Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf

Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf (born 1940) was the Iraqi Information Minister under Saddam Hussein.

Unsourced

• "After Iraq aborts the invasion that is being carried out by the American and British villains, the USA will no longer be a superpower. Its deterioration will be rapid. I say to those villains who are meeting in Europe, thinking of launching psychological war and brainwashing: wait. Do not be hasty because your disappointment will be huge. You will reap nothing from this aggressive war, which you launched on Iraq, except for disgrace and defeat."

• "Again, and according to my early estimates, unless the remaining part of their soldiers surrender, the chance for their survival is very slim."

• "Americans are now in disarray."

• "Blair...is accusing us of executing British soldiers. We want to tell him that we have not executed anybody. They are either killed in battle, most of them get killed because they are cowards anyway, the rest they just get captured."

• "Bush is a very stupid man. The American people are not stupid, they are very clever. I can't understand how such clever people came to elect such a stupid president."

• "Bush, Blair and Rumsfeld. They are the funny trio."

• "Bush, this man is a war criminal, and we will see that he is brought to trial."

• "Coalition forces have not crossed the Tigris River and are not approaching Baghdad."

• "Don't believe anything! We will chase the rascals back to London!"

• "Faltering forces of infidels cannot just enter a country of 26 million people and lay besiege to them! They are the ones who will find themselves under siege. Therefore, in reality whatever this miserable Rumsfeld has been saying, he was talking about his own forces. Now even the American command is under siege."

• "God will roast their stomachs in hell at the hands of Iraqis."

• "I blame al-Jazeera - they are marketing for the Americans!"
  • (In a video clip in the documentary Control Room, speaking in Arabic)

• "I warn al-Jazeera - stop your American propaganda."

• "I can assure you that those villains will recognize, will discover in appropriate time in the future how stupid they are and how they are pretending things which have never taken place."

• "I can say, and I am responsible for what I am saying, that they have started to commit suicide under the walls of Baghdad. We will encourage them to commit more suicides quickly."

• "I have detailed information about the situation . . . which completely proves that what they allege are illusions. . . They lie every day."

• "I now inform you that you are too far from reality."
  • to John Burns of NY Times April 9, 2003

• "I speak better English than this villain Bush."

• "I think this is very laughable for a Superpower to be so cheap, to drop inside Iraq such poor things— and they are printed in Kuwait.
  • about leaflet drops by airplane.

• "I triple guarantee you, there are no American soldiers in Baghdad."

• "I would like to clarify a simple fact here: How can you lay siege to a whole country? Who is really under siege now? Baghdad cannot be besieged. Al-Nasiriyah cannot be besieged. Basra cannot be besieged."

• "In a few days, you will all witness something that can only be considered very beautiful against the Coalition forces. That, I assure you."

• "Iraqi fighters in Umm Qasr are giving the hordes of American and Brtish mercenaries the taste of definite death. We have drawn them into a quagmire and they will never get out of it."

• "Iraqi forces are still in control of the city, and they are engaging in an attrition war with the enemy."

• "It has been rumored that we have fired scud missiles into Kuwait. I am here now to tell you we do not have any scud missiles and I don't know why they were fired into Kuwait."

• "It's a small town, it has only a few docks... now they are in a trap."
  • Speaking of Umm Qasar

• "Let the American infidels bask in their illusion."

• "Listen, this explosion does not frighten us any longer. The cruise missiles do not frighten anyone. We are catching them like fish in a river. I mean here that over the past two days we managed to shoot down 196 missiles before they hit their target."

• "Lying is forbidden in Iraq. President Saddam Hussein will tolerate nothing but truthfulness as he is a man of great honor and integrity. Everyone is encouraged to speak freely of the truths evidenced in their eyes and hearts."

• "My feelings, as usual— we will slaughter them all."

• "No. I am not scared, and neither should you be!"

• "NO! We have retaken the airport. There are NO Americans there. I will take you there and show you— in one hour!"

• "On this occasion, I am not going to mention the number of the infidels who were killed and the number of destroyed vehicles. The operation continues."

• "Our armed forces, according to their tactics, are leaving the way open."

• "Our estimates are that none of them will come out alive unless they surrender to us quickly. They are completely surrounded now."

