Thursday, 18 December 2008

"The Return"? If Only

The Iraqi Ba’ath Party was multiethnic and secular. It had not been founded by Saddam Hussein, and his was a constant battle to keep control of it. To ban its erstwhile members from office is to ban anyone who has ever run anything, and amounts to a blanket ban on Sunni Arabs and on Christians. And to have destroyed it is almost certainly already to have destroyed the only body that would have been capable of producing a multiethnic, secular democracy in Iraq when the old man died, as he would have done soon enough.
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8 comments:

  1. Anonymous19 December 2008 at 15:18

    I may have misunderstood you - are you saying that, if the US-led invasion had not taken place and Saddam Hussein had died in due course of natural causes, the Iraqi Ba'ath Party would have sought to produce a multiethnic, secular democracy in Iraq?

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  2. David Lindsay19 December 2008 at 15:39

    It might not have sought to, but it very well might have done. And it was the only thing that ever could have done. Indeed, Saddam might not have "died of natural causes" - there was never any shortage of Ba'athists who wanted him gone.

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  3. Anonymous19 December 2008 at 17:02

    Indeed, Saddam might not have "died of natural causes" - there was never any shortage of Ba'athists who wanted him gone.

    True. But that would, of course, have been wicked, illegal and immoral - and hardly an auspicious way to produce a multiethnic, secular democracy. Have you learned nothing from the war?

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  4. David Lindsay19 December 2008 at 17:06

    But it would have been THEIR wickedness, illegality and immorality, not ours.

    And anyway, is tyrannicide *by the people suffering it* always wicked or immoral?

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  5. Anonymous19 December 2008 at 17:20

    "But it would have been THEIR wickedness, illegality and immorality, not ours."

    Ah, I see. It's all about keeping your hands clean. Nice.

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  6. Anonymous19 December 2008 at 17:24

    And anyway, is tyrannicide *by the people suffering it* always wicked or immoral?

    The people suffering it were murdered, tortured and imprisoned. The Iraqis most likely to kill Saddam were, as you say, Ba'athists who weren't suffering at all, but who wanted to get on and saw Saddam as a barrier to preferment.

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  7. David Lindsay19 December 2008 at 17:24

    Well, yes, up to a point.

    I'm not saying that Saddam SHOULD have been murdered. I'm saying that he might have been. And I'm suggesting (no more than that) that tyrannicide from within the state in question might not always be wrong, just as war is not always wrong (although this one certainly was and is).

    However Saddam had died, the Ba'ath Party would have been indispensible to putting something better in his place.

    And now that Saddam has died, the Ba'ath Party is indispensible to putting anything better in his place.

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  8. David Lindsay19 December 2008 at 17:26

    "The people suffering it were murdered, tortured and imprisoned."

    Not all of them.

    "The Iraqis most likely to kill Saddam were, as you say, Ba'athists who weren't suffering at all, but who wanted to get on and saw Saddam as a barrier to preferment."

    Be that as it may, it would have got rid of him.

    But from within Iraq.

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