Prisoners

"Take it from me — he's got the goods."

"A straw vote only shows which way the hot air blows."

"A burglar who respects his art always takes his time before taking anything else."

"Turn up the lights — I don't want to go home in the dark."

"Perhaps there is no happiness in life so perfect as the martyr's."

"What is the world at its best but a little round field of the moving pictures with two walking together in it?"

"May see thee now, though late, redeem thy name, And glorify what else is damn'd to fame."

"He lives to build, not boast, a generous race; No tenth transmitter of a foolish face."

"When Anger rushes, unrestrain'd, to Action, Like a hot Steed, it stumbles in its way! The Man of Thought wounds deepest, and strikes safely."

"Nay, but weigh well what you presume to swear! Oaths are of dreadful Weight—and, if they're false, Draw down Damnation."

"His outside is an ancient Yeoman of England, though his inside may give arms (with the best gentleman) and ne'er see the herald. There is no truer servant in the house than himself. Though he be master, he says not to his servants, 'Go to field,' but, 'Let us go;' and with his own eye doth both fatten his flock and set forward all manner of husbandry. He is taught by nature to be contented with a little; his own fold yields him both food and raiment: he is pleased with any nourishment God sends, whilst curious gluttony ransacks, as it were, Noah's Ark for food, only to feed the riot of one meal. He is ne'er known to go to law; understanding to be law-bound among men is like to be hide-bound among his beasts; they thrive not under it: and that such men sleep as unquietly as if their pillows were stuffed with Lawyers' penknives. When he builds, no poor tenant's cottage hinders his prospect: they are indeed his Almshouses, though there be painted on them no such superscription: he never sits up late, but when he hunts the Badger, the vowed foe of his Lambs: nor uses he any cruelty, but when he hunts the hare, nor subtilty, but when he setteth snares for the Snite or pitfalls for the Blackbird; nor oppression, but when in the month of July he goes to the next river and shears his sheep. He allows of honest pastime, and thinks not the bones of the dead anything bruised, or the worse for it, though the country lasses dance in the churchyard after evensong. Rock Monday, and the Wake in Summer, Shrovings, the wakeful catches on Christmas Eve, the Hoky, or Seed-cake, these he yearly keeps, yet holds them no relics of Popery. He is not so inquisitive after news derived from the privy closet, when the finding an aerie of Hawks in his own ground, or the foaling of a Colt come of a good strain, are tidings more pleasant, more profitable. He is lord paramount within himself, though he hold by never so mean a Tenure; and dies the more contentedly (though he leave his heir young), in regard he leaves him not liable to a covetous Guardian. Lastly, to end him: he cares not when his end comes, he needs not fear his Audit, for his quietus is in heaven."

"Is a Country Wench, that is so far from making herself beautiful by art that one look of hers is able to put all face-physick out of countenance. She knows a fair look is but a dumb orator to commend virtue, therefore minds it not. All her excellencies stand in her so silently, as if they had stolen upon her without her knowledge. The lining of her apparel (which is herself) is far better than outsides of tissue: for though she be not arrayed in the spoil of the silkworm, she is decked in innocency, a far better wearing. She doth not, with lying long abed, spoil both her complexion and conditions; nature hath taught her too immoderate sleep is rust to the soul: she rises therefore with Chanticleer, her dame's cock, and at night makes the lamb her curfew. In milking a Cow, and straining the teats through her fingers, it seems that so sweet a milk-press makes the milk the whiter or sweeter; for never came almond glove or aromatic ointment on her palm to taint it. The golden ears of corn fall and kiss her feet when she reaps them, as if they wished to be bound and led prisoners by the same hand that felled them. Her breath is her own, which scents all the year long of June, like a new-made haycock. She makes her hand hard with labour, and her heart soft with pity; and when winter evenings fall early (sitting at her merry wheel) she sings a defiance to the giddy wheel of Fortune. She doth all things with so sweet a grace, it seems ignorance will not suffer her to do ill, being her mind is to do well. She bestows her year's wages at next fair; and in chusing her garments counts no bravery i' th' world like decency. The garden and beehive are all her physick and chirurgery, and she lives the longer for it. She dares go alone, and unfold sheep in the night, and fears no manner of ill, because she means none: yet to say truth, she is never alone, for she is still accompanied with old songs, honest thoughts, and prayers, but short ones; yet they have their efficacy, in that they are not palled with ensuing idle cogitations. Lastly, her dreams are so chaste that she dare tell them; only a Friday's dream is all her superstition : that she conceals for fear of anger. Thus lives she, and all her care is she may die in the springtime, to have store of flowers stuck upon her winding-sheet."