• "Our farmers, they are targeting accurately the enemy."

• "Our initial assessment is that they will all die."

• "Search for the truth. I tell you things and I always ask you to verify what I say. I told you yesterday that there was an attack and a retreat at Saddam's airport."

• "The American press is all about lies! All they tell is lies, lies and more lies!"

• "The Americans, they always depend on a method what I call ... stupid, silly. All I ask is check yourself. Do not, in fact, repeat their lies."

• "The British forces which were dropped there have been eliminated mostly on the field, except for those who fled ... It is a complete defeat ... Amazingly the Americans have pushed the British to do that. They pushed them ahead as if it is an experiment. The result was very tragic for the British."

• "The capital, especially the commandos, are getting ready to wipe them out."

• "The force that was in the airport, this force was destroyed."

• "The imperialist invading U.S. and British forces are like a snake that slithers all over the place but that doesn't control anything."

• "The Iraqi troops and the Iraqi fighters are in control of all the places, as we have witnessed. No big change in that. We are fighting against them."

• "The leader of the international criminal gang of bastards."
  • (about President Bush)

• "The midget Bush and that Rumsfield deserve only to be beaten with shoes by freedom-loving people everywhere."

• "The shock has backfired on them. They are shocked because of what they have seen. No one received them with roses. They were received with bombs, shoes and bullets. Now, the game has been exposed. Awe will backfire on them. This is the boa snake. We will extend it further and cut it the appropriate way."

• "The situation is excellent, they are going to try to approach Baghdad...and I believe their grave will be there."

• "Their forces committed suicide by the hundreds.... The battle is very fierce and God made us victorious. The fighting continues."

• "Their infidels are committing suicide by the hundreds on the gates of Baghdad. Be assured, Baghdad is safe, protected."

• "There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!"

• "There are only two American tanks in the city."

• "There are no Iraqis disguising themselves."

• "These cowards have no morals. They have no shame about lying."

• "These images are not the suburbs of Baghdad. From what I glimpsed, these gardens with rows of palm trees on the side, which you saw in the images, are located in the south of Abu Ghraib, where we have surrounded the Americans and British."

• "They are achieving nothing; they are suffering from casualties. Those casualties are increasing, not decreasing."

• "They are becoming hysterical. This is the result of frustration."

• "They are deceiving their soldiers and their officers that aggressing against Iraq and invading Iraq will be like a picnic. This is a very stupid lie they are telling their soldiers, what they are facing is a definite death."

• "They are lying every day. They are lying always, and mainly they are lying to their public opinion."

• "They are not in Baghdad. They are not in control of any airport. I tell you this. It is all a lie. They lie. It is a Hollywood movie. You do not believe them."

• "They are not in Najaf. They are nowhere. They are on the moon. They are snakes in the desert..."

• "They are nowhere near Baghdad. Their allegations are a cover-up for their failure."

• "They are nowhere near the airport ..they are lost in the desert...they can not read a compass...they are retarded."

• "They are retreating on all fronts. Their military effort is a subject of laughter throughout the world."

• "They are sick in their minds. They say they brought 65 tanks into center of city. I say to you this talk is not true. This is part of their sick mind."

• "They are trapped in Umm Qasr. They are trapped near Basra. They are trapped near Nasiriyah. They are trapped near Najaf. They are trapped everywhere."

• "They are trying to fool you. They are showing any old pictures of buildings. They even went into the VIP section of the airport, just because Saddam Hussein may have sat in such and such a chair or slept in such and such a bed"

• "They do not even have control over themselves! Do not believe them!"

• "They fled. The American louts fled. Indeed, concerning the fighting waged by the heroes of the Arab Socialist Baath Party yesterday, one amazing thing really is the cowardice of the American soldiers. We had not anticipated this."

• "They think we are retarded— they are retarded."

• "They want to deceive their people first because now they are in a very shabby situation."

• "They're coming to surrender or be burned in their tanks."

• "This boa, the American columns, are being besieged between Basra and other towns north, west, south and west of Basra… Now even the American command is under siege. We are hitting it from the north, east, south and west. We chase them here and they chase us there. But at the end we are the people who are laying siege to them. And it is not them who are besieging us."

• "Those Iraqi fighters are slapping those gangsters on the face, and then when they flee, they will kick their backsides."

