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Arab TV Stations Show Tape of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad
Aired April 04, 2003 - 13:07 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: I want to bring in our Rym Brahimi. She spent months and months and months in Baghdad. She's now in Amman, Jordan.
Rym, I know you've been looking at both of these tapes. You heard the speech that he gave on Iraqi television in Arabic. You speak Arabic and you also see this videotape of him walking through this crowd.
First of all, this speech, the 10-minute speech, the reference to the Apache helicopter. Did that, indeed, according to your assessment, sound and look like the real Saddam Hussein?
RYM BRAHIMI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) it does seem that in many of the tapes, he does look different. What David was saying about the voice is really what will be revealing. Now, it seemed to me that the voice was President Saddam Hussein, at least the one that we've been hearing on Iraqi TV for the months that I was there. But that, again, was the case of the very baffling first case -- first night of the bombing.
It was exactly his voice, but it did not look like him at all. So a lot of questions there of course. In terms of the pictures, of course, you can see that some of them are very blurred. The angles are also sometimes to the side, sometimes from behind. It's not clear very well -- you can hardly see his face. Some of them are much better shots, definitely picked up the smoke in the background that would indicate, of course, that this is something recent.
The location is interesting. This is a place in Baghdad -- it's actually very close to the highway for Amman, the highway that leads to the Jordanian capital. And it's an area where there aren't that many people. It's a bit of a commercial area. But I wouldn't imagine these days of bombing that there would be a huge crowd of people. I think what's really interesting here, Wolf, is there has been an electricity blackout since Thursday 9:00 p.m.
I just spoke to people in Baghdad barely an hour ago, and they said electricity was still not back -- meaning people can't watch TV, that's now what -- they're not going to see him. So the question is who is this tape addressed to? It clearly shows that the leadership there is monitoring what is going on foreign or international news media, and clearly making every single effort, every time -- every time there's a tape like this to respond to that, maybe even more so then respond to its own public opinion, who at the end of the day might be listening to Iraqi state radio, as it is listening also to international radio stations that it receives. Definitely, so the timing and who is this addressed to, those would be the main questions right now - Wolf.
BLITZER: Rym, you've been watching Saddam Hussein for a long time. You know he's got this reputation of someone who's paranoid about cleanliness and germs. Indeed, when people come to him, they rarely kiss him on the cheek. They usually sort of just kiss his shoulder. But in this videotape that we see him going into the crowd, I've seen several women actually kiss him on the cheek. It looks to me that's a pretty unusual development, and would suggest that this might be a body double, it might be an impostor. But what is your sense?
BRAHIMI: Well that's very possible. Indeed, it could very well be an impostor. It's very, very unlikely that it would be him. But one cannot discount that possibility, so desperate is the regime right now, clearly, to really show its presence at a critical time when Saddam International Airport has been taken over by the U.S.-led forces. Now, the business of kissing him on the cheek, that's very interesting because, indeed, he does have a reputation for being very, very obsessed with catching germs and cleanliness.
That said, he's often kissed on the shoulder because that's more of a tribal type of salute. Every single way he's greeted by different officers and different people usually signifies something else in this part of the world. The other interesting thing, of course, is there's a lot of people around him.
This is very reminiscent, Wolf, of what happened after the Iran/Iraq war. Even during the Iraq/Iraq war, people you speak to in Iraq will say that during that war and towards the end, it was very frequent for Saddam Hussein to actually go from house to house and sometimes just talk to people. Of course, that changed a lot after the Gulf War. And, of course, now he's a target in this war, that's probably radically changed too.
But I think in terms of the collective images they're trying to bring back in the minds of people it's, again, those pictures of when he was maybe slightly more popular and when he was able to afford going out into the streets or sometimes going out to meet people. He's never made a public appearance in years, actually. I think maybe the last one was three years ago at the parade for the Jerusalem Army. But that has been the only one in many, many years - Wolf.
