DID THE UNITED STATES CREATE SADDAM HUSSEIN? In a word, no.

I was on a local talk-radio show a while back and some, er, underinformed soul said that we had backed Saddam against the Russians because he was a friendly right-wing dictator. I guess this is a leftist trope that’s so well established it’s become independent of the actual facts. Saddam was, in fact, a Soviet client. I pointed out that the presence of all those AK-47s and T-72s in Iraq made that point rather clear, and the caller retreated. But you keep hearing stuff like this from people who, I guess, can’t believe that there are dictators anywhere who aren’t the creation of the United States.