Original subtitles

[loud explosions; rapid gunfire]

(male narrator) 2003.

Following a swift and lethal invasion,

U.S. led forces occupy Iraq.

One of the most brutal regimes of the 20th century

has come to an end.

Ladies and gentlemen... we got him!

[loud applause & cheering]

(narrator) Iraq's former dictator, Saddam Hussein,

has been captured by U.S. Army Special Forces.

They found him on a farm, near the city of Tikrit,

at the bottom of an 8-foot hole in the ground.

(John Nixon) It was quite a night,

there was a real buzz in the station

and everybody was very excited.

And I was part of the team

that went in to debrief Saddam Hussein.

I remember thinking, it's Saddam,

it's really him, I still couldn't believe it.

At first he was very disarming.

You're expecting to get the Butcher of Baghdad and instead

you're getting somebody who is very charming, very personable.

Over time though, I would have this to say,

the more you got to know Saddam, the less you liked him.

And the more you got to see another side of him, which was,

could be a very nasty and brutish

and kind of a horrible and frightening figure.

Saddam was so ruthless, so brutal.

So violent in all sorts of ways.

[chanting]

(Natasha Ezrow) He was one of the most murderous leaders, really, in history.

And he got away with it.

He still was able to instill in his public

complete loyalty to him.

(narrator) Saddam Hussein ruled Iraq with an iron fist

for almost 30 years.

To maintain power for so long, he used fear,

intimidation, and violence

like few other dictators in history.

But in the end, even that was not enough.

[loud gunshot]

How did Saddam Hussein become

one of the most feared dictators of the 20th century,

only to lose it all?

(woman) Dictatorships have had an incredible impact

in the past century.

These dictators ended up learning from one another.

(man) They're all different, but many use the same tactics.

(woman) The use of terror. (man) Propaganda.

(woman) Control the elites. Create an enemy.

Cult of personality. (man) Use violence--

These are tools that dictators use to stay in power.

(narrator) April 28, 1937:

On the edge of the Arabian desert

in central Iraq, Saddam Hussein is born

into a family of poor, landless peasants.

He was born in a mud hut-- that means no floors, no toilets,

no running water, no electricity, in a tiny village

called Al-Awja, which means "crooked," and the population

by and large would have descended from nomadic tribes

The life of the Bedouin Nomad

was a very harsh life with its own rules of honor, of loyalty,

of obligation, family was immensely important.

(narrator) But Saddam's own family is in crisis.

Six months before he was born, his father disappeared.

Soon after, his 13-year-old brother died.

Saddam was now the only child

of a single mother.

He didn't have that father figure,

and the father figure in the Iraqi family,

particularly in tribes is a very important person because

they're a source of pride and prestige and protection.

(narrator) The young Saddam is beaten at home

and ridiculed and bullied by other village children.

You give into that or you fight it.

He definitely fought it.

(narrator) Saddam uses his advantage

in height and strength to strike back.

(Joseph Sassoon) He used violence from an early age

to basically tell everyone

that he is the person who has the power and control.

(narrator) It is a tactic Saddam will return to throughout his life,

a tool that will come to define his dictatorship.

(Natasha Ezrow) The use of violence

is important to any dictatorship.

It's key to the way they seize power and maintain control.

(Mariam Mufti) Saddam learned to use violence

as a tool in all sorts of ways.

He could use it for the purposes of threatening the population,

in a targeted way,

but also more generally.

There was an evolution in the way Saddam Hussein used violence

and it became more excessive as time went on.

In fact, I would argue that it became

even more random and unpredictable.

He really did become a master at the use of violence.

(narrator) In 1955, at the age of 18, Saddam settles in Baghdad.

There, his violent character will collide

with the turbulent Iraqi politics of the day.

He finds the capitol city alive with talk of revolution .

He grew up in that period really, almost everyone

was talking about Iraqi nationalism,

about its independence,

about the need to be totally sovereign.

(narrator) Iraq is built on the ruins of ancient Mesopotamia,

a civilization thousands of years old.

But the modern nation of Iraq

is a 20th-century invention.

Established by the Western powers after World War 1,

the country is a complicated mix of Sunni and Shia Muslims,

and other religious and ethnic minorities.

Since 1920,

Iraq has effectively been under British control.

The country is ruled by a monarchy,

under the puppet regime of King Faisal II.

But Britain controls Iraq's politics

and reaps almost all the profits of its vast oil wealth...

while 80% of Iraqis still live in abject poverty.

Fed up with this foreign influence,

Iraqis like Saddam are determined

to regain control of their own country.

Soon after his arrival in Baghdad,

Saddam joins the Ba'ath Party:

a new, revolutionary nationalist movement committed to achieving

Iraqi independence, by violence if necessary.

But there is another revolutionary group in Iraq,

one that is fiercely opposed to the Ba'ath vision

of Iraqi nationalism-- the Iraqi Communist party.

(Joseph Sassoon) The Ba'ath Party was really

a way to counter the communist ideology

that was spreading in the Arab world in the '30s and '40s.

(narrator) The communists and the Ba'aths are locked

in a bitter competition to control Iraq's future.

The communist party was an ominous force, and they were

the only archenemy if you were Saddam Hussein at the time.

(narrator) Saddam sees a way to help the Ba'ath cause

by doing what he knows best.

He becomes an enforcer for the party

and organizes roving gangs to intimidate communist opponents.

(Kanan Makaiya) He spent his youth contending with and fighting

the communist party on the streets

in all sorts of different ways.

(narrator) Saddam quickly makes himself

known to party leaders as a man unafraid of violence.

(Kanan Makaiya) So 1956 was the point at which

ideas were now decisively going to turn into

what this young man wanted to do with his life,

which was, become a militant, become a fighter.

(narrator) Then, in 1958,

a sudden change sets up an opportunity for Saddam.

The Iraqi Army stages a violent coup d'état.

King Faisal II and his family

are gunned down in the royal palace.

A new military dictatorship is established

under General Abd al-Karim Qasim.

It seems the dream of an independent Iraq

is finally within reach.

(Kanan Makaiya) So Saddam, like the rest of the Ba'ath party would have

cheered and applauded, gone out on the streets

in the immediate aftermath of the 1958 revolution.

(narrator) But almost immediately, the Ba'ath party is caught up

in a power struggle with the new government.

(John Nixon) There were elements of the Ba'ath Party who thought that

they were going to have more of a say in the government,

then they realized that the military was freezing them out.

(narrator) For Saddam and his comrades, the ultimate betrayal comes

when Qasim aligns his government with their sworn enemy,

the Iraqi Communist party.

The Ba'ath Party believes there is only one option left.

They assemble a team to assassinate General Qasim.

Among the first to volunteer is Saddam Hussein.

(Natasha Ezrow) Saddam Hussein had such facility with violence and brutality

but he is smart and he is wily.

He knows he's the man for this job.

(Joseph Sassoon) I think Saddam saw the assassination

as a way to advance,

saw it as a way to climb the ladder.

(John Nixon) I think Saddam always understood

that there's a lot of potential for advancement

if you're willing to do the things

that other people aren't willing to do.

(narrator) October 7, 1959.

22-year-old Saddam Hussein has used violence

to rise through the ranks of the Ba'ath Party.

Now, he's about to use violence on a whole new level.

Saddam and a small team of comrades are plotting

to assassinate Iraq's new leader, General Qasim.

They will attack his motorcade in broad daylight,

on central Baghdad's busiest avenue.

For Saddam, it is a key turning point on his path to power;

a moment he will later use to build a heroic image of himself

and justify his dictatorship.

(Mariam Mufti) Myth making is a commonly used strategy

by a lot of dictators, because they want to appear to

be more heroic, braver, better than the average person.

In Saddam Hussein's case, he used an origin story

to make people believe that he was special,

and that he was born to be their leader.

(narrator) Part of Saddam's mythology

is based on the assassination plot against General Qasim.

In time, the story morphs

into a celebration of his heroism,

and years later, it's even made into a feature film.

