On July 22nd in military history....in 2003

On July 22nd in military history….in 2003. Uday and Qusay Hussein are killed in Mosul, Iraq by elements of the 101st Airborne. When the US-lead coalition invaded Iraq to remove Saddam Hussein from power, former high-ranking members of the military and the regime were quickly sought out and apprehended. To give some idea of the importance in relation to others of the Iraqi regime, the United States put out a list of 55 high-ranking members of the regime with their names and photos on a deck of playing cards. Saddam Hussein was, of course, the ace of spades, but Uday was the ace of hearts and Qusay was the ace of clubs. There was also a reward put out for any information relating to their capture.

On July 22nd, the owner of the house where they were hiding, "dropped the dime" and alerted US forces to their location. A Special Forces unit arrived at the house and attempted to "arrest" the inhabitants, but it was fired upon by the inhabitants. This was the proverbial "big mistake" since the Special Forces unit fell back and called for back-up. When elements of the 101st Airborne arrived on the scene, they proceeded to return fire, which included TOW anti-tank missiles and air strikes by Apache attack helicopters and A-10 "tank buster" aircraft. After three hours of what amounted to "target practice", the troops entered what was left of the house and found four people dead and three others wounded. Among the dead were Uday, Qusay and Qusay’s 14-year old son, Mustafa.

The news of their deaths was met with much celebration in Iraq with Iraqis firing weapons into the air. However, the liberal, defeatist media around the world complained that they were killed in "cold blood" and it was a "crime" ("Alert the International Criminal Court") or that they should have been taken alive. A quick look at their lives here and here shows that taking these two worthless bags of fecal material alive would have been a slap in the face of all their victims.

I was in Baghdad the day of their deaths. We had already started to hear rumors about their deaths, but like many other rumors, you wait a day and the story would change. However, that night, we started seeing tracer rounds being shot into the air. At first we thought we were under attack and those tracers were ricochets, but after a few minutes, we came to realize that they rounds were deliberately being shot into the air. Since the Iraqis only do that when they are celebrating, we were pretty sure that Uday and Qusay had been sent to receive their "eternal reward" (which I highly doubt that it involves "72 virgins") for a life of brutality. I don't know about you, but I'm really looking forward to seeing their father, Saddam Hussein, swinging from the end of a hangman’s noose. Some may think that this is "inhumane" and "barbaric", but it’s better than having him walk thru downtown Kirkuk or Mosul, wearing a sign saying "Ask me how I gassed your relatives". How long do you think he would last without being beaten to death by an enraged mob or even worse?