Any Day Is A Good Day For A Hanging....

The martyr status isn't really going to happen where he's concerned. For starters, inspite of what many people believe, Hussein WAS tried by his own people and WILL be executed by them. He's hated as much in Iraq as he is any where. Steve Biko he ain't! ' ... Once you start making exceptions, Missi, where do you stop? ... ' I believe the exception is made by the person themselves. It always puzzles me, and has done most of my life, why it is that leaders that have it in their grasp to become saviours of their people and loved by them, invariably become despots that cause nothing but misery and suffering to those they claim to serve. Hussein deserves to die, and the only sick bit is that he can't die once for every one of his victims.

' ...the one and only anti-christ. Saddam Hussein... ' Ya see, it's got absolutely nothing at all to do with 'christ', anti or pro, it's to do with common decency, but people like you who assume the choices are between 'christ' and the 'devil' are the very ones that perpetuate this crap that humankind can't be civilised, or indeed even survive, without some fucking idol to worship. ' ...Any opinion other than the agreed upon one is unwelcome ... ' Your failed attemps at reducing world events to comedy infer that YOU believe that YOUR opinion is the only acceptable one. This isn't a 'closed' community, but in the main it helps if participants think through the implications of what they say before they say it. Before you re-direct that statement at me, I can assure you that I say nothing I haven't deliberated over. Where Hussein is concerned, I'd happily be the hangman, and put me down for Mugabe as well. ' There is more of beauty in a moment's silence than in all the works of tongue or pen...' Your tag-line; why not observe it?

Well I'm not happy about executions either but as I said above, he's an exception. The world will be a better place with him dead. The real problem with the trial is that there should never have been one, if the Yank that found him had shot him in the grubby hole he was hiding in he'd have been written off as just another casualty of war. Holding a trial gives all his sympathisers a soap-box.

Sorry pissfull, I've corrected my horrendous misteak.

As long as he is alive he is a focus for the 'sympathisers', who are it seems, the members of his torture addicted party. They would live in hopes of freeing him. Those that allowed him to stay in power were ultimately the people who didn't have the guts to stand up and be counted, preferring instead to hide behind their curtains and pray that the snatch squads wouldn't knock on THEIR door. It was fear that helped him survive. Mugabe seems to be lasting, and the only thing he seems to be sitting on is the graves of those he's murdered. 12,000 arrested in the last day or so, according to the press. It's fear that's keeping Mugabe in power also.

Yes Tim, I realised what you meant but the fact remains that those that lived in the country and under his rule were responsible. There were many attempts on his life but it seems they weren't very good at assassination. As an aside, I notice that NO ONE is pleading for clemency in the cases of the other two sentenced to death. From the BBC web site; ' Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, Saddam Hussein's half-brother: found guilty and sentenced to death Awad Hamed al-Bandar, Chief Judge of Revolutionary Court: found guilty and sentenced to death. '

One down, two to go. Oh happy day.

By; Dennis Ellam 'Hanged by the neck until dead. It wasn't the glorious destiny Saddam Hussein foresaw for himself when he ruled with total power, the tyrant no one dared defy. The man who shuffled to the gallows in chains had ruled his fearful nation for more than two decades of brutality and bloodshed. He was Saddam the Mighty, the man who handed out his own brand of 'justice' to others. Sometimes he did it himself. Once he lifted a prisoner off the ground and dropped him into a tank of acid, staying to enjoy the man's agonies as his body dissolved. On another occasion a minister made the mistake of disagreeing with Saddam in a cabinet meeting. The president jovially asked him to step outside to discuss it man-to-man. Everyone knew what that meant. Silence. A single shot. The Saddam came back and continued as if nothing happened. He would visit the notorious Abu Ghraib prison to see a fiendish machine called the human mincer. Living people went in one end. Bloody pieces came out the other. In a final gesture of horror, the bags were sent home to victim's families. In the dark age of Saddam, at least 300,000, possibly 2,000,000, perished. A country that had been one of the most prosperous and progressive in the Middle East was brought to it's knees........' Ya know it's hypocritical tossers like you two that help sustain murderous animals like Hussein. He was one of the vilest examples of how depraved and evil humans can get. Mugabe is another, as was Idi Amin, Ceacescu, Papa Doc Duvalier and the rest from the same mould. It IS a VERY HAPPY DAY that the arsehole is dead. The only sad bit is he didn't die before he caused the misery he inflicted on many hundreds of thousands of families. All those that believe Bush was responsible are nuts. What I would say is that if his father had found the guts to finish the job the first time around a large proportion of deaths would have been avoided. More importantly, if that useless organisation the UN had faced up to it's responsibilities the problem could have been resolved in the name of the free world, rather than the US/UK /others coalition.

