A drab debriefing room in a prison was for Saddam just one more milieu in which he would size up everyone present and figure out how they might be manipulated. His political skills were constantly in evidence. Saddam retained his swagger and his conviction that he was still the rightful president of Iraq. invasion barely weakened those qualities. Nixon highlights the qualities that enabled Saddam to rise to the top and retain power in the ruthless and bloodstained polity that Iraq has been ever since a coup overthrew the monarchy in 1958. The insight he acquired provides today’s readers with historical enrichment whether or not it was helpful at the time for those coping with the occupation of Iraq is another question entirely. Based on Nixon’s account-whose role in the process appears to have lasted only a couple of weeks near the end of 2003, before returning to Washington-he and his colleagues nonetheless managed to collect useful information from their famous subject. When that would occur, and what topics should be the focus of questioning until then, were left vague. Nixon and his CIA colleagues were instructed to start the process, then to yield to the FBI. But the FBI did not have a suitable team in place in Iraq to do the job. government’s premier specialists in interrogating bad guys with an eye for both criminal justice and intelligence equities, would be given the main job of questioning Saddam. The questioning was more of a challenge, largely because of the lack of prior planning. The identification was accomplished easily with the aid of such indicators as telltale scars and tribal tattoos. military had pulled from a spider hole on a farm near Tikrit was indeed Saddam Hussein, and then to begin questioning him. He was an obvious asset to throw into the breach, first to provide positive identification that the man the U.S. He had been in Iraq for two months on a short-term assignment, assessing information that might help in the search for Saddam. At the time of the capture, John Nixon was a CIA analyst covering the leadership of the Iraqi regime.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |