Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein ruled his country with an iron fist – and bloodshed – from 1979 to 2003, the year his regime was overthrown by the American invasion. But the strongman from Iraq, who was being held by the United States until his execution on December 30, 2006, led a strange life in prison that relied on overconsumption of Doritos and frantic periods of purification.
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A fan of chips
After the US invaded Iraq in 2003, ostensibly to find “weapons of mass destruction” that had never been there, the country’s leader Saddam Hussein was captured by US forces and jailed awaiting trial.
The task fell to three GIs to guard the President’s cell, who otherwise revealed all the curiosities of Saddam’s day. These 2005 testimonies by prison guards, reported by NBC News at the time, reveal a peculiar way of life, to say the least.
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First, there’s the dictator’s eating habits: Saddam loved the American brand Raisin Bran Crunch for breakfast, but was once particularly obsessed with Cheetos (the transatlantic equivalent of curly).
To the point that I “got grumpy” when they went out. Until one of the GIs switched his food to Doritos, his new treat: “He could eat a family pack of Doritos in 10 minutes (…) That was the only thing he talked about, c That was all he wanted to eat.” , says Sean O’Shea, one of the GIs in charge of security.
A very kind President
But beyond a rift in Doritos, Saddam Hussein has become something of a close friend of these guards. They paint the portrait of a friendly and extroverted man who even approaches his guards and learns their names, their history and their lives. In particular, O’Shea reports that after telling Saddam that he was not married, the ex-dictator began advising him: “You have to find a good wife. Not too smart, not too brutal. Not too old, not too young.” . One who can cook and clean.” Saddam Hussein laughed and slapped the soldier across the face.
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The former dictator is also said to have displayed an advanced phobia of germs, which led him to clean everything in his cell, wash his hands after shaking hands and wipe down the silverware brought to him with meals. He washed his laundry himself by hand.
delusions of grandeur to the end
The jailed former Iraqi leader also admitted that he admired Ronald Reagan a lot and that he thought Bill Clinton was “OK” in contrast to President Bush, his opponent in 1991 and 2003. “Father Bush, father son, villains,” says Jonathan Reese, one of his former jailers, in particular. However, O’Shea softened the tone: “Towards the end he explained that he didn’t hold any grudges and just wanted to talk to Bush Jr. to become friends.”
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But the ex-president also compared himself to Jesus after he said one of his relatives revealed his hiding place to American forces: a sacrilege equivalent to that of “Judas”. Saddam Hussein had basically not lost his megalomania and was convinced even in prison that he was the Iraqi President, as the last GI Dawson summed it up at the time: “He thinks so 100%.”
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