This was the obvious follow up to an earlier article. I had written about a phone call from a soldier while he was serving in Iraq to his family to say that he would be coming home. Click on the link at the end for the original story.

Soldier saw Saddam’s riches and people’s poverty

AN ARMY corporal has told of his time in Iraq and the contrast between the lifestyle of Saddam Hussein and the people who lived under the dictator’s rule.

Cpl Andy Adam, of Scunthorpe, who was attached to 2 Signal Regiment, has returned to
his home town after serving in the Gulf with the allied forces.

He flew into Brize Norton, on May 14, after his eight-hour flight was delayed for 27 hours. After enjoying well-earned rest, watching the FA Cup final and nightclubbing with his comrades, he travelled home.

While he was in Iraq he served at the front line and even managed to snatch a brief look inside one of the plush palaces of Saddam Hussein.

He said: “He’d never lived in it. It was still brand new. There were marble floors and grounds with their own lakes.

“They weren’t as plush as the Baghdad ones. I was not there very long, only five minutes.”

Cpl Adam said the main thing which struck him when he was in Iraq was the stark difference between the standard of living of Saddam Hussein and his people, who were begging for food.

The soldier, whose 222 signal squadron was attached to 2 Signal Regiment, said: “We were up in Basra for most of the war. We set up the headquarters so they could carry out their missions.”

Unusually for signals they were in the front line. He said: “We were the furthest north on the Ptarmigan Trunk Node communications network.

*We were up with 7th Armoured Brigade (the Desert Rats) and we had all the AS90 guns firing into Basra, so we felt safe.”

Cpl Adam did manage to ring home during the conflict at Easter, which had helped during the fighting.

“It put my mum’s mind at rest. Obviously, I didn’t tell her the whole truth. She was pleased and relieved,” he said.

He said he was pleased to get some better food now he was home, because he had been surviving on 24-hour ration packs in Iraq – and lots of noodles.

He said: “We finally managed to get some 10-man ration packs, which were supplemented with a little bit of fresh food. There was a lot of noodles, the chef got a lot of grief for the noodles.

“We were never short of food, but it was the same stuff over and over again. It got a bit boring.”

He said he was glad to have returned in time for the FA Cup final and, as a Spurs fan he was disappointed when their north London rivals Arsenal won.

There was a small family get-together to celebrate his safe return.

His mum Jane said: “We had champagne and the flags flying when he came home. We were so relieved.”

She said she didn’t recognise her son, who was so tanned, who was now looking forward to his four weeks’ leave. “He’s trying to book a holiday with the lads,” she said.

Andy’s dad, Bob, got a few more tales from his normally quiet son.

He said: “When they arrived back the CO put on pizzas and 1000 beers for the company.

“The Iraqi guard were dressed in American uniforms, they had no weapons. They’d just given themselves up. They thought they’d be better off in American uniforms.

“Andrew said to the people back here, the ones who’d protested about the war, the people
over there were happy to be relieved from a terrible regime.”

Related article: Son calls home to say: ‘I’m safe’

From the Scunthorpe Telegraph on Saturday, May 24, 2003.