Uday and Qusay Hussein will never torture, rape, rob, or murder again. Both were killed in a shoot-out with coalition forces in Mosul. They were more than sons of Saddam Hussein. They were his full partners in crimes against the Iraqi people.
From his childhood, Uday's every whim was indulged. Designer clothes. Fleets of luxury cars. Vast amounts of money wrung from the impoverished Iraqi people. With the assistance of armed bodyguards, he beat schoolmates with impunity. Nurtured on cruelty, he became a violent, twisted, alcoholic adult. He raped and sometimes murdered women and young girls in a private torture chamber called "the red room." Anyone who displeased him was subject to imprisonment, torture, or murder. Uday was a member of Saddam Hussein's bogus parliament. He was chairman of Iraq's Olympic Committee. He headed the so-called journalists union. And he commanded the Saddam Fedayeen militias that terrorized the Iraqi people.
Uday's violence was personal and erratic. For his brother Qusay, massive, systematic terror was a family business. As head of his father’s secret police, he directed the imprisonment, torture, and murder of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. His many atrocities included directing the genocidal campaign against Shia Muslims in southern Iraq. Qusay also played a key role in hiding Saddam's weapons of mass destruction from United Nations inspectors.
Pauline Jasim, a member of the Women's Alliance for a Democratic Iraq, says Iraq is a better place today:
"The death of Qusay and Uday has been welcomed and greeted with joy. And what they are looking forward to is to find the father of all evil, which is Saddam Hussein, and finally get rid of him also. Uday and Qusay are symbols of all oppression imposed on the people of Iraq. They were ruthless killers and protectors of their father's dictatorship. And their demise is welcomed by all."
The deaths of Uday and Qusay Hussein make it even more certain that, as President George W. Bush said, "there will be no return to tyranny in Iraq."