"He disdains all things above his reach, and preferreth all countries above his own."

"An Ambitious woman shewes her selfe to bee a troublesome disturber of the world, powerfull to make smale things great, and great monstrous"

"In part to blame is she, Which hath without consent bin only tride: He comes to neere that comes to be denide."

"Who defines terrorists? Today's terrorist is tomorrow's friend. We were the ones that worked with Saddam Hussein. The United States worked with bin Laden."

"A defanged Saddam has been forced to retreat behind his own borders. His nuclear, biological and chemical military capabilities have been destroyed and will stay that way if we can figure out how to prevent him from getting them in the future the same way he got them in the past- from unscrupulous firms, both western and eastern, more interest in the corporate bottom line than in world peace. Saddam's military forces suffered a crushing defeat and are no longer a threat to any other nation. Perhaps of greatest importance, because he did the unthinkable, attacked a brother Arab and subsequently lost face in a humiliating military rout, Saddam's irrational, militant voice is no longer relevant in Arab politics. Largely as a result of this and the coalition's gulf victory, the Middle East pace process is moving forward; Palestinians, other Arabs, and Israelis are sitting down at the negotiating table, and our hostages have been freed. Do I think it was worth it? You bet I do."

"As far as Saddam Hussein being a great military strategist: He is neither a strategist, nor is he schooled in the operational art, nor is he a tactician, nor is he a general, nor is he a soldier. Other than that, he's a great military man."

"The U.S. policy on Iraq, not just from Bill Clinton to Bush to Obama and beyond, has been consistent but that it's been consistent for six decades through eleven presidents. That included covert CIA operations, regime change, support for Saddam Hussein and a merciless policy of targeting the Iraqi civilian population."

"Saddam gave us a lot of things. The development of the country ... but I think what he took away from us in the meantime, was our very souls. We got into a stage where we were fearing each other, where husbands and wives didn't talk to each other, where parents were afraid to express anything in front of their kids because the teachers often asked the kids, 'what does daddy think of uncle Saddam? What does your mummy think of uncle Saddam?.' And there are horror stories of parents being executed because of the child."

"Osama Bin Laden and George Bush were both terrorists. They were both building international networks that perpetrate terror and devastate people’s lives. Bush with the Pentagon, the WTO, the IMF and the World Bank. Bin Laden with Al-Qaeda. The difference is that nobody elected Bin Laden... The United States supported Saddam Hussein and made sure that he ruled with an iron fist for all those years. Then they used the sanctions to break the back of civil society. Then they made Iraq disarm. Then they attacked Iraq. And now they’ve taken over all its assets."

"What they (Fox News) didn't want was a nuanced argument based on fact. I wasn't willing to take one piece of information, blow it way out of proportion and run with it. They wanted to turn every little thing into a proof that Saddam Hussein was the personification of evil, and after 9/11 we could no longer tolerate it... And I'm there saying, "but that's not really what's happening."... George Herbert Walker Bush invented regime change in Iraq and Bill Clinton inherited it, and ran with it. The CIA made four concerted efforts to assassinate Saddam Hussein under Clinton's leadership. So it's not like this was a passive program; it was an active program...."