Shown on Iraqi television,

the film depicts Saddam and his comrades

in a daring attack on the presidential motorcade.

[loud gunfire]

(Natasha Ezrow) He created a legend around himself

that this was someone that was not a normal person.

That the people were lucky that they had this person

who is seen as a brave and bold leader

willing to stand up against any types of threats.

(narrator) The film shows Saddam's heroic escape after the assault.

He barely survives a serious bullet wound in his leg,

eludes Qasim's well-armed security forces, flees Baghdad

and makes a thousand-mile journey through Syria, to Egypt.

But, in fact, the attack on General Qasim was nothing like

the glorious heroism depicted in the film.

It was a total disaster.

In reality, the assassination attempt ends in chaos.

Qasim is wounded, but survives,

and Saddam flees to a Baghdad safe house

where he is treated for a minor bullet wound.

(John Nixon) He said it was, yeah, it was a complete failure.

He got shot in the crossfire by one of his own people

as they were trying to nail Qasim in his motorcade.

(narrator) Some later claim it was Saddam's own fault

that the attempt was botched--

that he started shooting too early.

The attempt failed,

the leader was injured,

but so was Saddam, and he escaped.

(narrator) Saddam flees the country

and hides out in the Egyptian capitol, Cairo.

It's there that he begins to build

the myth of his heroic destiny.

He lays out his own version of what happened--

that he was a fearless warrior who nearly took down the regime

and escaped to fight another day.

That stamps his perception within the party.

He is the kind of thug,

he is the street fighter par excellence.

He's the man who understands guns.

(narrator) It is this self-created reputation

that will propel Saddam to ultimate power in Iraq.

February 9, 1963.

While Saddam is still in exile,

General Qasim is shot dead by Ba'ath party loyalists,

sparking a 5-year power struggle.

Saddam returns to Iraq.

But it's not until 1968

that the Ba'ath Party finally rises triumphant

it takes power under Saddam's own cousin,

President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr.

Under the new military dictatorship,

al-Bakr and a small group of key Ba'ath loyalists

assume almost total control over the running of the nation.

Thanks to his heroic reputation, Saddam is able to leverage

his way to a senior position in the new government.

Officially, Saddam is made vice president.

But with one eye on the future, he takes on another role--

one that many dictators have used

to gain the upper hand over rivals and enemies.

Controlling the secret police is important to the dictatorship

because they need to know

who the opponents are of the regime.

They need to get access to really good information.

They need to know who is loyal to the regime.

And they need the secret police to do its dirty work.

(narrator) Saddam's new security apparatus, known as the Mukhbarat,

will later be compared to the Gestapo,

the infamous and brutal secret police force

of Adolf Hitler's Nazi regime.

Their methods include espionage, intimidation, and terror,

and are used to send a clear message--

be loyal to the dictator, or else.

Saddam really believed in one thing;

it has to be loyalty to 100%.

It cannot be even 99%-- there is no such a thing.

(narrator) Saddam uses the secret police

to create an elaborate surveillance system

to monitor private mail and telephone communications.

Secret files are created for thousands of suspected traitors

in the government, the military, and the public at large.

(Joseph Sassoon) These are files about everyone.

Saddam would write in the margins in his own handwriting,

"to be kept for future reference."

and if someone crosses Saddam or become disloyal to him,

that's when this information will come up

and be used against them.

And that gives you an edge over them when you need it.

(Hayder Atracki) They bugged our phones.

They monitored all the phone calls.

(narrator) Like many Iraqis, Hayder Atracki

and his entire family lived for decades

under the threat of Saddam's secret police.

(Hayder Atracki) You are not free to talk.

You can't talk against him.

Always we were under eye of Saddam Hussein.

Always, they are watching us.

It's very dangerous-- if he feel you are a threat to him,

you are gone-- that's it.

(narrator) In 1969,

barely a year into his tenure,

Saddam will demonstrate the full power of his new position.

He claims that his secret police

have uncovered a broad conspiracy against the state.

