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The Power of Influence:
How Saddam Hussein and the Ba’ath Party influenced
children to becoming obedient citizens
As we have grown up here in America and are given more responsibilities to fill, we often think back to our
childhood and wish we could just be children forever. We had fewer responsibilities to worry about
because our parents took care of them. We were full of energy and used that energy playing sports and other
made up games with our friends. We had
choices in what we ate, who we hung out with, and what to do each day. Life was good. Unfortunately, life for children has not been
that way for many children in other parts of the world. It is sometimes hard for us to realize how
good life really was until we look at the lives of children in other parts of
the world whom had a different experience. Iraqi children are among those whose story has been a sad one. During the reign of Saddam Hussein and the
Ba’ath Party these children have been under a watchful eye and are told what
they are to believe in. For nearly forty
years these children have been faced with many horrific and tragic situations
that most of us will never know in America. It is a wonder why these children have not
fought back to get their freedoms and create an Iraq that has a government of the people. For
the children of Iraq,
they have been the victims of a government of influence. The government has controlled the children and
taught them to be obedient citizens who are too scared to fight back.
The Ba’ath
Party was originally a party designed to reform Iraq into a modern state. The goals of the
party were focused around secularism, socialism, and the creation of a pan-Arab
state. The party gained power for the
first time in 1963. At the time, Saddam
Hussein was studying in Egypt,
where he fled to in 1959 after he made a failed attempt to assassinate King
Faisal II. Upon the Ba’ath Party success
in 1963, Saddam moved back to Iraq to take part in the revolution. He took
a job as an interrogator with the Ba’ath party, a job that was nearly
synonymous with torturer. His strengths
at the job quickly moved him up the chain of command within the party.
While still
in this job, Saddam was arrested and thrown in jail by some military officers
who were not fond of the Ba’ath regime. In 1966, after being jailed for two years, Saddam managed to escape and started
his personal aspirations to take power. He set up an internal security group called Jihaz Haneen. The goal of this organization was to watch
for opposition building within the party. In 1968, General Ahmad Hassan al-Bakr seized power in the Ba’ath
Party. President Bakr appointed Saddam
as the Deputy Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, a position that also
placed him in charge of internal security. For the next ten years, Saddam held this position and built up the
internal security of the Ba’ath Party. He appointed family members to other positions throughout the department. He also builds a huge spy network that will
span across most of Iraq and will haunt the Iraqis in nearly all aspect of daily life.
In 1978, Iraq and Syria talked
of joining together in a federation. Should this merger happen, Saddam stood to lose his number two seat in
the Iraqi government to President Assad of Syria. Faced with this prospect, Saddam insisted
that President Bakr resign from office, an action that put Saddam as the president. In 1979, Saddam got his wish. Along with the removal of Bakr, Saddam also
had twenty other high ranking officials arrested and, soon after, killed along
with over four hundred military officers. With this move, Saddam was left without any real opposition.
Since the
Ba’ath Party originally had come to power in 1963, the only goal that it had
accomplished was secularism. A socialist
state was never sought after as the only ones who would receive sufficient money
were those loyal to the Ba’ath Party and who were willing to prove it time and
again. With the collapse of the
Iraqi/Syrian federation and the extreme opposition to Egypt,
the pan-Arab movement in Iraq would also crumble.
Secularism
was, however, achieved to a large extent. Saddam, who was raised Sunni Muslim, was not a practicing Muslim. Though he claimed to be religious, he did
little that would prove his faith. He
did, however, have his bloodline traced back to the descendants of the Prophet
Mohammed and have a Quran written out entirely with his blood.
The secular
movement made a large change in the school system. A large portion of the Iraqi population was
supportive of the secular movement as the majority of the country was Shiite
Muslim. A smaller, but still
significant, portion of the population was Sunni Muslim. Only a handful of the overall population
practiced religions other than these. College students, of which many were interested in politics, were
supportive of the secular movement. With
the government and the people in agreement, secularism was successful within
the government and public schools. Daily
prayers and religious studies were removed from schools throughout Iraq.
Instead of
religion, the curriculum was replaced with Ba’ath Party ideals. Every morning the students would have to
recite the accomplishments of the Ba’ath revolution. The students had to memorize these
accomplishments in order to recite them. These accomplishments were also placed just inside the door of every
classroom as well, so it would be among the first things that the children saw
when they went into the room. To further
indoctrinate the minds of the Iraqi children, the students were tested on
speeches that were given by either Saddam Hussein or any other high ranking Ba’ath
Party member.