"Three years ago, the ruler of Iraq was a sworn enemy of America who provided safe haven for terrorists, used weapons of mass destruction, and turned his nation into a prison. Saddam Hussein was not just a dictator; he was a proven mass murderer who refused to account for weapons of mass murder. He defied the international community and seventeen United Nations resolutions over the course of twelve years, giving no indication that Iraq would ever disarm and comply with the just demands of the world. In 2002 – in Resolution 1441 – the United Nations Security Council unanimously voted that Saddam Hussein had one final chance to comply with his obligations to the international community, or there would be serious consequences. As he had for over a decade, he refused to comply. Every responsible nation recognized this threat, and knew it could not go on forever."

"This war is uniting Israel. There is no disagreement over the viciousness of Saddam Hussein."

"Saddam Hussein... I believe is involved with this World Trade Center and Pentagon bombing. I believe that you're going to find out that money from Iraq flowed in and helped this happen."

"The PR strategy worked; by the fall of 2002, a majority of Americans were convinced that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, and at least 66 percent believed (falsely) that the Iraqi leader had been personally involved in the 9/11 attacks. Support for an invasion of Iraq — and Bush's approval rating — hovered around 60 percent. With an eye on the midterm elections, Republicans stepped up the attacks and pushed for a vote authorizing the use of force against Saddam Hussein. And on October 11, 2002, twenty-eight of the Senate's fifty Democrats joined all but one Republican in handing to Bush the power he wanted."

"Two weeks later they still have not been found. The question is, where is Saddam Hussein? Where are those weapons of mass destruction, if they were ever in existence? Is Saddam Hussein in a bunker sitting on cases containing weapons of mass destruction, preparing to blow the whole place up?"

"The attack on Iraq, the attack on Libya, the attack on Syria happened because the leader in each of these countries was not a puppet of the West. The human rights record of a Saddam or a Gaddafi was irrelevant. They did not obey orders and surrender control of their country.... As WikLeaks has revealed, it was only when the Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad in 2009 rejected an oil pipeline, running through his country from Qatar to Europe, that he was attacked.... From that moment, the CIA planned to destroy the government of Syria with jihadist fanatics – the same fanatics currently holding the people of Mosul and eastern Aleppo hostage. Why is this not news? The former British Foreign Office official Carne Ross, who was responsible for operating sanctions against Iraq, told me: “We would feed journalists factoids of sanitised intelligence, or we would freeze them out. That is how it worked.”"

"We wanted that final deal, similar to the one we'd struck with Saudi Arabia. We wanted to get Saddam Hussein to really tie in to our system, and he refused to do that. He accepted our fighter jets and our tanks and our chemical plants that he used to produce chemical weapons that we knew were being used against the Kurds and the Iranians. He accepted all that, but he wouldn't quite tie into our system in such a big way that he would bring in the huge development organizations to rebuild his country, as the Saudis did, in a Western image. And that's what we were trying to convince him to do and also to guarantee that he would always trade oil for U.S. dollars, instead of Euros, and that he would keep the price of oil within limits acceptable to us. He would not go along with those things. If he had, he would still be president, Amy."

"We also tried to do that to Saddam Hussein. When he didn't come around, the economic hit men tried to bring him around. We tried to assassinate him. But that was an interesting point, because he had pretty loyal security forces, and in addition he had a lot of look-alike doubles, and what you don't want to be is a bodyguard to a look-alike double and you think it's the president and you accept a lot of money to assassinate him and you assassinate the look-alike, because if you do that, afterwards your life and your family's isn't worth very much, so we were unable to get through to Saddam Hussein, and that's why we sent the military in..."

"Saddam Hussein was reduced to the Unabomber — Ted Kaczynski — a nutcase hiding in the sticks. Sure, the terrorism by his supporters is frightening. Hence, its name, "terrorism." Killing innocent people by surprise is not called "a thousand points of light." But, as frightening as terrorism is, it's the weapon of losers. The minute somebody sets off a suicide bomb, you can be sure that person doesn't have "career prospects." And no matter how horrendous a terrorist attack is, it's still conducted by losers."

