Chapter Eleven

Baghdad to Taji

Odeh’s (UN Ambassador) marble-lined split level residence was in the Mansour area of Baghdad where most of the ambassadors lived. He resided there in some splendour with his Iraqi manservant. I was invited to dinner there one night shortly after my arrival in Baghdad. The invitation had a dual purpose. Besides the social one I was also invited to the debriefing of two consultants from the English consultants, Binnie and Partners, who had returned after an inspection of the Dokan and Derbendikhan hydro-electric dams in Kurdistan.

The night was dark and cold as we pulled up on the ill-lit street outside the house. There was an Iraqi soldier on guard at the entrance, warming himself in front of a brazier. He gave me a shy smile as I entered and joined Dennis Halliday, the Humanitarian Co-ordinator for Iraq. The Binnie consultants made a presentation of their findings on the condition of the dams that was alarming and estimated the cost to make them safe to be $78 million.

Some weeks later (in February 1998) Kofi Annan the Secretary General of the UN addressed the Security Council on Iraq and stated that: “The structural integrity of the dams was the first priority. There are major problems here particularly in Derbendikhan…” I had been warned by the UN in New York that I was responsible for the success or failure of the programme and felt that I was carrying the weight of the Security Council as well as the weight of the dams on my shoulders after Kofi Annan’s address.

As Technopromexport of Moscow had constructed the Power Station associated with the Dokan Dam, I met a Russian Trade and Engineering delegation with Odeh on 22nd January 1998 in the UNDP Building on Abu Nuwas Street. It was led by Alexander Galanin, the trade representative of the Russian Federation. I lost no time in raising the issue of the repair of the Dokan dam with them and they confirmed an active interest in the project. True to their word some time later I met with Vladimar Sizov the Vice-President of Technopromexport of Moscow and his team in the Russian Trade Office in Nidhal Street Baghdad. We quickly reached a tentative agreement regarding the repairs at Dokan and initiated arrangements to further the project; I was quite satisfied as I left the meeting.

Next stop was the repair of Derbendikhan, a much harder nut to crack. Mitsubishi of Japan had built this power station but had no further interest in involvement with either Derbendikhan or Iraq as Saddam had used their workers as human shields during the First Gulf War and a number had been killed. As Saddam was still very much alive they had no desire to have a repeat performance. We would have to wait until Binnie and Partners would produce their official report on the condition of the dams, incorporate it in tender documents and wait for proposals from interested companies. This would take a minimum of six months before a contractor would be appointed and much longer before they could begin work. His meant that there could be a delay of up to a year before we could begin work at Derbendikhan, the more dangerous dam of the two.

In Saddam’s Iraq his engineers listed their requirements and submitted the list to my office in the UN Baghdad for approval. The approved lists would then be forwarded to New York and steered through the Sanctions Committee and Contracts Committee. The Sanctions Committee, largely composed of lawyers was a cause of frustrating delay. One of their jobs was to block any item that might have a dual use i.e. could be used for military purpose. Power station boiler tubes were blocked because they might be used as gun barrels, so a power station with a damaged boiler tube could not produce electricity in a country badly in need of power. Chlorine, required for purifying water for human consumption and in power station boilers, could not be imported into Iraq because of its potential use as a chemical weapon. This resulted in a rise of cholera and typhoid and the shutting down of a power station boiler. Oil centrifuges required to filter oil in high voltage electrical gear were barred because of their confusion with centrifuges used in the nuclear industry for potential nuclear bombs. This resulted in a further gradual strangulation of a shattered power grid. A plethora of demands for clarifications would issue from the Sanctions Committee for each suspect item and each had to be answered resulting in accumulating delays. When the items passed on to the Contracts Committee further delays ensued. Specifications would have to be translated into a Babel of languages and any query by a potential tenderer of any country could result in a clarified specification being issued with a consequent deferment of the tender closing date. The country ambassadors of the unsuccessful tenderers could demand an explanation as to why their countryman’s tender was not accepted so the whole contracts process would have to be defended by the UN. When these hurdles were overcome the items were purchased and delivered to Iraq where they would be erected on the grid by Iraqi engineers. The UN observers in Baghdad would then be responsible for monitoring the movement of the item from its entry into the country to erection.

The work in Kurdistan was more onerous than that in the rest of Iraq in that the UN had not only to follow the same procedures as above but had to identify what was required, procure it and install it on the electricity grid. This was because Saddam’s engineers had to flee the area when the Iraqi army left and the Kurdish engineers did not have the experience to do the work on their own. At the time the UN had only one international engineer in Kurdistan and this was totally inadequate to deal with the huge amount of work involved. In fact, when I left 18 months later there I had 40 international engineers working there.

I decided that the work up north to be the critical issue of the sector. The two dams were also situated in the northeast. I had to go there quam celerissime (with all haste) if I was to have any input as to the success or failure of the sector so I asked the technical advisor in UNDESA in New York, Michael Higgins, a fellow Corkman, to come over and accompany me to the north in order to introduce me to the movers and shakers there.

