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IRAQI COMMANDER SWEARS HE SAW USAF FLY SADDAM OUT OF BAGHDAD

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TeeYiYi Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:24 PM
Original message
IRAQI COMMANDER SWEARS HE SAW USAF FLY SADDAM OUT OF BAGHDAD
IRAQI COMMANDER SWEARS HE SAW USAF FLY SADDAM OUT OF BAGHDAD

Film will soon be made public of an Iraqi Army officer describing how he saw a US Air Force transport fly Saddam Hussein out of Baghdad. The explosive eyewitness testimony was shot by independent filmmaker Patrick Dillon, who recently returned from a risky one-man odyssey in Iraq. In the film, the officer, who told Dillon that he commanded a special combat unit during the battle for Baghdad airport and whose identity is temporarily being withheld, explains in detail how he watched as the Iraqi dictator and members of his inner circle were evacuated from Iraq's capital by what he emphatically insists were United States Air Force cargo planes.
Presently, the only copies of the film (which I have not yet seen) are in New York City. People who have viewed it describe it to me as compelling.

Much more: http://www.100megsfree4.com/farshores/sc03bd.htm

TYY
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mcd1982 Donating Member (221 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:26 PM
Response to Original message
1. Sounds fishy...
but I wouldn't put it past Bush having this be his "October Surprise"...

Matthew
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phoebe Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:56 PM
Response to Reply #1
13. why would this do * any good as implied by your post???
enquiring minds..
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Kamika Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:26 PM
Response to Original message
2. well..
Its not like he has any evidence..

Even if it was true who would believe him
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Pastiche423 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:32 PM
Response to Reply #2
6. Who doesn't have evidence?
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NYC Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:50 PM
Response to Reply #6
12. Just about everybody doesn't have evidence.
U.S. gov't. says lots of things with no evidence to back them up. This guy isn't any less believable.
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Kamika Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 05:07 PM
Response to Reply #12
24. well..
Your local joeschmoe will believe our goverment over a "dirty arab"
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Sophree Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:30 PM
Response to Original message
3. Wow
This is what most of us thought happened- (that we must have allowed them to escape or helped them escape ourselves.) Now there's proof.

We lifted bin Laden out of the battle of Tora Bora, too. Bastards.
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berry Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:47 PM
Response to Reply #3
11. Quite possible that deals were struck--but I can't imagine
why Saddam (or Osama) would trust that they wouldn't be murdered later. I suppose they could think themselves protected if they had info to be revealed in case anything happened to them... I wish I could just dismiss the possibility of things not being what they seem, but I can't.

Sophree--I never saw any articles about Osama being lifted out of Tora Bora. Have you saved any links?
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Pastiche423 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:03 PM
Response to Reply #11
15. Not Osama specifically..
SY HERSH: There was about a three or four nights in which I can tell you maybe six, eight, 10, maybe 12 more-- or more heavily weighted-- Pakistani military planes flew out with an estimated-- no less than 2,500 maybe 3,000, maybe mmore. I've heard as many as four or 5,000. They were not only-- Al Qaeda but they were also-- you see the Pakistani ISI was-- the military advised us to the Taliban and Al Qaeda. There were dozens of senior Pakistani military officers including two generals who flew out.

And I also learned after I wrote this story that maybe even some of Bin Laden's immediate family were flown out on the those evacuations. We allowed them to evacuate. We had an evacuation.

JANE WALLACE: How high up was that evacuation authorized?

SY HERSH: I am here to tell you it was authorized — Donald Rumsfeld who — we'll talk about what he said later — it had to be authorized at the White House. But certainly at the Secretary of Defense level.

JANE WALLACE: The Department of Defense said to us that they were not involved and that they don't have any knowledge of that operation.

SY HERSH: That's what Rumsfeld said when they asked him but it. And he said, "Gee, really?" He said, "News to me." Which is not a denial, it's sort of interesting. You know,

JANE WALLACE: What did we do that? Why we would put our special forces guys on the ground, surround the enemy, and then-- fly him out?

SY HERSH: With al Qaeda.

JANE WALLACE: With al Qaeda. Why would we do that, assuming your story is true?

SY HERSH: We did it because the ISI asked us to do so.

JANE WALLACE: Pakistani intelligence.

http://www.pbs.org/now/transcript/transcript_hersh.html

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DemLikr Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:31 PM
Response to Original message
4. OMG, they're making Sadam clear brush in Crawford!
IT all makes sense now. this is his punishment; and let's face it--what could be worse?

As a bonus to Sadam's humiliation, W's fake ranch gets cleared of all that nasty....you know, brush-stuff that needs to be cleared.

I wonder if Sadam wears steam-pressed slacks and a button down, long sleeved shirt while clearing those vicious leafy plants, as does W?
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QuietStorm Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:32 PM
Response to Original message
5. this reminds me

of the sy hersh interview. He covered afghanistan and recounted that momemnt when US troops were alleged to have cornered OBL et al in a hold out. Their mission was for some unknown reason aborted and the next thing hersh reported a helicopter took off from the building. Hersh alleges it was a US helicopter and in it was OBL et al. Nothing ever came of this that I know of but for sy hersh's claim in this one interview. Those that have been following this with more than the average skeptism from one article to the next over the last three years, can not be that surprised. It is certainly plausible all things considered.
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Minstrel Boy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:33 PM
Response to Original message
7. If he'd said Osama
I'd be more inclined to believe him. There's an asset who's still worth more alive and at large than dead.

