What can the Arabs gain from their Grand Unity and its justice?

by Saddam Hussein

IN THE NAME OF GOD, THE COMPASSIONATE, THE MERCIFUL

What can the Arabs gain from their Grand Unity and its justice?

At a meeting of the National Leadership of Ba'ath Arab Socialist Party held in early September 1997, the dialogue enlarged and covered many areas to the extent that Arab Unity and Socialism became, once again, one of its main topics, particularly what concerns the question of: How can the citizens of the Arab Gulf respond to their unification with the Arab nation on concepts and joint action in these two fields? Having seen the dialogue, the views and ideas raised during it, Comrade Saddam Hussein made the following speech:

Does an Arab country, especially the Arab Gulf countries, gain from Arab unity or lose? How? Why?

Despite the achievements which would have not been made in Iraq about which we are speaking here as the base of Ba'th Arab Socialist Party's live experiment, had those achievements and great attitudes not been based on the ideology of Ba'th Arab Socialist Party and its central and basic objectives: Unity, Freedom and Socialism, the past twenty years have witnessed developments that resulted in many phenomena in our Arab nation and its Arab homeland. Those developments have raised many questions, including, for example, that the per capita income in the Arab Gulf States and Emirates has increased to an extent, which creates a kind of selfishness amongst specific communities towards Arabism and Arab struggle, particularly against unity and socialism. Some people began to consider talking about Arab unity as if an approach to seize and control their wealth through integration. They also dealt with talking about Socialism in the same way. So, what is the means to find a common way for them to be unified with their nation and for their nation as a whole towards its integral parts?

It is essential for an Arab to realize and feel that he is an integral part of his nation and that this nation, which Almighty Allah bestowed upon it well-known characteristics and roles over the time: its great and faithful missionary role or its glorious cultural, national and humanitarian role, is great nation. He should realize that any Arab country, large or small, is an integral part of this nation and not the entire nation, even when it is distinguished by its area, population, water and natural resources or even if it was distinguished through history by a role or roles it played or chose to play by its will. An Arab should also realize that his belongingness to the Arab nation is a great honour because this belongingness confirms his roots. This belongingness is not a defect of him, but ability, effective and deep capability. It is not a burden.

The separation of an Arab from his nation makes him like a child of unknown father, or at least like a stray child who does not know his mother and father.

When any Arab country becomes an integral part of the nation's depth, and when the nation becomes the depth of that country in terms of history and heritage, thought and action, imagination and aspiration, past and present, this will constitute a great immunity and a high wall against violent wind and give an incentive of creation, innovation and influence which extends to the distance and range of this picture of working for and building forward. It is not a state of weakening.

When one feels that he is an integral part of a nation of 200 million people is something different from his feeling that he is just a part of people comprising few millions who are subjected to the threats and ambitions of big and super powers, and of regional powers larger than it, such as Iran and Turkey, in an era when some states, such as France, England, Italy and Spain, for example, find that their history, capabilities, national feeling within their national borders are not enough to make them capable to seize upon the necessary chance, to grab what should be grabbed or to be immune against those who are more capable than them. They find that this can only be achieved by being a part of a larger union, within the environment of the European continent, although it comprises various nations, and not one nation, and despite all the wars, we know, that were waged by the European states against each other, the wars during which too much blood was shed.

Therefore, it is essential for an Arab to feel that he is an Arab, not only in form or general name, but also in belongingness. He should realize that belongingness, to be genuine, should result in genuine awareness and obligation of one's duties towards his nation. When deep and genuine awareness arises, an Arab will find that Arab unity protects his true patriotism because the genuine national belongingness prepare a great depth for him which protects his wealth and keep it away from being spent on unnecessary expenditures. It will increase his wealth, renovate it, but will not weaken it, in the fields of trade, agriculture, industry and services. It will reduce and organize or cancel many aspects of the military expenditures, in large and small countries alike. Therefore, the genuine belongingness and the national bonds are not a loss, but a gain even for the countries, which did not make great sacrifices for the sake of its Arabism.

In order to be a true Arab believing in the objectives of the nation, such as Arab unity, which are essential for its strength and strong building, has an Arab to look upon this matter in a premature and shortened way on the basis of the neutral, naive and incapable question: What can he gain materialistically or economically from that belongingness just now?