(Kanan Makaiya) And they pluck 13 people,

as key conspirators supposedly.

They make a great big public spectacle

of the hanging of these 13 people.

(narrator) The executions are announced on national radio.

It's believed that as many as half a million Iraqis

gather to watch in central Baghdad.

(Natasha Ezrow) The reason why you make this public is,

it has a very, very big psychological impact.

It doesn't just affect the victims: it also affects anyone

who might think about challenging the regime.

(Kanan Makaiya) It was instilled in the mind of every Iraqi citizen

that if they broke with what was expected of them,

this would be the punishment they would receive.

And it was the terror of that hanging over your life

that was an enormous check on people's behavior.

Dictators always want to create

a sense that you might be picked up

or if you do something wrong

your mother might be interrogated.

So they want to create this fear as a general rule.

(narrator) By the end of the 1970s,

as vice president and head of the secret police,

Saddam has consolidated almost total control over Iraq.

It ends up, he was able to use this platform

to basically subvert everybody else

and to make himself really the leader of Iraq.

(narrator) After more than a decade

as Iraqi vice president and head of the secret police,

Saddam is ready to take the ultimate step to power.

In July 1979,

President Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr resigns,

making way for his second in command.

At just 42 years old, Saddam Hussein

is now the undisputed leader of Iraq.

He moves quickly to send a message to anyone

who could challenge his new dictatorship,

especially its biggest potential threat.

The country's ruling elite.

(Natasha Ezrow) Most of the time dictators are ousted in a coup

or some sort of elite ousting or removal.

And so the elites really hold the key.

They are the big stumbling block for dictators

in terms of holding themselves in power indefinitely.

The elites are going to be the ones

that are the biggest threat to any dictator.

And so in the beginning, dictatorships are often

highly repressive: trying to find out who is disloyal,

who they can't trust and who they need to get rid of.

(narrator) Just 5 days after taking office, Saddam calls a meeting

of Iraq's senior governing elite,

the Revolutionary Command Council.

Saddam Hussein had

this particular spectacle filmed in great length.

[man repeats a word; applause]

(narrator) Citing information he has

accumulated from secret police, Saddam claims

he has uncovered a conspiracy to overthrow his new regime.

[Saddam speaks Arabic]

(Joseph Sassoon) He begins by announcing

that it really truly pains him

to hear that people are plotting

against him, against the country.

And they are traitors.

(narrator) He has an informant read

the names of suspected traitors.

As each name is read aloud,

a man is sent out of the auditorium

and arrested by the secret police.

(Joseph Sassoon) I think people realize

nothing really truly matters except loyalty to him.

(narrator) In a chilling twist,

Saddam forces the remaining government officials

to personally execute their arrested colleagues.

[gunfire]

Notice the kind of fiendish intelligence behind this.

You are implicating them

in your assent to the presidency of the republic.

Complicity has essentially bound them to the regime.

They can't escape it.

(narrator) The film of the assembly is circulated around Iraq.

This sent a very clear message that if you are not loyal to me,

if you do not give me your undying support,

I will kill you.

[applause]

(Joseph Sassoon) And that in my opinion

established him in the party

as the unconditional leader.

(narrator) Saddam has relied on fear and violence

to establish his authority over the elites.

But to win their continued support,

he will need to use a softer touch.

(Natasha Ezrow) No dictator can survive with just repression alone,

they're going to have to employ a strategy

of not just sticks, but also carrots.

(narrator) Saddam begins to use public funds

to keep the ruling class happy.

Almost everyone in Saddam's inner circle,

including his closest political advisers

and a small army of bodyguards, is given a luxury car.

(John Nixon) The people around Saddam were very loyal

and they had reason to be loyal

because the well-being of them and their families

was connected to the well-being of the regime.

(narrator) With the loyalty of the elites secure for now, Saddam knows

he has to keep the Iraqi public on his side as well.

Taking advantage of Iraq's growing oil wealth,

Saddam funds a series of economic and social programs

designed to benefit average citizens.

Overall you could argue that this was the period

that really the Iraqi people

benefited from the dramatic economic progress.

