Who's laughing now?

Iraqi Information Minister Muhammed Saeed al-Sahaf was the subject of much ridicule when he issued his counter-intuitive bulletins during the early stages of the Iraqi war.

I went back to see what he said about the planned defense of Iraq, collected on what was supposed to be a funny Web site.

Many of his statements were outrageous lies, but others now take on a terrible truth.

"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything — they don't even control themselves!"

"The Americans, they always depend on a method what I call ... stupid, silly. All I ask is check yourself. Do not in fact repeat their lies."

"I can assure you that those villains will recognize, will discover in appropriate time in the future how stupid they are and how they are pretending things which have never taken place."

"Now even the American command is under siege. We are hitting it from the north, east, south and west. We chase them here and they chase us there. But at the end we are the people who are laying siege to them. And it is not them who are besieging us."

"because we will behead you all."

"Let the American infidels bask in their illusion."

"We have placed them in a quagmire from which they can never emerge except dead."

"Washington has thrown their soldiers on the fire."

"These cowards have no morals.They have no shame about lying."

"As a matter of fact, they do not respect the world, they want to tell taxpayers and the domestic public to keep them deceived. We will embroil them, confuse them and keep them in the quagmire. They have begun to tell more lies so that they might continue with the perpetration of their crimes. May they be accursed."

"They do not even have control over themselves! Do not believe them!"

"They (the U.S.) are deceiving their soldiers and their officers that aggressing against Iraq and invading Iraq will be like a picnic. This is a very stupid lie they are telling their soldiers, what they are facing is a definite death."

"They are achieving nothing; they are suffering from casualties. Those casualties are increasing, not decreasing."

Any apparent American gains, he said, were a cunning ploy by the Iraqis to lure the enemy into a trap. "Our armed forces, according to their tactics, are leaving the way open."

"Just look carefully, I only want you to look carefully. Do not repeat the lies of liars. Do not become like them."

"Bush is a very stupid man. The American people are not stupid, they are very clever. I can't understand how such clever people came to elect such a stupid president."