The belongingness of man to his nation is not a choice of him, like to choose belongingness to another nation by applying for its nationality, but rather it is firm choice and destined belongingness in which man finds all his roots and sees his present, past and future. He sees, like what he sees in his mother and father, that the relationship with his nation is based on love, destined solidarity, which necessitates gaining what is great and even the partial and entire items of his life on the basis of this belongingness. He should also make the necessary sacrifice in order to maintain this belongingness on the basis of its vitality and genuineness.

Therefore, that who thinks that he will lose partially in one field, will make, he and his coming generations, great profits in moral and material fields.

To further clarify this, here are some specific examples: If the Arab Gulf States and Emirates, for example, consider how many concessions and chances they lost, in terms of their essential national interests and considerations or of their resources from the emergence of Khomeini revolution to the scenario of involving the Arab Gulf States and Emirates into the aggression against Iraq under well-known pretexts, including the blackmail policy pursued by the big powers under various pretexts, they will realize how great it is for the part to be in the depth of what is more comprehensive. And how great it is for a country to be a live part of the Arab homeland, and for the people of any Arab country to be an integral part of its glorious Arab nation.

However, there is a difference between that who considers the entire past of the nation as his history and heritage, and that who becomes just a negative phenomenon or a dark corner within the nation. There is a difference between relying on unguaranteed present which is unpromising in its developments and outcome, and being a part of a situation in which one ensures being a genuine part of its past in a manner that ensures the present and future.

A GLORIOUS FRAMEWORK FOR INTERACTION

The unity in which we believe, about which we talk and for which we call, is not a passive, inevitable integration of the Arab countries which eliminate their cherished and necessary characteristics, but rather it is a glorious and ample framework for interaction and great becoming which expresses the nation's capabilities, destiny and its looking for what is higher, superior and the best.

The good sons of the nation will develop the experiments of Unity in a manner that makes those experiments as better as possible in comparison to the existing state of division and to another rejected state which sees the possibility of collecting the Arab countries mechanically in a manner that keeps every passive and positive thing as it is.

The Arabs may agree, within the framework of their Unity, to establish different economic systems, but those systems will not contradict each other in terms of the objective and outcome. They will supplement each other by their steps and actions. All of them will contribute to the growth of capabilities within the society of unity in which tranquility and justice will prevail.

The Unity should be viewed as a process of national, humanitarian and cultural creation, which will give birth to a higher entity. The new entity, resulting from that process, should be higher, superior, larger, more secure, more immune, more productive and more resistant to the challenges of time. This entity will not look over the present, but it will not subdue to its passive aspects and will not hesitate to take a decision on great advancement and creation. It should be a part of both present and future. But all the negative aspects of the present and its weakness should remain in the back, while the new entity should look for the future to which this entity, its existence and programmes are connected in a live manner.

While unity provides its parties with protection, equalizes an individual to other individuals and a country to other countries regardless of (its large or small size), and provides all parties with a chance to enjoy the depth and merits of the large size, deep and ancient history, immortal and abundant heritage and high status, all are required, everyone from his position and according to his characteristics, to provide the Unity with what he should submit. If the poor in Sudan, Egypt, Morocco, Yemen and Palestine, for example, are required to fortify the wall of the state of Unity by their lives, whether it is wholly or partially threatened, everyone of its sons, including its fat countries or parts whose fatness and the low number of its population make them unable to confront the threat by fighting, should contribute to the protection of the state of Unity. Those fat countries and parts should pay to the poor people of the nation. This payment is not a tax imposed on them, but rather it is the belongingness dues. It is not possible for the brothers to live under one tent and confront common destiny, while some of them are starving to death and others are full to death.

