PRESIDENT SADDAM HUSSEIN’S ADDRESS ON THE ELEVENTH ANNIVERSARY
OF THE GRAND BATTLE “MOTHER OF ALL BATTLES” JANUARY 16-17, 1991
In the name of Allah, the Merciful, the Compassionate
“Our Lord! Condemn us not if we forget or fall into error; our Lord! Lay not on us a
burden like that which Thou didst lay on those before us; our Lord! Lay not on us a
burden greater than we have strength to bear. Blot out our sins, and grant us
forgiveness. Have mercy on us. Thou art our Protector; help us against those who
stand against Faith.”
(The Holy Quran, II, 286)
Great people,
Striving people: men and glorious women,
High-spirited, chivalrous heroes of Arabism,
nationalism and faith, brave men of Iraq
in our valiant armed forces,
Sons of our glorious nation wherever you are: in our
great homeland or in the countries of emigration,
Friends all over the world,
Peace be upon you!
Today is a day in the Grand Battle, the immortal Mother of all Battles. It is a glorious and a splendid day on the part of the self-respecting people of Iraq and their history, and it is the beginning of the great shame for those who ignited its fire on the other part. It is the first day on which the vast military phase of that battle started. Or rather, it is the first day of that battle, since Allah decreed that the Mother of all Battles continue till this day.
It was a dark night, in which everything indicated the degree of darkness that possessed the minds of the aggressors, and settled in their sick souls and hearts, which are devoid of faith, culminating in their damnable malice to burn Baghdad with their bombs and rockets. But Baghdad did not burn. It dispersed darkness with its own torches. The most important thing which Baghdad turned to for support, after turning to Allah, was the light of the torches of faith, sent out by the zeal of men, from hearts full of faith and love and full of the sense of commitment to the role Allah decreed for them. Thus, light dispersed darkness. Amidst the darkness of that night and in the middle of the flames of the fire which was burning everywhere, hope and optimism were firm on their ground. The will to faith and the zeal to the values of honour and right formulated what every sparking mind and every firm heart expressed in saying to unbelief: No!, to falsehood: No!, to oppression: No!. And to say: Yes!, to everything Allah decreed that it be good, and ordered His righteous servants to follow. Thus, with its radiance, the light of faith triumphed over the flames of the fire of falsehood. That radiance and its light amazed all those who wanted for falsehood to be defeated and for right to triumph, and took the unbelievers by surprise. It was a defeat for darkness, murder, destruction and evil-motivated haughtiness towards the fountain of goodness, the land of the Arabs, the home of the Arabs, the land of Iraq, home of Allah’s Prophet, Abraham. The gloriously lustrous Iraqi women were sending out their trilling cries of joy like incantations and like invocations to Allah to protect sons and fathers, brothers and sweethearts.
With every shell fired and every rocket launched against Iraq, and while the valiant men remained firm in the trenches and battlefields, Allah, Who is our Protector, was present, because the believers trusted in Him. The air of beloved Baghdad was driving away the smoke of the fires. Rain, as if subjected to help in extinguishing those fires, was falling so heavily those days that it became black with smoke. In the thick of all of this, the sun of truth, together with steadfastness, was rising above the horizon for the far-off and the nearby to see.
When the details of what had happened to Baghdad and how, as the mother and sister of the Arabs and the Iraqis, it held its ground and how all the towns and villages of Iraq, in the plains and deserts, in the marshes and mountains, held their ground, together with the faithful, firm and tender mountain, Iraq – when these details were known, people’s conviction in the possibility of holding ground in the face of wrong, by those who believe in right and defend it, increased. Increased also was their conviction in the role of Baghdad. With the uncovering of these details, uncovered also, with great details, were the baseness of the aggressors, their smallness, and the badness of the evil in their souls and minds.
In spite of the wounds and bruises inflicted upon the daughter of the Arabs, the torch of light for humanity and the mother of the Iraqis, Baghdad, her face remained safe, splendid, shining, glowing with faith, healthy and unstained by dishonour or marked by shame. In addition to the badges of virtue and glory, Baghdad remained holding the orders of merit and the insignia of sublimity to the level decreed by Allah for her.