Being a member of the human race doesn't provide a 'get-out-of-jail-free' card. You obviously have fragile sensibilities when it comes to dealing with lifes rejects. I too watched some of the footage. My reason for watching was to be as certain as possible that they got the right bastard. The only sick feeling I get when thinking about him is that generated by the thought of the utter misery and fear in the minds of those as they were subjected to his disgusting treatment. He was allowed a quick, painless death, something very few of his victims had. His death won't bring them back, but you're wrong about one thing at least. The execution will help salve the tortured minds of those left behind. They will have some sense of justice, and little as that might be, it's better than nothing. That tired old cliche about two wrongs gets wheeled out every time some justice that is unpalatable gets meted out. Your last sentence is bollocks too. 'Growing up' is not even a remote feature of the human race. Acceptance of what it is, IS. We are all animals, maybe of varied intellect and intelligence, but animals nevertheless. If individuals wish to live in a human society they have to accept the rules. Those that refuse, surrender their right to be a part of it. Some of you people can't get your heads around the fact that to ensure society survives there has to be some kind of penalty for transgressors. The worse the transgression, the worse the penalty. Do you really believe that the free (ish) society we live in was achieved without killing and dying? That won't change. Not this year, not ever. Those that make the most noise about the administration of severe penalties, the pacifists, those that want peace but are afraid to fight for it, should realise that other people have done the killing and dying on their behalf The world is a better place today than it was 4 days ago.

The world is a better place today than it was 4 days ago.

I wouldn't normally engage in conversation with a pretentious twat like you, but I'm feeling a little gentle tonight. Being happy about his death isn't the same thing as smiling, laughing, being delighted. It means in this case, I'm NOT unhappy about it. OK? Now for christs sake stop promoting your fucking personal crap with every post. No one is interested and it makes you look even more pathetic than you probably are.

Growing up isn't the same as developing. Civilisation is developing I don't deny, but growing up? Either you have a different definition to me or you're talking out your archer again. You're entitled to your opinion though, I guess. Pissfull, save your pity for yourself, you need it more than I.

There's a certain hypocrisy in thinking that incarcerating Hussein (or indeed anyone) for the rest of his life is somehow a more humane, decent and honourable punishment than executing him. At the most he had an hour or two of fear when he started to believe it was really going to happen. The execution lasted as long as it took for his neck to snap. Locking a human in a cage for a lengthy period is sadistic. I can see that the 'civilised' people believe they would be free of any guilt in a Pontius Pilate way, but they are misguided just as he was. As members of a civilised society we are ALL guilty of the crimes that society commits. The arguments about making him a martyr are utter rubbish. If he was going to become a martyr it would happen whether he was dead or in prison. As far as I can make out infinitely more moslems are satisfied with his demise than are wailing about it. As long as he was alive and imprisoned there was the possibility of hostages being taken to effect his release. How many Ken Bigleys would have died? Some people want criminals punished but want to be spared any feelings of involvement or responsibility. Sorry folks, but the responsibility is there and unavoidable whether it's distasteful or not.

And of course, you're not. Oh dear, I've dared to disagree with Tim over martyrdom!

