Iraq: With His Country in Ruins, How Long Can Saddam Hang On?

O Iraqis! Yes, you triumphed when you stood with all this vigor against the armies of 30 states! You triumphed while emphasizing your ability to face the showdown and confrontation! You have recorded for Arabs and Muslims bright pages of glory that will be remembered for generations!

— Baghdad Radio, following the Feb. 28 cease-fire

That report was a blatant rewriting of history. Across Iraq, the shattered hulks of planes and tanks lie strewn across airfields and battlegrounds. Power stations, telephone and telegraph centers, oil refineries and factories have been reduced to smoldering ruins. Dozens of bombed bridges are slumped into the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Tens of thousands of Iraqi soldiers, as well as an unknown number of civilians, are dead. Many thousands more are either prisoners of the allied forces or straggling abjectly back to Iraq without their weapons. If this was victory, it is impossible to imagine what would constitute defeat.

Sooner or later — and probably sooner — Iraq’s 19 million battered people will understand just how costly Saddam Hussein’s miscalculation was. When they do, Saddam could face a fearful reckoning. The U.S. and its allies have made no secret of their desire that Saddam be overthrown by his own people. Most experts in Washington and other capitals say Saddam may be able to hang on, at least for a while, because he has so ruthlessly eliminated his internal rivals. But there was speculation that Saddam might flee. At week’s end there were rumors that he might seek political asylum in Algeria, although officials there denied it.

Saddam’s ouster or exile would end a bloody chapter in Iraqi history. But the one that follows could be just as sanguinary. In a country that has experienced five coups since 1958, Saddam’s 12 years in power are a record. His Baath Party has imposed stability through control of the army and a network of secret police and informers that penetrates every niche of Iraqi society. If that is swept away, simmering tensions between the Shi’ite Muslims (55% of the population), Sunni Muslims (20%) and Kurds (25%) could conceivably erupt into a communal bloodbath, fragmenting the country into another Lebanon.

That may be one argument for accepting Saddam’s continuation in power, provided he has been weakened to the point that he can no longer threaten neighboring countries. The gulf states have an interest in maintaining Baghdad’s sovereignty: a fragmented Iraq could give a resurgent Iran the chance to dominate the region. For the allies, the issues of putting Saddam on trial for war crimes and of Iraqi payment of reparations to Kuwait still need to be settled. Although he remains a hero to many of his followers, Saddam has probably ceased playing an effective role in Arab politics. Even such supporters as Jordan and the Palestine Liberation Organization are distancing themselves from Saddam in defeat.

It is hard to see how such a Saddam could ever be an international threat again. Alive, paradoxically, he is less of a hero than dead. His army is broken, his country is a shambles, and he has virtually no links to the outside world. Although the U.N. is likely to lift the economic sanctions fairly soon, the arms embargo will probably last as long as Saddam is in power.

There is little good news in Baghdad nowadays, but perhaps one bit is that people are beginning to voice criticism of their government in defiance of the dreaded mukhabarat, or secret police. The most common complaint has been the misery caused by the war. But this can be only the beginning. When the defeated troops return home with their stories of what really happened on the battlefield, Saddam’s claims of a glorious victory will be further undermined. “There will be a lot of opposition to Saddam inside Iraq,” observes Jamal Sha’ir, a former Jordanian Cabinet minister. “People will feel, ‘You are the one who sank us. You can’t be the one to correct things now.’ “

Saddam has made so many enemies that it would be suicide for him to hand over power voluntarily — unless he could get political asylum somewhere else. The most likely scenario — one that has ample precedent in Iraqi politics — is a coup by military commanders who feel that Saddam must pay the price for his misguided venture into Kuwait. There is reason for their anger: at every stage in the confrontation, Saddam’s blunders led to humiliation for Iraq. He personally devised a war-fighting strategy that resulted in the slaughter of large numbers of Iraqi soldiers while inflicting only a handful of casualties on coalition forces. He lost billions of dollars’ worth of military hardware, transforming the world’s fourth largest army into a military dwarf — all in a mere six weeks. With a debt of more than $70 billion, the country will be destitute for years to come.

Saddam’s hold on power has always relied on the placing of relatives from Iraq’s Takrit region in key positions of authority, and it might even be one of them who decides that the clan’s survival is more important than Saddam’s. In addition, two of his longtime associates appear to have more power than other members of the ruling circle: Deputy Prime Minister Taha Yassin Ramadan and Revolutionary Command Council Deputy Chairman Izzat Ibrahim. So far, neither has seemed ambitious enough to seize power for its own sake.

Another danger for Saddam is political unrest caused by Iraq’s severe economic crisis. Some experts believe that if protests start in Shi’ite Muslim areas south of Baghdad, it could bring down the regime.

Many Iraqis rallied around Saddam when their country was under attack by the allies, and felt betrayed by Arabs who didn’t come to their side. But eight years of war with Iran brought nothing comparable to the misery that Iraqis are experiencing now. Gasoline is rarely available, and when it is, the lines are 400 cars long. Baghdad residents have had no tap water or electricity for more than a month. Sewage systems overflowing with garbage are creating a health hazard. Surgical operations at hospitals have been conducted by candlelight without morphine. Food is still available, but prices have soared.

Last week an Iraqi official provided a glimpse into the kind of political difficulties Saddam may now face. Sharing a taxi into Baghdad with a foreign journalist, he openly speculated on what Iraq would be like without Saddam. That is an offense for which he could have been summarily shot. Sadly, the official took such a risk only to predict that Saddam’s successor could well be simply another Saddam.

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE

CREDIT: TIME Chart by Steve Hart

CAPTION: WHAT’S LEFT OF IRAQ’S ARMY