U.S. Offers Graphic Proof of Brothers’ Deaths

The U.S. military took the unusual step Thursday of releasing graphic photographs of the blood-spattered bodies of Saddam Hussein’s sons as proof to the Iraqi people that the two feared members of the past regime are dead.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told reporters in Washington that the release of the images was justified “because these two are particularly bad characters.”

“It’s important for the Iraqi people to see” the photographs of Uday and Qusai Hussein, he said, “to know they’re gone, to know they’re dead and to know they’re not coming back.”

The Hussein brothers were killed Tuesday in a ferocious battle with U.S. soldiers in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul. A 14-year-old boy believed to be Qusai’s son and a man thought to be a bodyguard also were killed in the raid, which left four Americans wounded.

It is rare for the U.S. military to release such photographs, both out of adherence to Geneva Convention rules that mandate respect for prisoners of war and slain combatants and because of concern that similar images of American troops might be shown in future conflicts.

The Third Geneva Convention states that prisoners must be protected at all times, particularly against acts of violence or intimidation and against insults and public curiosity. The First Geneva Convention calls on combatants to ensure that the dead are not despoiled and are honorably interred.

In March, when Arab media showed videotape of U.S. prisoners of war under interrogation and images of dead American soldiers, some of whom appeared to have been shot in the head, then-Defense Department spokeswoman Victoria Clarke decried it as a “blatant violation of the Geneva Convention to humiliate or abuse POWs or to harm them in any way.”

Officials with the U.S.-led administration in Iraq said there was heated discussion about whether to release the photographs. But after hearing widespread doubts from Iraqis that the men killed in Mosul included Hussein’s sons, Rumsfeld gave the go-ahead.

The defense secretary said it “was not a snap decision,” but he also said that “it was not a close call for me.”

“The more I thought about it, and the more I thought about the importance of having the Iraqi people gain conviction that that crowd is through, and the fact that it could reduce the number of Americans and coalition people who might be killed and it could increase the number of people who will come forward with information, that seems to me to outweigh the sensitivities,” he said.

Other officials in the U.S.-led coalition also defended the decision, saying it was justified given the circumstances in Iraq.

“The main reason they were released was because the Iraqi people wouldn’t believe it until there was proof,” said Christopher Harvin, a U.S. spokesman in Baghdad for the Defense Department.

Their skepticism is rooted in “the way the regime deceived them in the past,” he said.

In an additional effort to prove the Hussein brothers are dead and to bolster the recently appointed Iraqi governing council, administrators in Baghdad allowed members of the council to view the bodies in a morgue at the city’s main airport.

“By the council seeing it, it shows their importance to the free Iraq,” Harvin said. “We want them to control the country. We’re all trying to work ourselves out of a job.”

U.S. officials said Thursday that there had been no decision yet on what to do with the bodies. Islamic tradition requires that the dead be buried as soon as possible.

Although U.S. officials expressed hope after the raid that the brothers’ deaths might reduce attacks on American troops, who have been dying at a rate of about one every other day, three soldiers from the Army’s 101st Airborne Division were killed early Thursday in northern Iraq when they were ambushed by gunmen, who also fired rocket-propelled grenades.

In another reminder that Tuesday’s raid might not have an immediate impact on the antagonism toward U.S. troops, a group claiming to be part of the Fedayeen Saddam paramilitary force released a message to Arabic news media saying that the bodies were indeed those of Qusai and Uday Hussein and that the group was committed to avenging their deaths.

“I would not be surprised to see an uptick” in violence in the coming weeks, said L. Paul Bremer III, head of the U.S.-led administration in Iraq. He spoke at the Washington news conference with Rumsfeld.

More than anything else, the pictures convey a sense of the brothers’ vulnerability in the face of massive U.S. firepower, which included rockets fired by helicopters and ground troops. That is a point the Americans wish to underscore, both to provide a warning to members of the former Baath Party regime who are in hiding and to give an air of inevitability to the outcome of the search for Saddam Hussein.

“We’re making the point the Baathists are dead,” Bremer said. “In the long run, hopefully it will encourage more Iraqis to give us more information about Baathists.” The release of the photographs is “fully consistent with the Geneva Convention,” he said.

The pictures receiving the widest play on Arab satellite TV were taken from the chest up. Both men are naked, presumably for the forensic examination; a hand in a plastic glove is visible in the corner of the photograph of Uday. Both men have full beards.

Qusai, 37, has large, dark circles under his eyes, and spatters of blood mark his face, but his facial injuries appear to be limited. Uday, 39, was shot through the mouth, leaving a large, bloody gash where his lips and the base of his nose were. His head appears to have been partially shaved.

A third picture shows an X-ray of Uday’s legs, which were injured during a 1996 assassination attempt. He had pins and steel rods inserted to allow him to walk.

As dusk fell Thursday, news of the photographs spread quickly across Baghdad, although only people with access to satellite television were able to see the images when they were first shown, at 6 p.m.

In contrast to the Americans’ stated angst over whether to release the photos, Iraqis expressed broad approval.

At a popular nighttime gathering spot, the Fadha ice cream stand in Baghdad’s Jadriya neighborhood, couples and young families said they had no problem with the pictures’ being made public, even if they were graphic.

Far more important was to see convincing evidence that Uday and Qusai Hussein were dead.

Some also said it was persuasive that members of the country’s new council had been allowed to see the bodies.

“For sure it is a good thing,” Mohammed Ibrahim Fadha, 47, the proprietor of the stand, said of the deaths of the brothers. “We hope that showing proof of that would help bring an end to the current situation -- the lack of security and services.”

Mohammed Hussein, 31, an engineering student in Baghdad, said educated people like him were already convinced that the men were dead and that only those who wished to destabilize the country were circulating rumors to the contrary.

“There are people -- corrupt thieves of the old regime -- who are still lying and creating illusions and building myths,” he said.

“We educated people never believe them. We are convinced that they are dead and we are very happy, but we want the head of the snake.”

Even though the photographs are gruesome, “it is not objectionable,” said his friend, an employee of the Oil Ministry. “They were just killing and murdering people around them. So they should be shown ending up just like what they did to others.”

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Times staff writers Esther Schrader and Judy Pasternak in Washington contributed to this report.