4 ms·

At my first meeting with Saddam, within 30 seconds, he knew two things about me

18 points by breck 4y ago

huijzer 4y ago
Answer to the clickbait: > At my first meeting with Saddam, within 30 seconds, he knew two things about me. I told him my name was George Piro and that I was in charge, and he immediately said, “You’re Lebanese.” I told him my parents were Lebanese, and then he said, “You’re Christian.” I asked him if that was a problem, and he said absolutely not. He loved the Lebanese people. Lebanese people loved him. And I was like, “Well, great. We’re going to get along wonderfully.” (Saddam was a Sunni Muslim, while most Iraqis are Shia Muslims.)
- jmclnx 4y ago
  But a lot more information than the "click bait". Worth a read.
- lucumo 4y ago
  Bit of an underwhelming answer to a headline question. You'd think there were some deeper insight. Is that really the most interesting tidbit the headline writer could tease from the article?
  - cableshaft 4y ago
    I thought it was an a quite interesting article overall, and read the whole thing. Talked about Saddam's published book, his dislike of Bin Laden, him seeing on his birthday (on TV) how Iraqis really thought about him on his birthday when they weren't forced to celebrate it, and how the FBI were the only ones who acknowledged it at all (in part to build rapport), by bringing him homemade cookies, how Saddam at one point was tasked with assassinating someone, failed, and had to flee Iraq for several years before returning (before he became President), etc.
jhallenworld 4y ago
[flagged]
bobmichael 4y ago
As a Lebanese person, this is absolutely unremarkable. Almost any Arab, after hearing "my name is George Piro" in Arabic, would be able to tell recognize a Lebanese accent and the Christian name.
- jones6ofMont 4y ago
  Not necessary true. Many non muslim Arabs adopted Christian name. In fact the name is more of "western name". Same with millions of Chinese who are Buddhist or Taoist and yet have this kind of Christian Western name.
spaceman_2020 4y ago
I've always been conflicted about people like Saddam and Gaddafi. It's undeniable that they're dictators and like most dictators, have done some awful things to cement their rule. But it's also true that without strong rulers like them, their countries collapse into complete disorder. You can't impose democracy on them because they've never had democratic traditions or the institutions to perpetuate them.
- ekianjo 4y ago
  > they've never had democratic traditions It's not as much as having democratic traditions - it's simply that these countries are composed of a bunch of tribes, and such tribes have no intent of working with each other - the majority would crush the rest and have no problem about it.
  - joosters 4y ago
    I bet you couldn't name three tribes in Iraq without running off to the internet to look it up, and yet you are confident that you know them so well to state that the majority of them want to crush all the others? Please try not to paint everyone with your own colonial-era assumptions.
- marcosdumay 4y ago
  How does a democracy actually appear? The only way I know is that the when people join to kill the governors every time they decide to go around killing the governed, some democratic institutions appear. Yet, this is not how most democracies were created. It was how the concept appeared, but nowadays it tends to take a different route. Some murky, hard to follow route that looks exactly like noise to me.
  - spaceman_2020 4y ago
    You can see this in all post-colonial countries. There seems to be a common thread across them - countries that had some some democratic institutions before independence, AND managed to build some democracy-preserving institutions post-independence seem to have somewhat stable and even robust democracies. India is a good example. Way before independence in 1947, there were parties and organizations engaged in the political process, often with internal democracies. This facilitated the shift to democratic traditions even post-independence. And while it's not perfect, India does have a strong democracy today with hundreds of parties, largely fair elections, and robust electoral participation. Contrast this with a country like Sri Lanka that did not have the same engaged political class pre-independence and you can see how proper democracy never really thrived there post-independence.
ekianjo 4y ago
Are we supposed to believe anything that a FBI agent says?
- drewcoo 4y ago
  > Are we supposed to believe anything that a FBI agent says? Yes, everything.
bluepoint 4y ago
The interesting bit that I got is that he made a speech implying that he had weapons of mass destruction because he wanted to scare off Iran. He actually did not have anything left because of the sanctions, but he did not want to appear weak and deal with an iranian invasion. That speech seemed to have affected the US’s decision to invade.

