IRAQ: A long history of association with and support from the US for Saddam Hussein makes some Iraqis say that Saddam was America's man, writes Michael Jansen.
The capture of ousted President Saddam Hussein on December 13th revived the blame game which Iraqis of all stations in life and educational backgrounds have been playing for several years.
Now they not only blame the US for occupying their country but also hold it responsible for the harsh and repressive rule of Saddam Hussein. Iraqis who play the game say "Saddam was America's man". They cite confiscated party documents as evidence of the connection.
The blame game intensified after the US National Security Archive published a collection of documents on the US relationship with Saddam Hussein.
While his opponents consider this proof positive that he was "Washington's man", his supporters charge the US with trying to smear him by associating him with the country many Arabs consider their arch enemy because of its support for Israel and undemocratic Arab rulers.
According to a former Baathist, the US probably initiated contacts with the party in 1961-62. Washington's aim was to topple the Communist-backed Kassem regime, which was overthrown by the Baath Party in alliance with the Arab Nationalists in February 1963. The Baathists promptly began purging, persecuting and killing communists.
But the Baathists, divided between ideologues and pragmatists, left Iraq to chaotic nationalist rule until 1968 when the pragmatists seized power, earning kudos from the west.
Saddam emerged as a figure of interest in a British embassy report dated November 15th, 1969. The writer, Ambassador H.G. Balfour-Paul, characterised him as a "presentable young man. Initially regarded as a party extremist, but responsibility may mellow him. I should judge him . . . to be a formidable, single-minded and hard-headed member of the Baathist hierarchy, but one with whom, if only one could see more of him, it would be possible to do business."
In 1972 the Baath Party shocked the west when it nationalised the Iraq Petroleum Company in which British and US firms had major stakes. Nevertheless, two years later, the US Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, reached out to Iraq in the belief that there is no "basic clash of interests between Iraq and the United States".
In March 1979, Iraq stood with moderates Jordan and Saudi Arabia at the Baghdad Arab summit which suspended Egypt from the league for signing a separate peace treaty with Israel.
The then radicals - the Palestine Liberation Organisation, Syria and Kuwait - had demanded Egypt's expulsion.
Iraq's policy line enhanced the standing of Saddam, then vice-president and acknowledged strongman of the regime, in the region and on the international scene.
When he took power in July 1979, Saddam not only eliminated his rivals but also curbed radical elements in the party. This secured the approval of the US but did not mean he was its "man", simply that he was a person with whom the west could "do business."
Western interests coincided with those of Saddam after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini overthrew the Shah of Iran in 1979. Both the west and Iraq sought to prevent the Islamic republic from exporting its revolution to its neighbours, particularly the Iraqi Shias. Encouraged by the west and its allies, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, Iraq went to war with Iran in September 1980.
Both the Carter and Reagan administrations backed Iraq in the conflict, providing Baghdad with intelligence and satellite photographs of Iranian troop concentrations and movements.
In 1981, the Reagan administration sent a high-ranking envoy to Baghdad. The US Secretary of State, George Shultz, said the US objective was to "help prevent an Iranian victory".
Iraq's use use of chemical weapons during this war is said to have been a turning point in Saddam's relations with the west. However, it ignored Iraq's use of chemical agents and gas in 1982-83 during battles in the south where Iran also used such weapons.
The current US Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, was dispatched to Baghdad in 1983 and 1984 to assure Saddam of "undiminished" US support following his use of chemical weapons. The west only condemned Iraq's use of gas after the 1988 attack on the Kurdish village of Halabja.
Subsequent US contacts with Baghdad and meetings between US envoys and Saddam involved normal diplomatic exchange and did not indicate that he was in any way an "agent" of the United States. This became clear in the months before he invaded Kuwait.
According to an authoritative Iraqi source, the US not only distanced itself from Saddam once the Iraq-Iran war had ended but Washington also began to take diplomatic steps to curb and corral the Iraqi leader. This contributed to his decision to invade Kuwait.
Saddam used all means and any to secure his position and stay in power, including cultivating useful relationships with the US, Britain, the USSR and Communist China.
Iraqis ignore his reliance of realpolitik and play the blame-the-west game. Both aware Iraqis and diplomats based in Baghdad argue that Iraqis refuse to accept any responsibility for Saddam's 35 years of repressive rule. It is much easier to blame Britain and US than to bear a share of the guilt for their ruler's cruel and bloody excesses.