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Today's
Stories
July
2, 2004
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Suicide Right on the Stage: the Demise
of the Green Party
Saul
Landau
Buzz Words and Venezuela
July
1, 2004
Katherine
van Wormer
Bush's Damaged Mind: the Madness in
His Method
Joe
Bageant
Is Our President a Whackjob? Does It Matter?
William
James Martin
The Dogma of Richard Perle
Dave
Lindorff
Bush's Evacuation Moment
Robert
Fisk
Bread and Circus Trials in Iraq
Alan
Maass
Green Party in Reverse
Website
of the Day
Michael Moore and Israel: Blind or a Coward?
June
30, 2004
Kurt Nimmo
Nicholson
Baker's Checkpoint: a New Kind of Anger About Bush
Tariq
Ali
Getting Away with Murder in Iraq
Jennifer
Van Bergen
Bush and the Detainees
Douglas
Valentine
Apotheosis of the Psychopaths: Instead of Fahrenheit 9/11, Rescreen
The Quiet American
David
Price
Fahrenheit 9/11 Through the McCain-Feingold Looking Glass
Roger
Normand
America's Criminal Occupation of Iraq
Stan
Cox
Sanitized for Your Protection: Ashcroft's
War on Art
Henry
David Thoreau
On the Futility of Bush v. Kerry: All Voting is a Kind of Gaming
Ben
Tripp
Who Dast Call Him Liar: a Rebuttal to Nicholas Kristof
June
29, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
The Cloak-and-Dagger Handover
Robert
Fisk
Alice in an Iraqi Wonderland
Troy
Selvaratnam
New York Times Boosts Pet Developer
Harry
Browne
Bush in Ireland
Ray
McGovern
The CIA According to Anonymous
Elaine
Cassel
Hamdi, Padilla & Rasul: Who Really
Won?
June
28, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn / Leyla Linton
Grisly Rituals in Iraq
Amira
Hass
Confronting Myths and Deadly Power
June
26 / 27, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Venezuela: the Gang's All Here
Patrick
Cockburn
Iyad Allawi, the CIA's New Stooge
in Iraq
Dennis
Hans
Once They Were Sweethearts: Cheney,
the NYTs and the Myth of an Iraq Link to 9/11
Ben
Tripp
Adventures in Fuel Efficiency
Dave
Lindorff
That State Department Terrorism
Report: What They Knew, But Didn't Tell You
Chris
Floyd
Cold Irons Bound: the Russian Gambit
Ali
Tonak
Contamination at Berkeley: Profit Motives,
Academic Freedom and the Case of Ignacio Chapela
Keith
Rosenthal
The Withering of the Anti-War Movement
Bryan
Sacks
The Failure of the 9/11 Commission
Wayne
Madsen
Another Case of Blowback
Thomas
St. John
L. Frank Baum, Racist: Indian-Hating
in the Wizard of Oz
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
American Swadeshi
June
25, 2004
Stephen
Gowans
US to North Korea: "Trust Us"
Saul
Landau
2006 Pentagon Budget as Sacrilege:
Bush Invests the National Treasure in Death and Destruction
Amir
Butler
Iraq: the Deadly Embrace
Jack
McCarthy
Another Times Plagiarism Scandal?
Did Maureen Dowd Lift from the World Weekly News?
Greg
Bates
Chomsky and Zinn Plan to Vote Nader
June 24, 2004
Gary Leupp
John
Lehman on the Iraq / al-Qaeda Links
Patrick Cockburn
A
Day in the Life of Col. Abu Mohammed: Defusing Bombs, Facing
Death Threats
Harry Browne
On
the Rebound: Bush Bounces Back...in Europe
Bill Kaufman
Another
Marxist for Kerry: Joel Kovel's Sad Smear of Ralph Nader
Christopher
Brauchli
Bush,
Cheney and the 9/11 Commission: What Did They Know? What Did
They Tell?
Rick Gioimbetti
Andrea Yates: Victim of Psychiatric Violence?
John Chuckman
Call Center ID Hypocrisy
Diana Johnstone
Kerry
and Kosovo: the Lie of a "Good War"
June 23, 2004
Laura Carlsen
Bush
and Castro Face Off
Dave Zirin
Barry
Bonds vs. Boston: "A Flea Market of Racism"
Kurt Nimmo
From
Saddam, With Love
Patricia Wolff
Foundation Wars
Mahboob A. Khawaja
"They Had Me Arrested and Shackled My Son"
Patrick Cockburn
The
Pretense of an Independent Iraq
Website of the Day
The Road to Abu Ghraib
June 22, 2004
Dave Lindorff
The
Meaning of Putin's Pronouncement: Mutually Assured Pre-emption
Ron Jacobs
Nuclear Plants in US Protectorate of Iraq?