18 points by breck 4y ago

Answer to the clickbait: > At my first meeting with Saddam, within 30 seconds, he knew two things about me. I told him my name was George Piro and that I was in charge, and he immediately said, “You’re Lebanese.” I told him my parents were Lebanese, and then he said, “You’re Christian.” I asked him if that was a problem, and he said absolutely not. He loved the Lebanese people. Lebanese people loved him. And I was like, “Well, great. We’re going to get along wonderfully.” (Saddam was a Sunni Muslim, while most Iraqis are Shia Muslims.)

jmclnx 4y ago
But a lot more information than the "click bait". Worth a read.
lucumo 4y ago
Bit of an underwhelming answer to a headline question. You'd think there were some deeper insight. Is that really the most interesting tidbit the headline writer could tease from the article?
- cableshaft 4y ago
  I thought it was an a quite interesting article overall, and read the whole thing. Talked about Saddam's published book, his dislike of Bin Laden, him seeing on his birthday (on TV) how Iraqis really thought about him on his birthday when they weren't forced to celebrate it, and how the FBI were the only ones who acknowledged it at all (in part to build rapport), by bringing him homemade cookies, how Saddam at one point was tasked with assassinating someone, failed, and had to flee Iraq for several years before returning (before he became President), etc.

jhallenworld 4y ago

[flagged]

bobmichael 4y ago

As a Lebanese person, this is absolutely unremarkable. Almost any Arab, after hearing "my name is George Piro" in Arabic, would be able to tell recognize a Lebanese accent and the Christian name.

jones6ofMont 4y ago
Not necessary true. Many non muslim Arabs adopted Christian name. In fact the name is more of "western name". Same with millions of Chinese who are Buddhist or Taoist and yet have this kind of Christian Western name.

spaceman_2020 4y ago

I've always been conflicted about people like Saddam and Gaddafi. It's undeniable that they're dictators and like most dictators, have done some awful things to cement their rule. But it's also true that without strong rulers like them, their countries collapse into complete disorder. You can't impose democracy on them because they've never had democratic traditions or the institutions to perpetuate them.

ekianjo 4y ago
> they've never had democratic traditions It's not as much as having democratic traditions - it's simply that these countries are composed of a bunch of tribes, and such tribes have no intent of working with each other - the majority would crush the rest and have no problem about it.
- joosters 4y ago
  I bet you couldn't name three tribes in Iraq without running off to the internet to look it up, and yet you are confident that you know them so well to state that the majority of them want to crush all the others? Please try not to paint everyone with your own colonial-era assumptions.
marcosdumay 4y ago
How does a democracy actually appear? The only way I know is that the when people join to kill the governors every time they decide to go around killing the governed, some democratic institutions appear. Yet, this is not how most democracies were created. It was how the concept appeared, but nowadays it tends to take a different route. Some murky, hard to follow route that looks exactly like noise to me.
- spaceman_2020 4y ago
  You can see this in all post-colonial countries. There seems to be a common thread across them - countries that had some some democratic institutions before independence, AND managed to build some democracy-preserving institutions post-independence seem to have somewhat stable and even robust democracies. India is a good example. Way before independence in 1947, there were parties and organizations engaged in the political process, often with internal democracies. This facilitated the shift to democratic traditions even post-independence. And while it's not perfect, India does have a strong democracy today with hundreds of parties, largely fair elections, and robust electoral participation. Contrast this with a country like Sri Lanka that did not have the same engaged political class pre-independence and you can see how proper democracy never really thrived there post-independence.

ekianjo 4y ago

Are we supposed to believe anything that a FBI agent says?

drewcoo 4y ago
> Are we supposed to believe anything that a FBI agent says? Yes, everything.

bluepoint 4y ago

The interesting bit that I got is that he made a speech implying that he had weapons of mass destruction because he wanted to scare off Iran. He actually did not have anything left because of the sanctions, but he did not want to appear weak and deal with an iranian invasion. That speech seemed to have affected the US’s decision to invade.