Biography hafez assad history

Hidden categories: Articles containing Arabic-language text People stubs. Toggle the table of contents. Hafez al-Assad. Official Portrait, In office 12 March — 10 June Ahmad al-Khatib. Abdul Halim Khaddam Acting. In office 21 November — 3 April His expertise won him a place to further study military science in Russia in at a time of intense political activity in Syria which led to the union between Syria and Egypt.

In the process of that union, the careers of many known Ba'th Party members in the armed forces were sacrificed, and Assad and some of his colleagues were assigned to posts in rural Egypt, far from their political bases. While in Egypt, Captain Assad joined forces with two other exiled Alawi officers—Salah Jadid and Muhammad 'Umran—and formed a secret military committee dedicated to terminating the union with Egypt and to throwing out the old Ba'th Party civilian leadership which had promoted the union in the first place.

Although some Ba'th officers participated in the coup which ended the union with Egypt, several, including Assad, were forced to temporarily quit the air force in a political purge. Assad then worked for two years as an official of the Ministry of Sea Transportation, a period during which he concentrated on Ba'th Party activities and, with other members of the secret military committee, planned the March 8,revolution which brought the Ba'th Party to power in Syria.

Following the Ba'th Party takeover, Assad was appointed commander of the air force with the rank of major. Inhe was promoted to the rank of general and placed on the party's regional command, and a year later he was made commander-in-chief of the air force. In that capacity, he joined ranks with Salah Jadid in to overthrow the Ba'th government of Amin al-Hafiz.

In the new government, he became minister of defense. The year was not a happy one for Syria or for Assad. Syria had half its air force planes destroyed on the ground and the troops lost one-seventh of Syria's territory to the Israelis. As defense minister, Assad should have been a target for major blame, but he deftly passed it along to the clumsy party apparatus and biography hafez assad history for having ruined the military prior to the war due to its purges and choosing party over national interests.

An absolute necessity for Assad was to rebuild and strengthen the armed forces, while others in the leadership—many of them radical and doctrinaire Marxists—sought consolidation of power and the championing of Marxist economic development. Assad was able to outmaneuver many opponents in and and challenged the party leadership and Salah Jadid. He even tried in to take over the government but was thwarted by Soviet pressure.

The stage, however, had been set for a showdown between Assad and Jadid.

Biography hafez assad history

Assad did his homework well in the party, and when the showdown came with Jadid, he prevailed and took over the reins of government in November At that time Assad became prime minister. Four months later he was elected president, a position to which he was re-elected several times. To many observers his bloodless coup in represented merely the replacement of one Alawi officer with another.

But below the surface there were several changes, including a shift away from a solely Marxist-socialist socio-economic policy in internal affairs and away from the uncompromising orientations in regional and international affairs which had isolated Syria from its neighbors in the post war period. Assad was associated with a pragmatic group which sought a more moderate path of socialism in social and economic policy.

This would allow Syria's commercial sector a freer existence and a more flexible and realistic foreign policy which would permit the ability to adjust to events and changing circumstances without the constraints of any ideological straightjacket. One factor precipitating Assad's coup was a fear among some that the directions in which policies were headed under Jadid were destined to undermine the whole Ba'th revolution on one level and the new found prominence of elements of the Alawi community on another.

The political position and power of Assad and the unprecedented political continuity he provided after was the result of his three principal pillars of support: the army, the Ba'th Party, and his Alawi community. In the early s, as various groups tested Assad and his leadership, and as Assad suffered a heart attackhe had to rely more on an elaborate system of security, with many key security positions occupied by Alawi officers, including his brothers, cousins and nephews.

Serious outbursts of civil unrest occurred in Syria between andand these prompted increasingly heavy-handed, often ruthless, measures by security forces of the Assad government. Eventually Israel and its allies—U. Assad helped Syria emerge as a powerful regional force. But the conflict in Lebanon and the strength of Israel made it clear to Assad that he could not completely ignore the United States.

