Iraq's Post-1950 History Revisited: Part 16

(See parts 1-15 below)

Most people in the United States would like to see the nearly 150,000 U.S. troops and 200,000 private contractors who are still occupying Iraqi soil (in support of special U.S. corporate interests) to finally be withdrawn from Iraq by Easter 2009. But the Democratic Obama regime is still not willing to immediately bring U.S. troops and private contractors in Iraq back home; and the Obama regime apparently plans to leave between 30,000 and 50,000 U.S. occupation troops stationed in Iraq as "military advisors" until January 1, 2012.

Yet if the Obama Administration officials responsible for authorizing the use of U.S. armed forces in Iraq--like U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton--had known more about Iraq's post-1950 history, perhaps U.S. troops and private contractors would not still be spending another Easter in Iraq in 2009?

Officially, 149 Iraq Communist Party members were executed between February 8, 1963 and the end of the initial 1960s period of Ba'th Party rule in Iraq in November 1963, including 7 of the 19 members of the Iraq Communist Party's Central Committee. But the actual number of Iraqi communist activists executed after the February 8, 1963 coup was apparently much higher. According to Said Aburish's book, A Brutal Friendship: The West and the Arab Elite:

"The number of people eliminated remains confused and estimates range from 700 to 30,000. Putting various statements by Iraqi exiles together, in all likelihood the figure was nearer five thousand…There were many ordinary people who were eliminated because they continued to resist after the coup became an accomplished fact, but there were also senior army officers, lawyers, professors, teachers, doctors and others. There were pregnant women and old men among them and many were tortured to death in the presence of their young children…The British Committee for Human Rights in Iraq, one of the few international groups to investigate what happened after the coup, confirmed all this in a 1964 report and compared the Ba'thist hit squads to `Hitlerian shock troops.'"

The CIA-backed Ba'th Party was able to overthrow the Qasim regime and then violate the human rights of thousands of Iraqi leftists in February 1963, despite there only being about 15,000 Ba'thist civilian supporters within Iraqi society at that time. But even after it eliminated its Iraqi communist political opponents and held Iraqi state power for the first time between February and November 1963, "the Ba'th was never able at any time to bring together one-third of the crowds that the Communists attracted in 1959," according to The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq book.

Although the Iraq Communist Party enjoyed much more support in Iraqi society between 1958 and early 1963 than the Ba'th Party, surviving Iraq Communist Party leaders later concluded in a 1967 internal self-criticism document that:

"We gave ourselves up to the delusion that we could preserve the mighty revolutionary army, which we built under the extraordinary revolutionary circumstances of 1958-1959, in a condition of passive defense or passive watchfulness indefinitely."

(end of part 16)

Iraq's Post-1950 History Revisited: Part 15

(See parts 1-14 below)

Most people in the United States would like to see the nearly 150,000 U.S. troops and 200,000 private contractors who are still occupying Iraqi soil (in support of special U.S. corporate interests) to finally be withdrawn from Iraq by Easter 2009. But the Democratic Obama regime is still not willing to immediately bring U.S. troops and private contractors in Iraq back home; and the Obama regime apparently plans to leave between 30,000 and 50,000 U.S. occupation troops stationed in Iraq as "military advisors" until January 1, 2012.

Yet if the Obama Administration officials responsible for authorizing the use of U.S. armed forces in Iraq--like U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton--had known more about Iraq's post-1950 history, perhaps U.S. troops and private contractors would not still be spending another Easter in Iraq in 2009?

Following the Kennedy Administration-backed February 8, 1963 military coup in Iraq, the 39-year old poet who had been Secretary General of the Iraq Communist Party since 1955, Husain ar-Radi (a/k/a Salam 'Adil), was arrested by the new Ba'th regime on February 20, 1963. But The Old Social Classes and The Revolutionary Movements of Iraq book noted that "although various means were employed to make him speak, he did not yield;" and "four days later he died under torture."

