Is "the butcher of Baghdad" really trying to clone himself? Saddam's Clones by D. Trull Enigma Editor dtrull@parascope.com The megahyped cloning of Dolly the sheep sent shockwaves of trepidation and panic across the globe, with armchair geneticists pondering all the moral ambiguities it poses for humankind. Clonophobia found its ultimate expression in our president, who decreed a puckered-sphincter moratorium on federally funded human cloning research. But another tubby world leader is said to be much more free-wheeling about the forward march of science: his excellency Saddam Hussein. According to a report carried by UPI, everyone's favorite wacky Iraqi is so intrigued by current developments in cloning technology that he would like nothing better than to crank out a few exact copies of himself. Saddam has charged Iraq's scientists -- whose most noteworthy specialties to date are nuclear and chemical weapons -- with the task of building him a genetic dictator replicator. Well, maybe. As you'll see, this strange tale involves the questionable cloning of unsubstantiated news reports as much as anything else. But let's take it from the top. The April 27 UPI wire story listed as its source London's Sunday Telegraph newspaper, which had run an interview with a "prominent Iraqi doctor." This unnamed doctor revealed that Saddam has become fixated on his own mortality. The ruler recently had his 60th birthday, which he celebrated by launching his own self-congratulatory web site. But since a cyber-shrine isn't quite enough to constitute full immortalization, Saddam has established a cloning laboratory in Baghdad, according to the Telegraph's mystery doctor, with the expressed goal of cloning himself. The UPI report then turned a skeptical eye on Saddam's clone scheme, noting that Iraqi scientists probably lack the necessary know-how to perform any cloning at all. Quotations from fertility expert Robert Winston pedantically spelled out the reasons why the plan wouldn't work, and why Saddam's clones wouldn't be Saddam: "Given the failure rate in previous published cloning experiments, Iraqi scientists would have to transfer genes to the uteruses of 40,000 primed women to produce 100 Saddams, then they would have to wait 30 years before they look much like Saddam," Winston explained. "Even then Saddam may be in for a hell of a shock. Clones cannot replicate anyone emotionally or culturally, only physically. You cannot create another Saddam Hussein. He is unique." Yeah, that's for sure. But other facts in the UPI story were not so cut and dried. On the Forteana e-mail discussion list, where I came across the report, some participants thought the story sounded like a load of crap. First off, what's up with this "prominent Iraqi doctor" guy? As someone pointed out, the anonymous expert making outrageous claims is a classic red flag of tabloid journalism. What was Dr. X's reason for spilling the beans? Is he a renegade scientist who fled Iraq, now out to reveal the depths of its leader's insanity? Or was he casually boasting of Saddam's brilliant strides for scientific progress, with full authorization from the head honcho? Was he a CIA psywar propagandist taking advantage of public anti-cloning sentiments? Enquiring minds want to know! Plus, there's another stumbling block in Saddam's clone dream: the cloning of mammals is currently possible only with female subjects. Regardless of Dr. Winston's scenario of multiple uterus implantation, true cloning derives a viable zygote from a single body cell, and male chromosomes aren't equipped to do that under present technology. Saddam may have waged the mother of all battles, but alas, he can't be the mother of any clones. So I undertook to verify this story through other sources, as per standard Fortean Slips procedure (believe it or not), and I found nothing to corroborate it. Nothing on the Internet, no mention in Letterman's monologues, and none of my buddies here at ParaScope had heard that this might be anything more than an urban legend. This lead was about to be consigned to the scrap heap of paranormal rumor and innuendo, before I went straight to the source. The British newspaper UPI cited, the Telegraph, has a web site called the Electronic Telegraph. It frequently runs weird news reports in a reputable fashion, and happens to be a primary source for Fortean Slips material. I looked up the Saddam Hussein clone story from April 27, which was originally a lot longer than the UPI version. The excluded passages possess an extreme wackiness that frankly reads a lot like a Fortean Slip, on one of my off days. For instance: "Saddam would have no shortage of uses for a clone. For years the dictator has escaped assassination attempts, and boring public engagements, by using a double whose face has been surgically altered to make him look more like his leader.... Clones would be simpler than surgery. "The production of Saddam clones would also enable the Iraqi leader to indulge further in one of his favourite pastimes -- dressing up. ... By having any number of readily available clones at his disposal, Saddam would save himself the inconvenience of having to dress himself in these exotic outfits. "Recently two of Saddam's son-in-laws sought political asylum abroad after falling out with the dictator and his son. Saddam lured them back to Iraq, then had them killed. Relations made to his own specifications would be less likely to be disloyal." Kooky, nutty, zany. And the strangeness doesn't end there. My Electronic Telegraph search for the terms "Saddam" and "clone" turned up several other news items, in which the notion of Saddam Hussein cloning himself is presented as a ludicrous hypothetical emblem of clone hysteria, and nothing more. A report from March 1, entitled "Relax, everyone: they can't clone Saddam Hussein," focused on how environment and experience would make any human clone entirely different from the original: "Fears of producing a super-race of Saddams or Hitlers are therefore misplaced. Saddam's clone, particularly if he were raised in a good home, might be a charming fellow." A March 8 story examined the logistical difficulties of cloning, and concluded with this wrap-up: "...it is clear that even a sinister billionaire in an unethical society would find it tough to indulge his narcissistic fantasy. One Dolly does not an army of Saddam Husseins make." How very interesting that these reports appeared nearly two months before the bombshell from our prominent Iraqi doctor. It's as if the fear of evil despots cloning themselves is embedded in the modern collective subconscious, dating back to Nazi eugenics and the junior Hitler brigade in The Boys from Brazil. And some of us, it seems, are awfully preoccupied about the threat of Boys from Baghdad. But is Saddam really trying to clone himself? Maybe the Telegraph got duped on this one. Or maybe April Fool's Day comes 27 days late in England. From reading all the reports above, I'm almost ready to believe the story about Saddam's clone scheme was entirely tongue in cheek. Could UPI have fallen victim to that subtle British "humour" we hardheaded Americans can't seem to fathom? From all your loving fan mail, I know firsthand what it's like to have my musings on weirdness taken deadly serious when I'm only joking. Egads -- could this Saddam fiasco be a taste of how international journalism would crumble if they cloned an army of me? Sources (in case you didn't notice): UPI; Electronic Telegraph (c) Copyright 1997 ParaScope, Inc. More Fortean Slips! What do you think? Share your views in the message boards!