Media Echoes: A French Perspective: A Confrontation of the USA with the World's Totalitarian Regimes?

By Jean-Christophe Grellety

Editors note: The following is a repost of an article that appears here. Note there is no permalink, so please look for the May 1, 2003 posting.

There are those who opposed the war in Iraq by necessity, because their anti-Americanism is so radical that they preferred closing their eyes to the violence of Saddam Hussein's regime - minimizing it, applying relativism& They should have listened to voices of the opposition living in western countries - 4 million exiles. From now on they shall hear the testimony of those who were victims of the regimes criminal madness, not counting that they are forced to digest proof left about the regimes crimes, such as recently discovered documents.

Saddam Hussein's Iraq fits the definition of totalitarianism well: The imposition of an official ideology established as dogma, a single party based on mass state expropriation, terrorist police control, a monopoly of communications, central planning of the economy, and the arbitrary establishment of objective enemies, the Jews for Nazis, the middle-class as traitors to the Stalinist regime, a label that justified their physical elimination as parasites of society. In Iraqs case, this ideology was Baathism, whose historic development tried to elaborate a fusion of socialism and radical fundamentalism; the Baath single party, a particularly ferocious, criminal, terrorist police state, with media completely controlled by the Hussein family, a centralized personalized economy, and official enemies represented by Iran, Kuwait, Israel and the United States. The dictators madness multiplied his enemies even among those who had never shown the slightest aggression toward Iraq or its overprotected dictator for thirty years.

One particularity of this Iraqi totalitarian State was its longevity. The world effectively adapted to the regimes mass crimes for many years with little to say.
Business is business, and with regard to greater international law, the French were less exemplary than others in Iraq (because its complicity with the fallen regime seems clear). Is liberated Iraq condemned to freedom? We know this: all democracies are fragile and can, without full necessary safeguards, die by collective suicide, following Germanys example in 1933, or be overthrown by putschists.

Iraq is not yet saved. Among its children are those who dream of making Iraq a regime that could support The imposition of an official ideology established as dogma, a single party based on mass state expropriation, terrorist police control, a monopoly of communications, central planning of the economy, and the arbitrary establishment of objective enemies, the Jews for Nazis, the middle-class as traitors to the Stalinist regime, a label that justified their physical elimination as parasites of society. - and they are the Shiite extremists who want to make Iraq the regions second Islamic republic based on the Iranian model. This would not be Historys first paradox: now that Iranians are more pro-American than ever and dream of Marines delivering them from mollahs and ayatollahs (see newspaper article in Le Monde entitled The pro-Americanism of Iranians worries Teheran, April 24th, 2003) that Iraq could, according to the wishes of some Shiites, also become a prison society. Facing such a nightmare, it must be acknowledged that General Jay Garner dares to say and perhaps believes that Iraqis will be free to choose their political system. But the inimitable Donald Rumsfeld fortunately is more in touch with the reasons that led the United States to sacrifice over a hundred men in the war in Iraq. Justified and motivated by the will to avenge the attacks of September 11th, 2001, and by the will to protect free countries from Islamic terrorism, the United States, having just liberated Iraq, cannot accept that country becoming a new base for Fundamentalist Islam, fanatical Islam, following the Iranian example.

Further, we must realize: this Shiite religious madness is contrary to the principles and spirit of the Koran! We must not allow ourselves to be impressed by the language of allegiance of these devotees to the Prophet, Ali and Hussein. Because as soon as the Prophet was dead, the ambitious did not hesitate to claim the power even when the Koran, supposedly God's Word, orders them to practice brotherhood and sharing. Now what emerges from the historical tradition of Arab political experience is indeed the opposite of the sense of sharing, with an exclusivity of power in the hands of only one or of a clan. To defend democracy in Iraq, is therefore equally to lead a fight toward true comprehension of the Koran& Otherwise, the Shiites will indeed be a new American nightmare, and not merely American&

Translation : Philip Estep

Jean-Christophe Grellety is a professor of Letters and History-Geography in France. He can be reached directly at this .