Saddam Husayn and Islam, 1968–2003

Download or read book Saddam Husayn and Islam, 1968–2003 written by Amatzia Baram and published by Woodrow Wilson Center Press / Johns Hopkins University Press. This book was released on 2014-11-10 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Saddam Hussein and Islam, 1968–2003, offers an intellectual history of the Bathi Party from the 1940s through 2003. Amatzia Baram focuses on the transition from its early insistence on "unity, freedom, and socialism" to its Islamization by the time it was toppled by U.S. forces in 2003, a change largely impelled by the need to rally Iraqis against Iran during their war of 1980–88. Baram reveals signs that Saddam Hussein himself became some sort of born-again Muslim, though these signs are inconclusive. Sources include open source material but also internal secret files and highly classified audiotapes of Saddam Hussein that were made available to researchers at the Conflict Records Research Center at National Defense University and some documents at the Hoover Institution.