Abdul Karim Qasim was first to nationalize Iraqi oil

In the video bellow John Perkins talks about the US relationship with Saddam when Abdul Karim Qasim was President of Iraq. I want to post this to remind people and myself that Abdul Karim Qasim nationalized Iraqi oil. Some Arabs seem to believe that Saddam was the first Iraqi president to nationalize Iraqi oil. He was not.

Many Arabs praised Saddam as if he was the original populist who did good things for ordinary Iraqis. He was not. It reminds me of my post Iraqi Goodfellas - I will always remember that dinner with the Iraqi woman who said that Saddam made education free!

 

 Thanks 3amu for the forward!

Baghdad hasn't hosted a summit since 1990

WP: "Baghdad has not hosted an Arab summit since 1990, only two months before then-ruler Saddam Hussein invaded neighboring Kuwait. After that, Iraq was all but ejected from the Arab fold, put under years of international sanctions, then mired in the near-civil war that followed the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and fall of Saddam."

Harsh sanctions may strengthen Iranian regime

just like sanctions strengthened Saddam, Chomsky argues:

'The sanctions against Iran may have the same effect as their predecessors against Iraq, which were condemned as “genocidal” by the respected U.N. diplomats who administered them before finally resigning in protest.

The Iraq sanctions devastated the population and strengthened Saddam Hussein, probably saving him from the fate of a rogues’ gallery of other tyrants supported by the U.S.-U.K. – tyrants who prospered virtually to the day when various internal revolts overthrew them.'

Saddam could have had nuclear weapons by mid-1990s

if he had not invaded Kuwait, the author of this article argues:

'By demonstrating Iraq’s vulnerability, the attack on Osirak actually increased Hussein’s determination to develop a nuclear deterrent and provided Iraq’s scientists an opportunity to better organize the program. The Iraqi leader devoted significantly more resources toward pursuing nuclear weapons after the Israeli assault. As Reiter notes, “the Iraqi nuclear program increased from a program of 400 scientists and $400 million to one of 7,000 scientists and $10 billion.”

Iraq’s nuclear efforts also went underground. Hussein allowed the IAEA to verify Osirak’s destruction, but then he shifted from a plutonium strategy to a more dispersed and ambitious uranium-enrichment strategy. This approach relied on undeclared sites, away from the prying eyes of inspectors, and aimed to develop local technology and expertise to reduce the reliance on foreign suppliers of sensitive technologies. When inspectors finally gained access after the 1991 Persian Gulf War, they were shocked by the extent of Iraq’s nuclear infrastructure and how close Hussein had gotten to a bomb.

Ultimately, Israel’s 1981 raid didn’t end Iraq’s drive to develop nuclear weapons. It took the destruction of the Gulf War, followed by more than a decade of sanctions, containment, inspections, no-fly zones and periodic bombing — not to mention the 2003 U.S. invasion — to eliminate the program. The international community got lucky: Had Hussein not been dumb enough to invade Kuwait in 1990, he probably would have gotten the bomb sometime by the mid-1990s.'

How Israeli leaders justified attack on Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981

'On June 7, 1981, eight Israeli F-16 fighter jets, protected by six F-15 escorts, dropped 16 2,000-pound bombs on the nearly completed Osirak nuclear reactor at the Tuwaitha complex in Iraq. Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Defense Minister Ariel Sharon saw the reactor as central to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s quest to build nuclear weapons, and they believed that it posed an existential threat to Israel.

The timing of the strike was justified by intelligence reports suggesting that Osirak would soon become operational. Two days later, Begin explained the raid to the public: “We chose this moment: now, not later, because later may be too late, perhaps forever. And if we stood by idly, two, three years, at the most four years, and Saddam Hussein would have produced his three, four, five bombs . . . another Holocaust would have happened in the history of the Jewish people.” '

Obama has done it better

Another great stand up by Bill Maher, and this time it's online. It's mostly about American politics, but at about 25 minutes he compares Obama's foreign policy to George Bush's. Very funny satire. He also made good points, including: Bush spent a trillion dollars to get Saddam, and then Obama spent a billion dollars (1000 times less than a trillion) to get Qadhafi.

Maher says Obama did it better, and it's true. "It's called doing things smart," Maher says. Obama was lucky he didn't have to deal with Iraq, I've said before, but it's not over for Obama. The conflict in Syria could explode. World powers are calling for intense pressure on Assad.

At 20 min he talks about John Steinbeck's quote about socialism, which I happened to see on fb today: “Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.” Bill Maher replaced "embarrassed" with "inconvenienced" but I think he got the message across. Great show.

