Fallujah and the coming cataclysm. posted by Richard Seymour

Some months before the bombing of Iraq became an invasion, Slavoj Zizek suggested that the bellicose and often extreme language of the hawks could have a secondary ideological function of disarming opposition. The idea was that the rhetoric would build up such a climate of apprehension about what destruction awaited Iraq that the world would breathe an immense sigh of relief, and even express gratitude in the event of relatively small casualties and a stable occupation. If that was the strategy, it certainly worked in the short term - until, that is, the occupation degenerated into so much of the 'stuff' that, as Donald Rumsfeld so laconically put it, 'happens'. The casualties mounted into the thousands, tens of thousands, and now - at a conservative estimate - 100,000. The power of nightmares in this case was their ability to irupt into reality.

Now, Fallujah is being pounded with 'preparatory' bombing in the build-up to an invasion by 10,000 US troops and a small contingent of trained Iraqi confederates. Of 285,000 residents, about 235,000 have fled to surrounding areas. They were urged to leave by US troops through loudspeakers, leaflets and a hard rain of artillery. 50,000 residents are said to remain, either because they have no choice or because they are readying themselves to fight the invaders. Only 1,200 of these are said to be hardcore insurgents. The fears of residents of Fallujah are justified; last time there was an attack on Fallujah a single day of bombing produced 400 deaths, and over a single week at least 600 were killed, mostly women and children. Iyad Allawi explains that this latest assault will 'liberate' the Fallujans, even though he blames the city for not handing over al-Zarqawi, who is alleged without evidence to be hiding there. A US soldier, appearing on BBC News 24 this morning, explained in his charmingly homespun way, that if he had a country house near Fallujah he wouldn't hang around. He might have added that anyone hooked up to a drip-feed in a hospital could clear off as well, since a hospital for women and children was precisely one of the targets bombed last night according to residents.

Kofi Annan has protested the bombing on the grounds that it will alienate the Iraqis and reinforce the perception that there is an occupation under way. He is right. There is nothing quite like tanks, airjets and armed troops blasting into a nearby city to induce suspicions that one is indeed under occupation.

Ironies abound at the expense of 'coalition' rhetoric. Fallujah is, we are told, beholden to Ba'athist remnants, foreign fighters and extremists. The residents, so we hear, are nostalgic for the old regime. If so, we have to wonder what the occupiers can have done to change so many hearts and minds. Consider: when Hussein's regime fell, Fallujah was one of the most peaceful areas of Iraq. The leader chosen by local tribes, Taha Bidaywi, was staunchly pro-US. Looting was, unlike elsewhere in Iraq, minimal. In fact, one of the first things the US did to offend local residents was to enter set themselves up in local Ba'ath party headquarters. A Fallujah Protection Force was set up by the Coalition and issued US-style camo fatigues.

However, when in April 2003 a small crowd of demonstrators decided to congregate outside the government building to protest the presence of troops, the crowd was fired upon and fifteen civilians killed. US troops alleged that gunmen had opened fire from the crowd, a tale which would be much more convincing if there were any corroborative evidence and if any of those killed or wounded had been dressed in US military fatigues. "[N]umerous patrols and raids on houses", the Scotsman reports , contributed to widespread dissatisfaction with the occupation. Resistance cells developed and, so we are told, foreign fighters crossed the Syrian border to join the fun. The lynching and mutilating of four 'security contractors' working on behalf of the occupation was notorious not just for its extremity, but for the fact that approximately 1,000 insurgents and residents took part in it. US forces took this as their cue to launch the calamitously named Operation Vigilant Resolve, a month long assault on the city that claimed anything between 600 and 800 lives. At the start of the assault, a power plant was bombed so that households, workplaces and hospitals were deprived of electricity for long spells. Civilians were bombed indiscriminately . Snipers shot at civilians indiscriminately, although as Rahul Mahajan notes, "One thing that snipers were very discriminating about - every single ambulance I saw had bullet holes in it". Sunnis and Shi'ites united from across Iraq to bring assistance to the beseiged Fallujans. On May 1st, 2004, the US gave up and handed control to Major General Muhammad Latif and a brigade including many of the insurgents who had been fighting the US. Banners appeared all over the city, celebrating the ouster of the troops.

They might have won that battle, but there was no way the ceasefire was permanent. Nir Rosen writes in Socialist Review :

Referring to Iraq's Highway 10, a former US Marine currently working very closely in a civilian capacity with the Marine commanders in Fallujah explained to me, 'Fallujah sits on a major artery between Baghdad and the rest of the world. There is no fucking way we will let them stand in our path. We're trying to rebuild the country. Fallujah is in the way. We will be moving massive amounts of people and material in the region. We would have been using the western route a lot more if it was safe.'

So, unsurprisingly, a narrative has been constructed in which Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, responsible for a fraction of attacks in Iraq (six out of three thousand), has been elevated to the status of terrorist mastermind, evildoer, Bond villain and much else besides. If he is in Iraq, he remains the petty anti-Shi'ite thug he was when he was working in Afghanistan. Nevertheless, the occupiers are certain that he is at the centre of the resistance and firmly ensconced in Fallujah, and it doesn't do to request evidence. There have been sporadic air attacks on Fallujah since the truce, in which approximately 60 people have died according to US military sources. In the last few weeks, although resistance activities ceased because negotiations were ongoing over the status of Fallujah, the city has been repeatedly bombed. There have as yet been no estimates as to what the cost of the latest campaign has been.

Speaking to the Fallujan Chief of Police, Nir Rosen asked what it was the insurgents wanted:

[H]is answer was typical of what I have been hearing in Iraq for the past 13 months. 'We want a national government that represents the Iraqi people,' he said.

A letter to Kofi Annan , signed by the shura council, tribal leaders and trade unions, says:

Many times the people of Fallujah have asked that if anyone sees al-Zarqawi they should kill him. We know now that he is nothing but a phantom created by the US.

Our representatives have repeatedly denounced kidnapping and killing of civilians. We have nothing to do with any group that acts in an inhumane manner.

We call on you and the leaders of the world to exert the greatest pressure on the Bush administration to end its crimes against Fallujah and pull its army back from the city.

When they left a while ago, the city had peace and tranquillity. There was no disorder in the city. The civil administration here functioned well, despite the lack of resources.

Our “offence” is simply that we did not welcome the forces of occupation.

This is our right according to UN Charter, according to international law and according to the norms of humanity.

It is very urgent that you, along with other world leaders, intervene immediately to prevent another massacre.

Annan, begged to roar, has squeaked. He is ignored or dismissed. Iyad Allawi has described Annan's pleas as 'confused'. The only interventionist force left is the antiwar movement . Only immediate and jarring protest has any hope of preventing this planned atrocity. Fallujah in need of defending from a double injury, then: they shouldn't have to bear the brunt of the US's desire to expand its geopolitical hegemony, and they certainly shouldn't have to hear that it is all their own fault, or it is being done for their own good.