Saddam's rule of terror revealed in Basra's colleges

THE militiamen and Baath Party members have hidden or fled and yesterday the legacy of fear and hatred which they left behind in Basra was beginning to emerge.

For Hashim Hamin, taking part in chaotic celebrations outside Iraq’s naval academy, the arrival of the British has come as a relief.

"I have come to help the British catch every single Baath Party member," he said.

For five years Mr Hamin, an English teacher at a local secondary school, was held in an Iraqi prison and tortured. He said his scarred arms were the result of being strung from the ceiling and beaten by the Iraqi secret service men.

"I had refused to join the party. They hit me a great deal and I was made to eat my meals like a dog with my hands tied behind my back. But I knew I could never join the Baath Party. How could I and keep my conscience clean?" he said.

"If you want to stay out of trouble you have to join and then you could be promoted in the party from the street level to representing the city. But then you would take part in beatings and the burning of property of the people they don’t like. I was one of the people they didn’t like."

"They stopped beating me after the first year but then every so often they would take me to the academy and attach electricity to my groins. The people who did this were young officers that Saddam liked."

The offices within the marble academy conference centre were disturbingly homely given this information.

Among some of the items saved from the looters by British soldiers in Z company of the Royal Fusiliers, was a sextant in a glass case built in London in 1945 and a brochure entitled 60 Years of the Iraqi Armed Forces: 1921-1981.

Inside the booklet were picture of smiling officers training in gyms, pointing weapons in different directions.

"That was when they were at their peak before all this began," said Major Duncan McSporran, standing before a row of seats with microphones.

"You could just image Saddam sitting in the chair over there, and pressing a button to send the officers he didn’t like plummeting to their deaths in pits below the seats."

He added: "We haven’t found any torture chambers under here yet. But all you need is a pair of electrodes to inflict real damage."

In the newly liberated Basra University, it was clear that even in higher education, Iraqis could not escape the clutches of the Baath Party or the military.

Secured by the recce group of the 1st Regiment, Royal Fulsiliers, newly liberated Basra University resembled more a paramilitary training camp for the party than a centre of academic excellence.

On the walls of the building, between oil paintings of a studious looking Saddam Hussein, were charts listing lecturers, scholars and the armoury of each faculty, promising the day "manhood" would come soon.

"Agricultural department," read one. "Senior Lecturer, Major Hamid Jalabi, 196 students, 200 AK47s, 20 rocket propelled grenades and ten hand guns."

He stood before a placard which read in Koranic script, "To be loved by the people is to be a member of the Baath Party."

"I never realised until now how deeply Saddam Hussein and the Baath Party had got into peoples lives," Capt Pugh said.

Baath Party ideology had clearly reduced the academic curriculum to a form of state flattery.

Though the looting had left most rooms bare, the library itself had been left untouched, whether as an indication of the fear with which Saddam Hussein is still held by the population or through a degree of discernment on the part of the looters.

Revolution and national education, read one book with a picture of Saddam on the front cover.

Others were: Socialism: Our own private way and a collection of speeches entitled The Mother of all Speeches and Speeches of Revolution and Victory.

"To our beloved president Saddam Hussein, on the occasion of his Birthday I would like to give as a present my thesis on the reproductive patterns of Iraqi beetles," the letter read.

We didn't do as good a job with getting this word out about the Ba'ath party as we did about the Nazi party.

They are in essence one and the same.

From its humble beginnings, the Baath Party now controls two countries and over 20% of the world's oil resources. The leaders of its two largest wings are known to dislike each other intensely, but share many common goals, and a vision of an Arab world marching together under the banner of "Unity, Freedom, and Socialism." Although the Baathist governments of Syrian President Hassad and Iraqi President Hussein have been known to support Islamic militants when it suited them, they are widely loathed and considered as infidels by many Islamic fundamentalists If the Baath Party is uncompromising in its secular viewpoint, it is equally uncompromising in its dislike of the West and its hatred for "Zionist colonialism in occupied Palestine."
The three major proponents of early Baathist thought, Zaki al-Arsuzi, Salah al-Din al-Bitar, and Michel Aflaq, were middle-class educators whose political thought had been influenced by Western education. At first they expounded their visions of pan-Arabic nationalism to small audiences; by 1947 they had established a constitution and a party headquarters in Damascus. After 1948, many blamed the founding of the new State of Israel on Arab disunity. By 1954 the Baath Party was established in Iraq; by 1963 it had come to power in both Iraq and Syria.
Still, there were major differences between the Syrian and Iraqi vision of "pan-Arabic unity." Hafez Assad, who came to power in a 1970 coup, was an Alawite, a member of a sect whose practices are largely influenced by Shi'a Islam but which include borrowings from Christianity, Gnosticism, Mithraism and pre-Islamic pagan practices. He saw religious fundamentalism as a threat because he had witnessed first-hand Sunni persecution of Alawites. (Assad had come to power in the Syrian army because the military was one of the few opportunities open to Alawites: much as African-Americans make up a disproportionate percentage of U.S. soldiers, a significant number of Syrian soldiers were Alawite). The Iraqi Baath Party, in contrast, was made up largely of Sunni Moslems. While Assad was courting Iran and trying to present the Alawites as Shi'a Moslems, Iraq's Sunnis were trying to cement their hold on power over Iraq's majority Shiite population. (There has historically been tension between the two sects; this lessened somewhat during the Iran-Iraq War, when Iraqi Shi'ites remained loyal to the Iraqi government despite fears they would support Iran).
These conflicts only intensified when Sadaam Hussein assumed control of the Iraqi Baath Party, and the Iraqi government, in 1979. His expansionist ideas led to a decade-long conflict with Iran… a conflict in which Syria backed Shi'ite Iran against Baathist Iraq. This led the two countries to sever relations, and began a long period of mutual hostility. Each regime sought to portray itself as the legitimate representative of Arab unity, while supporting dissidents against their opponent. When Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, Syria was among the Arab states who sent troops to participate in "Operation Desert Storm." Only in 1997 would a rapproachment between the two Baathist parties begin; since Assad's death in June of 2000, relations have improved considerably.
Hafez Assad's successor, his son Bashir, has encouraged entrepreneurial ventures and free trade; he has also made overtures toward the United States and toward the World Bank. Following in his father's footsteps, Assad has also continued to play one end against the other, currying favor with the Iranians and also working toward improving Iraqi-Syrian relations. Syria has been one of the key players in helping Iraq evade U.N. sanctions; it is estimated that some $15 million of Iraqi oil is smuggled through Syria weekly, providing a lucrative trade for both cash-starved governments.
Despite the lip service paid to "freedom," both branches of the Baathist Party have a dismal human rights record. Their commitment to "Socialism" has not stopped either Hussein or Assad from establishing dynastic dictatorships, nor has their commitment to "Arab Unity" stopped them from ruthlessly crushing those Arabs they saw as opponents. Nevertheless, the Baathist movement remains popular in many Arab countries, where Hussein is seen as an underdog standing up against Western imperialism. A large-scale invasion of Iraq, or a war between Syria and Israel, could well result in the Baathists becoming even more popular on the Arab street.
-- Article at Hybridmagazine.com

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