War Correspondent Sara Daniel Speaks to Truthout

By Leslie Thatcher
t r u t h o u t | Interview

Monday 27 November 2006

War correspondent Sara Daniel has been reporting from Iraq for Paris's Nouvel Observateur since before the 2003 American invasion of Iraq began. She has borne witness to an astonishing number of crucial events during that still-spiraling conflict. Her personal memoir of the Iraq War, Voyage to a Stricken Land, Four Years on the Ground Reporting From Iraq: A Woman's Inside Story, (Arcade Publishing, New York) came out in the US this fall - before the French version - and was reviewed in Truthout. Ms. Daniel was in the US to promote her book during the midterm elections and agreed to an interview with Truthout.

Leslie Thatcher: Ms. Daniel, could you explain to our readers how many times, when, and under what circumstances you have visited Iraq?

Sara Daniel: I went to Iraq twelve times for a period of between about one to two months each time. The first time was a year before the American intervention in 2002 for a press trip for Saddam's birthday. The second time was during the war in March 2003, and finally on many occasions since the intervention. I describe these trips in my book: each time, I found the situation had deteriorated, except perhaps for a brief period during the month of March 2004, when I found that things were going better, business was resuming, Baghdad's streets were more lively. A few days later, Moqtada Sadr's revolt took place, then the murder of the four contractors and the siege of Fallujah ...

Your publisher describes your book on the war in Iraq as a "personal memoir." What were your objectives, your hopes when you reassembled your war reports as a personal memoir?

I wanted to stand back a bit from that submersion into Iraq that had taken up over three years of my life, during my stay there, but also during my returns home. During that whole period, I dreamed of Iraq, and when I was in France or somewhere else, I spent my time on the telephone with Iraqis or American soldiers in Iraq. This reporting took over my life. Writing this book allowed me to work through all the horrors I experienced there, allowed me to realize also that I had taken too many risks, and let me turn the page on my Iraqi obsession.

Also, I wanted to tell about my reporting, about a journalist's life in Iraq, and how I was present for all the turning points of a deteriorating situation, observed all the mistakes that were made and how the American Army as well as the Iraqi guerrilla movement both changed little by little and lost sight of their primary objectives.

Would you describe some of your most spectacular "scoops?"

The time I found myself face to face with Zarqaoui's right hand man and he explained to me that he had participated in the decapitation of Nick Berg. The few days I spent with those who attacked the DHL plane. Having been present while the four contractors' bodies were desecrated ... [These and many other episodes are reviewed in Daniel's book.]

Ms. Daniel, in your book, you recount asking American veterans of the war in Iraq to describe their "best" experience of the war to you. May I ask you to do the same for us?

The extraordinary people I met in Iraq, heroes of all nationalities. Meeting Dr. Salaam, Roger Elliott.

The simple fact of finding myself still alive in the hotel at night, being able to swim in the pool as I tried not to think of the grenades that could fall in there, all the things I recount in the book....

And the worst?

The spectacle of the bodies in Fallujah. Seeing a very little boy lying wounded on his hospital bed after the battle of Fallujah. The filthiness and the destitution of the Nassiriya hospital, where Jessica Lynch was saved ... My own nightmares, nighttime in Baghdad. The fact that I haven't had any news from my colleague and friend Mohamed Allendaoui for a month ... [By the time this interview was completed, Daniel had news of Allendaoui: see below.]

To what extent, do you believe, had France's experience in Algeria conditioned its opposition to the war in Iraq?

It's true that France's Arab policy inaugurated by General de Gaulle began at the end of the war in Algeria. But that's not what determined France's opposition to the war in Iraq. Remember, France participated in the first Gulf War; it supported the first intervention against Saddam Hussein, as did the overwhelming majority of the international community....

What other factors were significant, then, in France's opposition to the war?

International legitimacy was the decisive factor in a position that I deem judicious for Chirac. We can't do anything in Arab countries without the support of the majority of those countries. The IAEA's position on weapons of mass destruction, as well as the certainty that there was absolutely no sympathy or military connection between Saddam and al- Qaeda, motivated that opposition.

Do you think there are any lessons the United States could still learn from France's experience in the Arab countries now, after we've become stuck in Iraq?

The two situations are not comparable in any way. There are no American civilian populations established in Iraq....

The only parallel from which one could hope to learn anything is, perhaps, the use of torture. In France, the generals who used it in Algeria regret it to this day. As you know, this question has outraged the public and incited numerous debates. But, even if it hid those practices, the French government of the time never legalized the practice of violent interrogations as the White House has done....

