The Israeli “Channel 13” broadcast a documentary series in which it revealed the details of the failure of a plan to assassinate the late Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in 1992, and the killing of 5 commandos assigned to implement it and the wounding of 5 others.
The series, a documentary on 8 episodes of 4 hours, stated that the investigations, which were kept secret for 30 years, revealed that the failure of the plan was due to “human error,” as the buttons responsible for launching the two missiles in “dry” and “wet” training were similar, so the officer confused between them. The live missile was fired instead of the training cartoon missile.
He also revealed that the missile fired during the training for the purpose of killing the Iraqi president did not kill the soldier who played the role of Saddam Hussein. When he entered the place designated for him, and started waving his hands to the “public” in the manner of Saddam, the missile fell near him and hit him in the leg, but did not kill him, so it is said that the plan failed twice. If it had been carried out the way they planned, it would have failed in the assassination as well.
He mentioned that this plan, which was prepared in 1991 without the knowledge of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, was initiated by the then Chief of Staff of the Army, Ehud Barak, who wanted revenge on Saddam for firing missiles at Israel.
At that time, from January 17 to February 25, 1991, the Iraqi army bombed Tel Aviv and Haifa and their surroundings by firing 43 Scud missiles. The strategic and political goal of the Iraqi campaign was to drag Israel into the war in order to embarrass the Arab coalition forces that united against its occupation of Kuwait, and thus cause a rift in this alliance.
He said that on November 5, 1992, the supposed operation in Iraq was simulated at the Betselim military training base in the Negev. General Levin oversaw the training, along with other officials.
During the training, at 06:10, the first part of the training was supposed to be “dry”, ie no live fire. But the crew in charge of the shooting pressed the wrong button, firing live “Tammuz” missiles at a group of soldiers who simulated President Saddam Hussein’s entourage.
These missiles were supposed to be launched in the second and “wet” part of the training, which was planned to be carried out when the area was empty. Five soldiers were killed, and there was no one among them who played the role of Saddam Hussein.
After the investigation, a number of officials were prosecuted by demoting them in ranks or recording a note in their files. The assassination plan was frozen.
Source: trend detail
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