My only briefing was a short report of two pages by Michael. It dealt with his impressions made during a recent visit he had made to the north. The paper noted the anger of the Kurds at the lack of progress of the programme and stated the Kurds claimed that the cost of transformer failures was running at one million US$ per week. The equipment was failing faster than it could be replaced. These failures were due to overload as there was a major problem of illegal connections where the inhabitants simply made connection themselves to the networks. In fact, I saw many such connections there, many of them carried out with the aid of the hooks of wire coat-hangers. Though this was the sole briefing I received regarding the north it impressed on me that the level of funding we were receiving was not enough to arrest the deterioration of the sector and that the situation was getting worse.

At last the day dawned when the UN Land Cruiser pulled up in front of the Babylon Hotel and we piled in and started our journey north. We eased out into the early morning traffic past the hawkers at each roundabout selling water and boxes of tissues and made for the northern suburbs. We had to perform one final ritual before we left the city. This was to stop at a large pastry and sweet shop where the driver stocked up on goodies as gifts for the staff in the north. The goods on offer were similar to those in the cake emporium on the outskirts of Amman where most of the offerings contained flaky pastry and were sticky with syrup.

In no time we reached the military checkpoint near the Baghdad Arch that spanned the northern exit from Baghdad. There is a saying that the only certain things in life are death and taxes. In Iraq one could add a third, military road checkpoints. By virtue of our UN status we were allowed to go to the head of the long queue and the driver presented my papers to the officer in charge. The papers consisted of our national passports, my UN Blue Book and travel permit. The Irish passport always evoked a good response and a friendly smile. This was very useful later when American and British subjects were ordered to leave Iraq around the time of the Clinton bombing. The officers used to confront me assuming I was British and left me in no doubt of their hostile intentions. When they saw the Irish passport their scowls broke into smiles as they waved me on. Funnily enough like their counterparts in the Ukraine many made reference to Irish Coffee as they handed back our papers.

My Temporary Travel Pass. It was strange to see my name written in Arabic and it was with documents like this that I familiarised myself with Arabic numerals. I am hopeless at languages and I had to contend myself with numerals.

Road from Baghdad to the North.

The map is the 2003 Special Reference Graphic Map of Iraq by NIMA.

Equally divided across each side of the checkpoint were what looked like a battery of 36 Chinese-made Type 59 130 mm field guns pointing their barrels skywards in the direction of the city. They had a maximum range of about 30 km. No match for their potential opponents I thought, World War II guns pitting themselves against Apache helicopters, Mach 2 fighters and Stealth bombers. It brought back to me similar scenes of futility during my childhood in Word War II as our neutral Irish army paraded with much smaller field guns that they hoped would stop possible belligerent invaders be they the British Army or the might of the Wehrmacht.

The road north was clear and was obviously built for a more prosperous Iraq. The country was very flat with the Zagros Mountains away to the east for most of the journey. They formed a formidable defence against Iraq’s traditional enemy, Iran. Now the traffic was sparse as we sped along Highway 1. It consisted largely of farmers conveying their produce to market in their Chevvy or Toyota pick-ups. I was intrigued by the local practice of transporting women. The males were ensconced in the air-conditioned cabs while their women sat in the open back with the farm produce.

Transportation of women in Iraq.

I took a few pictures as we passed some of these pick-ups. When the men in the cabs saw what I was doing they made their annoyance very obvious. Nearer the towns and villages the scene was reminiscent of a relaxed 1940s Ireland as farmers brought their produce to market in donkey-powered carts.

About 20 km north of Baghdad we passed what I was told was Saddam’s College of Armour at Taji with its two veteran Russian tanks on plinths as gate guards. The camp itself was in from the road and well-shielded from it. Taji was one of the largest bases in the country with a huge tank maintenance facility and boasted a 5,500-foot long runway. Later, when inspecting Taji, UNSCOM inspectors found 6,000 empty canisters designed to be filled with chemicals for use in 122mm rockets. The Al Taji complex also repaired SCUD missiles and had a factory complex with a forge capacity to produce 1,000 artillery barrels per year. The complex also included facilities for assembly of the T-72 tanks from kits. It was the new HQ of the Republican Guards Division tasked with protecting Baghdad after their earlier HQ at the Al Salam Palace in Baghdad was destroyed. Taji was obviously a prime target for US war planners so it was attacked in Clinton’s Operation Desert Fox bombing raids in December 1998 and 13 different targets were hit in the complex. In fact, I passed it at 100 miles per hour on our mad dash out of the country a few days after it was bombed but did not see any extra activity on the road near the base and was unaware that it had even been attacked. After the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 the base came under American control and was renamed Camp Cooke for a period before the name reverted to Camp Taji. It is now a New Iraqi Army Base while the runway is now Taji Air Base of the new Iraqi Air Force.

The destroyed remains of Iraqi T-55 Main Battle Tanks litter an Iraqi military complex West of Diwaniyah, Iraq on 16/04/2003.

Photo: MSgt Howard J. Farrell, USMC.

T-72_tanks of the new Iraqi Army at Taji.

Photo source: Michael Larsen, US Navy.

The Iraqi armour consisting of T-34 Soviet World War11 tanks augmented by later T-72 models was no match for American technology or numbers in 1991 and later in 2003.

Despite the fact that the T-72s were no match for Coalition tanks in the 2003 war the new Iraqi Army is being equipped with T-72s. These are largely supplied by former Soviet satellite countries for cash. The Americans on the other hand are providing the new Iraqi Army with the new, more powerful M1 Abrams tank in ‘Operation Draw Down’. These are presumably to counter any threat from Iran.