THE SADDAM HUSSEIN READER

“Nobody can just scratch Iraq off their calendar,” remarks a Baathist official at the close of this useful—and all too timely—collection on the dictator who has caused the Bush dynasty so many conniptions.

Few of the contributors to London-based Munthe’s anthology have particularly kind things to say about Saddam Hussein; Munthe (Commissioning Editor, Politicis and Middle East Studies/IB Tauris Publishers) comes closest by remarking that though a “tyrant,” the Iraqi president-for-life “is also, by any standards, a heroic leader.” (Readers may rush to suggest standards Munthe has perhaps not considered.) Saddam himself has some of the first words, remarking that “the Arab nation is the source of all prophets and the cradle of civilization,” professing his admiration for V.I. Lenin “because he deals with life in a lively manner,” and closing by adding, “I do not believe nuclear weapons can be used for peaceful, scientific purposes in an underdeveloped, bedouin society.” Most other writers here are more comprehensible. Among the most skillful pieces are those by leftist journalist Christopher Hitchens, who suggests, with good reason, that the US wants a Saddamist Iraq, only without Saddam; Iraqi dissident Kanan Makiya, who offers a charged account of Saddam’s war against Shiite Muslims in southern Iraq immediately following his defeat in the Gulf War; and Jerusalem Post reporter Heidi Kingstone, who writes that “about 40 people are in the running” to assume leadership in the event that Bush the younger forces a regime change. Few of those 40, by Kingstone’s account, give the West cause for cheer at the prospect of Saddam’s being run out of town. This is all thrown off-balance by the absence of official apologists for the Bush administrations, although a few Washington think-tank types come close to filling that role in pressing the case to remove Saddam at whatever cost necessary.

A perfect bedside companion for news junkies—and anyone else seeking a range of views on how things came to be so messy in Mesopotamia.