Students of
these Iraqi schools would receive new text books during the earlier years of
the Ba’ath reign and, again, when Saddam seized power. The books were filled with new material and
propaganda that all concluded that the Ba’ath Party and Saddam were the best
things that happened to Iraq. To further the control over literature, book
stores were now under close watch of the regime. Books and Magazines were screened prior to
being placed on the shelves for purchase. Many books were censored or banned from sale throughout Iraq. Magazines were also censored or banned and,
often times, had pages physically removed from them. The only other literature where students or
citizens could attain information was the Iraqi newspaper. The newspapers, however, were also controlled
by the regime as well. Under Saddam’s
rule, the paper was headed by one of his son’s to ensure that it was in the
right hands.
Television
and radio, the last of the media outlets were also controlled by the
government. The only channels broadcast
on television were the few that the Iraqi government allowed. Satellite and cable television was not an
option for the citizens. News that was
broadcast was highly biased and could not be trusted for legitimate news
coverage.
With all of
the propaganda floating around, it seemed that parents would be sure to notice
the influence of the regime over what their children were learning, and they
did. Unfortunately, they felt that there
was little that they could do to change things. The internal security network that was originally created by Saddam in
the 1960’s was now in full effect. The
system was so intricate that even an Iraqi parent could have no idea who was
working with the party and who was just protecting themselves. Family members could not even be trusted
anymore in a society where family has strong ties. Family members could only assume that the
immediate family was still intact and either with the party or secretly opposed
to it.
Children
would sometimes come to school to be called out of class and interrogated
without parental consent or knowledge. Members of the Ba’ath Party’s secret police would come in and ask
students questions to find out if their parents and family was loyal to the
regime or not. For the younger children, this was an
especially useful technique because it was hard for parents to explain to their
children what to tell to these interrogators. The younger the child, the more intimidating an interrogator could seem
to be. These were the same men who would
brutally torture people not loyal to the Ba’ath Regime. For the older Iraqi kids, they knew this, and
their worst fear was that they would get caught in their lies by contradicting
what they had already said.
Throughout
the stages of school there were slight variations to the curriculum based on
gender. While girls and boys both
studied art education and physical education, the two were separated by
gender. Additionally, girls also had the
additional subject of home economics while the boys had extra time in physical
education. Women of Iraq have been considered unequal to men for hundreds of years. Many women were taught only to read and not
to write prior to the Ba’ath Revolution. Under the Ba’ath education system, women were now required to go to
school. Though they were required, it
has been documented from 1963 to 1973 that approximately only 30 percent of the
school’s population was girls. The numbers
also show that the test scores of the girls throughout the same time period was
consistently higher than the scores of the boys. Despite these results, often times it would
be the boys who would continue on to higher education.
Despite the
mild differences in the between genders, all students would study many of the
same subjects that are practiced in the United
States. Among these would be the sciences, such as, chemistry, physics, biology,
and health. Math subjects would consist
of algebra and geometry. Literary
subjects, though varying by region, would oftentimes include Arabic, Kurdish,
and English. The students also had a
wide amount of humanity courses that they would be taught throughout their
twelve school years to include social studies, history, geography, civics,
sociology, philosophy and economics.[7]
During the
final two years of preparatory school, students would either pursue a literary
or science course of study. The science
education was slightly more rigorous and involved two more hours of school per
week. The literary course of study was
chosen more often though it had been determined that the needs of the nation
would suggest that more students would be needed in the sciences.
Some
students chose to take a path in vocational education rather than traditional
schooling. Students in vocational
education would study in a focused subject ranging from agricultural skills,
factory skills, craftsmen skills, and various other labor skills. During the 1963 to 1973 time frame only
sixteen percent of students were female.
Some
families were able to send a child to college if the child’s grades were good
enough. The grades, however, were only
partially based on the students’ performance. Oftentimes, the students were given extra points if their parents were
loyal to the Ba’ath Regime or if the student had completed a two month course
in military training over a summer. Students lucky enough to attend college were not lucky enough to pick
their course of study. They were
assigned a program based on their scores on standardized testing at the end of
basic schooling. The highest ranking
students would be chosen to be doctors and scientists. Many of those who were not able to meet the
required test scores found themselves in a less desirable situation. They were not qualified to move on to college
level education, but they were too educated to take on roles of the low
class. Retesting on the final
examination at the end of their preparatory school, which is equivalent to high
school, was banned because this would not reflect the student’s actual
knowledge of the subject. Likewise,
tutoring and practice examinations were also banned for the same reason. Partially due to these banned practices, and
partially because of an inadequate education system, the failure rates were
between 43% and 53%, which left many of the students trying to decide what to
do next.
In the
early 1980’s, UNESCO drew up a plan for education as a template to suggest to
various countries trying to work out new educational systems. As noted in “Youth Education in Iraq and Egypt”,
there were some major differences in the UNESCO educational plan and the Iraqi
educational system. The author points out that the Iraqi system
had less modern subjects than the UNESCO plan and that the arrangement of
materials in Iraqi textbooks was less likely to facilitate discovery. The Iraqi program relied on rigor and taught
only one method to arrive at the conclusion of math problems while UNESCO’s
program allowed for common sense and taught multiple methods to solve
complicated math problems.