The striking paradox is that the leaders of the erratic thinking, whether those who are considered as nationals of the nation and its countries or the foreigners who come from the dens of poisonous wasps, while they speak about the world as a small village whose guard and superior or rather its thief is the United Sates of America, and as they promote the idea of imperialist globalization led by the United States under the pretext of accepting the state of fait accompli, including the call for making concessions of billions of dollars which the Arab Gulf oil states and other Arab countries have submitted, and are still required to submit under this or that pretext or formal cover, and while they also stultify the possibility of maintaining any distance between yielding to the will of others, including the unjust resolutions imposed by the United States of America on certain countries in the Arab homeland, independence and dignity, and as they also stultify any call for nationalism and patriotism against the hegemony attempts of the Western imperialism, particularly the American ones, they consider the interdependence amongst the countries and sons of the Arab nation as a rejected matter. They also stultify the harmony between national and nationalist issues, falsely depicting for themselves and for others that the call for Unity will empty patriotism out of its meaning.

By doing so, they pave the way for imperialism under the leadership of America and its ally, Zionism, to impose their hegemony under the cover of protection, where those countries and small parts cannot resist their will and influence.

Now, in spite of all what we said: if things, including the Arab relations and the prospective slogan of Unity, are put according to the view of "win and lose" about which weak and suspected people talk, before those who look at things according to this view and ask them the following question: is it better for us, as Arabs, to give up, for our common state, the state of Unity, part of our domestic work and what we used to exercise, even if it is weak and inactive, and to give up, for this state, a part of our wealth with a view to ensuring both the present and future, or to give up this and what is beyond it to the foreigner permanently and without assured guarantee of future!?

I think that any wise and objective person, even if his nationalist belief has not been completely matured, will choose his nation and its united state. This is the way which connect the weft to its wrap in a manner that leads to weaving the beautiful dress of the nation which reunified its spirit in a new creation and defends the Unity whether amongst the sons of the Arab Gulf countries and other Arab countries or amongst all parts and countries of the nation with each other.

On this basis, the bridge of the relationship and dialogue will be built, although it has been already built, despite its name or form, and whether its name was the Ba'th or expressed by Arab nationalism, or by other titles, names or forms. But, we believe that Ba'th as a national and revolutionary ideology, and as an experiment in which Iraq represents the position that demonstrates its characteristics, is the way, which Arabs will choose for their unity, destiny, present and future.

FOR THIS WE HAVE BEEN STRUGLING

For this, we have been struggling since our childhood and since we were just students in secondary schools, and for which we then struggled in all subsequent stages.

In this struggle and in the spirit of our action and perception, we achieved victory over backwardness and crossed to ample prospects whose doors would have been opened to larger scope of view, had the embargo not been imposed.

However, with the capabilities of the impetus of principles and the impetus provided by the stage of rise, the doors for the future are widely and firmly opened. The present and future of Iraq, which are measured by its will and faith, are more secured and bright than other cases which do not believe in the importance of Arab Unity and do not work for it.

By this and with a great feeling of responsibility, we have achieved success in building Iraq and in the defence of it against the Iranian danger, and in the defence of Arab Gulf States and the Arabs in general during the glorious Qadissiyah.

By this and with its great depth, we confronted the devil of late twentieth century, and we confronted the thirty-nation alliance during the everlasting Um Al-Ma'arik.

By this, the evil was defeated, and we achieved victory and will also achieve victory with the help of God, the Almighty.

Is Arab Socialism Necessary for Unity and for the Sons of our Nation? How? Why?

Although we have answered, in the course of our speech on Unity and its aspects, how we agree as sons of one nation to the importance of Arab Socialism for our society to achieve, and since the interest in talking about the importance of Socialism for Unity and for justice is often less important than addressing the importance of Unity as an imperative, practical and constitutional expression when the sons of our Arab nation acknowledge their true belongingness to their nationalist, as one nation, and because what the nationalist Arabs wrote in this field was generally little in terms of scope and interest, we should address this subject detail. Therefore, we will re-address the subject of sociably answering the following question: How can we find a means leading to a common way amongst the sons of one nation, despite their different national incomes?

Others may add that the starting point in the development of the sons and countries of our nation, especially our people in the Arab Gulf countries, and the degrees of progress they achieved, are different.

First of all, we should say that low-income people and all the poor in our nation will not object to the Unity of the nation, unless their objection is mixed with anti-Arab influence or whims.

Otherwise, their interest lies in unity, especially those who are aware of this matter to the smallest details. Their feeling towards Unity reflects their high interest in and their eagerness to establish its foundation, building and wall. Accordingly, the Unity should express this fact, so that the speech on Arab nationalism and destined belongingness to it could be true and sincere.