Kuwaitis hated Saddam too

I stumbled upon this Wiki entry on Musallam Al-Barrak, member of the Kuwaiti National Assembly:

'On January 6, 2007, Al-Barrak called for halting foreign aid to Yemen and other countries that have seen protests against the execution of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. Al-Barrak strongly condemned the positions of Yemen, Libya, Fatah, Hamas, and certain groups in Jordan that deplored Saddam’s execution and hailed him as a martyr. Al-Barrak ridiculed Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh and Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, calling them “the orphans of Saddam Hussein who will face the same dark fate." Al-Barrak was quoted by the Kuwait Times as saying, "Yemen’s president has said that Saddam’s execution is an insult to all Arabs and we say that it is an insult to all leaders who oppress their people. Saddam has gone to the dustbin of history while his orphans Saleh and Gaddafi wait for their dark fate." Al-Barrak went on to say he regretted the flow of Kuwaiti financial aid to Yemen and other countries, the latest of which was a $200m interest-free loan to Yemen: “It appears that our destiny is to increase aid and help to countries while they increase their insults towards us. We urge the government to defend the dignity of the Kuwaiti people."'

"the system now is just like under Saddam"

'How do you make detainees confess? "We hang them from the ceiling and beat them until they are motionless corpses," he said. "Then they confess."

"Look," he added, "the system now is just like under Saddam: walk by the wall, don't go near politics and you can walk with your head high and not fear anything. But if you come close to the throne then the wrath of Allah will fall on you and we have eyes everywhere."'

Ahmad Hasan al Bakr died 3 months after Saddam took Presidency

I'm watching Saddam and the Third Reich on H2. I watched a shorter version of this documentary a couple of years ago. This version is two hours long and it contains footage I've never seen before. Also I learned something new: Ahmad Hasan al Bakr, the president of Iraq throughout the 70s, died mysteriously three months after Saddam put himself in charge of Iraq. After leaving Iraq, I often wondered what happened to al Bakr. According to this Wikipedia article, Ahmad Hassan al Bakr died in 1982. Somebody is wrong.

An abundance of ignorance about Iraq

I just read this comment by a "Sven Auge Jensen" on NPR's article about today's bombings that targeted Shia in Iraq: "Let me see if I've got this right. We destroy the entire country. We remove the worlds second largest known oil reserves from the world market. People murdered and maimed. Treasure squandered. And if all that wasn't enough we hung the one guy that could keep this nation of maniacs in line."

Saddam was allowing takfiri idiots to roam Iraq throughout the 90s (there were Salafi ties to Iraq before 2003) and Saddam did not keep this "nation of maniacs in line" unless keeping the nation in line means mass murdering Iraqis who were critical of the government, plunging the nation into an 8-year war with Iran and then invading Kuwait and subjecting the nation to 40 consecutive days of intense bombing and cruel sanctions and putting down a popular uprising and killing 300,000 Iraqi Shia. And we did not remove Iraq's oil from the world market!

I can see how uneducated Sunni Arabs would believe this kind of crap. But a westerner named Sven? Sven also seems to believe America hung Saddam. No, Sven, you've got it all wrong. I see a lot of ignorance and twisting of truth on the web with respect to Iraq. It is annoying. I just wanted to vent.

Inside Saddam's Reign of Terror

I'm watching Inside Saddam's Reign of Terror on National Geographic. Pretty good summary for a short documentary. I found it on YouTube too:

Fall of Saddam was cause for celebration, but...

"The fact that Saddam Hussein is gone is a genuine cause for celebration. But the list of errors and horrors in this war is inexcusably long, starting with a rush to invasion based on manipulated intelligence.

The Bush administration had no plan for governing the country once Saddam was deposed. The Iraqi economy still bears the scars from the first frenzied days of looting. The decision to disband the Sunni-dominated Iraqi Army helped unleash five years of sectarian strife that has not fully abated. Iraq’s political system remains deeply riven by ethnic and religious differences."

Sadr considers US embassy staff in Baghdad as "occupiers"

'In response to a question from one of his followers, Sadr now says that after the expiration of the SOFA, the staff of the embassy should be considered “occupiers” and must be “resisted”. '

On one hand I see Muqtada al Sadr as an ungrateful fundamentalist majnoon. His opposition to the US does not make sense, given that the US overthrew the dictator who murdered his father and his two oldest brothers in 1999.

