- The Americans "liberated" Baghdad yesterday,
destroyed the centre of
- Saddam Hussein's quarter-century of brutal dictatorial
power but
- brought behind them an army of looters who unleashed
upon the ancient
- city a reign of pillage and anarchy. It was a day that
began with
- shellfire and air strikes and blood-bloated hospitals
and ended with
- the ritual destruction of the dictator's statues. The
mobs shrieked
- their delight. Men who, for 25 years, had grovellingly
obeyed Saddam's
- most humble secret policeman turned into giants, bellowing
their hatred
- of the Iraqi leader as his vast and monstrous statues
thundered to the
- ground.
-
- "It is the beginning of our new freedom," an
Iraqi shopkeeper shouted
- at me. Then he paused, and asked: "What do the Americans
want from us
- now?' The great Lebanese poet Kalil Gibran once wrote
that he pitied
- the nation that welcomed its tyrants with trumpetings
and dismissed
- them with hootings of derision. And the people of Baghdad
performed
- this same deadly ritual yesterday, forgetting that they
ñ or their
- parents ñ had behaved in identical fashion when
the Arab Socialist
- Baath Party destroyed the previous dictatorship of Iraq's
generals and
- princes. Forgetting, too, that the "liberators"
were a new and alien
- and all-powerful occupying force with neither culture
nor language nor
- race nor religion to unite them with Iraq.
-
- As tens of thousands of Shia Muslim poor from the vast
slums of Saddam
- City poured into the centre of Baghdad to smash their
way into shops,
- offices and government ministries ñ an epic version
of the same orgy of
- theft and mass destruction that the British did so little
to prevent in
- Basra ñ US Marines watched from only a few hundred
yards away as
- looters made off with cars, rugs, hoards of money, computers,
desks,
- sofas, even door-frames.
-
- In Al-Fardus (Paradise) Square, US Marines helped a crowd
of youths
- pull down the gaunt and massive statue of Saddam by roping
it to an
- armoured personnel carrier. It toppled menacingly forward
from its
- plinth to hang lengthways above the ground, right arm
still raised in
- fraternal greetings to the Iraqi people.
-
- It was a symbolic moment in more ways than one. I stood
behind the
- first man to seize a hatchet and smash at the imposing
grey marble
- plinth. But within seconds, the marble had fallen away
to reveal a
- foundation of cheap bricks and badly cracked cement.
That's what the
- Americans always guessed Saddam's regime was made of,
although they did
- their best ñ in the late Seventies and early Eighties
ñ to arm him and
- service his economy and offer him political support,
to turn him into
- the very dictator he became.
-
- In one sense, therefore, America ñ occupying the
capital of an Arab
- nation for the first time in its history ñ was
helping to destroy what
- it had spent so much time and money creating. Saddam
was "our" man and
- yesterday, metaphorically at least, we annihilated him.
Hence the
- importance of all those statue- bashing mobs, of all
that looting and
- theft.
-
- But of the real and somewhat less imposing Saddam, there
was no trace.
-
- Neither he nor his sons, Uday and Qusay, could be found.
Had they fled
- north to their homeland fortress of Tikrit? Or has he
ñ the most
- popular rumour this ñ taken refuge in the Russian
embassy in Baghdad.
- Were they hiding out in the cobweb of underground tunnels
and bunkers
- beneath the presidential palaces? True, their rule was
effectively
- over. The torture chambers and the prisons should now
be turned into
- memorials, the true story of Iraq's use of gas warfare
revealed at
- last. But history suggests otherwise. Prisons usually
pass over to new
- management, torture cells too, and who would want the
world to know how
- easy it is to make weapons of mass destruction.
-
- There will be mass graves that will have to be opened
ñ though in the
- Middle East, these disinterments are usually performed
in order to
- allow more blood to be poured onto the graves.
-
- Not that the nightmare is entirely over. For though the
Americans will
- mark yesterday as their first day of occupation ñ
they, of course, will
- call it liberation ñ vast areas of Baghdad remained
outside the control
- of the United States last night. And at dusk, just before
darkness
- curled over the land, I crossed through the American
lines, back to the
- little bit of Saddam's regime that remained intact within
the vast,
- flat city of Baghdad. Down grey, carless streets, I drove
to the great
- bridges over the Tigris which the Americans had still
not crossed from
- the west. And there, on the corner of Bab al-Moazzam
Street, were a
- small group of mujahedin fighters, firing Kalashnikov
rifles at the
- American tanks on the other side of the waterway. It
was brave and
- utterly pathetic and painfully instructive.
-
- For the men turned out to be Arabs from Algeria, Morocco,
Syria,
- Jordan, Palestine. Not an Iraqi was among them. The Baathist
- militiamen, the Republican Guard, the greasy Iraqi intelligence
men,
- the so-called Saddam Fedayeen had all left their posts
and crept home.
- Only the foreign Arabs, like the Frenchmen of the Nazi
Charlemagne
- Division in 1945 Berlin, fought on. At the end, many
Iraqis had shunned
- these men and a group of them had turned up to sit outside
the lobby of
- the Palestine Hotel, pleading to journalists for help
in returning
- home.
