Saddam Hussein's Baʿthist regime survived the vicissitudes of thirty-five years marked by two major wars, recurrent military conflicts with the Kurds, a major uprising in 1991 after the end of the First Gulf War, and thirteen years of harsh sanctions. By examining the inner workings of the Baʿth Party, the questions that this book has sought to address are as follows: What were the characteristics of this regime? How did it manage to last such a long time? And, finally would it have endured had the U.S.-led invasion of 2003 not taken place?

There are many ways to interpret the regime's durability. Some argue that a dictatorship cannot be run by one man alone, however unrestricted his power. “The recognition that dictatorship flourished on wide complicity fuelled by a variety of motives from idealism to fear, makes great sense of their durability.” Whether in Iraq or elsewhere, control by “authoritarian and patrimonial means” paved the way for relative stability and longevity. Václav Havel explains complicity by pointing to the context created by thousands of party slogans, a daily barrage that provides meaning to the lives of ordinary citizens; he points out that