Iraq

Iraq- The Culture, The Community, The Country toc =__Influence of Oil__=  In Iraq during the 1945-1990 period, oil was their primary source of revenue by selling it to foreign countries across the globe. Oil accounted for 99% of Iraq's merchandise export and prior to the Iran-Iraq war, their oil production reached 3.5 million barrels a day and exported 3.2 million barrels per day. During the first few weeks of the Iraq-Iran war, Iraq's two major ports for exporting oil in the Persian Gulf, Mina al Bakr and Khawr al Amayah, were damaged severely by the Iranian attacks and in 1988, they would remain closed. Iraq's exports were furthermore injured in April 1982, when Syria would close Iraq's pipeline that ran to the Mediterranean Sea. As a response to this move, Iraq would launch efforts to make different channels for their oil to be exported. One of these tactics was shipping oil by using tank trucks across Jordan and Turkey. Throughout 1988, Iraq would use this method and was able to ship out 250,000 barrels of oil per day. In mid-1984, the pipeline that was running through Turkey was expanded by looping the line and adding pumping stations. With the expansion, the output of oil was raised to 1 million a day (http://lcweb2.loc.gov) media type="custom" key="25908288" width="1" height="49" align="left" Oil in Iraq is seen as the backbone for their economy and because of the war between Iraq and Iran from 1980-1988, Iran jeopardized Iraq's economic livelihood as offshore export terminals were the key to deliver this oil to industrialized nations in other parts of the world. In other words, if there are barriers to the delivery of this oil to other nations, it will hurt the economy greatly. Despite fighting a 7 year war with Iran, oil production in Iraq grew tremendously during this time period. Another investment in the Iraqi economy was towards the maintenance and growth of oil refineries. Because Iraq was so focused on oil production and exports, the nation failed to develop an industrial and manufacturing sector. But despite a quadrupling of imports between 1978 and 1980, Iraq continued to gain account surpluses in excess of $10 billion per year. As the Iran-Iraq War entered its eighth year, “Iraq's debt topped US$50 billion, the government was implementing comprehensive economic reforms it had announced in 1987. Iraq's new economic policy was designed to reverse twenty years of socialism by relinquishing considerable state control over the economy to the private sector,” (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/).

=__Quality of Life__= During the 45 year spam, Iraq had the best health services throughout the entire Middle East up until 1990. In the 1970s and 1980s, Iraq had one of the highest standards of living in the Middle East. According to a report on humanitarian needs in Iraq made in 1991 prior to the 1990 economic sanctions, “It was a highly urbanized society, dependent on a large service economy, with high standards of healthcare very widely available, and a complex infrastructure typical of a modern society.” Another report prior to the 1990 economic sanction indicated that about 94% of children were enrolled in a primary school and that 90% of the population had access to safe water. Also, the World Health Organization stationed in Baghdad had reported that, "...Before the Gulf War, 93% of the population had access to a free, modern, high quality health care system. Today that system is barely functioning,” (http://www.salaam.co.uk). Women During the, "...1 950s through the 1970s were able to legally work, study, marry, divorce, and wear what they wanted." Under the rule of Saddam Hussein, the rights for women became more limited over the years of his ruling (http://civics.sites.unc.edu). Once Saddam Hussein became president in 1979, he had used the higher education sector as a venue for political correctness, corruption, and to manipulate resources to further ensue Ba'athist policies. When the Ba'athist party had control over the higher education sector, one of the most damaging things they did was a brain drain of students and faculty members. Many of the students and professors traveled west from Iraq to teach there and learn while the ones who stayed had a lack of new research and a lack of contacting people in the outside world (http://www.usip.org).