There is a lot of money coming in

which was used for infrastructure.

(narrator) Iraq provides free, universal healthcare,

free university education,

and equal rights for women.

(Joseph Sassoon) And that is the empowerment he gave to women.

More women are entering the universities,

more job opportunities for women.

He believes that if he gains the support of women,

he will have 50% of the population.

(narrator) Above all, Saddam wants the public to see

his dictatorship as the source

of a more modern, more prosperous nation.

Many people want stability, they want predictability.

They want to be assured that they are going to be taken care of.

And that's something that dictatorships provide.

This really ensures that the masses feel

that there is a need for this dictatorship.

[extremely loud cheering]

(narrator) With both an iron fist and a giving hand,

Saddam has gained control

over Iraq's elite and the broader public.

His new dictatorship seems rock solid.

(narrator) But in 1980,

a new danger appears on the horizon,

one that will directly threaten his rule.

A recent revolution in neighboring Iran

has overthrown its monarchy.

In its place, a new Islamic republic has been established

under the radical Muslim leader, Ayatollah Khomeini.

The rise of Khomeini in Iran is very disturbing to him

because of the extreme religious philosophy.

(narrator) The Ayatollah believes in theocratic rule--

that Iran, and the entire Middle Eastern world,

should be run strictly by religious law.

Khomeini publicly calls for a revolution in Iraq;

he urges Shia Iraqis to rise up

against Saddam's regime and build a new Islamic republic.

It's a challenge Saddam can't ignore.

To face this threat to his power,

and unite his public behind him,

he turns to another classic dictator's tactic.

One of the important tools for any dictatorship

is to create an enemy; either it's imagined

and sometimes maybe it is actually real.

But they need to have some sort of enemy

that they can use as a scapegoat.

And that is one way they can unite the masses

to be committed to the particular dictatorship.

(narrator) For Saddam, the enemy is very real.

He begins telling the Iraqi public

that Iran is out to destroy modern Iraq

and turn it into a medieval religious state

and that he alone can stop this from happening.

That external enemy is a threat,

these people are out to get us.

We have to get them before they get us.

(narrator) Saddam expels some 35,000 Iraqi citizens of Iranian origin,

claiming they are part of the Ayatollah's plan

to topple his regime.

He also plans a bold preemptive strike against Iran.

It's purpose-- to remove the Ayatollah

before the Ayatollah removes him.

[rapid gunfire]

On September 22, 1980,

Iraqi forces cross the border into Iran.

Saddam believes victory will come in a matter of days.

But the invasion quickly stalls

and becomes a bloody war of attrition.

(narrator) In 1982,

two years into the war,

Saddam gets some vital help from an unexpected source--

the United States government.

The Americans, under President Ronald Reagan,

see Saddam as a secular Arab nationalist

providing the last line of defense

against Iran's religious extremism.

Remember, Iran was already an enemy of the United States

since the kidnapping of the members of the U.S. Embassy.

I think that the Americans thought, here is a man

who is obviously antireligious, anticommunist.

He is willing to share

the same ideals economically with the West.

(narrator) The CIA actively begins

to encourage and aid Saddam's war with the Ayatollah.

I think there was definitely the American support to Iraq,

a lot of intelligence was exchanged,

photos of bases,

a lot of information about Iranian units were given.

And there was a belief that he might win.

(narrator) But the American aid is not enough to get Saddam

the quick victory he was hoping for.

As casualties continue to mount, Saddam offers Iran a cease-fire.

The Ayatollah rejects the offer

and vows to keep fighting until Saddam is overthrown.

(Natasha Ezrow) And so when this happened,

one of Saddam Hussein's ministers

suggested to him "Why don't you step down temporarily,

and then after the truce has been accepted,

you can return to power."

Saddam Hussein thanked him for his service,

and then the next day his body arrived in a duffel bag,

delivered to his wife, and it was chopped up into pieces.

And that sent a very clear message.

You have to be loyal to him or else you will face

some of the most horrible things that you can imagine facing.

You couldn't even give any kind of inkling

that you challenged him.

