Saddam's Lion Cubs trained to protect

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Hussam Faiq Hassan was 14 when forced to join Ashbal Saddam, or "Saddam's Lion Cubs," a paramilitary camp. Hisham Karim Alwan was just 12.

Along with hundreds of other boys -- some as young as 9 -- they endured three weeks of intense training. In summer heat that can hit 130 degrees, army sergeants drilled them in weapons, martial arts and other military skills.

Many Ashbal recruits went on to join Feddayin Saddam -- "Saddam's Men of Sacrifice." Its paramilitaries fought U.S. and British troops as Iraq's army faded away last year, and U.S. officials suspect they are behind the continued insurgency here.

Hassan, now 18, recalls how officials of the now-deposed Baath Party came to his school and not-so-subtly recruited more than 100 boys for Ashbal. "They said you have to join. Otherwise, they would take us from our houses and put us in jail."

Alwan says he was told he could not enter high school if he didn't join up.

Hassan entered a camp in Taji, north of Baghdad, in June 2000. Its 900 boys were given black uniforms, black caps, and brass pins emblazoned with the words "Saddam Hussein," "Allah," "Homeland" and "The Leader."

Some sons of regime officials also enrolled, he says, but enjoyed better quarters, more food and other privileges. "They didn't have to train as hard ... the sergeants were afraid of them."

A breakfast of soup and a cup of milk came at 4 a.m. Training started at 6 a.m. and continued until noon. The "Lion Cubs" ran, marched, assembled assault rifles or bayoneted targets while chanting slogans such as "Mothers, don't cry -- we protect Saddam Hussein!"

"During the first week, while we were marching, small helicopters would fly really close to us and we had to continue marching. They would come very fast," says Hassan.

After a two-hour break during the hottest part of the day, the boys drilled in martial arts or such military maneuvers as reconnaissance and infiltration until 8 at night.

The final hours were brutal: "The little ones sometimes would cry, and then others would start crying, too." He cried only once, out of homesickness, during the second week, he says.

Three boys died from dehydration or exhaustion, he says; another was accidentally electrocuted.

A few others tried to escape by hopping a freight train; they were caught and brought before the camp. The boys were stripped to the waist and forced to crouch while a guard beat them with a swagger stick. "They each got twelve beatings and if they moved, he beat them harder."

On Fridays, families were allowed to visit. "We used to watch the cars," he says, even now sounding wistful. "My parents came so late."

Alwan, now 19, attended a camp for 400 boys at a military academy, where the drill was even more intense. He fired rocket-propelled grenades, machine guns and hand weapons, hurled grenades, disassembled land mines. "Sometimes it was hard, but we learned how to hunt, to make street battles ... to fight inside the cities," he recounts.

At the end of training, Taji's "cubs" paraded before a crowd of military officers, Baath officials and family. The toughest recruits put on a demonstration -- firing weapons, jumping through flaming tires, crawling under barbed wire as Feddayin fired live ammo all around, according to camp administrator Faisal Mussa. Others rappelled from helicopters while firing assault rifles.

Hassan demonstrates another moment in the ceremony. Growling and twisting, he mimics the boys who ripped apart a rabbit and a snake with their teeth and hands. "It was strange," he says quietly, shrugging his shoulders.

The former "Lion Cub" believes his training had some value. "I learned patience and how to handle myself in a severe situation ... now I know how to shoot a gun."

Yet he adds: "We have a tradition here. When we have bad memories of a place, we throw seven stones at it. And we threw them at the camp after we left."

Then, standing to leave, he salutes -- just as he was trained to do.