<quote> As a young man, Saddam got caught up in the maelstrom of Arab politics during the 1950s. In those days, Communists, Socialists, Nasserists, Pan-Arabists, and nationalists of every stripe actively vied for power throughout the Middle East. Saddam soaked up the politics of his uncle Khayrallah and his kinsman, which included an army officer named Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, an important member of the Iraqi Ba'th Party. The Ba'th (Renaissance) Party had started in Syria in the 1930s as one of the many Pan-Arabist parties but later sprouted offshoots in Iraq and several other Arab countries. Like numerous other political parties, the Ba'th combined socialism and Pan-Arabism in a nebulous and often contradictory philosophy. The early Ba'thists were mostly intellectuals, army officers, students, and lawyers; Saddam stood out for his limited education, money, and manners. <...>
In 1958, the monarchy was finally overthrown by General 'Abd al-Karim Qasim, who capitalized on the widespread popular unhappiness with the government because of its failure to provide any support to Nasser's Egypt when it had fought the Israelis, British, and French in the 1956 Sinai-Suez War. When Qasim overthrew the monarchy, Saddam and the Ba'thists rejoiced, only to become quickly disillusioned with the new dictator. ... Qasim refused to join the Pan-Arabists, the new United Arab Republic, which Syria and Egypt had formed under Gamal 'Abd al-Nasser. In addition, Qasim began relying heavily on the Iraqi Communists and increasingly regarded the nationalist and Pan-Arabist parties as enemies. Saddam and the Ba'thist's began mixing it up with the Communist Party in bloody gang wars.
In 1959, Saddam participated in an assassination attempt against Qasim. he was the seventh member of a seven-man hit team, and his job was to provide covering fire against Qasim's bodyguards to allow the rest of the team to kill the dictator. But Qasim was late on the day of the hit. When he finally arrived, Saddam was so keyed up that he forget his assignment and instead fired at Qasim too. Thanks to Saddam's impatience, the hit failed. Qasim was seriously wounded but not killed because his bodyguards were able to kill one of the assassins and drive the rest off, wounding Saddam. Eventually, Saddam managed to flee to Syria and from there to Egypt, where he spent three years lying low, debating politics, and waiting to return to Iraq.
The Ba'th finally managed to overthrow Qasim in 1963, but only by combining forces with a group of army officers including Qasim's former accomplice in the 1958 coup, Colonel 'Abd as-Salim Arif. With the Ba'th in the driver's seat, Saddam returned as a follower of Hassan al-Bakr. However, the Ba'th was ill-suited to rule Iraq and no sooner had it taken power in Bagbdad than the left and right wings of the party fell to fighting among themselves, leaving Bakr to try to moderate--unsuccessfully.
The divisions within the Ba'th then allowed Colonel Arif to turn on them and divisions within the Ba'th then allowed Colnel Arif to turn on them and purge them the next year. While a traumatic event for the party, its ouster proved to be to Saddam's advantage. The radical wings of the party were purged, and Bakr emerged as the leader of the new Ba'th with Saddam his right-hand man--a ruthless thug whom Bakr could count on to work tirelessly and do anything. Saddam spent two years in prison as a result of his work for Bakr.
'Abd as-Salim Arif ruled Iraq for less than three years before dying in a helipcopter crash in 1966. He was succeeded by his less crafty brother, 'Abd ar-Rahman Arif, who managed to hold power for only two years. On July 17, 1968, a combination of the reformed Ba'th Party and another group of high-ranking military officers against overthrew the dictator. Official Iraqi accounts notwithstanding, Saddam played little part in the July 1968 coup that returned the Ba'th to power. However, he was Hassa al-Bakr's right-hand man and quickly became the central cog in the party machine. He was the head of the party's internal security force, the Jihaz Hunin and was named the deputy secretary-general of the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), the highest policy-making body, akin to the Soviet Politburo. The Ba'th numbered only about 2500 members at that time, but they had learned the lesson of their previous experience in power and were not going to be shunted aside by their military compatriots again. Saddam enforced discipline within the party's rank and took the offensive against the senior military officers who had helped bring the Ba'th back to power. He outmaneuvered each of the various groups of officers and then set his sights on potential rivals within the Ba'th, pursuing each in turn until only he and Bakr were left as the unchallenged power brokers of the regime.
