picture of Armando Soler, Cuba

The choice that Saddam Hussein now faces is far from being original. There are fewer and fewer opportunities for fleeing the country to enjoy spending the loot undisturbed. Even Syria, the dictator’s closest friend, changed its mind for inviting its dangerous friends after the USA had put pressure on it.
There is an anecdote about a dictator whose regime is about to collapse, his palace is being rounded up and he has but a few minutes to escape. There’s a helicopter waiting for him on the roof and the dictator is choosing a country that would accept him. He twirls the globe for a while and then asks the adjutant “Is it the only globe we have?”
Every year it becomes harder and harder for former dictators and international criminals to hide from retribution. Intelligence services and reconnaissance of states concerned used to hunt then down. For example, the Nazi criminal Adolph Ahman was stolen from Argentina by the Israeli special services, was tried in Israel in 1962, and was sentenced to death.
Bulgarian communist leader Todor Zhivkov, head of French collaborationist government Henri Petan, former Nicaraguan dictator Manuel Noriega – all of them were put under trial. Zhivkov was sentenced to long-term imprisonment. Due to his elderly age it was changed for house arrest, under which he died in 1998. Petan was sentenced to death, but De Goll replaced the capital punishment by life imprisonment, and he died in prison in 1951 at the age of 95. Pier Laval, also member of the collaborationist government in France, was tried and executed in 1945. And in 1990 American court sentenced Nicaraguan dictator Manuel Noriega to 40 years in prison.
In 1945 communist guerillas shot the Italian dictator Benitto Mussolini. In 1989 in Bucharest Rumanian communist dictator Nikolae Chaushesku was executed practically without any trial
The emperor of Central-African Republic Jan Bedel Bokasso, notorios for his cannibalism, was sentenced to death in his own country in 1988. Later on the sentence was changed for life imprisonment. He died in prison in 1996.
Ugandan dictator general Idi Amin did manage to escape the requital. He found asylum in Saudi Arabia where he is obviously now living. Former Cambodian dictator Paul Pot died a natural death hiding in jungles.
Slobodan Miloshevich and other war criminals, responsible for crimes against humanity in Yugoslavia and Rwanda, are waiting for the sentences of international war tribunals.
In case he is alive, Saddam Hussein will find it extremely difficult to find refuge. He’s unlikely to try and restore his power by galvanizing into life a guerilla movement. The man who had ordered gold lavatory pans to himself at the time when his fellow countrymen were dying of hunger will hardly find any public support. What’s more he is hardly capable of leading a guerilla life, which is full of risks, destitution and which requires the need of giving up one’s own welfare. He has only bank accounts worth millions. And it looks like he’ll never use these accounts again.
Sad is the fate of overthrown dictators.