Saddam hanged a few minutes ago...

[noxlumos]

Is the hanging of Saddam the start of peace in Iraq or the beginning of an even bloodier time in an already war ravaged country? Was it a mistake to make a martyr of him or was it the only just course of action and what next for the Iraqi people, how long are we going to inflict ourselves upon them, and more to the point what happens after we dol eave, when they get a Govt we don't like / approve of will we go through the whole bloody business again, or perhaps we'll just never leave...
Any thoughts on the whole sorry story most welcome.

[Lonnie]

I don't think it'll make a blind bit of difference, in the short term, the violence will increase, but then settle down to the level its at at the moment.

He'll be remembered as a Martyr, but in my view, thats better than him being alive.

[kev100]

He will be remembered for what he is a piece of dog****

[berniecuddles]

is he really dead?

[jno]

I don't know if anyone can really say the world - or even just Iraq - is a better place today than it was yesterday; so I'm not convinced execution was right. After all, we've now done to him what he did to others. Are we better than him because our ways of killing are nicer than his?

As to what it will do to Iraq, who can say? The country is split between Sunni, who have lost power since his downfall and are outraged, and Shia, who have gained power and are happy. (And Kurds, who don't want to be there at all.) I don't see any early end to the insurgency. Maybe it will take a generation; maybe it will take centuries. The surest way of pacifying absolutely everyone would be to leave the country prosperous and give people something to lose when things go wrong; but we haven't even begun to do this, as far as I can see. And if it comes it will probably do so by selling Iraq's oil to Texas, which won't necessary make Iraqis proud to be Iraqis, and more than Brits are proud to be the 51st state under Governor Blair.

[Compostella]

Im ready for the abuse............................ but I assume that the execution will be put on the net

Anyone know where it can be viewed yet?

[Gromit]

He is only a martyr to those who glorified him anyway so that will really make no difference. Sadam was suppose to die while being captured, like his sons. When he was detained, this left the Bush administration with an embarrassing problem. Sadam had so much dirt on the Bush administration. (The US had been a supporter and apologist for Sadam for many years. The US for example supplied the positions of Iran troops so Sadam could drop chemical weapons on them.). The US made sure Sadam was tried the Dujail massacre rather than other more documented acts of genocide such as the gassing of the Kurds at Halabja. (A bit embarrassing when your partner in the region starts to poison its own people, so the US State Department initially blamed Iran for Halabja)

Sadam was executed to stop any more embarrassing details of US involvement with him being publicised. The forthcoming trials (against a dead man) will be quitely dropped

It will not make things better in Iraq, and it can't really make things worse, but a least a lot of aSdams secrets will die with him.

[ummmm1]

A martyr dies for what they believe in!

He didn't want to die so he is not a martyr

[jno]

martyrs don't want to die, they're just prepared to if they have to. As far as I know Saddam's death wasn't filmed but the moments leading up to it were and you should be able to see them on the BBC; he's since been filmed in a shroud.

[jno]

just to add to Gromit's post, I believe the authorities (US and Iraqi) were afraid he'd die in jail before being convicted of anything, like Milosevic of Serbia, hence the need to try him for the simplest and most easily provable crime they could find. As things turned out they still had to fix the trial to get the verdict. It's always awkward tracing a line of evidence from a political leader to the actions on the ground.

[chic21998]

He wont be forgotten thats for sure.

History proves that govt imposed on a country by foreign intervention dont work Im sure that an equal if not larger no. of iraquis will die through our intervention than under Saddam (not to mention how many perished in the gulf war)

It sickens me, im actually raging-not because I am a fan of Saddam mind you but because Im a fan of the truth.

At least Saddam was true to his autrocities and didnt hide beneath a shiny false smile, an italian suit and well choreagraphed body language unlike our leaders who oder for kilings of civilians like me and u get a takeaway, with one phone call from their catalogue style offices.

Having said that of course the analytical in society know the truth, can read between the lines and see through the smoke screens, its those that cant that i feel sorry for.

[jump79]

Like Gromit, I also think Saddam had a lot of inside information about the US govt (having been around long enough to see both senior and junior Bush) so no doubt, they were in a hurry to get rid of him once and for all. He was an evil man but life imprisonment would have sufficed just as well.

The outcome smacks of hypocrisy IMO and as far as I'm concerned, Bush is just as guilty as Saddam and should be put on a trial of his own.