Military Families Weigh Saddam Execution

Former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein gestures during his trial held under tight security in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone, in this Jan. 29, 2006 file photo. An Iraqi judge said Friday Dec. 29, 2006 that Saddam Hussein will be executed by Saturday at the latest and lawyers representing him say the condemned former leader is no longer in U.S. custody. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic, Pool) (Darko Bandic - AP)

-- As word of Saddam Hussein's execution flashed around the world, Stephanie Dostie watched the news from her home on a military base and thought of her husband, who was killed in Iraq a year ago.

With her two children at her side, Dostie monitored the television reports while she prepared for the anniversary of her husband's death. She called Saddam's execution "a very generous death."

"He got his last prayer. He got his last meal," she said from Fort Campbell, Ky., a base that straddles the Kentucky-Tennessee border.

"I'm assuming he was probably able to talk to his family. And that's something my husband didn't get and something thousands of other soldiers didn't get." Her husband, Sgt. 1st Class Shawn Christopher Dostie, was killed by an improvised explosive device on Dec. 30, 2005.

Soldiers and their loved ones offered mixed assessments Friday of what Saddam's death would mean. Some held out hope that the execution could help the U.S. win the war. And if peace is not within reach, they said, then perhaps the former dictator's demise will at least provide peace of mind.

"I want this evil man off the face of this earth," said Nancy Hollinsaid, of Malden, Ill., whose son, Army Staff Sgt. Lincoln Hollinsaid, was killed in a grenade attack. "I want peace to come sooner."

But Hollinsaid, who followed Saddam's trial, also has a more personal wish _ that the execution will "do some good for my heart."

Capt. Hiram Lewis, who served with the West Virginia National Guard's 111th Engineer Group in Iraq, said it's important that the death sentence came from an Iraqi court, rather than the U.S.

"This wasn't American justice. This was the Iraqi people," he said. "It's a culmination of a long, drawn-out battle that unfortunately has cost a lot of American lives."

Other veterans of the war also expressed satisfaction.

"It is what we are over there for _ helping to support and stabilize. It is a very big step and an example of the successes," said Brian Schiller, a Marine gunnery sergeant from Chicago who returned in October from a second seven-month tour in Iraq.

But Schiller, who also served six months in the Persian Gulf War, said Saddam's death would not necessarily bring the war closer to an end. Instead, he hoped that the execution would "bring closure and be a symbolic gesture that unites different factions."