5.2.1 Iraq from the Overthrow of the Hashemites to Saddam Hussein - Part 1

Moving from the revolutionary process in Egypt to the revolutionary process that took place in Iraq, which led to the transition from the Hashemite monarchy and eventually to the rise of the infamous Saddam Hussein. Iraq was the first of the British mandated countries to achieve independence. Iraq was independent already in 1930 and in 1932 Iraq was the first Arab State to join the League of Nations. That is the predecessor to today's UN, but the Iraqi monarchy was not able to consolidate a cohesive Iraqi State. Fortunately, for the regime the opposition wasn't coherent either and the Kurds and the Shiites were relatively weak located in the periphery and could hardly cooperate against the Sunni-dominated regime. From the outset, the regime was dominated by the Sunni Arab minority led by the Hashemite monarchy. Like in Egypt, the parliamentary system was corrupted by the main powers of Iraqi politics. The British, the monarchy, the urban notables and the tribal chiefs. And elections were always stage managed in one way or another by the government. The building up of a national army based on conscription began in 1934. The army was successful in suppressing the Shiite tribes in the South, but much less successful in reference to the Kurdish minority in the area of Mosul in the North. The Kurds were the majority in the form of Vilayet of Mosul, but were never really completely subdued by the state. But we see in Iraq, an early interference of the army in politics and pressure from the army in reference to government formation was prevalent already in the mid 1930s. After the fall of France in June 1940, a pro-German government of Rashid Ali al-Kaylani supported by military officers. Came to power in the spring of 1941 and the Hashimites were forced to leave the country. Thanks to the intervention of the British army, the Hashimites were restored to power. But from mid-1941 onwards, the Hashimites were living on borrowed time. In the Post- War period, there were very significant social changes in Iraq. Rising levels of education led to the increased politicization of Iraqi society. High school graduates increasing in number. Had insufficient opportunities of suitable employment and it was they who were attracted to radical parties. The rapid process of urbanization increased the possibilities for street protests that became a very common feature of Iraqi politics of the late 1940s. The poor urban masses were open to the influence of the radical parties and these were particularly the Ba'th Party on the one hand and the communists on the other. The defeat in Palestine in 1948, naturally had its damaging influence on the stature of the government in the eyes of the people and the Free Officers movement began to form in the Iraqi army, very much under the impact of the military coup in 1952 in Egypt, which served as a model for Iraqi officers too. But the early 1950s were actually the good years for the regime, these were the years where Iraq was beginning to really enjoy its oil wealth, but all of that rested on very shaky foundations. And in July 1958, a military coup overthrew the regime with incredible ease. The general public was absolutely delighted with the coup, which was received with great public excitement. The Hashemite monarchy in Iraq was after all, a small elite group without any really large social basis and as a pro-Western monarchy, it was not at all popular. The leader of the coup was Brigadier Abd al-Karim Qasim, who brought about the abolition of the monarchy by the execution of its leading figures. Like in Egypt, this was followed by the demise of the land-owning elite. Land reform therefore, was designed to destroy the big landlords. And the old elite was replaced by the rule of a civil and military bureaucracy. At the top, were Sunni officers. Mainly from middle and lower classes and a very small minority of Shiites. The coup did not build strong institutions and everything revolved around the personality of Qasim him, himself. He and his number two, Abd al-Salam Arif, soon split in disagreement on the pace of unity with the United Arab Republic that had been formed in this union between Egypt and Syria in early 1958. Other enemies were eliminated through the regular use of the revolutionary court, which dispensed with most of Qasim's challengers. Popular support was built up by extensive social welfare programs that were managed in the towns in particular. This was an urban revolution and Qasim invested in the well-being of the urban population at the expense of the villagers in order to create a loyal constituency for his regime. Agrarian reform did not change a great deal in the rural areas and the pattern of massive migration to the cities continued unabated. Population growth continued to bring pressure to bear on the standard of living of the people. In the 20 years between 1957 and 1977, the population of Iraq doubled form about six million to 12 million. And in the 20 years after that, it almost doubled again to 22 million in 1997. And presently, over 30 million. Fortunately, for Iraq, oil wealth was available to improve the Iraqi economy. But the regime was deeply divided within itself. Qasim never had the charisma of Abdel Nasser. It never captured the imagination of the masses, like Abdel Nasser did. Competing factions of officers within the military joined with civilians in the Ba'th Party to set the stage for yet another coup. What was the Ba'th Party? The Ba'th Party was established in Syria in the early 1940s as a secular, Arab-nationalist party that believed in Arab unity and socialism as the avenue to Arab revival, Ba'th. Ba'th means revival in Arabic. And Qasim was overthrown and executed in February 1963 by new rulers, many of whom came from the Ba'th. The new rulers, however, were not united amongst themselves either and internal power struggles led to another coup in November 1963, led by Abdul Salam Arif and the Ba'th supporters were ejected from the new ruling group. The Arif regime, like its predecessor was made up of a few personalities. Loose army factions and cronies, but no serious building of supportive institutions.

