# The Trial of Saddam; a savage hypocrisy. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 1, 2004, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056 "2004-07-01T15:20:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/21 "2004-07-02T07:59:53Z")
IIRC, Saddam’s lawyers are floating the balloon that Saddam can’t be guilty of any crimes, since he was the Head of state at the time those events occurred, and therefore everything he did was legal by dint of authority. Anyone else reminded of a recent attempt to justify prisoner abuse in Iraq and Gitanimo? ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/22 "2004-07-02T13:02:24Z")
No. ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/23 "2004-07-02T13:14:55Z")
[QUOTE=El\_Kabong] b) I’m sure you have a few in mind, so please, don’t be coy; air 'em out. Me, I’m tempted to mention the leader of a certain North American country, but that would be too easy. There are, of course, others. [QUOTE] How has Paul Martin committed any war crimes? Canada hasn’t done anything to my mind. ---
**Author:** ![Dunderman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecb155/32.png) [@Dunderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dunderman)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/24 "2004-07-02T13:22:24Z")
> [@Airman Doors](#): > > And that was me. As usual. Robin and I are living, breathing examples of why post counts don’t matter, because I think half of all our posts are apologies like this one. We should have a Straight Dope whipround to get you an extra computer. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/45deac/32.png) [@Evil\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_One)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/25 "2004-07-02T14:16:10Z")
> [@emacknight](#): > > Saddam is being charged with “crimes against humanity” most notably for his treatment of the Kurds and for invading Kuwait. My problem with this is that those HAPPENED 13 YEARS AGO. > > If what Saddam did was wrong, why are we waiting until now? Because he would still be in power if the United States had not intervened. > [@emacknight](#): > > Is the UN so powerless that it allows war criminals to go about their daily lives, running their country into the ground, free to continue? Yes…especially of some of the members are profiting from keeping the war criminals in power. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/26 "2004-07-02T15:30:55Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > If all the judges are appointed by the United States or by the U.S installed puppet government, the trial is unfair on its face. And even if during this trial you show videos of Saddam Hussein killing people with his own hands and speaking clearly into the camera “I, Saddam Hussein am knowingly murdering people in full violating of all national and international laws against murder” it STILL wouldn’t be a fair trial because the trial is still a sham. Wait a minute. Why exactly would you hold that judges appointed by the as yet unelected Iraqi government would automatically be unfair? Why would it automatically by a railroad, simply because there haven’t been elections in Iraq yet? What I’m getting at is that the trial process itself must be fair, and the political situation in Iraq might be interesting, but is irrelevant. Surely you can agree that an elected Iraqi government could hold a sham trial for Saddam, right? Elections don’t magically sprinkle pixie dust over the trial to make it fair. What will make the trial fair is if Saddam has access to counsel, if he is able to conduct a defense, if the judge is impartial, if he is required to testify against himself, all the mechanisms that make trials fair. I don’t understand where you get the idea that I’m advocating a kangaroo court. But why does the fact that the US is still occupying Iraq automatically make the trial unfair? Why would elections make the trial fair? ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/27 "2004-07-02T15:45:11Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > If all the judges are appointed by the United States or by the U.S installed puppet government, the trial is unfair on its face. Then every trial in America is unfair, isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![jshore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5e925/32.png) [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/28 "2004-07-02T17:52:34Z")
> [@Evil One](#): > > Yes…especially [if] some of the members are profiting from keeping the war criminals in power. You mean, like the U.S. in the days after he had already committed some of his crimes but before we decided he was a bad guy? You mean like Osama in the days after he had, I would imagine, already have committed some terrorist acts but before we decided he was a bad guy? You mean like Augusto Pinochet after we installed him in power? Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/29 "2004-07-03T03:00:02Z")
> [@Liberal](#): > > Then every trial in America is unfair, isn’t it? Thank you for missing the point entirely. When Iraq invades us, arrests our President, and holds a “trial” for him with judges appointed by Iraqis (directly or indirectly), maybe you’ll get the point I was trying to make. ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/30 "2004-07-03T03:56:07Z")