Praise belongs to Allah, whose aid we seek!
Let the criminals be despised!
Brothers,
Friends,
Under those circumstances or in time preceding and following them, we said that the US would be dislodged from the summit to the foot of the mountain, with the first bomb it would fire against Baghdad. We said that it would not remain on the summit it had occupied before the seventeenth of January, 1991, and it would never, after that date, be able to resume ascending to that summit again. For that intuition, I was not drawing facts from history alone or from the law of the rise and fall of civilizations. The Americans have not yet established a civilization, in the deep and comprehensive sense we give to civilization. What they have established is a metropolis of force, devoid of historical values based on what pleases Allah and His messengers. Those who saddled and mounted the horses of that metropolis were and still are destructive of the human soul and the human structure founded on faith and human affection. In this, their role was nearer to that of the ravagers than to that of the guides of the march towards a constructive role for humanity. Besides, bombarding Baghdad does not bring honour to whoever does it because Baghdad is the symbol of the Arabs and Muslims, the cradle of their culture, the glorious and deep-rooted part of their heritage and genius, and the site of their great action for right against falsehood, or rather, the heart of that action for eight hundred years. During that time Baghdad was under the care and protection of Allah, Who watches all form His heights. He distinguishes right and reinforces it in the behaviour of those who follow it, and distinguishes falsehood and lowers it in the behaviour of those who practise it. In the light of these facts, Allah will not allow the action of those who aim at Baghdad to bring them happiness or allow them to close their eyes peacefully in sleep.
Some people, perhaps including Arabs and plenty of Muslims and more than these in the wide world, regarded that intuition as wishful thinking at best. Some of them described it as pure fancy. Others perhaps leveled more severe accusations against it in the light of their own whims or the apprehensions of those who considered the ascent of the US to the summit as the last scene in the world picture, after which there will be no more summits and no one will try to ascend and sit comfortably there. They considered it the end of the world as they hoped for, or as their scared souls suggested it to them.
Dashed be their deeds and their hopes and what
was suggested to them!
And Allah if the greatest!
Allah if the greatest!
Look around you, brothers,
Hasn’t the US rolled down from the summit to the foot of the slope next to it? If it still looks nearest to the summit in distance, the nearness of the place of the fall to the summit does not always mean the nearness to the summit to resume ascent, and it does not constitute a chance for it. In the case of the US, it means nothing but saying firmly with deep-rooted conviction that the US is farther than the others from the chance of resuming the ascent to the summit now.
One may ask the speaker: “How do yousay this when you see and hear how the US is moving freely in the world with its destructive military power?” To this I say again: the ascent to the summit is not achieved by brute force. It requires the power of a humane and tender mind, a clear conscience and a faithful heart that wins people to help it reach the summit and hold it for a long time. The untamable horse will be killed if it is let loose without rider or rein to control it. It may fall into a ditch which will destroy it or break one of its legs. Its role on the basis of its duties will end.
Yes, brothers, breaking loose will definitely be neck-breaking for the US. It is the road to its collapse towards the abyss. I do not think that any of the specialists in future studies, basing his predictions on what he sees or hears in the present, will not say what I am saying now and what I said eleven years ago.
The events of the eleventh of September and the American reaction to them came to reveal extensively how the US is going headlong in antagonizing the world. People all over the world now feel a strong antagonism toward the US and the role it is playing or planning to play. All of them express it with their hearts, many with their tongues, though only few take action with their hands. This conclusion is not to be invalidated by saying that the US is capable of striking and destroying. It can strike at those who are destined by Allah to meet death or martyrdom as a result of the US aggression. This capability not only confirms the conclusion, it rather hastens it. If the fall under other circumstances requires a longer period of time, the US reaction after the eleventh of September, 2001, its failure to study the causes of what had happened before searching for the originators of the events and taking revenge on them, and its failure to take warning and learn new lessons from what had happened - - all of these made time hasten to witness the fall with other witnesses. The sons of this generation are destined to see this, unless the US changes its way of treating not only the world but itself also fairly and justly. Its self-examination will result in new behaviour and a new outlook on its relation with the world and on its role in it. It will result in following the right path leading to that role. If some fallen empires used the base to resume the ascent to an acceptable distance above the place of their fall, no ascent to any acceptable distance will ever be possible for the US after its fall. This is because the ascent of the US to where it ascended had, from the start, no strong, deep or firm base to support it.