Since you completed your book, you've been to Afghanistan and Iran. Could you briefly summarize the similarities and the differences between the situations of the three countries today?

The situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating rapidly. The Taliban are using military and media examples (filmed executions, roadside bombings, suicide bombers) from the Iraqi insurgents. Kabul has become Afghanistan's Green Zone. Anti-Americanism prospers in Afghanistan as in Iraq.

With respect to Iran, the situation is completely different. It's a much more developed country. In spite of appearances, there are many secular people, young people who despise religion. And apart from around a fourth of the people who sympathize with the president, the regime and the Bassidjis, I don't think anyone is truly anti-American in Iran. As many Iranian have told me, the Islamic revolution has vaccinated the youth against fundamentalism....

When do you think you'll be able to return to Iraq?

Perhaps sooner than I would have liked, to help my guide Mohamed: I have just learned that he was wounded by a bullet, then arrested for 40 days, only to be released a few days ago. (He was caught in the crossfire between American soldiers and an unidentified group.)

Apart from that, I wanted to go interview Khalizad before he leaves office. That takes a rather long time to organize because of security issues.

In your book, you write a good deal about your family and their worry about you during your Iraqi stays. Your father, like you, is well-known to Truthout readers, some of whom have been known - for example - to write me to ask what he is writing about the crisis in Lebanon or some other Middle East subject. If it's not too personal a question, could you tell us what your father thinks of your exploits?

Of course he's afraid, but he is a journalist and has never attempted to discourage me from going there. I have to admit that I never gave too many details about my life in Iraq. I believe that after reading the book, my family may exert more pressure on me not to take so many risks!

In a recent interview, you deplored the possibility that Saddam Hussein might be executed before having to answer for his crimes against the Kurdish people, notably those committed during the Anfal campaign. You refer to the Shiites' pressure to eliminate Hussein as soon as possible, but some US commentators believe Hussein will not be tried for those crimes because he would have the opportunity to talk about his accomplices: the Western countries (including the US, France, and Germany) that supplied him. Do you see merit in that argument or do you believe this was strictly an internal Iraqi decision?

I guess a full-fledged trial would certainly be embarrassing to the West. But in this case, the timetable and its urgency had more to do with the will of the Shia and the prime minister to get rid of Saddam, whom they see - wrongly, I think - as a mythical figure for the Sunni. In their eyes, Saddam's execution would really consecrate the Sunnis' defeat.

After I listed a few courageous women war correspondents in my review of Voyage, one of our readers suggested Iraq's Riverbend should be counted among them. Have you met Riverbend? Have you been influenced by her reporting?

I have never met her, no. Her blog is more than interesting, but I wouldn't describe her as a war correspondent: that is what makes her blog so special. It's an opinionated firsthand account of the war experienced by a young Iraqi woman.

Another reader who spent time in Iraq in the years before the war wrote that far from looking forward to war with the US, the families he knew in Iraq worried about the impact of war on their lives. You wrote that some people looked forward to Saddam's overthrow when you went to Iraq in 2002. Were they a preponderance of voices? What did people say about the American-led sanctions regime?

Of course everybody who has experienced it is afraid of war. Iraqis were afraid, but all the normal people I met then (apart from the Baathists linked to the regime) were exhausted with Saddam's tyranny. They distrusted the Americans' overthrow of the regime and often explained how Saddam was convenient to the Americans: that was the only explanation they could find to justify the fact that they didn't go after him during the first war. In their minds all the evils - Saddam and the Americans - were somehow linked.

Another Truthout reader wants to read Voyage "in the original." When will the French version of your book come out? What will it be called, and what house will publish it?

It has now come out in France with éditions du Seuil; the title is Voyage au pays d'al Qaida.

What was it like for you to be in the United States during the midterm elections?

I had mixed feelings. Happy, of course, for the United States, but I could not really work up complete enthusiasm because I am aware that for Iraq and that part of the world, it's a little late. I had very much hoped that Kerry would defeat Bush in the presidential elections....

Also, the talk of some Democrats and some of my friends who take the position of withdrawing the troops as rapidly as possible with a "come what may" attitude worried and upset me....

What position do you feel is more adequate to the situation or more responsible?

This is very interesting: it's a crucial and unresolved question to me.... It will be the subject of my next story, and I am still working on it, although I am not sure it's my role to give advice about what to do.

Sara Daniel, we'll look forward to that next article, then. Thank you so much for talking with us.

Translation: t r u t h o u t French language correspondent Leslie Thatcher.

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