page_title: Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party – Iraq Region
section_title: Qasim's Iraq: 1958–1963
hierarchical_section_title: Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party – Iraq Region / History / Qasim's Iraq: 1958–1963
caption_attribution_description: Saddam Hussein and the Ba'ath Party student cell, Cairo, in the period 1959-63
context_page_description: The Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party – Iraq Region, officially the Iraqi Regional Branch, is an Iraqi Ba'athist political party founded in 1951 by Fuad al-Rikabi. It was the Iraqi regional branch of the original Ba'ath Party before changing its allegiance to the Iraqi-dominated Ba'ath movement following the 1966 split within the original party. The party was officially banned following the American invasion of Iraq, but despite this it still continues to function.
context_section_description: Shortly after taking power, Qasim changed his position on joining the UAR and started campaigning for the "Iraq first policy". To strengthen his own position within the government, Qasim created an alliance with the Iraqi Communist Party, which was opposed to the notion of pan-Arabism. The change of policy provoked several pan-Arab organisations, especially the Ba'ath Party. Later that year, the Ba'ath Party leadership was planning to assassinate Qasim and take power to continue the policy of pan-Arabism.
  Saddam Hussein was a member of the operation. At the time, the Ba'ath Party was more of an ideological experiment than a strong, anti-government, fighting machine. Most of its members were either educated professionals or students, and Saddam Hussein fit the bill. Abdul Karim al-Shaikhly, the leader of the operation, asked Hussein to join it when one of the team members left. The idea of assassinating Qasim may have been Nasser's and speculations exist that some participants in the operation received training in Damascus, which was then part of the UAR. However, "no evidence has ever been produced to implicate Nasser directly in the plot."
  The assassins planned to ambush Qasim at Al-Rashid Street on 7 October 1959.  One man was to kill those sitting in the back of the car, the rest would kill those in front. During the ambush, Hussein began shooting prematurely, which disorganised the whole operation. Qasim's chauffeur was killed and Qasim was hit in the arm and shoulder. The assassins thought they had killed him and quickly retreated to their headquarters, but Qasim survived.
  At the time of the attack, the Ba'ath Party had less than 1,000 members. Some of the plotters quickly left the country for Syria, where Michel Aflaq gave Hussein full party membership. The Iraqi government arrested some members of the operation and took them into custody. At the show trial, six of the defendants were sentenced to death and, for unknown reasons, the sentences were not carried out. Aflaq, the leader of the Ba'athist movement, organised the expulsion of leading Iraqi Ba'athist members, such as Fuad al-Rikabi, on the grounds that the party should not have initiated the attempt on Qasim's life. At the same time, Aflaq secured seats in the Iraqi Ba'ath leadership for his supporters, including Hussein.
  Qasim was overthrown in the Ramadan Revolution in February 1963, which was allegedly supported by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and led on the ground by Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr. Declassified documents and the testimony of former CIA officers indicate there was no direct American involvement, although the CIA had been previously notified of an earlier Ba'athist coup plot in July 1962 by a high-ranking informant within the Party. The CIA official working with Archie Roosevelt, Jr. on a separate plan to instigate a military coup against Qasim, and who later became the head of the CIA's operations in Iraq and Syria "from late 1968 to June 1970," has "denied any involvement in the Ba'ath Party's actions," stating instead that the CIA's efforts against Qasim were still in the planning stages at the time. Several army units refused to support the Ba'athist coup.  The fighting lasted for two days, during which 1,500–5,000 were killed. Qasim was captured and, an hour later, he was killed by firing squad. To assure the Iraqi public that Qasim was dead, the plotters broadcast a film of Qasim's corpse being mutilated.
caption: Saddam Hussein and the Ba'ath Party student cell, Cairo, in the period 1959–1963
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