The problem was that these particular lions had just experienced a horrific aerial bombardment, as Uday's palaces had been a prime target, there was a rotting lioness in the enclosure with them, and they were starving and frightened. All of this made the situation extremely volatile.
The big question was: would the lions retreat when we came in, or would they challenge us?
Husham and I discussed our options, but they didn't look good. I was again forced to consider the last resort of simply shooting them all. The situation felt hopeless. But as we watched and talked, carefully studying the lions' behavior and temperament, we decided that a rescue attempt was perhaps possible. Our decision was based simply on the fact that despite one halfhearted mock charge at the fence where we were standing, the lions generally backed off or kept away whenever we approached the fence.
I looked at the lions and a feeling of pity and desperation came over me. These poor creatures, I thought, owned and abused by a cruel dictator, caged in alien surroundings far from their natural environment, afraid and intimidated, and yet there was still fight in them. They still had spirit.
Suddenly my mind was made up. “We can do this,” I said firmly, hoping to inspire as much confidence as I could. “We must do it.”
Husham and Abdullah nodded, and I was heartened by their positive attitude.
The ever-helpful Lieutenant Szydlik provided a truck with a crane and the zoo staff found some rusty transport cages that had been too heavy for the looters to carry off. So we were in business.
However, the main problem would be coaxing the felines into the mobile cages. Dr. Hussan and I had an on-site chat and came up with an idea that edged upon lunacy butâwith a lavish dollop of luckâcould work if everyone kept their nerve.
The plan was simplicity itself. Each lion had a cage that led into the communal open area where I had first stumbled onto the dogs guarding the cubs. At the back of each cage was a small door, about a meter high. If we placed a transport cage directly behind the slideup door and drove the lions into their cages, then toward the open trap door, the cats would have nowhere to go but straight into the mobile cage.
That was the theory. Of course, only a barking mad idiot would have sanctioned such hairy tactics; there was a great deal of chance involved, but these were desperate times.
In the courtyard the zoo team found a junked fence gateâbasically just a tubular steel frame meshed with plastic-coated chicken wire. This would be our shield, our sole buffer against about 150 pounds of spitting, snarling razors and daggers. I was hoping for something less flimsy, but it would have to do. It was all we had.
The radio in a troop carrier parked a few yards away clattered into life. It was an officer from Lieutenant Szydlik's base camp instructing the soldiers with us to return as soon as possible. One of the GIs walked over.
“Did you hear that?”
I nodded.
“We've got to move quick, man. Let's load these cats and go.”
“How much time have we got?”
“Two hours maxâeven that's stretching it. But we may not get this crane again. This could be your only chance.”
“Okay, let's get cracking.”
We held a brief team talk and Dr. Husham translated the plan into Arabic for the other zoo employees.
I then asked two soldiers to stand at the fence with their M-16 rifles cocked and ready. Their job was to ensure the team was not attacked from behind by other lions and to shoot if this happened.
But, I stressed, lions often mock-charged and it was vital the soldiers fire warning shots first. Only at the last instant should they shoot to kill.
“How will we know the difference” one soldier asked.
“When I start screaming, shoot, and not a moment before,” I replied, “and please don't hit us.”
Husham and Abdullah Latif, one of the Kuwaitis, grabbed a side of the fencing each and, with me standing between them issuing instructions, we cautiously advanced toward the closest cat, a lioness.
The rest of the zoo staff formed a semicircle about five yards behind usâthe “bull's horn” attack formation used with devastating effect by the great Zulu warrior Shaka. Slowly we inched forward, making no sudden movements, and the lioness started backing off warily, moving into her sanctuary, the cage.
So far, so good. Now to drive her out the small back door and into the transport cage. Abdullah and Husham gently edged the fencing into the cage and steadily pushed it toward the feline who was now barely three feet away. The lionessâhissing and baring her sword-sharp fangsâkept retreating, finally finding nowhere to goâexcept through the trapdoor into the transport cage. Once she was through, the door was immediately snapped shut.
Whew ⦠I expelled a noisy blow of relief, buckets of adrenaline dumping into my system. This was freaky stuff, and the possibility that somebody could get badly hurt, or killed, was frighteningly real. A derelict piece of fencing was a screwball defense against angry lions. But we had nothing else, and if we left the cats where they were, they would probably die.
“We were lucky that time,” Husham said.
He was right. I knew what he was talking about. I had come to within a whisker of being attacked by lions in Africa several years beforehand after inadvertently driving slap bang into the middle of a pride of hunting lions.
It had happened on a dark night when Françoise, some friends, and I had been cruising slowly along a road that was little more than a dirt path when our tracker 's spotlight picked up a lion crouched in the bush. Then another, and another. We realized that we were surrounded by a huge pride of lions, spread out through the veld around us. Up ahead, our headlights shone briefly on a
herd of impalas. We were caught in the middle of a hunt, and all hell was going to break loose at any moment when the attack began. We stopped and, as is customary to deny advantage to either predator or prey, turned off all the lights and waited.
As we were watching and listening, the trap was sprung from behind the herd and the bush came alive with impalas and lions running frantically in all directions around us. I looked over and saw a large male impala hotly pursued by two lionesses darting toward us. The panicked buck bounded straight at our open Land Rover, jumping higher and higher as he got closer.
God, I thought, he is going to jump into the vehicle, followed by the lionesses.
I braced for the impact, and as I did so the buck and two lionesses hit the side of the Land Rover next to me in a screaming, tumbling crescendo of raw violence.
