After more than eight months, the security and intelligence services of the United States, in conjunction with collaborationist Iraqi and Kurdish forces, finally captured Saddam Hussein. Promenaded as a great Bush victory, the Saddam’s arrest will be used to exhaustion to “prove” the United States was correct to wage a criminal war with all its associated atrocities. U.S. repressive agencies are now assigned to squeeze out of the Iraqi ex-president a confession of his crimes and his possession, when he governed the country, of weapons of mass destruction, that the UN inspectors, using legal means, and the occupation troops, using violence and illegal acts, have never been able to find on Iraqi territory. The intimidation of the leader with the early announcement that he could be put to death, made by the U.S. president himself and by other U.S. authorities, combined with the isolation of the prisoner and the secrecy over where he is being detained and interrogated, indicates that Bush’s henchmen will not hesitate to use torture, savage or scientific, to obtain the “proof” that will win the argument for the tyrant from Texas to present himself as the “savior of the world.” For this reason the declarations regarding juridical customs in the case against the former Arab leader are worthless.

The exhaustive exhibition of nauseating images of a caged animal, besides exposing the repressive nature of the occupation forces, contradict the most rudimentary ideas of justice and human rights generally accepted. But it has clear objectives: to intimidate the Iraqi resistance, for which Saddam Hussein was considered a symbol; to exhibit a hunting trophy to an ever more bored and reactionary silent majority in the United States, so that they re-elect Bush; and to send a warning to those few leaders remaining in the world who take stands that are anti-imperialist and in opposition to the bellicose and hegemonic plans of the United States, to let them know that their fate is sealed and will be the same as Saddam’s. We are witnessing an “avant-premiere” of a great media spectacle of the Hollywood mold, based on mass brainwashing techniques that will invoke the crimes of Saddam Hussein and the virtues of the United States’ civilizing mission. We can expect they won’t lack farcical scenes like that one we saw recently, where the president of the most powerful country on the planet offered his soldiers a plastic turkey on Thanksgiving Day.

Though it is understandable that many people might celebrate the fall of Saddam Hussein, we must make it clear that the anti-imperialist forces of the world cannot associate themselves with the U.S. glee. Even if they would like to, they will never share in the results of the triumph of a Bush who directs a project based on indivisible power – strictly bourgeois, imperialist and North American. Because the available information is controlled and filtered, it is also understandable that the majority of people do not know that in Iraq, in Palestine, and in a good part of the Arab and Muslim world the capture of the former Iraqi president caused consternation and outrage. Supporters of Saddam Hussein held demonstrations in Baghdad, Falluja, Ramadi and Tikrit, during which there were violent clashes with the police and occupation forces. In Falluja, the U.S. troops reacted by carrying out another massacre. And especially in Palestine, where the heart of Arab resistance beats the strongest, demonstrators went out on the streets protesting against Saddam Hussein’s arrest.

 We emphasize, that if a victory of imperialism under the leadership of the ultra-conservative group centered around President Bush is a step forward in his continuing strategy to concretize his hegemonic plans to dominate the world by force, the capture of the former Iraqi president can only be something negative for the Iraqi resistance, for the Arab cause and for the anti-imperialist struggle of the peoples of the entire world. “The capture of this man was crucial to the rise of a free Iraq,” Bush said to announce his triumph, tying the fate of the occupation to the arrest of the former leader.

  The regime of Saddam Hussein, installed in 1979, corresponded to the constriction and degeneration of Iraq’s anti-imperialist and anti-colonial revolution. It was the violent result of internal struggles in the course of the revolutionary process begun in 1958, when a popular insurrection, in which the communists were active participants and protagonists, threw down the reactionary monarchy of King Feisal. General Kassem, supported by the Communist Party, governed for five years before being overthrown by Colonel Aref, when the center of power moved to the Baath Party. From that time there were a series of coups, with Aref overthrown by Al Bakri, who in his turn was thrown out a window in 1979 by Saddam Hussein. In the complex political tableau of the Middle East, there was a time in which the interests of Saddam Hussein and U.S. imperialism converged. This was principally after the popular Iranian revolution that gave birth to the Islamic Republic threw from power in ancient Persia the most loyal lackey of U.S. imperialism in the region, Shah Reza Pahlevi. The crimes that Saddam is accused of committing were for the most part committed in this epoch, including the use of chemical weapons during the war against Iran, when the U.S. was instigating Iraq.

The sudden turns in the world political climate, the consolidation of the Iraqi regime as a regional force with its own interests and above all the resistance that began to move against the interests of the imperialist oil monopolies, brought about a new relationship of forces. The Iraqi regime, under the leadership of Saddam Hussein, came to symbolize the Arab cause itself. It is for this reason that his physical death is not enough for imperialism. It is necessary to kill the symbol, to liquidate the myth.

Logically speaking, the capture of Saddam Hussein implies no fundamental change in the Iraqi situation. The occupation continues, with all its anti-national, anti-democratic and illegal content from the point of view of international law. It is an illusion to suppose that now conditions will effectively be created conditions to develop Iraqi self-rule and that the disappearance of the ex-dictator will create conditions to democratize Iraq. U.S. planning takes neither the one thing nor the other into consideration. It is not in the outlook of U.S. imperialism to construct a true national power in Iraq. It is more likely, taking account of international reactions, of the anachronism of maintaining a colonial administration and allowing for political wear and tear and the loss of lives of its soldiers and officials, the USA could move toward the construction of a puppet government, maintaining, however, rigorous political and military control over the country. Many formulas for this are under study, including the division of the country in three parts according to religious and ethnic criteria in line with the Yugoslav pattern.

From the point of view of the resistance, even if the capture of Saddam Hussein causes a loss of morale among his supporters, in essence nothing has changed. There may not be conditions in the short run that allow the resistance to arise as an organized force and inflict significant setbacks on the occupation forces. Still on the other hand it is certain that the national mood will continue to express itself in the form of violent acts against those who violate the sovereignty of the country. Bush himself had to admit, in the same talk where he announced the capture of the former president: “The capture of Saddam Hussein will not mean the end of violence in Iraq.”

Also on the world scene, the capture of Saddam Hussein represents nothing new in terms of reducing the danger of new warlike adventures on the part of U.S. imperialism. Again, we look at Bush’s own words. “The war on terror is a different kind of war, waged capture by capture, cell by cell, and victory by victory. Our security is assured by our perseverance and by our sure belief in the success of liberty. And the United States of America will not relent until this war is won.”

Bush demonized Iraq and Saddam Hussein, as part of an all-inclusive imperialist project to destroy whatever country dares resist its dictates. The creation of the axis of evil myth is part of that project. Behind the high-level speeches in the name of democracy are hidden the plans for war and the violation of sovereignty of countries and peoples. It is the task of the anti-imperialist forces to combat them.

[translation: John Catalinotto]