Lecture transcript

The regime lasted for five more years, until the rise to power of the Ba'ath in July 1968. Now the Ba'ath was much better organized than before, and the party dominated the new regime entirely. For the first time since the monarchy, a regime of institutions was actually created. The Ba'ath party branches and cells were established all over Iraq, which led to an effective and centralized government which imposed its authority over all organizations. Such as professional and trade unions. The party ruled over the army, and not vice versa. The two key figures in the regime were Ahmad Hasan al-Bakr and Saddam Hussein. Both Sunnis of provincial background, from the town of Tikrit, north of Baghdad and both men with modest lower middle class backgrounds. Saddam Hussein was the real strong man of the regime. And he became president in 1979. And what is very characteristic of the Saddam Hussein regime, aas this predominance of men from the town of Tikrit, not just Sunnis, not just members of the Ba'ath party, but Sunnis from one particular town in, in Iraq in the northern provincial town of Tikrit. In 1987, for example, one-third of the senior Ba'th party leadership was composed of people from Tikrit. The regime was socialist and secular. That meant that the economy was state-controlled, oil was nationalized in the early 1970s, and the state bureaucracy was a major employer, giving many a vested interest in the political status quo. There was a common sectarian interest between being a Sunni and a member of the Ba'ath. Secular politics, trying to push religion to the margins of politics, served the interests of the Sunni minority. After all, if politics in a country like Iraq were to be religious, surely the Shiite majority would dominate. The Sunni Arab minority in power therefore had no particular interest in pushing the issue of religion, but rather marginalizing religion as much as possible. Secularism served the particular sectarian interest of the minority. But the Ba'ath encountered increasing religious opposition, especially from the Shiites, to the secularizing tendencies of the Ba'ath regime from the late 1960s onwards. And the regime assumed a more religious character of its own, to defend itself against this kind of criticism. It enforced religious observance on Ramadan, for example. Even Saddam himself exhibited a more religious observance. The Islamic revolution in Iran, in 1979, added to the regime's anxiety about the possible effects of Khomeini's Shiite revolution on the Shiite population of Iraq. It was this fear of the revolutionary fervor of Shiite Iran that drove Saddam Hussein to launch a war against Iran which lasted for eight destructive years, from 1980 to 1988. So now Hussein launched his war against Iran in the expectation of rapid victory. But the war dragged on for eight years at huge cost. And with hundreds of thousands of casualties on both sides. An issue that Iraq never really found a solution to aside from its Shiite majority, was the question of the Kurdish minority in Iraq. And the Kurdish opposition to the central government in Iraq. Between 1961 and 1975 the Kurds fought the regime for greater autonomy, only to be constantly repressed by all the various governments in power. In 1975, following an agreement between Iran and Iraq. The Iranians ceased all their support for the Iraqi Kurds and their struggle collapsed. But the Kurdish struggle here resumed during the Iran-Iraq war, with renewed Iranian support. And in the closing phases of Iraq's war with Iran, mainly during the year of 1988, the Kurds were ruthlessly crushed by the Iraqi regime. The Anfal Campaigns, as they were called, included the killing of tens of thousands and mass deportations of Kurds from thousands of villages that were destroyed. And other atrocities like the gassing of the people of Halabja in March 1988 in which some 5,000 people perished. Iraq's basic problem of collective identity was never really resolved. Shi'is, Sunnis, and Kurds never fully shared the Arab identity of the Iraqi state. Shi'is after all, saw Arabism as just another means of Sunni domination. The Kurds weren't Arabs at all, and therefore Arab nationalism hardly appealed to them. The attempt to promote a particular Iraqi identity resting on the glorious past of ancient Babylon, was very artificial. And neither Sunni Arabs nor Shiites or Kurds were particularly attracted. And therefore, whether it was Arabism, or Iraqiness, or Islam, which could not possibly unite both Sunnis and Shi'is all were problematic in one way or another. And Saddam therefore ruled by the ruthless suppression of the secret police in the creation of a state described by an Iraqi author, Kanan Makiya as the Republic of Fear. With a state ruled with an iron fist of gruesome repression. And this only came to an end by the external intervention of the United States in 2003.