TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/100890/1008012.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 14.2 KB | 285 lines

                                                                                THE GULF, Page 30

In the Capital of Dread


From shopkeepers to ministers, Iraqis realize that their lives
have changed irrevocably. Perhaps that is why there are grumbles
of unhappiness with Saddam.

By CARL BERNSTEIN/BAGHDAD


    Poised on the edge of war, this is a city moving in several
directions at once, none of them encouraging, some of them
infinitely sad, all of them frightening. The authorities have
tried to give outsiders the appearance of business as usual. But
there is no hiding the reality that, be there war soon or a few
more months of hair-trigger peace, life for the Iraqi nation is
changing irrevocably.

    The countdown to a finale has begun, and almost everyone
here seems to know it, hostages and hoteliers, the men in the
souk, the women in black abayahs, the few young dancers left in
the discotheques. The tension is evident in the conversation of
Iraqi ministers, at one moment fevered and passionate, the next
dazed and even depressed. It surfaces in the frustration of the
businessman who cannot comprehend that "an Arab solution" is not
enough for the rest of the world. It stares out from the eyes
of the mother whose sons have just been discharged from eight
years at the Iranian front.

    There are more imported delicacies available in this city
than there have been for years, quail and cheeses liberated from
the refrigerators of Kuwaiti sheiks and destined for the tables
of privileged Iraqis. But there is almost no medicine for high
blood pressure, heart conditions and asthma. Some factories are
beginning to shut down, people are hoarding their money, many
shopkeepers sit idle. In the diplomatic residences of the
fashionable Al-Mansur neighborhood, ambassadors and attaches
debate the options for Saddam and the U.S.: almost all are bad,
and most end in grief or horror. Among Westerners, there is some
gallows humor. Among ordinary Iraqis, it seems, there is
acceptance, chagrin, forlorn hope or simple noncomprehension.

    There are rumors: of 28 people killed in the town of Mosul
during a demonstration protesting food shortages; of an attempt
by the President's first cousin to assassinate him; of generals
executed for plotting against Saddam. The rumors come not from
diplomatic intelligence sources but from Iraqis, many of whom,
despite the pervasive fear and security apparatus of the state,
insist that opposition and dismay with Saddam Hussein run deep.

    "Go out and talk to the people," Information Minister Latif
Nassif Jassim told a group of reporters one night last week. "It
is more important than what any minister says." He would not be
pleased with the results. Despite the demonstrations organized
by the government, enthusiasm for Saddam seems muted. "The
people here are tired of war, tired of him, tired of not
traveling, of not living," says a young man tending a store with
no customers.

    Signs of Saddam's contradictory legacy abound: housing
projects only half-finished, soccer stadiums and no foreign
teams to play in them, empty hotels with antiaircraft batteries
on their roofs. The city is at once sinuous and Stalinesque:
palm trees and concrete mausoleums with a martial theme. And
everywhere the gaze of the maximum leader. Hundreds of
billboard-size portraits are painted on buildings, framed in
traffic circles, displayed in lobbies: Saddam drawing sword,
Saddam on stallion, Saddam in sunglasses, Saddam in camouflage
fatigues, Saddam looking like Xavier Cugat in white suit, Saddam
slaying the infidels. In the city center is a new statue, 60 ft.
high: Saddam, ramrod straight, arm outstretched in salute.

    The devastating results of the eight-year war against Iran
are visible everywhere: the numbed population, fraying public
services, unemployment and a pervasive security state that
enforces Saddam's rule through fear and a cult of personality
that is truly Orwellian. "This could have been the most
prosperous, advanced country in the Middle East," says a
diplomat stationed here for six years. "It has the minerals, 10%
of the world's oil reserves, favorable climate, it's not
overpopulated. But as Nasser did in Egypt, Saddam put his
country's resources into technology, and then the technology was
applied to the war machine instead of the country."