Although, the basis of the legitimacy of major decisions taken within the framework of the nation is that they should truly represent the interests, views and conscience of the majority, we want here to take care of the minority of our nation who may have another point of view. We also want to increase the intensity of awareness and farsightedness of the majority which believes in Unity, so that the losses of Unity from within will be as less as possible, even if the sacrifices made by all on the way of achieving Unity and protecting it, are generous and great sacrifices.

Disparity in income exists among large families descending from one grandfather, or even from one father. It also exists in villages composed of people who belong to different families, and in small cities of one country or one state. This disparity has not been an obstacle, as long as it remains within its balanced framework, on the way of achieving the unity of one country and of the joint national work of its sons, even if there has been disparity in their incomes and the degrees of their development. We find this disparity in many states of the world, and in its parts when they are reunified. There are some instances happened in recent years. Germany, for example, has been reunified, although its western part is more developed and the income of its people is the higher one. Hong Kong is reunified with China despite its well-known high income and level of technological and scientific development.

The existence of a common way taken by national or nationalist gathering, despite disparity in ownership or the level of development, has been a well-known case long ago since man has known the idea of possession and ownership in the course of human development. Thus, disparity in income, and subsequently in the forms, volumes and areas of ownership is something existing in all societies, including modern Iraq, that have been established on a base of development which involves a reasonable extent of constancy. Accordingly, it is not strange for the state of unity to have such phenomena, whether they are demonstrated by certain persons or by municipal borders to which the state of Unity is distributed, when national or domestic considerations play their role in this distribution. The parts resulting from that division will be named as provinces or any other names in the state of Unity in accordance with its circumstances.

A POSITIVE BIRTH

But, besides this fact, we should say that any society in which these realities, I mean disparity in income and ownership, are built on injustice or non-entitlement that make the majority feel grievous unfairness, will witness the rise of conflict. If the state of that society does not solve that conflict, the disadvantaged people and the people of virtue will find themselves, under the pressure of spiritual and moral considerations, and under the feeling of responsibility within the framework of terms and conditions of the holy solidarity, looking for a solution of this flagrant discrepancy between entitlement and non-entitlement, between the legitimate opportunity and the illegitimate one, and consequently between right and wrong. When those people do not find the constitutional institutions, which are centrally responsible for their state, are not able to find a solution and to put an end to this or that criticized phenomena and cases, they will search for another way. That way will finally be public opposition, then a revolution. If the revolution will not be their desired solution, when they fail to find a solution through the existing constitutional institutions, their thinking, behavior and attitudes will be passive. They may not take care, or a large segment of them, of external and internal security of their society and its state nor of its progress, backwardness, pride, dignity or the deterioration of its status and weight. Their positive feeling might become so weak that they will lose the correct estimation that such a feeling is one of the elements of the national rise, and it is earnestly needed.

Since the state of Unity, as we said, is a process of creation which should, rather must give birth to a positive entity, it will be a great psychological and ideological loss if things within it turn to be passive things. This might involve a dangerous feeling threatening the Unity. Therefore, Arab socialism and its practical implications concerning the policy of using public wealth and social interdependence and solidarity, is imperative not only for the aforementioned reasons and other reasons that we will mention later on, but rather in order to maintain the unity too. Hence, socialism is a means not only to create a new life in which love amongst the sons of the nation prevails, but a defensive means that makes the wall of unity a high wall which has no holes that could be used against it by its external and internal enemies. And in order that the souls of some desperate sons of the Arab nation not breath out the sigh of death, as a result of these holes. If they despair of closing or patching the holes, they will fall in the foreign hunters' nets.

Since Unity and its state are positive situation resulting from a glorious creation and as they are great representation of the legitimate history and aspirations of our nation to resume its national, humanitarian, spiritual and cultural role, keenness on unity requires, inter alias, that justice should prevail the society and that its sons should feel that they are all equal in opportunities and in the patronage provided by their state, as long as they are equal in their sacrifices, attitudes, actions and as the honorably shoulder their duties and obligations.

