The 1979 Ba'ath Party Purge (), also called the Comrades Massacre
(), was a public
purge of the
Iraq
Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...
i
Ba'ath Party orchestrated on 22 July 1979 by then-president
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein (28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician and revolutionary who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 1979 until Saddam Hussein statue destruction, his overthrow in 2003 during the 2003 invasion of Ira ...
six days after his arrival to the presidency of the
Iraqi Republic on 16 July 1979.
Six days after the resignation of President
Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr and Hussein's accession to
President of the Iraqi Republic, Regional Secretary of the party, and Chairman of the
Revolutionary Command Council on 16 July 1979, he organized a Ba'ath conference on 22 July in Al-Khuld Hall in
Baghdad
Baghdad ( or ; , ) is the capital and List of largest cities of Iraq, largest city of Iraq, located along the Tigris in the central part of the country. With a population exceeding 7 million, it ranks among the List of largest cities in the A ...
to carry out a campaign of arrests and executions that included Ba'athist comrades, who were accused of taking part in a pro-Syrian plot to overthrow Saddam.
The list included most of the comrades who opposed Saddam Hussein's rise to power after Al-Bakr,
and among these was the former president's secretary,
Muhyi Abdul-Hussein Mashhadi. Names of people were announced and they were taken outside the hall and into custody; 21 of them were later executed. Ba'athist propaganda at the time showed that they were convicted of conspiracy and high treason to the party.
Iraq subsequently cut off
diplomatic relations with its fellow
Ba'athist regime in Syria
Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...
, accusing
Hafez al-Assad
Hafez al-Assad (6 October 193010 June 2000) was a Syrian politician and military officer who was the president of Syria from 1971 until Death and state funeral of Hafez al-Assad, his death in 2000. He was previously the Prime Minister of Syria ...
of organizing the plot.
Background
Syria–Iraq unification talks
Various rounds of unification talks were ongoing between the two Ba'athist parties at the official level, with the
Iraqi vice-president,
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein (28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician and revolutionary who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 1979 until Saddam Hussein statue destruction, his overthrow in 2003 during the 2003 invasion of Ira ...
, publicly endorsing the merger of Iraq and Syria in 1978. By then, Saddam had become the effective leader of the Iraqi Ba'ath Party due to the Iraqi president, Ahmed Hussein Al-Bakr's health issues. A major demand of Saddam was the unification of both the Syrian and Iraqi wings of the Ba'ath Party, as the first step to integrate Syria with Iraq. He also sought the rehabilitation of
Michel Aflaq who was on the kill-list of
Syrian Ba'ath party, and make Aflaq the head of a
re-unified Ba'ath Party. It was reported that the Syrian president,
Hafez al-Assad
Hafez al-Assad (6 October 193010 June 2000) was a Syrian politician and military officer who was the president of Syria from 1971 until Death and state funeral of Hafez al-Assad, his death in 2000. He was previously the Prime Minister of Syria ...
, objected to these demands and was strongly opposed to the idea of a unified military command.
Resignation of al-Bakr
On 11 July 1979, an ailing al-Bakr announced his resignation before a meeting of the
Revolutionary Command Council (RCC) and his intention to transfer the
presidency
A presidency is an administration or the executive, the collective administrative and governmental entity that exists around an office of president of a state or nation. Although often the executive branch of government, and often personified b ...
to Saddam Hussein.
[ The US government's Radio Free Europe claimed in 2003 that it was a "coup" orchestrated by Saddam who compelled the ailing president to retire "for health reasons".
Muhyi Abdul-Hussein Mashhadi, an RCC member, fiercely objected to al-Bakr's resignation during the session and urged al-Bakr to take a temporary vacation without transferring power to his successor, a proposition that was declined by al-Bakr. This had raised the suspicion of Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi second-in-command who became president on 16 July 1979. In an assembly of the party leadership convened on 22 July, Saddam staged a purge against the military wing of the Ba'ath Party whom he accused of collaborating with Syria to topple the regime in Iraq.][
]
Event
Saddam hurriedly convened an "emergency session" of party leaders on 22 July. During the assembly, which he ordered to be videotaped, he claimed to have uncovered a fifth column within the party. Abdul-Hussein "confessed" to be part of a Syrian-financed faction established in 1975 that played a major role in the Syrian-backed plot against the Iraqi government. He also gave the names of 68 alleged co-conspirators.[ These were removed from the room one by one as their names were called and taken into custody. After the list was read, Saddam congratulated those still seated in the room for their past and future loyalty. Those arrested at the meeting were subsequently tried together and found guilty of treason. Twenty-two men, including five members of the Revolutionary Command Council,][ ] were sentenced to execution. Some party members were given weapons and directed to execute their comrades.
Some of the victims are listed below:
Aftermath
Details of the events were publicised on 28 July 1979, and Iraqi media began accusing Syria of backing the alleged plot. Syrian Ba'athists responded by denying any relations to the coup plotters.[ On 8 August, the Iraqi News Agency announced that twenty-one of the twenty-two Iraqis were executed by firing squad for "their part in a plot to overthrow Iraq's new president". The twenty-second man was condemned to death ]in absentia
''In Absentia'' is the seventh studio album by British progressive rock band Porcupine Tree, first released on 24 September 2002. The album marked several changes for the band, with it being the first with new drummer Gavin Harrison and the f ...
because he was "nowhere to be found", the agency said. A tape of the assembly and of the executions was distributed throughout the country. Shortly thereafter, in early August 1979, Hussein took to the balcony of the presidential mansion in Baghdad to inform “a chanting crowd of 50,000 supporters that he had just witnessed the punishment the state court had ordered for 21 of those men: They had been executed by a firing squad. The crowd cheered.”
The events led to a complete rupture of ties between the Ba'athist governments of Syria and Iraq. Hussein’s personal conclusion, which he conveyed to Syrian president Assad, was that Syrian Ba'athists "were deep in the plot,” though he continued to provide Syria with the financial support originally offered during the 1978 Arab League summit. This agreement was eventually halted in 1980 with the outbreak of the Iran–Iraq War, during which Assad overtly aligned with Iran, spurring Iraq to accuse him of betraying Pan-Arabism.[ A 1981 secret memo issued to Syrian Ba'ath Party members by Assad further demonstrated the division between the two nations, with Assad declaring that Syria's policy was to prolong "the war to a degree that will facilitate the replacement of Saddam" and install pro-Syrian Iraqi Nationalist Front in Iraq. Syria would go on to support Iraqi opposition parties for decades, including the pro-Iranian Shia Islamic Dawa Party.] Iraq
Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to Iraq–Saudi Arabia border, the south, Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq border, the east, the Persian Gulf and ...
in turn supported the National Front for the Liberation of Arab Syria, a coalition of Syrian opposition factions that included pro-Iraqi Syrian Ba'athists and Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, which opposed the Alawite
Alawites () are an Arabs, Arab ethnoreligious group who live primarily in the Levant region in West Asia and follow Alawism, a sect of Islam that splintered from early Shia as a ''ghulat'' branch during the ninth century. Alawites venerate A ...
-dominated Ba'ath Party rule in Syria. It also supported the Islamist revolts in Syria after 1980. Relations between the two countries remained strained until Saddam Hussein's overthrow in a 2003 American invasion.[
]
References
{{Saddam Hussein
1979 murders in Iraq
Ba'athist Iraq
Iraq–Syria relations
Political and cultural purges
Political repression in Iraq
Saddam Hussein
1970s in Baghdad
Massacres committed by Iraq
Political violence in Baghdad
20th-century mass murder in Iraq
Massacres in 1979
Mass murder in Baghdad