    The state-owned hotel where most of the press and many
Western "guests" are kept serves as metaphor for the failed
ideal of Saddam's Baathist party, which preaches a renascence of
Arab greatness through socialism, Islamic values and the secular
goals of a modern industrial nation. The place is overreaching,
contradictory, a lot better in conception than execution. From
the outside, it beckons impressively, promising luxury,
hospitality, comfort. There is tennis, a casino, gardens of
bougainvillea and the shade of towering eucalyptus trees. But
all has been overtaken by security functions, inefficiency and
economic chaos: at the official rate, lunch for one costs $75,
the phones are monitored constantly, employees whose only
purported function is to check the ashtrays apologize after
bursting into the room, the lobby is watched by ever present
"minders" who keep tabs on the press. A scratchy recording of
Beethoven's Fur Elise has been playing constantly for 10 days,
the sound grating, nerve-racking.

    Nearby is the Baathist Bauhaus enclave, where party
members, wealthy Iraqis and foreign diplomats reside. Outside
the Pakistani embassy, refugees from Kuwait squat next to their
belongings. A few lawns away, a "PNG party" is in progress, to
toast farewell to French personnel declared persona non grata.
Inevitably the conversation gets around to where people plan to
be when the attack comes. Most think the safest haven will be
their embassy or residence. Since few buildings in Baghdad have
basements, a Scandinavian says, "We will sit beneath the
staircase or in a corridor with no windows and hope for the
best."

    Among Western ambassadors and military aides, there is
virtually universal belief that war is almost inevitable and
probably imminent. Representatives of countries that for 40
years opposed or ignored one another now share information,
plans, intelligence, last-minute strategy. They speak
emotionally of a renewed international security system made
possible by the Soviet-American thaw. The Iraqis, they say, do
not comprehend the change implied in the new world order or its
implications for international resolve against Baghdad.

    Almost all diplomats here seem to be operating on the
assumption that an attack by U.S.-led forces could begin within
two weeks -- as soon as the weather turns cooler in the desert
and in the gulf. This is their perception, colored by living at
the epicenter of the tensions and years of reading between the
lines of coded cables. They say that it is the heat, and not
just the desire to maximize manpower and equipment levels or the
possibility of diplomacy, that has delayed a military response
until now. Radar screens blacked out from the high temperatures,
missile-control systems failed on some aircraft, metal alloys
expanded on planes, causing leakage from fuel lines, cooling
systems faltered and sand-fouled tanks and guns. These problems,
the diplomats say, should ease after the first or second week
of October.

    Among those closest to Saddam Hussein, some aides appear to
be both increasingly appreciative of how close to war the
country is and at the same time stubbornly convinced that Iraq
will find ways to avoid conflict and prevail through diplomacy.
There are still indications that Iraq may pull back its troops
in Kuwait and hold on to only that portion of the sheikdom with
the most strategic and economic value: the Rumaila oil fields,
two offshore islands and perhaps four harbors on the gulf.

    Meanwhile, Iraq's senior officials seem convinced that an
American-led attack will be launched in October or November
unless they can induce one of the major powers -- France is the
primary target -- to break ranks with the U.S. The Iraqis
acknowledge that they badly misjudged American reaction to the
annexation of Kuwait. They have been stunned by the swiftness
and size of the U.S. deployment as well as by Washington's
ability to rally so many European and Arab nations. Sitting in
their offices, listening to their obligatory attacks on Israel,
the sheiks and the U.S., one senses that they are dazed, even
desperate.

    "Our hope is in the street," said a top Saddam aide,
referring to the region's tens of millions of poor Arabs. "That
is where America has miscalculated -- that and our ability to
engage the United States in a long conflict. Iraq did not bring
harm to U.S. interests. We will guarantee America's legitimate
interests in the region -- low oil prices, free from the
fluctuations of the past. But if we are attacked, every Iraqi
will defend his homeland, his religion." It is a litany
frequently heard here, and one now senses resignation -- not
belligerence -- in conversations with officials.

    There are also increasing indications that Saddam may be
miscalculating the will of his people. TV screens are filled
with images of jeering masses of civilians and of soldiers
proclaiming their hatred. The reality seems far different.