Therefore, since socialism basically means social justice in economic, cultural and educational fields... etc., and as social justice is deeply rooted in the Arab society since the first revolution of prophecy and message initiated by the merciful God against the unjust thinking and behavior of man, or it is the action of God, the Almighty to teach man such form of justice which the then man's thinking, behavior and action had not realized, in either cases, or in both of them, and as the Arab nation was not and would not be a customs agent of illegal goods, rather it is an agent of honesty and knighthood to carry God's banners, books and teachings through all messages, orders, teachings and books that were carried humanity messengers of God, what is being practiced, in any dark corner of other nations outside our nation, of what is rejected according to the standards of our nation's heritage and to which the opposition there has not reached the level of revolution, dose not apply to the thinking, psychological building, attitude and action or reaction of our nation.

For these reasons and for other more important reasons on which a principled and moral position has been already taken, since an Arab is obliged to correct the deviation and to be a good example to be followed by humanity, not a bad one, his society, especially the society of unity which is a society of highness and not a society of falling into the abyss, should be prevailed by equitable rights and duties. Justice has no meaning among the sons of one nation or one state, if it is only provided for in positive laws or if it is only understood according to its theoretical explanation in the heavenly laws and repeated in a peacock like way, but it must, if it is wanted to be serious, include an equal starting point towards the state potentialities and the opportunities of its sons in life, in education, teaching, health, culture and economy and related money and wealth. It also should include correcting any illegitimate deviation at the expense of others after its starting point. In all cases the policy of investing and using the public wealth must be in accordance with the interest of the majority of the sons of one nation.

SOCIAL JUSTICE IS MORAL AND PRINCIPLED DUTY

The basis of the social justice that we call for is to achieve interdependence and equality in opportunities on an objective basis. And the more capable element in achieving the essence of social justice, in economy and wealth, is the public wealth. In order to be able to achieve justice in the state of unity, the role of public wealth should be the role of an oar that maintains the balance of its splendid ship, in a manner that pleases the poor and the needy and to make them creative and able to influence according to their numbers.

So, the social justice, in its socialist frame, is a moral and principled duty and practical and constitutional necessity as well. Its practical part protects Unity and kindles the feeling of unified responsibility towards it and towards the society as we mentioned before.

According to our concept, socialism, basically, is not based on taking the increase in the ownership of other people, it is not merely a distribution of the existing wealth, but it basically rests on justice and wealth creation and development. Therefore its basic duty is to stop any condition that may infringe upon the principle of equality among the sons of one nation.

Justice among the sons of one nation in its semi-absolute meaning, that is to say equality, can be achieved only by ensuring that all stand on one horizontal starting point and in one equal array when they proceed forward seeking opportunities.

The rules of measurement, which correct the deviation that may happen at the expense of others after the starting point, should be semi-absolute in their equity as well. Except for the abovementioned case, the gathering can change its march from walking in array into walking in line without illegitimate exploitation or oppression. For further explanation, here are some practical examples:

If admission to universities is based, for example, on whims, which lack objective basis and criteria, the outcome will be unfair because the people admitted to universities and specialized colleges may not all fulfill the scientific requirements, while others who have been deprived of admission fulfill those requirements. Therefore, we will find later that the incomes of the concerned people vary; for some of them remained only secondary graduates while their colleagues graduated from colleges of medicine, engineering and others. Thus, the first one who became a clerk, assistant supervisor in an office or a porter in a residential building with the limited income of this title according to the established salaries or the prevailed prices or wages, whereas his colleagues achieved higher incomes, because they became engineers, doctors or scientists in physics... etc.

Accordingly, the harvest or its corps will not be based on efficiency and entitlement, in which marks of graduation from secondary school constitute the semi-absolute condition for justice, if it is taken as a measurement. It is based merely on the whims, which admitted a group of secondary graduates to colleges and deprived others. Had admission been based on the marks gotten by every secondary school graduate, the case would have been different, and the measurement of admission to universities and their colleges would be called a semi-absolute just measurement.

Here is another instance, we take it from the merchant community: If the state grants import license to specific number of them, not on the basis of entitlement according to an objective measurement, and deprives others not on specific objective measurement as well, the outcome will be that some merchants will be rich without entitlement, while others will be deprived of it.