By March 1963, an estimated 10,000 Iraq Communist Party members had been arrested by the Ba'th regime and many imprisoned Iraqi leftist activists were not treated gently. As the book The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq recalled:

"In the cellars of an-Ninayah Palace…were found all sorts of loathsome instruments of torture, including electric wire with pincers, pointed iron stakes on which prisoners were made to sit, and a machine which still bore traces of chopped-off fingers. Small heaps of blooded clothing were scattered about, and there were pools on the floor and stains over the walls."

And even some members of the anti-communist Ba'th Party apparently began to protest against the way some of their imprisoned Iraqi leftist political opponents were being tortured after the February 8, 1963 coup. (end of part 15)

African-American Male Worker Jobless Rate Under Obama Regime: 16.1 Percent In February

The official “not-seasonally adjusted” unemployment rate for African-American male workers over 20 years-of-age in the United States under the Democratic Obama Administration increased from 15.8 percent to 16.1 percent between January 2009 and February 2009; while the “seasonally adjusted” unemployment rate for African-American male workers increased from 14.1 percent to 14.9 percent, according to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

The “not-seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all African-American workers increased from 13.4 percent to 13.8 percent during this same period; while the “seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all African-American workers increased to 13.4 percent.

For all U.S. workers over 20 years-of-age, the “not-seasonally adjusted” jobless rate jumped from 8.5 percent to 8.9 percent between January 2009 and February 2009; while the “seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for all U.S. workers increased to 8.1 percent.

The “not-seasonally adjusted” unemployment rate for white male workers also increased from 8.3 percent to 9 percent between January 2009 and February 2009. In addition, the “not-seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for Hispanic or Latino male workers increased from 11 percent to 12.1 percent between January 2009 and February 2009.

Between January 2009 and February 2009, the “seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for African-American youth between 16 and 19 years-of-age increased from 36.5 percent to 38.8 percent; while the “seasonally adjusted” jobless rate for white youth between 16 and 19 years-of-age was 19.1 percent.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ March 6, 2009 press release:

“The number of unemployed persons increased by 851,000 to 12.5 million in February…

“Among the unemployed, the number of job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs increased by 716,000 to 7.7 million in February…

“The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more)increased by 270,000 to 2.9 million in February…

“In February, the number of persons who worked part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers) rose by 787,000,reaching 8.6 million…This category includes persons who would like to work full time but were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find full-time jobs…

“There were 731,000 discouraged workers in February…Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them…

“Total nonfarm payroll employment dropped by 651,000 in February…

“Employment in professional and business services fell by 180,000 in February. The temporary help industry lost 78,000 jobs over the month….In February, job declines also occurred in services to buildings and dwellings (-17,000), architectural and engineering services (-16,000), and business support services (-12,000).

“Widespread job losses continued in manufacturing in February (-168,000). The majority of the decline occurred in durable goods industries (-132,000), with the largest decreases in fabricated metal products (-28,000) and machinery (-25,000). Employment in nondurable goods manufacturing declined by 36,000 over the month.

“The construction industry lost 104,000 jobs in February…

“Employment in truck transportation declined by 33,000 in February…The information industry continued to lose jobs (-15,000)…

“Employment in financial activities continued to decline in February (-44,000).... In February, job losses occurred in real estate (-11,000); credit intermediation(-11,000); and securities, commodity contracts, and investments (-8,000).

“Retail trade employment fell by 40,000 over the month…In February, employment decreased in automobile dealerships (-9,000), sporting goods (-9,000), furniture and homefurnishing stores (-8,000), and building material and garden supply stores(-7,000). Employment in wholesale trade fell by 37,000 over the month,with nearly all of the decline occurring in durable goods.

“Employment in leisure and hospitality continued to trend down over the month (-33,000), with about half of the decrease in the accommodation industry (-18,000)…”

Iraq's Post-1950 History Revisited: Part 14

(See parts 1-13 below)

Most people in the United States would like to see the nearly 150,000 U.S. troops and 200,000 private contractors who are still occupying Iraqi soil (in support of special U.S. corporate interests) to finally be withdrawn from Iraq by Easter 2009. But the Democratic Obama regime is still not willing to immediately bring U.S. troops and private contractors in Iraq back home; and the Obama regime apparently plans to leave between 30,000 and 50,000 U.S. occupation troops stationed in Iraq as "military advisors" until January 1, 2012.

