Saddam's Secrets: The Hunt for Iraq's Hidden Weapons

by Tim Trevan

The author of this text, Tim Trevan, was a key British participant (1992-1995) in UNSCOM's investigation of Iraqi chemical and biological sites. In his narrative, he shows how UNSCOM dealt with Iraq's devious, despotic the early frustrations encountered because of Iraq's lying and obstruction; the techniques and technologies inspectors employed; the personal difficulties and dangers of the job; and their ingenuity in tackling problems. The book also shows how the Commission maintained support in a divided UN Security Council long enough to achieve success, despite the ceaseless stream of international crises unleashed by Iraq to try and break the Commission.

Genres: Military Fiction

352 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1999

Reviews

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 3 out of 5]

First to review! Somewhat surprising given that Harper Collins published this, but hey. I've read several inspector accounts by now, and they all fall between two stools in a way. On one hand, they are usually semi-autobiographical, but on the other, they try to tell the history of the sanctions overall. Trevan struggles with this balance. It's often hard to tell which inspections he was a part of (he was a biological weapons expert) and which ones he's just reporting about. The book is also a little odd in several ways: too long (Richard Butler, the head of UNSCOM, wrote a book about 100 pages shorter), too many epigraphs at the start of each chapter, an occasionally he just throws many-page-long chunks of primary source material into the chapters. A more focused story and better editing would have made this a more enjoyable read and valuable resource.

Still, this book does offer some important insights into IQ's biological weapons programs and the inspections/monitoring/destruction effort by UNSCOM. I'm always impressed at how tough, driven, and brilliant the inspectors were, as well as how duplicitous and often ridiculous the Iraqi officials were. This book is useful for anyone studying Iraq in the 90's or the issue of WMD inspection/monitoring, but for anyone else I wouldn't recommend it.