BLITZER: Rym, Rula Amin, our reporter in Ruwaished and our analyst Ken Pollack said that Saddam's sort of executive assistant, his aide who's always with him, is, in fact, seen in this picture, within the mob, where he's going out and trying to encourage these people. They don't seem to need much encouragement, which would lead to believe that maybe this is, in fact, the real Saddam Hussein. What do you make of the bodyguards that he has present? Do you recognize these guys in uniform? Are they the ones that normally accompany Saddam Hussein?
BRAHIMI: Well, that -- the one in particular with -- he's not saying much, but with a very, very thick and prominent mustache, that is all the time beside the man that is believed to be maybe -- or said to be the president -- well, that's one of his very close aides, and he's very often seen on Iraqi TV by -- on the side of President Saddam Hussein. So definitely, he's a very recognizable figure, maybe more so, and more clearly than the man they are saying is Saddam Hussein right now.
So definitely, that is definitely a sign that they're trying to sort of attract people's attention as well to that man or that figure, who is next to the man they say is the president. It is very baffling. I find some of the pictures very, very difficult to read. But some of them, I could tell you, maybe with 60 percent conviction, that's definitely not him, it can't be him.
But then again, he stands on an angle and then they show a different shot and it looks like him. It's not impossible, also, to say that they may have played a bit with the shots and edited some pictures in a certain way as to confuse, to bring about this confusion and this uncertainty. And I think, at any rate, in their situation right now, uncertainty would probably seem a better deal than the certainty of people imagining he's gone.
And it's all about, you know, really playing with people's minds and trying to send out that image, especially abroad, again, since many people in Iraq will not be seeing that, to say that he's still around and he's still in charge, just responding to all these questions that have come up in media reports in the past couple of days- - Wolf.
BLITZER: Rym Brahimi. She spent a long time in Baghdad until she was expelled with Nic Robertson, the rest of our team in Baghdad, monitoring the situation now from Amman, Jordan. Rym, thanks very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired April 4, 2003 - 13:07 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: I want to bring in our Rym Brahimi. She spent months and months and months in Baghdad. She's now in Amman, Jordan.
Rym, I know you've been looking at both of these tapes. You heard the speech that he gave on Iraqi television in Arabic. You speak Arabic and you also see this videotape of him walking through this crowd.
First of all, this speech, the 10-minute speech, the reference to the Apache helicopter. Did that, indeed, according to your assessment, sound and look like the real Saddam Hussein?
RYM BRAHIMI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, the (UNINTELLIGIBLE) it does seem that in many of the tapes, he does look different. What David was saying about the voice is really what will be revealing. Now, it seemed to me that the voice was President Saddam Hussein, at least the one that we've been hearing on Iraqi TV for the months that I was there. But that, again, was the case of the very baffling first case -- first night of the bombing.
It was exactly his voice, but it did not look like him at all. So a lot of questions there of course. In terms of the pictures, of course, you can see that some of them are very blurred. The angles are also sometimes to the side, sometimes from behind. It's not clear very well -- you can hardly see his face. Some of them are much better shots, definitely picked up the smoke in the background that would indicate, of course, that this is something recent.
The location is interesting. This is a place in Baghdad -- it's actually very close to the highway for Amman, the highway that leads to the Jordanian capital. And it's an area where there aren't that many people. It's a bit of a commercial area. But I wouldn't imagine these days of bombing that there would be a huge crowd of people. I think what's really interesting here, Wolf, is there has been an electricity blackout since Thursday 9:00 p.m.
I just spoke to people in Baghdad barely an hour ago, and they said electricity was still not back -- meaning people can't watch TV, that's now what -- they're not going to see him. So the question is who is this tape addressed to? It clearly shows that the leadership there is monitoring what is going on foreign or international news media, and clearly making every single effort, every time -- every time there's a tape like this to respond to that, maybe even more so then respond to its own public opinion, who at the end of the day might be listening to Iraqi state radio, as it is listening also to international radio stations that it receives. Definitely, so the timing and who is this addressed to, those would be the main questions right now - Wolf.