The heavy impact from the trio slewed the vehicle over on its suspension, and in the ensuing melee blood from the dying animal sprayed onto my face and jacket as the lionesses' massive teeth ripped open the impala's neck.
The impala was forced down and under the vehicle, and as more and more lions arrived and started trying to get at it beneath the Land Rover, the vehicle started rocking like a boat in surf.
Hearing a loud roar off on my right, I turned to see the huge alpha male loping in from the other side to claim the kill. For a split second I thought he was going to take the shortest route and climb over us. At the last moment he went under instead of over. Savagely shouldering the females out of the way, he dragged the buck out into the open right next to me. Suddenly he became aware of my presence, stopped, and looked straight up at me. His huge face was barely a yard or so away from mine in the open vehicle, his mouth and mane covered in blood and gore, his hunched shoulders snaked with wriggling cords of muscle. He stared straight at me, his eyes glistening like polished opals in the spotlight, and a chill shot down my spine. I averted my gaze and, moving very slowly,
felt in my pocket for something to defend myself. All that was there was a cigarette lighter. Great. Perhaps I could singe his whiskers ⦠.
To my relief, he broke the stare and continued feasting.
Fortunately, twenty-two lions (we counted!) will make short work of even a large impala buck. Soon all that was left was a chewed skeleton and the giant cats moved off.
But it was too close for comfort, nevertheless. A golden rule in the bush is that even though they generally are unlikely to attack you without provocation, you don't get too close to dangerous animals. Keep out of their immediate space and they will leave you alone.
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HOWEVER, HERE IN BAGHDAD we had no option but to break the rules. We had to invade these lions' spaceâalmost an invitation to attackâif we hoped to force them into the transport cages.
I didn't want us to be lulled into a false sense of security after the first, easy transfer and so called Husham aside, and we discussed ways to fine-tune the capture technique for the second lion. Whatever happened, he and Abdullah could not let go of the piece of fencing, the sole bulwark between us and the lion. If that went spinning, the cat would be onto someone at sonic speed. A charging lion is as fast and lethal as a runaway train, and as young as these were, it could be a deadly attack.
Getting the second lion into his cage proved relatively easy at first. But not for long. Just before entering the cage, the infuriated animal suddenly turned and hurled himself at the flimsy fencing. It was so sudden that Husham and Abdullah nearly dropped their shield. Quick as lightning the cat started clambering over it. Husham and Abdullah reflexively thrust the fencing upward, spilling the cat off the top. As he landed he went low, slithering like a snake. But Husham and Abdullah were fractionally faster, smashing the gate down to the ground a blink beforehand.
The lion then scrambled up the barrier again as the two men held fast with grim determination. I rushed to help them cling on,
for if the berserk cat got through the chicken wire he would be among the staff in a flash.
It was a crucially close call; we were jerking the gate up as the lion attempted to scale over, then desperately yanking it down as he tried to scamper under. At times we would have to let go with one hand, arm muscles searing as we doggedly gripped onto a wafer-thin barrier being battered by a cyclone of rage.
And the racket! The lion was roaring at full decibel while the staff were either screaming in terror or yelling encouragement.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw a TV crew set up and start filming. I groaned out loud. That's all we neededâcrazy men being filmed trying to capture hungry lions. Or even worse, a real-life lion attack being beamed into a million living rooms.
Then the lion backed off for a moment. He lay crouched on his stomach facing us, ears flat, snarling and switching his tailâsure signs he was on the verge of attacking again.
“Leave the fencing,” I hissed urgently to Husham. “Let's wedge it against the wall to trap him and wait for everything to calm down.”
The pandemonium was just what I had been dreading. The whole aim was to relocate the animals with as little trauma as possible. Well, as little as possible under the desperate circumstances. I was also very concerned about the possibility of inducing capture myopathy, a condition brought on in an animal by the stress of game capture that often leads to death. We needed to stop for a while.
We slowly retreated out of the cage. In the enclosure one of the other cats, a lioness, had climbed high into an Albizia tree while another attempted to dissolve into the shadows on the far side of the den. Both had obviously been spooked by the ruckus, and there could be problems in capturing them later as well.
The good news was that during the mayhem zoo workers had nabbed the two lion cubs by the scruffs of their necks and they were now in a cage with their friends the dogs, ready to go.
I sat cross-legged on the ground, mentally going over our seat-of-the-pants capture system again and again, step-by-step, trying
to visualize improvements. The Iraqis, meanwhile, used the break as prayer time, prostrating themselves toward Mecca. It was Friday, I suddenly realized, and the muezzin was calling the faithful to pay homage. The fact that these men were prepared to workâindeed, to risk their livesâat this holy hour was powerful testament to their dedication. I hoped they were praying for a successful capture.
Half an hour later we returned to the cage and this time I insisted on absolute silence and fewer people in the “bull's horn” behind us. Only I was permitted to speak, and that was solely to give instructions. Fewer people meant less commotion and less claustrophobia for the lion. I also wanted fewer of my men in the firing line; I was profoundly aware that the fencing was all that held back an enraged wild animal equipped with fangs as sharp as butchers' knives.
By now the lion appeared to have calmed down, and as Abdullah and Husham began nudging the fencing gently forward again, he turned, bolted out through the trap door, and was captured. The prayers had worked!
The third lion was the easiest, as his brother and sister were already in their separate transport cages and he was eager to join them, scudding through the trap door quickly as Husham and Latif approached.
The last lioness, which had been up a tree watching the proceedings with interest, suddenly climbed down and ran into the main cage by herself. This was going to be easy, I thought to myself.