We knew Saddam was mad, says officer in elite Guards
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Your support makes all the difference.When his troops came to see Colonel A T Saied and protest that they did not want to die fighting in a hopelessly unequal war, he sent them home with his blessing. He and a group of other Republican Guard commanders had already decided that they were not going to sacrifice themselves or their men for Saddam Hussein.
The colonel is the first senior officer of the Guards, the elite troops President Saddam depended on most, to talk about the fall of Baghdad. He gave a candid and revealing account of just how shambolic were plans to defend the capital, and how many officers had decided their leader had long lost touch with reality.
When Saddam appeared on television on walkabout in the Adhamiya district of Baghdad during the bombing campaign, the reaction was: "Why doesn't someone shoot him?" Col Saied described how unit after unit melted away, and the "political commissars" of the regime, men attached to the notorious secret police branch, Amn al-Khas, were the first to desert. The US bombing of communications meant messages had to be relayed orally, and that system then collapsed as commanding officers at headquarters disappeared.
Col Saied also dismissed the notion that the Republican Guard were super-efficient and professional shock troops. Instead, he maintained, they were under-equipped, the senior officers were often corrupt, and morale was dented by Baath party members being paid more than their superiors in rank. Ordinary soldiers received 20,000 dinars (£3.80) a month.
"Senior members of the Republican Guard and the Special Republican Guard would go to see Saddam, and he would tell us how the Iraqi forces could defeat anyone in the world, including the United States.
"Afterwards, a few of us, who trusted each other, would say the man is mad, he cannot mean this," said Col Saied. "Our immediate superiors also knew that, but they said we must humour him. No one believed we could hold Baghdad for more than a few days without air cover and with American superiority in equipment".
Col Saied, who only wants his first initials published, left his command last week as American tanks rolled through Baghdad. He changed his uniform and medals for civilian clothes and returned to his wife and four children.
Yesterday he said: "As a Muslim and an Iraqi, I am duty bound to defend my country and my family. But in this case, the Americans have done us a favour. No one could have got rid of Saddam from inside. So this is for the good."
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