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When
one looks at Goya’s paintings (Disasters of War),
one is struck by the brutality and inhumanity of the
French army in Spain. Eventually, Napoleon’s
back was broken in Spain by small but determined resistance
of guerrilla fighters. Napoleon once said of Spain,
“That unfortunate war destroyed me . . . All
. . . my disasters are bound up in that fatal knot”(2).
Indeed, Napoleon lost more French troops in Spain
than in Russia. The comparison with the American army
in Iraq today, is not dissimilar in term of violence
and destruction inflicted by the U.S. army on one
of the greatest civilisation of human kinds.
The
Spanish word guerrilla means, “little war”,
described the tactics used to resist the French empire
of Napoleon Bonaparte. However, guerrilla warfare
and tactics are centuries old. Guerrilla bands in
Iraq began emerging immediately after the U.S. forces
entered Iraq, evidently because of the power vacuum
that developed when the Iraqi regime collapsed, and
the U.S. army failed to establish effective authority
of their own. The Iraqi resistance groups varied,
some are former soldiers or workers but others being
religious persons with local influence. Although these
groups are not centrally linked, almost all of them
shared an enthusiastic devotion to Islam and an enthusiastic
rejection of the brutal U.S-British occupying forces.
The
brutal and horrific behaviour of the occupying forces
towards the Iraqi people have contributed to increase
support for the Iraqi resistance among the Iraqi population.
Furthermore, the use of torture, sexual abuse and
the apparent murder of Iraqi detainees in prisons
at the hands of occupying forces, removed any doubt
about the “real” intention of the occupation,
and united the people against the enemy, the “infidels”.
Sectarian differences did not block the Iraqis from
uniting behind a common cause.
The
wide cultural gap between the Iraqi culture and the
culture of the occupying forces has contributed to
the widespread resentment of the occupation. Occupation
authority in Iraq publicly declared that the U.S army
presence in Iraq is represented superior enlightened
views and superior enlightened rule. The occupying
forces saw the Iraqis as “terrorists” and
backward people, who could only be controlled by force
and who therefore deserved to be. Meanwhile, the American
public, and to certain extent, the British and Australian
public was told that Iraq as a whole welcomed U.S.
army as “liberators” and that only a few
misguided bandits opposed the occupation. The opposite
is true. Support for the occupation in Iraq is very
minimal and only found among some Iraqi Kurds in the
north, and those “expatriates” returned
to Iraq with the occupying forces. The fact that a
Vichy government have not been found in Iraq is a
proof.
Recent
polls conducted in Iraq showed that the majority of
Iraqis (over 85%) want the occupation to end and U.S.-British
forces to leave Iraq. This is very significant in
that the guerrilla fighters are able to melt easily
within the population, which make them very strong
and unpredictable force to fight by regular army of
soldiers, tanks and helicopter gunships. With bases
of support among the population, the Iraqi resistance
have been very successful in Fallujah and other parts
of Iraq. Many Iraqis are joining the resistance to
truly liberate their country from colonial occupation.
The
invasion and occupation of Iraq is a form of globalisation
by armed conquest. This armed conquest is the relic
of colonialism and we should not allow it to success
threatening the future of the planet. In addition
to its violent crimes against the Iraqi people, the
U.S. is systematically and illegally milking Iraq
of its oil revenues, and selling Iraqi industries
to American corporations. Currently, the Bush Administration
is skimming the benefits of high oil prices, while
keeping silence.
Washington
and London are not in the business of spreading “democracy”
and “freedom” in the Middle East. It would
be a good idea, but that is not what the U.S. and
Britain are doing. The record speaks for itself. They
spread “dependence, subordination, and dictatorship”,
Noam Chomsky said recently. The people of the Middle
East have long experience in this dishonest and flawed
democracy promises by the West. The U.S. and British
forces are intended to stay in Iraq; otherwise their
whole invasion and occupation debacle is crimes against
humanity because the reasons are a complete fabrication.
More
than one thousands dead Iraqis a month are added to
more than 12,000 innocent civilians killed by the
invading and occupying forces. The Iraqi people need
our support. Their struggle is our struggle against
unjust system. The belligerent and violent U.S. behaviour
has increased the threat of terrorism and anti-Western
feelings around the world. The message to motivate
people around the world cannot be clearer than: End
the illegal occupation and give Iraqis their freedom.
The lies to justify the invasion and occupation of
Iraq need to be exposed vigorously.
The
global peace movement who courageously opposed the
invasion of Iraq should declare its solidarity with
the Iraqi people in fighting a colonial occupation
army, and U.S. imperialism. Arundhati Roy have spoken
of non-violence resistance movement “allowed
to atrophy into feel-good political theatre, which
at its most successful is a photo opportunity for
the media, and at it’s least successful, simply
ignored”(3). However, there
is hope. In the U.S., Britain and Australia, popular
support for the imperialist war in Iraq is down, and
the majority of people are against the war on Iraq.
In my own opinion, the antiwar movement is growing
into a worldwide anti-occupation movement.
Recently,
the Spanish people have rejected to be part of brutal
empire. Because the Spanish people believe that another
world is possible, and they know how to help built
it. We have the moral, legal and political obligations
to change the course of empire. Our solidarity with
the Iraqi people will give them a voice, and like
the Spanish people, the Iraqi people will prevail
over empire.
[1]
Arundhati Roy, Interviewed by Amy Goodman at www.DemocracyNow.org,
5/19/2004.
[2] Napoleon Bonaparte, Memorial de Sainte-Helene,
Vol. 1 (Paris: 1961 [1823]), 609-10.
[3] Arundhati Roy, How deep shall we dig? ZNet,
01 May 2004. www.zmag.org/content.
Ghali Hassan is in the Science and
Mathematics Education Centre, Curtin University, Perth,
Western Australia. Hassan@exchange.curtin.edu.au
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