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Dear Hassan, I am extremely grateful to you for your comments and information. If you could recommend any sources where I might find out more about this passage in Iraqi history, I would be very much obliged. Being extremely busy in mobilising people for the London demo and related tasks, I haven't time right now to write a considered response. I would want to explain what I mean by "national, democratic revolution", and why this definition does not imply an endorsement of or identification with the policies of the government or any tendency within it, especialy the Stalinist Iraqi CP, and does not exclude taking full account of the errors and mistakes and indeed the crimes of this government which contributed to the undermining of this attempt at self-determination. Maybe the adjectives "incipient", "abortive", "stalled" could be inserted to qualify the term. But the essence is that the pro-British neo-colonial set-up was overthrown in a rebellion which was initially extremely popular, and key tasks of the national and democratic revolution were addressed, however inadequately - especially land reform, nationalisation of oil; and all this in the context of anti-colonial revolutions. This is why I continue to interpret 1958 as when "nation-time" arrived for Iraq. As Che Guevara said at that very historic moment, and as was confirmed positively by the Cuban experience and negatively by the Iraqi experience "the revolution will be socialist, or it will be a caricature of a revolution". best wishes to you and your people John S --- Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). Version: 6.0.461 / Virus Database: 260 - Release Date: 10/03/2003 _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk