Saddam Hussein was born April 28, 1937 in the village of Ouja, near Tikrit in northern Iraq. He was born to a poor peasant family. His father was abusive and he was beaten many times and so Hussein ran away to live with his maternal uncle, Khairallah Talfah, who influenced Saddam’s life tremendously. Several reports link Saddam to the murders of a schoolteacher and a cousin during these early years.

In 1957 Saddam joined the Ba’th Party at the age of 20. Also in this year Saddam was denied admission to the prestigious Baghdad Military Academy, most likely because he hadn’t finished high school.

Later in 1958 he was a complicity in an assassination attempt against Abdul Karim Qasim, Prime Minister of Iraq. The attempt failed, it was planed so that when Qasim got in his car they would ambush him and fire on the car. Using powerful AK 47 the bullets went right through the car and they were basically firing on each other. Abdul was not hurt and got away safely, but two of six assassins died and Saddam fled to Egypt with a bullet wound in his leg. He spends the next four years in Egypt and completes high school.

1975-1979 President Bakr remains the head of State, but his power is virtually reduced to a figurehead while Saddam controls in the president's shadow.

January 17, 1991 Allied planes begin bombing Iraq.

Ceasefire declared between Iraq and Iran, ending the 8-year war. The war is estimated to have caused one million casualties including 250,000 Iraqi dead. Adnan Khayrallah, Saddam's cousin, brother-in-law, popular army officer and Defense Minister dies in a helicopter crash widely believed to be engineered by Saddam.

In the fall of 1968 beginning of purges to remove all non-Ba'thists from posts within state institutions. Saddam engages in purifying the government and society of potential dissidents. The higher echelons of the military and the government deemed disloyal are sent into retirement, imprisoned, tortured, or executed. Members of non-Ba'th political parties and non-Arabs are accused of crimes and executed or deported. It was like a small version of the Holocaust.

1987-1988 Saddam launches the Anfal campaign against the Kurds, in which some 180,000 "disappear." 4,000 villages are razed. Depopulation of large areas of eastern Kurdistan. Then the Kurdish town of Halabja is gassed. 5,000 people die, 10,000 suffer injuries. A number of Kurdish villages on Turkish borders are gassed, thousands of casualties.

On the July 30, 1968 Saddam carries out a plot to oust the rival Faction, the Arab Nationalist officers in the coup among others, minister of defense Ibrahim Dawood is sent to Jordan and Prime Minister Abd al-Razzah Nayif is "sent" to Morocco.

November 1969 President al-Bakr, Saddam's kinsman, appoints Saddam Deputy Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council, RCC, and Vice-President. He controls the internal security and intelligence organs and is the driving force behind the regime.

Some topics in this essay:
President Bakr, Minister Abd, Saddam Hussein, Minister Iraq, Kuwait Jan, Dakan Mosul, Saudi Arabia, Farzad Bazoft, City Feb, Ayatollah Khomeini, president bakr, prime minister, revolutionary command, saddam hussein, command council, ba'th regime, revolutionary command council, chairman revolutionary command, chairman revolutionary, saudi arabia, command council rcc, un security, un resolutions, un security council, secretary-general ba'th party,