Similarly, when the chance to be enrolled in schools, from the first year in the primary school, is available equally to all, and the staff of schools is provided in full according to a view based on justice in treating the sons of one homeland and one state of one society, and when education is available equally to all children, as it is the case in the society of Iraq, the results will be just and justice will be semi-absolute.

Why did we say here that justice is semi-absolute? And did not say absolute, although all equally stood in an array on the horizontal starting point?

The absolute justice basically can only be seen or achieved by God the compassionate, the merciful. In the example we cited, there have been chances taken by some people and their parents while others and their parents have been deprived of them. Some were born in countryside with all its difficulties, while others were born and grew up in cities with all their facilities. So, there were chances available to some people while others were deprived of them. These chances might influence the marks they got and their success or failure. As a result we will face outcomes that we have to deal with on a semi-absolute just base, even if we ensure justice in admission, because the student whose parents are teachers or they read and write, while the parents of his colleague are illiterate, then the results of their study and the level of their marks will be different for this reason, and not due to the superiority of the brain of the son of the teacher compared to the son of the farmer of the illiterate worker. Nevertheless, in some cases the latter gets higher marks than the first due to his seriousness, intelligence and cleverness.

Now let us go back to the part of the strategic thinking of unity and socialism, and their effects on the life of the rich people of our nation, including the sons of our nation in the Arab Gulf. We remind here, before our decisive word, that everyone basically thinks within the limits of his responsibility. Therefore, the blacksmith, for example, will be engaged in the normal conditions of his daily life and work that make him, generally, skillful in the field of his work and profession. And the farmer will mainly engage in his farm within the limits that life provided him with, the same thing is done by a train driver, an electronic engineer and a mathematics or physics scientist, unless they have joined political movements, so their thinking will take another trend, but when the mathematics or physics scientists are secondary school teachers their thinking will be limited to a specific level, and when they work in an atomic field and carry out their duties on both patriot and national levels, they think within a specific area with a different feeling of responsibility. So, on the basis of such examples we will find that the person, who is in charge of the personnel's files, thinks in a way different from his director general or his minister.

On this basis, the person who is in charge of lower responsibility generally thinks within the scope of that responsibility, while that who is in charge of higher responsibility often thinks within the limits of his responsibility. This applies in general to everyone who works within the boundaries of a kingdom, an emirate or a republic whose population is several millions or hundreds or thousands. Definitely, the case will be different when he is part of a state whose area and territorial waters extend from the Atlantic shores to the Arab Gulf where two hundred millions of Arabs live in. A clever scientist in physics, chemistry or atom remains just a draft science in a small state and the see of a scientist may die inside him in underdeveloped state which does not work actively in an area of responsibility which provides his science with an opportunity to be examined and prosper, for his spirit to shine and be high. So, we find that a Chinese, Japanese or French scientist in atom graduating along with a Mauritanian scientist from a college or post-graduate studies in USA, will assume his work eagerly to benefit his country in the atomic field for military or civilian purposes, whereas the scientist from Mauritania in the same specialty, for example, may be frustrated and desperate after returning home, or he will be forced to immigrate to a country that understands his science and where his science can find the proper environment for action and effect. According to the same measurement, the thinking scope, about trade and economy, of the owner of a small shop in a popular quarter differs from the thinking of that who imports large quantities of goods from different origins.

Let us now enter directly, after citing these examples, to say that a large part of the humanness, ability and knowledge of a portion of the sons of our nation in the Arab Gulf area has been curtailed or/and killed by conditions there, and that placing them before their human, scientific and practical opportunities, both cultural and spiritual, within the large environment, restores to them what they had lost, and provides them with the ability to be creative, which their situation fails to provide. This applies even to businessmen, financiers and investors among them, although they differ from others in specialization and finance. They know, like others, that their chances in external investment in foreign countries will shrink, and that even if they remain open until sometime they will be hemmed in by perils, and that these perils and those besetting their incomes deposited in banks are great. A large portion of them will erode in accordance with the laws of foreign states there and subject to the conditions and developments of the value of currency, whether according to its current pattern or to special plans. What applies to private funds applies also to the funds of the state deposited with foreign banks, or deposited there, with a greater degree of risk. The people of the Gulf must have heard more endless stories than we have in this sphere, about how their states, or some of them, are prohibited from withdrawing their money except in compliance with special instructions and within specific sums, which may not be exceeded.

