20 April 2003 — Saddam Hussein’s palace in Tikrit:

It is impossible to describe the size and opulence of a palace so enormous that it takes four hours to see it in its entirety; thousands of tons of granite and marble cover the floor and line the walls; twenty-four carat gold decorates the walls, bathroom accessories, and even adorns the crystal chandeliers. The Versailles palace in France is insignificant in comparison to this enormous labyrinth.

Sitting high on a hill overlooking Tikrit city and the Tigris River, rooms in this palace are the size of football fields. One loses count of the many carved wide marble staircases throughout the palace. The four-storied modern building is full of calligraphy carved in marble; wood and brass adorn the doors, ceilings and walls.

A granite sign outside one of the many grandiose entrances it took six years to build the palace.

“The opulence he was enjoying is shameful, when you see the poverty his people were forced to endure,” said Lt. Col. Fred Blish, who traveled up from Kuwait with his unit during the past month and gave me the palace tour.

Walking through the palace is eerie. Empty of all furnishings, which the Marines believe were meticulously removed and hidden by Tikriti clansmen before they arrived, the vast halls and rooms are all intact, marred only by some shattered glass on the floor. The Marines ruined none of the palace, or its grounds.

There are no scuffmarks on the floors or walls, and nothing appears broken, cracked or marked, as often happens when things are removed in haste, which is why the Marines feel that the removal of the objects was well-planned in advance.

To protect the palace from damage and looters, the Marines have stationed troops in the complex on a 24-hour watch.

Tikritis themselves were overwhelmed with curiosity when they learned of my visit and peppered me with dozens of questions regarding details of the palace. “We’ve never been near it, tell us about it,” this correspondent heard over and over again.

This is not a complaint reserved only for Iraqis. On my previous trips to Iraq, it was strictly forbidden to photograph a palace even from the street.

Once, before the Gulf War I, while driving through Baghdad with a group of journalists, I tried to sneak a photo from the highway. Within seconds secret police pounced on the bus, grabbed my camera and ripped out the film. I still wonder how they saw they me take the photo.

So, the significance of being able to enter Saddam Hussein’s palace compound certainly was not lost on me. Just less than one week ago it would have been impossible to look cross-eyed at the palace and not be questioned.

Perhaps the biggest question I have is how he managed to hide the magnitude of his palatial constructions from the public eye.

During my five previous visits to Iraq, I remember hearing repeatedly that Saddam Hussein was a benign dictator, that he had not robbed the country of its riches, that he had moderate and not gargantuan tastes.

Perhaps it was due to these previous remarks that I was shocked by the enormity of what I saw. Watching TV channels describe his huge palaces in Baghdad did nothing to prepare me for this colossal site in Tikrit. “The absolute extraordinary opulence is unbelievable in its magnitude,” said Colonel Mike Anderson, of the MWSG-37, with whom this correspondent has been embedded since early March.

“It is the ostentatious display of wealth in this palace is in stark contrast to the mud hut homes throughout the rest of this country,” he said, “which proves that Iraq’s alleged need of oil-for-food was ‘BS,’” he said, referring to the UN program that allowed the country a clause in the UN-brokered sanctions to import “food for oil.”

“It’s a stinking evil fairy tale castle,” said the caustic colonel from his tent near Tikrit, where he and a portion of his unit are currently located.