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U.S. soldiers stumbled Friday upon the personal weapons cache of President Saddam Hussein's son Odai, finding boxes of assault rifles and dozens of ceremonial firearms in an abandoned house.

The infantry company was searching through a Baath Party enclave when they made the discovery of Odai Hussein's collection inside the home. Many of the weapons were apparently already looted; there were hundreds of Beretta 9mm pistol boxes, but no pistols.

But not everything was gone. There were dozens of gold- and silver-plated military weapons, apparently presented as gifts to Odai. None of those were taken by looters.

There were also letters that accompanied some of the presents: One, from the Iraqi Tae Kwon Doh Association, came with a ceremonial gold-plated sword. Another letter from the Saudi Government came with an antique, silver-plated Bedouin musket.

And there were boxes of Austrian-made Steyr assault rifles, including a dozen still in their packing crate. The boxes bore the address of a Jordanian military official.

In Jordan, government officials scoffed at the idea that the discovered Steyr boxes could have been a supply of arms to Iraq after the imposition of U.N. sanctions in 1990.

"If there was something found, it could've been very old, much before 1990," said one official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

"In the Arab world, it's common to exchange gifts, and the boxes said to be found which are apparently of a trivial quantity are very much in line with that custom," the official told The Associated Press.

Odai is the commander of Fedayeen Saddam, a paramilitary militia used by the regime to oppress internal foes. He held a seat in parliament, ran Iraq's most popular newspaper and headed the national Olympic committee.

photo credit and caption:

U.S. Army Spc. John Dresel from Oxford, Conn., inspects a sword, part of the private arms collection of Odai Hussein, son of Saddam Hussein, in Baghdad Friday, April 11, 2003. U.S troops from A Company 3rd Battalion 7th Infantry Regiment found a huge cache of collectable as well as military weapons, including arms from Austria and Germany, Italy, Belgiam and the United States. Some of the weapons had been shipped via Jordan and were still in boxes. (AP Photo/John Moore)

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