What I meant regarding the 'if you hang him you'll make him a martyr' argument is that martyrdom has very little to do with death. It is more to do with how the devotees see him. To those people he would have been held in exactly the same regard if he had been incarcerated for ever. His death adds very little or nothing to the result. The connection between the two points I made are, I guess, tenuous, but I was thinking along the lines that if most moslems are satisfied with his death, it leaves very few to regard him as a martyr anyway. Midge; The population of the Tikrit area is comparatively small which means that even if every single person there laments his death it still doesn't amount, to use Humphrey's phrase, to a hill of beans. The term 'city' doesn't have the meaning around the world that it has in Europe. Even the USA uses the term indiscriminately, referring to communities that would be termed 'villages' in the UK, as cities.

I didn't know that, Gary, but then I have to admit, I've never given it much thought. To be a city in the UK it has to have a cathedral, which in turn requires the place to be large as the C of E would only site one in a big place. At least, that's how I understand the designation. A town would be any other largish place between a village and a city. Towns here invariably have a mayor, but unlike the US his/her function is purely ceremonial, they have no real power to do anything.

Hitchens is a hypocrite. Not because of anything he said in his report, not because of his personal convictions, I agree with much that he said. The manner of Hussein's execution was grim, (so were the thousands of deaths he presided over), and it does nothing for international respect for a new government to be a party to a disrespectful display. No, he's a hypocrite for including the video of the hanging in his report.

Oh, I SEE ! Hussein was a poor innocent, led down the road to hell by those nasty Americans. Very, very interesting? Just another load of political bullshit designed to twist heads. Some of it may have some basis in truth, but overall it's just propaganda to press home the views of the people who put it together.

From what I've heard about the Downing St tea lady's tea, she SHOULD be in jail.

I just can't get my head around this 'illegal war' concept at all.

Bruce, all I can say is that YOUR understanding differs greatly from mine. Firstly, the UN has no jurisdiction anywhere in the world apart from their tiny patch on the east side of Manhattan, so their authority is no authority at all. All the UN functions as is a boys club for failed politicians. It seems to me that in ANY war their is an initial aggressor and an initial defender, so it follows that EVERY war is legal and illegal at the same time, depending on which side you are on, according to your second definition. Your analogy citing the police and judges is nothing like the same situation either, as THAT scenario relates to action within a country by, and against, it's own ctizens. I dispute your claim that there was no threat to the UK in Iraq. Ok, there didn't appear to be any overt, imminent threat, but it's quite possible there could have been a destabilising effect in the long run. Your rather emotive use of the term 'mass murder' is just that. You use it as an emotive phrase to reinforce your already set-in-stone view of the whole episode. Whilst I respect your riight to hold that view, it isn't either necessarily everyone's view, nor necessarily correct. Furthermore, your assertion that hundreds of thousands of deaths in Iraq are the responsibility of the coalition is debatable also. It IS a fact that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were either killed, tortured or forced to become refugees, by the actions of Hussein and his murderous regime. That's replied to most of your points in a basic fashion, but your assertions demand further analysis. You say the difference between the two gulf wars was simply UN approval! If that is the case you're saying that the deaths incurred during the first Gulf war were legitimate killings. It follows that the deaths during the second war were murders in your book, not because of the manner of the deaths but simply because a few old farts in New York didn't say go ahead. As I've said repeatedly on different threads, the UN sits on it's useless hands in the luxury of NY and prevaricates, but is completely gutless when it comes to real action. Further more, if it had 'approved' of Bush senior finishing the job the first time around, when 'Storming Norman' was ten miles from Baghdad, instead of saying he had to stop short, many thousands killed in the second war might just still be alive. If that is the case, then the UN is partly responsible for deaths in the second war itself. It's no secret that Hussein was at one point, building a massive gun with sufficient range to cover most of western Europe, and greedy industrialists in the UK were supplying the parts for it. This weapon, had it been completed, could have posed a threat to the UK by all accounts. There's also a logical argument that ALL deaths in ALL wars are criminal, but you choose to label those that offend you and help your argument as such, and say nothing about the rest. Were the Argentinian deaths in the Falklands war criminal? Indeed, was the Falklands war illegal and criminal, bearing in mind that no British citizens or property were at risk by the Argentinian invasion, firstly in South Georgia and subsequently in the 'Malvinas'. No one died until the UK made it a war, and I don't actually remember Britain asking UN permission to fire a single bullet either. No right thinking person can fairly argue that Britain has more claim on the Falkland Islands than Argentina, that Britain has more claim on Gibralter than Spain, that Britain has more claim on Northern Ireleand than Eire. I won't bother to list all the other territories that Britain has annexed over the last 300 years, most of which were reclaimed, sometimes, as in the case of Rhodesia, by force. The criminal acts in Iraq were perpetrated by Hussein and his mental regime on his own people. It's my contention that irrespective of whether there's any risk to outside parties, we all have a right, if not responsibility, to go to the aid of people being murdered and persecuted by their own government. Inevitably when such action is embarked upon, people die. That's how life is. That's also how death is.

