![]() ![]() Those images created a national sensation because, as one reporter put it, they illustrated "the cruelty - and bizarre revelry - at many lynchings in the United States." Many of the photos had been made into postcards by people who sold them as souvenirs or sent them to friends. Several years ago, we again were reminded of the demand to witness and the distress it causes when galleries and museums around the country displayed James Allen's powerful and disturbing collection of lynching photographs. After the event, his film circulated widely and still can be seen today. As 6,600 volts of alternating current brought the elephant to her knees, Edison's camera rolled in plain view. It was instead the last moments of a notorious and violent circus elephant, meeting a fate decreed by her owners before a large crowd gathered to enjoy the spectacle. What he captured, however, was not the dignified death of a criminal condemned through orderly judicial procedures. Thus more than a century ago, in one of the earliest movies, Thomas Edison filmed the first execution by electrocution. Moving pictures of executions are almost as old as the medium itself. This has turned out to be as true of Saddam Hussein's execution as it is in other cases.With so much attention being paid to the apparent recent scandal created by the surreptitiously produced video of that event, we should not lose sight of the real scandal of the execution it portrays. As a result, those who carry them out seek to control what is seen and by whom. Yet what we see when we watch often disturbs and unsettles us. Despite a prolonged search, weapons of mass destruction were never found in Iraq.Pictures And Executions: The Real Scandal In The Hanging Of Saddam HusseinĮxecutions seem to demand witnessing. A soldier at the scene described him as “a man resigned to his fate.”Īfter standing trial, he was executed on December 30, 2006. He did not resist and was uninjured during the arrest. ![]() The man once obsessed with hygiene was found to be unkempt, with a bushy beard and matted hair. soldiers found Saddam Hussein hiding in a six-to-eight-foot deep hole, nine miles outside his hometown of Tikrit. soldiers raided a villa in which they were staying in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.įive months later, on December 13, 2003, U.S. On July 22, 2003, Saddam’s sons, Uday and Qusay, who many believe he was grooming to one day fill his shoes, were killed when U.S. After declaring Saddam the most important of a list of his regime’s 55 most-wanted members, the United States began an intense search for the former leader and his closest advisors. Obsessed with security, he is said to have moved among them often, always sleeping in secret locations.ĭespite proclaiming in early March 2003 that, “it is without doubt that the faithful will be victorious against aggression,” Saddam went into hiding soon after the American invasion, speaking to his people only through an occasional audiotape, and his government soon fell. ![]() While many of his people faced poverty, he lived in incredible luxury, building more than 20 lavish palaces throughout the country. During his 24 years in office, Saddam’s secret police, charged with protecting his power, terrorized the public, ignoring the human rights of the nation’s citizens. Saddam took over for his cousin 11 years later. SADDAM HUSSEIN CAPTURE AND EXECUTION INSTALLHe participated in several coup attempts, finally helping to install his cousin as dictator of Iraq in July 1968. After moving to Baghdad as a teenager, Saddam joined the now-infamous Baath party, which he would later lead. Saddam Hussein was born into a poor family in Tikrit, 100 miles outside of Baghdad, in 1937. Saddam’s downfall began on March 20, 2003, when the United States led an invasion force into Iraq to topple his government, which had controlled the country for more than 20 years. After spending nine months on the run, former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein is captured on December 13, 2003. ![]()
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