How will history judge Saddam and his lieutenants?
Saddam Hussein was a monster. He seized power in a country with enormous oil reserves, a well-educated population and an efficient administration — and then ruined it. There was no need for him to crush any sign of dissent as if it was an attempted coup. His regime prided itself on its violence. It recorded its most vicious crimes on video tape. Saddam was in some ways like Stalin, but there was also an element of Inspector Clouseau about him: he launched disastrous wars and described humiliating defeats as victories. But many Iraqis find it difficult to believe the revulsion expressed by the British and US governments at Saddam’s crimes against humanity following the invasion of Kuwait in 1990, when the West had said so little about them previously. For instance, George Bush laments Saddam’s use of poison gas at Halabja, which killed 5,000 civilian Kurds in 1988. But the US and Britain said so little to condemn Iraq’s use of poison gas against Iranian soldiers and civilians during th
