If Saddam was imprisoned instead of put to death would he eventually pull a Mandela?

[Ckmlb1]

Saddam was hated by the majority of the people. The majority of Iraqis are Shia muslim, Saddam was Sunni. He killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and he would have never been able to come back into power.

The US won't invade Iran because the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan went badly and Iran would be 10 times more difficult than both of those combined (more people, more weapons, more foreign allies). But people saying that Russia would start world war 3 over Iran are delusional, Iran isn't even one of the most important countries for Russia.