Gordon Carrera

They're going to find the weapons and they're going to disarm him or they're going to find that he's hiding stuff and then that will help justify the war.

So they think they've trapped Saddam with this resolution.

But as we'll see, I think the US and particularly the UK are the ones who are going to be trapped.

So the idea is Saddam has to cooperate with these inspectors.

It's a kind of test for him to show whether he's going to be able to cooperate.

But the expectation is that he'll fail.

And then that will build support.

The hawks in Washington, as you said, Dick Cheney and the like, see these inspections as a mistake.

They're going to divert the US away from the war they just want to get on with.

And the idea is that then when Saddam frustrates the inspectors or they find something, then there'll potentially be a new UN resolution authorizing action against Saddam, which everyone can get behind and everything's going to be fine.

That's the idea.

Spoiler alert, it's not going to work out that way.

How do you come clean to something you don't have?

And so I think it's worth going back to Saddam, isn't it?

Because I think that's what's so interesting is Saddam as a character in this story because...

As we get to the end of 2002, Saddam is going to decide, well, I'm going to let the inspectors back in.

He's been told by France and Russia that, you know, that's what he should do.

And he kind of listens to them.

And then again, we get one of these meetings.

I love these meetings of Saddam's Revolutionary Command Council, you know, where he gathers all his top aides.