Thus, their deposits erode and they are prohibited from returning those deposits, in their entirety, home, upon need. Zionism and Western houses of finance, each according to its own motives, cash these deposits. Zionism will continue to chase the deposits and investments in the West or in any country where Zionism plays an influential role even if the Arabs concerned comply with all Zionism's wishes and turn away from the very spirit of their nation and its rights. This is because they are Arabs, and if Zionism feels safe vis-a-vis this or that ruler, within a specific period of time, because of his subordinated ness or his being a client to its American ally, or because of his poor vision or poor sense of responsibility, then it won't feel safe vis-a-vis the (silence of honorable Arabs) in the face of injustice, including the sons of the Arab Gulf. It won't feel safe from their out rage, or perhaps their revolt for their legitimate rights and their usurped holies. Furthermore, Zionism, in consequence of its very Jewish nature, chases out any rival capital in the field of investment, and any rival funds on the currency and speculation market.

The wide vistas and the safe haven of the money of the Gulf are in the Arab homeland, their big tent which is of strong texture, high pillars and firm wedges striking deep in the soil, the tent erected by the nationalist, conscious and solid will in order that it may protect all the big, medium and small tents in the Arab homeland above which flutters the flag of unity over all national and local banners. It is, at the same time, the wide vistas in which tremendous capabilities are available, in order to guarantee against the risks faced by Arab money when the people concerned in the state of unity find that investment of public or private money is necessary outside the Arab homeland.

Hence, is it a paradox that some Arab states should consent or seek to become part of regional or international organizations in which a new flag flutters above their flags over which flies the US or other flag, as is now the fashion with the so-called GATT and subsequently the World Trade Organization... and find it strange that the will of the nation should fly over their will to strengthen and heighten it?

The living and permanent wealth is not merely oil which is exhaustible or liable to be replaced by another source of energy, if humanity is placed before its critical insufficiency or before the possibility of finding a cheaper alternative, although its price is the lowest price due to partition and egoism. The living wealth is what is planted and created by the will of the people in their knowledge and work, in the sphere of agriculture, industry and other fields, and where such will is at a level capable of defending wealth when it is threatened by foreign ambitions and their ferocious gale when it blows yellow to extirpate eyes before roots.

Wealth, as such, together with trade, investment and depositing, has no safe place and an arena where it flourishes, without the Arab homeland in its entirety being open to it, without being supported by all the capabilities of the nation and without the grand Arab Unity, which plucks out egoism and fear from hearts, releases energies and capabilities in order to soar to their clear sky and future.

On the arena of the Arab nation, extending from the Atlantic Ocean to the Arab Gulf, and its great capabilities, its economy flourishes in order to be in various bright colors, all of which serving the supreme interest, to the greater firmness and solidarity of Arab unity. Each and every one of these colors suits its phase and its circumstances and augments the splendor of souls and fortifies its high fence.

Hence, the historical need of the sons of the Gulf for unity now, with all its implications of social solidarity and justice, may be more urgent than it is for Iraq, Egypt or Algeria. Considering all you know about Iraq, it finds, according to the theory of the great Ba'th, that unity is our start and destiny, the resurrection of our past and the guarantee of our future.

Hence, it is all the more appropriate that other Arabs should see in Arab unity as their goal and rush forwards to it with longing and yearning. Otherwise, the coming generation and their grandchildren, if not their children, will curse them if they do not believe in it, enthuse for it and work consciously and earnestly for its achievement.

At all events, Arab unity is brought about by the solid will and the devoted endeavor, relying on God, of the national and nationalist Arab leaderships, with the capable support of the crusading and conscious masses, or comes about, even when the will of the rulers hesitates on the path of its achievement, through imposing the will of the conscious masses, under the leadership of their crusading revolutionary vanguards in the name of the people and the nation.

Saddam Hussien

8th Jumada al-Ula/1418 of the Hejira, corresponding to 10th September 1997