Will the Americans ever do what is right? I am repeating the same question I asked in the Amman Summit in February, 1990. Though many events happened and twelve years passed, I give now the same answer: I would that they do? But they will not do what is right, and they are inevitably heading toward the abyss.
Brothers,
Friends,
We faced, as did our people and our army, in the battle of that day and the following days, difficulties which rose up to the level of that occasion. The greatest difficulty for us was facing something for which we did not possess the knowledge of one who stood its test. The leadership was then prepared for the encounter in the light of the calculated probabilities, supporting its conclusions with the information it gathered about the aggression and the aggressors. But will the performance of one who has sat a test and passed in a subject, in which the repeated material is more than the new, be higher and better, or lower and lesser than one who has not? We pray to Allah, glorified be His Name, to keep our people and our nation away from the evil of the evildoers and their wicked intentions. Yet, we say with determination and conviction that our people have known where right is and where falsehood is. They have discovered where their strength lies and used it creatively with the permission of Allah. They have dealt with each case of weakness and overcome what should be overcome in it so that the march may go on towards its objectives. Now, they have more confidence in themselves and more conviction in their march than they had in the year 1991. They have identified their basic enemies, or the fickle and chameleon-like ones, those who act openly and those who act secretly, and have prepared for them. Their faith in their role, according to what Allah orders, has deepened. Their hold to Allah’s bond and their trust in Him, glorified be His Name, have become stronger and greater. After the course of the aggression eleven years ago, backed up by a continuous aggression till this day, our people will not be taken by surprise by anything and any situation for which they have prepared themselves.
Allah, glorified be His Name, is the Omnipotent One
Who guides the believers to see what lies around
and what lies ahead of them, and what the ordinary
and naked eyes cannot see.
The future will be for our people, as the present is.
They will be the true sons of their history and its
heritage, and the fragrant shoots of the message
of their nation.
Allah will dishonour the unbelievers.
There is no help except from Allah, the All-mighty,
the All-wise.
A salute to every friend of our nation and our people who was protesting in a loud voice or even in whisper to put into effect the significance of the saying of the Messenger of Allah (Peace be upon him):
Let whoever witnesses an atrocity alter it with
his hand; if he cannot, then with his tongue; if
he cannot, then with his heart, and the last one
is the weakest kind of faith.
(Truth is in the sayings of the Messenger
of Allah, peace be upon him)
A salute to every faithful and self-respecting person, and to every Arab who felt in his heart the pain of the enemy’s blows against the army of Iraq, its people, its properties, and its historical and cultural monuments.
A special salute to those who left their homes, urged by faithful national zeal or by the factors and values of faith in general or by the values decreed by Allah to bind humanity together, to demonstrate and say “No!” to the false god and to protest against the shameful action of that evil alliance, and against the continuation of the aggression and the embargo till this day.
Blessed be those who fell, stained with their own blood, because of that action. We pray to Allah to admit them to His Paradise as martyrs. From Him, glorified be His Name, we derive strength, steadfastness and resolution.
Blessedness and the Uppermost Heaven, as guests of the Merciful Lord, for the martyrs of Arabism, faith and national zeal, the bearers of the torches of right against falsehood.
Blessed be the martyrs of the Mother of all Battles.
Long live our glorious nation!
Long live Palestine, free and Arab! May Allah ordain
that we be counted among its liberators!
Long live Iraq, and its people and its army!
Long live Baghdad!
Allah is the greatest!
Allah is the greatest!
Allah is the greatest!
And let the debased be despised!