Final Assignment

1. Write a biography of a famous person. Start with an orientation, describe

the events, and finish it with the reorientation. Write at least 150 words.

Saddam Hussein, also spelled Ṣaddām Ḥusayn, in full Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti,
(born April 28, 1937, Al-ʿAwjah, Iraq—died December 30, 2006,
Baghdad), president of Iraq (1979–2003) whose brutal rule was marked by costly
and unsuccessful wars against neighbouring countries. Saddam, the son of
peasants, was born in a village near the city of Tikrītin northern Iraq. The area was
one of the poorest in the country, and Saddam himself grew up in poverty. His
father died before he was born, and he went at an early age to live with an uncle
in Baghdad.

He joined the Baʿth Party in 1957. In 1959 he participated in an unsuccessful

attempt by Baʿthists to assassinate the Iraqi prime minister, ʿAbd al-Karīm Qāsim;
Saddam was wounded in the attempt and escaped first to Syria and then to Egypt.
He attended Cairo Law School (1962–63) and continued his studies at Baghdad
Law College after the Baʿthists took power in Iraq in 1963. The Baʿthists were
overthrown that same year, however, and Saddam spent several years in prison in
Iraq. He escaped, becoming a leader of the Baʿth Party, and was instrumental in
the coup that brought the party back to power in 1968. Saddam effectively held
power in Iraq along with the head of state, Pres. Ahmad Hasan al-Bakr, and in
1972 he directed the nationalization of Iraq’s oil industry.

Saddam began to assert open control of the government in 1979 and became
president upon Bakr’s resignation. He then became chairman of the Revolutionary
Command Council and prime minister, among other positions. He used an
extensive secret-police establishment to suppress any internal opposition to his
rule, and he made himself the object of an extensive personality cult among the
Iraqi public. His goals as president were to supplant Egypt as leader of
the Arab world and to achieve hegemony over the Persian Gulf.

Saddam launched an invasion of Iran’s oil fields in September 1980, but the
campaign bogged down in a war of attrition. The cost of the war and the
interruption of Iraq’s oil exports caused Saddam to scale down his ambitious
programs for economic development. The Iran-Iraq Wardragged on in a stalemate
until 1988, when both countries accepted a cease-fire that ended the fighting.
Despite the large foreign debt with which Iraq found itself saddled by war’s end,
Saddam continued to build up his armed forces.

In August 1990 the Iraqi army overran neighbouring Kuwait. Saddam apparently
intended to use that nation’s vast oil revenues to bolsterIraq’s economy, but his
occupation of Kuwait quickly triggered a worldwide trade embargo against Iraq.
He ignored appeals to withdraw his forces from Kuwait, despite the buildup of a
large U.S.-led military force in Saudi Arabia and the passage of United
Nations (UN) resolutions condemning the occupation and authorizing the use of
force to end it. The Persian Gulf War began on January 16, 1991, and ended six
weeks later when the allied military coalition drove Iraq’s armies out of Kuwait.
Iraq’s crushing defeat triggered internal rebellions by both Shīʿites and Kurds, but
Saddam suppressed their uprisings, causing thousands to flee to refugee camps
along the country’s northern border. Untold thousands more were murdered, many
simply disappearing into the regime’s prisons.

As part of the cease-fire agreement with the UN, Iraq was prohibited from
producing or possessing chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. Numerous
sanctions were leveled on the country pending compliance, and those caused
severe disruption of the economy. Saddam’s continued refusal to cooperate with
UN arms inspectors led to a four-day air strike by the United States and Great
Britain in late 1998 (Operation Desert Fox). Both countries announced that they
would support efforts of the Iraqi opposition to unseat Saddam, whose regime had
grown increasingly brutal under UN sanctions, but the Iraqi leader barred UN
weapons inspectors from entering his country. In the interimit became clear that
Saddam was grooming one of his sons—Uday or Qusay—to succeed him. Both
were elevated to senior positions, and both mirrored the brutality of their father.
Moreover, Saddam continued to solidify his control at home, while he struck a
profoundly defiant and anti-American stance in his rhetoric. Though increasingly
feared at home, Saddam was viewed by many in the Arab world as the only
regional leader willing to stand up to what they saw as American aggression.

In the wake of the September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001, the U.S.
government, asserting that Saddam might provide terrorist groups with chemical or
biological weapons, sought to renew the disarmament process. Though Saddam
allowed UN weapons inspectors to return to Iraq in November 2002, his failure to
cooperate fully with the investigations frustrated the United States and Great
Britain and led them to declare an end to diplomacy. On March 17, 2003, U.S.
Pres. George W. Bush ordered Saddam to step down from office and leave Iraq
within 48 hours or face war; he also indicated that, even if Saddam left the country,
U.S. forces might be needed to stabilize the new government and search for
weapons of mass destruction. When Saddam refused to leave, U.S. and allied
forces launched an attack on Iraq on March 20.

The opening salvo of the Iraq War was an assault by U.S. aircraft on a bunker
complex in which Saddam was thought to be meeting with subordinates. Although
the attack failed to kill the Iraqi leader, subsequent attacks directed against Saddam
made it clear that eliminating him was a major goal of the invasion. Always
obstinate in his tone, Saddam exhorted Iraqis to lay down their lives to stop U.S.
and British forces, but resistance to the invasion soon crumbled, and on April 9, the
day Baghdad fell to U.S. soldiers, Saddam fled into hiding. He took with him the
bulk of the national treasury and was initially able to evade capture by U.S. troops.
His sons, Uday and Qusay, were cornered and killed in Mosul on July 22, but it
was not until December 13 that Saddam was finally captured. The
once dapper leader was pulled, disheveled and dirty, from a small underground
hiding place near a farmhouse in the vicinity of Tikrīt. Although he was armed,
Saddam surrendered to U.S. soldiers without firing a shot.

In October 2005 Saddam went on trial before the Iraqi High Tribunal, a panel court
established to try officials of the former Iraqi government. He and several
codefendants were charged with the killing of 148 townspeople in Al-Dujayl, a
mainly Shīʿite town, in 1982. Throughout the nine-month trial, Saddam interrupted
the proceedings with angry outbursts, claiming that the tribunal was a sham and
that U.S. interests were behind it. The tribunal finally adjourned in July 2006 and
handed down its verdicts in November. Saddam was convicted of crimes against
humanity—including willful killing, illegal imprisonment, deportation, and
torture—and was sentenced to death by hanging. Saddam’s half brother (an
intelligence officer) and Iraq’s former chief judge were also sentenced to death.
Days after an Iraqi court upheld his sentence in December 2006, Saddam was
executed.

2. Constructing a spoof text

• Think of a funny incident that happened to you.
• Here are some questions to help you add necessary and
interesting information to your story.
1. Who was involved in your story?
2. Where did it happen?
3. When did it happen?
4. What are the important events in the story?
• Follow the rhetorical steps of spoof texts: orientation, events, and twist.

One day my family and I went to the beach. We went there on a

motorcycle because the distance was quite close to my house, about 15
minutes away.
When he arrived there we immediately ordered rice and fish. usually
people burn their own fish for cheaper. but we ordered fish and rice from
the shop around the beach.

my children were very happy. they play around the beach running
barefoot. my husband and I were very happy to see our children happy

Until one day a man asked a question to our son. "Whose son are you,
kid?"
Without a long thought my son answered, "Whose father is that sir?"
The father smiled at my son's question and asked back, "Why don't you
answer the question, sir?"
"Abang, abi Auliya's son". We laughed, because my son never called
himself me but always called himself brother.