By the early 1970s, Saddam had emerged as the regime's 'eminence grise'. ... (By 1975), Saddam had eclipsed Bakr as the de facto ruler of the country, although it was not until 1977, when Saddam convinced Bakr to give up his secondary position as defense minister, that Saddam's position truly became unassailable. Without the defense portfolio, Bakr lost his long-standing ties to the military, and when he handed the position over to Saddam's cousin Adnan Khayrallah (promoted from colonel to major general) this ensured that Bakr could not use the military against Saddam. At that point it was simply a matter of time, and in 1979, Bakr was forced to step down. On July 16, 1979, Saddam Hussein assumed the presidency of Iraq. ...
In the most famous of the events of the first purge, Saddam convened a meeting of the senior members of the party on July 22. he produced Muhyi 'Abd al-Hussein Mashadi, secretary-general of the RCC, Jashadi had openly opposed Saddam's succession, and when he appeared on the 22nd, it ws physically apparent that he had paid a terrible price for his opposition. In a broken voice Mashadi read a long confession regarding a Syrian-backed plot against the nation he had led. Saddam then took the podium and named 54 additional conspirators--all of them sitting in the room. As each one's name was read out, armed guards walked down to him and led him out. Many broke down in tears and had to be dragged out by the guards. Many of those who remained began to sob uncontrollably as Saddam read the list of names. That same day, Saddam convened a kangaroo court of high-level officials to try and sentence the guilty. In the coup de grace, Saddam then ordered all of the other high party officials whose names had not been called to participate in the firing squads that dispatched the victims. ...
(Saddam) placed only the most trusted personnel in the highest internal security positions. He shifted personnel in lower-level positions constantly to prevent them from building up any kind of a loyal following that could be used in a coup plot. He built multiple agencies with redundant missions and responsibilities to ensure that nothing would be missed, and to created rivalries that would allow him to play one group off against another. He centralized all power and information in his own hands so that no one else fully understood everything that was going on in the Iraqi state. (pp 7 -11) ... Saddam was never particularly ideological, and since his accession to power, Ba'thist ideology has been essentially relegated to a propaganda device. But the Ba'th Party is another matter. For better or worse, Ba'thists have hitched their wagon to Saddam's star. They benefit from their party membership but are also culpable for the regime's crimes and damned to obey its orders. Consequently, they are a ready pool of manpower. Saddam has learned not to put too much faith in Ba'th party ties after their performance in the Iran-Iraq War and during the intifadah, and as a result, their prestige and prominence has declined over the years. But they still serve a purpose. They can be counted on to assist the secret police in ferreting out dissent, they can be mobilized for street demonstrations and to spread the regime's propaganda, and they can be armed and put on the streets to help keep order in time of crisis.
Saddam works assiduously to reinforce the bonds of loyalty that tie him to each of these groups. He rewards them in accordance with their degree of support and importance to him. His family, friends, and other high-ranking officials get limitless perks. Officials of the security services and the Republican Guard get better pay, cars, and other material benefits. Even the rank and file are ensured better living standards than their counterparts in the regular armed forces or in civilian life. On the negative side, Sadddam provides constant reminders of the punishments that await traitors--and those from the inner circles who turn against him are usually treated much worse than outsiders. Moreover, as he first started doing in 1979, Saddam systematically includes his followers in his crimes. Torture, killing, rape, genocide, and other cruelties are parceled out as assignments to as many of the regime's personnel as possible. The regime is also fond of filming or videotaping what happens to those who oppose Saddam and as a means of implicating as many people as possible.
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Amatizia Bram and others have argued that in Ba'this political culture, it is necessary to suffer damage before backing down--the threat of damage is not good enough. Backing down in the face of a threat brings shame and humiliation, which, if you are a leader, means that you lose the support of your loyalists against other challengers and may well be toppled by them. According to Baram, "In the Ba'thi political culture, it is far safer to look unnecessarily intransigent than weak. Only when all other options have been clearly exhausted and when Saddam has demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is tougher than anyone else, will he risk making concessions." (pp. 256-7)
Kenneth Pollack, The Threatening Storm