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April Pasquale
Mrs. Dwyer
Period 8
April 17, 2009
Has History repeated itself when it comes to human atrocities in
the world? Many kinds of genocides have happened since the
Holocaust. One of these was the Terror of Saddam Hussein. Saddam
Hussein was president of Iraq for two decades and is also known as the
world’s best known and most hated Arab leader (Butt, 1). Genocide
still occurs today.
What is genocide? Genocide is the act of killing part or whole of
a certain ethnic, political, national, racial, or religious group. Some of
the methods of genocide that Saddam Hussein used were chemical
bombs. Some of the chemical bombs were used on Iranian troops that
killed over 2000 people.
"Saddam is a dictator who is ready to sacrifice his country, just
so long as he can remain on his throne in Baghdad (BBC, 1)". Saddam
Hussein was born in a village near Takrit in April of 1937(BBC, 1). He
made a plot to assassinate Abdel, a prime minister. But when his plot
was found out he fled the country. Saddam Hussein was given many
names. Some of the names were “the Next Hitler” by George Bush
and many of his victims and Enemies called him the “Butcher of
Baghdad” (Wakin, pg. 20). He also started the war between Iran and
Iraq.
Kurds was one of the genocides that Saddam committed. He
dropped chemical bombs on the Kurdish villages and drove the
survivors to certain collection points. He dropped the bombs on Kurds
because separatists from

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there sided with Iran in the war and Saddam feared he would lose
control of the oil fields he had control over (Pringle, 1).
To defend his dictatorial style of leadership by arguing that
“nothing else could have kept such a vast and diverse nation divided”
(Butt, 1). When he was a dictator he created the “Secret Police”. The
Secret Police were responsible for the deaths and torture of tens of
thousands of innocent Iraqis.
During the Holocaust many people were killed. In this genocide
there was the rise of Hitler who gassed the Jews. Adolph Hitler blamed
the Jews for the poor economy and the loss of the war. He set up Labor
camps where the Jews were worked to death. Hitler also had a group
called the Nazi’s who were responsible for the many deaths that
occurred. There were also Ghettos. The Ghettos were where the Jews
were placed away from the “German citizens.”
The Nazi’s and Saddam Hussein had different roles in genocide.
The Nazi’s killed 11 million people about 6 million were Jews. Saddam
Hussein killed around 1,500,000 people. The Nazi’s used gas
chambers to kill people. Saddam Hussein used the method of chemical
bombs.
In conclusion, genocide still exists today. As you can see, the
world still repeats past mistakes even after the Holocaust. Saddam
Hussein is just one of the many genocides that have happened since
the Holocaust. Some of the other genocides that have happened are
Cambodia, Rwanda, Armenia, and Bosnia.