' .. If you are concerned about the suffering of the Iraqi people you surely cannot be pleased that our invasion has doomed them to many more years of misery. Baghdad now is an even more nightmarish place to live than it was under Saddam. Our intervention has replaced one bad thing (Saddam's brutality) with another (civil war between Sunnis and Shias). ..' Bruce, it seems to me that the focus of our different views is set by your undiminished mind-set that basically the war was 'illegal' and based on lies. I'm sorry but it wasn't illegal, neither was it legal, 'legality' as a concept can only exist within a closed community (though that CAN involve more than one community, if by mutual agreement). You also seem unable to see that the life of the Iraqi people was horrendous before the war started. Because Iraq was very much a closed community very little accurate detail leaked out to the free world, and I know that the attitude of many people, (my brothers included) was that 'it's none of our business, they aren't bothering us'. If you were to put yourself in the position for instance, of the families of any number of young girls snatched off the street for the sexual entertainment of Hussein's sons, you may very well have been spending an awful lot of time PRAYING for the intervention of the USA and/or the UK, to bring salvation to your country. To claim that life there now is far worse is not really possible for those living outside the country to ascertain. Neither is it possible for the coalition troops on the ground. In the main they man certain check-points and suppress as much violence as possible aimed at the legitimate government and peace-keeping forces. To REALLY know whether life is worse you'd have had to be a Kurd for instance, living in a Kurdish village, wondering which day is going to be your day to get a gas bomb. Yes, I'm concerned. Concerned enough to know that were I one of the oppressed I'd gladly risk my pitiful life for the chance of a safer country. Whether or not it IS safer, as I've already pointed out, is highly debatable. A major factor in 'your' overall view is that since the war started there has been infinitely more information coming out of Iraq, information that you select to support your argument. The fact that there was very little beforehand doesn't mean that nothing untoward was happening. The on-going war between Sunni and Shia factions was always there, they are both nuts and that won't change anytime at all. ' ...Does it not worry you that the politicians lied to us, massaged the facts, fabricated the threat, changed their story repeatedly? Or that they bungled so badly the post-invasion rebuilding of Iraq. .. ' The 'lying' accusation is another emotive word used to press home the anti-war point of view. The bottom line there is that it is always very easy to label a mistake, (if there was one), as a lie, after further information modifies the original knowledge. I don't believe that lies were told. They made a decision based on the knowledge at hand, coupled with the likely projected results of doing nothing. I don't believe that either Bush or Blair took that decision lightly, or lied to support their action. They MAY have been wrong, but again that is always easier to assess after the event. The re-building of Iraq I agree was badly under-estimated and it may be that the coalition rather innocently (in the childish sense) believed that after the war everyone in the land would be united. That this didn't happen illustrates the lack of knowledge about how Moslems perceive each other and the western world. The world is no longer a place that nations can exist in, in isolation. To be a part of the world community there has to be some large areas of common thought and action. Sadly large parts are either stuck in the middle ages or determined to maintain their often awful, regimes. The middle east is one such area, as is the Indian sub-continent and most of Asia. ' ...Does it not worry you that the only real gainers from this war are the arms industry ... ' Bruce, I've always been worried by the arms industry. It's no good picking on a particular US company as an example because it's one of the 'great satan's' companies and supports your argument. Every industrialised country has an arms industry and NONE of them are fussy who they supply. The UK arms industry has supplied whoever will buy from it, (countries too numerous to list), The French have done the same, to the extent