SADDAM HUSSEIN has a range of eleventh-hour tricks and ploys to avert an American-led invasion, White House officials and Iraqi experts believe.

One option, it is thought, would be staging a fake coup. In an analysis of the Iraqi leader’s options if war is inevitable, Saddam may even mastermind his own assassination, using one of his many doubles. Saddam would then wield power from behind the scenes.

According to The Wall Street Journal, officials in the office of Dick Cheney, the US Vice-President, have been fretting over how Washington would deal with this scenario, although Mr Cheney’s press office yesterday refused to confirm the story.

Nevertheless, Iraqi experts close to the White House say that a false coup or death are two of several sleights of hand that Saddam could use to avert a war.

One of the most likely, they believe, is a last-minute conversion by Iraq’s leader, or the appearance of one, in which Saddam suddenly “discovers” large caches of forbidden weapons. This “discovery” could then be blamed on disloyal aides or military officers.

If Baghdad turns over a significant stock of weapons, key US allies may decide that a war is no longer necessary.

Anthony Cordesman, a former Pentagon official and one of Washington’s most respected Iraqi experts, said that United Nations inspectors could expect Saddam to pull a variety of tricks as his regime became increasingly threatened.

“Everything Iraq can do to preserve its capability, it’s going to do,” he said. “We already know. He has done this before. He did it with Unscom (the UN’s previous arms inspection regime throughout its existence.”

Mr Cordesman, a fellow at the Centre for Strategic International Studies, a Washington-based think tank, said that Saddam could surprise inspectors with a sudden but partial declaration, or he could make a fuller one with the hope of going back to weapons production after UN sanctions were lifted.

“They (Cheney officials are worried about him staging his own assassination,” a US official told The Times. At the State Department officials say they are more concerned with the prospect of Saddam staging a false coup.

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