IRAQ WAR: Folklore and the Statue of Saddam Hussein

I once contributed to a volume on "a day in the world press", an impressive volume in which the front pages of major newspapers around the world were published in English translation to show different perspectives. As a footnote to this enterprise, it would be interesting to publish a collection from different countries of the accounts of the placing of a US flag on the head of the statue of Saddam Hussein. Mike Sullivan forwards this account by Stephen Farrell from the pro-US London Times entitled " Victory in the 21-Day War": ""Yankee bastard," yelled the young British peacenick at the first American tank to roll up to the Palestine Hotel. "Go home." She picked a man who had waited for 576 days to give his answer. Marine First Lieutenant Tim McLaughlin leant from the turret of his Abrams tank and screamed back: "I was at the Pentagon September 11. My co-workers died." Lieutenant McLaughlin had with him a Stars and Stripes that he had been given at the Pentagon that fateful day. In Baghdad's Paradise Square, he handed the flag to Corporal Edward Chin [son of Burmese-American immigrants - CNN], who climbed a giant statue of Saddam and draped it over the deposed dictator's head" RH: The reports I saw, with a picture of his mother, said he was a Chinese American. It would be interesting to know how the event was reported in the Chinese and Burmese press.

Ronald Hilton - 4/16/03