Iraq’s people and its military will quickly desert President Saddam Hussein in the event of a US blitzkrieg against his regime, a key exiled opposition leader claimed on Thursday, ahead of talks with senior US officials.
”Nobody in Iraq will defend Saddam Hussein,” said Iraqi National Congress (INC) representative Sharif Ali bin Al-Hussein, one of six opposition leaders due to meet Pentagon and State Department officials on Friday.
”The Iraqi military is not willing to fight and die for Saddam Hussein,” he said, pointing to the quick ejection of Iraqi forces from Kuwait in 1991 by a US-led coalition as evidence of the military’s propensity to fold.
”The Iraqi military has been humiliated, insulted, oppressed, tortured, murdered, their families have been abused by Saddam Hussein.
”No stretch of the imagination would make them want to defend Saddam,” Hussein said, adding that his information came from military sources inside the country.
As expectations mount that US President George Bush will decide to launch a war against Saddam, one-third of his ”axis of evil” including Iran, Iraq and North Korea, Hussein said the West must look to the ”day after” the Iraqi leader’s ”inevitable” overthrow.
”After decades of brutal dictatorship, the people of Iraq deserve a democratic government,” he said at a press conference.
”The war doesn’t end with the fall of Saddam. The war will continue, and that war is establishing democracy in Iraq.”
US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Marc Grossman and Undersecretary of Defence Douglas Feith will host talks on Friday with the six opposition leaders.
The talks are designed to discuss possible scenarios for the overthrow of Saddam by internal opponents and the political framework of the country following his ousting.
The United States accuses Saddam of developing weapons of mass destruction and supporting international terrorism.
The INC is an umbrella group uniting disparate factions of the Iraqi opposition. – Sapa-AFP