Spectator, The: Mimi versus Saddam

Singular life

The part of the world which likes to call itself civilised is facing a problem that seems to he insuperable. That is, what to do with Saddam Hussein? It would have been best for everyone if the old boy had gone down fighting in a hail of bullets, instead of putting up his hands without even drawing so much as a razor blade - although one rather admires his rat-like instinct for survival.

In captivity, as in freedom, he poses another dilemma. The Iraqi provisional government has not ruled out execution. But if Saddam is executed the finger of blame will be pointed at the Americans and the British as having installed a puppet tribunal. Mr Blair in any case has stated in the past his principled opposition to the death penalty. How could he, without seeming a hypocrite, make an exception for a former foreign dictator?

That leaves life imprisonment. The Americans don't want Saddam in the USA, so he would have to be jailed in Iraq. If he is jailed in Iraq, he will remain a focal point for his supporters as well as for anti-American dissidents. There will always be some crazed suicide-bomber ready to launch himself at the jail in order to facilitate Saddam's escape. With Saddam alive in Iraq, there will always he the possibility of going back. That is why Lenin shot the Tsar and all his family: to show there was no going back.

So what is to be done? What I propose is a secure establishment outside of Iraq and out of reach of America. In this secure establishment, condign punishment will be meted out to Saddam hourly by a multinational group (this would please the United Nations), which would ensure he remains in close captivity under sufficiently humiliating circumstances.

The establishment I am proposing is Cav Av, the Wyatt family home. Both its features and situation, as an estate agent would say, are ideally suited. There is my old childhood bedroom. Saddam could sleep there. It has bars on the windows, put there to prevent me from crawling out. If a toddler couldn't sneak through these defences, I bet that a pretty stout dictator would not be able to either.

If by any chance he did manage to, he would find himself facing a 70 ft drop on to concrete. He might try the old rope fire-escape, attached to the bedroom wall. I think it was made in 1910; certainly no one I know has tried it since. When we were children, my brother and I tried to coax people we disliked into slipping the canvas harness under their arms. They perceived rightly that this was, however, a more dangerous game than Russian Roulette.

If someone should try to enter from the outside, they would find security equally tight. First, there are two wobbly marble busts of Pitt and Perceval, which tend to fall on people as they enter the front gate. They would certainly be patriotic enough to knock out an Iraqi terrorist. Second, there is Mimi the dog. I realise that Mimi is rather minuscule, but it is the effect which counts. Remember what Stiffy Byng's small dog did to Constable Oates? I have had burly minicab drivers rushing back into their minicabs on hearing Mimi do her stuff.

If that should fail, there is the presence of three gibbering Hungarians: Katalin, Marty (the new au pair) and my dear mother. This coalition would keep anyone in line. They have more weapons of mass destruction between them than Saddam has seen in a lifetime. My mother's racing hats - with decorative objects attached that could neverthless poke out eyes. Her Carmen rollers - more deadly than an Arabic dagger. Katalin's souffle dishes - which even when empty would fit over Saddam's head like an iron mask. And other horrifying objects of torture.

As for the tasks to be meted out to the former dictator as punishment? I can only say that the man will be broken in a week. He can start the day by bringing my mother breakfast in bed. If that doesn't cow him, nothing will. Next, he would be required to wash Mimi with conditioning shampoo in the bath and then dry her with a Braun salon hairdryer. Could anything be more humiliating for an Arab? Afterwards, he would dust my mother's collection of porcelain eggs, tune the piano, make the beds and arrange flowers. Later on, he would face something worse than a firing-squad, and just as painful: making Paprika Chicken for dinner. Finally, so as not to break every rule of the Geneva Convention, he will be allowed down the road to the local mosque for a spot of salaaming - accompanied, of course, by the three Hungarians and Mimi the dog. After all this, I predict that even the maddest Iraqi won't want him back.