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Title: Class struggle in Iraq
Author: Workers Scud
Date: June 1991
Language: en
Topics: Iraq, class struggle, interview
Source: Retrieved on 6th March 2021 from https://libcom.org/library/class-struggle-iraq-interview-veteran
Notes: First published in ‘Workers Scud — no patriot can catch us!’ (London, June 1991), a collection of articles reflecting on the Gulf War.

Workers Scud

Class struggle in Iraq

Q: Can you briefly tell us about the class struggle in Iraq before the

overthrow of the monarchy in 1958?

A: In the 1940’s and early 1950’s the class struggle was mainly situated

in the rural areas. Peasant uprisings (eg. in Aali-azarchi which lasted

about 3 years before being violently suppressed) were a constant

headache for the semi-feudal landowners and the state.

Urban struggles intensified with the nine-day strike of Kirkuk oil

workers in 1946 (put down with loss of 10 lives). Unemployment and

homelessness were rampant. There were thousands of sarifas (shacks made

of palm branches) around and inside Baghdad.

1956 (Suez Crisis) had a massive impact on Iraq, with demonstrations

against the Iraqi regime who were seen as British stooges. The

Palestinian issue also helped radicalisation. I still wonder why there

wasn’t a revolution in 1956!I These internal and external events led to

the formation of the Free Officers (nationalist/Nasserist) who had links

with the Iraqi ‘Communist’ Party (l.C.P.) but not so much with the

Ba’ths.

Q: The way I see it there were two main contradictions in the Iraqi

society at this time (1946- 58). One between the emerging proletarian

movement and capitalism and one, left over from the past, between

capitalism and the feudalist landlords. Do you agree?

A: No, I don’t agree with this neat and simple text book analysis,

because even prior to ’58 the feudals owned not only the rural areas but

also a huge portion of the urban areas. Hotels, factories, and

residential areas belonged to them as well as the village. The majority

of peasants’ were therefore proletarians, but with a far worse living

standard than their urban counterparts.

Q: In 1958 Qasim and the Free Officers seized power and ousted the

Monarchy, but some of the gains were recuperated.

A : That’s true but the significant thing was the level of class

struggle. The Monarch and some of his ministers were killed by those

they called prostitutes. For one year or so no one could control the

workers. Even the l.C.P. which unfortunately had a massive base within

the population (despite its attacks on the working class) could not

control the angry proletariat, basically because workers were armed.

People took food from the shops without paying for them. For them money

was obsolete.

Q: I hear that even the Koran was desecrated by the workers.

A : Yes that’s absolutely right. They understood the reactionary nature

of Islam. Also in Kirkuk about 90 generals, capitalists and landlords

were taken to the road, had a rope put round their necks and dragged

around by car until they were killed. l.C.P. denounced the actions and

tried to distance themselves from workers’ “excesses”.

But gradually with land reforms, the rising price of oil and loans from

USSR, the government managed to stabilise the situation in the South.

Kurdistan was more resistant. Armed peasants groups (eg. in Halabja)

were not intimidated by either the state or the l.C.P. and took over the

land that the escapee owners had left (mostly fleeing to neighbouring

Iran). The absentee landowners would send assassins to Iraq and with the

connivance of the military kill a revolutionary and then flee to the

safety of Iran.

Q: Why was there so much support for the l.C.P. and Kurdish nationalists

despite their reactionary policies?

A: That is a difficult question. The people were not happy with either

group and especially felt let down by the l.C.P. , but there was no real

revolutionary alternative so people tended to give the I.C.P. the

benefit of the doubt and apologise for their ‘shortcomings’. They would

say naively: “The Iraqi Communist Party is young and is bound to make

mistakes, but soon they would mature like their Russian and Chinese

counterparts” (!!) I suppose there just wasn’t the necessary

consciousness to see these parties for what they are.

In 1963 Qasim was overthrown by the Ba’thists and a period of intense

violence resulted in the death of thousands of activists. The Ba’ths

were supplied a list of known ‘trouble makers’ probably by the CIA.

During Qasim’s last days the people demanded weapons from him for

protection against the National Guards, but he refused to arm them. Even

then the military were so unpopular that they had to trick the people in

order to get into the cities. They put photographs of Qasim at the front

of their tanks, the people thought they intended to defend them from the

Ba’thists, so they were not opposed, until it was too late.

Q: The Ba’ths first experiment In dictatorship was unsuccessful but they

got Into power again In 1968. Can you tell us about Saddam Hussein’s

personal path towards power?

A: Saddam was a cut throat petty gangster, which is probably why no one

took him too seriously at first. His role in the attempted assassination

of Qasim was exaggerated later. Gradually he made himself a power base

with the help of his Takriti tribe and important landlords.

During the 60s there was a critical re-assessment of the l.C.P. policies

of United Front with the Iraqi bosses which eventually led to a split by

‘Aziz al-Hajj who was influenced by Mao and Che Guevara. His guerrilla

actions were unsuccessful and the group was defeated, but his ideas

remained very popular. He is now Ba’thist ambassador to France!

Q: Unlike neighbouring Iran where guerrilla activity by leftists never

threatened the regime.

A: Yes, in Iraq armed struggle was far more widespread. Assassinations

of individual capitalists led to wide-scale armed confrontations, and it

must be said these actions were extremely popular amongst the

population. But the truth is that our security measures were inadequate.

We temporarily controlled the streets because we had guns but when the

’68 coup d’ etat succeeded, we became very exposed. Even our leaders

made horrendous mistakes, and a lot of comrades were arrested and

executed.