> [@rjung](#): > > IIRC, Saddam’s lawyers are floating the balloon that Saddam can’t be guilty of any crimes, since he was the Head of state at the time those events occurred, and therefore everything he did was legal by dint of authority. Actually, I think that stance has some merit. Technically, you cannot charge someone for a crime comitted before the act was illegal. This is only part of the reason why I feel that Saddam should be tried before the United Nations for War Crimes, rather than by the Iraqi people. He should be tried by a “jury of his peers”: other world leaders, or their chosen representatives in a multi-national court. Don’t get me wrong: the man was an evil son-of-a-bitch, but in my opinion, the Iraqi people have no standing to try him, no matter how much he wronged them. Legally, they don’t have the authority-- they don’t have a Constitution which authorizes the impeachment of a President, or other related legislation. IIRC, their Constitution gives the leader total immunity. > [@Airman Doors](#): > > Exculpatory evidence? What’s that? He killed those Kurds but not those Kurds? > > This case is so airtight that Johnnie Cochran himself could pull out the Chewbacca defense for Saddam and he’d still lose. Well, there are still questions to be answered at the trial as to which acts he actually committed, and which are merely rumors, such as the fabled plastic shredder. I think we should be as honest and open as possible in examining the evidence. I have a fear that some of the atrocities of which Saddam will be convicted will be unsubstantiated, much like the weeping girl who described Iraqi soldiers tossing Kuwaiti babies out of incubators. Sure, he’s capable of it, no one doubts that, but will the angry jury actually stop to consider the truth of the statements, or will emotions rule the day? ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 7:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/31 "2004-07-03T07:43:58Z")
> [@Lissa](#): > > I have a fear that some of the atrocities of which Saddam will be convicted will be unsubstantiated, much like the weeping girl who described Iraqi soldiers tossing Kuwaiti babies out of incubators. Just to nitpick, but that whole incubator story appears to be a 100% fabrication: > [@](#): > > [**Iraq: Fact or Myth**](http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=2528) > > MYTH > Iraqi soldiers ripped Kuwaiti babies out of incubators when they invaded Kuwait in August 1990. > > FACT > In October 1990, members of Congress listened to the powerful testimony of a 15-year-old Kuwaiti “refugee” named Nayirah. In tears, Nayirah described how she had witnessed Iraqi troops steal incubators from a hospital, leaving 312 babies “on the cold floor to die.” > > …There’s just one problem: It wasn’t true. Nayirah’s false testimony was part of a $10 million Kuwait government propaganda campaign managed by the public relations firm Hill and Knowlton. Rather than working as a volunteer at a hospital, **Nayirah was actually the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador** to Washington. ---
**Author:** ![Sisyphus\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bc79bd/32.png) [@Sisyphus\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sisyphus_Stone)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/32 "2004-07-03T10:09:30Z")
> [@qcomdrj](#): > > First, yes, the UN is weak. It is in the best interests of the US to insure that the UN is weak. That’s why the UN is considered weak. If the US gave the UN their head, the US would figure right out of international politics. The UN sees the obvious intervention (read invasions) from the US to further the US economic interests in world politics. Because the UN has tended towards the humanitarian side of politics, the UN opposes the US. The polarity (and the polemic) is readily apparent. ---
**Author:** ![Apos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Apos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apos)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/33 "2004-07-03T15:04:54Z")
> [@](#): > > IIRC, Saddam’s lawyers are floating the balloon that Saddam can’t be guilty of any crimes, since he was the Head of state at the time those events occurred, and therefore everything he did was legal by dint of authority. The scary thing about this is that it’s been pretty much U.S. policy to nod sagely at stuff like that when it comes to mass murderers who are still on our side. If there is any hypocrisy in this situation, it is in the fact that: -the U.S. media is falling all over themselves to call Saddam a brutual murderer and vicious dictator and so on: but they do not seem to use these terms as widely or eagerly for other brutual dictators. Apparently, they have to be safely behind bars before the media will honestly characterize these guys as what they are. Till then they can yuk it up with Larry King for all the media cares -the U.S. has a stance on murdering dictators that cannot in any way be based on any coherent sense of morality, just realpolitik. Pinochet was a mass murderer. So is Rios Mont of Guatemala. So was Saddam Hussien when we supported his brutual bloody rise to power and stayed good pals after he eradicated whole towns. There have been numerous times which the US could have brought these men to justice outside of their own country’s laws (which protected them), but we held raising a stink to be more of a concern than punishing evildoers. ---
**Author:** ![Apos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Apos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apos)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/34 "2004-07-03T15:08:18Z")
Personally, I think the major point of the rushed, heavily stacked trial is to: -help Bush’s re-election chances, just as Saddam says -humiliate Saddam, which will drive home to Iraqis that Saddam’s era is over It’s not really to conduct a real or fair trial. I don’t think one could be conducted for this guy under any circumstances. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/35 "2004-07-03T16:48:33Z")
> [@Apos](#): > > Personally, I think the major point of the rushed, heavily stacked trial is to: > > -help Bush’s re-election chances, just as Saddam says > -humiliate Saddam, which will drive home to Iraqis that Saddam’s era is over While I think Bush can and will gain a lot of political points by the \*\*pre-trial \*\* publicity, has a date even been set for the actual trial? I doubt it’ll take place before the election. I’m wondering why you consider it “rushed”. ---
**Author:** ![1010011010](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/1/ea666f/32.png) [@1010011010](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/1010011010)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/36 "2004-07-03T18:56:03Z")
Here’s a thought… Does the new Iraq have any more claim of jurisdiction over Saddam than any other country? Granted the two nations in question both call(ed) themselves Iraq, but I’m willing to be most of the stuff Saddam did wasn’t illegal for him to do in Saddam’s Iraq. So, by that reasoning, he hasn’t commited any crimes. There’s the new Iraq, yes, and it might be illegal under the legal code of the new Iraq, but if that’s the case… isn’t it pretty much a completely different nation, only with the same land and name? I’magine all this will be ignored, due to the convenience it affords in disposing of Saddam, though. ---
**Author:** ![Mehitabel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8797f3/32.png) [@Mehitabel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mehitabel)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/37 "2004-07-03T19:29:05Z")
Heh. I’ve seen some amazing stories in the past few days quoting ordinary Iraqis. My favorite is the man who had all his brothers killed by him and wants the Iraqis to execute him, and then have Allah send him back to Earth so he can be killed again, and then Allah sends him back to Earth…and the relatives of the Halabja victims? Now, they have much worse plans for him. Anyway, trial’s not until early 2005 at the earliest. By then the Americans may have little to no input, according to [this article.](http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/01/international/middleeast/01TRIA.html) > [@](#): > > Compared with war-crimes courts from Nuremberg to Sierra Leone, the Iraqi Special Tribunal is unique in that it is not an independent international judiciary from the start. The Iraqi government has insisted on trying him in the country, under Iraqi law and by Iraqi judges. American lawyers and law enforcement agents have been dispatched to sift through the evidence against Mr. Hussein, dig up mass graves for forensic proof of his crimes and develop the prosecution strategy. > [@](#): > > Many Iraqis say that having a court composed of fellow Iraqis try the former dictator could provide a kind of catharsis that an international tribunal could not. One of Moammar Qaddafi’s daughters just joined the defense team today. Mix of Arab and Western lawyers, including an American. It’ll be interesting to say the least. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/38 "2004-07-03T20:08:50Z")
How can he be tried under Iraqi law when Iraqi law at the time gave him sovereign immunity? Any conviction of Saddam would be based on ex post facto law. The only crimes Saddam could be guilty of is international crimes aganst humanity charges. And the competant body to judge him on that is the World Court. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/39 "2004-07-03T20:14:50Z")
If Saddam does end up being tried and executed, won’t he be the first head of state put on trial by his own people and put to death? ---
**Author:** ![Zagadka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zagadka/32/7272_2.png) [@Zagadka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zagadka)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056/40 "2004-07-03T20:28:49Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > If Saddam does end up being tried and executed, won’t he be the first head of state put on trial by his own people and put to death? Unless you count all those times where the people did without the formality of a trial? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trial-of-saddam-a-savage-hypocrisy/253056.md?page=3)