Vanessa Jones
Coogee, Peter Garrett and Valium Earrings
Mickey Z
An Open Letter to the People of Iraq
John L. Hess
Clinton Exhales
Pedro Marset/Ex-Solidarity
Committee for Pacho Cortés
An Exchange on the Case of Pacho Cortés
Bruce Jackson
Saying
No to Prosecutors: Why Steve Kurtz's Colleagues Refused to Testify
Website of the Day
From Boot Camp to Boot Hill
June
21, 2004
Gary
Leupp
Putin's Helpful Remarks
Lucson
Pierre-Charles
Haiti After the Press Went Home: Chaos
Upon Chaos
Cockburn
/ Khan
Saddam May Face Death Penalty
Uri
Avnery
Irreversible Mental Damage
June
19 / 20, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
Inside the Green Zone: US is Paranoid
and Isolated
Bruce
Anderson
Frozen Gringos
Diane
Christian
Morality and Death: a Meditation
on Bush and Blake
Walter
A. Davis
Passion of the Christ in Abu Ghraib
Josh
Frank
How Democrats Helped Bush Rape Mother
Nature
Col.
Dan Smith
Respectable Genocide?: the Crisis
in Sudan
Brian
Cloughley
A Profound Disruption of the Senses
Christopher
Brauchli
Bush and the Timken Plant, a
Year Later
Prudence
Crowther
Mr. Ashcroft, Deport Me!
Poets'
Basement
Iqbal/Alam, Krieger and Albert
Kathy
Kelly
Dying to See Their Kids
June
18, 2004
Chris
Floyd
Blood Victory
Dave
Zirin
Danielle Green, Basketball Player
& Disabled Vet, Speaks Out Against War
Justin
E.H. Smith
The Christian Question in American
Politics
Gary
Leupp
The "Long-Established" Link?:
Iraq, al-Qaeda, and al-Zarqawi
June
17, 2004
Noel
Ignatiev
Zionism, Anti-Semitism and the People
of Palestine
Kurt
Nimmo
The Bush-Kerry Conundrum
Ed
Cardoni
The Persecution of Steve Kurtz
Ron
Jacobs
Power Relations: Rounding Up Everyone Who Knows More Than They
Do
Dave
Lindorff
Philly Daily News: "Four Wasted Years"
Greg
Moses
Geneva Ignored
Norm
Dixon
How Reagan Armed Saddam with Chemical
Weapons
June
18, 2004
Noel
Ignatiev
Zionism, Anti-Semitism and the People
of Palestine
Kurt
Nimmo
The Bush-Kerry Conundrum
Ed
Cardoni
The Persecution of Steve Kurtz
Ron
Jacobs
Power Relations: Rounding Up Everyone Who Knows More Than They
Do
Dave
Lindorff
Philly Daily News: "Four Wasted Years"
Greg
Moses
Geneva Ignored
Norm
Dixon
How Reagan Armed Saddam with Chemical
Weapons
June
16, 2004
Lenni
Brenner
A Question for Kerry Supporters
Davey
D
Hip Hop Reflections on Reagan
Daniel
Wolff
Why Did Michael Moore Withhold Video Evidence of US Prisoner
Abuse?
Bruce
Jackson
Harry Levin and the Penultimate Manuscript of Finnegans Wake
Patrick
Cockburn
Boom! Boom! Out Go the Lights: Bombings Target Oil and Power
Facilities
Gary
Handschumacher
Mourn Ben Linder, Not His Killer: Reagan's Death Squads
JG
Turning Haiti into One Big Sweatshop
Mario
Benedetti
Obituary with Cheers
Vicente
Navarro
Meet the New Head of the IMF: Who
is Rodrigo Rato?
