Saddam Accepted Exile Plan to Avert War

A quick search pulls out the articles from 2003 where Powell, Bush and many others are urging Saddam to leave Iraq to avoid the invasion. Apparently, that is what he wanted. Amr Moussa, head of the Arab League, said no.

Deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had secretly accepted a last-minute plan to go into exile to avert the 2003 Iraq war, but Arab leaders shot the proposal down, Al Arabiya television reported on Friday.

UAE President Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahayan made the proposal for Saddam to go into exile at an emergency Arab summit just weeks before the U.S.-led war began in March 2003.

But the 22-member Arab League, led by Secretary-General Amr Moussa, refused to consider the initiative.

Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak says in the documentary that the United States had signaled its support for the proposal.