BLITZER: Rym, you've been watching Saddam Hussein for a long time. You know he's got this reputation of someone who's paranoid about cleanliness and germs. Indeed, when people come to him, they rarely kiss him on the cheek. They usually sort of just kiss his shoulder. But in this videotape that we see him going into the crowd, I've seen several women actually kiss him on the cheek. It looks to me that's a pretty unusual development, and would suggest that this might be a body double, it might be an impostor. But what is your sense?
BRAHIMI: Well that's very possible. Indeed, it could very well be an impostor. It's very, very unlikely that it would be him. But one cannot discount that possibility, so desperate is the regime right now, clearly, to really show its presence at a critical time when Saddam International Airport has been taken over by the U.S.-led forces. Now, the business of kissing him on the cheek, that's very interesting because, indeed, he does have a reputation for being very, very obsessed with catching germs and cleanliness.
That said, he's often kissed on the shoulder because that's more of a tribal type of salute. Every single way he's greeted by different officers and different people usually signifies something else in this part of the world. The other interesting thing, of course, is there's a lot of people around him.
This is very reminiscent, Wolf, of what happened after the Iran/Iraq war. Even during the Iraq/Iraq war, people you speak to in Iraq will say that during that war and towards the end, it was very frequent for Saddam Hussein to actually go from house to house and sometimes just talk to people. Of course, that changed a lot after the Gulf War. And, of course, now he's a target in this war, that's probably radically changed too.
But I think in terms of the collective images they're trying to bring back in the minds of people it's, again, those pictures of when he was maybe slightly more popular and when he was able to afford going out into the streets or sometimes going out to meet people. He's never made a public appearance in years, actually. I think maybe the last one was three years ago at the parade for the Jerusalem Army. But that has been the only one in many, many years - Wolf.
BLITZER: Rym, Rula Amin, our reporter in Ruwaished and our analyst Ken Pollack said that Saddam's sort of executive assistant, his aide who's always with him, is, in fact, seen in this picture, within the mob, where he's going out and trying to encourage these people. They don't seem to need much encouragement, which would lead to believe that maybe this is, in fact, the real Saddam Hussein. What do you make of the bodyguards that he has present? Do you recognize these guys in uniform? Are they the ones that normally accompany Saddam Hussein?
BRAHIMI: Well, that -- the one in particular with -- he's not saying much, but with a very, very thick and prominent mustache, that is all the time beside the man that is believed to be maybe -- or said to be the president -- well, that's one of his very close aides, and he's very often seen on Iraqi TV by -- on the side of President Saddam Hussein. So definitely, he's a very recognizable figure, maybe more so, and more clearly than the man they are saying is Saddam Hussein right now.
So definitely, that is definitely a sign that they're trying to sort of attract people's attention as well to that man or that figure, who is next to the man they say is the president. It is very baffling. I find some of the pictures very, very difficult to read. But some of them, I could tell you, maybe with 60 percent conviction, that's definitely not him, it can't be him.
But then again, he stands on an angle and then they show a different shot and it looks like him. It's not impossible, also, to say that they may have played a bit with the shots and edited some pictures in a certain way as to confuse, to bring about this confusion and this uncertainty. And I think, at any rate, in their situation right now, uncertainty would probably seem a better deal than the certainty of people imagining he's gone.
And it's all about, you know, really playing with people's minds and trying to send out that image, especially abroad, again, since many people in Iraq will not be seeing that, to say that he's still around and he's still in charge, just responding to all these questions that have come up in media reports in the past couple of days- - Wolf.
BLITZER: Rym Brahimi. She spent a long time in Baghdad until she was expelled with Nic Robertson, the rest of our team in Baghdad, monitoring the situation now from Amman, Jordan. Rym, thanks very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