Yet if the Obama Administration officials responsible for authorizing the use of U.S. armed forces in Iraq--like U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton--had known more about Iraq's post-1950 history, perhaps U.S. troops and private contractors would not still be spending another Easter in Iraq in 2009?

Following the Democratic Kennedy Administration-backed February 8, 1963 military coup in Iraq, the then-pro-Ba'thist colonel, Abdel Salem Aref, was named to head the post-coup Ba'th regime in Iraq. And between February and November 1963, there apparently was a reign of terror against Iraqi leftists during this first Ba'th regime.

According to the 1978-published book, The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq:

"The new rulers had a past score to settle and, in their revengeful ardor, went to unfortunate extremes. Upon the slightest resistance on or a mere suspicion of intent to resist, Communists--real or hypothetical--were felled out of hand. The number of those seized so taxed the existing prisons that sports clubs, movie theatres, private houses, An-Rihayah Palace…were turned into places of confinement. The arrests were made in accordance with lists prepared beforehand."

The Kennedy Administration's CIA apparently helped prepare the Ba'th regime's arrests "lists." As the now-deceased King Hussein of Jordan told the Al Ahraim newspaper on September 27, 1963:

"I know for a certainty that what happened on 8 February [1963] had the support of American intelligence. Some of those who now rule in Bagdad do not know of this thing but I am aware of the truth. Numerous meetings were held between the Ba'th party and American Intelligence, the most important in Kuwait. Do you know that on 8 February a secret radio beamed to Iraq was supplying the men who pulled the coup with the names and addresses of the Communists there so that they could be arrested and executed?"

According to A Brutal Friendship--The West and the Arab Elite by Said Aburish, a Time magazine reporter named William McHale was apparently also an undercover CIA operative in Beirut who furnished Ba'th leaders with a list of Iraqi communist suspects. McHale had previously been expelled from Iraq on March 26, 1959, after interviewing Qasim and then writing a hostile article for Time magazine about the Qasim regime's successful suppression of the Ba'thist-supported 1959 coup attempt in Mosul.

In his April 10, 2003 investigative report, UPI Intelligence Correspondent Richard Sale also revealed that "the CIA provided the submachine gun-toting" Ba'thist National Guardsmen of the post-coup regime "with lists of suspected communists who were then jailed, interrogated, and summarily gunned down, according to former U.S. intelligence officials with intimate knowledge of the executions."

According to Sale's "Exclusive: Saddam key in early CIA plot" investigative report:

"Many suspected communists were killed outright, these sources said. [Unholy Babylon book author Adel] Darwish told UPI that the mass killings, presided over by Saddam, took place at Qasr al-Nehayat, literally, the Palace of the End.

"A former senior U.S. State Department official told UPI: `We were frankly glad to be rid of them. You ask that they get a fair trial? You have to be kidding. This was serious business.'”

"British scholar Con Coughlin, author of Saddam: King of Terror, quotes Jim Critchfield, then a senior Middle East agency official, as saying the killing of Qasim and the communists was regarded `as a great victory.' A former long-time covert U.S. intelligence operative and friend of Critchfield said: `Jim was an old Middle East hand. He wasn't sorry to see the communists go at all. Hey, we were playing for keeps.'"

(end of part 14)

Iraq's Post-1950 History Revisited: Part 13

(See parts 1-12 below)

Most people in the United States would like to see the nearly 150,000 U.S. troops and 200,000 private contractors who are still occupying Iraqi soil (in support of special U.S. corporate interests) to finally be withdrawn from Iraq by Easter 2009. But the Democratic Obama regime is still not willing to immediately bring U.S. troops and private contractors in Iraq back home; and the Obama regime apparently plans to leave between 30,000 and 50,000 U.S. occupation troops stationed in Iraq as "military advisors" until January 1, 2012.

