How fighting for my country paid off, by Adel Al-Zanki (Kuwaiti War Veteran)

Adel Al-Zanki was a  teacher  in Kuwait before the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 under the grip of the maximum ruler, General Saddam Hussein. Though the option of running to seek refuge in Saudi Arabia was open to him, he chose to face the invaders and fight to liberate Kuwait.

Adel Al-Zanki (Kuwaiti War Veteran)

He spoke with a team of Nigerian journalists who paid a two-week visit to Kuwait  in the build up to the celebration of the 20th Liberation Day, 50th Independence Day as well as the 5th year of the reign of the Amir His Highness Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, fourth son of the late Sheikh Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, who was born in Kuwait on June 6, 1929. Abayomi Adeshida of our Abuja Bureau was part of the team and provides excerpts of the interaction here.
Excerpts:

How would you describe the events of the night of the invasion of Kuwait by the Iraqi Army in 1990?  What exactly happened and what was your immediate reaction?

The events of that terrible night in 1990  when we suddenly saw the unwanted military men of Iraq in Kuwait  were a horror many Kuwaitis who witnessed it shall never forget in a hurry.

We had  heard it in history that they had earlier carried out similar invasions in the days of our fathers, but, that particular incident  was fearful, yet annoying that one would just wake up in the land his fathers gave him to a rude shock of an invasion by a neighbor who originally is supposed to be one’s closest security, with the attempt to take over the land completely!

The Kuwaiti people never expected that attack; at first it was like a rehearsal of a bad huge movie, but later we realized that the people’s bad intensions were real after they continued setting fire on all our investments. As if we were in a scary dream after watching a war movie, several war planes, war tankers and foot soldiers took over Kuwait like a blanket, and, before we knew it, heavy smokes from our national monuments took over the skies; after they completed the looting of any particular one, they set it on fire.

One thing we will also not forget is how God, in his infinite mercy, protected the Kuwaiti leadership throughout this period, for the several months that these people ravaged our land, nothing terrible happened to our leaders. Also, Kuwaitis will forever remain grateful to the entire people of the world, most especially nations that contributed resources and even laid down the lives of their citizens, to help us beat back the invaders.

When Kuwaitis look back at the role played by other nations in the struggle for the fight for our land, we always thank God who,  in His infinite mercies,  made it possible to make other nations come around to help suppress our oppressors.

Twenty years ago, you were younger than this without much family troubles. What exactly did you as a Kuwaiti youth do when the invaders took over Kuwait?  Did your youths organize against the Iraqi army to fight or even kill any of the Saddam Hussein soldiers?

Yeah, we got into action, but not through public demonstrations of confrontations! Who would confront a rolling tank driven by a foe who is invading you because he knew you have lesser population? We held secret meetings after the first immediate shock that took us over. We got out of the shock and decided to take action to protect weak family members who looked up to us the youths for their protection as well as the protection of family businesses which were being looted by the Iraqis.

I was not keen at first at joining the youths but, after they killed a member of our family who insisted he would never be alive for them to loot our investment, then I took up courage to join in the plans to liberate our land from the Iraqis. It was when so many of their army started dying through some of the things we did secretly that we knew that we could do more to assist our country and rescue our fatherland from them.

The invasion was just like a plan they woke up one day themselves to execute without proper training of their army  to carry out. For example, there were many of their soldiers  who came here without knowing exactly where they were heading for; they got here only to be asking us for directions on how to get to some of the places they were just told to go and man. When we realized this, we quickly designed a grand plan to mislead them till we out-numbered  and killed  them.

Another thing that gave them to us was their love for material thing, they came with the intention  to vandalize our property and steal our things, we also set out to trap them with other material things as flashy cars which were already laden with explosives. It was like the army that came to take over our land was a set of hungry Iraqis. It did not take us  long  to find out that we were just being invaded by urchins who were happy to take over our land because we were better people, and the mentality of  those of us who joined to support our army then was that if we were superior to them, we could beat them despite their number. Many of us volunteered then and we  achieved results.

For each of our men that was lost during the operation, we  claimed the lives of more than fifty Iraqi soldiers, and we were happy for this at the beginning, but later we improved when they started losing their men in thousands.

What were you doing before the war and how did you get into participating in the war when there was the option of running away to Saudi Arabia?

Before they invaded our land, I was a teacher. Once the invaders took over our land, one of the first things  that came to my mind was the future of my students. I refused to run away because if everybody ran away, then we will be told a story when the land is liberated as it was eventually delivered from the invaders.

Now, I have a conviction that the sence of duty to protecting our fatherland which we had then was a nationalistic decision that paid off eventually. If we had not done anything, it would have been difficult for the coalition forces to fight for us with ease and it would have taken them a longer time to help chase out the invaders.

We  want to know how you got enlisted into the Kuwaiti army, after the Iraqis took over. Was there a fresh recruitment exercise…?

As a volunteer. You see, there is a way information was passed from mouth to mouth among Kuwaitis  that time and,  you may not believe it, that form of information was very effective. You know we were fighting a common enemy, many codes were used to mean many things and we understood each and everything that was meant at the time. For example, if we were to meet at a place, the information was coded and, at the appointed time, everybody made it to the place and only a few of our plans did not work out.

Today, all of us who participated in that war still use some of the codes to joke and laugh at the Iraqis who heard us most times and thought we were talking about other things. When we got into the Kuwaiti army, we were not given arms and ammunition at first, but we were made to cook for our army while we were being trained on how to shoot; when we concluded the training, we participated in action at the fronts when the coalition forces  entered Kuwait.

After the war, was there any form of compensation from the Kuwaiti government or medal given to those of you who volunteered to take back Kuwait from the invaders?

After we won the war, we got recognitions from our government and even international recognition. When I look back today, I thank God that I participated and it is an experience I and members of my family will forever cherish. Up till now, many families are still receiving compensations for damages they suffered and there are still investments channeled towards rebuilding Kuwait.

Having lived among your people for about two weeks now, it is surprising that one cannot find policemen on your streets. Is it because they are too few to parade the streets?

No, we thank God for the people He created in Kuwait, we have a tradition of peace that we have transferred from generation to generation. I can tell you today that we have the most peaceful youths in the world. Our children enjoy life, and they know how it feels to be cheated; so, they do not go all out to cheat people; so, you have very low level of disagreements among our people.

Your observation is right, the few policemen you have on the streets are traffic policemen  there to monitor our youths who enjoy the ride on their power bikes. You know a few accidents do occur, they are there to safe-guard their lives and the lives of others who might be around the scene of the accident. We have a heavy presence of our soldiers  around the Kuwaiti borders to prevent the repeat of the invasion of Kuwait.