On the other hand I can understand why Muqtada al Sadr and his followers would distrust the US, given that the US could have overthrown the dictator in 1991 after bombing Iraq for 40 consecutive days and marching to the outskirts of Baghdad. By the 29th day of the 1991 bombing, the "Allied air campaign passes 40,000-sortie mark - 10,000 more missions than were flown against Japan in final 14 months of World War II."

Based on comments by Americans for posts about 1991, some Americans seem to think the Iraqis should not be angry or bitter about what the US should have done differently in 1991. Some think Iraqis should blame the Saudis, who were afraid of Iran taking over. So did the US allow Saddam to fly his helicopters because the Saudis did not want to see the Shia take over Iraq? Did KSA & USA have common interests? Or was KSA in charge? Is America KSA's bitch? It seems that way, especially when you consider that KSA was not punished for 9/11. The friendship seemed to flourish, actually.

For Americans and Saudis, 1991 turned out to be a good year. They got it all: a short war with relatively little casualties, KSA paid for the war and Sunni Arab domination of Iraq continued. Few Americans and Arabs were interested in helping Iraqis overthrow the Saddam.

Despite the bad things that happened and the mistakes, I would say the average Iraqi does not agree with Muqtada al Sadr and would like to see normal relations with the US. Iraq needs international assistance to develop into a prosperous nation.

Will Qadhafi pull a Saddam?

'Like Saddam, Gadhafi is thought to have access to millions of dollars stashed away over the years. He has loyalists who benefited from his long rule and who, like the Iraqi leader's Baathist followers, believe they have nothing to gain and everything to fear from a new Libyan government.

"What we've learned is that finding one individual particularly in a tribal area is tough, despite all of technology we have, with our ability to collect intelligence sources together," said retired Lt. Col. John Nagl, who served in Iraq's al-Anbar province in 2003.

"The good news is Libya has a long coast line and the population is clustered close to the shore," said Nagl, who now heads the Washington-based Center for a New American Security. "The bad news is we have few, if any, Americans on the ground, and this is a society we don't understand very well." '

Uday, the Devil's Double

I've noticed during the last few weeks the rising number of people who've been referred to my blog by searching "uday hussein". In the last month, according to Blogger stats, "uday hussein" was the top search keyword that resulted in somebody looking at my blog. 76 searches of "uday hussein" with 31 searches of "iraqi mojo" at a distant second. A Google search of "uday hussein" yields one of my posts called "I WAS UDAY HUSSEIN", a Viceland article about Latif Yahia, who was forced to be Uday's double. It was the most viewed post on my blog in the last month, and the second most viewed post all time. For that post, on July 10 David All commented 'Latif's horrifying tale has been made into a movie, "The Devil's Double" that is scheduled to be released in theaters on July 29th. You can read more about it at http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1270262'. Thanks David All for that comment!

I have seen at least two commercials for the movie, and tonight I found a description of the movie in Wikipedia:

The Devil's Double is a 2011 drama film directed by Lee Tamahori and starring Dominic Cooper, Philip Quast, Ludivine Sagnier and Raad Rawi. It was released on January 22, 2011 at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and will be released in limited theaters on July 29, 2011 by Lionsgate and Herrick Entertainment.[1] Story: Based on a gripping, unbelievable true story of money, power and opulent decadence, Lionsgate's THE DEVIL'S DOUBLE takes a white-knuckle ride deep into the lawless playground of excess and violence known as Baghdad, 1987. Summoned from the frontline to Saddam Hussein's palace, Iraqi army lieutenant 'Latif Yahia' (Dominic Cooper) is thrust into the highest echelons of the "royal family" when he's ordered to become the 'fiday' -- or body double -- to Saddam's son, the notorious "Black Prince" Uday Hussein (also Dominic Cooper), a reckless, sadistic party-boy with a rabid hunger for sex and brutality. With his and his family's lives at stake, Latif must surrender his former self forever as he learns to walk, talk and act like Uday. But nothing could have prepared him for the horror of the Black Prince's psychotic, drug-addled life of fast cars, easy women and impulsive violence. With one wrong move costing him his life, Latif forges an intimate bond with Sarrab (Ludivine Sagnier), Uday's seductive mistress who's haunted by her own secrets. But as war looms with Kuwait and Uday's depraved gangster regime threatens to destroy them all, Latif realizes that escape from the devil's den will only come at the highest possible cost.

So now I know why there have been so many views of the post "I WAS UDAY HUSSEIN". I am looking forward to watching this movie.

