This article is a damn lie. No description of Ba'athism could possibly be complete without mentioning its Nazi roots.
Ba'athism is not an "ideology of peace," it has its roots in Nazi ideology. Passing it off as secular pan-Arabism is like passing off Naziism as secular pan-Aryanism. I don't think Godwin's law applies here, because Ba'athism really is descended from Naziism, I'm not just throwing out the word "Nazi" here as hyperbole.
This is my understanding as well, although I'd bet it was Italian facism that caught the attention of pan-Arabists initially. Italy had never been a true nation since the Roman Empire. Mussolini and the fascists were able to create a nation out of what had been for hundreds of years a squabbling assemblege of fiefdoms. This is exactly what the pan-Arabists wanted to accomplish, and they decided fascism was just the ticket. Problem is -- despite the failure of fascism, and other forms of socialism, in both Europe and the Middle East -- they never have managed to quite shake this conviction.