"I managed to get to him the message that he will be executed, finally telling him that, "You are the last card to be played by Bush and Blair." He said, "I am the last card?" I said, "Yes, you are the last card, because Bush and Blair have no reasons to invade Iraq. All the claims were against Iraq — nuclear, link with al-Qaeda — all these stuff has actually disappeared, proved that they don't exist. But they have you. You are they one who they will claim, 'We have removed the dictator.' Do you think removed dictator will be for life sentence or for releasing?" He said, "I understand.""

"In our view, all-out war promises the least success in achieving the objectives we have outlined. First, it would not necessarily discourage other potential aggressors. Defeating Saddam Hussein promptly in an all-out war would send an unequivocal signal that this aggression had not been tolerated. But if casualties were high, U.S. sentiment probably would be driven toward a more isolationist posture. Many Americans would be dismayed by the carnage and resentful that our allies were not paying a similar price. (The seeds of such resentment already exist.) They could be expected to oppose any comparable U.S. role in the future. The message would be that the United States had neither the inclination to work in concert with other nations nor the stomach to repeat the anti-Iraq action. Many of our current collaborators, who are ambivalent at best about the war option, might also lose interest in future cooperation with us. A world of growing brutality and chaos would become a likely prospect."

"One of the most dangerous forms of human error is forgetting what one is trying to achieve. In the gulf crisis, it is crucial that we look beyond our anger at Saddam and remind ourselves of precisely what U.S. interests are in the crisis and what we seek to accomplish."

"A Ba’athist-dominated coup in 1963 induced Saddam to return, but the new ruler of Iraq, Abdul Salam Arif, soon fell out with his Ba’athist allies, and Saddam was imprisoned for several years before escaping in 1967. He went on to become the right-hand man of the Ba'ath Party leader, Ahmad Hassan al-Bakr, and after the part seized power in 1968, he emerged as the strong man of the regime, becoming vice-president, as well as head of Iraq’s security apparatus and general secretary of the Ba’ath Party. He deliberately fashioned his regime on that of Stalin, whom he studied. From his new position Saddam oversaw the nationalization of the Western-owned Iraqi Petroleum Company, using the funds accrued to develop the country’s welfare state (especially its health system). He also initiated a major drive against illiteracy, made improvements to Iraqi infrastructure and generally sought to encourage modernization and industrialization. At the same time, however, he also worked assiduously to accumulate power to himself, moving loyal lieutenants into key positions, building up a brutal secret police and strengthening his grip on levers of state. In mid-1979 Saddam pressured the ailing al-Bakr to resign, and assumed the presidency himself. He immediately summoned the Revolutionary Council, comprising the senior Ba’ath Party leadership, and announced that “Zionism and the forces of darkness’ were engaged in a conspiracy against Iraq. Then, to the horror of his audience, he announced that those involved were present in the room. While Saddam sat smoking a huge cigar, a series of names were read out, and, one by one, 66 people were led away. Subsequently 22 of these men were found guilty, and Saddam personally supervised their killing, requiring senior figures in the Iraqi leadership to carry out the death sentences."

"Saddam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq, aspired to be an Arab hero and conqueror, but his long reign of ruthless oppression, sadistic cruelty, gangsterish corruption, unnecessary wars, mass murder and a ludicrous personality cult led to a series of political miscalculations that brought about the destruction of his regime and his own death on the scaffold."

"As the Bush administration prepared for war, Saddam Hussein retreated further and further into his own fantasy world. He believed that the United States would not attack because Americans lacked the will to take casualties. His forces could and would kill so many Americans that any Desert Storm II offensive would stall well short of Baghdad, He allowed no one in his inner circle to question his delusions. He also believed that France and Russia, his allies, would deter the United States from displacing him because that was in their economic interests. He planned to save his oil wells and air forces for another postwar rebirth. The WMD threat may have been real to Saddam Hussein and other true believers like his sons, but the missiles, warheads, and deadly chemicals were scattered, hidden, forgotten, and never existed, although few Iraqis outside Chemical Ali's circle knew it. The Iraqi high command was so stacked with loyalists that the generals could easily assume someone else's part of the armed forces had real capability. Information-sharing was an invitation to disgrace and death."

