MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti commentator Andrei Murtazin) - Iraq has been living without Saddam for six years, but the dictator's shadow still haunts the land. He was and remains a hideous tyrant for some, but others recollect with nostalgia the halcyon days when suicide bombers did not blow themselves up in the streets and when Iraq was one of the most influential regional powers.
The Saddam phenomenon invites comparison with Stalin. Under Hussein, the country was in many ways reminiscent of the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Iraq had borrowed from the U.S.S.R. the totalitarian political system: the ruling party, the structure of the armed forces, the special services and the apparatus of political surveillance. Foreigners who lived and worked in Iraq felt quite comfortable and safe, unless, of course, they meddled in the country's internal affairs or criticized the regime. Not so the Iraqis. Any rash remark spelled jail or execution.
Saddam came to power 30 years ago as a result of a government coup on July 16, 1979. However, unlike Nasser and Qaddafi, young rebel officers who toppled monarchies in Egypt and Libya, respectively, Hussein was no rookie politician. In spite of his comparatively young age (he was 42), he was already the number two man in the state after President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, controlling the repressive arm of the ruling Arab Socialist Revival Party (Baath), the Arab equivalent of the CPSU.
American-style democratization of Iraq has failed. None of the current Iraqi leaders have the charisma or the power of the executed dictator. There are three power centers in modern Iraq - the Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds - each torn by internecine conflicts, which will take not years but decades to resolve. The Americans have withdrawn troops from Iraq's cities, but they are not going to leave Iraq. Having spent massive material and human resources, they have the right to claim the lion's share of the Iraqi "oil pie." However, the government of Nuri al-Maliki is clearly afraid to be left to face the Sunnis who supported Saddam and indeed the Shiite brothers, with the rebel Imam Muqtada al-Sadr, who wants to turn Iraq into a theocratic state similar to Iran.
http://newageislam.com/six-years-after-saddam--dictator-or-martyr/islam-and-the-west/d/1562
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