Workers' Party of Belgium

14 December 2004

The arrest of Saddam Hussein: will the anti-US resistance continue?

Does the arrest of Saddam Hussein, last Saturday in Tikrit, mean the end of the resistance against US occupation? Will it have removed the main obstacle to democracy and security in Iraq, as Western political leaders are saying? A reaction from Mohammed Hassan, Middle East specialist.

David Pestieau

What is your first reaction on this arrest?

Mohammed Hassan. It is amazing that the man most wanted by the US and its allies in the whole world was able to evade arrest for more than eight months. This indicates that Saddam Hussein could count on a certain level of support among the Iraqi population. Did you know, for example, that some 69 different intelligence services are active in Iraq, with as priority mission to proceed to this arrest?

Does the arrest of Saddam Hussein mean the end of the resistance against US occupation?

Mohammed Hassan. No. The arrest is a political success for the US occupation troops. The United States will use this arrest for propaganda purposes, in order to demoralise the anti-US resistance and the Iraqi population. Without any doubt, this arrest will provoke confusion and an amount of disorganisation in the ranks of the resistance. But over the past few months, the resistance has been able to get organised. It is no longer embryonic, it no longer lacks coordination and it can no longer be crushed. It has arms, financial means and even well-informed intelligence services. Recently, the Americans found the day-to-day schedules of the colonial administrator Bremer in a resistance hideout…

Add to this that the resistance is not solely composed of members of the old Baath Party but also of other patriotic, nationalist and Islamic forces, in a sort of federation.

With this arrest, the occupier hopes to have struck at a part of the resistance leadership. But the objective conditions that give rise to the resistance are still in place. The occupation continues, the economic crisis is very serious. Many Iraqi’s don’t even have the food rations that they still received under Saddam Hussein. 400,000 soldiers have been demobilised without retirement benefits or salaries. And 250 out of the 700 first soldiers of the new Iraqi army have deserted right after their training.

History has proven that a colonial occupation cannot crush a resistance, not even with the arrest of some of its leaders. Take Algeria, where the major leaders of the anti-French resistance were arrested in the very first years of the anti-colonial war.

Has the arrest removed the main obstacle to democracy and security in Iraq, as Western political leaders pretend?

Mohammed Hassan. There can never be democracy under colonial occupation. The colonial democracy, US style, is a democracy based on ethnicism and clanism, on the economic pillage of the country and on the repression of all nationalist forces.

Washington’s henchmen who are now leading the provisional government (completely subordinated to US colonial administrator Bremer) support the US project of a federal State that will divide Iraq in three parts. Just like the Americans have done in Yugoslavia. On one hand, and confronted with the resistance, Bremer has called for national reconciliation. With a general amnesty, the Americans may try to win over some sections of the resistance, promising them functions in the new government. On the other hand, the pro-Iranian Shiites demand an Islamic State. From now on, all contradictions that have been initiated with the US occupation will intensify, between all these different components. This will further fan instability.

All this is happening in a context in which resistance will most probably continue. And the US will no longer be able to invoke the role of Saddam Hussein in it, thus more clearly exposing the genuine anti-colonial character of the resistance before the whole world.