Looking Beyond Hussein's Execution

With CNN acting all excited about Saddam Hussein's execution in the early morning hours in Baghdad, I thought it would be interesting to speculate on just how this could go horrendously wrong for Iraq's occupiers:

1) Hussein becomes a Martyr, and subsequently a legend develops around him. Ghosts are damnably hard to kill. Although I have no idea how the Arab world is going to respond to this execution, I can't imagine it will be framed as anything other than a Kangaroo Court decision driven by American politics.

2) The former Ba'ath party in Iraq will ally itself with Iran and Bin Laden's organization.

3) Iran is very difficult for the US to attack, especially if their troops are tied up in Iraq trying to control a combination of resistance fighters and civil war. Also, Iran's close economic ties with China mean that if you screw with Iran, China gets involved. Given how much US foreign debt is held by China, that would not be a smart move.

4) Iran becomes the tacit money laundering agent for both al Qaeda and the Iraq Ba'ath party, providing a safe route for access to resources for both organizations.

That would give Bin Laden access to resources the like of which he can only dream of today, and the Ba'ath party in Iraq moves into place as the powerbroker keeping the country tied up in violence just enough that the US can't move its troops too easily.

Iran stays just below the radar (beyond the usual heckling coming from their president), making them very hard to justify attacking on the world stage. (and the world isn't likely to be impressed by yet another round of "but they've got WMD's!" - whether or not that's the case)

- Purely speculative, and downright scarey to consider. It creates a near perfect storm for what will amount to a war of economic attrition.