that during the Falklands war they actually ran two separate production lines in their Exocet factory, one labelling them in English for the UK, the other in Spanish for the Argentines. It was these missiles that killed the majority of UK soldiers in THAT war, (apart from those that died at Goose Green because they were led by a fucking idiot Whitehall desk-jockey trying to write his way into the history books. The outcome of that is he killed his entire platoon, (including the only son of a personal friend) and Thatcher awarded him a VC rather than admit he was unfit to lead a boy scout troop let alone front-line soldiers). ' ..The Iraqi people certainly have lost. Most of them have gone from the frying pan into the fire. ... ' I'm not too sure that jumping in the fire is worse than being in the frying pan.. ' There's no denying that the war has cost the UK as well as the other countries involved, (and don't lets forget that many other countries took part, indicating that THEIR governments decided it was a just cause too). Whether it was 'pissed away' we'll never know, because we'll never know where non-interference would have led Iraq and the free world. There is an indication that Iran is using the 'world hatred' of the US as a smoke screen to build nuclear bombs. They deny this, but should we REALLY trust them? As it happens, I'm personally convinced that Israel will allow a period to see if the UN sanctions have any kind of effect before blowing the Iranian facilities to kingdom come. THAT will provoke further outrage, largely by the wanky UN, who will say it should have been dealt with by negotiation. When WILL those stupid bastards realise, there's no way to negotiate with a rogue nation. You cite the 120 (or is it 130?) UK deaths in the conflict. Well firstly on that point, every single service man and woman knows what they're are signing up for when they volunteer. When you take the 'kings shilling' you agree to do as you're told, if you have political problems about that, DON'T volunteer. But most of all, don't whinge about the orders or the results thereof after the event. Your assertion that the coalition going to the aid of oppressed people is like an ambulance running over the victim is ludicrous. What that in effect means is, that no one should ever go to another's aid for fear of getting it wrong! It's never possible to guarantee the outcome of any conflict, the decision has to be made on whether or not it's better to intervene or not. In this case, the judgement of the USA, UK, Italy, Spain (though they withdrew for dubious reasons) and several other nations, was that it WAS better to intervene. The animosity however, is almost totally directed at the US and the UK. Perhaps you should direct some of your anger towards the others? Finally, and I've touched on this elsewhere, I don't believe the war was started on 'lies', but on what was seen at the time as preventing a situation arising that would have been even more prejudicial to the safety of western Europe. The 'spin' word irritates me no end as it's just another piece of crap jargon. It may be that there were, among the advisors in the Ministry of Defence, those that distorted the facts somewhat (for whatever reasons, maybe they have shares in arms companies!) before they were presented to the Cabinet. Most people realise that it is in fact the civil service and ministry mandarins that direct government policy, and that the PM and his Cabinet that make the public pronouncements and take the responsibility. Evidence is not always conclusive and sometimes has to be evaluated with the most likely outcome in mind. That's not an unfair way of judging a situation, if it IS less than perfect. I repeat that the UN's support is neither necessary nor any kind of seal of legality. The use of the terms 'legal' and 'illegal' are completely out of context in this scenario. The use of the words are designed to infer some kind of criminality when criminality varies from nation to nation. In any case, the UN had years in which to deal with the problem but declined. In the face of unwillingness to deal with a thorny problem the US was not bound by them when taking the matter into their own hands. Finally finally, the intervention of the US in the last war, who were in no danger from Germany, saved your life and mine. I was already born and would have undoubtedly been subjugated under the jack boot in the event of losing the war, you may never have been born!