Saddam shoulda been killed Usama-style

I heard Bill Maher ask Irshad Manji tonight if Muslims appreciate it that the US didn't send a cruise missile to kill bin Ladin. Manji thought about it for a second and said "no". I don't know how other Muslims would answer that question, but I am one Muslim who appreciates the fact that the US did not bomb the place and kill a bunch of innocent civilians. I wish Saddam had been killed like Usama was. Catching Saddam and putting him on trial resulted in many problems. Sunni Arabs ended up sympathizing with him and thought his trial was unjust. Killing him and his sons with an elite Navy Seal team would have been much more preferable than weeks of bombing that caused collateral damage, and then a subsequent imprisonment and trial that further divided Arabs along sectarian lines. Many people, including non-Arabs, defended Saddam without understanding his crimes, and I believe that many people would have defended Usama as well had he been captured and put on trial.

Iraqi commentators get violent during discussion about Saddam's legacy

Watch this clip of a show called "The Democracy Club" to see a Saddamist (I presume) telling an Iraqi Shiite that he'll cut his tongue out if he talks about Saddam. The Iraqi Shiite replies with "eat shit, I WILL talk about Saddam". They get up, the Saddamist starts throwing punches and a fight ensues. You can hear the Saddamist yelling obscenities, insulting the Shiite's father and calling him a Shroogi, an Iranian. The Shiite replies with some of the same pejoratives ("no YOU are despicable!").

This is an example of why democracy and reconciliation have been so very difficult in Iraq.

Maliki orders closure of Iraqi Communist Party HQ

According to this article, Maliki has ordered the closure of the Iraqi Communist Party's headquarters in Baghdad. Maliki's team has determined that a large number of demonstrators are communist party members.

Maliki is looking more like Saddam by the day, it seems.

Thanks Heydar Alsaadi for posting on fb.

Ayesha Qaddafi was on Saddam's defense team

Ayesha Qaddafi, Mu3amar's only biological daughter, is trained as a lawyer and was on Saddam's defense team. She was a "goodwill" ambassador to the UN until she was fired recently for supporting her dad.

Similarities between Saddam and Qaddafi

I have noticed some similarities between Saddam and Qaddafi. Like Qaddafi, Saddam believed he was the leader of some united Arab nation. They both believed they fought valiantly and defeated the US.

Saddam was also flamboyant, although Qaddafi is on a different scale, I admit. "The only real regional analogue in recent memory is Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, but even there the megalomania and cult of personality didn’t run as deep."

They both built a number of palaces for themselves. Angry Arab wrote today: 'The tyrant who claims to not hold any official title, and who claims that the "masses" run Libya, has collected a number of palaces in Libya.'

Both dictators made their respective tribes powerful and put their sons in high positions, but there was internal conflict. "Libyan dictator Col. Moammar Gadhafi heads a fractious family obsessed with power, wealth and chart-topping R&B stars, according to U.S. diplomatic cables released by anti-secrecy site WikiLeaks."

Both tyrants became wealthy from oil that lies underneath land where the dictators' political foes live: "The rebellion began in Cyrenaica, a region endowed with oil that was home to Libya’s first and only monarch, King Idris..."

Both tyrants gave up their WMD, but they kept their guns and police states.

Perhaps the most striking similarity is their determinations to fight to the bitter end: "Iraq taught us that magnitude of destruction has to be immense. Muammar Qaddafi's rhetoric suggests he understands this and is willing to follow through. This will depend on the willingness of the army to follow his directives. Saddam did not have the army, but he did have a series of concentric circles of supporters loyal to him because of the patronage he extended them (special-forces units and tribes). He had tied their interests to his survival so successfully that they could not risk defecting.

...Mr Qaddafi, like Saddam Hussein, probably cares less about external pressure because the damage has been done. He may feel he can go it alone, as he has in the past."

20 years ago in February 1991, while US & allied troops marched towards Baghdad, many Iraqis were looking forward to the end of Saddam's regime, and a rumor spread among Iraqis that suggested Saddam and family had their bags packed and were ready to go to Libya. It's too bad that didn't happen. Saddam and Qaddafi could be fighting together today.

PS: They both believed they were great authors and governors: "Colonel Qaddafi had presented himself as the inheritor of the legendary Egyptian strongman Gamal Abdel Nasser. He had written, it was claimed, the three-volume Green Book, which by his lights held a solution for all the problems of governance, and servile Arab intellectuals indulged him, pretending that the collection of nonsensical dictums could be given serious reading."

PPS: Now that I think more about that rumor about Saddam going to Libya, I believe the rumor started before the US & allies began the aerial bombing campaign in 1991.