Baghdad’s Monuments
Tuesday, 9th August 2005 by James Turnbull
During the 1980s Saddam committed money from oil revenues to build many over-the-top monuments around Baghdad. The most famous is the now toppled statue of Saddam (it's pretty hard to spot from the satellite photo) but most of the other monuments are still standing and make much better "top-down" viewing.
The Monument of the Unknown Soldier in Baghdad was dedicated to Iraqis lost in the Iran-Iraq war and supposedly represents a shield falling from the hands of a dying warrior. During the US occupation this was central to the "Green Zone" and used as the army headquarters.
To the west of the monument are the parade grounds. Each end of the parade grounds is marked by gigantic replicas of Saddam's arms holding swords, constructed partially from the melted down rifles of dead soldiers. Although most would agree that Iraq lost the war with Iran the hands were built to commemorate Iraq's supposed victory.
The Shaheed Monument was built to commemorate Iraqi soldiers killed in the Iran-Iraq war. The two large blue domes sit in the middle of an artificial lake, with an eternal flame at the centre.
Thanks: Matt, Doug, Keith T., Daniel, Todd Day, Sayf Sharif, Hans Masing, Sig
My god, the Shaheed Monument is absolutely massive! That must have been a whole bunch of oil revenues…
Perhaps a street market up in Saddam City?
Those monuments are really really cool. It is sad that they had to be built by a dude like saddam.
Those are really cool. Remember kids, if you become an evil dictator, build some huge-ass monuments.
a huge ass monument?
how about a huge ass monument with a zippo lighting an eternal fart?
i remember seeing those for the first time and wondering what the hell they were! thanks for the ground-view pictures, they clear that question up nicely 🙂
it’s became a meletary base for us army , i think it’s a huge ass now .
I actually slept directly next to/underneath these a few days after we took the city in april 03 during my first tour there, we called them the big blue boobies. We were tould not to directly do any damage to the place, it was a sacred site from some reason to the locals, and from what I saw no one did anything to mess the place up. Got some great pictures though, the muesum and auditoruim underneath the place was ransacked by looters(Iraqi’s themselves). Everything was gone, except some old Iraq Flags and uniforms,old and new, some of which these were probaly ditched by fleeing Iraq troops. In every direction you looked, you could see the shells of former buildings, but this place was pretty much left un dameged, and probaly the coolest thing I saw in that country out of the both times I was there.
PLEASE DONT MAKE FUN OF EVERYTHING THERE. OUT OF ANY POLITICAL OPENION ITS SOMEBODYS COUNTRY WHO LOVE VERY MUCH INSPITE OF HAVING SUCH A DICTATOR FOR SOMETIME. THE PLACE IS IN THE END A PEACE OF A GREAT ART.PLEASE START TO LEARN HOW TO LOOK TO THINGS FOR ITS SELF AND DONT CONECT IT TO OTHER THING THAT WERE AT THAT TIME OUT OF OUR HANDS.TRY TO LOOK AT IT HOW IT WAS DONE AND HOW IT IS BEAUTIFUL AND HOW BEAUTIFUL IS ITS COLOUR AND HOW ITS DONE PERFECTLY THEN TRY TO FOREGET ABOUT THE BAD PEOPLE WHO WERE AMONG US AT THAT TIME…YOU WILL GET A DIFFERENT PICTURE AND DIFFERENT OPENION..THANK YOU
you can view what happened to some of Saddam’s statues on http://www.toppledsaddam.org
The Shaheed was built to honor the 100,000s of war dead during the iran/iraq war. A war in which we supported the Iraq side. To damage this place would cause massive problems for U.S. soldiers. You’d be better to not touch it. It is a Memorial built not for Saddam’s ego but is just as important as the Vietnam or WWII Monuments in Washington, D.C. I cannot believe that an army soldier did not know or was not told what these were. Are we that ignorant? At least know a little before invading some country for a reason.
These represent miserable yet important memories of all Iraqis, but for sure every one of us (The Iraqis) should bow with respect to these monuments & u Yankees better not talk shit about ’em for that u don’t have any appreciation to the 5000-year civilization..