"The point was that it was someone who knew Saddam well who was questioning Saddam's stated intentions. This man had exhorted others to fight to the last - but did not not do what he said he would do.

Does this make him a coward?"

No, not necessarily...it just makes him an absolutely typical wartime politician and resistance leader. They always say: "fight to the last". And really, what else would they say? To do otherwise would be ridiculous, under the circumstances. What did Winston Churchill say: "We will fight them on the beaches, we will fight them in the streets"...etc, etc, etc. What did Hitler and Stalin say? Same sort of thing exactly. It's standard wartime rhetoric for those in a desperate circumstance, who wish to shore up morale among the fighting troops.

Given the fact that Saddam was lying prone in a coffin-like, dark little crawl space, I hardly think it was necessary for the American troops to open fire on him when they found him...or very feasible for him to do anything but surrender or shoot himself. His natural desire for survival clearly was stronger than his desire for instant martyrdom...and that would be typical of most people, whether or not they were "cowards" in someone else's opinion.

His capture is good news for almost everyone except the remnants of the Baath Party and the various ordinary Arabs and Palestinians who looked to him as a sort of folk hero for resisting the USA (and, by implication, Israel).

Oh, and it's rather bad news for the Democrats, of course! I bet they're glad it didn't happen 2 weeks before the forthcoming 2004 election. The Republicans will probably schedule his show trail (or its conclusion) for around about then, if they can arrange it.

- LH