• "Today I have visited whole Baghdad city, no invaders found. You go and see how we have ousted them from this city. They are crying outside and waiting to receive bullets. They will be killed shortly."

• "Today we slaughtered them in the airport. They are out of Saddam International Airport. The force that was in the airport, this force was destroyed."

• "Tonight, we will do something unconventional against them. This means: not by the military. We will do something that I believe will become a pretty example for those mercenaries. I would not be giving out a secret when I say that action in the dark against such mercenaries is effective, not through the action of armies. I say that dropping down those mercenaries in a surprise fashion at Saddam Airport without accurate calculations is largely meant for showing things. It's a showy operation. It is a kind of surprise muscle flexing to the world to show it that the shock and awe operation is indeed successful. May they be accursed.

• "What they say about a breakthrough is completely an illusion. They are sending their warplanes to fly very low in order to have vibrations on these sacred places. . . they are trying to crack the buildings by flying low over them."

• "We are in control. They are in a state of hysteria. Losers. They think that by killing civilians and trying to distort the feelings of the people that they will win. I think they will not win, those bastards."

• "We are not afraid of the Americans. Allah has condemned them. They are stupid. They are stupid— and they are condemned."

• "We are surrounding them and pounding them. The whole trend has changed and we are going to finalize this very soon.

• "We are winning!"

• "We besieged them and killed most of them, and I think we will finish them soon."

• "We blocked them inside the city. Their rear is blocked."

• "We expect the aggressors to use anything, we don't rule out that in their depression at being vanquished, those losers will become hysterical and commit even more folly."

• "We have destroyed 2 tanks, fighter planes, 2 helicopters and their shovels. We have driven them back."

• "We have shot down 2 Apache helicopters. Have the Americans said yet that they were shot down by their— what do they call it— friendly fire? No? Well— not yet!"

• "We have them surrounded in their tanks."

• "We made them drink poison last night and Saddam Hussein's soldiers and his great forces gave the Americans a lesson which will not be forgotten by history. Truly."

• "We went into the airport and crushed them, we cleaned the whole place out, they were slaughtered"

• "We will kill them all— most of them."

• "We will see how the issue will turn out when they come to Baghdad."

• "We will slaughter them, Bush Jr. and his international gang of bastards!"

• "We will welcome them with bullets and shoes."

• "We're giving them a real lesson today. Heavy doesn't accurately describe the level of casualties we have inflicted."

• "We're going to drag the drunken, junkie nose of Bush through Iraq's desert, him and his follower dog Blair...There are 26 million Saddams in Iraq"

• "We're now trying to exhaust them, until our leadership decides the time and method to clean our territory of their desecration."

• "Whenever we attack, they retreat. When we pound them with missiles and heavy artillery, they retreat even deeper. But when we stopped pounding, they pushed to the airport for propaganda purposes.

• "Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!"

• "Yes, the American troops have advanced further. This will only make it easier for us to defeat them."

• "Yesterday, we slaughtered them and we will continue to slaughter them."

• "You can go and visit those places. Nothing there, nothing at all. There are Iraqi checkpoints. Everything is okay."

• "You think their tanks are in an endless line coming towards us? Wrong. They are only a few of them and they turn around and then return, as if to make a long snake."

• "We have placed them in a quagmire from which they can never emerge, except dead."

• "They're not even (within) 100 miles (of Baghdad). They are not in any place. They hold no place in Iraq. This is an illusion ... they are trying to sell to the others an illusion."

• When told coalition troops occupied Baghdad airport:"...at Saddam Airport? Now that's just silly!"

By others

• "He's my man. He was great. Somebody accused us of hiring him and putting him there. He was a classic." - George W. Bush, spoken during a NBC interview (April 24, 2003)
• "In an age of spin, al-Sahaf offers feeling and authenticity. His message is consistent -- unshakeable, in fact, no matter the evidence -- but he commands daily attention by his on-the-spot, invective-rich variations on the theme. His lunatic counterfactual art is more appealing than the banal awfulness of the Reliable Sources. He is a Method actor in a production that will close in a couple of days. He stands superior to truth." - Jean-Pierre McGarrigle from Welovetheiraqiinformationminister.com