspective on Sunday. "It’s wonderful that he was captured, because now we’ll find out where the weapons of mass destruction are," said McGovern, with tongue firmly planted in cheek. "We killed his sons before they could tell us."
Indeed, reality intrudes. The push for war before March was based upon Hussein’s possession of 26,000 liters of anthrax, 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, 1,000,000 pounds of sarin gas, mustard gas, and VX nerve gas, along with 30,000 munitions to deliver these agents and uranium from Niger to be used in nuclear bombs. And let us not forget the Al Qaeda terrorists closely associated with Hussein who would take this stuff and use it against us on the main streets and back roads of the United States.
When they found Hussein hiding in that dirt hole in the ground, none of this stuff was down there with him. The full force of the American military has been likewise unable to locate it anywhere else. There is no evidence of Al Qaeda agents working with Hussein, and Bush was forced some weeks ago to publicly acknowledge that Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11. The Niger uranium story was debunked last summer.
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Of course, the rhetoric mutated as the weapons stubbornly refused to be found. By the time Bush did his little ‘Mission Accomplished’ strut across the aircraft carrier, the occupation was about the removal of Saddam Hussein and the liberation of the Iraqi people. No longer were we informed on a daily basis of the "sinister nexus between Hussein and Al Qaeda," as described by Colin Powell before the United Nations in February. No longer were we fed the insinuations that Hussein was involved in the attacks of 9/11. Certainly, any and all mention of weapons of mass destruction ceased completely. We were, instead, embarking on some noble democratic experiment.
Finally, The Guardian printed an incredibly clever cartoon by Martin Rowson, depicting Blair and Bush kneeling at the foot of an open cave. Lights illuminate the cave. We see that Saddam is being held down by soldiers. A star is shining above the cave. And Bush and Blair are worshipping Saddam as the Saviour. Clever.
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