=__**Ethnic Cleansing**__= Since 1975, the Iraqi government forcibly displaced hundreds of thousands of Kurds, Turkomans, and Assyrians from their homes in Northern Iraq and replaced them with Arab settlers. The Iraqi government, made up of primarily Sunnis, wanted to cleanse this area of people they deemed to be of lesser ethnicity but also to have control over valuable oil resources and arable land in this region. This policy was known as Arabization. The worse of the ethnic cleansing's was seen in 1988 when the orders of Saddam Hussein were carried out by his cousin. This ethnic cleansing was known as the Anfal Campaign.  During this ethnic cleansing, chemical weapons were used on Kurds in northern Iraq and this campaign was reaching genocidal proportions which had resulted in 100,000 bodies of Kurds disappearing. When this campaign was happening, the Iraqi government had set 3,000-4,000 villages on fire and had displaced hundreds of thousands of Kurds. Some of the displaced Kurds winded up in "collective settlements" that were heavily guarded by military while others would go to south Iraq or other countries, most commonly Iran. This campaign had devastated hundreds of thousands of Kurds that made them run away from Northern Iraq and causing the population to disperse. The genocide nature of this campaign has made it seem entirely different compared to the earlier and later Arabization campaigns (http://www.hrw.org).

=__Sunnis vs Shi'ites in Government__= The Iraqi people believe those who should take the role in their government are the Sunnis even though they are the minority religion in Iraq in comparison to the large population of Shi'ites. The people also believed that the Shi'ites would drive the Sunnis out of their power if they were presented the opportunity to do so. For many years Iraq was ruled by Arab Sunnis who have came from restricted areas throughout Iraq. Iraq was ruled by the Sunnis for many years even before Saddam Hussein came into power with the Ba’ath party. Under the Ba’athist government, major roles of the government were held by Sunnis and those who practiced the religion. Along with high government roles being held by Sunnis, major security services and commanders of the army have been held by Sunnis. The Shi'ites held the majority of government roles in 1952 all the way to 1963. The Shi'ites were commonly known as the opposition of the Persians since the Shi'ites were primarily made up of Arabs. To show this age-old rivalry, the Iraqi government had posted propaganda against the Persians and the two ethnic groups showing the ancient struggle between the two for land. Some Arabs called it a modern-day Qadisiyah. But the real tension in Iraq during the late 1980s was between the large majority of the population along with the Sunnis and the Shi'ites in regards to whose religion belief and practices were of significant value. Even though the Shi'ites were under represented in the government during the British monarchy, they were able to make advancements in education and business. Also, before the ruling of the Ba'athist party in 1963, from 1952-1963, they held the majority of leadership roles but also were believed to have Shi'ites represented at all of the different levels in their party in proportion to their population (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/).

=__Politics in Iraq__= Iraq is one of the homes for the belief in Anti-Israel. Iraq was part of the 1948 War against Israel by multiple Arab countries surrounding Israel as well as taking part in the 6 day war. In 1967, Iraq cut all of their ties to the West and decided to join sides with the Soviet Union. But before that, after the British Mandate and the installment of a monarchy in Iraq, it was toppled in 1958 because of a coup and replaced with a republic. This republic wouldn't last long because of a coup that toppled them and put the Ba'athist party into power. When Saddam Hussein became president in 1979, petroleum accounted for 95% of the countries foreign exchange earning (http://www.bbc.com). This oil gave them (the Ba'athist party) political leverage in the industrialized world. Right after Saddam came into power, he called a Ba'ath party meeting regarding killing his opposition systematically. Saddam continued to reinforce his base with enlarging security forces and jobs for family members in the government. An estimate in 1984 said that 50% of Iraq's population was employed by the government or military or had a family member who was (http://civics.sites.unc.edu). Following the Iran revolution, Iraq went to war against them from 1980-1988. =__Impact of Globalization__= As a result of the vast amounts of oil available in Iraq, the nation increased its trade contacts with the Western industrialized world. Prior to the rule of the Ba’athist party and Saddam Hussein, women were accepted as equal and able to do what they wanted from getting divorces to legally working. Other Western ideals that Iraq has adapted to has been using radio, television and cassettes for Islamic lectures and rock music (http://yaleglobal.yale.edu). During the mid-1950s, America had an embassy stationed in Baghdad and some of the people stationed there had Westernized some of their news in the paper, radio stations, and on television by spreading news about anti-communism ( http://www2.gwu.edu). Iraq didn't get as hard hit by Globalization compared to some other countries near it, like Iran, because it wasn't until the later 1990s that oil companies from outside countries actually set up business in Iraq. How Iraq was affected by Globalization was mainly their economy increasing by exporting the vast supply of oil that is held underneath their land.