How Many People Has Saddam Hussein Killed? (NYTimes)

[drdon326]

Since then, Mr. Hussein's has been a tale of terror that scholars have compared to that of Stalin, whom the Iraqi leader is said to revere, even if his own brutalities have played out on a small scale. Stalin killed 20 million of his own people, historians have concluded. Even on a proportional basis, his crimes far surpass Mr. Hussein's, but figures of a million dead Iraqis, in war and through terror, may not be far from the mark, in a country of 22 million people.

-

The terror is self-compounding, with the state's power reinforced by stories that relatives of the victims pale to tell — of fingernail-extracting, eye-gouging, genital-shocking and bucket-drowning. Secret police rape prisoners' wives and daughters to force confessions and denunciations. There are assassinations, in Iraq and abroad, and, ultimately, the gallows, the firing squads and the pistol shots to the head.

DOING the arithmetic is an imprecise venture. The largest number of deaths attributable to Mr. Hussein's regime resulted from the war between Iraq and Iran between 1980 and 1988, which was launched by Mr. Hussein. Iraq says its own toll was 500,000, and Iran's reckoning ranges upward of 300,000. Then there are the casualties in the wake of Iraq's 1990 occupation of Kuwait. Iraq's official toll from American bombing in that war is 100,000 — surely a gross exaggeration — but nobody contests that thousands of Iraqi soldiers and civilians were killed in the American campaign to oust Mr. Hussein's forces from Kuwait. In addition, 1,000 Kuwaitis died during the fighting and occupation in their country.

Casualties from Iraq's gulag are harder to estimate. Accounts collected by Western human rights groups from Iraqi émigrés and defectors have suggested that the number of those who have "disappeared" into the hands of the secret police, never to be heard from again, could be 200,000. As long as Mr. Hussein remains in power, figures like these will be uncheckable, but the huge toll is palpable nonetheless.
-

Using a satanic arithmetic, prison governors worked out how many prisoners would have to be hanged to bring the numbers down to stipulated levels, even taking into account the time remaining in the inmates' sentences. As 20 and 30 prisoners at a time were executed at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere, warders trailed through cities like Baghdad, "selling" exemption from execution to shocked families, according to people in Iraq who said they had spoken to relatives of those involved. Bribes of money, furniture, cars and even property titles brought only temporary stays.

http://www.iraqfoundation.org/news/2003/ajan/27_saddam.html

.................................................................

Good riddance saddam.

[hector459]

1. A better question is "How many people has the US in Iraq killed over the

past 14 years?"

[drdon326]

2. Good question......but thats not the point of the article.

[wtmusic]

4. What is the point of the article?

and the post?

[wtmusic]

3. Hot off the presses

Thanks for the update from 2003, but this should be in Latest Breaking News! :eyes:

[Jade Fox]

5. So, why did we leave him in power after the Gulf War?

Because we thought he was still "our" dictator, and we could control him?

[Hubert Flottz]

6. Too many!

Killing is a sin!

[mike_c]

7. Iraq and the world would be better off today...

...if Saddam Hussein were still in power. I'm sorry-- there just isn't any compelling argument that the Iraqis lot is better today than it was under Saddam, and in many ways it is certainly worse. See my sig....

[wtmusic]

9. yep, sad but true

the US abiding by the terms of the UN charter...the word "sovereignty" still having a meaning...

:(

[leftchick]

13. I believe he has already killed more than Saddam

With many more to come. :(

bush** is THE biggest tyrant in the 21st Century.

[drdon326]

17. You are kidding , right ?

Iraq would be better off today..if Saddam Hussein were still in power

I never would believe i would ever have read that here.



you really believe iraq is BETTER with a mass murderer who ruled by terror, fear and autocracy....the very antithesis of progressiveism?

Whether you support the war or not, at least they have some small chance at democracy.....under sh they had none.

[wtmusic]

21. I thought *you* were kidding...

of course the world would be better off with Saddam still in power.

Democracy Schmemocracy. 100K are now dead. They preferred life under Saddam, I promise.

