Quiet... Then the Sky Caught Fire
The Associated Press, Wed 10 Jan 2001

The owner of the outdoor fish restaurant overlooking the Tigris asked
whether I was there to watch Saddam Hussein's palace across the river
get
bombed.

Yes, I answered.

No fan of the Iraqi president, he said this was why he had stayed open
that
chilly night instead of fleeing.

``It's a historic moment never to be missed,'' he said as he served
masguf,
a river fish grilled over burning palm fronds and wood.

It was Wednesday, Jan. 16, 1991, a day after the deadline the United
Nations
had set for Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait.

Last-minute peace efforts, including a visit by U.N. Secretary-General
Javier Perez De Cuellar, had gotten nowhere. We were expecting the
bombing
to begin at any moment. U.S. and other diplomats were leaving the
capital of
4 million people, and so were tens of thousands of Iraqis, crammed into
buses and cars.

My mother, wife and two sons had stayed put through some 20 missile
strikes
in our neighborhood during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war. They were at
first
reluctant to leave me alone in Baghdad.

But this time Iraq was facing armies from some 30 nations and an
awesome
American arsenal within striking range on the Saudi border. My family
finally agreed to join the exodus.

Before sunrise Jan. 16, I drove them to my hometown of Karbala. The
one-hour
drive south tripled in length because the four-lane highway was jammed
with
cars, minibuses, trucks and even tractors carrying people ‹ some still
in
nightgowns.

I installed my family with relatives. The less fortunate camped in the
cold
and rain, in palm groves on Karbala's outskirts, its public parks, even
its
narrow sidewalks. Even before it had started, the war was leaving its
scars
on Iraqis.

Back in Baghdad that afternoon, I asked Minister of Information Latif
Nessyef Jassim if the government had contingency plans in case the
allies
bombed out the phone lines. He answered: ``Let them try and they will
see if
they can return alive to their bases!''

As dusk approached, the streets were quiet. Troops manned roadblocks at
main
junctions of a city that history books call ``The House of Peace.''

The government confined the small contingent of Western reporters to
the
Al-Rashid Hotel. I, as an Iraqi citizen, could move around Baghdad, but
it
was confusing and frightening to cover war in a city that was my home.

My last report on the night of Jan. 16 summed up: Saddam defiant, Iraq
bracing for military showdown, Baghdadis cowering at home.

Then I went to the fish restaurant to await the big bang.

An hour after midnight, nothing had happened. Perhaps war had been
averted
by last minute diplomatic activity? I went home.

At 2 a.m., I entered my house on 15th Street. Then my phone rang. My
neighbor, Um Ali, had seen me parking and wanted to know what was
happening.
Had war been averted? I knew she would be extra-anxious, having a son
commanding an anti-aircraft base.

``Not sure,'' I answered, then added, ``Inshallah.'' God willing.

At 2:30 a.m., the first bombs fell. Um Ali screamed and the line went
dead.

Explosion after explosion rattled my windows. Iraqi anti-aircraft
batteries
on high buildings fired back nonstop. Over the city of ``a thousand and
one
nights,'' the sky looked as if tens of thousands of firecrackers had
gone
off.

From my second-story window I could see flames spilling from the Dora
oil
refinery and a nearby power station. From afar, I could see that part
of
Saddam's huge presidential complex was ablaze.

Electricity and running water went off.

A dawn tour of Baghdad revealed a ghost city with some of the main
government buildings and communications centers either knocked out or
heavily damaged.

Iraq seemed on its way back to the Middle Ages.

At the Al-Rashid Hotel, the Information Ministry officials seemed to
have
changed. Gone was the confidence; they looked nervous.

Baghdad had hardly caught its breath when air raid sirens sounded at 10
a.m.
Just as before dawn, no one could see any aircraft, only the tracers of
anti-aircraft fire.

The attacks came intermittently throughout the day while Iraqis
continued to
flee. Each raid brought the wail of ambulance sirens. A tour of
downtown
indicated a few old houses had collapsed after nearby communications
facilities were knocked out. Police sealed off the area; few casualties
were
reported.

From the seventh floor of the Al-Rashid, I watched a Tomahawk missile
hit by
Iraqi gunners land close by. Had its warhead exploded, the hotel would
have
been blown up.

Air raid shelters were scarce, so people sought cover on the ground
floors
of their own homes whenever the air raid sirens howled.

As the days stretched on with no civilian targets hit, people began
watching
the attacks from their roof tops. But when bombs started falling on
bridges
over the Tigris and closer to civilian targets, fears increased.

By nightfall on the first day, the city was in full darkness. The
government's jamming equipment had been knocked out, and around a fire
they
had made of tree branches near my house, Iraqis gathered to listen to
BBC
and Voice of America reports of the bombing. Some argued about who was
to
blame, Saddam or the Americans.

``Both,'' said Abu Nizar, a retired teacher and my next-door neighbor.
Then,
realizing the danger of seeming to criticize Saddam, he quickly
corrected
himself: ``I mean, the Americans.''
‹‹‹
The writer was an Associated Press correspondent in Baghdad when U.S.
planes
first attacked the city on Jan. 17, 1991. After the war, the Iraqi
government, angered by his reporting, withdrew his journalist's
accreditation and he left the country. He is now based in Cairo, Egypt.