    Even in the intimidating atmosphere of Saddam cultism, it
doesn't take long before some Iraqis share their war-weariness,
their discontent, even their hatred of Saddam. Their frankness
comes as a surprise; obviously, those willing to talk are the
exception, not the rule, and the fact that they can speak some
English indicates that they may not totally reflect the country
at large. They concede their sense of powerlessness. But they
are persuasive in their insistence that the undercurrent of
discontent runs deep, that it is a given in discussion among
friends and family who can be trusted.

    "People are talking much more freely, which is
astonishing," says a West European who has lived here for
several years. "There has been a huge change in the past 10
days. A lot of people are saying they are ashamed of what their
country is doing. You actually hear people talking about the
possibility of a change in government."

    A shift in the mood seems to have begun several weeks ago,
when Baghdad announced a treaty agreement with Iran and gave
back to its mortal enemy the few spoils of its war in hopes that
Tehran would join the struggle against the U.S. "The people do
not understand how Saddam could do that," says a Baghdad
shopkeeper.

    "Nobody likes Saddam, because we now fight all the world,"
claims a young man who served five years at the Iranian front.
"Nobody in the world likes us anymore. All the Iraqi people feel
this way," he asserts, which is clearly not the case. "If the
whole world is your enemy, what kind of politics is that? We
just finished the war. The main interest for the Iraqi people
is food. And now we lack almost everything."

    "In the past two weeks many people have really begun to
worry, especially after all these fiery statements by Saddam,"
says a man in his 50s, an intellectual who has lived here all
his life. "Some people have started going north to the resorts."
Most, however, are working class or poor, and cannot afford
resorts. "They have been led to think that fighting the
Americans will be like fighting the Iranians. The leadership
knows how bad it will be -- but not people in the street. Still,
they are saying, `Haven't we had enough war? Do we need another
war, and why?' They don't care about Kuwait. The big mistake
journalists make is to think Saddam enjoys the support of the
people. We call him `Big Charlie.' He is not popular, among
ordinary people especially. There is a ferocious silent majority
in the country -- silent and silenced."

    Many people here, living on what could be ground zero if
America's awesome military machine is unleashed, go about their
business with surprising cheerfulness and equanimity. In what
might be a scene from a 19th century Ottoman tapestry, two dozen
men play dominoes and gamble at backgammon in a stately hall on
the banks of the Tigris. At 1 a.m., on the other side of the
river, some 30 young men watch Indian movies on TV in a yard
behind the city's open-air fish restaurants. In the noonday sun,
Irish and Dutch hostages play water polo in the hotel pool.
Relatively few soldiers patrol the streets. A couple of hundred
at most man defense and ministerial facilities, bridges and the
outer gates of the presidential palace. In the past two weeks
Saddam has not made a public appearance, but he pops up often
on TV, greeting the latest Arab dignitary or Palestine
Liberation Organization official who has come to Baghdad to
express solidarity.

    On the radio, cab drivers seem to favor Arabic rock,
heavily synthesized and sounding like wailing Europop to the
Western ear. AM frequencies that usually broadcast the Voice of
America and BBC are jammed. The Arabic service of Radio Monte
Carlo serves as a bridge to the outside world and plays American
rock 'n' roll. No foreign newspapers, books or magazines are
available; faxes are forbidden, and foreign travel by Iraqis has
again been curtailed, as it was during the war with Iran. Still,
the Deputy Foreign Minister's phone plays Home on the Range when
the caller is put on hold.

    Though the wealthy can afford the Kuwaiti delicacies on
sale in the fancy food shops of Masbah and Al-Mansur, ordinary
Iraqis are being squeezed by rationing and rising prices at
government-owned stores. The cost of Marlboros has increased
threefold since the invasion. "You can find everything at the
private market, but who can pay?" says a man outside a grocery.

    Many restaurants have been closed; too many staples, needed
for rationing over the long haul, were being consumed. There is
almost no bread in the city. Though the downtown streets are
jammed every night, there are few customers in the stores.
"Business is very bad," concedes a senior minister. "The
blockade is hurting." Meanwhile, says Information Minister Latif
Jassim, "morale is very high, and the people are very strong."