Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
New York Post
January 25, 2008 By Hasani Gittens
Saddam Hussein didn't believe the United States would attack Iraq because of weapons of mass destruction - so he concealed the fact that he didn't have any to prevent an Iranian invasion, his chief American interrogator has revealed in a bombshell interview.
"He told me he initially miscalculated . . . President Bush's intentions," FBI agent George Piro says in an upcoming "60 Minutes" broadcast on Sunday.
"He thought the United States would retaliate with the same type of attack as we did in 1998 . . . a four-day aerial attack."
Piro, a Lebanese-American and one of the few FBI agents who spoke Arabic, was assigned to debrief Saddam after his December 2003 capture. He ended up spending seven months in the interviews, winning the dictator's confidence along the way.
When it became clear that the US military was about to come marching in, Saddam asked his generals if they could hold the coalition off for two weeks, "and at that point, it would go into what he called the secret war" - a reference to the insurgency.
Even then, the Butcher of Baghdad still wouldn't admit that he had no WMDs.
"For him, it was critical that he was seen as still the strong and defiant Saddam," said Piro. "He thought that [faking having the weapons] would prevent the Iranians from reinvading Iraq."
The two countries fought a bitter war from 1980 to 1988 that took over 1 million lives.
And Piro tells CBS correspondent Scott Pelley that Saddam still had the resources and intentions to restart the weapons program.
"[Saddam] still had the engineers. The folks that he needed to reconstitute his program are still there," said Piro. "He wanted to pursue all of WMD . . . to reconstitute his entire WMD program."
According to Piro, the "entire program" included chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.
It was nine months into the war when Saddam was finally found - hiding in a seven-foot hole, covered by bricks and dirt.
His "spider hole" was near a group of dilapidated buildings nine miles from his hometown of Tikrit.
US forces found weapons and about $750,000 in American $100 bills with the ex-dictator. They also found two AK-47s and a pistol.
Saddam boasted to Piro that he altered his routine and security to evade coalition forces.
"He told me he changed . . . the way he traveled. He got rid of his normal vehicles. He got rid of the protective detail that he traveled with, really just to change his signature," said Piro.
The madman also told Piro that months before his capture, he had actually been at a bunker in southeast Baghdad when it was bombed.
"He said it in a kind of a bragging fashion that he was there, but that we missed him."
January 25, 2008 By Hasani Gittens
Saddam Hussein didn't believe the United States would attack Iraq because of weapons of mass destruction - so he concealed the fact that he didn't have any to prevent an Iranian invasion, his chief American interrogator has revealed in a bombshell interview.
"He told me he initially miscalculated . . . President Bush's intentions," FBI agent George Piro says in an upcoming "60 Minutes" broadcast on Sunday.
"He thought the United States would retaliate with the same type of attack as we did in 1998 . . . a four-day aerial attack."
Piro, a Lebanese-American and one of the few FBI agents who spoke Arabic, was assigned to debrief Saddam after his December 2003 capture. He ended up spending seven months in the interviews, winning the dictator's confidence along the way.
When it became clear that the US military was about to come marching in, Saddam asked his generals if they could hold the coalition off for two weeks, "and at that point, it would go into what he called the secret war" - a reference to the insurgency.
Even then, the Butcher of Baghdad still wouldn't admit that he had no WMDs.
"For him, it was critical that he was seen as still the strong and defiant Saddam," said Piro. "He thought that [faking having the weapons] would prevent the Iranians from reinvading Iraq."
The two countries fought a bitter war from 1980 to 1988 that took over 1 million lives.
And Piro tells CBS correspondent Scott Pelley that Saddam still had the resources and intentions to restart the weapons program.
"[Saddam] still had the engineers. The folks that he needed to reconstitute his program are still there," said Piro. "He wanted to pursue all of WMD . . . to reconstitute his entire WMD program."
According to Piro, the "entire program" included chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.
It was nine months into the war when Saddam was finally found - hiding in a seven-foot hole, covered by bricks and dirt.
His "spider hole" was near a group of dilapidated buildings nine miles from his hometown of Tikrit.
US forces found weapons and about $750,000 in American $100 bills with the ex-dictator. They also found two AK-47s and a pistol.
Saddam boasted to Piro that he altered his routine and security to evade coalition forces.
"He told me he changed . . . the way he traveled. He got rid of his normal vehicles. He got rid of the protective detail that he traveled with, really just to change his signature," said Piro.
The madman also told Piro that months before his capture, he had actually been at a bunker in southeast Baghdad when it was bombed.
"He said it in a kind of a bragging fashion that he was there, but that we missed him."