Website
of the Day
Iraqi Oil Revenue Watch
June
15, 2004
Harry
Browne
Ireland Adds a Brick to Fortress Europe
Neve
Gordon
The Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited
David
Palmer
Richard Armitage, Abu Ghraib and CACI
John
Blair
Lovelock's Misguided Call: Nukes Are No Solution to Global Warming
Dave
Lindorff
God Wins in TKO
Bill
Quigley
Blood-Pouring Peace Activists: State Charges Dropped; Feds Step
In
Patrick
Cockburn
Carbombs and Street Dances: 13 More Killed in Baghdad Blast
John
Chuckman
John Kerry, Political Placebo
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
July
2, 2004
Saddam
in the Dock
Confused?
Shadow of His Old Self? Hardly...
By
ROBERT FISK
Baghdad.
Bags beneath his eyes, beard greying,
finger-jabbing with anger, Saddam was still the same fox, alert,
cynical, defiant, abusive, proud. Yet history must record that
the new "independent" government in Baghdad yesterday
gave Saddam Hussein an initial trial hearing that was worthy
of the brutal old dictator.
He was brought to court in
chains and handcuffs. The judge insisted that his own name should
be kept secret. The names of the other judges were kept secret.
The location of the court was kept secret. There was no defence
counsel.
For hours, the Iraqi judges
managed to censor Saddam's evidence from the soundtrack of the
videotaped proceedings--so that the world should not hear the
wretched man's defence. Even CNN was forced to admit that it
had been given tapes of the hearing "under very controlled
circumstances".
This was the first example
of "new" Iraq's justice system at work--yet the tapes
of the court appeared on CNN with the logo "Cleared by US
Military". So what did the Iraqis and their American mentors
want to hide?
The voice of the Beast of Baghdad
as he turned--much to the young judge' s surprise--on the court
itself, pointing out the investigating lawyer had no right to
speak "on behalf of the so-called coalition"? Saddam's
arrogant refusal to take human responsibility for the 1990 invasion
of Kuwait? Or his dismissive, chilling response to the mass gassings
of Halabja? "I have heard of Halabja," he said, as
if he had read about it in a newspaper article. Later, he said
just that: "I've heard about them [the killings] through
the media."
Perhaps the Americans and the
Iraqis they have appointed to run the country were taken by surprise.
Saddam, we were all told over the past few days, was "disorientated",
"downcast", "confused", a "shadow of
his former self" and other cliches. These were the very
words used to describe him on the American networks from Baghdad
yesterday. But the moment the mute videotape began to air, a
silent movie in colour, the old combative Saddam was evidently
still alive. He insisted the Americans were promoting his trial,
not the Iraqis. His face became flushed and he showed visible
contempt towards the judge. "This is all a theatre,"
he shouted. "The real criminal is Bush."
The brown eyes moved steadily
around the tiny courtroom, from the judge in his black, gold-trimmed
robes to the policeman with the giant paunch--we were never shown
his face--with the acronym of the Iraqi Correctional Service
on his uniform. "I will sign nothing--nothing until I have
spoken to a lawyer," Saddam announced--correctly, in the
eyes of several Iraqi lawyers who watched his performance on
television.
Scornful he was, defeated he
was not. And of course, watching that face yesterday, one had
to ask oneself how much Saddam had reflected on the very real
crimes with which he was charged: Halabja, Kuwait, the suppression
of the Shia Muslim and Kurdish uprisings in 1991, the tortures
and mass killings.
One looked into those big,
tired, moist eyes and wondered if he understood pain and grief
and sin in the way we mere mortals think we do. And then he talked
and we needed to hear what he said and the question slid away;
perhaps that is why he was censored. We were supposed to stare
at his eyes, not listen to his words. Milosevic-like, he fought
his corner. He demanded to be introduced to the judge. "I
am an investigative judge," the young lawyer told him without
giving his name.
In fact, he was Ra'id Juhi,
a 33-year old Shia Muslim who had been a judge for 10 years under
Saddam's own regime, a point he did concede to Saddam later in
the hearing without telling the world what it was like to be
a judge under the dictator. He was also the same judge who accused
the Shia prelate Muqtada Sadr of murder last April, an event
that led to a military battle between Sadr's militiamen and US
troops in the holy cities of Najaf and Kerbala. Mr Juhi, who
most recently worked as a translator, was appointed--to no one
's surprise--by the former US proconsul in Iraq, Paul Bremer.
Already, one suspected, Saddam
had sniffed out what this court represented for him: the United
States. "I am Saddam Hussein, the president of Iraq,"
he announced--which is exactly what he did when US Special Forces
troops dragged him from his hole on the banks of the Tigris river
seven months ago. "Would you identify yourself?"
