Samarrai: Saddam was quite irritated. He had preferred to have captured the entire Kuwaiti leadership because he thought that by capturing him will put an end to the demands on liberating Kuwait. Certainly had they captured the Emir, he would have done very ,very bad things that never come out of a normal person. I think that he would have kept them in gaol and killed them by poisoning one by another..... to make them die slowly in prison, these methods were followed by Saddam with all top leaders of the party and the army. Those whom he thought of as enemies, or likely enemies, we have many examples. Various types of poisons that lead up to cancer. After administration in six months it leads to death. The other part of these poisons is Thalium. It has a very strong impact on the nerve system. It leads to death within one month of administration. Many cases have happened in this way with opposition figures.

The other kind of poison is that which effects the heart and which have its effects in full bloom within hours. This, for example, what has happened with the former Foreign Minister and member of the regional command of the Ba'th Party. In 1979 he was gaoled and one tablet of this poison led to his death within hours. Very severe pain in his chest and his heart and then he died.

Q: View of the US military....

Samarrai: He thought that the US troops were not ready enough to engage in land battle. He thought that the lesson of Vietnam was very harsh on the US administration. We used to ask him "Do you think that the Americans will launch a campaign?" He used to say "Perhaps they attack and perhaps they will not".

At the intelligence circles we were absolutely sure that they will launch an attack. He really was quite comfortable with his ideas and he started to boost the morale of his men and we heard him on the air saying that his Iraqi soldiers will break Bush's teeth. He really miscalculated. He said, I remember "Now the allies have 600 aircrafts and we have 600 aircrafts, so we will fight them". We told him "But the technology difference, they have better technology and advanced technology".

But he was not to be talked into this. He used to say that they were crazy about computers and they used to operate along.. pre-agreed programs they were.. which they were crazy about, but they did not really consider the forces we have.

He thought that America's involvement in Vietnam had brought extensive damage to the US force and to US policy making. It was an outright defeat, militarily and politically.

But we had a realistic assessment of what had happened in Vietnam. We know that there were very big differences between the circumstances in Vietnam and here. The land there had vegetation cover, here it was a desert. And since they had the aerial superiority, we will be defeated in this battle. In Vietnam the bushes and the thick vegetation cover helped the Vietnamese.

He kept saying that the Vietnamese soldiers have proved themselves to be quite efficient and that the US plans faltered in Vietnam and that they did not plan well. He said an awful lot of things about the US forces in Vietnam to underestimate the US troops in Saudi Arabia.

Before six days of the land assault he said to us the USA had astronomical debts, more than 300 billion dollars, and that the USA had very poor economic state and that they would not be able to sustain the war for too long.