Yet if the Obama Administration officials responsible for authorizing the use of U.S. armed forces in Iraq--like U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton--had known more about Iraq's post-1950 history, perhaps U.S. troops and private contractors would not still be spending another Easter in Iraq in 2009?

At 8:30 a.m. on February 8, 1963, Brigade General Jalal al-Awqati, the pro-Iraq Communist Party Air Force chief, was assassinated near a confectionary shop in Baghdad. Next--at 9:30 a.m.--two Iraqi military jets first dive-bombed at Rashid Airport, making its runway unusable. Then they joined other Iraqi MIG-17s in firing rockets and cannons at the Iraqi Ministry of Defense.

From their camps, other Iraqi military troops were also ordered to then march and Baghdad's radio transmitter was seized by the Iraqi military coup-plotters. And by 9:40 a.m. a statement of the Ba'th-led coup plotters was being aired over the radio.

At 10 a.m., however, the Iraq Communist Party’s Central Committee issued a proclamation that called for resistance to the February 8, 1963 coup and stated:

"A worthless band of reactionary and conspiratorial officers has made a desperate attempt to seize power in preparation for the putting of our country back into the grip of imperialism and reaction."

Thousands of Iraq Communist Party and/or Qasim regime supporters then began massing in front of Iraq's Ministry of Defense, forming an outer ring. And when Qasim arrived at the Ministry of Defense at 10:30 a.m., the crowd of anti-coup demonstrators outside apparently was begging Ministry of Defense officials to distribute arms to it.

In addition, on the other side of Baghdad, meanwhile, Iraqi communist protesters tried to rush the Broadcasting House which the Ba'thist coup leaders had seized. But the Iraqi Army's Fourth Tank Regiment blocked the protesters from gaining control of Baghdad's radio transmitter.

At 11:30 a.m. hundreds of anti-coup protesters were then killed in front of the Ministry of Defense when an Iraqi Army tank regiment linked up with armed Ba'th militia members and fired on the mainly civilian protesters. Although the majority of Iraq's soldiers apparently were against the February 8, 1963 coup, they were indecisive, however, in attempting to resist the coup.

At 3 p.m. a battle to seize Qasim's headquarters at the Ministry of Defense began which did not end until noon of the following day, February 9, 1963. A half-hour later after the battle to seize Qasim's headquarters ended, Qasim was arrested by the pro-coup soldiers; and at 1:30 p.m. on February 9, 1963 Qasim was then executed.

In the fighting in Baghdad between February 8 and 10, 1963, 5,000 Iraqi citizens were apparently killed, including 80 Ba'th Party activists and 340 Iraqi communist activists. (end of part 13)

Iraq's Post-1950 History Revisited: Part 12

(See parts 1-11 below)

Most people in the United States would like to see the nearly 150,000 U.S. troops and 200,000 private contractors who are still occupying Iraqi soil (in support of special U.S. corporate interests) to finally be withdrawn from Iraq by Easter 2009. But the Democratic Obama regime is still not willing to immediately bring U.S. troops and private contractors in Iraq back home; and the Obama regime apparently plans to leave between 30,000 and 50,000 U.S. occupation troops stationed in Iraq as "military advisors" until January 1, 2012.

Yet if the Obama Administration officials responsible for authorizing the use of U.S. armed forces in Iraq--like U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton--had known more about Iraq's post-1950 history, perhaps U.S. troops and private contractors would not still be spending another Easter in Iraq in 2009?

By the end of 1962, a Ba'th Party militia of about two thousand men had been organized and trained; and in December 1962 the Ba'th activists fixed the date for a military coup against the Qasim regime for January 18, 1963.

So on December 24, 1962 the Ba'th Party's student activists declared a student strike at Iraq's schools and university. The purpose of the Ba'th-led student strike was apparently to divert the attention of Qasim away from the Iraqi army and to act as a screen for the planned Ba'th-led military coup. On January 6, 1963, however, the proposed coup date was postponed until February 25, 1963.