[drdon326]

23. "Democracy Schmemocracy"....on DU ?

Perhaps you think Iraq under SH was some fun place to live....I dont.

[wtmusic]

24. Perhaps you think there is actually a chance at democracy

with the US there...I don't.

[drdon326]

26. You may be right.

But i'm still damned glad SH is out of power.

[wookie294]

28. What?

"But i'm still damned glad SH is out of power."

Why? He was basically "out of power" by 1991 and murdering as many innocent people as Saudi Arabia by that year. In other words, he was a murdering asshole, but he was not Hitler. He was alot like America's Arab allies.

[drdon326]

31. You aint kidding.......

and those psychos should be out of power too....hopefully their own people will throw them out....what I would have hoped iraqi people should have done.

[wookie294]

32. So, you support an invasion of Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan?

I opposed the apartheid government in South Africa during the 1980s (and got arrested protesting it), but I never advocated sending America's youth into the country to topple the regime. There are OTHER ways of dealing with tyrants like Saddam Hussein. We can force these assholes out of power by using our economic might.

[drdon326]

35. Huh? Did you read my post ?

I said "....hopefully their own people will throw them out "

[bennywhale]

40. Tried that. Sanctions. 1 million dead Iraqis

[wookie294]

43. Good point

I disagreed with sanctions by the mid-1990s, just like the sanctions against Cuba are insane and ineffective. But I definitely think war with Iraq was more insane. America has killed more Iraqis than Saddam ever did. That's what history will remember. Ironic.

[drdon326]

44. OK.....You dont support the sanctions....

obviously you didnt support the war.

I dont think you supported the regime of SH.

How should SH been removed from power?

[wookie294]

45. Saddam was already weakend and about to fall

Saddam's days were numbered on the day we invaded.

"If anything, Saddam was coming apart. The sanctions were working. The containment was working. He had a hollow military." -- Gen. Anthony Zinni, Commander in chief of the United States Central Command, 1997-2000

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/_/id/6593163?pageid=rs.Politics&pageregion=single1&rnd=1117251574802&has-player=true&version=6.0.12.872

[bennywhale]

48. I'm not a pacifist, yet have a

distinct hatred of the obscenity of war. Yet the thing i cherish the most is my freedom. (I know i know I'm sounding like a Neocon and some moist eyed appeal for support for pillaging the Middle East, but it is them who have stolen the language.)

I believe that violence has and will be necessary in people's fights for freedom. This is historically the case, from riots to revolutions and this, in a perfect world would have happened. People would have died as they did following the first gulf war when they were deserted, yet it would have been legitimate.

If we suppose that was impossible, the next "best" solution would have been an international/UN led invasion. Unthinkable though it is, i have been arguing for a long time for the creation of a "counter-crimes against humanity force" within the UN, or a "Anti-Genocide force" with a mandate to act in places such as Rwanda and Dafur. A similar such multi-national force could have been deployed in Iraq a long long time ago. However as it is Nations are inherently self interested so this will not happen, and there lies the problem. I don't buy in to the false post-Westphalia treaty world of the sanctity of sovereignty. Even though it was originally to prevent religious invasions it is outdated, and when fellow human beings are at stake the world should have the capability to act. This will ensure no one nation can profit from war as in Iraq(which is illegal, and which America did also post WW1 and WW2). The rules of engagement would also have been internationally agreed so less trigger happy slaughter of innocents, no cluster bombs and no Depleted Uranium. There is no such thing as good war or nice war but there is such a thing as trying to be noble during such an obscene trait of humanity. So there is a hint of my humble solution.

[LynnTheDem]

36. Iraqis Endure Worse Conditions Than Under Saddam

http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=6103

Responses to a detailed survey conducted by a United Nations agency and the Iraqi government indicate that everyday conditions for Iraqis in the aftermath of the 2003 US-led invasion have deteriorated at an alarming rate, with huge numbers of people lacking adequate access to basic services and resources such as clean water, food, health care, electricity, jobs and sanitation.

