"And yes, yes... the lights have gone out... it's a good clean drop!"
"There's the hanging. Well done, well done. They'll be pleased with that."

Considering how much the US interferred and 'helped' them with their new constitution, the fact this trial was conducted under that new constitution, and the fact defence lawyers were killed, the judge changed on the orders of the Government, there's loads of reasons to disagree with it as well as the obvious moral issues.

Well just one fact to point out is that women had many more rights in Iraq than in most other nations of the region prior to the invasion. Saddam was actually quite secular when it came to social freedoms. That is why Bin Laden, et al, denounced his regime. Baghdad University was very co ed, and graduated a significant number of professionals annually during his reign.

But we fed Saddam's megalomania with weapons, because he fought the Iranians, who had pi*ed us off with their revolution, and subsequent embassy hostage siege. We may not have created this monster, but we sure as he* nurtured him. His anthrax came from US. His nerve gas precursors could never have been allowed to be sold to him without the approval of our government. The targeting images used to drop that nerve gas were taken by our satellites. With not one bit of concern for what he was doing to his own people.

Over the last twenty-five years, the people of Iraq have suffered a holocaust.

It's that simple.

They suffered political repression under a tyrant. War all through the 80's. War again in 1990. A decade of sanctions (toothpaste is on the UN list) and further bombings (google Al Amariya 2/14/91)), all culminating in an invasion and failed occupation. The failure of our government to "liberate" the people of Iraq (the subject of many future books) has led to civil war.

Tens of millions of Iraqis have suffered from these events. From Kurds, to Shiites, and now every one. We have not solved their problem.

Oh, I liked that comment complaining that this was done under the NEW Iraq constitution. Good luck for Saddam that it was... wonder what is worse, hanging or slowly disolving by acid?

The era of the Middle East strongman, propped up by and enforcing Western policy, appears well and truly over. His power is being replaced with rule by civil war, apparently now the American administration's favored model across the region.

Fratricidal fighting is threatening to engulf, or already engulfing, the occupied Palestinian territories, Lebanon and Iraq. Both Syria and Iran could soon be next, torn apart by attacks Israel is reportedly planning on behalf of the U.S. The reverberations would likely consume the region.

Western politicians like to portray civil war as a consequence of the West's failure to intervene more effectively in the Middle East. Were we more engaged in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or more aggressive in opposing Syrian manipulations in Lebanon, or more hands-on in Iraq, the sectarian fighting could be prevented. The implication being, of course, that, without the West's benevolent guidance, Arab societies are incapable of dragging themselves out of their primal state of barbarity.
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The obvious question, then, is why would the U.S. want and intend civil war raging across the Middle East, apparently threatening strategic interests like oil supplies and the security of a key regional ally, Israel?
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The reason is that a chaotic and feuding Middle East, although it would be a disaster in the view of most informed observers, appears to be greatly desired by Israel and its neocon allies. They believe that the whole Middle East can be run successfully the way Israel has run its Palestinian populations inside the Occupied Territories, where religious and secular divisions have been accentuated, and inside Israel itself, where for many decades Arab citizens were "de-Palestinianized" and turned into identity-starved and quiescent Muslims, Christians, Druze and Bedouin.

That conclusion may look foolhardy, but then again so does the White House's view that it is engaged in a "clash of civilizations" which it can win with a "war on terror."
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If we expect rational behavior from Israel or its neocon allies, more fool us.