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Saddam's three choices
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- CNN analyst Ken Pollack, a former CIA staffer, spoke with CNN Anchor Bill Hemmer Sunday about the increasingly limited options of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein as he makes his last stand against U.S.-led forces in his country. HEMMER: If it's possible for you to get inside of Saddam Hussein's head, if he's still in charge of anything regarding his military, what is his strategy to defend the capital city? POLLACK: First of all, you said it right. We don't know if Saddam is alive, if he is capable of functioning. For a moment let's assume that he is. Right now he's basically got three broad options and none of them are particularly good. One is stay in Baghdad. He is well dug in there. He's got his most loyal troops around him. Try to regroup the Republican Guard as best he can. There are some of the Republican Guard divisions that are still functioning in and around Baghdad. He seems to be clearly trying hard to reset those forces to mount some kind of defense of Baghdad. Option two is try to flee to Tikrit, his homeland, his hometown where support for Saddam will be strongest. One of the problems he has in Baghdad is the people of Baghdad won't be too sorry to see him leave. The problem he's got is he's got to get to Tikrit. U.S. forces have blocked off all the exits from Baghdad. And the third is try to flee out to Iraq's western tribes. Those tribes are among the most loyal to Saddam. He might believe that they would give him sanctuary of some kind and maybe allow him to flee to Syria where there are reports that his family and other high-ranking regime families have already been sent. There as well, he's got a problem. He's got to find his way out to the tribes and when he gets there, he has to make sure the tribes don't betray them because the United States will put tremendous pressure on the tribes to give him up. None of the options are particularly good. If you look at the numbers, it's true that 3,000 Iraqi soldiers were killed on Saturday alone, in one day of fighting in and around Baghdad. The walls of the room are closing in quite quickly. HEMMER: If that is the case, do you see a point where he cuts and runs? Does he follow the Baath party leaders to Syria. Is that possibly not even an option right now? POLLACK: As you're pointing out, his options to run are pretty limited. I don't think any Iraq expert thought there was a high likelihood Saddam would run. That's not the style and what we've seen from him in the past. You've heard U.S. Central Command talking about it. The alternative that Saddam begins at some point to decide that the game is up, that he has lost it, that his regime is over. Under those circumstances, the most likely course of action for him is probably to try to lash out and inflict as much damage as he possibly can on people and I think that's why you heard U.S. Central Command say they are very concerned about looking for Iraqi ballistic missiles trying to head out to the west where they can be fired against Israel. HEMMER: Ken, talk about the [U.S.] ring of steel surrounding their capital. POLLACK: I think it's increasingly apparent that the Iraqis were caught off guard by the quickness of the U.S. advance. It was something we saw from the Iraqis in 1991. They just underestimated how quickly and how powerful U.S. forces can move. I think U.S. forces caught them before they can actually establish the defenses of Baghdad that they'd expected. I think they thought they had more time to build up those defenses. All of a sudden they found the U.S. 3rd Infantry Division at their gates and they are scrambling to try to put something in place and they're having a tough time of it.
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