United States forces had no role in Saddam Hussein’s hanging, but would have handled it differently, a US general said on Wednesday after a video of Iraqi officials taunting him on the gallows sparked outrage among Sunni Arabs.
Major General William Caldwell also urged the Iraqi government to reach out to disillusioned Sunni Arabs.
Caldwell said US forces, who had physical custody of Saddam for three years, left all security measures at Saddam’s execution, including searching witnesses for mobile phones, to Iraqi authorities. Saddam was handed over to Iraqi authorities at the prison and US forces then withdrew from the building.
”Had we been physically in charge at that point we would have done things differently,” Caldwell told a news conference, reacting to criticism of the hanging that embarrassed US officials and moderate Shi’ite and ethnic Kurds.
”At this point the government of Iraq has the opportunity to take advantage of what has occurred and really reach out now in an attempt to bring more people back into the political process and bring the Sunnis back,” he said.
An unofficial video of the hanging, apparently filmed on a mobile phone, showed Shi’ite officials mocking Saddam just before he was hanged, inflaming sectarian passions in a country already on the brink of sectarian civil war.
”We had absolutely nothing to do with the facility where the execution took place,” Caldwell said.
”We’ve only had physical control and so all we did was return physical control of him back to the Iraqis, who’ve always had the legal custody of him. At that point it’s a sovereign nation. It’s their system, they make those decisions.”
Saddam courteous
Caldwell said Saddam had been courteous to his captors and thanked the guards and medical personnel who cared for him.
The Iraqi government has promised an investigation into how a witness at the hanging filmed it on a mobile phone and released the video to television stations and websites.
The timing of the hanging, just four days after an appeal failed and on the first day of the Eid al-Adha religious holiday, shocked many, both in Iraq and in the rest of the Muslim world. US and Iraqi officials say the US ambassador tried to convince Maliki to delay the hanging.
A senior US official was quoted as saying Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki was concerned that if Saddam was not hanged quickly he would somehow avoid the gallows.
The official told the New York Times that Maliki was worried insurgents would stage a mass kidnapping and use it as a bargaining chip to secure the release of the former president.
”His concern was security, and that … maybe there would be a mass kidnapping to bargain for Saddam Hussein’s release,” the official said.
”He was concerned that he might somehow get free.”
After ousting Saddam in a US invasion in 2003, American troops had kept physical custody of the former president in a high-security prison near Baghdad airport.
Thousands of Saddam’s fellow Sunni Arabs have marched in Sunni Arab strongholds to vent anger at the execution. More mourners came to visit his grave in his home village of Awja on Wednesday, and other towns also saw further demonstrations.
In the video, widely seen on the internet, observers chant the name of Shi’ite cleric and militia leader Moqtada al-Sadr as Saddam stands on the scaffold, appearing dignified in contrast to the uproar below him. — Reuters