The UN survey reports 32 deaths per 1,000 births during infants’ first year. The report further indicates that "infant and child mortality rates appear to have been steadily increasing" during the last 15 years of war and sanctions. The number of mothers who die during labor was 93 for every 100,000 births, far worse than the rates of maternal mortality in Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

http://newstandardnews.net/content/?action=show_item&itemid=1816

[bennywhale]

42. Schemocracy? Are you serious? Do you think the

North Koreans think that for example. Saddam Hussein ran a truly horrific regime. He was ousted by an illegal war with designs on Iraq's oil. But Schemocracy? You can't be blinded to the point of making a comment like that. You are joking?

[Vladimir]

25. What they have a chance of now is not democracy

its provincialism. And the world would be a better place today if the invasion of 2003 had never happened, damn straight it would.

[mike_c]

27. Iraq once had the highest literacy rate...

...in the middle east-- under Saddam-- and enjoyed one of the highest general standards of living in the region. It was a secular society with modern standards of health care, education, and social justice, at least outside of political power struggles. Saddam didn't destroy that-- we did (helped, ironically, by the Iranians). Even under brutal western sanctions Saddam kept the ethnic tensions mostly under control and rebuilt after the Gulf War attacks rapidly. Saddam kept the lights on and the water flowing in far greater portions of the country than we have. Abu Ghraib is more crowded under American occupation that it was under Saddam. Iraqis are dying at a faster rate under American occupation than they ever died under Saddam's rule. We are leveling whole cities-- Saddam BUILT cities.

I'm not trying to say that he was not despotic, and he was certainly a dictator, but the U.S. is treating the Iraqis worse than Saddam did, so yes, I say they were better off under his rule.

Iraq was not a regional threat under Saddam, at least not after 1991, but it is a hotbed of resentment now, spiralling toward a civil war that will have FAR reaching effects throughout the middle east. The world was better off with Saddam in power than with the U.S. invasion and occupation.

[wookie294]

22. More Iraqis would be alive today if Saddam was still in power

In 2001, Amnesty International said “Hundreds of political prisoners and detainees are executed in Iraq every year.” Note the word "hundreds," not "thousands." Saddam was a disarmed JOKE by 1992 and his killing fields were OVER by then. See link...

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE140042001?open&of=ENG-IRQ

[drdon326]

8. Adding up the "known" killed by SH approaches 1,000,000

give or take. In a country of 22 million thats quite an achievement.

[LynnTheDem]

11. LOL!!!

Twist & shout...

Too funny!

[ET Awful]

12. If by "known" you mean "alleged" then perhaps.

But considering that many of the same sources for that "known" number also provided "slam dunk" evidence of "stockpiles of WMD's", I'm not inclined to accept them as the gospel truth.

[wookie294]

19. Nobody in government asserts Saddam murdered "millions"

Even Bush doesn't think Saddam murdered "millions."

[mike_c]

20. "known" by whom, and how much of that is the usual propoganda...

...designed to inflate the evil the bogey man represents? I think a more credible estimate is around 300,000, but even there, one must step back and separate the events from the hype. Saddam Hussein did not kill 300,000 Iraqis or 1,000,000 Iraqis-- they were killed by the state under his rule. He might be directly responsible for some of those deaths, but not for all-- are American presidents responsible for every unjust death that occurs in U.S. jails, for example?

Hussein was president of Iraq from 1979 until 2003, so even if we accept the undoubtedly inflated number of 1 million Iraqis killed by the state under his rule, that's about 41,600 or so per year, and the more realistic estimate is problably one third that number. Under George Bush and the American occupation, the correspondingly high estimate for the number of Iraqi civilians alone killed exceeds 100,000 during the first 18 months of so of the occupation, IIRC. That gives us a kill rate equivalent to Saddam's or higher, without even counting Iraqi soldiers or irregulars fighting the occupation. You know what they say about people who live in glass houses....

[wtmusic]

10. Gosh people, I'm starting to rethink this whole Iraq war thing

drdon326 makes many good points...

We should make it so any country can do war crimes to another country to stop their war crimes.

[LynnTheDem]

15. ...that happened 15 years ago and weren't happening since and including

all dead from wars.