I don’t want to give the impression that the regime only used repression

in dealing with the dass struggle. No, they used the usual carrot and

stick tactics and it worked. Between 1968 and 1974 the state became far

more powerful. Again in 1972 the I.C.P. entered into a pact with Ba’ths.

It is incredible how completely degenerate these Stalinists are. In 1975

the Algiers Agreement between Saddam and the Shah, meant that both

leaders could turn their attention towards their internal problems. The

Kurdish uprising collapsed very fast and Saddam became even more

powerful.

Q: Can you now talk about your own break first from Stalinlsm and then

from Leninism in general?

A: We knew some comrades in Baghdad, Basra and Kurdistan who were also

dissatisfied with the prevalent ideologies. At that time, we thought

armed guerrilla struggle was the be all and end all of the revolution,

but gradually and under the influence of the Iranian revolution we

became very critical of guerrilla activity.

I made two visits to Iran during the revolution and brought back new

ideas. We became acquainted with Trotsky’s critique of Stalin and later

on we were introduced to anarchist ideas by comrades from Baghdad. There

was a Lebanese journal, called Darasat aI-arabie, which was critical of

both Leninism and Marxism. We didn’t always agree with them, but they

influenced us greatly.

Q: Did these revolutionaries develop their own independent critique of

Leninism or did they borrow it from the west?

A: Unfortunately us ‘eastern’ communists have always been awe-struck by

our ‘western’ comrades, and looked in their direction for divine

inspiration as muslims look at Kiblah (Direction towards which muslims

turn in praying). Consequently we have always relied on them for an

understanding of capitalism.

But gradually we came to realise that the previous parties we were

involved in were like cages for our minds, stifling our independence.

Consequently we rejected ‘Third worldism’ and ‘Socialist’ revolution and

understood that the only worthwhile path is a Communist revolution (the

abolition of wage slavery, money and the state). We began criticising

Lenin here and there but a complete critique of Leninism came later.

At this stage we decided to form a new organisation called Fasileh

(later renamed Kar). Our programme was very eclectic. It contained good

and also bad things. With the help of some Anarchists we started

publishing a magazine in Arabic and Kurdish The level of class struggle

inside Iraq was very low, but the regime’s repression was fierce. The

state tried very hard to find us but we were careful. Mokhaberat

(security service) would offer reward for our arrest and finally they

raided us.

I got away but a comrade was later arrested, and most probably executed.

We decided to send some comrades abroad to learn from the experience of

the world proletariat and establish internationalist contacts. But when

we got here, we found the level of class struggle was even lower! This

coupled with the usual refugee problems led to petty personal quibblings

which made us forget the purpose of coming abroad. But now that things

are beginning to pick up again, we have once again started to organise

ourselves and meet regularly.

Q: The media here is explicitly giving encouragement to Kurdish

nationalism. Can you tell us a little about the origins of Kurdish

nationalism?

A: In the mid 50’s there was no such thing as a Kurdish nationalist

movement in Iraq. Sometimes at times of crisis, capitalism would

financially induce a Kurdish feudal landlord to organise something, that

they would name a ‘nationalist movement’. In order to give theses

leaders credibility, the central government would move ‘against’ them.

At these times, there was no real Kurdish patriotic identity, it had to

be artificially fostered. Arabs and Kurds viewed their struggle as one.

Kurdish nationalist leaders who shared power with the central

government, broke with them once they received support from the west and

the Shah. But they lacked a popular base and had to escape to the

mountains. They organised a militia but were defeated severely at first

because their soldiers were not volunteers. Learning from their

mistakes, they organised the Peshmerga — a guerrilla outfit — and looked

for better weapons. They began to engage in sectarian murder. For

example, they would get hold of an Arab driver and execute him for being

an Arab.

Q: Sounds a bit like Irish nationalists over here?

A: Yes, very similar, Innocent Arab workers and students were murdered,

and the government in turn would make capital out of this by publicising

‘Kurdish’ atrocities, whipping up anti-Kurdish sentiments. Iraqi

generals would deliberately send young, inexperienced soldiers into

Kurdish areas, knowing full well they were cannon-fodder for the

peshmerga. The next day, a Kurdish village would be destroyed by the

regular Iraqi army in revenge. All these tactics helped to divide the

proletariat.

But despite everything, nationalism hasn’t managed to create

unbridgeable obstacles. Proof of this is the latest uprising. When

Iraqis in the south rose up against Saddam after the war, their efforts

were supported by northerners. Arab soldiers in the north, voluntarily

gave up their arms to the Kurds.

Q: Finally let us talk about the future of the class struggle in Iraq. I

think the Americans are still banking on a Romanian scenario, i.e a

popular uprising from below followed by a preplanned coup d’ etat from

above to oust Saddam. Do you agree?

A : Yes, probably. But the Iraqi situation is more complicated than

Romania, and the divisions between Kurds and Arabs, Arab and Turks, and

Sunni and Shi’ite muslims could easily lead to a prolonged civil war

situation. And the next regime will probably be more religiously

orientated. So there are differences with Romania.

The strongest party seems to be the Al-Dawa (Shi’ite) which receives

backing from Iran. The Radical Ba’ths are not very popular and has

connections with Syria. The I.C.P hasn’t got the power it once used to

have but mustn’t be underestimated. Its base, however, seems to be

amongst the elder generations and not the young.

As for the Patriotic Union of Kurds (PUK) and the Democratic Party of

Kurdistan (DPK), they used to have about 5000 armed peshmergas before

the recent events and are not as significant a force as the media makes

out. The Kurdish towns are being taken not by the political parties but

the people. Akhvan aI-muslimin is the last powerful Sunni organisation

being supported by both Egypt and at times US.

All in all it must be said that the future of autonomous proletarian

activity in Iraq is not very bright.