When Judge Juhi said he represented
the coalition, Saddam admonished him. Iraqis should judge Iraqis
but not on behalf of foreign powers, he snapped. "Remember
you're a judge, don't talk for the occupiers." Then he turned
lawyer himself. "Were these laws of which I am accused written
under Saddam Hussein?" Judge Juhi conceded that they were.
"So what entitles you to use them against the president
who signed them?"
Here was the old arrogance
that we were familiar with, the president, the rais who believed
he was immune from his own laws, that he was above the law, outside
the law. Those big black eyebrows that used to twitch whenever
he was angry, began to move threateningly, arching up and down
like little drawbridges above his eyes.
The invasion of Kuwait was
not an invasion, he said. "It was not an occupation."
Kuwait had tried to strangle Iraq economically, "to dishonour
Iraqi women who would go into the street and would be exploited
for 10 dinars". Given the number of women dishonoured in
Saddam's torture chambers, these words carried their own unique
and terrible isolation.
He called the Kuwaitis "dogs",
a description the Iraqi authorities censored to "animals"
on the tape. Dogs are, alas, one of the most cursed of creatures
in the Arab world. "The president of Iraq and the head of
the Iraqi armed forces went to Kuwait in an official manner,"
Saddam blustered.
But then, watching that face
with its expressive mouth and bright white crooked teeth, the
eyes glimmering, a dreadful thought occurred. Could it be this
awful man--albeit given less chance to be heard than the Nazis
at the first Nuremberg hearings--actually knew less than we thought?
Could it be that his apparatchiks and grovelling generals, even
his own sons, kept from this man the iniquities of his regime?
Might it just be possible that the price of power was ignorance,
the cost of guilt a mere suggestion here and there that the laws
of Iraq--so immutable according to Saddam--were not adhered to
as fairly as they might have been?
No, I think not. I remember
how, a decade and a half ago, Saddam asked a group of Kurds whether
he should hang "the spy" Farzad Bazoft and how, once
the crowd had obligingly told him to execute the young freelance
reporter from The Observer, he ordered his hanging. No, I think
Saddam knew. I think he regarded brutality as strength, cruelty
as justice, pain as mere hardship, death as something endured
by others.
Of course, there was that smart,
curious black jacket, more a sports blazer than a piece of formal
attire, the crisply cleaned shirt, the cheap pen and the piece
of folded, yellow exercise paper which he took from his jacket
pocket when he wanted to take notes. "I respect the will
of the people," he said at one stage. "This is not
a court--it is an investigation."
The key moment came at that
point. Saddam said the court was illegal because the Anglo-American
war which brought it into being was illegal--it had no backing
from the UN Security Council. Then Saddam crouched slightly and
said with controlled irony: "Am I not supposed to meet with
lawyers? Just for 10 minutes?"
And one had to have a heart
of stone not to remember how many of his victims must have begged,
in just the same way, for just 10 more minutes.
Robert Fisk is a reporter for The Independent and
author of Pity
the Nation. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's
hot new book, The
Politics of Anti-Semitism.
Weekend
Edition Features for June 12 / 13, 2004
Peter
Linebaugh
Remembering the Common Hood: Soweto
and Runnymede
Team
CounterPunch
CP's Favorite Albums
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Troy, Now and Then
Gary
Leupp
Not Really a Puppet Government in Iraq?
Brian
Cloughley
US Military in Crisis
Antonio
Ponvert, III
Iraqi Prisoner Abuse: the Connecticut Connection
Ben
Tripp
The Polls Get Stupider
Joe
Bageant
Mash Note to the "Girl with the Leash"
Ron
Jacobs
The Return of the Hip Hop Insurgency
Forrest
Hylton
Object Lessons from the Case of Francisco Cortés
Christopher
Brauchli
Federal Bureau of Errors
Kurt
Nimmo
Going After Qaddafi, Again
Wayne
Madsen
Israel's Slap at Reagan
Anthony
Loewenstein
Al Jazeera Awakens the Arab World
Michael
Donnelly
A Lightship in the Forest: Greenpeace Docks in the Siskiyous
Greg
Moses
Who Will Tell Us More About the Workers of Nasiriyah?
Susan
Davis
Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban
Joseph
Ramsey
Weather Report: a Review of The Weather Underground
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The 18th Brumaire in the 21st
Century
Wayne
Saunders
The Gipper, D-Day and the Stanley Cup
Poets'
Basement
Richey, Ford, La Morticella, Albert
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