Did a chastised officer lead to Saddam's capture? - Tom Kovach

Dominos blown by West wind
Did a chastised officer lead to Saddam’s capture?

In recent months, “politically correct” forces — both inside and outside of the American military — were eager to punish Lieutenant Colonel Allen B. West, who had been an infantry battalion commander in the 4^th Infantry Division of the US Army. For those that might have been living in a “spider hole”, in August of this year LTC West was accused of an assault upon a turncoat Iraqi police officer during an interrogation. The “assault” consisted of scaring information out of Yahya Jhodri Hamoody by firing a pistol near his head. Immediately thereafter, Mr. Hamoody confessed to his complicity in helping to set up guerilla attacks against US Army members, and vomited up copious amounts of information that led to the suppression of future attacks upon our soldiers.

My question is: what else did LTC West’s actions lead to?

I believe that it is absolutely no accident that the military and intelligence leaders in the War Against Terrorism suddenly changed their information-gathering strategy in the wake of the successful information-gathering actions by LTC West. For months, those same leaders had concentrated on finding, capturing, and interrogating members of the so-called “deck of cards” — top officials of the Saddam Hussein regime. After discovering how much information can be quickly pulled from a low-level operator, however, it seems that commanders and case officers quickly shifted gears. They went after bodyguards, who are on a political parallel with police officers such as Hamoody. Published reports said that tips about Hussein had increased dramatically in recent weeks; the same recent weeks as the publicity about West shooting near Hamoody’s head. It certainly appears that former Hussein sympathizers got the message that West intended.

Shortly after following the lead of LTC West, our Army caught Saddam Hussein.

I believe it is also no accident that the Fourth Infantry Division, the same division that LTC West had belonged to as a battalion commander, was used as the sweeping force to effect the apprehension of Hussein. Partly for operational reasons — because Major General Raymond Odierno’s division has the geographic responsibility for that part of Iraq — and partly for public-relations, the same commander that could have court-martialed West is now credited with capturing Hussein. Ultimately, it seems that “a cooler head prevailed”, and MG Odierno will be proven right by history for not going forward with a court-martial against the man whose singular action may have really tipped over the dominos that led to Hussein’s capture. (Career military people know that, to survive, you must make your commander look good. West did, but paid dearly.)

The question that remains in my mind is whether, in clearer hindsight, that same commander will exercise his option to set aside his own sentence. And, in the event that MG Odierno is not inclined to set aside the $5,000 fine against LTC West, it can be set aside by a superior commander — such as President Bush. Such a move is authorized by subsection (d) of Article 15 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and would send the proper signal to all observers: soldiers, reporters, politicians ... and Iraqis.

Tom Kovach