-
- "We left our wives and children and came here to
die for these people
- and then they told us to go," one of them said.
But at the end of the
- Bab al-Moazzam Bridge they fought on last night and when
I left them I
- could hear the American jets flying in from the west.
Hurtling back
- through those empty streets, I could hear, too, the American
tank fire
- as it smashed into their building.
-
- But tanks come in two forms: the dangerous, deadly kind
and the
- "liberating" kind from which smart young soldiers
with tanned faces
- look down with smiles at Iraqis who are obliging enough
to wave at
- them, tanks with cute names stencilled on their gun barrels,
names like
- "Kitten Rescue" and "Nightmare Witness"
(this with a human skull
- painted underneath) and "Pearl". And there
has to be a first soldier ñ
- of the occupying or liberating kind ñ who stands
at the very front of
- the first column of every vast and powerful army.
-
- So I walked up to Corporal David Breeze of the 3rd Battalion,
4th
- Marine Regiment, from Michigan. He hadn't spoken to his
parents for two
- months so I called his mother on my satellite phone and
from the other
- side of the world, Mrs Breeze came on the line and I
handed the phone
- to her son.
-
- And so this is what the very first soldier to enter the
centre of
- Baghdad told his family yesterday evening. "Hi you
guys. I'm in
- Baghdad.
-
- "I'm ringing to say 'Hi! I love you. I'm doing fine.
I love you guys.
- The war will be over in a few days. I'll see you all
soon.''
-
- Yes, they all say the war will be over soon. There will
be a homecoming
- no doubt for Corporal Breeze and I suppose I admired
his innocence
- despite the deadly realities that await America in this
dangerous,
- cruel land. For even as the marine tanks thrashed and
ground down the
- highway, there were men and women who saw them and stood,
the women
- scarved, the men observing the soldiers with the most
acute attention,
- who spoke of their fear for the future, who talked of
how Iraq could
- never be ruled by foreigners.
-
- "You'll see the celebrations and we will be happy
Saddam has gone," one
- of them said to me. "But we will then want to rid
ourselves of the
- Americans and we will want to keep our oil and there
will be resistance
- and then they will call us "terrorists". Nor
did the Americans look
- happy "liberators". They pointed their rifles
at the pavements and
- screamed at motorists to stop ñ one who did not,
an old man in an old
- car, was shot in the head in front of two French journalists.
-
- Of course, the Americans knew they would get a good press
by
- "liberating" the foreign journalists at the
Palestine Hotel. They lay
- in the long grass of the nearest square and pretended
to aim their
- rifles at the rooftops as cameras hissed at them, and
they flew a huge
- American flag from one of their tanks and grinned at
the journalists,
- not one of whom reminded them that just 24 hours earlier,
their army
- had killed two Western journalists with tank fire in
that same hotel
- and then lied about it.
-
- But it was the looters who marked the day as something
sinister rather
- than joyful. In Saddam City, they had welcomed the Americans
with "V"
- signs and cries of "Up America" and the usual
trumpetings, but then
- they had set off downtown for a more important appointment.
At the
- Ministry of Economy, they stole the entire records of
Iraq's exports
- and imports on computer discs, with desk-top computers,
with armchairs
- and fridges and paintings. When I tried to enter the
building, the
- looters swore at me. A French reporter had his money
and camera seized
- by the mob.
-
- At the Olympic sports offices, run by Uday Hussein, they
did the same,
- one old man staggering from the building with a massive
portrait of
- Saddam which he proceeded to attack with his fists, another
tottering
- out of the building bearing a vast ornamental Chinese
pot.
-
- True, these were regime targets. But many of the crowds
went for shops,
- smashing their way into furniture stores and professional
offices. They
- came with trucks and pick-ups and trailers pulled by
scruffy, underfed
- donkeys to carry their loot away. I saw a boy making
off with an X-ray
- machine, a woman with a dentist's chair.
-
- At the Ministry of Oil, the minister's black Mercedes
limousine was
- discovered by the looters. Unable to find the keys, they
tore the car
- apart, ripping off its doors, tyres and seats, leaving
just the carcass
- and chassis in front of the huge front entrance.
-
- At the Palestine Hotel, they smashed Saddam's portrait
on the lobby
- floor and set light to the hoarding of the same wretched
man over the
- front door. They cried "Allahuakbar" meaning
God is Greater. And there
- was a message there, too, for the watching Marines if
they had
- understood it.
-
- And so last night, as the explosion of tank shells still
crashed over
- the city, Baghdad lay at the feet of a new master. They
have come and
- gone in the city's history, Abbasids and Ummayads and
Mongols and Turks
- and British and now the Americans. The United States
embassy reopened
- yesterday and soon, no doubt, when the Iraqis have learned
to whom they
- must now be obedient friends, President Bush will come
here and there
- will be new "friends" of America to open a
new relationship with the
- world, new economic fortunes for those who "liberated"
them, and ñ
- equally no doubt ñ relations with Israel and a
real Israeli embassy in
- Baghdad.
-
- But winning a war is one thing. Succeeding in the ideological
and
- economic project that lies behind this whole war is quite
another. The
- "real" story for America's mastery over the
Arab world starts now.
-
- http://argument.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=395707
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