Hussein Rule Perpetuated by Relentless Repression

Saddam Hussein walked with brisk, deliberate strides into the conference room of his military headquarters. Two dozen American journalists waited there, seated around a horseshoe-shaped table. He eyed them and his lips parted as though to smile in greeting. But the dark full mustache didn’t move and no smile came.

Hussein took his place on a raised platform 50 feet away, surrounded by aides and bodyguards. He wore green army fatigues, a beret, spit-shined boots, and a Soviet-made pistol on his hip. Beneath the shock of black hair and heavy eyebrows were eyes of ice, the kind that lock you in their stare and make you want to look away.

The scene, which occurred in Baghdad seven years ago at a time when Iraq was at war with Iran and its relations with Washington were warming, was Hussein’s first meeting ever with the American news media, and it offered a chilling glimpse of the man who now may hold the issue of peace and war in his hands.

It was also a reminder of the daunting obstacles facing those inside or outside Iraq who seek Hussein’s removal.

When the first question came, the Iraqi president brushed it aside. “First, I want to know what criticisms you have heard about Iraq,” he said. “About what the world thinks of Iraq.”

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, one of the visiting journalists volunteered that many people believed Hussein was less popular than his presidential cult might indicate. And, said another, there was talk that opposition figures in Iraq simply disappeared into the night.

The reporter rattled off a list of six prominent Iraqis who had not been heard from for some time, including Health Minister Riad Ibrahim.

The candor of the questioner stunned Hussein’s aides, and the room fell so quiet that one could hear the nervous breathing of the information minister, Latif Jasim. The deputy prime minister dropped his pencil. One bodyguard turned his glance toward the far wall, as though just the act of looking at the inquisitors might cast an evil spell on him.

But Hussein remained emotionless. He answered matter-of-factly that Ibrahim had indeed been killed, for corruption, not bothering to add that shortly after Ibrahim had questioned a presidential decision, his body--chopped into small pieces--had been delivered to his family in a black bag.

As for the others on the missing list, that, Hussein declared, was nonsense: Iraqis had as much recourse to justice as Americans.

If any of the Americans had wondered why there were no voices of dissent in Iraq, Hussein’s responses made the answer abundantly clear. His repressive rule, Western and Arab Iraq-watchers agree today, has so intimidated his critics and enemies that any hope the Persian Gulf crisis will end with the overthrow of Hussein appears to be little more than wishful thinking.

“This is a man who got where he is by running coups and eliminating leaders,” said Robert Hunter of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “He knows how to keep himself from being eliminated. His overthrow, in the near-term at least, seems extremely unlikely.”

Hunter and others agree that any attempt to unseat Hussein would be at the initiative of internal forces, not exile groups, and would involve the military. In a closed, opaque society such as Iraq, it is all but impossible to gauge discontent among the military and the populace, but there are numerous groups, inside and outside the country, whose interests would be served by Hussein’s removal.

One is the Communist Party, which Hussein suppressed in the 1970s through assassinations. Intelligence sources no longer consider the party a serious force.

Another group is that of fundamentalist Shiites, who make up 55% of the population. The most active of the Shiite organizations is Dawa (The Calling), banned by Hussein in 1980. More than 200,000 Shiites have been deported to Iran and Turkey in the past decade.

A third source of unrest is Iraq’s 4 million Kurds. Hussein turned his attention to them after the cease-fire with Iran in 1988, razing more than 3,000 Kurdish villages and killing at least 10,000 people with poison gas.

Within the military, Hussein has purged and executed officers, playing off various groups--the mainstream military, the Special Forces and the Republican Guards--against one another and not letting any senior commander get too comfortable. Even his brother-in-law, Gen. Adnan Khairallah, was killed last year in a mysterious helicopter crash.

Though Hussein, a secular Sunni Muslim, is a civilian whose handling of the Iran-Iraq War reportedly caused grumbling among his generals, he has further maintained the army’s apparent loyalty through a system of patronage ensuring that officers are looked after materially.

Intelligence analysts noted with interest, though, that Iraq’s Army Day was celebrated in January, 1989, with no traditional parade, despite Iraq’s limited victory over Iran. They wondered if Hussein was fearful of a large military assemblage.

More than 1 million Iraqis live abroad, many of them having fled Hussein’s repression. But the anti-Hussein groups overseas are divided along religious and ethnic lines and have never joined into a unified force. They have not received much attention in the international media, and Western intelligence agencies generally have discounted their importance.

A prominent Iraqi dissident in London, who asked that his name not be used, said by telephone that opposition groups outside Iraq had settled their differences since the invasion of Kuwait and had formed a joint front to depose Hussein. He said that 50,000 men, many of whom live in Syria and Iran, were involved, though Western Middle East experts were skeptical of that estimate.

Iraqi exiles interviewed in the United States and London said there is a widespread undercurrent of discontent with Hussein in Iraq. The regime’s brutality, the nation’s $80-billion foreign debt and the military’s realization that Hussein gave back everything he won in the Iran-Iraq War have all raised questions about his competence, they said.

But there are no signs yet that any group is about to translate such discontent into action against the president, they added.

“Saddam has perpetuated his rule by beating up the Iraqi people,” said an exiled Iraqi businessman. “He makes people afraid and they tremble and have to love him. They have no choice. It’s like beating a dog to make it loyal.”