Although he had little respect for the United States and did not wish to do business with the Americans, he knew that alienating the superpower could be very dangerous since the United States had many resources it could turn against Syria both economically and on the biography hafez assad history. He was suspicious of America's intentions in the Middle East and especially its military and economic support for Israel.

Throughout Assad's leadership, Syria kept the United States at arm's length, dealing with it only when absolutely necessary. The first. When Hafez Assad died on June 6,it was clear that whoever was to follow as the next president of Syria would inherit a country that still needed economic rebuilding as well as better relations with Western countries such as Britain, France, Canada, and the United States.

Syria also needed a strong leader who would hold the support of the people as well as the military. The person that many Syrians were hoping could take on this role was the son of Hafez Assad, Bashar Assad. Bashar Assad had never intended to become a politician. Instead, he had wanted to become an eye doctor. After getting a degree in Syria, he left to study in London where he received specialized training.

It was only after the death of his older brother, Basil, that Bashar returned to Syria. Originally it was Basil who was being trained in Syrian politics in the hopes that he would one day follow his father as the next president of Syria, but with Basil's death, it fell to Bashar to take up this task. During the early s Bashar joined the Syrian military.

This was most likely a move to gain respect from the Syrian people, showing that he was willing to fight for the country he might one day lead. In the late s, Bashar took on more responsibility in the government itself, leading task forces against corruption within domestic situations and being an avid spokesperson for technology within Syria. Shortly after Hafez Assad's death, Bashar became the president of Syria.

In the first few months of his presidency Bashar appeared to make many changes in Syrian political policy. He released hundreds of political prisoners as a gesture of good will to the international community. He also allowed the first non-government newspaper in thirty years to be printed and opened Internet cafes to allow the biography hafez assad history of free information to go in and out of Syria.

As another gesture to the international community, he began to allow groups with democratic ideals to hold public meetings. He also made sweeping economic reforms, making plans to allow private banks to set up within Syrian borders and to open up more trade with Eastern and Western European countries. However, many of the changes that Bashar made early on did not seem to last.

The independence of the press has been restricted somewhat by the government and many of the groups that support more democratic ideas have found it hard to get licenses for public speaking. While the Internet cafes remain open, the Web sites that the computers are allowed to access are limited. And the international community is still not pleased by the fact that close to political prisoners remain in Syrian jails.

It is still too early to gauge whether Bashar Assad will truly reform Syria politically and economically, but even with the setbacks that have occurred, many Syrians remain hopeful that Bashar will continue to effect change within Syria. Gulf War was a war fought between an alliance of countries led by the United States to free Kuwait from Iraqi invaders.

Doing so enabled Syria's economy to benefit from nearly 2 billion dollars in foreign aid. Despite the fact that Assad was an accomplished soldier, he hardly ever wore his military uniform. Indeed, he hardly ever appeared in the public. He was a family man at heart, who spent much of his time with his wife and children. He lived very humbly and was not interested in money and riches.

He managed to stay in power for a long time because he created a secure state with a loyal military, and his skill and intelligence allowed him to remain two steps ahead of those who worked for him. But he had suffered from cancer and kidney problems for a long period, and his heart finally gave out on June 10, Assad's three decades as president of Syria made him the longest-serving leader in the country's history.

The CNN Web site reported that Syrian newscasts declared upon Assad's death that "The legacy of his accomplishments and ideas is a planet that will shine not just on this generation, but also on coming generations. Gordon, Mathew. Hafez Al-Assad. New York : Chelsea House, He was dismissed from the armed forces due to his opposition to the union with Egypt.

In Cairo, he formed a secret Military Committee and participated in the Ba'athist movement. Upon his return to Syria, he took part in the coup that brought the Ba'athist government to power in Before his election as president for a seven-year term in MayAssad held positions as Minister of Defense, Commander of the Air Forceand Prime Minister Simultaneously, he utilized security services to suppress any organized opposition.