Every single thing that you said had to comply with his wishes.

He wanted people to tell them

that the military was stronger than ever

and that they were defeating their enemies

even though this was far from the truth.

And that helps explain, to some extent,

why Saddam Hussein was so delusional.

He was surrounded by sycophants

that told him exactly what he wanted to hear.

(narrator) Over the next 8 years,

as many as 500,000 Iraqis will die.

Almost every Iraqi family suffers a personal loss.

For Saddam, the sheer scale of the war with Iran

has weakened his grip on power at home.

He is about to face any dictator's worst nightmare...

open rebellion.

Sensing an opportunity,

the Kurds, one of Iraq's largest ethnic minorities,

rise up against the dictatorship,

they seize the town of Halabja near the border with Iran.

In response, Saddam will resort to violence yet again.

But this time, it's a unique kind of violence

with a dual purpose-- to crush an immediate threat

and deter any future challenge.

Terror is the indiscriminate and arbitrary use of force

that can incite fear in the hearts of people.

That fear can be used by the dictator to advance his goals.

Now terror is the kind of unique brutal violence

that people tend to remember, and it leaves

a lasting impression on the minds of people.

(narrator) In March 1988,

Saddam orders his military commanders

to crush the Kurdish rebellion.

The air force launches an attack on Halabja.

An 11 year-old Iraqi Kurd, Kamaran Haider,

takes refuge alone in a bomb shelter.

(narrator) But some of the bombs are unconventional,

they are filled with poison gas.

Men, women, and children succumb to Sarin and mustard gas.

It is a horrible death.

In the aftermath, Kamaran Haider goes outside

to search for his family,

and see what Saddam's military has done.

[Kamaran Haider speaks]

(narrator) In all, some 5,000 of Saddam's own citizens are killed.

Another 10,000 are horribly injured.

Just as Saddam intended,

the attack solves two problems for his regime.

It reminds Iraqis of the price to be paid for rebellion.

And it sends a powerful message to Saddam's mortal enemy, Iran.

That, of course, instills terror.

And then he manipulated it and worked with it.

(narrator) Iran's leaders now fear

Saddam could unleash chemical weapons on their cities.

They agree to begin UN brokered cease-fire negotiations.

After 8 years of brutal fighting, the war ends

with neither side achieving any territorial gains.

(Kanan Makaiya) An 8-year-long war,

a human meat grinder if there ever was one,

a war that in its impact and scope on the region

as big as World War I on the countries that waged it.

I mean, it results in a million dead.

(narrator) But within days of the cease-fire,

as he has done before, Saddam props up his dictatorship

by spinning failure into triumph.

Dictators in general,

tend to use propaganda to generate a false reality.

It is the ultimate fake news.

And Saddam really wanted to convince the people

that he was a great military leader.

He really wanted them to believe that everything

that he had done was for the best of the country.

However, in reality, the war was a total disaster

and Iraq suffered many losses.

(Joseph Sassoon) He announces that it is a holiday.

I want every Iraqi to celebrate.

And that is really one of the things about Saddam--

how you can turn a war that is really not successful,

to a successful ending.

[people cheering]

(Fathali Moghaddam) We see this illusion of control,

and of course, we see

an increased exaggeration of their own glory,

of their own abilities.

(narrator) But the sham victory celebrations

are just a temporary distraction from a new problem...

the war has left his regime nearly bankrupt.

This was really a huge issue.

Saddam never needed money as much as he needed in 1988.

(narrator) After the 8-year war with Iran,

Iraq is billions of dollars in debt to its neighbors,

especially Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

Saddam demands the debts be forgiven.

The response from the gulf Arab countries,

especially from Kuwait was,

no, we're not going to forgive the loan.

And Saddam felt very insulted by this,

because he felt that he had bled for them,

and now he was being treated like a beggar.

I think it hurt his sense of pride and honor,

and I think he thought he wanted to teach them a lesson,

particularly wanted to teach the Kuwaiti's a lesson.

(narrator) Saddam outlines a plan

to invade and annex Iraq's neighbor, Kuwait.

