Secret US documents show Saddam as brutal survivor

An Iraqi woman carries pictures of her sons who were executed by in 1982 by security forces of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in the town of al-Dujail, north of Baghdad yesterday. Residents of the Shiite village of Dujail demanded the death penalty for Saddam as he goes on trial accused of the mass killings of their friends and loved ones. The disappearance in 1982 of 143 inhabitants from Dujail, whose bodies have never been recovered, is the first case to be brought against Saddam. He could face the death penalty if found guilty. PHOTO: AFP

But the documents, which cover a period from 1975 to 2003 while Saddam held power in Iraq, also reveal US intelligence anticipated that the dictator's overthrow could trigger sectarian divisions and leave the country vulnerable to Islamic militancy and Iranian influence.

The National Security Archive, a Washington-based independent organization dedicated to public access to government information, released the documents the day before Saddam was to go on trial in Baghdad for the 1982 massacre of 143 Shiites in the town of Dujail.

In nearly three decades of analysis and intelligence gathering, US government agencies had little idea of how to influence or depose Saddam and mostly hoped that he would be brought down by an internal coup, the documents show.

The declassified papers for the most part present detailed assessments of Iraq's politics, military and economy with a grudging respect for Saddam's ability to hold on to power through debilitating defeats on the battlefield, internal insurrection and grinding international sanctions.

"Saddam possesses a strong drive for power and an exaggerated view of his own capabilities which disposes him to assess optimistically his chances of success in any venture," said a CIA document from June 1982.

"Failure is a major blow to his self esteem, which places Saddam under substantial emotional stress," the CIA said.

Still, the analysis concluded that "Saddam is a fundamentally pragmatic man in touch with political reality" and would likely rebound by blaming others for setbacks in Iraq-Iran war in the 1980s.

Eleven years later, another CIA report echoed that sentiment in a description of a micromanager who misses little.

"Imprisonment, exile, years of danger-filled underground existence, and numerous assassination and coup attempts have honed his survival skills. His 25-year reign as Iraq's strongman has taught him self-reliance and wariness," it said.

However, US intelligence was unsparing in its assessment that brutal repression, often meted out through his family, was the underpinning of Saddam's long dictatorship.

An August 1983 document about Baghdad's ongoing campaign against Shiites in the southern Iraq marshes, while heavily redacted, nonetheless gives a picture of unforgiving oppression.

While carrying no dramatic revelations, the documents convey how Washington harbored fears that Iran and the Soviet Union might gain control over Iraq and its valuable oil resources.