Her pet name is "Jamama," Dove. Twenty-nine, young, slim, willowy, and exceptionally beautiful - she was the most recent love of the former despot Saddam Hussein. She inherited her light complexion and blue eyes from her mother, who is German and who uses a German passport on her trips to Europe including her native country. Her daughter Jamama is Saddam's fourth wife. The marriage was kept secret, known to only a few in the dictator's inner circle.

However, since Saddam, 66, is now a fugitive, and his henchmen can no longer bully the Iraqi people, the secrets of the regime are coming to light - especially the spicy ones. And - well, what do you know - of course many diplomats in Baghdad knew about the mysterious story connected with the 61-year-old German mother, who had been living in the land of the two rivers for more than two decades. She has a German passport and also probably Iraqi and diplomatic passports, one of those from another Arab state. She has changed her last name several times.

Her last marriage was to Saddam's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Military Industrialization and Weapons Development, Abd-al-Tawwab Mullah Huwaysh. In Washington's card game of the 55 Most-Wanted he ranks way up there as the "Ten of Hearts" (Number 19), because he must have been well informed about Saddam's programs for Weapons of Mass Destruction. The Americans captured the minister on May 1st and locked him up in a prison camp located at the airport where about 1,200 of the most prominent of Saddam's former henchmen are imprisoned. Apparently Huwaysh offered no revelations.

As to the dictator's familial affairs, it is well known that he had been separated from his first wife (and cousin) Sajida for many years. His two sons from that marriage, Odai, 39, and Qusai, 37, were shot by the Americans in Mosul on July 22. The marriage also produced three daughters Raghad, 36, Rana, 34, and Hala, 31. Two of the daughters themselves became victims of their father's regime of terror. In 1995, their husbands who had fled to Jordan were lured back to Baghdad with a promise of amnesty, even though they had revealed their identities to the CIA. Saddam had them killed shortly after their return. Nonetheless, Rana and Raghad, on arriving in their Jordanian exile, spoke with enthusiasm of their "affectionate father." Saddam, they said, had "a big heart." Their mother is probably living in Syria.

Samira Shahbandar is considered wife number two by people in Baghdad. It is said that Saddam's son Ali is from this marriage with the daughter of a respected family. He is twenty years old. As his third wife, Baghdad's ruler chose Nidal Hamdani, also a beauty from the best of society.

In addition Saddam kept a selection of mistresses on the side, as is only right for a virile potentate. Probably Parisoula Lampsos was one of these. She left Baghdad two years ago, and chatted about her relationship with the Iraqi president on U.S. television. "Saddam was warmhearted," she confessed. Toward the end he sometimes used Viagra and relaxed with whiskey, cigars, and videos of torture. Once he stood before a mirror and called out, "I am Saddam. Heil Hitler!" Lampsos, a Greek citizen, who is 55 years old, is currently hiding in Lebanon.

And finally, Saddam's fourth wife, his German conquest. At a reception Jamama first caught the eye of Odai, the despot's wayward first-born, a sadist and rapist, who pestered Jamama's parents to get them to to his marrying Jamama. In distress Deputy Ptime Minister Huwaysh turned to the head of state, who took a hand in the matter but with unexpected results. Saddam reined in his eldest son, only to lay claim to her himself. Saddam fell in love with the half-German woman and in 2002 she became his fourth wife.

"If you wanted to survive, you didn't turn down offers like that," Jamama's best friend Nihal, an art expert, recalls. Saddam never made the legalization of his belated bliss public. Jamama had to introduce herself in Baghdad as the President's "special consultant."