He believes Kuwait's cash and oil reserves could prop up

Iraq's failing economy and strengthen his regime.

But it's a move that will break

a cardinal rule of a successful dictatorship--

never provoke an enemy you can't hope to beat.

Saddam is about to pick a fight with some powerful foes.

His sense of wanting to show strength

really truly dominates his thinking all the time.

This always tilts him to take action

that actually is counterproductive.

(narrator) August 2, 1990.

Saddam's army invades Kuwait.

Leaders in the West warn that the invasion

could spark a wider war in the Middle East, drawing in

key oil-producing nations like Saudi Arabia,

and jeopardizing some 50% of the global oil supply.

The response to Saddam's aggression

is swift and near unanimous.

And the American goodwill Saddam enjoyed

during the Iran/Iraq war is wiped out.

President George H.W. Bush,

with the full backing of the United Nations,

sends an enormous ground, naval, and air force

halfway around the world to the Persian Gulf.

Saddam's strong-arm tactics have always served him well at home,

but to the rest of the world,

his methods are a dangerous provocation.

He's about to face an opponent that will not be bullied.

(Kanan Makaiya) I think he was very smart,

but he had street smarts.

And he had Iraqi street smarts.

You know, street smarts only work in the streets that you know.

So he did not perhaps understand the world,

I'm pretty sure of that. He misjudged phenomenally

what the United States might or might not do.

Saddam really misunderstands the West, international affairs,

time and again, and of course,

this begins a series of catastrophic mistakes.

(narrator) On January 16th, 1991,

the American-led coalition makes Saddam pay for his aggression.

[jet engines roar; extremely loud explosions]

Operation Desert Storm begins.

For the first time in his dictatorship,

Saddam is truly vulnerable.

He goes deep into hiding,

moving to a new location every day.

Within weeks,

the American led coalition force crushes Saddam's army.

What's left of it limps back across the border to Iraq.

(Pres. George H.W. Bush) As president, I can report to the nation,

aggression is defeated, the war is over.

[loud applause]

Thank you!

(narrator) But Saddam gets an extraordinarily lucky break.

UN forces had orders to liberate Kuwait,

not to bring down his regime.

The coalition forces withdraw,

and Saddam emerges from hiding.

He has survived,

but his dictatorship hangs by a thread.

(John Nixon) When it came to Kuwait,

he sort of put his hands up to his head and rubbed his eyes.

And just said oh, this gives me such a headache!

And ah, and that was as close to an admission of failure

or that he had made a mistake.

Things weren't the same after that.

(narrator) From this moment on,

Saddam has a target on his back.

Surviving the Gulf War isn't a victory,

it's a stay of execution.

[shouting a command]

(narrator) As Saddam will soon find out,

he remains in the crosshairs of the United States.

I believe that the George W. Bush administration

felt that Saddam was unfinished business but wasn't quite sure

what it was going to do to remove him from power.

Thank you for coming.

(narrator) The answer to this problem is provided in September, 2001.

[whistle of jet engines then loud explosion]

(John Nixon) After 9/11 that was all that they needed.

[screaming]

That is the day that Saddam's death warrant gets signed.

(narrator) The United States declares an international war on terror.

After moving on Afghanistan, it sets its sights on Saddam.

To build the case against him, the Bush administration alleges

that Saddam has weapons of mass destruction

and plans to use them on America and its allies.

Saddam must give them up or risk invasion.

In fact, Saddam has no such weapons,

but his old strong-man instincts

cultivated since childhood lead him

to project strength rather than tell the truth.

To international weapons inspectors, he lies,

obfuscates, and behaves as if he actually has an arsenal of WMDs.

Weakness was really critical.

That's one of the reasons that he never declared

that there were no weapons of mass destruction,

because that was showing weakness,

to the Iraqi people and to the world.

(narrator) In the face of Saddam's obstruction and arrogance,

President Bush concludes the time for talk is over.

On March 20th, 2003,

American and British forces launch Operation Iraqi Freedom,

a massive air and ground assault.