By February 3, 1963, however, Qasim had discovered that a coup was being planned and so he ordered the arrest of three leading Ba'th plotters, including the CIA's apparent representative on the "National Council of Revolutionary Command," Saleh Mahdi Ammash. But fearing further arrests, the remaining coup-plotters then acted on February 8, 1963.

Not surprisingly, L'Express reported in its February 21, 1963 issue "that the British and US intelligence services had known" of the February 8, 1963 coup in advance, according to the Iraq Under Qassem book. Citing the January 1, 1994 issue of London's Guardian newspaper as his source, William Blum also observed in Rogue State that "papers of the British cabinet of 1963, later declassified, disclose that the coup had been backed by the British and the CIA." UPI Intelligence Correspondent Richard Sale's April 10, 2003 investigative report also noted that "[former National Security Council Staffer Roger] Morris claimed recently that the CIA was behind the coup, which was sanctioned by President John F. Kennedy…" (end of part 12)

Iraq's Post-1950 History Revisited: Part 11

(See parts 1-10 below)

Most people in the United States would like to see the nearly 150,000 U.S. troops and 200,000 private contractors who are still occupying Iraqi soil (in support of special U.S. corporate interests) to finally be withdrawn from Iraq by Easter 2009. But the Democratic Obama regime is still not willing to immediately bring U.S. troops and private contractors in Iraq back home; and the Obama regime apparently plans to leave between 30,000 and 50,000 U.S. occupation troops stationed in Iraq as "military advisors" until January 1, 2012.

Yet if the Obama Administration officials responsible for authorizing the use of U.S. armed forces in Iraq--like U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton--had known more about Iraq's post-1950 history, perhaps U.S. troops and private contractors would not still be spending another Easter in Iraq in 2009?

As Haymarket Books' A People's History of Iraq: The Iraqi Communist Party, Workers' Movements, and the Left 1924-2004 notes, in 1959 "the Ba'thists and the nationalists" had "set up clandestine anti-communist squads employed in assassinating members" of the Iraq Communist Party "and other radical groups." So between 1960 and early 1963, Iraqi leftist activists were also, increasingly, the apparent victims of Iraqi right-wing violence. Between early 1960 and October 23, 1961, for example, 286 Iraqi leftists were apparently assassinated and 1,572 were apparently wounded by right-wing Iraqi gunmen. By early February 1963, 400 people in Mosul, alone, had been killed by right-wing Iraqi extremists.

The self-determination demands of Iraq's Kurdish population had also apparently not been satisfactorily met by Qasim's regime by the summer of 1961. So a war broke out then between Kurdish nationalists and the Qasim government. In December 1961, Qasim decided to also release Iraq's political prisoners, including some Iraq Communist Party members. But after Iraqi communist activists organized large demos which called for peace with the Kurds in May 1962, Qasim again ordered the arrest of many Iraq Communist Party members.

Qasim apparently feared the potential internal political threat to his dictatorial position from Iraqi communist activists more than he feared the real threat to his position (and life) from the apparently CIA-backed Ba'th Party activists, who were quietly gaining more support within the Iraqi military. On November 25, 1961, for example, the pro-Ba'thist former Deputy Prime Minister (who had been jailed in November 1958 for allegedly trying to assassinate Qasim at an October 1958 meeting), Col. Abdel Salem Aref, "was brought from prison to Qasim, who embraced and entertained him, escorted him home and reinstated him in the army, although not in active service," according to the book Iraq Under Qassem: A Political History, 1958-1963.

After being pardoned by Qasim and released from prison, however, Aref soon joined the "National Council of Revolutionary Command" committee of Ba'th leaders and active or retired anti-Qasim military officers who carried out the CIA-supported 1963 coup in Iraq. Another member of this committee was an Iraqi colonel named Saleh Mahdi Ammash, who was apparently recruited by the CIA when he served at the Iraqi embassy in Washington, D.C., according to the book A Brutal Friendship: the West and the Arab Elite by Said Aburish. (end of part 11)