28 March 2003
Wolfowitz, Iraqi-Americans Call End of Hussein Regime Vital to Iraq
(At Foreign Press Center briefing, they cite decades of repression) (1180) By Ralph Dannheisser Washington File Special Correspondent Washington -- Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and three Iraqi-American professionals told international reporters at Washington's Foreign Press Center March 28 that removal of the Saddam Hussein regime is vital to free Iraqis from decades of atrocities and intimidation. Wolfowitz, a leading architect of the administration's Iraq policy, emphasized the central points of U.S. policy toward Iraq: the U.S. objective is "the removal of this regime"; despite an unexpectedly high level of Iraqi war crimes in the conflict, "the ultimate end of this regime is a certainty"; and the coalition forces are making great efforts to prevent civilian casualties. The briefing opened with the screening of a short film that featured assertions by Iraqi survivors and witnesses of a decades-long history of human rights abuses by Hussein's government. They described beatings of a four-year-old girl to get information about the whereabouts of her dissident father, the public decapitation of women "accused of loose morality," and the use of mustard gas and nerve agents against opponents of the regime. Wolfowitz asserted that, despite some views to the contrary, U.S.-led coalition forces are making "good progress" in the invasion, even though they are "fighting an enemy that shows consistent contempt for the rules of war." The defense official catalogued what he said were examples of such violations. Coalition forces, he said, "have encountered squads who dress as liberated civilians, pretend to surrender so that they can mount ambushes against our men." "Those same squads shoot their own countrymen in the back, or cut off their heads or cut out their tongues. These are not Saddam's martyrs, these are Saddam's executioners," he declared. As for the coalition forces, Wolfowitz said, they are "working extremely hard to protect the Iraqi people as they work to liberate them." "The restraint that has been demonstrated in our careful targeting of our bombing is extraordinary and unprecedented in history," he continued. "We are taking deliberate measures not only to avoid (hitting) civilians but to avoid those installations that are critical to the functioning of Iraqi society." Indeed, he said, "If you looked at a map of Baghdad and saw where we actually have targeted, you would be astonished, I believe, at the huge expanse of the city that is untouched... I don't believe the population of Iraq has too much doubt that what we're targeting are regime targets." Wolfowitz said concerted efforts are under way to restore normal services, including provision of food and water, to people in the southern areas who have been deprived of them. He said U.S.-led forces are working to demine the harbor in Umm Qasr to permit delivery of relief supplies and have laid pipe from Kuwait for water delivery. News media reported on March 28 that the first coalition ship carrying humanitarian aid to Iraq had, in fact, docked at Umm Qasr, the port of southern Iraq. The British ship HMS Sir Galahad was reported to be delivering a cargo of water, food, medicines, blankets and shelter, the media reported. "We think it is very important for the Iraqi people to understand...that this is a war on their behalf, not a war against them," Wolfowitz said. He rejected suggestions that the coalition effort is proceeding more slowly than intended. "Things are happening in some respects faster than we expected," he said, and cited, in particular, success in achieving "substantial control over the southern oil fields before Saddam Hussein was able to create the kind of environmental disaster that he was planning to do." On the issue of civilian casualties, one of the Iraqi émigrés, attorney Zakiya Hakki, placed all blame squarely on Hussein. "He is the one and the only one who is responsible for all these casualties against civilians," she said. Hakki asserted that Hussein had positioned antiaircraft emplacements and missiles on roofs of houses, mosques and hospitals. "Then what can we expect? They will return the fire. The casualties will be among civilians," she said. Wolfowitz added that it is "a war crime to put antiaircraft guns on the top of hospitals." Nevertheless, he said, "We're not going after those guns," in the interest of avoiding civilian casualties. Hakki, now a resident of Annandale, Virginia, was a circuit court jurist in Iraq's ministry of justice. Emad Dhia, an engineer by training who left Iraq in 1982 and now lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan, said fear of Hussein has deterred Iraqis from welcoming U.S. troops as liberators. "The presence of the death squads inside the cities was instrumental in keeping people from welcoming the coalition forces that came to liberate them," Dhia said. He said that death squads dressed in civilian clothes had kept residents in check by force. "There is a lot of atrocity going on inside these cities and you (expect) people to come and cheer? They can't," he said. The third Iraqi-American participant, Sam Kareem, said doubts about U.S. commitment to liberate Iraq permanently from Hussein's rule had a dampening effect on efforts to bring about surrenders by Iraqi military forces or a popular uprising. Kareem, a Baghdad University engineering graduate who has been in the United States since 1984, indicated that Iraqis under Hussein's yoke felt abandoned by the United States after the first Gulf War in 1991, and need proof that, this time, his regime will be removed for good. In 1991, Kareem recalled, "They revolted, but the result was complete suppression of their revolt and we lost 300,000 people in the process. So this thing is still in their memory, and until the regime is gone they're not going to welcome the U.S. forces -- until they're very sure that it's gone." Kareem related a story of a woman who, days ago, had sought to welcome the advancing American forces. "They (Hussein's loyalists) snatched her and killed her just because she tried to greet these forces. Try to realize that if you have a gun pointed at your head, you're not going to go out and greet the U.S. forces," he said. Wolfowitz dismissed a reporter's suggestion that regime change is not a legitimate war objective under international law. "I believe the international legitimacy of our actions is very clear," he said, citing a long history of U.N. resolutions that deal not only with Iraq's pursuit of weapons of mass destruction but also with repression by the Hussein regime. "If there's a legitimacy issue, it has to do with the illegitimacy of this regime, which has held one of the most talented populations in the Arab world captive for decades now," Wolfowitz said. "There is no question about what the end result (of the U.S.-led invasion) is going to be, and the Iraqi people and the world will be better off for it," he said. (The Washington File is a product of the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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