(You forgot to add that part)

[wtmusic]

18. Oh, so WE might have actually killed about a half million

that sounds about right...

[The_Casual_Observer]

14. They unearthed something like 2000-5000 in a rush right after the invasion

as tangible justification. I don't remember that they ever reported anymore after that. I don't remember any news about a 1,000,000 people genocide in Iraq in all the years Saddam was in power. Call me wrong if necessary, but all of this sounds like bush propaganda machine news.

[LuPeRcALiO]

16. This is op-ed opinion, not reporting, and openly tendentious.

"In the end, if an American-led invasion ousts Mr. Hussein, and especially if an attack is launched without convincing proof that Iraq is still harboring forbidden arms, history may judge that the stronger case was the one that needed no inspectors to confirm: that Saddam Hussein, in his 23 years in power, plunged this country into a bloodbath of medieval proportions, and exported some of that terror to his neighbors."

Anyway the NY Times is a highly compromised source of information on this war.

[Honest_Abe]

29. How many of those he killed...

were killed while he was still our "friend"?

We supported him for years. That means we must share someof the responsibility for some of those deaths.

[wookie294]

30. Most of Saddam's victims were killed during the Reagan/Bush presidencies

By the 1990s, Saddam was a relatively TAMED tiger. He was a joke.

In 2001, Amnesty International said “Hundreds of political prisoners and detainees are executed in Iraq every year.” Notice the word "hundreds," not thousands and certainly not "millions." See link....

http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGMDE140042001?open&of=ENG-IRQ

[Walt Starr]

33. It is still my considered opinion that Iraqis are worse off today

than they were the day before we invaded.

[wookie294]

34. Iraqis agree with you

“Large majorities of Iraqis - 69 percent of Shiites and 82 percent of Sunnis - want U.S. soldiers to get out of Iraq quickly, according to an Abu Dhabi TV/Zogby International poll earlier this year. Over half of Sunnis considered insurgent attacks to be a legitimate resistance to U.S. presence. This follows polling last year that showed that 71 percent of Iraqis considered U.S.-led forces ‘occupiers’ rather than ‘liberators’.”

http://www.zogby.com/Soundbites/ReadClips.dbm?ID=11353

Gallup Poll of Iraqis: “The growing negative attitude toward the Americans is also reflected in two related survey questions: 53% say they would feel less secure without the coalition in Iraq, but 57% say the foreign troops should leave anyway.”

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2004-04-28-poll-cover_x.htm

“In a Baghdad University poll taken earlier this year, more than 80% of the Iraqis questioned expected their government to gain strength in coming months. That has dropped to 45% today.”

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/052905Z.shtml

[drdon326]

38. I agree they want US out.....

But that doesnt mean they want SH back in....as some have stated.


What i'm sure they do desparatly want is a functioning democracy.

[manic expression]

47. Hoo Boy...

The Iraqi people were better off with Saddam in power than with the US occupying them.

You really have no idea what you're talking about. Saddam's "genocide" was largely fabricated by Bush I to bang his drums of war, while the myth of his horrid rule (pretty much on par with many US allies right now) is just that: a MYTH.

(edited for generalization)

[LuPeRcALiO]

37. Let's be honest. This isn't about Saddam's crimes against Kurds

Wouldn't it be better to discuss the issue directly instead of using Iraqis as a proxy?

[drdon326]

39. You're right....its about SH crimes against humanity.

good point

[LuPeRcALiO]

41. Let's be clear about which war and which crimes

and which humanity. So far we haven't been.

[manic expression]

46. Ah, SUCKERED INTO RW LIES

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

DrDron, you really are something. The way you fall over yourself to believe the lies of neo-cons and the White House is BEYOND COMICAL. You really need to get a grip on reality. Saddam's atrocities are so overblown here and by the WH it is unbelievable.

The bottom line is that Occupied Iraq is WORSE than Ba'athist Iraq. PERIOD. Those false statistics you cite are beyond wrong and serve to perpetuate this unjustified war.

How could I expect any better from YOU of all people, anyway?

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: