[continued from previous message] 
  
 This was hardly surprising. No Iraqis, not even the Sunni community from 
 which he came, wanted Saddam back in power. Only the US generals, at their 
 ludicrous press conferences in Baghdad's Green Zone, pretended that he 
 played a central role in the war against the occupation. As his lieutenants 
 pictured on the US Army's notorious pack of cards were killed or captured, 
 it became increasingly evident that none was at the centre of the war of 
 resistance. 
  
 The US made every effort to portray the trial of Saddam as an Iraqi-run 
 affair, but the former leader was right in seeing it as orchestrated by 
 Washington. If confirmation of this were needed, it came when the date for 
 announcing his death sentence was moved to 5 November, so it could be the 
 leading item on the news the day before the US midterm elections. In the 
 event, the reality of 25,000 US soldiers killed and wounded in Iraq made 
 more impression on American voters. 
  
 Many Iraqis will rejoice at the death of Saddam. While some will accept his 
 estimate of himself as a symbol of his country, making the final patriotic 
 sacrifice, he is only one of 4,000 Iraqis who will die violently this month. 
 The war has its own momentum, and Iraqis are too worried about staying alive 
 themselves to lament or rejoice very long at the execution of the man who 
 ruled them for a quarter of a century. 
  
 [Patrick Cockburn is the author of 'The Occupation: War and Resistance in 
 Iraq' (Verso) ] 
  
  
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