"Taking his own counsel, which he admitted rested on his religious convictions and intuition, George W. Bush decided after becoming president that he would rid the world of Saddam Hussein, which already had congressional sanction in 1998. Bush made several public statements about his mission to remove "evil" tyrants and destroy governments that sponsored terrorists. Bush's instincts took more stimulus from Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the neoconservatives in the national security system. Even before 9/11 the White House had investigated what a global war on terrorism might entail. For a president impatient with the complexities of foreign policy, the national security analyses provided little comfort. No other government (not even Israel's) had much stomach for redefining the continuing struggle against terrorism as a war upon a particular state, including Iraq. Even after the shock of 9/11 and the start of Operation ENDURING FREEDOM, the Bush administration found little international support in making Iraq Target Number One for international action. Instead, the consensus, communicated by the State Department and the CIA, was that Saddam Hussein's days were numbered and that his ability to attack his neighbors had been largely, if not completely, destroyed. Saddam was "contained." The president did not accept these assurances."

"On August 2, 1990, the very day when President Bush announced a plan to focus defense planning on regional conflicts, the Iraqi mechanized divisions of Saddam Hussein plunged across the border of Kuwait and in six days eliminated conventional military resistance against an outnumbered and uneven Kuwaiti defense force. On August 8, with his crack Republican Guard divisions closing in on the border of Saudi Arabia, the Iraqi dictator declared the "lost province" of Kuwait annexed to Iraq. Saddam Hussein condemned the Kuwaiti ruling family, the al-Sabahs, for mistreating foreign workers and supporting Iraqi dissidents; however, for Saddam the invasion represented primarily a financial coup de main that would place Kuwaiti oil in Iraqi hands. It was a desperate attempt to increase the oil revenues he needed to pay his war debts, rebuild his army and air force, pacify his Sunni Muslim supporters, pursue his grandiose plans to build nuclear and chemical strategic weapons, and replace the now-lost largesse from the Soviet Union and the anti-Iranian Western nations."

"If Saddam is such a demon, and people are calling for war crimes charges and trials against him and his nation, why do we not hear the same cry for blood directed at those responsible for even greater amounts of "mass destruction" -- like those responsible and involved in dropping bombs on the cities mentioned above?"

"For decades, Saddam Hussein has tortured, imprisoned, raped and murdered the Iraqi people; invaded neighboring countries without provocation; and threatened the world with weapons of mass destruction. The time has come to end his reign of terror. On your young shoulders rest the hopes of mankind. When I give you the word, together we will cross the Line of Departure, close with those forces that choose to fight, and destroy them. Our fight is not with the Iraqi people, nor is it with members of the Iraqi army who choose to surrender. While we will move swiftly and aggressively against those who resist, we will treat all others with decency, demonstrating chivalry and soldierly compassion for people who have endured a lifetime under Saddam’s oppression. Chemical attack, treachery, and use of the innocent as human shields can be expected, as can other unethical tactics. Take it all in stride. Be the hunter, not the hunted: never allow your unit to be caught with its guard down. Use good judgment and act in best interests of our Nation. You are part of the world’s most feared and trusted force. Engage your brain before you engage your weapon. Share your courage with each other as we enter the uncertain terrain north of the Line of Departure. Keep faith in your comrades on your left and right and Marine Air overhead. Fight with a happy heart and strong spirit. For the mission’s sake, our country’s sake, and the sake of the men who carried the Division’s colors in the past battles-who fought for life and never lost their nerve-carry out your mission and keep your honor clean. Demonstrate to the world there is "No Better Friend, No Worse Enemy" than a U.S. Marine."