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mistertrickster Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:35 PM
Response to Original message
8. How does he explain Qusay and Oudai?
EOM
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wtmusic Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:37 PM
Response to Original message
9. Finally, proof
that * and Saddam are lovers! Film at eleven!
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tsipple Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:40 PM
Response to Original message
10. I Saw Monica Lewinsky Get on a Flight to Baghdad
Honest, I really did.
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HalfManHalfBiscuit Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 03:58 PM
Response to Original message
14. I swear that I saw Castro lighting farts in my basement
Hell, the US government makes plenty of claims without evidence, so my claim is no less believable.
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WillyT Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:05 PM
Response to Original message
16. The ONLY Reason That They Wouldn't Just Shoot Saddam Dead Is...
If ole Saddam had some real good shit on the Bushies et.al., that would be disseminated publically upon his death.

I too have trouble believeing this story, but if you think the Bushistas want Saddam giving testimony in the Hague, think again.

I'm sure his file on American criminality in the Middle East is a mile thick!!!

Remember Dumsfeld shakin hands with Saddam?????? He wasn't there for a nice game of Canasta ya know!!!

:shrug:
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9215 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:11 PM
Response to Original message
17. Another red herring
in all probability. Remember the film of Poppy flying back from Paris in the fall of 1980 in an SR-71 Blackbird only this new film is even more difficult to substantiate. The lawyer who threatened to expose Poppy's role was found dead three weeks later.

They'll need multiple eyewitness and then they'll have to prove it wasn't a Hussein double.
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Pastiche423 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:17 PM
Response to Reply #17
18. What's the skinny on Poppy's Paris flight?
It isn't ringing any bells.
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w13rd0 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:30 PM
Response to Reply #18
19. Poppy arranged with Iran...
...that they wouldn't release the hostages until Reagans election was secured...
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BrotherBuzz Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 05:22 PM
Response to Reply #18
25. October surprise
Stories of secret arms for hostage meeting dates in Paris conflicted with the fact that ALL the fat cats were encamped at the Bohemian Grove, Calif. When confronted with conflicting dates someone fabricated the myth that Bush secreted to France from Bohemian Grove encampment (limo to Santa Rosa, fighter jet to McClellan AFB, SR71 to Paris - he traveled and returned before people knew he even left, or so they say) to set up the arms for hostages deal/ October Surprise...in essence, making foreign policy before Reagan even entered office. I think he may have used a telephone, but the SR71 story makes better copy...nothing more than urban myth.
http://www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/coupreaganbush.htm
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Junkdrawer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:46 PM
Response to Original message
20. Well, since many ask Why...
Edited on Sun Aug-17-03 04:58 PM by Junkdrawer
1.) The fight for Baghdad was supposed to be the bloody part of the war. Many rumors floated days after the easy victory that major players were bribed.

2.) The hunt for Saddam, like the hunt for Osama before him, has been used in order to justify, to the general public, the ongoing blood bath. This regime needs boogiemen, although one would hope that at some point the public would get tired of a perpetual fruitless search.
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joycep Donating Member (847 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:54 PM
Response to Reply #20
22. I have felt for a long time
That Bin Laden had US protection. I do think that it could be true about Saddam. It just seems so odd to me that they can't find any of the leaders.
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TeeYiYi Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:54 PM
Response to Original message
21. "Saddam was little more than an american tool" . . .
Dillon says his film lends major support to what many have believed for years: that Saddam was little more than an american tool, a stage-managed "evildoer", just one in a long line of useful villains bought and paid for by the United States in order to better manipulate international politics and commerce. The gutsy New York based filmmaker, who risked his life amid the chaos of postwar Iraq, says that much of the Iraqi populace believes Saddam is not dead and they worry he could still exact revenge from afar. While many Iraqi civilians initially welcomed American forces, Dillon told me most Iraqis, having now had a bitter taste of American occupation, feel enraged with the US and its soldiers. Dillon said living conditions in Iraq are horrible and that little of significance is being done to relieve the situation.

Based on what he saw during his travels, Dillon told me he's convinced the war and its sweeping devastation of the Iraqi nation is in reality a mind boggling charade. Rather than liberating Iraq, its actual purpose is to corral Iraq's huge oil reserves and to serve as a pretext for channeling tens of billions in largesse to favored American corporations like Haliburton and Bechtel. As an example, Dillon pointed to how US air strikes systematically obliterated every last Iraqi telecommunications facility from one end of the country to the other, a measure he maintains vastly exceeded all practical military necessity. Then, without even the pretense of a competitive bid, Washington gifted WorldCom, the near bankrupt US telecom giant responsible for the greatest fraud in financial history, with a huge multi-billion dollar contract to build Iraq a new nationwide state-of-the-art telephone system.

http://www.100megsfree4.com/farshores/sc03bd.htm

TYY
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peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 04:55 PM
Response to Original message
23. Advantages to protecting and hiding Bin Laden and Hassein
Two major reasons combined...suppostition...

One is talked about all the time...

If they capture or kill either, they lose their WAT advantage - their war on terrorism advantage and cannot proceed as smoothly with their agenda - to control of the world. They'll have to bring the troops home and their won't be anyone to protect the oil lines and ports. It would mean the loss of a bluster and bluff reason to allow Ashcroft or Poindexter or Meese or Rumsfeld or Rove or Olson or Perle or the brass or intelligence to reign and the weapons factories will go idle and the press might find relief to do something. When the WAT is in force, they can poison the earth some more or take away one more right for some group somewhere in the world.

The other is some kind of pact with the other leaders in the area and on the periphery. For some reason, it is extremely important not to kill their leaders.

They have to plot and purchase everyt little deal.

Some people have expressed the thought that they had a deal with Hassein before the troops moved.

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dansolo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Aug-17-03 11:02 PM
Response to Original message
26. Why not his sons?
Why would Saddam be flown out and not his sons?
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whatelseisnew Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Aug-18-03 08:14 AM
Response to Reply #26
27. Why do you believe his son's were really killed?
?
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