Unlike the Gulf War,

this is a no-holds-barred invasion with one purpose--

bringing down Saddam and his regime.

Iraq has been under Saddam's control since the 1970s.

Now, a generation later,

his rule has finally come to end.

But even in the face of total defeat,

Saddam refuses to give up.

Once again, he goes deep into hiding.

(John Nixon) He had a very strong feeling

that he was the leader of Iraq,

he belonged in Iraq, and he will survive this.

The American's will tire, and then they'll leave,

and he'll live another day.

(narrator) But Saddam has misjudged his enemy once again.

[engine roars]

[loud explosion]

An elite task force is ordered to hunt him down.

Navy SEALS and Delta Force units search house-to-house,

arresting and interrogating Saddam's former associates.

The U.S. military also offers a $25 million reward

for information leading to his capture.

But no one is willing to give him up.

Saddam may be beaten and on the run,

but most Iraqis still believe he is too dangerous to betray.

And to remain at large, Saddam doubles down

on his old tactics of bribery, threats, and deception.

(John Nixon) One of the things that Saddam did that was very clever,

and it shows you his street smarts and his genius

when it comes to his own personal safety,

he took a lot of his usual bodyguards

and switched them out and brought in a new set

that were unknown to foreign intelligence agencies,

and people had been watching his regime for years,

and these individuals, we didn't know anything about them.

(narrator) After 9 months of searching,

some 600 operations against possible targets,

and more than 300 interrogations,

the task force catches a break.

They found one of the bodyguards one of the chief bodyguards

who, you know, decided to give him up and got a big payday.

(narrator) December 13th, 8:30 pm,

acting on the chief bodyguard's tip,

U.S. Special Forces discover Saddam's hiding place.

He is found in a hole in the ground,

just miles from his birthplace.

Ironically, his life has come full circle.

(John Nixon) it was quite a night, there was a real buzz in the station,

and everybody was very excited, and we had gotten a message

that the military thought they had Saddam Hussein,

but they weren't completely sure,

and that's when I got asked to identify him.

The minute I laid eyes on him, I knew it was him.

(narrator) Even under heavily armed American military guard,

Saddam still believes there is a way out.

He didn't show any signs

of a person having their world turned upside down,

he didn't seem panicked.

He still had this sense that he was still president of Iraq.

Deep down he always harbored a hope, I think, that somehow

the American's would come to their senses,

and he'd be able to cut a deal, and I think that deep down,

he still was kind of hoping for a miracle.

(narrator) Charged with crimes against humanity,

Saddam is publicly tried in an Iraqi court.

Defiant to the end.

[Saddam speaks Arabic]

(narrator) He rails against the court, even as he is found

guilty on all counts, and sentenced to death.

(John Nixon) He thought he would be

remembered very, very positively.

He seemed to feel that the Iraqi people loved him,

that they will always love him, and that they will see,

especially what happens after he's gone,

they will see that, how much he did for them.

[chanting]

(narrator) December 30, 2006.

At the age of 69, Saddam Hussein meets the same brutal fate

he had handed out to so many of his victims.

[loud applause & cheering]

Across the nation, Iraqis,

weary of war and hardship, celebrate his death.

Saddam Hussein was a classic strongman dictator.

His relentless use of violence, terror, and fear

helped him create one of the most enduring dictatorships

of the 20th century.

But those same tactics made him live

in a dangerously false reality,

forever convinced of his own invincibility,

even as his country was invaded

and his government destroyed.

Iraq was left to rebuild under an American-led occupation.

And today, the country still grapples

with its history of division, violence, and dictatorship.

You simply cannot understand anything that's going on in Iraq

without realizing that his shadow

looms over everything-- it's simply everywhere.

His legacy lives on.

That's one of the remarkable things about dictatorships--

we always tend to underestimate the impact

they have on future generations.

(man) To order "The Dictator's Playbook" on DVD,

visit shopPBS.org

or call 1-800-PLAY-PBS.

This program is also available

on Amazon Prime Video.

[synthesizer fanfare]