"Canada's position was Saddam Hussein should be disarmed. Now, to be quite honest, I had a lot of difficulty understanding how he was going to be disarmed without being replaced."

"The US has not committed atrocities in Iraq that are even remotely comparable to what Saddam did."

"Saddam is dead but is Iraq much better than Saddam’s times? I do not think autocracy is right. But if democracy is the answer, expecting it to perform miracles overnight is stupid."

"As you go through history, I didn't think it was going to get quite this close. So it's just one of those recurring things… I hope this doesn't come true in our country. Maybe the film will waken people to the situation. … When I wrote it [Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith], Iraq didn't exist… We were just funding Saddam Hussein and giving him weapons of mass destruction. We didn't think of him as an enemy at that time. We were going after Iran and using him as our surrogate, just as we were doing in Vietnam… The parallels between what we did in Vietnam and what we're doing in Iraq now are unbelievable…[In ancient Rome,] why did the senate after killing Caesar turn around and give the government to his nephew? Why did France after they got rid of the king and that whole system turn around and give it to Napoleon? It's the same thing with Germany and Hitler. … You sort of see these recurring themes where a democracy turns itself into a dictatorship, and it always seems to happen kind of in the same way, with the same kinds of issues, and threats from the outside, needing more control. A democratic body, a senate, not being able to function properly because everybody's squabbling, there's corruption."

"The war against terrorism will not be finished as long as he [Saddam Hussein] is in power."

"What we have now come to regard as typical of Middle Eastern regimes is not typical of the past. The regime of Saddam Hussein, the regime of Hafiz al Assad, this kind of government, this kind of society, has no roots either in the Arab or in the Islamic past. It is due and let me be quite specific and explicit it is due to an importation from Europe, which comes in two phases."

"Stunningly, as bad as things were under Saddam—and we have to keep in mind this perspective of Saddam in the wake of a brutal eight-year war with Iran and then the genocidal sanctions for 13 years, from 1991 up until the beginning of this invasion in March 2003—as bad as it was under Saddam, with the repression and the detentions and the torture and the killings, the overall feeling of Iraqis today, in and other places in Iraq where I went this trip, was that things are much worse now. There's less—far less security. You don't really know where you can go and what you can do and know that you're going to have any kind of safety. "Any time that we send our kids out to school now," is what I was told, "we don't know for sure on any given day that they're going to come back." And so, the prevailing sentiment is that, yes, it was good initially to have Saddam removed, but people are still concerned with basic things like security, an economy stable enough to be able to have a job to work, to have food and provide something for your family. And these things just no longer exist today in Iraq. So the prevailing sentiment is that it's far worse now even than it was under Saddam Hussein."

"I got hold of a copy of the video that showed how Saddam Hussein had actually confirmed himself in power. This snuff-movie opens with a plenary session of the Ba'ath Party central committee: perhaps a hundred men. Suddenly the doors are locked and Saddam, in the chair, announces a special session. Into the room is dragged an obviously broken man, who begins to emit a robotic confession of treason and subversion, that he sobs has been instigated by Syrian and other agents. As the (literally) extorted confession unfolds, names begin to be named. Once a fellow-conspirator is identified, guards come to his seat and haul him from the room. The reclining Saddam, meanwhile, lights a large cigar and contentedly scans his dossiers. The sickness of fear in the room is such that men begin to crack up and weep, rising to their feet to shout hysterical praise, even love, for the leader. Inexorably, though, the cull continues, and faces and bodies go slack as their owners are pinioned and led away. When it is over, about half the committee members are left, moaning with relief and heaving with ardent love for the boss. (In an accompanying sequel, which I have not seen, they were apparently required to go into the yard outside and shoot the other half, thus sealing the pact with Saddam. I am not sure that even Beria or Himmler would have had the nerve and ingenuity and cruelty to come up with that.)"

"He is not mad in the least. He's a very astute person, a clever person."