Saddam Hussein

Saddam Hussein
صدام حسين
Saddam in August 1998
5th President of Iraq
In office 16 July 1979 – 9 April 2003
Prime Minister	Himself (1979–1991) Sa'dun Hammadi (1991) Mohammed Hamza Zubeidi (1991–1993) Ahmad Husayn Khudayir as-Samarrai (1993–1994) Himself (1994–2003)
Vice President	Taha Muhie-eldin Marouf (1974–2003) Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri (1979–2003) Taha Yassin Ramadan (1991–2003)
Preceded by	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Succeeded by	Jay Garner (as Director of the Office for Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance of Iraq) Jalal Talabani (2005)
Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council
In office 16 July 1979 – 9 April 2003
Preceded by	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Succeeded by	Office abolished
Prime Minister of Iraq
In office 29 May 1994 – 9 April 2003
President	Himself
Preceded by	Ahmad Husayn Khudayir as-Samarrai
Succeeded by	Mohammad Bahr al-Ulloum (as Acting President of the Governing Council of Iraq)
In office 16 July 1979 – 23 March 1991
President	Himself
Preceded by	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Succeeded by	Sa'dun Hammadi
Secretary General of the National Command of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party
In office January 1992 – 30 December 2006
Preceded by	Michel Aflaq
Succeeded by	Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri
Regional Secretary of the Regional Command of the Iraqi Regional Branch
In office 16 July 1979 – 30 December 2006
National Secretary	Michel Aflaq (until 1989) Himself (from 1989)
Preceded by	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Succeeded by	Izzat Ibrahim ad-Douri
In office February 1964 – October 1966
Preceded by	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Succeeded by	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Vice President of Iraq
In office 17 July 1968 – 16 July 1979
President	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Preceded by	Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr
Succeeded by	Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri
Member of the Regional Command of the Iraqi Regional Branch
In office February 1964 – 9 April 2003
Personal details
Born	(1937-04-28)28 April 1937[a] Al-Awja, Saladin Governorate, Kingdom of Iraq
Died	30 December 2006(2006-12-30) (aged 69) Camp Justice, Kadhimiya, Baghdad, Iraq
Cause of death	Execution by hanging
Resting place	Al-Awja
Political party	Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party (1957–1966) Iraq-based Ba'ath Party (1966–2006) National Progressive Front (1974–2003)[2][3]
Spouses	Sajida Talfah ​ (m. 1963)​ Samira Shahbandar ​ (m. 1986)​
Children	Uday (deceased) Qusay (deceased) Raghad Rana Hala
Signature
Military service
Allegiance	Iraq
Branch/service	Iraqi Armed Forces
Rank	Marshal
Battles/wars	Iraqi–Kurdish conflict Iran–Iraq War Gulf War 1991 Iraqi uprisings Iraqi no-fly zones conflict Iraq War

Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti^[c] (28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician and revolutionary who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 1979 to 2003. He also served as prime minister of Iraq from 1979 to 1991 and later from 1994 to 2003. He was a leading member of the revolutionary Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party and later the Baghdad-based Ba'ath Party and its regional organization, the Iraqi Ba'ath Party, which espoused Ba'athism, a mix of Arab nationalism and Arab socialism.

Saddam was born in the village of Al-Awja, near Tikrit in northern Iraq, to a peasant Sunni Arab family.^[8] He joined the Ba'ath Party in 1957, and later in 1966 the Iraqi and Baghdad-based Ba'ath parties. He played a key role in the 17 July Revolution and was appointed vice president of Iraq by Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr. During his time as vice president, Saddam nationalised the Iraq Petroleum Company, diversifying the Iraqi economy. He presided over the Second Iraqi–Kurdish War (1974–1975). Following al-Bakr's resignation in 1979, Saddam formally took power, although he had already been the de facto head of Iraq for several years. Positions of power in the country were mostly filled with Sunni Arabs, a minority that made up about a fifth of the population.^[9]

Upon taking office, Saddam instituted the Ba'ath Party Purge. Saddam ordered the 1980 invasion of Iran in a purported effort to capture Iran's Arab-majority Khuzistan province and thwart Iranian attempts to export their own 1979 revolution. The Iran–Iraq War ended after nearly eight years in a ceasefire after a gruelling stalemate that cost somewhere around a million lives and economic losses of $561 billion in Iraq. At the end of the war, he carried out the brutal Anfal campaign against Kurds, recognized by Human Rights Watch as an act of genocide. Later, Saddam accused its ally Kuwait of slant-drilling the oil reserves in Iraq and occupied Kuwait, initiating the Gulf War (1990–1991). Iraq was defeated by a multinational coalition led by the United States. The United Nations subsequently placed sanctions against Iraq. Saddam suppressed the 1991 Iraqi uprisings of the Kurds and Shia Muslims, which sought to gain independence or overthrow the government. Saddam adopted an anti-American stance and established the Faith Campaign, pursuing an Islamist agenda in Iraq. Saddam's rule was marked by numerous human rights abuses, including an estimated 250,000 arbitrary deaths and disappearances.

In 2003, the United States and its coalition of allies invaded Iraq, falsely accusing Saddam of developing weapons of mass destruction and of having ties with al-Qaeda. The Ba'ath Party was banned and Saddam went into hiding. After his capture on 13 December 2003, his trial took place under the Iraqi Interim Government. On 5 November 2006, Saddam was convicted by the Iraqi High Tribunal of crimes against humanity related to the 1982 killing of 148 Iraqi Shi'a and sentenced to death by hanging. He was executed on 30 December 2006.

Saddam has been accused of running a repressive authoritarian government, which several analysts have described as totalitarian, although the applicability of that label has been contested.

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