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July 06, 2009

Who Owns Saddam's Pistol?

The New York Times reports that it is likely that the handgun found in the "spider hole" where Saddam Hussein hid is likely to go on display at the President George W. Bush Library. 


The Times reports this chain of custody of the weapon:

The odyssey of the gun began on Dec. 13, 2003, when Mr. Hussein was discovered in the 8-foot-deep hole on a farm near Tikrit. Delta Force soldiers did not see the gun at first, said Steve Russell, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who helped lead the mission and is now a Oklahoma state senator.
Mr. Russell said Mr. Hussein had been crouched on all fours, the gun on the floor. The soldiers kept the rare pistol, which can fire bullets automatically, with two AK-47s found in the farmhouse, he said.
In early 2004, one of the soldiers came up with the idea of presenting the gun to Mr. Bush. On March 1 that year, the Delta Force men surprised the president with the pistol at an Oval Office meeting.


Weapons uncovered during combat operations should rightfully be put out of commission by troops, but should those weapons automatically belong to the victor?  The weapons certainly are not the property of the victorious soldiers themselves, no matter how much we appreciate their service. Perhaps the Government of Iraq properly transfered the weapon to the United States. There is certainly international law on this issue, and I hope that the United States has followed that law closely.

Perhaps the Iraqi museums, who lost many of their artifacts during the invasion, might have wanted to display this trophy.  After all, the people who suffered most under that gun were the people of Iraq.  

From ancestral relics to Elgin Marbles to jewels, countries newly-freed often keenly feel the loss of national treasures. Perhaps that feeling might extend even to objects of infamy.

Posted by Anupam Chander on July 6, 2009 at 10:34 AM in Globalization | Permalink

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