Ahmed Hassan Al-Bakr - Early Life and Career

Early Life and Career

Al-Bakr was born 1 July 1914 in Tikrit, Ottoman Iraq, and was Saddam Hussein's elder cousin. He entered the Iraqi Military Academy in 1938 after spending six years as a primary-school teacher. During his early military career, he took part in the Rashid Ali al-Gaylani's failed revolt against the British in 1941, and was arrested, imprisoned, and compulsorily retired from the army. After several years of trying to rehabilitate himself al-Bakr was reinstated in the Iraqi Army in 1956 – the same year as he became a member of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party's Iraqi cell. The following year, in 1957, al-Bakr was appointed brigadier general. It was at about this time that al-Bakr got into contact with the Free Officers and Civilians Movement. al-Bakr helped bring down the Hashemite Monarchy and bring Abd al-Karim Qasim to power during the 14 July Revolution. He had a short stint in the public limelight during Qasim's rule, and withdrew Iraq from the Baghdad Pact and was a key player in improving Iraqs bilateral relations with the Soviet Union. In 1959, a year following the coup, he was again forced to retire from the military under allegations that he led an antigovernment rebellion in Mosul by officers who favoured closer ties with the United Arab Republic. It was during this period, that al-Bakr became a member of the Ba'ath Party. Even so, al-Bakr retained his prominence within the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party's Iraqi cell.

It was in the late 1950s, when Saddam became a member of the Ba'ath Party, that the two established a bond. Their future close-knitted relationship became to fruition because of Saddam's uncle, Khairallah Talfah. However, at the very beginning, Saddam was only a Ba'ath Party member, not a party activist.

Because of Qasim's government's repressive policy towards the opposition, Ali Salih al-Sadi, Secretary (leader) of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party's Iraqi cell, reorganised the party's rank and file, and on 24 December 1962 launched a nationwide protest against Qasim's regime. The government's treatment of dissent did not softened, and by 1963, several leading Iraqi ba'athist had travelled to Beirut, Lebanon to plan a coup against Qasim's regime. The plan was simple, build a support network in the military; a Military Bureau, al-Bakr was elected its chairman, was established to set these plans in motion. The bureau managed to recruit increasing numbers of officers, most often through personal attachments to certain people; for instance, some officers attached themselves to the bureau because of their relationship with al-Bakr. Al-Bakr led the 1963 Iraqi coup d'état, later referred to as the Ramadan Revolution, and overthrew Qasim's government.