The education
in many subjects during the late 1990’s was less than substantial as U.S.
sanctions took a toll on the money that was being invested in educational tools
and updated procedures. When U.S. sanctions went into effect, Saddam allowed the sanctions to hurt the citizens
before it hurt the government. U.N. programs designed to help the affected
Iraqi citizens who were struggling under the sanctions were headed off by the
govern and Saddam blamed the U.S. government with the intention that the citizens would compel more hatred to the
western world.
Outside of
the school, family life was similarly pressed to hide disloyalties to the Iraqi Government. Neighborhoods soon became
under the eye of the Ba’ath Party. Circles were formed in the majority of neighborhoods in Iraq. These circles were made up of Ba’ath Party
members with the highest ranking member as the head of the circle. The circles were used to inform the members
of what was happening in the neighborhood relevant to the regime. All members were required to attend the
meetings though some of the circle heads could be paid off to ignore the
absence. For the children and the
families that lived in these neighborhoods who were only loyal to the Ba’ath Regime
in the open, it made life rough. They
were constantly under the watch of the members who would report them for any
sign of opposition to the government for their own well being.
There were
advantages to reporting your neighbors, co-workers, or anyone else who might
seem to be opposed to the party. The
more merit one received in the within the party, the more he or she could get
paid for their loyalty to the regime. If
one were caught not reporting someone for their questionable activities, then
he or she may come under government scrutiny.
It would
become apparent when one of the members had reached higher levels of trust
within the party because they would be rewarded with a pay increase and
sometimes even gifts, such as new cars. Cars in good condition were a commodity in Iraq. Most cars in Iraq were not in good condition because the Ba’ath Regime wanted to limit the
mobility of the Iraqi citizens. Many
families had cars prior to when the party came to power but it was even hard to
keep the cars running as parts were hard to come by. Many children had to walk to school as there
was no public transportation for them to use, and it was not necessary to waste
the car usage on that. The use of the
cars was normally reserved for the parents’ trip to work if it was far away, or
to make important trips. Long trips in
the car were difficult as many of them did not have air conditioning. Even an hour long trip could be dangerous in
the heat of the day.
Families
who were well off could afford to have live-in maids stay with them, often from Egypt, to help
tend to the daily chores at home. As
some found out though, these maids were sometimes hired by the government to
spy on the family. These spies were
often highly effective as they would become very close to the family, including
the children. Spies, such as this kind, who were not part
of the Ba’ath Party, were threatened and kept under close watch by the
regime. Though they couldn’t be watched
all the time, the third party spies would be just as scared as anyone else to
resist the regime’s orders.
Healthcare
for children throughout Iraq slowly diminished as time went on. While
at the beginning of Saddam’s reign in the early 1980’s healthcare was doing
well, medicine was hard to come by in the 1990’s. Diseases which had once been extinct in Iraq,
such as cholera and polio, were returning with haunting results. This is because the medicines were being
withheld from the healthcare facilities. Many of the medicines intended to treat these illnesses and other were
being resold to other countries. Saddam also took many of the medicines for
himself, his family, and those in his party rather than those who were in need
of the medicines the most.
As it
has been documented many times throughout the reign of the Ba’ath Party and the
rule of Saddam Hussein, the children of Iraq were denied their right to think for themselves. By denying the children the means of free
thought and discovery in the educational system the government has only
produced literate children who are, on the outside at least, obedient
citizens. Using methods that do not
entirely reflect a child’s true potential or that is entirely based on academic
merit the government has hurt itself by not allowing opportunity for economic
growth. The only reason Iraq was able to survive in such a system was due to the
large quantities of oil that produce money for the country. The government-run oil industry allowed for
the country to be run by a small minority of scholars and created a large
peasant class who were unable to seek white collar jobs because they were not
scholastically qualified for them according to the Ba’ath educational
program. To further instill the fear of
the children to live the way the government wanted them too, the children have
witnessed many atrocities to friends and family members to serve as a reminder
of what the punishments were to try and live a life other than what the
government intended for them to live. Though
every person has had their share of hard times in life, it is hard to find such
extensive examples of helpless children who are left with no options than to
comply with the evil tyrannical ways of an oppressive government or die trying
to fight for freedom.
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Arnove, Anthony and Ali Abunimah. 2000. Iraq under siege: The deadly impact of sanctions and war.
Cambridge, Mass.: South End Press.
Batatu, Hanna. 1978. The old social classes and
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Princeton, N.J.: PrincetonUniversity Press.
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